Now that the sun is out and the weather is warmer, helping your child manage his or her ADHD symptoms can be as simple as going outside. We’ve talked about the benefits of exercise and outdoor activities for children with attention deficiencies or hyperactivity before. These benefits are backed up by research; a study published in the journal Applied Psychology: Health and Wellbeing discovered that even the briefest exposure to green outdoor settings resulted in milder symptoms among kids with ADHD.

Here are four great outdoor activities for your child to try this spring.

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Ever wonder why ADHD is more prevalent in North America and Europe, and not quite so in more sunny locations? According to a pioneering study in the journal Biological Psychiatry, the ADHD diagnosis occurs less in places with intense sunshine.

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The hyperactivity component in childhood ADHD has fewer physical manifestations when the child reaches adulthood. Instead of running around like they’re driven by a motor, adults with ADHD are mentally hyperactive. They’re easily distractible, they need extra motivation, and they struggle to stay organized.  Their ability to multitask is compromised because of their faulty short-term memory, and they feel easily overwhelmed by the tasks they have to accomplish at work and at home. As a result, adults with ADHD are easily exhausted or at greater risk for chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), a modern-day condition where debilitating exhaustion is not relieved by sleep or rest.

Here are some tips that can help you recharge your tired ADHD brain.

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Stimulant medication may be the most widely-used treatment for ADHD, but more and more parents are looking into natural ADHD treatments after learning about the debilitating side effects of these drugs.  Still, the transition from ADHD medications to natural treatments isn’t always easy. A lot of lifestyle adjustments have to be made, and it takes weeks for any positive changes to appear.   For this reason, parents prefer the quick fix of medication over drug-free treatments, especially if the symptoms are severe. But if there was a way to beat your child’s symptoms without medication and its side effects, wouldn’t you take it?  Here are the most popular ways to beat ADHD without medication.

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Dealing with ADHD symptoms can be frustrating, especially on days when your child seems to be out of control.  In the UnRitalin Solution’s Resource page, we’ve shown you how various nutritional supplements and diets deal with the causes of ADHD and reduce the intensity of symptoms.  However, figuring out what supplements to give to your child and which brands bring the results you desire can be difficult to determine.  In this blog post, I’ll be explaining concepts you can use to decide what vitamins, herbs, and other supplements your child needs to recover from ADHD naturally.

Before anything else: know what you need to treat

The right supplements depend on the possible causes of your child’s ADHD symptoms. For instance, if your child has the classic biological cause of ADHD, products like omega-3 fish oil and pycnogenol will boost neurological function and minimize inattention, hyperactivity, and impulsivity. On the other hand, if your child has a specific nutritional deficiency, you’ll want to replenish these missing nutrients with vitamins and minerals. In other words, consult your child’s doctor and find out the causes of your child’s symptoms before buying supplements. Otherwise, the products you end up getting may not bring the help your child needs.

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As a parent of a child with ADHD, you’ve probably noticed something I observe among my patients: kids with ADHD don’t do well in the winter.  As fall turns to winter and a blanket of snow covers the streets, kids with ADHD tend to:

• Become more hyperactive or impulsive as they grow increasingly restless. In the winter, they have fewer opportunities to burn excess energy or do activities they enjoy outside of school or at home.
• Become more argumentative and oppositional due to the inability to use their regular coping skills, such as outdoor activities or sports, to help them vent their feelings and burn off excess energy.
• Become more distracted and inattentive, resulting in difficulties doing homework or completing errands and chores.
• Experience more disciplinary or legal trouble as their frustration, restlessness, impulsivity, and hyperactivity increases.

Does this sound like your child?

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It’s difficult to quantify what the most effective ADHD treatment is. Because a child experiences more problems than hyperactivity, impulsivity, and inattention, it’s not uncommon for parents to use more than one method to treat ADHD.   But which of these treatments have the most impact?  According to a new survey from Consumer Reports, stimulants are the most effective ADHD treatment for kids, but parents still think it’s not enough.  In fact, the survey notes that kids who tried alternative treatments besides medication did better than kids who were on medication only. As for the most effective non-medical treatment for ADHD, it turns out that sending children to a school better equipped to deal with ADHD made all the difference.

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We have a lot of articles that explore the relationship between nutrient deficiencies and ADHD.  Often, these nutrient deficiencies and the ADHD symptoms they cause are the secondary effects of a larger underlying problem like leaky gut syndrome.   One of the hottest vitamin supplements at the moment is vitamin D, and many say that it can bring benefits to those with ADHD. Although it’s not as widely studied as zinc or magnesium supplementation, the speculative discussion on this nutrient suggest ways where vitamin D can help someone with ADHD.

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Most pediatricians and psychiatrists diagnose ADHD based on a series of criteria outlined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders (DSM-IV).  According to the DSM-IV, there are three types of ADHD: inattentive type, hyperactive-impulsive type, and combined type.  But did you know that there are more than three types of ADHD?

Psychiatrist Dr. Daniel Amen has handled hundreds of children and adults with ADHD and developed a special brain imaging technique called the SPECT test to help him find the cause of the condition.  His work on SPECT imaging made him realize the full complexity of the disorder.  Over the years, he noticed that there are six distinct SPECT patterns in his ADHD patients, and that each requires a specialized treatment. Based on these observations, Dr. Amen came up with the six types of ADHD.

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In our Article Library, you’ll find several discussions on various nutritional interventions for ADHD. Although vitamin C is known more for its immune-boosting and antioxidant properties, some studies suggest that it may play an important role in managing hyperactivity, impulsivity, and inattention. Before you get excited and start buying vitamin C supplements, take note that vitamin C works more as a secondary treatment that boosts the efficacy of supplements and dietary methods; in other words, it should not be used as a single, stand-alone treatment. Although some of its speculative benefits still need to be confirmed by further studies, it seems like maintaining or increasing vitamin C levels can reduce ADHD symptoms in five ways:

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