For those of us who have  Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD,) anger is common and can be a big problem.  Now is a particularly tough time for people with ADHD. People with ADHD don’t like being told what to do. So having to “shelter-in-place” because of Covid-19 and feeling “fenced in” sets us up to be unusually prone to anger.

Instead of waiting for the situation to arise in which you get angry and perhaps become destructive, try developing strategies for dealing with your anger in advance.  Try working on ways to reduce the anger and frustration you carry around with you.

These methods might include:

• Frequent exercise to work off stress
• Control of substance use so that you do not lower your level of self-control with drugs like alcohol or cocaine.
• Regular practice of meditation or prayer.
• Getting a reasonable amount of sleep every night.
• Psychotherapy or coaching to learn how to put feelings into words instead of action

Of course, anger can get the better of everyone from time to time, whether you have ADHD or not. When anger gets the best of you, however,  accept the human inevitability of messing up and do not let the sinking feeling of here-we-go-again devastate you.  Instead, learn from the experience and say,  “I messed up. I apologize. Let me make it right.”

In this YouTube Video on ADHD and Anger, I discuss how to identify and watch out for your triggers and why now is a particularly tough time for people with ADHD.  You’ll also learn how to manage your expectations, reign in your tendency to loose control and why it’s important to connect with others.

CLICK HERE TO WATCH!

Greetings,

COVID-19 Update – On behalf of all of us here at the Hallowell Center Boston MetroWest, located on Rt. 117 in Sudbury, I want you all to know we are open and fully operational during this pandemic.

Of course, to do this, we’ve had to make some changes. We are “seeing” our patients via Zoom or other virtual platform, or over the telephone. We prefer the virtual platforms as they allow for a deeper connection than the telephone, but if the telephone is all you’ve got, that’s fine.

NEW PATIENTS:

We welcome new patients during this time. We have more flexibility than ever and can accommodate you or your child quickly. Refusing to let the virus prevent us from serving you, we are able to do a full diagnostic assessment of children and adults via Zoom or other platform, without asking the patient to leave home.

If you wish to learn more about becoming a new patient, just send us an email to: hallowellreferralssudbury@gmail.com or fill out the form at the bottom of the page. We’re eager to hear from you and share with you our unique strength-based approach. At the Hallowell Center, we don’t treat disorders or disabilities; we help people of all ages unwrap their gifts!

TESTING:

If testing is deemed necessary, our neuropsychologists follow the full CDC COVID-19 safety protocols for in-person testing, including providing masks if you do not have one. Now would be an opportune time to schedule Neuropsychological Testing for your child. A neuropsychological assessment can help you understand your child’s needs, how much progress he or she has made, and how best to help them learn and make progress over the next 4 months so they are ready for the new school year.

We also test grown-up children, aka, adults. Adults can learn a great deal from a neuropsychological assessment. It’s the closest thing there is to an MRI of your mind, and is especially enlightening in the world of ADHD.

NOTE: Intakes, interviews and feedbacks can be conducted via phone (remotely) and then the in-person testing would be conducted on an extremely efficient basis to minimize time at the center.

Prescriptions

As for prescriptions, we mail them out so you need not come to the office to get them, and we offer remote follow-up on questions regarding all medications.

If you need a prescription or a prior authorization when required, please contact the office at 978-287-0810. Our wonderful office manager, Ellen D’Ambrosia, who is both an RN and an MSW, will assist you in getting exactly what you need. Even the people who are paid to deny services, the minions of the insurance companies, (with the exception of Dr. Ken Duckworth, Medical Director of Blue Cross Blue Shield MA, who has moved mountains to reduce bureaucratic red tape and eliminated the dreaded prior authorization), say Ellen is the best in the business and are always trying to hire her away from us!

ALL OTHER SERVICES

All our services will be provided remotely for the foreseeable future. Each of our clinicians is geared up to work with clients through virtual platforms, or even just the telephone, although having a visual does enhance the experience.

Learn more about Teletherapy HERE.

Call our office to get instructions to arrange a Teletherapy session.

To reach our front desk to schedule testing, a virtual appointment, change an appointment, request a prescription or get other help or information, please call us at: 978-287-0810.

