You are absolutely right. Anecdotally, my consumption of sugars and carbs was a symptom of the severity of my ADHD, and absolutely not a causal factor. I used sugar to self-medicate as I was undiagnosed for over 4 decades. Sugar triggers the production of dopamine so my sugar addiction was a product of a neurotransmitter dysfunction and deficit.
I recently cut ALL carbs and my symptoms massively reduced. Stimulants dont work for me and nothing else they tried has either but seemingly no carbs does help big time. Very high fat intake though, so maybe this is fueling my brain better.
@@Benjamin-u7fcinnamon tea helps me whenever I intake a lot of carbs. Unfortunately, it happens. Do you exercise? Because I do but can't do it with energy without carbs. Still can't find a solution for this.
@@Jofferpg2009 Wow! There are several different versions of oats available for making into oatmeal / porridge. I wonder if you are eating the higher-glycaemic ones such as instant oats? Traditional oats tend to have a much lower-glycaemic-index. Or, obivously I am an amateur commentator, it could be some other reason. Still unexpected and surprising. Cheers, Anna.
Causation =/= correlation. Who says that you didn't eat all the sugar because of the deficiency in your brain, that you were just trying to compensate for? To me, eating sugar always felt like that when I did, I finally felt "OKAY", like a normal human being, and that kind of checks out, because that's exactly what ADHD does, it deprives your brain of dopamine and sugar brings back the dopamine.
I used to think it was the aspartame in the 80s until I realised that my mum had it too and likely my dad my youngest sister almost certainly and my grandparents so definitely more likely to be genetic for my lot
It’s just a symptom, and it’s important to not mistake the symptom with being a cause instead of an effect. For example, if you look at the repeatedly scientifically disproven claims of people here promoting keto… they don’t realize the benefit they think they feel is from paying more attention to their diet, getting more exercise, and replacing the portion of their diet that was low-quality rapidly digestible processed carbs with B vitamins supplements and greens/veggies. Healthy, happy people don’t go on extreme diets for no reason - they’re too busy living their lives because what they’re doing is already working. If you replace something unhealthy with something less unhealthy you’re going to see a benefit, and if you replace something unhealthy with something healthy you’re usually going to still see a benefit even if you’ve simultaneously added something unhealthy. They also claim their glucose tolerance is improved because their blood sugar is lower due to not consuming carbs, when really the measure of glucose tolerance is being able to consume and process the sugars we get from high-fiber carbs (which we are biologically evolved to use as our optimal and preferred energy source) properly… which someone on keto is less equipped to do because all the saturated fat they’re eating cripples insulin’s ability to ferry blood sugar into cells. People claiming keto helps diabetes is like saying not eating gluten cures celiacs… you can’t measure the improvement of a disease in the absence of its triggers, because the abnormal response to the trigger *is* the disease. Point being, take the time to learn about how things work… biology is complex and there are myriad concurrent factors influencing it. If you think something is causal, look at how you feel after with or without it and also evaluate everything else (especially food and environmental) that could be a more likely cause or an influential factor. Experiment on yourself, and try to be cognizant of when you’re drawing conclusions you want to believe without making a comparison to anything or when your comparisons are intellectually dishonest (namely claiming something unhealthy is good by pitting it against something worse)
Thank you so much! I'm the one that emailed you about food addiction and this was very very helpful!! THank you for emailing me back and for sharing this important info with us each week :)
I got diagnosed with ADHD AFTER being diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes. I had no idea my uncontrollable sugar cravings had a cause I thought I was just irresponsible and depressed lol. Learning about dopamine seeking particularly through food was eye opening.
While high sugar consumption is not good for you, the thing that gives you type 2 diabetes is high *fat* consumption (think saturated/trans or refined fats, things like nuts/seeds are still healthy because they are packaged with fiber and phytonutrients and your body absorbs much less of their fat). The fats from meat, dairy, and refined oils gum up receptors in your muscle cells, blocking a chain reaction that allows insulin to ferry sugar into your muscle cells - so your body’s insulin is trying to clear blood sugar and it’s just stuck hammering at doors with stuck locks, so you need more insulin to get sugar out of your bloodstream and through the smaller number of cell doors that are still unlocking properly. That’s why we have 50+ years of studies showing that you can reverse type 2 diabetes in as little as 2 weeks on a low-fat whole food plant based diet (or for people who have had type 2 diabetes long enough to do permanent damage, reduce their insulin needs up to 80%). Unless you’re eating a ton of really simple sugars/carbs not bound to fiber, high blood sugar is a symptom of your body not being able to get it out of your bloodstream and into your muscle cells. Cutting down on sugar or carbs will mask your symptom of high blood sugar, but it will do nothing to fix your body’s difficulty with clearing blood sugar. The real dietary change you need to be making is 10% calories from fat and 95%+ whole plant foods (greens, legumes, whole grains, fruit, nuts, seeds) so your body can clear the excess of fat gumming up the receptors in your muscle cells and start using insulin effectively again and eliminate or reduce the need for a flood of supplemental insulin.
I discovered, in relatively early childhood, that eating sugar (and glucose powder) made me feel warmer and safer. So I did. At every opportunity. By my 20's I was living on coffee, sweets, cup-a-soup and toast. I'm nearly 60 now and sweeties are still a thing. I can do without if necessary, but, I'm as thin as a stick so there's no attendant obesity. So I've been hoovering up the sugar for the last 40+ years. I'm the same with nicotine. Etc.
It's crazy isn't it. Same here, to me eating sugar always made me feel like a baseline normal human being, because it brought back all the dopamine that my brain was missing, due to ADHD. But I have to say the effects of the sugar itself on my health werent good at all. I hope people and parents of ADHD children look into this more as this is very important. Sugar is bad, but it also helps people with ADHD to feel somewhat normal. Hopefully there is either a middleground or something to replace the sugar, that the people in the future keep in mind, when dealing with ADHD patients and loved ones.
@@kinetic-cybernetic Not coke. But, if I enjoy something there's a tendency for it to get done to excess, whether that be sweeties, cups of tea, spliffs, etc. Did go through a coke phase 20 or so years ago, but it surprised me how quickly I got to the point where fun had to be coke flavoured or it wasn't fun, and it's not cheap, so it struck me as kind of pointless as drugs go so I stopped and haven't touched it since. The only things I cannot get hold of, that I'd like to be able to get hold of, are LSD and MDMA. But I live in the UK - one of the most retarded, spiteful and anti-knowledge countries when it comes to "drugs".
I will be forever grateful for a hyperfocus I had 9 years ago when I got a vitamix dupe for 100 dollars I went full on whole food plant based and those date sweetened snacks and treats helped me kick my junk food habit completely 80% reduction in anxiety after 2 weeks and for the women in here I had period pain on an 11 out of 10 scale that was gone after 2 months never came back its been 9 years I'd had it for 23 years. The reduction in my what were now obviously adhd symptoms too was very noticeable unfortunately ahead were extremely traumatic times and after that ptsd and I think I'd been eating like I previously was i don't think I'd have made it. I've never really gone back because the junk food had such a severe impact on my mental health that if I eat something like now I can feel the difference. There's a huge emotional component to eating and memories associated with it its why it's a lot harder for some people to kick it. Took 2 weeks for my taste buds to change mind used to think raisins tasted of nothing but now they're like fruity sugar drops 😂 🥰
It's funny, because I have no addictions to anything be it alcohol, drugs or other. None of that shit. I hold my drink and have never sought out drugs. But sugar? Oh lordy. It is the only addiction I have that I time and time again fall back into. I have tried for years to combat it, but it always comes back. Especially during very stressful times where I feel like I don't have control over my own life. It scares me. My dad is the same. He would sometimes eat our candy when we weren't around, lol. He's not diagnosed, but he has some signs that he might have it. He has a terrible temper, always has a bunch of ideas and projects going on and constantly thinks about thing he needs to do, especially before bed. He has had, what I now know are hyperfixations several times. I remember a specific gardening project he became obsessed with when I was a kid and he read all about it and prepared for months and built the thing and maintained it for awhile. I don't remember how long we had this garden project, but eventually he grew bored of it and took it down and went on to something else. He also became obsessed with a vacation project where he wanted to hike for a month in a foreign country and he once again read book after book about it, bought all kinds of gear and monitored all his things down to how much they weighed and how many stops he wpuld need to make in order to not destroy his body. He went on this trip several times and then he was done with that too at some point and hasn't really gotten back to since. I have always vibed really well with my dad. I feel like he understands me better than my mom does. He has had his fair share of challenges in life and had a lot of different jobs when he was young and gone on all kinds of crazy adventures and has always had very particular systems and routines he stuck to. And he has a sweet tooth. I'm so much like him in so many different ways. I don't get to travel as much as he did because I can't afford it in this economy, but I don't really mind it either because traveling has never been a fixation of mine. Sorry for rambling. This was about sugar and I just ended up talking about my dad, lol. He's a good dad, though. Not perfect, definitely not perfect, but his energy and passion for all kinds of random things has always been inspiring to me and I'm very much Iike that myself. And fuck sugar. Haha
Starchy and sugary stuff helped calm my extreme anxiety as a kid I think? But actual anti-anxiety medication and adhd medication works so much better. I tried a balanced keto diet (not meat only, plenty of vegetables and even small amount of berries) and I struggled not with sugar but with ditching starch like all the different kinds of breads. I only stopped because of having to move and deal with my dead father's estate, depression, etc. The only things I have felt actively addicted to (like made my skin itch unpleasantly to wait for it, and even anticipating it made me feel kind of jittery and giddy) in my life was socializing with other people as a kid and teen (I was super lonely), and iron infusions as much older (chronic iron deficiency because of too heavy periods) because they so radically improved my quality of life.
