My Two Cents on ADD

Bane tells a story on his dealings with an ADD diagnosis which, pretty much, ties into my understanding of the issue:

My youngest Marine got diagnosed with ADD way back in Middle School, and put on Ritalin by my ex. We lived apart. I was told that he began to make real progress in school. Then he started acting out, so she gave up and violated court orders and gave him to me (which eventually happened with all four kids).

So, I come to pick him up, and he is 'slow' and morose, not like him at all. She hands me his pills, and overwhelmed me with instructions as to times and dosages, and we took off on what was nearly a day long drive home. Eventually, he began to come out of his 'cloud', and the time for another dose approached. He went from flat affect to agitated before my eyes. I asked him if he wanted a pill, and he begged me not to. Why? I asked, and he said 'because they make me feel stupid...slow.'

I took one, and it kept me awake and alert and chatty the whole rest of the trip. I made a deal with him, there in the car. We get to my place, I buy a paddle, and whenever he screws up, he has to let me whup him, or he's back on the pills. We shook on it, and I bought the paddle, a truly imposing piece of boardage. I had him bend over and gave him a test whap, and we both thought he was gonna seize up and die for a second or two. He survived, and I never had to use that paddle again.

At times in my life, I've tried to provoke men with violent tempers to see if they would, or could, loose it with a much bigger guy.

I'm sorry to say, and in one case in particular, very sorry, that I've failed every time. I fully believe that most uncontrollable discipline cases just lack a person of respect in authority. I've read of schools (an unusual case) where the administrator noticed that female teachers were the ones with the ADD cases. Their solution was to take the children in question and transfer them to a teacher with a 'stronger personality'. Usually the transfer involved going from a female teacher to a male teacher.

There are some things about men, even 10 year old men, that women will never understand and that other men know without even thinking about it.