You may also email your request to: hallowellreferralssudbury@gmail.com or fill out the form at the bottom of this page.

A FINAL WORD

It’s been said before, but let me say it again: we’re in this together. Together we shall prevail, but not without, sadly, tragedy, pain, and loss.

Being in the tragedy-pain-sadness-and-loss business, we want you to know we are here, ready to listen to you carefully, and respond with whatever assistance and wisdom we can.

Human connection is our core value, knowledge and empathy our main tools. We hope you will visit us via Zoom in the days ahead, and that you will feel the positive energy that emanates from us all when we band together.

Warm Regards,

Edward (NED) Hallowell, M.D., Founder
The Hallowell Center

MISCELLANEOUS RESOURCES

Massachusetts Department of Public Health – COVID-19 UPDATE

Centers for Disease Control (CDC) guidelines.

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If you are feeling desperate, down, or full of pain right now, Dr. Hallowell shares in his podcast, some words of comfort with you through a “letter” he wrote a few years ago, after experiencing his own feelings of desperation.

You can LISTEN HERE or you can read his letter below:

TAKE MY HAND

Take my hand. If you are desperate, just take my hand. You don’t have to believe anything, just take my hand. Listen.

It will all work out. It has before. It will again. It will all work out. It always has. It will again.

Whatever it is that has you feeling desperate, it will pass. Nothing lasts as it is. Everything subsides. Even pain. Especially pain.

Stay with me. Take my hand. That’s what I need when I am desperate, and I’ve had serious moments of desperation in my life, more than a few.

Take my hand. Please stay with me. We are in this life together.

All of us. Has someone betrayed you or threatened you? That happened to me, once really badly. I forgave the person only to have that person betray me again. I know. . . fool me once. . .

Have you done something that’s gotten you into trouble? Who hasn’t!

Are you desperately worried about someone you love? That’s especially hard, because you have so little control.

Whatever your situation, you do have me, this voice, at least right now. You also have everyone else in the world, it’s just pretty hard to feel their presence sometimes. Pain isolates us. But everyone else is out there, in some way pumping positive energy your way. One day science will prove exactly how. They’re all there and they’re with us from the afterworld, too, at least if you ask my opinion, but that’s a totally different topic. Now you don’t need opinions, you need real comfort and reliable relief.

Things will get better. Take that to the bank.

You sure don’t need theories or slogans. I Googled “feeling desperate” and got a lot of sites with solutions (usually for a fee, once you entered and scrolled down a bit), Biblical citations, and literary references to books like The Little Prince or Jonathan Livingston Seagull. Those books are wonderful fables, but you need something more immediate right now.

Like a guarantee. Who doesn’t love a guarantee? I can guarantee you, if you hang in there, things will get better.

Pain passes. Humiliation passes. Loss passes. Death takes, and then subsides. Betrayal passes.

If I knew exactly what was bothering you, maybe I could offer better help. But maybe I don’t need to know, because feeling desperate, at its core, is pretty much the same regardless of the cause.

I’m still here. I’m not going anywhere. Things will get better. Just hang in there.

Get angry at me if you’d like to. When I feel desperate, I often get angry at the people who tell me things will get better. How could they possibly know? It makes me mad.

But it’s also what I want to hear because it’s what I want to believe.

Life is so hard. For us all. The good thing is it’s not hardest on all of us at the same time. So when one of us is more or less ok, we can help offer hope to those who are in the depths. It’s how we get each other through.

The Key Is Each Other

Each other. See, we’re the key. That’s not a theory, it’s a fact. You know it, I know it.

We’ve all been in the depths. If you’re there now, I can tell you, I’ve been there, too. Now, I have your hand. Maybe then, you had mine. So we can’t be all that far apart, if you get what I mean.

Being human keeps us close. We all have to play by the same rotten rules. Age, suffer, and die. Lose everyone and everything.

Maybe not everything. As long as someone has hope, there is hope. And as long as there is hope, desperation will subside.

Hope

Please allow for hope. Don’t block it out. It will come if you don’t block it out.