The gold is always in the comments... Lived experience is pouring out of people. In the old days they would say 'witness'... Now science devalues this kind of testimony. Nobody has a place to express their reality anymore (except here!), the online world is usually so superficial.
Thank you for making this correlation. My dad was bang on what you described. He would study books, learn new techniques, attend classes at the local college to learn everything about Jewlery and metalsmithing, finally succeed at it... And here I just found a 25 lb box of ceramic particulate investment that he never opened, but I have found most of the tools necessary to follow through on it, as well as the wax copies he made of various rings and cool objects. He was NOT a jewler by any means, but he was always so curious about everything that he was very inspiring to me, and always will be❤. He did in fact keep sweets in his nightstand drawer 😂 Thanks for sharing. Hope you are abke to ask him for help with the big things in life that you are stuck with, while he is still around.
I mean jist the fact that he met my mom while Traveling Australia and New Zealand. He was in a tournament for Marlin Fishing for gods sake! Never caught one, but he did snag a wonderful woman :)
Dr. Barkley, thanks for all your hard work. Just diagnosed this year at 38 and I've been listening to your book "Taking Charge of Adult ADHD" and it's been invaluable for navigating this disorder. You and your colleagues that have spent so much effort and time researching this disorder have made a massive difference in my life and I appreciate you so much. Thanks you.
Hello Dr Barkley I'm not sure if you're taking suggestions but have you considered making a video on disentangling ADHD and Trauma symptoms specifically? I know you've covered their separate etiologies but I've seen many claims made that trauma is often mistaken for ADHD and vice versa based on a similar appearance such as "cognitive shifting" problems, especially relating to the conception of cPTSD. I'd be interested to learn how to disentangle these things as it is hard to parse what has good scientific backing and what has weak evidence to support it on the internet, because claims are often made without citing evidence. I've been trying to learn more about trauma, and it has been confusing to me to understand what symptoms I should be treating as ADHD and what I should try to work on from a CBT perspective
I back this request HARD. I am convinced I have CPTSD. I have ADHD that I self diagnosed correctly after watching many many hours of the Doc's adhd lectures and got a diagnosis for. But it doesnt explain all the other "stuff" that cptsd does. I have spent probably 100 hours researching all of this and have come to understand a lot but there is a lot more left..as you say, to disentangle. My main question is... can adhd get so bad in certain times, maybe under extreme stressful situations/times in life, that it can manifest symptoms or "show" what is already there, that aligns more heavily with cptsd. I have heard some things the Doc has said about isolation, and coupled with rejection sensitivity.. makes me wonder if I dont have cptsd and its just extreme adhd.
Another very interesting video, thanks for the continued information. I had a question about some of your older content on youtube, like your conferences from 10-15 years ago. Have there been significant enough changes in medicine about ADHD that would change some of the conclusions from the information in those older videos, or is the older content still pretty much up to date with modern studies/thinking around ADHD? Are there some points you would caution us about today that seemed less controversial back then?
It’s the opposite, where the condition causes us to crave sugar. I certainly do. There are many conditions in which sugar cravings are listed as a symptom/effect, namely the sex chromosome abnormalities: Klinefelter Syndrome, XXYY, etc. After researching the SCA’s, I found that it was actually the comorbidity of autism, and/or ADHD, which frequently accompanies those genetic conditions. It’s in published medical literature.
One saving grace for me is that I cannot tolerate excessive sweetness at a time. Besides, my taste buds are very selective about sweets. I am trying to cope with other symptoms.
I wonder if they considered re doing some of these studies without using aspartame. There is plenty of info out there about side effects of aspartame use.
Ive been wondering if this is where the stereotype of people who smoke a lot of cannabis came from. "Stoners" are considered to be lazy, inattentive, flakey, procrastinators, perpetually late, unmotivated, can't get their life together, and rebel against authority. That's also a good start at a list of ADHD symptoms. I know there's a correlation between ADHD and substance use. Are there any sort of studies on how many frequent drug users have ADHD? Specifically cannabis, but I'm curious about substance users in general.
there is a correlation with autism, i found many videos here on ty, look up thoma henley. and i'm both autistic and adhd. my stoner friends from back in the day were probably one, the other or both, like me. we shared similar issues around executive function and self regulation
After reading the comment section... its clear most dont seem to understand G+E=P. Genetics + Environment = Phenotype. Phenotype is the outward expression of one's genes. We know the phenotype for ADHD can manifest differently, but how much is one's environment influencing ADHD really? I see/hear people in here and in other chats etc as well as everyone I have told about my adhd say things that either place it all on genetics or on environment. As a breeder and student of genetics that equation has taught me a lot. For example there is a 20% average (varies by breed) of genetic predisposition to hip dysplasia. BUT dogs can get hip dysplasia without those genes. On top of this, dogs with the genes for HD, dont always have symptoms of HD. And to finish this off... dogs with the genes for HD + environmental aspects like jumping off high places/climbing stairs too much/accident to their back end, will INCREASE the likelihood of HD symptoms manifesting. We know that ADHD can occur from injuries. We know that people can have ADHD symptoms without actually having ADHD genetically. We also know people with ADHD can live highly successful lives with no knowledge they even have ADHD etc etc etc. It clearly is possible to reduce or exacerbate one's genetic ADHD through environmental cues. We have research that even the Doc has presented, to back this idea that we can influence our ADHD. If ADHD is not caused by sugar intake, is there any positive or negative correlations with carbs that the Doc thinks is valid?? I guess I dont blame all the people who think ADHD can be caused by just environment. Most general practitioners only have cursory knowledge unless they have learned more of the details. And most dont know ADHD is a genetic thing because it is very sneaky and can hide itself. haha
In my anecdotal experience, cutting down on carbs decreases the intensity of my ADHD symptoms(however it's never an easy process since my father brings in sweets every week, whenever he returns to home for work, and he is somehow increasingly sentimental about the purchase of the fairly expensive sweets, so rejecting it isn't an option unless I am okay with him getting silently angry with me). There have even been few studies on the positive affects of a keto diet on ADHD. Even if sugar consumption doesn't directly cause ADHD, it definitely seems to increase the severity of ADHD symptoms.
When you cut down on sugar, what did you replace it with? Would it possibly be healthy foods like nuts, seeds, and greens? That’s not a benefit of keto, that’s a benefit of making a healthy swap. The only studies showing benefit of keto are for people with severe epilepsy that doesn’t respond to other medications and the benefit of reduction in seizures from keto’s brain changes outweighs the increased mortality that comes with being on keto long-term. Have the people promoting this actually cited any studies (generally they don’t)? If so, did you actually read them? Who paid for the “studies” and what were the conflicts of interest declared? Were they ever peer-reviewed and published? Was there a control group or any comparison to a heart-disease-reversing whole-food plant-based diet? Just being the subject of a dietary intervention study gets people unconsciously making positive diet and lifestyle changes they wouldn’t ordinarily make, so comparative controls are incredibly important. You can find plenty of keto people saying there are studies that butter lowers your cholesterol, but if you take the time to do your research you’ll find that they’re paid for by the dairy industry and making intellectually dishonest comparisons like adding 1 Tbsp of butter to the diet of one group to like 1 cup of coconut oil in another group… of course the butter group’s outcomes will be less worse because they’re consuming 1/16 of the amount of added fat as the other group. Then some blogger or personal trainer with middle-school level understanding of biology repeats it all over the internet because it gets them viewers, ad revenue, or supplement sales. Consider getting your science from qualified professionals who aren’t trying to sell you something.
