Rae70, the rages you describe are not symptoms of ADHD. Have you ever been officially diagnosed? A lack of remorse and the violence you describe are not ADHD symptoms. Also, the steroids in asthma medication are not the same anabolic steriods that are known to cause violence. They are corticosteroids and are not the same chemicals that athletes use to pump up and then go destroying the gym in a violent rampage.
In fact, the symptoms you describe indicate a very violent personality. I would see a psychiatrist right away in order to sort that out.
Cheekydeeky
Many non-ADD people tell ADDers to "just try harder" or "just use some self control".
Do this little experiment: Close your mouth and pinch your nose shut and try to hold your breath for ten minutes. After about 30 - 60 seconds when you feel like you are going to die, "just try harder", then when you start felling panicky like you are going to just explode if you do not breath, "use a little self control, its all in your mind", "it is just yor attitiude".
Oh well, that is what it is like for me. I can control my ADD symptoms through sheer willpower about as well as you can hold your breath for 10 minutes through sheer willpower.
Now with medication and counseling, I can obviously do much better.
Honestly, I'm not really sure how to answer that. I think it's great that you are trying to understand your son. However, since ADHD is neurological, I don't know that he feels out of the ordinary, no matter what his change in mood is. It feels normal to him. If you son has rages he may also have other things besides ADHD or he's going through a lot of stress right now.
ADHD feels normal to me, except when hyperactive. Then I feel like I have an incredible amount of energy that I just can't expel. It's only other people's reactions that lets me know it isn't normal. And I feel bad and for years I wondered why I couldn't be like everyone else. Then I basically got real. I learned to be at peace with my condition and take things one day at a time.
Try to allow your son to recognize his behaviors without making him feel ashamed.
Cheekydeeky
As a child I could get extremely angry. I remember loosing it one day with the neighbours dog and hit the poor thing till it had whelts. During this rage I felt strong, powerful in control and unloading all the frustrations and pain and anger I was feeling, but crikeys the guilt I felt afterwards. I even felt extremely scared of myself and what I could do when angry, but still felt utterly justified.
Luckily those outburst were few and far between, but I think a lot of the time it is just Letting It All Out. Interestinly tho I had to take steroids for my asthma for 2 weeks, during this time I often went into rages and felt no remorse at all, unlike the remorse and guilt I feel most of the time if I hurt or upset people. I lost my ability for compassion and was extremely cocky, and I thought later when I was off the steroid "is this how men feel, do they make hard decisions and shoot off at the mouth, because their hormones make it nearly impossible not to"
These are some of my experiences - hope they help
Hi, I have a young son who has recently been diagnosed with adhd(8yrs). The question I have is, 'I have often asked him how he is feeling in one of his rages or inattentive moments or hyperactive moments and understandably he cant put it into words, I have read books,listened to doctors and professionals to try and understand just what he is going through,and the best people to learn from is those with adhd. I was just wondering if anyone could help me to learn more about exactly how it affects them personally. Thank you for any help
feelingalone.