When I’m desperate, the worst moments are when hope, all of a sudden, vanishes, and all I can see are the very worst outcomes. It’s like a cloud blocks out the sun and my world just goes dark. It’s just a feeling that overcomes me, with no warning, in periods when I am living in fear, sorrow, or danger. My world goes dark.

But, sooner or later, the cloud does move on, thank God, and the sun, such as it is, returns. I say “such as it is” because in those periods even the sun doesn’t restore me completely.

It’s a cliché, but still it’s true: life is all ups and downs. Thank God the downs don’t last forever, and I guess it’s just as well the ups don’t either.

If you’re in a down, please let me be with you. Think of me, a person you don’t know, talking to you right now, a person who’s been very down, but who, right now at least, has hope. Think of me just trying to get next to you in spirit to pump in some of the hope you don’t feel right now.

Hope is a potent force. When I’m desperate what I need more than anything is hope. Desperate basically means out of hope. Full of fear, but no hope.

Take my hand.

Now let me transfuse some of my hope into you. Just hold tight, it comes through naturally, just like it did when you gave it to me, back when.

Even if you can’t hold my physical hand, which you can’t of course because you are reading this and you don’t know me from Adam, even so you can still feel as if you were holding my hand through my words. These are words of hope.

They are hard earned words. I won’t tell you all the troubles I’ve seen, but I’ve seen many, and I’ve been places where I felt nothing but fear, where I felt no hope at all.

Let me hold you now. It will work out. It always has. It always will.

If you are  feeling tired, sad or on edge, listen to Dr. Hallowell’s podcast on “The Side Effects of the New Normal.”

Read Dr. Hallowell’s Blog post on “Managing Toxic Worry.”

Shelley MacLeod, LICSW is offering support for overwhelmed parents. Parents are experiencing a great deal of stress and emotions right now in this current crisis.  The truth is, many of us already felt overwhelmed before we even heard of Covid-19.  The amount of “hats” that parents are wearing right now is quite heavy:

• parent,
• teacher,
• employee,
• counselor,
• worrier of loved ones,
• Zoom play-date scheduler,
• and many more!

You are also trying to manage your own emotional rollercoaster of fear, loss, hope, and frustration while responding to all of your child’s emotions, too.  If you are finding your own “cup” empty from filling up everyone else’s, you need support.

Shelley MacLeod, LICSW is available to offer support to parents through Zoom or phone appointments.  Shelley is a psychotherapist at the Hallowell Center Boston MetroWest. She has more than a decade of experience of working with children and families with a warm engaging style.  She is also a mother of two young children.

Support sessions are available Monday through Friday via zoom or by phone.  If you would like to set up a Zoom or phone appointment with Shelley, fill out the form below:

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In his podcast, Dr. Hallowell offers some tips on How To Take Care of Yourself in Times of Crisis.

Learn about ADHD students and remote learning.

The Force of Each Other

So here we are, everyone’s stressed out, worried, preoccupied, and otherwise twitched and bewitched by what my friend Ken Duckworth calls “The Thing”. It’s all anyone talks about on TV or radio, and it’s pretty much the driver of most conversations elsewhere. The Thing.

But even before “The Thing” there was life interactive. Back then, BTT, before The Thing, we went to:

• restaurants,
• movies,
• church (well, my wife and I went to church, you may have gone somewhere else),
• hair salons (how on earth am I going to get my hair cut now?),
• we milled around in malls, and
• flew long flights in supersonic jets,
• we saw dentists and doctors for the now cancelled elective procedures, and
• lastly, we pretty much elected to do whatever we wanted.

Before The Thing – BTT:

• we did not fear other people within six feet of us, unless they were malodorous or menacing;
• likewise we did not fear making a transaction with cash;
• nor did we fear going to the dry cleaner or the cobbler or the fruit stand;
• we did not fear aerosols, droplets, or every sneeze and cough, at least most of us did not.
• finally, BTT we could breathe free.

But now, In the Age of The Thing, ITAOTT, pronounced eye-tah-ott, which rolls off the tongue more trippingly if you pronounce it EYE-dah-yott, now we see the face of things quite changed. The Thing has worked its way into our lives more intimately than any of us could ever have imagined. It’s changed our daily lives far more than 9/11 did. It’s the first global natural disaster most of us have ever lived through.

