Ritalin

[alainbryden]

I'll make this short.
Ritalin is unfair to kids. It's definately the cure it all drug for a parent that doesn't want to bother raising their kids. It doesn't enhance anything, all it does is kill mind activity in the kid who's taking it, so that he can't think of more than one thing at once, and the mental stagnation makes him weak willed so that he will more or less mindlessly take any order given too him. It's just such a hideously wrong thing to do with a human being. I would have to say 95% of kids who take it are not in a medical condition that is in need of it.

Agree or Dissagree. This discussion can go in the direction of drugs meant to control kids as well as innapropriate child diagnoses made to excuse kids who are just acting the way they were meant to.

I remember Maddox made an article "Beat your kids", and it was a humorous exaggeration, but it does reflect how parents are giving up on the efforts of discipline when giving them a drug or slapping them with a videogame is so much easier.

[Specforces]

Drugging your kids is the easy way out. When I was young I was extremely hyper, I didn't have ADHD, but I knew kids that "said they did." The parents couldn't handle the stress so they put their kids on drugs. It's an easy way to parent, give your kids modified valium, and let them sleep it off. I disagree with it. For society however, that is a different story...

Specforces

[GuidoHunter]

Haha, funny how an ad for buying ritalin online came up when I went to reply...

Anyway, I do sympathize with the parents of ADHD kids. For nearly every school day for three and a half years of high school I worked at an after-school program for a local elementary school and watched over groups of nine and ten year old kids, a few of which took ritalin.

One of my kids was seriously ADHD, and his brother was a year younger and ADD himself (both were on Aderol, which is pretty much Ritalin++), and they had twin four year old brothers that very well might be ADD themselves, but I didn't see them much. Their mother was a really nice woman, taught special ed, and appeared to be a good, loving mom. Their father, while also a nice guy, didn't make much money, and that didn't help difficulties at home. When the two boys weren't on their medicine, they were complete hellions and almost out of control, but were relatively docile when on them. I can't comprehend how hard it would be to run that household if it weren't for Ritalin.

Plus, even if good parenting were enough to keep them in line at home, what about school? The teachers aren't nannies; they aren't expected to take away from the class to try and control select students. Their alternative would be to send the kid to the principal because he or she is such a distraction. Well, being in trouble every day looks bad to the parents, so the simple solution is to put them on medication to last through the school day at least, and do what's necessary after that.

Now, alain, you are very much correct that too many kids take ritalin when they don't need it, and I think that's where the problem lays. Another one of my kids was on it but, though the meds did have an effect on him which made my job easier, without it he was only slightly more rowdy than any other ten year old boy. He had a fine home situation and good parents, but I can't help but think they took the easy way out with the meds, and that happens way too often. Hell, my ex-girlfriend was (is) on ritalin at 18, and I still don't know why.

I'm sure ritalin is harmful to the body, as I know of people who take it to get high, but its effect can be a blessing. I also know people in college with me who take it when they need to study, and they have absolutely no medical situation where they need it; they just want to concentrate a little more. Could you see it becoming something that anybody of any age could request to enhance concentration? Could it even become over-the-counter? Unfortunately, I can see that happening.

--Guido

http://andy.mikee385.com/

[perfect_fat]

They tried to prescribe it to me when I was 18 or so because I couldn't think straight. I won't tell you what happenned when I got the pills.

[RobbyZero]

You went mad happy? Super joyful? You thought straight? You overdosed?

[Anticrombie0909]

I would be willing to bet at least 80% of kids diagnosed with ADD or ADHD do not suffer from it. It's so overdiagnosed that a simply hyper or active kid will get pumped up on drugs. It's completely insane.

[User6773]

I think ADD/ADHD can be caused by overstimulation, not by simple genetic coincidence. Give a kid nothing but TV and videogames and of course he's going to crave more sensory stimulation.

Stay at home moms own. When you have kids, if you can afford it, do it. Parental attention is important. Encourage your kids to read.