Awhile back I posted about how we get ADHD (Attention Deficit/Hyperactive Disorder) kids in the clinic occasionally.
Someone followed up with some questions because of an ADHD kid they were trying to help, so I thought I'd share the answers.
Anyhow, what do you know about getting this cool little 8 year kid fixed via QiGong? I've been looking at some TCM stuff too. Do you know which organs are the root of the ADHD?
ADHD is one of those diagnoses that for an Eastern practitioner could really mean anything. Every patient I've seen diagnosed with ADHD has had a different problem from a Eastern perspective and had different symptoms from anyones perspective: if I lined up all my ADHD patients together, it would be obvious to you just looking at them that they had different complaints. That is, I've seen ADHD cover everything from kids who look totally listless to kids who are vibrating where they stand.
So when I treat a kid with ADHD, I generally ask:
How do the parents see the ADHD manifesting itself?
What led to the diagnosis of ADHD?
How does the child respond to heavy physical exercise? If you have the child run around the building for 5-10 minutes are their particular symptoms better or worse?
Does the child prefer to concentrate on a single task for a long period of time, or flit from thing to thing? That is, would the kid spend 4 hours playing with legos, or 15 minutes each playing with 16 different toys?
Based on the answer to those questions, the treatment will vary widely. So while we have a lot of success with ADHD, its hard for me to treat remotely.
Since you don't have me available unless you live in Flagstaff, I'll make the following suggestions for the rest of you:
Find a good kung-fu/tai chi class to enroll the kid into. The old softer styles of Kung Fu didn't separate health from martial arts the way the more derivative successors like Karate do. So its quite possible that by enrolling the kid in a kid kung fu class that their system will gradually rebalance itself as they learn. Most instructors have some sort of trial lesson thing so that they can scope out the kid and the parents. In that introductory visit, if the parents talk to the instructor about the ADHD diagnosis, the instructor may very well be able to figure out how to get the kid to focus, especially if the instructor is pretty experienced with kids. People were coaching kids for a long time before there was ADHD
Now, finding what I would consider a “good” kid program is hard to explain because the martial arts you teach kids has to be customized for their age anyways. I'd probably examine the adult side in some detail, looking for tai chi or qi gong classes on the adult side.
The ideal would be something like we have locally where the kids program is separate but the adult program includes both qi gong, qi gong healing, and a healing clinic so you know there will be crossover to the kids program. That would be the ideal, but that's hard to find. If you find some websites for programs in your area I can look at them, but the parents should also follow their instincts when they meet the instructors: better a good coach in a bad program then a good program with a bad coach, and better a program that they can commit to driving the kid to twice a week then one across down they'll never go to.
Here's a study about Tai Chi and ADHD if you're interested.
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