What to Do?

I wish I could tell you how to squelch The Thing. But I can only tell you what you already know: keep physical (not social!) distance; wash hands; wear a mask if you can find one or create one; and do your best not to leave your house.

It’s difficult to “fight” an invisible enemy against which your most powerful weapon is avoidance. We are accustomed, when we fight, to engage, to confront, and to battle, either physically or verbally. But now the very last thing we want to do is engage physically with this enemy; our verbal engagements only serve for us to blow off steam, fear, and anxiety.

Each day, we read the daily dismal stats. We get angry at policy-makers with whom we disagree, and we get inspired or at least comforted by policy-makers with whom we agree. Of course, we all love Dr. Fauci, so we all thank God that he is on the case. But even Dr. Fauci can’t wave a magic wand and make it all go back to BTT. We are left ITAOTT.

People  Rising to the Occasion

Still, I can’t help but say this has all the makings of our finest hour, as:

• more and more people rise to the occasion,
• while more and more people put their lives on the line in high-risk essential jobs,
• and more and more people stay at home, find ways to secure additional income or make provisions for lost income;
• they manage to keep peace in the house and food on the table as the days march by, one at a time, with no real notion of an end-date.

We worry over and pray for the people who live in crowded housing who have no choice but to all but be on top of each other, or crowd into the one elevator in the fifteen story building that works. Additionally, we worry over and pray for the people we could normally roll up our sleeves and go help, but who we now have to steer clear of.  Finally, we worry and pray also for our friends, our communities, and ourselves, knowing that even the safest among us is not safe.

What we have is what we’ve always had, only now, ITAOTT, it is different. It is called each other. Friends who do not usually call me or text me have been calling me and texting me. They have no idea what a pick-me-up that gives me. The patients I’ve been seeing remotely still engage with me, only remotely, and we get the work done without missing much of a beat. But it is different, and we both know it. I don’t know how my patients feel for sure, but I think we both feel proud of our ingenuity and glad that we haven’t let the virus stop us dead in our tracks.

Turning to Each Other

Fully mindful that is has stopped an awful lot of people dead, period, I still remind myself that it is each other to whom I turn. To whom we all turn. Imagine, wherever you are, turning your eyes around the world in your imagination, bringing to mind the billions of us who are all rooting together for each other. When was the last time that happened? The collective each other all rooting together for each other?

I don’t know about you, but I think that kind of rooting sets in motion a special kind of therapeutic force, a force of positive energy that can’t but do us all a pack of good. Let’s add to the force of science, the force of each other.

Here’s looking at you, kid.

I have ADHD.  That means I have one hell of an imagination.  But is having a potent imagination a blessing or a curse?  Centuries ago Samuel Johnson, who had one hell of an imagination himself and also fit the profile of ADHD, wrote about “that hunger of imagination which preys incessantly upon life, and must always be appeased by some employment.”

Our imagination is hungry, we who have the condition so misleadingly called Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD.)  I say misleadingly because the last thing we suffer from is a deficit of attention.  To the contrary, we possess an abundance of attention.  Our challenge always is to control it.

The most difficult part of our mind to control is our imagination.

Hungry?  It’s ravenous.  It must be fed. It knows no feeding schedule, but when it feels the need, it lets us know.   If we can then find employment, to use Johnson’s word, for our imagination in some pleasant or constructive project, scheme, or other undertaking, then our imagination becomes our ally, even proof of our genius, our originality, our way of changing the world even.  When suitably employed in creating something of value to us or to others, then we give thanks to our genes and our Creator for this gift called imagination we did nothing to earn but can never abandon.

However, when we cannot find suitable employment for this hungry faculty over which we have so little control, why then it turns on us with a ferocity others can’t understand. It sets about:

• devouring us,
• ripping away at our self regard, our
• feeling of security in the world, our
• confidence in a bountiful future, and our
• actual grip on reality, on our own sanity.

What happens when our imagination is not fed?

When not fed by some suitable employment, our imagination turns into an:

• untamed and vicious beast, an
• an ugly, salivating monster,
• our worst enemy, made all the worse and far, far more dangerous by being of us, in us, and always with us.

