With a Learning Disabled Child
by Jaqueline Lapa Sussman
Woman Magazine - May 1996

“IT'S TOUGH. IT'S PAINFUL. There are no real answers. You are left feeling at a dead end. And when it is your very own kid who's suffering, that is the worst part."

This was said by a mother I interviewed of a child diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. Her complaint was echoed by dozens of parents who called me in response to my previous article of December 1995. Published in Woman Magazine, it was titled, "Drugs or Imagination? Your Choice in Healing Learning Disabilities."

What I discovered while speaking with numerous readers was that each one of them had a compelling story to tell about trying to find help for their child. Readers were battling confusion, frustration, and ambivalence as they sought help for their children. However. as I heard the stories, a pattern emerged of common experiences. Here is what the readers told me:

1. Parents are blamed for their child's problem:

Many parents told me that while interacting with their children's schools, they were blamed for their child's problem. Most were initially shocked by the blame, and then felt frustration, and finally anger. A 15 - year-old boy's mother, who is a high school teacher herself, told me, "I got 100 percent blame from the school. We were not doing the right things. First, we were told that we did not have a structured enough home environment. Then we were told that we were not lenient enough. We were constantly told opposites and the total blame was on us. The school wanted to take no responsibility for what was going on with my child. At first, we took all the blame and guilt. It was hard not to, since at the school team meetings, with seven of my son's teachers, guidance counselors and psychologists we were told what we were doing wrong. We were out there ourselves. They can't tell you where to go and find real help. If they tell you where to go, the must pay, so they leave you dry."

Another mother of an 8-year-old boy said, "When my child was having trouble in the classroom following directions, his teacher approached me and suggested that he be tested because he may have A.D.D. His grades, however, were excellent. When I went to a school meeting the teacher made me feel that the problem was my style of mothering. I was told that my son was too strong willed. So, I came home and began to come down heavy on him to try to break his will. I did not know what else to do. As a result of my actions, his ability to follow directions did not improve, he only felt worse about himself and angrier at me. What was very upsetting to me was that the mother is always guilty. You know, you did something to your child to make him this way."

A third mother of a son who went to private schools told me, "My son went to the wealthiest and best available Connecticut private schools. I thought that these schools would offer the help he needed. I was shocked when I could sense that I was being blamed for this at the school meetings. There was even a preposterous innuendo about sexual abuse. When I would get called in to a school meeting I had the feeling that I was getting reduced. It is always the same thing—the tendency to blame. The most upsetting thing was that they kept telling me that one must adapt to the school rules, rather than the school adapting to meet my child's needs. I could not help thinking that Learing Disabilities is a million dollar industry which also feeds the schools. I always wonder if there could be any connection between adapting to the rules and this economic fact?"

2. Your children are blamed for their problems:

Parents told numerous stories of their children being blamed for symptoms they could not help having. The real problems of their children were not diagnosed properly, so the blame was placed on "misbehaving" children who could not conform to standard classroom activities.

A mother of a 15 -year-old boy who could not concentrate told me, "They said that he is lazy and that he does not want to succeed. Wnen I gave them examples of how this was not true they then told me,`"well, it must be something else. He is stubborn then." Another mother of an 8-year-old hyperactive boy said, "the teacher told me that my son was snapping pencils, jingling money in his pockets, rocking his chair and doing all these odd behaviors.

At the same time, he began not wanting to go to school. He would wake up and feel sick to his stomach and actually throw up. He developed a horrible school phobia. Then I found out that the teacher had put him in a seat up by her desk. I was horrified. When I questioned the teacher, she said that he liked it better there because he got into less trouble. She has two desks for kids who can't go by the rules and he is in one of them. I am angry and I don't want him traumatized by second grade. I told the teacher that it was hurting my son to sit in the "bad boy" chair. And she insisted, "No, he knows that when he can control himself in the classroom that he can go back with the rest of the group." Obviously, he can't help himself. Now he thinks there is something wrong with him his self esteem is going down and no one is really helping him."

