ADHD - Is your ADHD teen using Dagga ?

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I am writing about Marijuana and ADHD . 

This link keeps coming up as a thread for ADHD teens and young adults. We have met a few adults who are ADHD and use this drug every day. 

 I have read a report written to Psychiatrists in South Africa. The findings in THAT report linked ADHD use of alchol and Marijuana or Dope or Dagga ( many more names).

I have listened to a talk at a support group where the same ideas from studies was expressed by an expert on child neurons and medication. 

 I heard it again on the talk by Dr. William Dobson . 

A question was asked about ADHD and addiction. Are ADHD people more prone to addiction.

The answer we do not like or want to hear as parents, is

Yes!

This make sense though. If  life is so tricky and a constant struggle to focus and maintain behaviour that is socially acceptable - things that run quite opposite the the way the ADHD brain functions, well then life can be really difficult.

Self- medication relieves the pain of the broken self-image that many ADHD children experience because the adults around them do not understand ADHD and therefore are little or no support. 

Drugs and alcohol help to deaden the pain of boredom.

Marijuana seems to be the drug of choice that helps ADHD impulse behaviour.

These are the findings. Teenagers and young adults and in fact adults who are ADHD who ARE NOT using ADHD Medication like Ritalin and Conserta etc, are found to use dope instead. The reason is that dope does what Ritalin and other meds do for the ADHD brain. It slows down hyper restlessness that most if not all ADHD people experience. In a real way, the use of Dope is a way to self- medicate. Of teens who do not use medication to help manage ADHD impulses , 60% will use Dagga to do this. When meds are involved the stas come down to the same as all other people who are not ADHD. My husband used Dope prolifically in his young adult life and he was an undiagnosed ADHD person. Dobson tells his parents of ADHD teens that either he medicates them of someone at a party will.

I hear his warning.
I write this post in particular with a hope that someone who is doubting medication as a real help for ADHD might reconsider.
I have experienced 2 loved ones using Dope as a life choice and experienced its destruction.
It is not a choice!