Keanu was diagnosed with ADHD – attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. There is no effective treatment for this disorder, you just need to wait for the baby to outgrow. But it turned out that the reasons for the characteristic behavior of ADHD are not at all in this syndrome.
Doctors say that the diagnosis of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder is now more common. And they do not even exclude the possibility that this is our new reality: soon there will be more such children than ordinary ones, and society will have to rebuild. But while scientists are thinking about the nature of this phenomenon, much rests on the problem of diagnosis. Sometimes ADHD is given to children who do not suffer from it at all.
Melody Yazani, mother of an eight-year-old boy, shared her story, which is just about it. She hopes her story will help the thousands of mothers struggling with ADHD in their children, which is exhausting. Few people can understand what it is like to be the mother of a baby who cannot control himself, while those around him think that he is simply poorly brought up.
Kian, Melody’s son, had behavioral problems. They did not appear right away – in kindergarten it was an ordinary child, active, intelligent, restless, but in moderation. And when Kian went to school, the teacher began to complain that the boy was simply uncontrollable. “The class teacher said that Kian was pushing other children, acting as if he could not control his body,” Melody wrote on her social media page.
Then Kian’s school behavior improved slightly, but at home he turned into a monster. “Every morning – hysterics on hysterics, they started even before Kian got out of bed. He threw things at me, threw himself at me and did not stop screaming all this time, ”says Melody.
The parents were confused, they could not understand what had happened to their lovely boy. What did they do wrong, what happened? The therapist sent the child for ADHD testing. The diagnosis was confirmed.
This is how they would have been fighting the disorder if Melody hadn’t come across an article that talked about the connection between ADHD and sleep-disordered breathing. And she just took a cute selfie, as little Kian dozing on her chest … Melody looked at the photo again – the boy’s mouth was ajar. He was clearly not breathing through his nose.
“When a child breathes through his mouth, his body and brain are not getting enough oxygen. At night this leads to a decrease in the quality of sleep, the body does not really rest, ”explained the doctor Melody.
“Look closely at this picture. It has a huge red flag on it that indicates a problem. Constant sleep deprivation causes the same symptoms in children as it does in children with ADHD, ”Melody writes.
As a result, Keanu was diagnosed with sleep apnea and sinusitis. He really didn’t get enough oxygen. And the boy often had a headache, but his parents had no idea about this – he never complained. Keanu had an operation: adenoids and tonsils were removed. Now he can breathe through his nose. And his parents noticed incredible changes in the behavior of their baby.
“No more tantrums, scandals over little things, it all disappeared instantly,” Melody writes. “Maybe my story will help other moms.”
Doctor’s comment
“To identify apnea in a child, they conduct an ECG, examine the upper respiratory tract (including x-rays), and carry out somnography. Apnea can be provoked by diseases of the central nervous system, anatomical disorders – enlargement of the tonsils or adenoids, for example, this problem is often found in obese children. Due to apnea, daytime sleepiness may develop, which does not go away even after a daytime sleep, the child learns worse, cannot concentrate. Sometimes even urinary incontinence begins. Treatment can be prescribed only after examination, when the causes of apnea become clear, ”said pediatrician Klavdia Evseeva.