you are on the right track. it takes time to get it all out of his system and learn new behaiver.

how he acts in school now is all he knows. he is used to not having the attention span. it will take some time for his body and mind to get used to sitting and consentrated for extened periods.

i still work on my grandson. he loves to set timers to study and read now. it's like a game. he add a minute every few days.

my daughter is 13. she does fine as long as she doesn't have music on or had snackls she shouldn't have. that is hard with a teenager.

Thank you so giving me some comfort. He has such a great spirit about himself. Am total against medication, which is what the school likes to do, and want to make sure that I am on track with a solution. I have changed my diet to coincide with his to keep it simple for him. Looking for recipe to make his eating fun. Any suggestion on a good gluten and sugar free bread and pancake mix?

i can see what i can find.

i try and just stay clear of pancakes and waffles. my little guy wouldn't eat them without syrup and i don't like all the artificial sweetners.

we eat only whole grain breads, but not very often. i'm not a big bread eater. the bread we have been eating has omega 3's with flax seed. that has been helping. ( the omega's)

breakfast is normally oatmeal ( the long cooking kind ) with some almonds and raisin on top. or i make eggs. mostly egg whites.

he likes chocolate soy milk. he does better on soy milk than cow.

one of our members, silverlady, recomends this site:
http://www.glutenevolution.com/

she buys a lot from them. the bread looks really good.

One big, warm, tight, hug, handshake and howdy, moose-size official type welcome to the site. This place is amazing!

Wow.
My heart goes out to you because my oldest boy, Gabriel (6), is having similiar problems. His teacher says he has trouble staying on track. Or 'changing gears', as I put it. They'll be reviewing a lesson in class and switch to the next subject and he has trouble adjusting and keeping up. He also displays a lot of emotion here at home but does well with his homework.

Gabriel was born 7 weeks early. I'm not sure if it's developmental issues or what, but I've put him in therapy. I need his mother (my ex) in there as well. She's just a worthless mommy. And by proxy; makes her a worthless human being.

Anyway, Dominic sounds sharp. The first thing that popped in my head was, "Has he had an IQ test"? He may be just too smart for the grade or classes he's in. Just a thought. Please keep us posted, because:

You are not alone.
You are one of us.
And we are here to help.

moose, is gabriel artistic? musical? sensitive? like quick to say...awww..when a cute puppy comes on tv..or fast to give hugs.

i ask because this is common with those who are. it takes teachers willing to work with them. more visual..animated. the lecture style of teaching can't hold their interest. it doesn't spark that isde of their brain.

my daughter can learn anything put to music. the old school house rock vidoes are a godsend.

i do agree with being too smart for the grade. they get bored.

my grandson is way ahead of his class. doing the hooked on phonics before he went into kindergarden helped. he was a wonderful teacher that knows how to keep him occupied.

I'll say that he can be, beautiful. There's some details I left out of the post earlier. I know part of it is his mother being preoccupied with her current boyfriend. She doesn't make either of our sons a priority. (Whereas I had dogtags made with both the boy's names and birthdays on them. They are always around my neck, because my sons are who I fight for now).

By putting him into therapy I hope we, (yes, me and him) can find a real solution to it.

The jury is still out on his teacher. She's supposed to be top notch. Winning all sorts of awards and what have you. I don't specifically care for her. Not real big on positive re-inforcement. (At least where I stand she isn't. I'm all about pushing the positive. And have plans of becoming a teacher myself one day).

But enough about me... fparker and Dominick need us.

I can relate in a way to what you are saying. My youngest Grandson is 13 and in the 7th grade. He has always been just like you described your son to be. We thought he might be ADHD at one time but as he got older he has learned to settle down more in class. He keeps his grades up to stay in sports. He's in wrestling now. He weighs 95 lbs and won all 5 of his matches so far. He will go into soccer next, then football, then basketball so he keeps busy that wear and it wears him down some.

With him, at times I have him to sit down and look me in the face so he will listen to what I am saying. It's very hard to keep his attention or get him to answer a person at times.

He is very popular. He has been the Class president for the past 3 years and good at art.

I am thinking as your son gets older he may become more focused like Devin has. As I said, I still have to turn him to look at me at times to get an answer out of him. He use to act up in class also. He was known as the class clown.

Hopefully they will find out what is going on with him soon.

Ada

Hello fparker and welcome to NeuroTalk

What your sons school wants you to do for Dominick, well, it's not their choice - it's yours.

I understand you feelings about medicating your son but I would like to offer a different perspective....if you don't mind.

I would like to recommend you get your son evaluated by a Child Psychiatrist - you might find your son is not ADHD but this is just normal for him or he could just be bored. Not uncommon for alot of kids in school now a days.

If your son is ADHD there are other options - Ocupational Therapy (OT) can help children with ADHD (ADD). And of course the option you do not like - Medication.

Children with ADHD (ADD) are very smart and it's not uncommon for them to be up and doing things they are not supposed to do. Yet, if you ask them what has been discussed they can tell you.

The medications for ADHD allows these children to focus on what is going on and to be totally tuned in. The medications for ADHD (ADD) calms the childs mind and allows outside distractions to not be a distraction but the medication does not "hype" the child up nor does it make the child a zombie. Their thoughts are no longer scattered which happens with ADHD (ADD)

Children with ADHD (ADD) have a problem with impulse control. They tend to act or re-act before thinking about the consequences of those actions.