Helping the Parents of Hyperactive Children

“My husband spends half his time keeping me from Joey because it gets so I just want to kill him,” the mother of a 5-year-old said in a gentle voice that contrasted with the turbulence of her admission. The 15 other parents seated at the long rectangular table indicated understanding and commiseration with murmurs and nods.

Perhaps nowhere else would the speaker--who said she never strikes her child--have been listened to this non-judgmentally while describing such ambivalent feelings toward her hyperactive son. This was a meeting of the 3-year-old nonprofit support group called Parents of Hyperactive Children. It meets in Glendale the first Wednesday of the month and is the only gathering in the greater Los Angeles area with this focus.

“The intensity level is different with a child like this,” said Marjorie (who, like the others in the group, chose not to use her or her child’s real name in order to protect their privacy). “When Kevin was 4, everybody hated him, nobody wanted him around, especially family. Certain situations make it worse, like when we go out of town, or his dad is away on a trip. Kevin was so aggressive, even at a few months. When I took his bottle away, which his doctor suggested, he started biting and all this aggression came out.”

One of the anomalies of hyperactivity is that it is frequently worst in the presence of the primary caretaker, usually the mother.

Mothers ‘Real Victims’

“The mothers are the real victims in this kind of disorder,” explained Brian Conlan, the licensed clinical social worker who helped originate the meetings. “It’s common for the mothers to say, ‘My husband thinks he’s just a normal active boy.’ That’s been the terrible tragedy. From pediatricians and from mental health professionals, the mothers hear, ‘If you only weren’t so nervous, if you’d do something different. . . . ‘ “

Conlan hypothesizes that it may be easier to misbehave with a mother because they are more tolerant, less easily provoked. “It’s been reported over and over again,” he said, “that you do not see the symptoms of hyperactivity as much when the child is relating to a stranger. But if you take ‘normal’ children, that would also be true, they would be different with strangers than they are with their parents at home.” One member reported her son as saying, “I don’t have to be good, I’m home.”

Despite the name of the group, not all of these families have children who are hyperactive in the way that word is commonly understood. In fact, hyperactivity has been eliminated from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, DSM III, though researchers and writers in the field still use the term.

Attention Deficit Disorders (ADD) is a newer and more accurate term used to describe children who have one or more of a combination of problems. These may include hyperactivity, learning disabilities, distractibility, and emotional, social, and family problems that have usually developed as a result of the other difficulties. The switch to ADD was made in an attempt to be more scientific, because children with ADD can be diagnosed by means of standard tests. With ADD, a clear set of symptoms will usually be present by age 6. Boys outnumber girls by at least three or four to one, although it is not know why.

Four years ago, when Conlan was director of the Burbank Child Guidance Clinic, he had a number of clients who were parents of hyperactive children. He started a series of 10-session weekly meetings for parents under the auspices of the clinic. Several of those parents expressed interest in a support group that would be under their control.

“I see it as a parents’ group, not as my group,” Conlan said. “My role was more important at the beginning, to be the central focus for parents to figure out ways they wanted this organization to be. I do not provide therapy, but rather make sure the conversation goes around the group, stays on track.”

Parents of Hyperactive Children is affiliated with the California Assn. for Neurologically Handicapped Children, which is a statewide lobbying body. Members make phone calls and mail flyers, and every other month, a guest speaker is scheduled. These have included representatives from public schools who have discussed special education classes and adults who were hyperactive children.

Marjorie has been attending the support group for nearly two years. Her son Kevin had a lot of food allergies in the past, and she still has trouble with guilt feelings. “I think that if I stuck to all organically grown natural foods, then he might not need the medication, or very little,” she said.

Most of the children of families in this group are on medication for their disability, and much of the discussion at meetings relates to parents’ anxieties in this area. However, according to Dr. Frank Dudenhoeffer, a clinical professor of pediatrics at USC with a private practice at Descanso Pediatric Medical Group in La Canada Flintridge, stimulant medication is part of the treatment recommended for ADD by the American Academy of Pediatrics.

“I spend a lot of my time explaining and convincing parents of the necessity for medication,” Dudenhoeffer said. Besides stimulants, which have the reverse effect on a large percentage of children with ADD, the recommended treatment includes counseling, including family support and therapy, and special education if there are specific learning disabilities.

Gloria is one of the original parents who helped found the current group. She is no longer having the same kind of problems she used to, now that her learning disabled son is 12. She discovered his learning disability before hyperactive behavior was observed.

“He’s not aggressive, he’s just wiggly and his attention span is short, especially when he’s doing academically related work,” Gloria said. “We tried a variety of things over the last several years. We haven’t found anything that’s really worked. And I’ve heard that from other people too. Fortunately, his confidence has grown because of the teacher he had last year, so the problems are lessened. At this point, I stay in the group to help others as a co-leader dealing with administrative details.”

Marjorie was a successful teacher before giving birth to Kevin. “Then, bam, I felt I was the worst mother, then I became an emotional wreck,” she said. “I didn’t trust myself, my judgment. I tried to use discipline, but with a hyperactive child it doesn’t work. They always have the energy to do it one more time.

“This group has let me know that I’m not the only person in the world with a child like this, and therefore I am able to say to myself that it’s not all me.”

Another of the founding members, Cecile, told how her son was first diagnosed at age 3 and put on medication at 4. “We had power struggles; he was very defensive. I tried a diet which eliminates artificial food additives, but he’d get money from classmates for ice cream,” she said. “I took a course in parenting. It didn’t help. The problem wore me out. Eric’s father never accepted the idea of our son’s hyperactivity. He insisted it was my problem I couldn’t get along with him. It was comforting to come to this group and find there were other parents in the same situation I was. Relatives and other people just think your kid is a brat and ask why you’re ‘letting him get away with this?’ ”

According to Conlan, who is now in private practice at the Riverside Psychiatric Clinic in Burbank, “The so-called Terrible Two’s are more than just terrible with a hyperactive child. That’s the point where mothers really run into problems. Pediatricians who are not very familiar with hyperactivity might say, ‘Don’t worry, the physical exam is OK, just stay with it.’ And that may leave them trying to deal with the problem in a way that just makes it worse.” Conlan plans eventually to offer a series of more therapeutically oriented groups at a very low fee.

“The parents who attend the support group are typically those who work at it and try the hardest,” said Bob Dannenhold, director of Hillside Center in La Canada, a school for learning disabled and hyperactive children. The offspring of several of the members of Parents of Hyperactive children attend Hillside Center, and Dannenhold has been a speaker at one of the meetings.

“The support group,” Dannenhold said, “gives parents a chance to vent, to feel that they’re normal, that their reactions, their experiences, and their guilt trips are not uncommon. It gives them a chance to go back home to their children and say ‘I may be angry, but I really love you and care about you.’ ”

For more information about Parents of Hyperactive Children, call Brian Conlan at (818) 848-5593 or Shirley Tenger, area representative for CANHC at (818) 507-0447.