The most touching interview I had was with a 10-year-old boy. He told me that noises in the classroom distracted him and often he could not understand what the teacher was saying. He said, "Sometimes I have trouble listening to what the teacher says, then if I don't understand an assignment I go up to the teacher and tell her I don't know what to do. She usually says, 'You should have been listening.' Then she tells the class, Anybody not finished with the work in class will have to do it for homework.' I don't understand it at home either.

The next day I tell her I could not do it because I did not understand it. She then gets mad at me and tells me, "Stop making excuses." "A lot of my teachers are coming down hard on me and it is hard."

3. Your child's self esteem will suffer:

Readers agreed that the most painful aspect of having a leaming disabled child was seeing the self esteem of their children plummet. Their children began to feel "different" and "wrong." Many began to not care about themselves or school and they started to spend time with other children who lacked self esteem. One mother stated the wish of every mother I talked to, "I don't want my son to feel different in a negative way. A couple of times lately he has said, 'I'm so stupid. I'm dumb.' And then I have to go through my whole routine about why he is wonderful and why I love him so much. This is the part that hurts the most and that is how he is feeling about himself."

A 26-year-old learning disabled man, who had gone through special education classes in high school told me how these experiences had formed his negative self image. "We in special education classes were treated like children. It was embarrassing the way they would talk to you in front of your other friends that weren't in special ed. They talked to you like you were a little kid and that would make me feel even worse. My self esteem became very low. I hung out with people who were in trouble a lot and who just did not care about schoolwork because I felt more comfortable with them. So, I just did not care. Ah, it was so terrible. I was teased because I had a learning problem. The special education classes bored me and did not really help me with any disability. I felt stupid. I just knew that I could do more than what I was being given in special education classes and that I was bored most of the time. It devastated my sense of myself. This still affects me today. I have trouble feeling like I deserve good jobs. I am nervous about myself with others and I feel inferior."

4. Facing ambivalence about medication:

Most parents were told to put their child on Ritalin. Ritalin is the brand name for Methylphenidate Hydrochloride. It acts as a psycho stimulant on the central nervous system. The mode of action on the brain is not understood, but it is thought to activate the brain stem arousal system and cortex to produce a stimulant effect. It is supposed to help children deal with disturbed attention span, hyperactivity, emotional liability, and impulsivity It is prescribed to help children focus and reduce their agitation. However, readers were concerned about the side effects, especially since there is no sufficient, well-established data available on the safety and efficacy of its long-term use.

Parents of teenagers were especially worried because their teens could overdose themselves to get "high", since the drug acts like an amphetamine. They had heard reports of Ritalin misuse by teens who were buying it from their friends with prescriptions.

Those with a history of addictions were especially vulnerable to psychic dependence on the drug. It's most common known side effects include nervousness, insomnia, hypersensitivity (including skin rashes), anorexia, nausea, dizziness, palpitations. Headaches, dyskinesia, drowsiness, blood pressure and pulse changes (both up and down), tachycardia, angina. Abdominal pain and weight loss.

Most readers told me that they had been advised to put their children on Ritalin. The decision to medicate their own children made then intuitively uncomfortable. Although some found it helpful in some cases its numerous side effects made readers nervous.

Parents reported noticing personality changes such as diminished creativity, imagination and introspection in their medicated kids.

Every parent that spoke to me, whether they had medicated their child or not, had ambivalent feelings about Ritalin. One mother who had put her 6-year old son on it told me, "I was worried because I heard that the child can suffer depressions and commit suicide. This was the scariest of all the side effects for me. But we were desperate, and at a dead end, so in spite of guilt feelings, we put him on it. The first thing that we noticed was that he did not go to sleep at night. He would stay up watching T.V. all night. Next, we noticed that he was more aggressive than usual and this made it difficult for our whole family. At the same time, he started having headaches. I did not see any school improvement, so I was told to up the dosage. Instead, I took him off of it."

