Aa
Neurofeedback a possible "med free" solution for ADD, and other issues
Ok, I posted this back about a month ago, but I feel its worth repeating again given how many posts I keep seeing pop up about people who find out about ADD, but seem to live in terror of medication.
First ill start off with a little about my personal ADD. My ADD is the brain shuts off, falls asleep in class, daydream's constantly, not the non-stop wired wild child, though for Neurofeedback to treat it it doens't really matter. My ADD was bad, and the depression that came with it was nearly as bad. I was sucidaly depressed, however, my ADD was so bad it was also more trouble then it was worth to talk myself into taking the nesscary steps to kill myself. so I would lay there on the worst of days, not wanting to live, but unable to motivate myself suffecntly to die.
Ofcourse I tried meds, LOTS of meds, but golly gee, you gotta remember to take meds, and they have all those side effects, that you then have to take other meds for. I HATE meds. I have no meds now. none, and I feel great!
On good days I would "focus" but that would last maybe 2 weeks before I burned out. Its kinda funny, when i had my first neurofeedback test it required that I focus, unmoving, almost unblinking on a object. afterward the specilist i see looked at it, and said i looked like i was high on Marijuana. What I never knew, (which I discovered over the course of treatments) that whenever someone told me to focus, I was really "hyper" foucsing, which would explain why i burned out so fast. I truely had absoutly no idea what foucs REALLY meant. So when the guy hooked me up, and told me for the first time that "what your feeling right now is a focused state" i thought he was nuts. Boy it explained EVERYTHING (well it explained a lot at least).
I'm now off all meds, granted I still have bad days, but those are few and far between, and ive learned how to cope with them. I'm attending collage, with a GPA of 2.8 I think so far (totaly amazing and impossible for someone that flunked his way though school) my parents are VERY pleased (i think i could do better).
about a year and a half ago I was introduced by my parents to somthing called Neurofeedback, and since then ive made Dramatic improvments. Mostly in the ADD, and OCD, but also in the depression. Growing up my most favorite Phrase was "i don't care", now i go months without uttering the phrase at all. Also social it has helped (sort of) learning social behavior is supposed to happen at a certain age ive learned, well im long past that. I defeinetly feel I have a real capacity to improve in this area now, but im past the optimal time for when I should have learned it. Still its amazing how great it still feels to FEEL the way im supposed to. Also one of the best parts I think about this is that im totaly off all my meds, I can live my life without the prepeual fear of "freaking out" or "shutting down". My mind is no longer a total battlefield for basic stability.
Neurofeedback is like biofeedback only it works with your head instead of the rest of your body. In short each area of the head has diffrent "jobs" that its best at. Your head is tested for the electrical and wave comuication between the various points on the head. Then mild stiumlation is applyed to each area(s) in order to correct the "problem" area's. Its like getting your own perfect perscritption, a drug that will give you all of the benifit without any of the side effects. The brain natrualy wants to get better, and as time progresses it learns to HOLD the new patters, so this isn't a life long thing. For those that might have asburgers and be scared of "loseing" parts of themself I can gureentee this doesn't happen I still think like someone with Asburgers but I now have a greater capacity to relate to things that I stood around going ?hunh? too.
The bad news. This is new, the medical is very slow at reoncinsing new things, there's no limits on the tecnoigly (though most honest supplyers won't sell to everyone off the street) there's also no limits on the education needed to operate it either, so you need to be sure you find someone who absoulutly knows what their doing, (which is rare the guy i see in Spokane, WA is the only guy in short of any other major city that practices it). Worse, since its new, and its hard to test (you can't placebo effects like this, people become attuned and KNOW when its working or not) insurance companys won't cover it directly. Lastly I was born "broken" I am / was totaly oblivious to what "normal" was, i lived pepeutaly with a stressed out brain. Good treatment is slow treatment (at least for people that have developed into adulthood, you can probabaly get away with a lot more with kids) rush too fast and you as a person won't be able to keep up with the improvments your brain will make (I freaked out and back slided a number of times) doesn't feel nice to have your "comfort zone" unexpectedly moved and you don't know where it went. People that started out good then had disruptions (head injury, stroke, chemical depenancy (alcholol)) tend to make more rapid recoverys becuase both they and their brain despreatly want to return to "normalacy".
www.neurotherapynw.com is the website of the guy I see, he's really well learned and met some of the core developers of the thearpy so he should be able to refer you to someone who knows what their doing in your area if your intrested.
