Genetic ADHD - Might you have it?

[nanonug]

Antidepressants like Wellbutrin come with their own set of problems, they aren't totally harmless, at least for some people.

No medicine is totally harmless. Heck, acetaminophen (aka, paracetamol) which is a common painkiller, kills more people every year than any other medicine and is freely available over the counter!

 

[Ocean]

No medicine is totally harmless. Heck, acetaminophen (aka, paracetamol) which is a common painkiller, kills more people every year than any other medicine and is freely available over the counter!

Of course, but I view antidepressants as having a lot of potential for problems and getting off them can be very difficult for people as well. I just wanted to stress that while they may not have the same properties as stimulants they are pretty serious themselves, at least in my experiences and observation.

 

[Vegas]

How many of you had ADHD before developing full blown CFS/FM?

Dopmaine excites the pituitary, the master gland, to signal most of the hormones in the body. It would be a good idea if you have the money to do a genetic test on 23andme (or some place that can test ADHD genes). ADHD is real ... literally dopamine just leaks out of the membrane backwards when it should be moving forwards. Let me find the article...http://www.dnalc.org/view/2393-Treating-ADHD-with-Amphetamine-.html

I've had ADHD since a kid. I've also had frequent urination though from time to time. I don't know what preceeded what but I have heard of a urologist who attempts to restore pituitary hormones by giving people amphetamine to stimulate the pituitary by stimulating more dopamine.

I used to be one of those people that did not believe in ADHD. IT IS REAL. These scientists are showing dopamine just leaking out of the vesicles. lol Then we have some CFS docs using dopamine agonists to treat ADHD and finding low levels of dopamine in most CFS/FM patients. Could it be that they were just long undiagnosed with ADHD? Dopamine is calming and without it every stimulus hits the brain. Hormones are calming. Having a normal healthy blood volume is calming compared to being hypovolemic. In all of the cases of deficiencies of adrenaline overshoots and we have nervous exhaustion. Could it all be from a genetic predisposition to low dopamine to begin with?

I don't think I would qualify for an ADHD diagnosis anymore, even though my history of this goes back many years. The fatigue onset came after the severe neurocognitive symptoms, but other executive functioning problems certainly date back to my childhood. All these ADD symptoms have responded to biomedical interventions, with the primary ones listed below. My younger ADHD children have also done very well with frequent dose chelation. Their ADHD symptoms are markedly diminished. It took about 100 days of approx 7 mg of ALA taken every three hours before I could really see the changes. If you believe that ADHD is on the Autism Spectrum, then the same things that work for these children may work for ADHD. For us, in rough order of efficacy, frequent dose ALA-chelation, methylfolate, methylcobalamin, B2, rda doses of manganese, zinc supplementation, phospholipids, omega 3 (high epa/dha ratio), magnesium. Also, sulfate, taurine, glutamine, & probiotics & melatonin have been helpful.

I think my list matches up pretty well with experiences of others. While only a survey, it does involve 27,000. http://www.autism.com/pdf/providers/ParentRatings2009.pdf

 

[xks201]

Alpha-lipoic-acid? Really? Well the body has backup mechanisms for everything but if you have the gene for a leaky dopamine transporter basically amphetamine/ritalin is what fixes it scientists have found. That is not to say there are not multiple variants/causes of ADHD though. My interest in this thread was just as you answered regarding childhood ADHD. We have the beta and alpha adrenergic system...the hormone system...circadian rhythm even....sleep apnea...I could go on, all influencing cognitive function but many people who I talk to complain of having hyperadrenergic symptoms even at a young age before the fatigue started. My pupils were always dilated as were another person's I just spoke with for example.

 

[Ocean]

Alpha-lipoic-acid? Really? Well the body has backup mechanisms for everything but if you have the gene for a leaky dopamine transporter basically amphetamine/ritalin is what fixes it scientists have found. That is not to say there are not multiple variants/causes of ADHD though. My interest in this thread was just as you answered regarding childhood ADHD. We have the beta and alpha adrenergic system...the hormone system...circadian rhythm even....sleep apnea...I could go on, all influencing cognitive function but many people who I talk to complain of having hyperadrenergic symptoms even at a young age before the fatigue started. My pupils were always dilated as were another person's I just spoke with for example.

What are some hyperadrenergic symptoms? I definitely have had AHDH all my life, and it also runs in my family.

 

[alex3619]

I know quite a few patients who have tried stimulants including amphetamines. They feel good for a couple of days then crash badly. I think a few feel better on them longer term, but see no cure. Some just do badly. The response is highly variable from my experience, but that doesn't mean there is not a subgroup who might benefit. The question is: how do we identify that subgroup?

With the mitochondrial and cardiac involvement in many cases of ME, its possible such stimulants might increase mortality rates. It pays to be careful.

Many of the problems we see in ME are now being tied back to oxidative stress. Any model has to adequately account for that. Having said that, certainly CFS and probably ME are heterogenous conditions, so we have no idea what is involved in every subgroup yet.

Bye, Alex