My son was diagnosed with ADD/ADHD at the age of 8. I put him on medication, and it of course did what medication will do and calmed him and got him focused, but he never got better grades on Ritalin. I tried Concerta, and he reacted badly to it, so I switched back. He is now 14, and in the 8th grade. He has failed math pretty much every year in the last 4 years, but never held back or given help. He struggles overall with completing work; handwriting is horrible; forgets text books; struggles with being overwhelmed with the amount of work given; can do very well in creative writing; can answer questions much better verbally versus written; scored with a high VCI OF 121 and 80 PSI in the 6th grade on the Wechsler IQ testing. Discrepencey of 41 points He also has a 116 Working memory score from that test. He was on 40 mg of Ritalin last year, and it still did NOT help ever him with progressing well in school. I have now gotten involved with the middle school team, and he will be retested using the Wechsler as well as other sub tests to find out why my son is struggling so much in school. He is currently failing both Pre Algebra,and his math help class which is only 5 students. He struggles in Science at times as well.
Because I never saw him do any better with his grades, homework, etc on 40 mg of Ritalin, I do not have him on any drug right now.
Why do that if it makes no difference in his grades or grasp of what is being taught?
I have in the last two weeks read every single article I can get my hands on, on line, as well as read the book, UNDERSTANDING NONVERBAL LEARNING DISORDER which I HIGHLY RECOMMEND. Once I stumbled on this disorder, I am reading daily more and more about it, and increasingly convinced that THIS is the issue at hand with my son. There are several sub types to the disorder, and it takes a major amount of assesment to tease it out. Not all kids with the disorder are alike. It is a learning disability that medication DOES NOT HELP.
It is an impairment of the right hemisphere of the brain in the cerebellum The symptoms of NLD, often mimic ADD/ADHD, but medication does NOT help improve issues in school, unless it is found that the child suffers from both disorders. Most ADD kids have low scores of working memory as well.
I urge any of you with kids with a high verbal ability and slow processing speed to look into this disability/disorder. I am awaiting new testing to be done now in the 8th grade, as well as a full spectrum of testing done by a nuero psychologist to get to the bottom of why my son continues to struggle in school. I hope that for all dealing with the issues will do their due diligence of looking at NLD (nonverbal learning disorder) to see if some of the descriptions fit and to get a proper LD diagnosis. My son does not have all the NLD symptoms, but for sure has enough of them to have a strong enough argument to rule it in or out during testing phase. I will keep this board posted with results by December.
I hope my post helps some of you looking for answers or places to research. I have been reading on NLD for many hours and gotten pretty well educated on all it entails. It for sure is not easy for any parent to deal with a kid with any LD that is gravely affecting their education and life.
