Brilliant … But Bouncy

Maybe I’ll Just Read the Book.

As if I’d forgotten, I am now listening to a book on CD that reminds me of the most obvious – and easily forgettable – fact about Dylan: he has ADHD.

I’ve seen Dr. Daniel Amen on PBS many times. I listened so intently to what he was saying, it never occurred to me to actually read one of his books. But now I’m reading Healing ADD, and I’m absolutely astounded at myself for waiting this long. He’s an ADHD expert, who has raised children with ADHD and done thousands of brain studies on people with ADHD.

His book describes Dylan over and over and over – reminding me that every, single one of Dylan’s problems can be attributed to ADHD.

So, as I often do, I got a bit carried away within minutes of listening to this book. I did a quick internet search for the Amen Clinics. I remembered from years ago that there is one in my area – so I looked it up online and called the number.

“How may I help you?” asked the well-trained man on the other end of the line.

“I’m considering bringing in my son for an evaluation,” I said, knowing that this was a very expensive possibility.

Insurance doesn’t cover anything related to ADHD – just like it doesn’t cover anything related to vision processing disorder. These are “learning” issues, not physical ones, according to the insurance companies. Never mind that the learning issues are caused by very physical brain malfunctions. But that’s a rant for another day.

“How did you hear about us?” asked the Amen Clinic representative.

“Well, I saw Dr. Amen on PBS a few times, and I’ve read some of his books.,” I said. (I was literally two chapters into one book, actually, so perhaps I was exaggerating a bit.)

“Tell me about your son,” he said.

“Well, he has ADHD. We know that for sure. He has every symptom, and we’ve done the testing and we are sure he has ADHD. And we’ve tried everything there is to try, but he’s not getting any better. So I thought we might bring him to you.”

The man laughed. “We hear that a lot,” he said. Then he described the clinic’s methods, which he called a “natural approach.” It sounded wonderful. I learned later in the book that this “natural” approach often includes a “low dose of Ritalin” and/or other common ADHD medication.

“The evaluation takes place over three days,” he said. “And it will be $3,700 for the initial consult.”

I wanted to vomit, but remained upbeat. “Okay,” I said. We decided he should send me an email with all the pertinent information, and I would talk to my husband.

So I did talk to my husband. “Maybe I’ll just read the book,” I told him, “and see what he would recommend for Dylan – and we’ll try that. Then, if we think we should take him in, we could do it later.”

“I think that’s a good idea,” said my husband. After $20,000 in vision therapy treatments for Shane, and equal thousands (spread out over a decade) spent on Dylan already, throwing another $4,000 at the problem seemed a bit … extreme.

So I’m listening to the rest of the book now. Duh. Perhaps I should have done that before making the phone call.