I have found that sugar from natural sources such as eating plain dates and grapes helps me focus, but sugar from processed food like candy bars somehow has the opposite effect.
the thing is... i'm pretty sure the craving for sugar, or high carb foods isn't bigger with higher adhd symptoms, but it's much harder to resist that urge to consume suger/high carb foods! i still feel the same craving for suger/high carb foods (and same goes for caffaine btw), but with my medication i'm actually mor often than not able to resist and don't snack like a maniac! 😬😵💫
Thats a lot of time to say no.😂 A thought I had about adult diet and adhd that is corollary is poor diet choices due to inattention to time and hunger. Suddenly you realize you're hungry and haven't eaten anything all day. Well it's fast food for a reason.
Hi Russell - any thoughts why so many scientists and researchers keep concluding that correlation equals causation? Not just in this field either, it seems to happen across all scientific fields. I would have expected this to be taught during the basics of any science/medical based college or university course.
One of the difficult things to come to terms with as an adult is… a lot of people are bad at their jobs. And as we’ve become increasingly anti-intellectual as a culture, we’ve made it socially acceptable by rewarding people for doubling down on willful ignorance. There’s the old joke “what do you call a doctor who graduated from Harvard with a D average?” with the punch line being “a Harvard-educated doctor”. Just because somebody passed the lowest barrier of entry into their field doesn’t mean they’re good at it, or that they feel any ethical obligation to promote true information that doesn’t financially benefit them. Coupled with decades of defunding public education, movements to “abolish critical thinking in schools because it forces people to question their deeply-held beliefs” (that’s an actual published policy goal of the Texas Republican Party from the 2000s), lack of access to quality K-12 education or being unable to afford higher education, and the general demonization of science while elevating voices who promote sensationalized misinformation, most people don’t even listen to (let alone trust) sources that satisfy a reasonable minimum bar to be qualified to speak to a subject.
Hi Dr. Barkley, what do you think about Dr. William Walsh protocol that’s designed to cure Cu/Zn imbalance that’s prevelant in ADHD and treatment to address under-methylation?
I suspect that Bill Watterson's "Calvin and Hobbes" helped spread the belief that excessive consumption of sugar causes ADHD; but as much as Calvin loves his Frosted Sugar Bombs, I think a close look at his mother would suggest that his ADHD is genetic (but that is something Watterson himself would have to confirm).
If anything, I would like to see a study done on protein deficiency and ADHD. My ADHD symptoms are greatly exacerbated when I don’t have adequate protein in my diet. Not sure if it is more causality or correlation.
6 months ago dealing with severe adhd symptoms and massive brain fog and always tired... I thought maybe I dont get enough calories and/or my nutrition is imbalanced. I spent time inputting my diet into various calculators to see if I was deficient. And I was massively missing out on protein and calories in general. I switched to a high protein/high fat/zero carb diet and have seen a massive reduction in symptoms. My brain is working MUCH better. Still have adhd but it is not the same as before this switch. You should look into this for yourself.
Human breast milk is literally the optimal food for the most rapid period of brain development you ever experience after being born, and once you remove the water it’s mostly carbs and only around 10% protein… myths inflating the need for protein are rooted in an early 1900s study where baby rats failed to flourish on a low protein diet, but rats have higher protein needs than humans and the higher protein in rat milk/diets reflects that. There is no documented case of disease caused by dietary protein deficiency that I’m aware of, because protein is in virtually everything… but there is plenty of research documenting that over consuming protein is inflammatory and can trigger disease. A small to average height woman with a BMI in the athletic range can generally hit her protein RDA by eating a single peanut butter sandwich with wheat bread. If you tracked your nutrition with a tool like Cronometer and weren’t hitting the RDA, you were likely eating really poor quality calories (chips, microwavable dinners, etc) with low nutritive value or a generally insufficient number of calories. The only reason to increase protein over the RDA is if your body has a temporary need to build new tissue, like if you are building a lot of new muscle at the gym or recovering from surgery. It’s much more likely that you are attributing other diet or lifestyle changes you made when you started increasing your protein consumption to being a benefit of protein… whether it’s improving your sleep hygiene, getting more exercise, swapping out junk food for healthier or less-worse alternatives, adding greens/veggies/fruit to your protein smoothies/meals, making healthier food choices in general by virtue of paying more attention to what you’re eating, etc. If you want research, consider checking out nutritionfacts.org which is a nonprofit headed by a medical doctor with the mission of reviewing nutrition research and providing science-backed health education to medical professionals and laypeople. The videos and articles have citations and links to the supporting research. One of the things he does a great job of is hammering home “as compared to what?” when drawing conclusions about whether something has a benefit or caused some improvement instead of jumping to some emotionally-validating conclusion we want to be true.
I did it for 3 months. Wound up dropping a 6yr drinking everyday and nicotine addiction. Lost all my belly fat. My face looks 10yrs younger. I feel 15yrs younger. I had weird back pain that went away after the first month. Had the pain for about 15yrs. My cracked heels dissapeared and look healthy now. I took a TOVA test the week I started and another a month in. 23pt score increase (expected increase with ADHD medication is a 5pts) and I'm guessing that was due to the keto. Highly recommend. Also took creatine and a lot of wild blueberries
@@oysterchampion8998 how did you deal with being tired in the first weeks of keto? I always end up really fatigued and give up. I take mct oil and electrolytes but still
@NatalieNicole2222 I surprisingly was only fatigued for the first 3 or 4 days. Started on a Friday by chance so had the weekend to do nothing. Energy went way up after that. I took a lot of B vitamins and milk thistle and some other supplements that are recommended for keto based off what I read and watched. Maybe that helped but I didn't take most of them until a month or so into it.
For me, not consuming any added sugar and not taking my ADHD medication feels exactly the same as when I was consuming added sugar daily while taking my ADHD medication.
Hi dr. I remember being in 5th grade and having a teacher tell my mother I wasn’t allowed to eat bananas because they had to much sugar (early 2000s) … so ridiculous ….
Thank you for this! Now, please, can you kill the myth about gluten and ADHD too? (Non celiac disease) That’s too something I hear often…(and don’t believe in)..
What is the effect on dopamine in the brain of consuming sugary foods? Is it possible that some people with ADHD are self-medicating with sugar? This might suggest causation in the opposite direction.
Thanks, sugar can be a way for the child to obtain a stimulant substitute with or without medication. As a child I would add six+ teaspoons of sugar to my corn flakes and could manage fairly well in school, if I had something else for breakfast low in sugar then I had troubles... Then I discovered coffee. Later at work if I was in the office I'd drink close to a pot of coffee, if I was out in the field/woods one cup or less was fine and I'd have issues at night. Interesting on the aspartame, personally at first I found that it tasted a bit weird then years later it gave me migraines. For my youngest son sugar was fine but he would be absolutely wired with aspartame and awake half the night, as an adult he finds aspartame makes him feel weird so he avoids it.
There is a bunch of research demonstrating neurological side effects of artificial sweeteners… in the 90s the pink packets (sweet n low?) used to have tiny hard to read red writing on the back saying “this product is known to cause cancer in laboratory animals”, which to my recollection quietly disappeared from packaging at some point during the corporate deregulation efforts of Bush Jr’s administrions. Neurological reactions aside, artificial sweeteners are hundreds to thousands of times sweeter than normal sugar. Consuming them distorts your brain and body’s perception of sweetness away from what’s natural (so it takes a lot more sugar to perceive foods containing natural sugars as sweet), and when your taste buds get hit with such extreme sweetness your body ramps up insulin production with the expectation that it’s about to have to handle the sweetness equivalent of 1-10 cups of sugar … when your body never gets hit with the actual sugar, you end up craving and eating more food throughout the day to compensate for the calories your body has been prepped and waiting for since your taste buds were hammered with the artificial sweetener. This is believed to be the causal mechanism for the known link between artificial sweetener consumption and long-term weight gain
I figured I knew this stuff so was going to skip, but was hoping some information about glucose and the forebrain and type 1 diabetes might be discussed. My understanding is people with type 1 have higher rates of ADHD, possibly from vessel damage, but alternatively, it may be found more often due to the taxing EF requirements for diabetes. I know the older videos and maybe the book talks about snacks to tweak blood glucose in the brain during intense activity. So yeah sugar doesn't cause ADHD, but isn't there some interesting things to discuss about sugar and ADHD outside of the causality question?
