Allopathy or Alternative Medicine For ADHD? Which is good?
In my introductory blog post I have mentioned that I will start writing about attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder.
In the post I have specifically mentioned about SUPPLEMENTS not about medicines to alleviate ADHD condition.
I don’t want to give my child any conventional medicines for his ADHD condition because of its chronic nature.
I have given him allopathic medicines up to past his silver jubilee birthday (~25 years) starting since he’s 5 years old.
I didn’t see much improvement in his behavior, and it only maintained his condition. The conventional doctors never advised us to follow any particular diet for him. Because of my ignorance we had given him normal and regular diet including non-vegetarian.
Because of my work pressure I couldn’t pay attention to his condition thinking that we could do nothing to help him as he was already attended by specialist doctor and various special education services for him at school.
I was WRONG.
Back in late nineties and early 2000s internet was not this pervasive. We were not having this many resources as available today. Except for few books suggested by school not much available readily.
So, he was on conventional medicine for more than 25 years without much progress in a positive way except for the maintenance of his status quo.
Further, just before pandemic he used to complain of ache around his fore legs. He couldn’t sit on the sofa even for few minutes with crossed legs as he was used to do that earlier.
The ache legs were due to his weight gain because of the conventional medicine he was on. Additionally, he was also on sleep medication for his insomnia and several other multi-vitamins tablets.
So, his medicine regime used to have at least 4to 5 different medicines to just keep him calm in the day and help him sleep in the night.
Does it mean, no benefits at all with conventional medicines?
I can’t say that.
There are several advantages with conventional medicines.
Firstly, it’s very convenient as the regimes are very simple to remember and follow.
Secondly no food restriction whatsoever.
Any food can be given. He used to like pizzas, several wheat-flour-based products and even dairy products were his favorites.
Pre-pandemic, the conventional medicine dosage was not enough for him to keep him calm because of his weight gain.
He used to get severe headaches and we needed to increase his dosage of the same.
I was afraid if I continue further on this path, he will be very soon will have other complications because of these medicines.
So, around this time Covid pandemic hit the world and even I was grounded. This allowed me to observe him closely.
SO, I DECIDED TO TAKE HIM OFF “ALLOPATHIC MEDICATION ROUTE” FOR HIS CHRONIC CONDITTION.
AND CHANGED THE GEARS TO VEGETARIANISM AS WELL.
It’s a MAJOR CHANGE for him.
There you go we have a double whammy FOR HIM.
TAKING OFF ALLOPATHIC MEDICINES AND FOLLOWING VEGETARIAN DIET.
But I believe whatever I did was in HIS BEST INTEREST.
For ADHD it’s normally recommended to go on keto-diet, that means we need to go on NON-VEGETARIAN DIET.
Wait I had mentioned in the beginning that we used to give him non-veg food items as well. Yes, that was when we were in USA but in early 2000s, we returned to India for good and changed our diet habits at home.
But continued non-vegetarian food for him whenever possible. But during pandemic period he was also brought onto VEGAN DIET.
How do I solve this riddle of vegan diet for ADHD condition instead of the suggested keto-diet.
Several herbal SUPPLEMENTS were tried and tested to help him manage his condition.
In the next posts, the discussion will be around whether the supplements were beneficial or not.
If helped, to what extent they helped him will be outlined.
Have you tried naturopathy yourself or for your child? What’s your thoughts?
Keep the discussion rolling.
Cheers until the next post,
Vara Chamakura
