Treatment

Treatment is generally a form of anti-seizure medication. In Amanda's case, from the day she began taking her prescribed medication, her learning ability improved dramatically. Within three weeks she was reading beginner books, and within a year she was within the range of normal reading ability for her age. The downside for Amanda was the side effects of the medication. While her learning seemed to improve, she became increasingly "sleepy", until she was falling asleep in school.

A Solution?

What's a parent to do? We removed Amanda from her elementary school midyear and began a home school program. We soon realized that Amanda was sleeping a minimum of fourteen hours in a day, and took her off the anti-seizure medication. A year later, after a follow-up EEG which was still abnormal, her pediatrician referred us to a new neurologist. This new Doctor had extensive experience with a variety of neurologic disorders, and after a battery of tests, concluded that Amanda did in fact suffer from a form of Inattentive Attention Deficit Disorder, or ADD. Is it possible that the abnormality in her brain caused her to have both petit mal and ADD? Or was she originally misdiagnosed. We may never really know. As medical science improves, we hold out hope that the answer will be found.

If Amanda's story sounds similar to your own, consider talking to your child's physician. Amanda's case is far from abnormal, and is in fact probably much more common than we know. Girls with ADD are most frequently undiagnosed or misdiagnosed, as they generally do not display the typical "hyper" behavior. Adults can also have ADD and may display similar behavior that is attributed to irresponsibility, forgetfulness, or impulsiveness. There are many web sites that deal with these disorders, following are some suggestions:

ADD-

Http://www.borntoexplore.org/ Http://www.additudemag.com/ Http://www.nimh.nih.gov/publicat/adhd.cfm Http://www.chadd.org/

Petit Mal

Http://health.yahoo.com/health/encyclopedia/000696/0.html Http://www.fpnotebook.com/NEU209.htm http://health.discovery.com/diseasesandcond/encyclopedia/1854.html

About the Author

Michelle Gonzalez is the editor of both www.youthweekly.com and www.inspiredparent.com . A mother of three, she enjoys writing articles as well as poems and stories in her spare time. Her passions around childrens literacy and good parenting led her to create her two successful ezines.