Two of my seven children were behaviorally reactive to certain food dyes. This was not a subtle thing; it was as if someone toggled a switch and the unhinged zombies came out. (I remember once coming home to a child in the center of the living room, neck cranked up, staring at the ceiling fan, as he spun to keep pace. His dad had given him colorful sugar cereal.) We rarely experienced this as I did the shopping and never brought things into the house that any of the kids were allergic, sensitive, reactive to it intolerant of. Not what I’m wondering is, as so many sugar foods marketed to kids are loaded with food dyes, if people are attributing to sugar what’s actually sensitivity and reactivity to some food dyes.
@@elemental7726 , maybe “used your brain” by listening to the lived experience of others and asking clarifying questions BEFORE rendering judgment and insulting them to boot. No, diabetes is rampant in my family for generations. I raised my children on a low glycemic index diet. The only time my kids would get carb (including much sugar at all) overloaded was when they were with my diabetic mother or occasionally their father. (My diabetic MIL was much more respectful of parenting boundaries.) It only happened with certain dyes, which generally were paired with sugar, not with sugar alone.
@@elemental7726sugar high isn’t really a thing, those claims are situational misattribution. There was a study where researchers fed kindergarten aged children a bunch of sugar and then did calm activities with them like reading, and then had their parents rate their behavior. On another day, the researchers didn’t feed the children any sugar but hyped them up with a lot of high energy play, and then asked their parents to rate their behavior. The parents all thought the children were ‘sugar high’ on the high energy play day when they’d actually had no added sugar, and no parents noted behavioral complaints after the high sugar calm activity day. If you take a kid to a carnival and they’re hyper, they’re amped up about being able to run around in a new place surrounded by exciting things and that they got to eat special treats… it’s not the sugar in their cotton candy or ice cream getting them excited, it’s the environment and novelty of the experience.
@@bryonyvaughn2427there are certain dyes (especially some of the reds) that are known to be causal triggers for adhd, though if the trigger is combined with an exciting rapidly digestible processed carb he doesn’t normally get to eat the excitement could exacerbate his response to it. It could be worth “playing a taste test game” with your kid where you blindfolded feed them a similar dye-free version of a few spoons of the cereal one day and the dye-filled version another day and see how reacts, and just mix in tasting a few different things (I think cascadian farms has some fruit loop / fruity pebbles alternatives that use natural dyes from foods like beets, greens, and spices. Have the rest of their meals and activities on both days be the same. Then you can say with a higher degree of confidence what’s situational vs what’s biologically reactive. If diabetes is rampant in your family, you should try to keep dietary fat under 10% unless it’s in a whole plant food (nuts, seeds, and avocados are fine because the oil is bound to fiber and phytonutrients and your body absorbs much less of it). Saturated fats (from dairy, meat, eggs, refined oils) gum up receptors in your muscle cells and block a chain reaction that needs to take place for your body’s insulin to ferry blood sugar into your muscle cells… when your cells are gummed up with saturated fat, your your insulin is stuck hammering at doors with stuck locks until it can finally find one that it can open. You can learn more about this at nutritionfacts.org, a nonprofit devoted to reviewing nutrition research and providing science-backed nutrition education
Are there any studies on how adhd may present in patients who likely have inherited it versus those who have had high lead exposure? Given the two different causes, would they respond the same way to medication or would they respond differently?
Hey dr Russ! I was wondering, given that your audience is probably mostly people with ADHD, do people stop watching your videos after a couple minutes a lot? I like your videos but I find myself getting distracted while watching unfortunately.
I Am extremely ADHD, I am 66 years old, I'm sorry to be commenting in this video about a previous video. it comes with the territory 😊. Anyways I don't agree with your time blindness theory, I could even say that at times my experience is opposite.
Anxiety and depression should decrease with medication and lifestyle changes… if you have adhd, they are likely symptoms of it not being managed. Eat more whole plant foods and try to get 10k steps per day. Make positive psychology exercises part of your everyday routine. For medication, that’s something you need to figure out based on your own brain chemistry. What are ways you’ve been self-medicating, and what kinds of things do you get lost in? You may need a medication that increases dopamine, norepinephrine, or some combination of both depending on the specific chemistry of your body.
Thank you for covering this. Wouldnt the entire united states have adhd if sugar was the causation?! 😅 this subject will always irritate the life outta me, including caffeine being the cause too! 🫠
Our whole family has adhd (my mother has it as did my grandpa, as well as my sons). Sugar doesn’t cause it, but it definitely doesn’t alleviate our symptoms. 😂 We also found that gluten and a high-carb diet is AWFUL for adhd symptoms. I can feel the change within hours of eating a gluten-filled meal. My kids grades decline.
I have found the same as you and trying to convince my entire family with adhd to try it for themselves too. zero carbs and high fat for the brain fuel. I never gained any weight for switching from carbs to fat for brain fuel.
I dont know if you mean plaque, but in my 40's and been on a zero carb diet for nearly 4 months. And surprisingly my teeth plaque that was very bad has nearly disappeared along with a 25 year sever autoimmune disorder that affected my gut and skin badly. I am stunned with all that is clearing up and how fast.
13:20 I have observed this in recent life, and feel vindicated having heard you confirm it! The expectation of bad behaviour on sugar. Confirmation bias?
There is ADHD psychiatrist in Poland "Jarosław Jóźwiak" one of the biggest in Europe, he thinks that borderline personality disorder could potentially be a subtype of ADHD, do you have any thoughts of this ?, personally as person with both i feel very triggered
Borderline Personality Disorder could be a trauma response that's a step above Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria, itself a trauma response to enduring persistent / repeated social rejection with some other underlying cause. In this case, untreated neurodevelopmental disorders (like ADHD) being a significant contributor to experiences of social trauma.
@@LucarioBoricua yeah, i know very well what they are !! , it's pointless to counter his argument without properly representing it, but it is basically very ridiculous, and I want to bring more attention to this trend of thought
I agree with him on most things but I have heard him say a few things that are def hyperbolic and made my eyebrows go cross. haha And this is one of them. But honestly I hear many many people who should know better... not know better. I am convinced 99% of the population is stuck on a stereotype of adhd and anything that fits in with that stereotype constitutes a cause for adhd.
Yes, I think that eating bad food results in bad brain activity, and of course it wouldn't be a surprise that this would cause some ADHD like symptoms, same with social media, and some people will just have some ADHD symptoms anyway, ADHD is not a definitive diagnosis, it's not like you're either pregnant or not pregnant, it's more like have you got IBS, you may have a little digestive issues or they could be life limiting caused by Chrons or diverticulitis or something, and is dependant to some extent on what you eat. Having indigestion does NOT mean you have a bowel disease, and eating better will make it go away, not the case with an actual bowel disease, same with ADHD there is an overlap between people with some mild ADHD symptoms because of lifestyle, but it's not actiual ADHD.
Very curious what Dr.Barkey thinks of no/low carb diets in regards to adhd??? I have been on a ZERO carb/high fat diet for 3 months now. Previously was on a low carb diet and I have gone from over the top sever symptoms to MUCH milder adhd symptoms (not curable). No medication used for a few years now, as none ever seems to work (Canadian health care leaves a lot to be desired though...). No other changes that I think would be involved. Maybe something else is causing the reduction om adhd symptoms somehow but the 25 year sever autoimmune disorder I have that affects my gut and skin have also nearly disappeared comparably speaking. I am going to study up on this heavily now. Thanks DOC!!!!
I do remember the Doc mentioning somewhere, maybe an older lecture, to sip some sugar throughout the day. I am finding that any carbs at all makes me real foggy the next day. Is this just me somehow making up this correlation between carbs and my brain fog along with a host of other symptoms that affect my cognition?
water caused my ADHD. I drank water as a child. Other things that led to my adhd - air, video games, basketball and curse by jesus himself. Or I am genetically born this, I don't know.
Dr B is at pains to distinguish a specific disease pathology from general lifestyle impacts... Which is fine in academia, but in the wild west of society where influencers of all types have direct effects on people... It's a very asymmetric battle. Going also to posit Dr B has the education intelligence & lifestyle to approach a virtuous wellbeing regime that most people never achieve. In terms of mental control, the random crap we put in our bodies on a daily is a massive contributor to cognition, motivation, mood... Mostly negative. But correlation is not proof of causality of course. There's hardly anybody in the 'developed' world not already addicted & toxified by the laundry list of 'foods' we love to abuse. People who say they're fine are usually delusional. The vast majority will have a measurably shorter life and major physical health deficits from their lifestyle choices, especially what (& how much) they 'choose' to eat. Mostly folks just don't think at ALL. Many do know they have a problem but are powerless to effect change. It's the curse of abundance & freedom we enjoy. In the perception of media, linking this toxic soup with ADHD is understandable - They know the zeitgeist term ADHD gets clicks & views so truth never gets in the way of a chance to sell something...
