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Can meditation alone treat ADD/ADHD?
Woah93
Veteran
Hey everyone, so these disorders have been quite a heated debate amongst a lot of people lately and I'm just wondering what your opinion is on the matter. I was diagnosed with ADD rather late at the age of 19 after finally recognizing my concentration and focus just wasn't up to par a few years ago. I've been prescribed dexedrine and while it worked I have recently stopped taking them since I don't see being on amphetamines all the time as a healthy way of dealing with it.
I was wondering though that maybe a lot of the problems people with ADD/ADHD deal with is caused by simply not being present and it does make sense. Daydreaming, unconsciousness, lack of focus and inability to hold concentration and focus are things which are addressed by a meditation practice right? So what do you think? Are medications the wrong way to go? Can the mind be trained enough to reduce/eliminate the symptoms caused by ADD/ADHD?
I was wondering though that maybe a lot of the problems people with ADD/ADHD deal with is caused by simply not being present and it does make sense. Daydreaming, unconsciousness, lack of focus and inability to hold concentration and focus are things which are addressed by a meditation practice right? So what do you think? Are medications the wrong way to go? Can the mind be trained enough to reduce/eliminate the symptoms caused by ADD/ADHD?
0
Comments
** Never go off any prescribed meds without your doctor's knowledge and monitoring.
** No, meditation is not a 'cure' for real, physiological illnesses or mental imbalances or illness.
So don't play around with your health & well-being. Talk to your doctor about your meds and ask what are the long term goals (or reality) for eventually getting off them - gradually, the 'right' way.
edited to add:
Going off your meds without doctor's knowelege - (before or after starting meditation; it doesn't matter) - is one issue. Thinking/asking about meditation alone being a treatment for ADD/ADHD is another issue.
the way i see it, amphetamines are not a very good solution to actually doing anything worthwhile as there can be numerous health problems linked to taking them. a diagnosing of the milligrams seems to be based on how you talked to your doctor and how he perceived what you said. ive known people who were prescribed 60mg adderoll who weighed less than 160 pounds. seems like a good way to getting kidney failure sure you may have all A's in school but your kidneys are failing. now you have to take 3 more medications for your kidneys liver and your blood which all have side effects as well.
whats the downside to stopping taking them having add/adhd which you already had in the first place?
my advice is seek out some food/herbs as well as meditation. ashwagandha is an indian herb used in Ayurveda. i bought some from a health foods store near me and i will vouch that it definitely has helped me to adapt to the stress of a new job odd work schedule and to memorize some of the items i am responsible for stocking at the store i work at!
the more time spent in meditation the more refined the mind will become.
http://www.chopra.com/community/online-library/ayurvedic-herbs-foods/ashwagandha
That said, don't underestimate the power of the mind and what it can do and change with deep meditation. I personally have much more faith in meditation than in medicine in many cases, but look at your own case personally and don't let my opinion change yours.
By the way, the things you mention to me seem very humanly. I think most people have trouble with those things without a specific cause. If those are the only symptoms I would apparently need a diagnosis too!
Though in that study most of the participants were also on medication.
You should understand that a diagnosis is a description. It is like a doctor saying "I see X".
It is only relevant if it improves the life of the patient (and sometimes the patients relatives). The same, consequently, goes for the drugs. So, do the medications improve the quality of your life?
The diagnosis does not say anything about the cause. Causes are explored in other ways, either by means of psychology, biochemistry, statistics, etc. Treatment options are then suggested and assessed in trials based on the knowledge of what might be happening. The cause of something is never completely known (the human body is still greatly unexplored, especially the brain, with which no one wants to mess with - any experiments and observation are hard to do for obvious reasons).
Now how the way the brain "learns" is by making some sinapses (connections) stronger, and others weaker. Whatever you experience (as a person - sensory experience gets translated to chemical signals in the nervous system) or ingest (which may be a chemical signal in itself), will do this in the same way, but every experience or chemical will do it on different neurons and pathways (groups of neurons that work together). Therefore i don't think you should dismiss your treatments on the ground that it is "amphetamines". It is not an inherently bad thing. You always have to ask yourself, whether your life was better without them, or did it improve with them.
Which works for most things, really
The reason I made this thread is I have noticed "the storm" quiets down a lot after meditation and I found it does help empty my head so maybe it can be used as an alternative treatment. I know dexedrine isn't bad per se but I know how they work and I have studied about brain chemistry and the way serotonin and dopamine works and having my dopamine boosted by a substance over the long-term worries me. I have not found a study about the long-term effects on the brain yet but I have read some that show neurotoxic effects from amphetamine use which cause inability to focus and concentrate which would mean that in the future I will be worse off then I am now.
Though in that study most of the participants were also on medication.
They were! And they noted that the meditation added benefits above and beyond the pills. Of course not enough research has been done yet to give any firm conclusions, hence the perhaps. But if pills are giving you a 30% reduction and meditation is giving you a 30% reduction. With all else being equal, just meditation could be equal to just pills. More research is certainly necessary.
I agree about more research being necessary. This study was small-scale and short-term, and it looks as if there wasn't a control group or longer-term follow-up. It seems there was a short-term benefit to the participants, perhaps due to the calming effect of mindfulness of breathing - though I suspect these benefits weren't maintained subsequently.
Also I'm not sure what work has been done on other psychological therapies, eg relaxation techniques, cognitive therapy, alternative therapy, etc.
There are also questions around the possible over-diagnosing of these conditions, and the possible over-prescribing of drugs like Ritalin.