Here is the experience of a physician, also a father, who had taken Ritalin in medical school. He said, "l took Ritalin in medical school to help me study. I could sit for long periods of time and study for 18 hours a day. It had similar effects to dexedrine. It made me very motivated and one pointed. However, it killed any kind of introspection and it did not deal with anything other than the task that was in front of me. It is an amazing thing because it gives a false sense of reality. Oh, I could focus on a task all right, but my imagination, my creativity and my spiritual inner self were nonexistent. I cared much less about the people around me. It made me feel less human and extremely task oriented. I find it scary because we don't know how this artificial drug affects the formation of a young child's mind and personality in his formative years, since it dulls the best parts of the child's mind. As a physician, I am seeing masses of children being put on this drug. I think in some small number of cases it is indicated. I just don't think it should be done in the mass way that it is being prescribed. We have become so intolerant in our society for anything the least bit difference. If a kid shows antisocial behavior's, well, ok. But if he is not quite as task oriented...maybe he is more creative. Maybe his brilliance is not in line with conventional society. After all, he is an individual creature. Edgar Allan Poe wasn't in step with his enviroment either."

One very agitated mother told me, “how can I put my child on Ritalin. I was considering it. Then I saw the news that they found a new link between Ritalin and cancer in rats. They told the parents not to panic, because it is a "weak'' link and to pay attention to further studies. Are they nuts? Do they think I am putting my son on Ritalin while they take their time to research this ‘weak' link? This is just like the thing that happened with saccharin. Am I supposed to just trust these people?" Finally one mother summed it up, "Each time I give him the pill, I feel guilty.

5. What is the solution?

Nobody is to blame, and yet everyone is accountable for the formation of the disabilities in our children. Blame is of no use because it only engenders guilt. Blame offers no solutions. Accountability is the ability to discern what actions have unknowingly contributed to the problem. Many of the reasons things occur are unconscious on the part of adults, so it is no one's fault. With accountability we can see where the exact problems are. and then find the solutions.

For example, Eidetic psychology imagery studies have found that many children develop learning disabilities after a divorce, or during periods of time where parents are in conflict and fighting. Their basic ground of security is shaken, they withdraw into themselves and then cannot pay attention in the classroom.

Others, have developed leaming disabilities after a particularly difficult year with a strict or humiliating teacher who did not nourish the child's unique self nor learning needs. These children become anxious and shut down when they attempt to learn. Hyperactive children often have much in them to express, which becomes suppressed in a rigid teaching environment that does not allow the full flow of their creativity and imagination. Some develop disabilities, such as dyslexia, due to the repeated interruption by their siblings as they try to focus on their homework.

Learning disabled children are known to be, extremely sensitive and gifted. They take in the emotional messages and dynamics of life around them in a deep way and can be traumatized by events that other children take in their stride. Each child's unique disability, whether it is distractibility, blanking out, hyperactivity, or lack of focus has its roots in specific injured social interactions which continues to affect them.

The underlying problem must be rooted our and dealt with so that the child's natural capacity, to learn is restored. Drugging our children only masks the symptoms and does not deal with their real problems.

When a child is taken off the medication his basic disability remains. The common misconception is that the most likely cause of A.D.H.D. is a chemical imbalance or a deficiency of certain chemicals in the brain.

However, on a recent televised Merrow Report, it was disclosed that there are no statistically significant differences between the brains of normal children and children diagnosed with A.D.H.D., and the root cause of the disorder remains unknown.

Many parents I spoke to intuited that something had created their child's learning disability. One mother wondered, "why did he develop his disability in the fourth grade when he was doing fine in school before that?"

Another mother said, "I wanted to fix a problem, not drug my child. It seems like there was something going on in him that was affecting him that I could not put my finger on."

Another mother was not convinced of her child's diagnosis, "I am going to make an appointment to see a psychologist just to confirm in my mind that he does not have A.D.D. I can see that he is anxious and has had this anxiety for about a year. I think he was traumatized by something. So, is it anxiety or A.D.D.—which comes first?"

The solution is to find the unique causes of the disabilities in each child so that they can be overcome. The specific images of the problematic events which inhibit learning are stored in the brain and their negative consequences manifest as symptoms in the learning ability of the child. Once these specific images are uncovered, their healing counterparts, which are also stored in another part of the brain, are brought forth imagistically and overcome the symptoms of the disability. In this way, the unique brilliance, abilities and gifts of each child are discovered and expressed in an integrated, purposeful and essential manner.

Parents are struggling to find answers. Many have found the courage to face what is truly inhibiting their children. By facing these truths, solutions can be found. the choice is in our hands. Do we choose temporary medicated conformity or unique gifted expression?