I don't disagree with some of your analysis, especially about media looking for clicks by using ADHD to create stories, or globally how we are effected by influencers or advertising etc... On the other hand I have a bit of an issue with equating intelligence and making health directed decisions in your life. Maximizing one's life span is not the ultimate goal for most people, it's usually a factor in decisions we make, but we mostly seek ''happiness'' (however one defines it for themselves). Many doctors smoke, many nutritionists are overweight, many academics will make poor scientific conclusions or fall prey to their biases, that is not a sign of lack of intelligence, but just of being human. I believe you are attributing ethics to what Dr. Barkley is explaining in this video, whereas you will never hear doctors, psychiatrists, or psychologists, tell you how to live your life. They will give you information on how your body works and available treatments, but in the end the decision is with you to follow that or not. Many people make risky/dangerous decisions every day that aren't optimal, or healthy, or even safe, but make them happy. Like smoking, eating unhealthy foods, extreme sports, drugs etc... That's not a sign of lack of intelligence, but of that individual making decisions that satisfy them. I for one would rather be happy and live to 40 then be unhappy and live 80, but each person gets to make that decision for themselves.
@@FlynnaTH-cam Very well said. The trick with ADHD is to avoid labelling people less intelligent, as it's a flaw to implement the knowledge, rather than the knowledge itself. You went further into self-determination, freedom of choice, maybe destiny... A popular scientist called Sapolski(?) has recently released a book on the subject of free will ( or lack of it). I don't have any solutions... my general point was that 'regular' folk are FAR from virtuous, and yet want to label others as ADHD i.e. deficient. Stones/ glass houses!
@@jonr6680 Oh, yeah for sure, I very much agree with your last general point. I think the major issue is that there's an implicit appeal to normality within most people, if not all. Therefore most people will try to fit in, by copying behavior, speech, appearance, ideas etc... which isn't intrinsically a bad thing, except that anything that goes against that norm will be seen as abnormal, weird, or strange... We see it about skin color, gender, sexual orientation, handicap whether it's physical or mental, and as early as childhood, which is most likely learned behavior, with casual bullying about clothes, height etc... I don't have any solutions either, seeing how history repeats itself, and these perceptions have not changed with time does not bode well for people who diverge from the norm, which I personally do on many aspects.
Except ADHD is highly genetically related. What you're saying is the equivalent of blaming a particular excess of some micronutrient in one's diet to shortsightedness
Keto is not healthy… for-profit entities promoting keto have pumped millions into trying to demonstrate benefits of keto and gone bankrupt… it decreases your lifespan (heart disease, increased cancer risk, etc), and the only people who keto is medically recommended for are ones with severe epilepsy where the brain changes involved in keto reduces their incidents of seizures and the benefit of less severe and frequent seizures outweighs the negative outcomes of being on a keto diet. People who feel better on keto or paleo generally haven’t been doing it very long and are experiencing a combination of the placebo effect + they replaced high carb low fiber highly processed foods in their diet with greens and low-carb veggies as part of their dietary change and then they misattribute the improvement to the diet in its entirety instead of the subset of healthy swaps they made when they adopted the diet. I would challenge you to try getting 50-100 grams of fiber from food (not supplements) per day and see how that impacts your ADHD, depression, energy, and lipid/metabolic panel numbers.
Video games are designed to give you dopamine hits, similar to social media. That can most definitely be addictive, especially for someone with a dopamine deficiency.
You are absolutely right. Anecdotally, my consumption of sugars and carbs was a symptom of the severity of my ADHD, and absolutely not a causal factor. I used sugar to self-medicate as I was undiagnosed for over 4 decades. Sugar triggers the production of dopamine so my sugar addiction was a product of a neurotransmitter dysfunction and deficit.
I recently cut ALL carbs and my symptoms massively reduced. Stimulants dont work for me and nothing else they tried has either but seemingly no carbs does help big time. Very high fat intake though, so maybe this is fueling my brain better.
Besides carbs there are some sort of carbs that trigger me worse the symptoms of ADHD like oat
@@Benjamin-u7fcinnamon tea helps me whenever I intake a lot of carbs. Unfortunately, it happens. Do you exercise? Because I do but can't do it with energy without carbs. Still can't find a solution for this.
@@Jofferpg2009 Wow! There are several different versions of oats available for making into oatmeal / porridge. I wonder if you are eating the higher-glycaemic ones such as instant oats? Traditional oats tend to have a much lower-glycaemic-index.
Or, obivously I am an amateur commentator, it could be some other reason.
Still unexpected and surprising.
Cheers,
Anna.
0:34 "This is an idea that WILL NOT DIE. I feel like I'm playing scientific whack-a-mole with this idea" LOL
Looking fine as wine, Dr. Barkley. Shirt looks nice on you! Thank you for everything you are doing for the ADHD community!
I was just diagnosed with ADHD last month at the age of 33 and I always wondered about this because of all the sugar I consumed as a child.
Causation =/= correlation. Who says that you didn't eat all the sugar because of the deficiency in your brain, that you were just trying to compensate for? To me, eating sugar always felt like that when I did, I finally felt "OKAY", like a normal human being, and that kind of checks out, because that's exactly what ADHD does, it deprives your brain of dopamine and sugar brings back the dopamine.
I used to think it was the aspartame in the 80s until I realised that my mum had it too and likely my dad my youngest sister almost certainly and my grandparents so definitely more likely to be genetic for my lot
It’s just a symptom, and it’s important to not mistake the symptom with being a cause instead of an effect.
For example, if you look at the repeatedly scientifically disproven claims of people here promoting keto… they don’t realize the benefit they think they feel is from paying more attention to their diet, getting more exercise, and replacing the portion of their diet that was low-quality rapidly digestible processed carbs with B vitamins supplements and greens/veggies. Healthy, happy people don’t go on extreme diets for no reason - they’re too busy living their lives because what they’re doing is already working. If you replace something unhealthy with something less unhealthy you’re going to see a benefit, and if you replace something unhealthy with something healthy you’re usually going to still see a benefit even if you’ve simultaneously added something unhealthy. They also claim their glucose tolerance is improved because their blood sugar is lower due to not consuming carbs, when really the measure of glucose tolerance is being able to consume and process the sugars we get from high-fiber carbs (which we are biologically evolved to use as our optimal and preferred energy source) properly… which someone on keto is less equipped to do because all the saturated fat they’re eating cripples insulin’s ability to ferry blood sugar into cells. People claiming keto helps diabetes is like saying not eating gluten cures celiacs… you can’t measure the improvement of a disease in the absence of its triggers, because the abnormal response to the trigger *is* the disease.
Point being, take the time to learn about how things work… biology is complex and there are myriad concurrent factors influencing it. If you think something is causal, look at how you feel after with or without it and also evaluate everything else (especially food and environmental) that could be a more likely cause or an influential factor. Experiment on yourself, and try to be cognizant of when you’re drawing conclusions you want to believe without making a comparison to anything or when your comparisons are intellectually dishonest (namely claiming something unhealthy is good by pitting it against something worse)
Thank you so much! I'm the one that emailed you about food addiction and this was very very helpful!! THank you for emailing me back and for sharing this important info with us each week :)
I got diagnosed with ADHD AFTER being diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes. I had no idea my uncontrollable sugar cravings had a cause I thought I was just irresponsible and depressed lol. Learning about dopamine seeking particularly through food was eye opening.
