I am sorry to hear that she is so ill. Dr. Parker is indeed a great person that goes beyond what some would consider the ‘norms’. If anyone can help, I am willing to bet, he is the doctor! However, it takes a mother like you to research, never give up and find! That’s a special kind of love!

It is very complicated, but it seemed to be anxiety, but it became paralyzing at age 13 and 14, she has not attended school in 3 years and through my research (endless) we discovered (hurray!!) Dr. Chuck Parker who helped us to narrow down the field and home in on the physiological side of things.

The professionals we worked with here – all of them good hearted, kind and competent to the extent of their limitations — seem to have forgotten that the brain is a body part and while it does influence everything else, so is it influenced by everything else.

The girl is ILL. And while it is very taxing to be her mother, I would not trade it in for anything in the world. She is a wonder and amazement to me, still.

At my house, it all happened this way: first I got the idea I had this condition; received corroboration from a psychiatrist, started medication. Then, as my vision cleared, I understood much better what was happening with my daughter, then seven.

Over a period of months, she began to tell me things she noticed about herself, including not being able to NOT talk when it wasn’t her turn, her profound embarrassment about this; how her teachers tried to help her by admonishing her (“that doesn’t help, Mama, because it’s already happened, and I KNOW what to do!”), then praising her when she didn’t do this (“It doesn’t make any difference, Mama, because it already didn’t happen.”).

I inquired about the “happened” part and she said she knew it was HER, but it was so NOT what she wanted to do and the words were out before she could stop them. She was not hyperactive, but impulsive, not inattentive. Hypersensitive, yikes.

I asked what might help, and she said, “Well, if the teachers want to really be helpful, they could say something, or touch my shoulder maybe so I don’t get distracted (I mean it — she said this), in the little bit of time between when I am quiet and when I talk.”

I asked if she ever noticed that bit of time and she said No. And I explained to her how in that case it was impossible for anyone else to do so.

She had many problems at home, too numerous to write, here, and it frustrated her terribly. I told her this was her brain letting her down, which caused her to make mistakes, but I did not see her as misbehaving, at all. She accepted my explanations for her experience and corrected me if I was too imprecise.

It was nothing, then, to tell her it was time to see what a doctor said about her brain. And on Day One of a gnat’s dose of Adderall, she said, “Mama!! So that’s what you meant!!” That summer went from awful to happy.

Bryan