We can to nothing to dispose of it or rip it out of our minds.  To quiet it we sometimes turn to drugs, alcohol, or compulsive behaviors like gambling, spending, or sexual escapades.  It is the rapacious hunger of imagination, unable to find suitable employment, that turns so many of us who have ADHD into addicts and compulsive people of all kinds.

But is also that hungry, never-satisfied imagination that turns so many of us into:

• artists,
• inventors,
• discoverers,
• builders, and
• creators of all stripes and types.

It is that hunger of imagination that drives the man with ADHD always onward in the lifelong search for something “commensurate to his capacity for wonder”.

Were our capacity for wonder not so great, were we not so predisposed to imagine greater than what ordinary life offers up, we would not be driven all but mad by our need to fill that capacity for wonder–to create the perfect song, or swing, or double helix, or arc, or love, or empire.  Had we punier, less intrusive imaginations, we could relax.  But because we can envision the ideal, because we can imagine perfect love, perfect symmetry, perfect prose, or perfect beauty of any kind, then we can never rest easy until we create it.

Which, of course, means we can never rest easy.

So, tell me, does this hell of an imagination create heaven, or hell?  Is it a blessing or a curse?  If you ask me, it’s both.  I have no choice but to live with it, allow it its shabby stall in my mind, feed it best as I can, and try to stay on the sane side of life as it works its way with me.

Watch Dr. Hallowell’s YouTube video on Tapping Into Your Imagination

If you wonder if you have ADHD, click here to learn about the symptoms of ADHD.

One of the bright and shining lights in the current dismal viral fog is the beam of human altruism.

During a crisis, and certainly during this crisis, the cynic might expect people to rush toward every-man-woman-for-himself-herself. And sure enough, the toilet-paper hoarders, the face mask price-gougers, the medication squirrellers, the hand sanitizer sudden-capitalists, the food marauders, and the rest who cannot share but prefer to profit at other people’s expense bear out the hypothesis that human nature acts only on self-interest, and that to believe otherwise is naïve if not downright stupid.

Until you meet the rest of humanity.

Until you meet my friend who works in an intensive care unit in Manhattan where he says, “I am 100% certain I will get the virus. I want it to happen soon so I can get it over with.” He is a doctor who could easily quit and immediately get a job in a low-risk area, rather than in his hospital which is the highest risk in the nation. But he chooses to stay.

“I’m no hero,” he said to me, when I told him he was one. A crusty cynic, he said, “Everything I am seeing supports my belief in how stupid most people are,” before launching into a story of how the chairman of his department, “who is way out of his league” sent out a memo that contained orders which, if followed, would put everyone’s life at risk. My friend shot back a note telling him he would quit immediately if the chairman did not retract that memo on the spot. Which he did.

So why does my friend lay his life on the line?

“I’m not falling on any hand grenade, believe me. I’m taking precautions, doing my best to make sure other people do, and then taking care of the patients who need help. There’s nothing noble about it. The situation sucks, that’s all.”

But there is something noble about it. No, noble is the wrong word. There is something human about it. Usually when we refer to something as human, we refer to a frailty, a shortcoming, a weakness. But I see in my friend a quality that I see in most people, an instinctual, natural altruism that emerges under stress. Rather than looking out for himself, my cynical friend who sees the weaknesses in humanity for sure, puts his own life in serious jeopardy by taking care of patients who need him desperately.

Why does he do this?

Why does he not protect himself and leave Manhattan? Why does he keep going into the hospital even though he is “100% certain” he will get infected?

Because he wants to. This is the part that’s so hard to believe until you see it. But we see it over and over again during crises. During 9/11. During Katrina. During fires every day around the country. During wars around the world.

Believe it, there is a streak of altruism, of love for others before love for self, that runs through human nature just as sure as there is a streak of selfishness.

Look around you these days. You will see it. Look into yourself. You will see it there, too.

Take heart from knowing that as bad as we all can be, we can just as much be good. Life-sacrificingly, life-savingly good. To love others, at least sometimes, more than you love yourself, that’s human, believe it or not.