While high sugar consumption is not good for you, the thing that gives you type 2 diabetes is high *fat* consumption (think saturated/trans or refined fats, things like nuts/seeds are still healthy because they are packaged with fiber and phytonutrients and your body absorbs much less of their fat). The fats from meat, dairy, and refined oils gum up receptors in your muscle cells, blocking a chain reaction that allows insulin to ferry sugar into your muscle cells - so your body’s insulin is trying to clear blood sugar and it’s just stuck hammering at doors with stuck locks, so you need more insulin to get sugar out of your bloodstream and through the smaller number of cell doors that are still unlocking properly. That’s why we have 50+ years of studies showing that you can reverse type 2 diabetes in as little as 2 weeks on a low-fat whole food plant based diet (or for people who have had type 2 diabetes long enough to do permanent damage, reduce their insulin needs up to 80%). Unless you’re eating a ton of really simple sugars/carbs not bound to fiber, high blood sugar is a symptom of your body not being able to get it out of your bloodstream and into your muscle cells. Cutting down on sugar or carbs will mask your symptom of high blood sugar, but it will do nothing to fix your body’s difficulty with clearing blood sugar. The real dietary change you need to be making is 10% calories from fat and 95%+ whole plant foods (greens, legumes, whole grains, fruit, nuts, seeds) so your body can clear the excess of fat gumming up the receptors in your muscle cells and start using insulin effectively again and eliminate or reduce the need for a flood of supplemental insulin.
I discovered, in relatively early childhood, that eating sugar (and glucose powder) made me feel warmer and safer. So I did. At every opportunity. By my 20's I was living on coffee, sweets, cup-a-soup and toast. I'm nearly 60 now and sweeties are still a thing. I can do without if necessary, but, I'm as thin as a stick so there's no attendant obesity. So I've been hoovering up the sugar for the last 40+ years.
I'm the same with nicotine. Etc.
It's crazy isn't it. Same here, to me eating sugar always made me feel like a baseline normal human being, because it brought back all the dopamine that my brain was missing, due to ADHD. But I have to say the effects of the sugar itself on my health werent good at all.
I hope people and parents of ADHD children look into this more as this is very important. Sugar is bad, but it also helps people with ADHD to feel somewhat normal. Hopefully there is either a middleground or something to replace the sugar, that the people in the future keep in mind, when dealing with ADHD patients and loved ones.
@@kinetic-cybernetic Not coke. But, if I enjoy something there's a tendency for it to get done to excess, whether that be sweeties, cups of tea, spliffs, etc. Did go through a coke phase 20 or so years ago, but it surprised me how quickly I got to the point where fun had to be coke flavoured or it wasn't fun, and it's not cheap, so it struck me as kind of pointless as drugs go so I stopped and haven't touched it since. The only things I cannot get hold of, that I'd like to be able to get hold of, are LSD and MDMA. But I live in the UK - one of the most retarded, spiteful and anti-knowledge countries when it comes to "drugs".
@@kinetic-cyberneticLol
I will be forever grateful for a hyperfocus I had 9 years ago when I got a vitamix dupe for 100 dollars I went full on whole food plant based and those date sweetened snacks and treats helped me kick my junk food habit completely 80% reduction in anxiety after 2 weeks and for the women in here I had period pain on an 11 out of 10 scale that was gone after 2 months never came back its been 9 years I'd had it for 23 years.
The reduction in my what were now obviously adhd symptoms too was very noticeable unfortunately ahead were extremely traumatic times and after that ptsd and I think I'd been eating like I previously was i don't think I'd have made it.
I've never really gone back because the junk food had such a severe impact on my mental health that if I eat something like now I can feel the difference.
There's a huge emotional component to eating and memories associated with it its why it's a lot harder for some people to kick it.
Took 2 weeks for my taste buds to change mind used to think raisins tasted of nothing but now they're like fruity sugar drops 😂 🥰
It's funny, because I have no addictions to anything be it alcohol, drugs or other. None of that shit. I hold my drink and have never sought out drugs.
But sugar? Oh lordy. It is the only addiction I have that I time and time again fall back into. I have tried for years to combat it, but it always comes back. Especially during very stressful times where I feel like I don't have control over my own life. It scares me. My dad is the same. He would sometimes eat our candy when we weren't around, lol. He's not diagnosed, but he has some signs that he might have it. He has a terrible temper, always has a bunch of ideas and projects going on and constantly thinks about thing he needs to do, especially before bed. He has had, what I now know are hyperfixations several times. I remember a specific gardening project he became obsessed with when I was a kid and he read all about it and prepared for months and built the thing and maintained it for awhile. I don't remember how long we had this garden project, but eventually he grew bored of it and took it down and went on to something else. He also became obsessed with a vacation project where he wanted to hike for a month in a foreign country and he once again read book after book about it, bought all kinds of gear and monitored all his things down to how much they weighed and how many stops he wpuld need to make in order to not destroy his body.
He went on this trip several times and then he was done with that too at some point and hasn't really gotten back to since.
I have always vibed really well with my dad. I feel like he understands me better than my mom does. He has had his fair share of challenges in life and had a lot of different jobs when he was young and gone on all kinds of crazy adventures and has always had very particular systems and routines he stuck to.
And he has a sweet tooth. I'm so much like him in so many different ways. I don't get to travel as much as he did because I can't afford it in this economy, but I don't really mind it either because traveling has never been a fixation of mine.
Sorry for rambling. This was about sugar and I just ended up talking about my dad, lol. He's a good dad, though. Not perfect, definitely not perfect, but his energy and passion for all kinds of random things has always been inspiring to me and I'm very much Iike that myself.
And fuck sugar. Haha
Starchy and sugary stuff helped calm my extreme anxiety as a kid I think? But actual anti-anxiety medication and adhd medication works so much better.
I tried a balanced keto diet (not meat only, plenty of vegetables and even small amount of berries) and I struggled not with sugar but with ditching starch like all the different kinds of breads. I only stopped because of having to move and deal with my dead father's estate, depression, etc.
The only things I have felt actively addicted to (like made my skin itch unpleasantly to wait for it, and even anticipating it made me feel kind of jittery and giddy) in my life was socializing with other people as a kid and teen (I was super lonely), and iron infusions as much older (chronic iron deficiency because of too heavy periods) because they so radically improved my quality of life.
The gold is always in the comments... Lived experience is pouring out of people. In the old days they would say 'witness'... Now science devalues this kind of testimony. Nobody has a place to express their reality anymore (except here!), the online world is usually so superficial.
Thank you for making this correlation. My dad was bang on what you described. He would study books, learn new techniques, attend classes at the local college to learn everything about Jewlery and metalsmithing, finally succeed at it... And here I just found a 25 lb box of ceramic particulate investment that he never opened, but I have found most of the tools necessary to follow through on it, as well as the wax copies he made of various rings and cool objects.
He was NOT a jewler by any means, but he was always so curious about everything that he was very inspiring to me, and always will be❤. He did in fact keep sweets in his nightstand drawer 😂
Thanks for sharing. Hope you are abke to ask him for help with the big things in life that you are stuck with, while he is still around.
I mean jist the fact that he met my mom while Traveling Australia and New Zealand. He was in a tournament for Marlin Fishing for gods sake! Never caught one, but he did snag a wonderful woman :)
Very cool. I'm like your dad and my daughter just got diagnosed. Both our handwriting is identical
Sweets/candies help reduce my ADHD symptoms. I always presumed it was giving me that lacking dopamine-type stimulation.
Just wanted to say I love you Dr Barkley; the beautiful voice of reason. 😊
Dr. Barkley, thanks for all your hard work. Just diagnosed this year at 38 and I've been listening to your book "Taking Charge of Adult ADHD" and it's been invaluable for navigating this disorder. You and your colleagues that have spent so much effort and time researching this disorder have made a massive difference in my life and I appreciate you so much. Thanks you.
Hello Dr Barkley I'm not sure if you're taking suggestions but have you considered making a video on disentangling ADHD and Trauma symptoms specifically? I know you've covered their separate etiologies but I've seen many claims made that trauma is often mistaken for ADHD and vice versa based on a similar appearance such as "cognitive shifting" problems, especially relating to the conception of cPTSD.
I'd be interested to learn how to disentangle these things as it is hard to parse what has good scientific backing and what has weak evidence to support it on the internet, because claims are often made without citing evidence. I've been trying to learn more about trauma, and it has been confusing to me to understand what symptoms I should be treating as ADHD and what I should try to work on from a CBT perspective
I back this request HARD. I am convinced I have CPTSD. I have ADHD that I self diagnosed correctly after watching many many hours of the Doc's adhd lectures and got a diagnosis for. But it doesnt explain all the other "stuff" that cptsd does. I have spent probably 100 hours researching all of this and have come to understand a lot but there is a lot more left..as you say, to disentangle.
My main question is... can adhd get so bad in certain times, maybe under extreme stressful situations/times in life, that it can manifest symptoms or "show" what is already there, that aligns more heavily with cptsd. I have heard some things the Doc has said about isolation, and coupled with rejection sensitivity.. makes me wonder if I dont have cptsd and its just extreme adhd.
