What You Should Know About Counseling for Attention Deficit Disorder

At the ADHD Information Library we are big believers that you should not just be giving a child with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder medication without also providing some sort of counseling or therapy. There are good, long-term studies that show that medication by itself over the long term is not a whole lot better than no treatment at all (Satterfield, et.al.). Medication for Attention Deficit Disorder is far more effective when it is combined with counseling of one type or another. But not all forms of counseling are worth the investment of time or money. Read on to learn what works and what does not.

Family therapy is helpful.

The family needs to adjust to the ADHD child, and needs to know how to do that. Parents need to know what to expect from the ADHD child, and the siblings need to be filled in on what is going on as well.

In fact, often the focus of family therapy ought to be the siblings. There is often a lot of jealousy with the siblings focused at the ADHD patient. Why? Because the patient has been getting all kinds of attention from the parents, both good attention and bad, over the past several years. Also because the ADHD child probably gets away with a lot more than his non-ADHD siblings do. So the jealousy needs to be addressed at some point in the family context.