Is It You, Me, or Adult A.D D.?: Stopping the Roller Coaster When Someone You Love Has Attention Deficit Disorder »

San Francisco-based freelance journalist Gina Pera is nationally known as a powerful advocate for AD/HD awareness and effective treatment standards. Her work producing special issues for USA Weekend won the prestigious Best Magazine Edition award from The Association for Women in Communications and a Unity Award in Media, recognizing accurate exposure of issues affecting minorities and disabled persons. Her journalistic background is detailed at www.GinaPera.com. Join the discussion on her blogs: ADHDPartner.org and ADHDRollerCoaster.org

As many as 30 million adults in the U.S. have a genetic condition that jeopardizes their health, employment, finances, and even their closest relationships. Yet only one million adults know they have it, and few of them truly understand it.

What is this neglected condition? Adult Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (AD/HD). And contrary to popular myth, the symptoms can be even more impairing in adulthood than in childhood. In short, it's no joke.

Adult AD/HD was declared a medical diagnosis in 1994. Still, the public and even many mental-health professionals harbor harmful misconceptions. Recent years' focus on the "gifts" of ADHD has helped to provide a more balanced perspective. Yet for some it's also meant that their very real challenges in regulating their actions are now denied or minimized instead of being taken seriously with evidence-based strategies for change.

The bottom line: Millions of adults suffer in silence and isolation, along with their loved ones not comprehending why life seems so much harder for them than it seems for others. But this groundbreaking book is poised to change all that.

The truth is, everyone knows someone with adult AD/HD (previously called ADD; the slash mark indicates that hyperactivity is not always present and, in fact is seldom present in adults). But we often misattribute the symptoms to anxiety, depression, or even laziness, willfulness, selfishness, moodiness, addictions, and worse. We simply don't make the connection to a brain disorder, perhaps because AD/HD symptoms do resemble the human condition in exaggerated form.

Meanwhile, these adults and their family members face the "AD/HD Roller Coaster" of chaos:disorganization and clutter at home, forgotten tasks and obligations, unpaid bills, neglected home repairs and lost jobs, hot tempers and erratic parenting styles, traffic accidents and citations, chronically poor health habits, and more.

Everyone affected by AD/HD will find this book invaluable, especially the partners of adults with ADHD and the adults themselves, not to mention their pastors, psychotherapists, friends, and extended family members. Treating physicians also will find this a unique, practical guide to successful medication protocols.

Meticulously researched by this award-winning journalist, Is It You, Me, or Adult A.D.D.? offers the latest information from top experts who explain the science and proven protocols for reducing AD/HD's most challenging symptoms. Real-life details come from the partners themselves.

The revolutionary message is one of hope for millions of people-and a joyous opportunity for a better life.

Alex Moore - Foreword Magazine

USA Weekend contributor and AD/HD researcher presents information on how to help and cope; chapters include "Psychological Denial," "Treatment Results that Last," and "Driving While Distracted," which includes Denise's story of when her husband slammed into a moose at fifty mph because he was "playing with the radio, fussing with the cell phone, adjusting the heat . . . "

Acknowledgments xiii
Foreword xvii
Introduction xix

PART ONE
From the Tunnel of Love to the Roller Coaster:
Could Your Partner Have ADHD?

Introduction 3
Who Has a Ticket to Ride? Spotting ADHD's Surprising Signs 13
Laying the Track's Foundation: What Is ADHD, Anyway? 31
Deconstructing Your Coaster: Why Each Is Unique 43
Financial Loop-the-Loops: "It's Only Money, Honey!" 63
Driving While Distracted: The Roller Coaster Hits the Road 71
Peaks and Valleys: ADHD in the Bedroom 77
More Mystifying Twists and Turns 89

PART TWO
Roller Coaster Whiplash and G-Force Confusion:
How Many Plunges Before You Say, "Whoa!"

Introduction 101
First Plunge: Explaining the Inexplicable 105
Second Plunge: Managing the Unmanageable 119
Third Plunge: Breaking Down in Illness-Or Through to Truth 131

PART THREE
Your Relationship and the Art of Roller Coaster Maintenance:
Four Success Strategies
Introduction 145

SUCCESS STRATEGY #1: TAKING CARE OF YOURSELF
Introduction: The Amusement Park's Emergency Room 147
Strategies for Right Now 151
Solving ADHD's Double Whammy 161

SUCCESS STRATEGY #2: DEALING WITH DENIAL
Introduction: Roller Coaster? What Roller Coaster? 169
Psychological Denial: The FEAR Factor 173
Biological Denial: Not Unwilling to See-Just Unable 185
New Ways to Broach "The Conversation" 195
More Solutions and Strategies 203

SUCCESS STRATEGY #3: FINDING EFFECTIVE THERAPY
Introduction: Calling in aConsultant to Help Retrofit Your Ride 211
Why the Wrong Therapy Is Worse Than No Therapy 215
Therapy That Works for ADHD 227
More Solutions and Strategies 245

SUCCESS STRATEGY #4: UNDERSTANDING MEDICATION'S ROLE
Introduction: Tightening the Brakes on the Roller Coaster 253
Making Connections Between Brain and Behavior 263
Rx: Treatment Results That Last 277
Maximizing Lifestyle Choices, Minimizing Rx Side Effects 295
Catch Your Breath and Take Five 299

APPENDIX A:
Adult ADHD Evaluation and Diagnosis 315
APPENDIX B:
"But I Heard That . . . ": More Background for the Unconvinced 321
APPENDIX C:
Three Views from Decades on the ADHD Roller Coaster 329
Resources 345
Endnotes 353
Index 357