Doctor, you look stunning in your summer colors!! Big fan of yours ❤
Thank you for sharing all your knowledge. I'm a big fan from Brazil 🇧🇷.
Another very interesting video, thanks for the continued information.
I had a question about some of your older content on youtube, like your conferences from 10-15 years ago.
Have there been significant enough changes in medicine about ADHD that would change some of the conclusions from the information in those older videos, or is the older content still pretty much up to date with modern studies/thinking around ADHD?
Are there some points you would caution us about today that seemed less controversial back then?
Brilliant as usual Russ! What will we do to celebrate the 100k subscribers? 🎉
It’s the opposite, where the condition causes us to crave sugar. I certainly do. There are many conditions in which sugar cravings are listed as a symptom/effect, namely the sex chromosome abnormalities: Klinefelter Syndrome, XXYY, etc. After researching the SCA’s, I found that it was actually the comorbidity of autism, and/or ADHD, which frequently accompanies those genetic conditions. It’s in published medical literature.
Love the new tee Russell. Thanks for your content I greatly appreciate it.
One saving grace for me is that I cannot tolerate excessive sweetness at a time. Besides, my taste buds are very selective about sweets.
I am trying to cope with other symptoms.
Expectations of children .. maybe check within urself as parents whether u have adhd urself
This is absolutely fantastic.
I wonder if they considered re doing some of these studies without using aspartame. There is plenty of info out there about side effects of aspartame use.
Yes! I was wondering the exact same thing.
No there's not lol.
Ive been wondering if this is where the stereotype of people who smoke a lot of cannabis came from.
"Stoners" are considered to be lazy, inattentive, flakey, procrastinators, perpetually late, unmotivated, can't get their life together, and rebel against authority.
That's also a good start at a list of ADHD symptoms.
I know there's a correlation between ADHD and substance use. Are there any sort of studies on how many frequent drug users have ADHD? Specifically cannabis, but I'm curious about substance users in general.
there is a correlation with autism, i found many videos here on ty, look up thoma henley. and i'm both autistic and adhd. my stoner friends from back in the day were probably one, the other or both, like me. we shared similar issues around executive function and self regulation
After reading the comment section... its clear most dont seem to understand G+E=P.
Genetics + Environment = Phenotype. Phenotype is the outward expression of one's genes.
We know the phenotype for ADHD can manifest differently, but how much is one's environment influencing ADHD really?
I see/hear people in here and in other chats etc as well as everyone I have told about my adhd say things that either place it all on genetics or on environment.
As a breeder and student of genetics that equation has taught me a lot.
For example there is a 20% average (varies by breed) of genetic predisposition to hip dysplasia. BUT dogs can get hip dysplasia without those genes. On top of this, dogs with the genes for HD, dont always have symptoms of HD. And to finish this off... dogs with the genes for HD + environmental aspects like jumping off high places/climbing stairs too much/accident to their back end, will INCREASE the likelihood of HD symptoms manifesting.
We know that ADHD can occur from injuries. We know that people can have ADHD symptoms without actually having ADHD genetically. We also know people with ADHD can live highly successful lives with no knowledge they even have ADHD etc etc etc.
It clearly is possible to reduce or exacerbate one's genetic ADHD through environmental cues. We have research that even the Doc has presented, to back this idea that we can influence our ADHD. If ADHD is not caused by sugar intake, is there any positive or negative correlations with carbs that the Doc thinks is valid??
I guess I dont blame all the people who think ADHD can be caused by just environment. Most general practitioners only have cursory knowledge unless they have learned more of the details. And most dont know ADHD is a genetic thing because it is very sneaky and can hide itself. haha
In my anecdotal experience, cutting down on carbs decreases the intensity of my ADHD symptoms(however it's never an easy process since my father brings in sweets every week, whenever he returns to home for work, and he is somehow increasingly sentimental about the purchase of the fairly expensive sweets, so rejecting it isn't an option unless I am okay with him getting silently angry with me). There have even been few studies on the positive affects of a keto diet on ADHD. Even if sugar consumption doesn't directly cause ADHD, it definitely seems to increase the severity of ADHD symptoms.
When you cut down on sugar, what did you replace it with? Would it possibly be healthy foods like nuts, seeds, and greens? That’s not a benefit of keto, that’s a benefit of making a healthy swap.
The only studies showing benefit of keto are for people with severe epilepsy that doesn’t respond to other medications and the benefit of reduction in seizures from keto’s brain changes outweighs the increased mortality that comes with being on keto long-term.
Have the people promoting this actually cited any studies (generally they don’t)? If so, did you actually read them? Who paid for the “studies” and what were the conflicts of interest declared? Were they ever peer-reviewed and published? Was there a control group or any comparison to a heart-disease-reversing whole-food plant-based diet? Just being the subject of a dietary intervention study gets people unconsciously making positive diet and lifestyle changes they wouldn’t ordinarily make, so comparative controls are incredibly important. You can find plenty of keto people saying there are studies that butter lowers your cholesterol, but if you take the time to do your research you’ll find that they’re paid for by the dairy industry and making intellectually dishonest comparisons like adding 1 Tbsp of butter to the diet of one group to like 1 cup of coconut oil in another group… of course the butter group’s outcomes will be less worse because they’re consuming 1/16 of the amount of added fat as the other group. Then some blogger or personal trainer with middle-school level understanding of biology repeats it all over the internet because it gets them viewers, ad revenue, or supplement sales. Consider getting your science from qualified professionals who aren’t trying to sell you something.
I have found that sugar from natural sources such as eating plain dates and grapes helps me focus, but sugar from processed food like candy bars somehow has the opposite effect.
the thing is... i'm pretty sure the craving for sugar, or high carb foods isn't bigger with higher adhd symptoms, but it's much harder to resist that urge to consume suger/high carb foods! i still feel the same craving for suger/high carb foods (and same goes for caffaine btw), but with my medication i'm actually mor often than not able to resist and don't snack like a maniac! 😬😵💫
Thats a lot of time to say no.😂 A thought I had about adult diet and adhd that is corollary is poor diet choices due to inattention to time and hunger. Suddenly you realize you're hungry and haven't eaten anything all day. Well it's fast food for a reason.
exactly... couple that hanger with emotional regulation issues and it causes problems right quick. haha
Hi Russell - any thoughts why so many scientists and researchers keep concluding that correlation equals causation? Not just in this field either, it seems to happen across all scientific fields. I would have expected this to be taught during the basics of any science/medical based college or university course.
One of the difficult things to come to terms with as an adult is… a lot of people are bad at their jobs. And as we’ve become increasingly anti-intellectual as a culture, we’ve made it socially acceptable by rewarding people for doubling down on willful ignorance.
There’s the old joke “what do you call a doctor who graduated from Harvard with a D average?” with the punch line being “a Harvard-educated doctor”. Just because somebody passed the lowest barrier of entry into their field doesn’t mean they’re good at it, or that they feel any ethical obligation to promote true information that doesn’t financially benefit them. Coupled with decades of defunding public education, movements to “abolish critical thinking in schools because it forces people to question their deeply-held beliefs” (that’s an actual published policy goal of the Texas Republican Party from the 2000s), lack of access to quality K-12 education or being unable to afford higher education, and the general demonization of science while elevating voices who promote sensationalized misinformation, most people don’t even listen to (let alone trust) sources that satisfy a reasonable minimum bar to be qualified to speak to a subject.
I've never had a sweet tooth. Salt, however...
I hope the studies used better controls than artificial sugars, because those have their own possible negative health effects.
That's my thought too!
Hi Dr. Barkley, what do you think about Dr. William Walsh protocol that’s designed to cure Cu/Zn imbalance that’s prevelant in ADHD and treatment to address under-methylation?
I suspect that Bill Watterson's "Calvin and Hobbes" helped spread the belief that excessive consumption of sugar causes ADHD; but as much as Calvin loves his Frosted Sugar Bombs, I think a close look at his mother would suggest that his ADHD is genetic (but that is something Watterson himself would have to confirm).
If anything, I would like to see a study done on protein deficiency and ADHD. My ADHD symptoms are greatly exacerbated when I don’t have adequate protein in my diet. Not sure if it is more causality or correlation.
Surely it has to be directly dependent. Do you also have to be careful in hot weather?
6 months ago dealing with severe adhd symptoms and massive brain fog and always tired... I thought maybe I dont get enough calories and/or my nutrition is imbalanced. I spent time inputting my diet into various calculators to see if I was deficient. And I was massively missing out on protein and calories in general. I switched to a high protein/high fat/zero carb diet and have seen a massive reduction in symptoms. My brain is working MUCH better. Still have adhd but it is not the same as before this switch. You should look into this for yourself.
