At some point, we’re all like the dog in the Pixar movie, Up, doing one thing and then responding to the real-life equivalent of “Squirrel!”īut ADHD isn’t a disorder of the modern age. Ours is not a society tolerant of perpetual motion or daydreaming. We’re also asked from a very young age to be still, nearly motionless, except for the tapping of our fingers on the computer keys. Most Americans are exposed to an average of 100,000 words a day-about the length of Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn-very little of which we’re able to absorb, according to a 2009 study on America’s information consumption from the University of California, San Diego. ![]() After all, we’re all on the information Autobahn. It’s easy to see why some dismiss ADHD as simply an artifact of modern life. Keith Connors, professor emeritus of medical psychology at Duke University and creator of the Connors Rating Scales for diagnosing ADHD, says he always offers the same challenge: “Take one of these kids on a car trip for a day and see how you feel about it then.” “I think that’s because they’ve never experienced it firsthand.” “A lot of people don’t believe in it,” she says. It’s the fear for her child’s future that makes Meenagh bristle when she hears someone-family, friends, strangers, even scientists-say that ADHD doesn’t exist, that the symptoms are caused by poor parenting, food additives, or 21 st century life in the fast lane, lack of physical activity, or that they’re just kids being kids, albeit less manageable than most. Overall, boys (13.2%) are more likely than girls (5.6%) to be given an ADHD diagnosis. But the 5% to 11% of American children 4 to 17 years of age who are diagnosed with the disorder-the numbers are up for debate depending on whom you talk to-also face a lifetime of increased risk for accidents, teen pregnancy, drug and alcohol abuse, smoking, and even dying prematurely. Being fidgety and easily distracted are two of the most common and recognized symptoms of ADHD, often leading to poor performance in school, the most recognized fallout of the condition. (While she’s not at school, her mother gives her a medication holiday in order to boost her appetite, help her gain weight and grow, all things Vyvance interferes with.) “When we had her tested they said that in 20 years she was the most hyperactive child they ever tested,” says Meenagh, gently removing that errant foot from the table yet again.īut Saorla’s perpetual motion isn’t what concerns Meenagh the most. But if she’s not on her medication-which she isn’t at the moment because we met at her family’s home in a Philadelphia suburb during the summer-she is an exhausting ball of boundless energy. People just meeting her find her adorably sweet, if quirky. She rarely finishes a task and being with her can be as disconcerting as watching television with someone pressing the channel changer every 10 seconds.Īlong with a gift for math and a love for Gaelic sports, Saorla has inherited something else from her father: attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, ADHD. She sits on her knees, then jiggles, then rocks, then circles photos in a stack of food magazines with a pen, turning off the TV, turning up the TV, turning down the TV, and making part of a bracelet on a Rainbow Loom before she finally loses interest. During that time, Saorla’s actions are as scattered as pool balls in a break. ![]() ![]() “I don’t know-random positions,” she says, as her mother, Kerri, a pediatric nurse practitioner quietly pushes her daughter’s bare foot off the table where it has wandered for what may be the 10th time in half an hour. When asked her position on the team, Saorla wiggles in her seat at the family’s dining room table. Saorla, whose blue eyes, white skin, and sprinkle of freckles helped win her a modeling contract with a New York agency-on hold until her braces come off -also plays softball and Gaelic football, a soccer-like game her father, Seamus, a contractor, enjoyed when he was growing up in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland. With her long dark hair flying, Saorla Meenagh, 10, (pictured above) can execute a perfect switch leap, one leg out, one tucked under, her arms glued to her sides in classic Irish step-dancing style.
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