First ill start off with a little about my personal ADD. My ADD is the brain shuts off, falls asleep in class, daydream's constantly, not the non-stop wired wild child, though for Neurofeedback to treat it it doens't really matter. My ADD was bad, and the depression that came with it was nearly as bad. I was sucidaly depressed, however, my ADD was so bad it was also more trouble then it was worth to talk myself into taking the nesscary steps to kill myself. so I would lay there on the worst of days, not wanting to live, but unable to motivate myself suffecntly to die.
Ofcourse I tried meds, LOTS of meds, but golly gee, you gotta remember to take meds, and they have all those side effects, that you then have to take other meds for. I HATE meds. I have no meds now. none, and I feel great!
On good days I would "focus" but that would last maybe 2 weeks before I burned out. Its kinda funny, when i had my first neurofeedback test it required that I focus, unmoving, almost unblinking on a object. afterward the specilist i see looked at it, and said i looked like i was high on Marijuana. What I never knew, (which I discovered over the course of treatments) that whenever someone told me to focus, I was really "hyper" foucsing, which would explain why i burned out so fast. I truely had absoutly no idea what foucs REALLY meant. So when the guy hooked me up, and told me for the first time that "what your feeling right now is a focused state" i thought he was nuts. Boy it explained EVERYTHING (well it explained a lot at least).
I'm now off all meds, granted I still have bad days, but those are few and far between, and ive learned how to cope with them. I'm attending collage, with a GPA of 2.8 I think so far (totaly amazing and impossible for someone that flunked his way though school) my parents are VERY pleased (i think i could do better).
about a year and a half ago I was introduced by my parents to somthing called Neurofeedback, and since then ive made Dramatic improvments. Mostly in the ADD, and OCD, but also in the depression. Growing up my most favorite Phrase was "i don't care", now i go months without uttering the phrase at all. Also social it has helped (sort of) learning social behavior is supposed to happen at a certain age ive learned, well im long past that. I defeinetly feel I have a real capacity to improve in this area now, but im past the optimal time for when I should have learned it. Still its amazing how great it still feels to FEEL the way im supposed to. Also one of the best parts I think about this is that im totaly off all my meds, I can live my life without the prepeual fear of "freaking out" or "shutting down". My mind is no longer a total battlefield for basic stability.
Neurofeedback is like biofeedback only it works with your head instead of the rest of your body. In short each area of the head has diffrent "jobs" that its best at. Your head is tested for the electrical and wave comuication between the various points on the head. Then mild stiumlation is applyed to each area(s) in order to correct the "problem" area's. Its like getting your own perfect perscritption, a drug that will give you all of the benifit without any of the side effects. The brain natrualy wants to get better, and as time progresses it learns to HOLD the new patters, so this isn't a life long thing. For those that might have asburgers and be scared of "loseing" parts of themself I can gureentee this doesn't happen I still think like someone with Asburgers but I now have a greater capacity to relate to things that I stood around going ?hunh? too.
The bad news. This is new, the medical is very slow at reoncinsing new things, there's no limits on the tecnoigly (though most honest supplyers won't sell to everyone off the street) there's also no limits on the education needed to operate it either, so you need to be sure you find someone who absoulutly knows what their doing, (which is rare the guy i see in Spokane, WA is the only guy in short of any other major city that practices it). Worse, since its new, and its hard to test (you can't placebo effects like this, people become attuned and KNOW when its working or not) insurance companys won't cover it directly. Lastly I was born "broken" I am / was totaly oblivious to what "normal" was, i lived pepeutaly with a stressed out brain. Good treatment is slow treatment (at least for people that have developed into adulthood, you can probabaly get away with a lot more with kids) rush too fast and you as a person won't be able to keep up with the improvments your brain will make (I freaked out and back slided a number of times) doesn't feel nice to have your "comfort zone" unexpectedly moved and you don't know where it went. People that started out good then had disruptions (head injury, stroke, chemical depenancy (alcholol)) tend to make more rapid recoverys becuase both they and their brain despreatly want to return to "normalacy".
www.neurotherapynw.com is the website of the guy I see, he's really well learned and met some of the core developers of the thearpy so he should be able to refer you to someone who knows what their doing in your area if your intrested.
SO glad you posted this.
do you know if neurofeedback/biofeedback is covered by insurance for the treatment of ADHD?
do you know if neurofeedback/biofeedback is covered by insurance for the treatment of ADHD?
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