____________________________________

In this Psychology Today interview, Why Does a Crisis Make Us Want to Connect and Be Kinder? Dr. Hallowell shares his views on why a crisis changes us.

If these times have you feeling anxious and worried, read Dr. Hallowell’s blog post on Managing These Uncertain Times and Figuring Out A System.

What is the secret ingredient to stoke your immune system during this stressful time, or DTST? (During This Stressful Time is a phrase we use so often now I think it deserves its own abbreviation, DTST.)

One of the best steps you can take is to bolster your immune system. It’s your body’s internal defense system. Combined with the inflammatory response, the immune response comes to our rescue every day, 24/7.

Well, DTST, we need our immune system to be in tip-top, best-possible fighting shape. This is obviously a premier, super high, gotta do it priority. Keeping your defenses up against invading microbes has never been more important.

But. . . how do you do it? 

You can probably guess some items on the list already. Eat lots of fruits and veggies. Get regular exercise and good sleep. Don’t smoke. Drink alcohol only in moderation. De-stress.

But there is one magic ingredient that usually doesn’t make the list. I call it a “secret” ingredient because, even though there is a ton of evidence to prove its value—in fact it may be more powerful than all those other steps—it might as well be secret because most people don’t use it nearly enough nor do they know about its titanic healing and life-prolonging powers.

Even better, this ingredient is free and infinite in supply. Plus, it’s fun to use! 

What is this magic factor that’s fun, free, infinite in supply, and incredibly good for you?

In its most concentrated form we call it love. As it spreads out, I call it connection. The force of connection—from love to friendship to a relationship with a song or a cause—the force of connection does us more good, and spares us more ill, than any single force in the universe.

Connection—to people, pets (I adore dogs, but if you’re a cat person, that’s fine), places, ideas, objets d’art, the past, certain activities—connection to anything or anyone you care deeply about, that force does you more good than you likely know. Far more good. It enriches and actually lengthens your life. It provides you with a special satisfaction, with what Aristotle called eudaimon, literally “good spirit”, but much richer than that short term can impart. Aristotle deemed eudaimon as the highest good for human beings, the deepest satisfaction and fulfillment, what Maslow would call self-actualization, the most harmonious and joyful state a person can achieve.

And it all depends upon connection.

Not focusing on yourself, but on the connections your self can make outside of yourself. These are the connections and this is the force that, among other benefits, strengthens your immune system big time.

Since it’s free, fun, good for you, and easy to find, use it. Get and give massive doses of it every day. Even in quarantine or isolation, you do not need to be disconnected or lonely. Being lonely is bad for you. But you can cure loneliness with a:

• phone call,
• book,
• piece of music,
• dog (the best!),
• email,
• text,
• trip down memory lane,
• daydream,
• fantasy

All you have to do is connect outside of yourself to anything, as long as you care deeply about it. Caring mildly is good too, just not as potent as caring deeply. Yes, the effect is dose-dependent, so if you want the really big bang for your connection buck, make it a connection you care deeply about.

This is the secret, the most magical ingredient we have to bolster immune function. 

And while you’re connecting, don’t forget the best foods*—citrus of all kinds; red bell peppers; Greek yogurt; almonds; broccoli; ginger; garlic’ turmeric; green tea; papaya; spinach; berries; as well as special mushrooms (all available in powder form on Wellevate or Amazon) like Reishi; Lions Mane; Turkey Tail (don’t you love these names?); and cordyceps; as well as shellfish, for the zinc.  And of course, exercise, meditate, pray, and sleep well.

But, above all, use copious amounts of the secret ingredient that should no more be secret DTST, connection. Connection, and its mother, love, drive the very best in life. The vast sea of connections beckons like a beautiful, infinite, shimmering pool. Jump in, have fun, and live long. And these days, stave off those nasty bugs with a super-charged immune system!

Warm wishes,

Edward (Ned) Hallowell, M.D.

If you want to learn more about living a connected life, read Dr. Hallowell’s book: Connect

or watch his YouTube video on The Power of Vitamin Connect

*Disclaimer: These foods may be helpful in building your immune system, but they DO NOT prevent or protect you from COVID-19.  Here is a link to the CDC guidelines on How to Protect yourself.