Human breast milk is literally the optimal food for the most rapid period of brain development you ever experience after being born, and once you remove the water it’s mostly carbs and only around 10% protein… myths inflating the need for protein are rooted in an early 1900s study where baby rats failed to flourish on a low protein diet, but rats have higher protein needs than humans and the higher protein in rat milk/diets reflects that. There is no documented case of disease caused by dietary protein deficiency that I’m aware of, because protein is in virtually everything… but there is plenty of research documenting that over consuming protein is inflammatory and can trigger disease. A small to average height woman with a BMI in the athletic range can generally hit her protein RDA by eating a single peanut butter sandwich with wheat bread. If you tracked your nutrition with a tool like Cronometer and weren’t hitting the RDA, you were likely eating really poor quality calories (chips, microwavable dinners, etc) with low nutritive value or a generally insufficient number of calories.
The only reason to increase protein over the RDA is if your body has a temporary need to build new tissue, like if you are building a lot of new muscle at the gym or recovering from surgery. It’s much more likely that you are attributing other diet or lifestyle changes you made when you started increasing your protein consumption to being a benefit of protein… whether it’s improving your sleep hygiene, getting more exercise, swapping out junk food for healthier or less-worse alternatives, adding greens/veggies/fruit to your protein smoothies/meals, making healthier food choices in general by virtue of paying more attention to what you’re eating, etc.
If you want research, consider checking out nutritionfacts.org which is a nonprofit headed by a medical doctor with the mission of reviewing nutrition research and providing science-backed health education to medical professionals and laypeople. The videos and articles have citations and links to the supporting research. One of the things he does a great job of is hammering home “as compared to what?” when drawing conclusions about whether something has a benefit or caused some improvement instead of jumping to some emotionally-validating conclusion we want to be true.
I'm gonna take a wild guess and say "no". 🤔
What are your views on the keto diet for ADHD?
I would like to know too. Great video Dr. A big fan from Brazil 🇧🇷
I did it for 3 months. Wound up dropping a 6yr drinking everyday and nicotine addiction. Lost all my belly fat. My face looks 10yrs younger. I feel 15yrs younger. I had weird back pain that went away after the first month. Had the pain for about 15yrs. My cracked heels dissapeared and look healthy now. I took a TOVA test the week I started and another a month in. 23pt score increase (expected increase with ADHD medication is a 5pts) and I'm guessing that was due to the keto. Highly recommend. Also took creatine and a lot of wild blueberries
@@oysterchampion8998 how did you deal with being tired in the first weeks of keto? I always end up really fatigued and give up. I take mct oil and electrolytes but still
@NatalieNicole2222 I surprisingly was only fatigued for the first 3 or 4 days. Started on a Friday by chance so had the weekend to do nothing. Energy went way up after that. I took a lot of B vitamins and milk thistle and some other supplements that are recommended for keto based off what I read and watched. Maybe that helped but I didn't take most of them until a month or so into it.
For me, not consuming any added sugar and not taking my ADHD medication feels exactly the same as when I was consuming added sugar daily while taking my ADHD medication.
Hi dr. I remember being in 5th grade and having a teacher tell my mother I wasn’t allowed to eat bananas because they had to much sugar (early 2000s) … so ridiculous ….
Thank you for this! Now, please, can you kill the myth about gluten and ADHD too? (Non celiac disease) That’s too something I hear often…(and don’t believe in)..
What is the effect on dopamine in the brain of consuming sugary foods? Is it possible that some people with ADHD are self-medicating with sugar? This might suggest causation in the opposite direction.
I would think this somewhat likely but sadly the bad side effects of sugar.... yarg
I cant live without sugar
I'd be more concerned with the ADHD criminality connection
Thanks, sugar can be a way for the child to obtain a stimulant substitute with or without medication. As a child I would add six+ teaspoons of sugar to my corn flakes and could manage fairly well in school, if I had something else for breakfast low in sugar then I had troubles... Then I discovered coffee. Later at work if I was in the office I'd drink close to a pot of coffee, if I was out in the field/woods one cup or less was fine and I'd have issues at night.
Interesting on the aspartame, personally at first I found that it tasted a bit weird then years later it gave me migraines. For my youngest son sugar was fine but he would be absolutely wired with aspartame and awake half the night, as an adult he finds aspartame makes him feel weird so he avoids it.
There is a bunch of research demonstrating neurological side effects of artificial sweeteners… in the 90s the pink packets (sweet n low?) used to have tiny hard to read red writing on the back saying “this product is known to cause cancer in laboratory animals”, which to my recollection quietly disappeared from packaging at some point during the corporate deregulation efforts of Bush Jr’s administrions.
Neurological reactions aside, artificial sweeteners are hundreds to thousands of times sweeter than normal sugar. Consuming them distorts your brain and body’s perception of sweetness away from what’s natural (so it takes a lot more sugar to perceive foods containing natural sugars as sweet), and when your taste buds get hit with such extreme sweetness your body ramps up insulin production with the expectation that it’s about to have to handle the sweetness equivalent of 1-10 cups of sugar … when your body never gets hit with the actual sugar, you end up craving and eating more food throughout the day to compensate for the calories your body has been prepped and waiting for since your taste buds were hammered with the artificial sweetener. This is believed to be the causal mechanism for the known link between artificial sweetener consumption and long-term weight gain
❤
Are there studies on ADHD and sugar consumption in adults?
I figured I knew this stuff so was going to skip, but was hoping some information about glucose and the forebrain and type 1 diabetes might be discussed. My understanding is people with type 1 have higher rates of ADHD, possibly from vessel damage, but alternatively, it may be found more often due to the taxing EF requirements for diabetes. I know the older videos and maybe the book talks about snacks to tweak blood glucose in the brain during intense activity.
So yeah sugar doesn't cause ADHD, but isn't there some interesting things to discuss about sugar and ADHD outside of the causality question?
Two of my seven children were behaviorally reactive to certain food dyes. This was not a subtle thing; it was as if someone toggled a switch and the unhinged zombies came out. (I remember once coming home to a child in the center of the living room, neck cranked up, staring at the ceiling fan, as he spun to keep pace. His dad had given him colorful sugar cereal.) We rarely experienced this as I did the shopping and never brought things into the house that any of the kids were allergic, sensitive, reactive to it intolerant of.
Not what I’m wondering is, as so many sugar foods marketed to kids are loaded with food dyes, if people are attributing to sugar what’s actually sensitivity and reactivity to some food dyes.
most likely a suger high, use your brain
@@elemental7726 , maybe “used your brain” by listening to the lived experience of others and asking clarifying questions BEFORE rendering judgment and insulting them to boot.
No, diabetes is rampant in my family for generations. I raised my children on a low glycemic index diet. The only time my kids would get carb (including much sugar at all) overloaded was when they were with my diabetic mother or occasionally their father. (My diabetic MIL was much more respectful of parenting boundaries.) It only happened with certain dyes, which generally were paired with sugar, not with sugar alone.
@@elemental7726sugar high isn’t really a thing, those claims are situational misattribution. There was a study where researchers fed kindergarten aged children a bunch of sugar and then did calm activities with them like reading, and then had their parents rate their behavior. On another day, the researchers didn’t feed the children any sugar but hyped them up with a lot of high energy play, and then asked their parents to rate their behavior. The parents all thought the children were ‘sugar high’ on the high energy play day when they’d actually had no added sugar, and no parents noted behavioral complaints after the high sugar calm activity day. If you take a kid to a carnival and they’re hyper, they’re amped up about being able to run around in a new place surrounded by exciting things and that they got to eat special treats… it’s not the sugar in their cotton candy or ice cream getting them excited, it’s the environment and novelty of the experience.
@@bryonyvaughn2427there are certain dyes (especially some of the reds) that are known to be causal triggers for adhd, though if the trigger is combined with an exciting rapidly digestible processed carb he doesn’t normally get to eat the excitement could exacerbate his response to it. It could be worth “playing a taste test game” with your kid where you blindfolded feed them a similar dye-free version of a few spoons of the cereal one day and the dye-filled version another day and see how reacts, and just mix in tasting a few different things (I think cascadian farms has some fruit loop / fruity pebbles alternatives that use natural dyes from foods like beets, greens, and spices. Have the rest of their meals and activities on both days be the same. Then you can say with a higher degree of confidence what’s situational vs what’s biologically reactive.
If diabetes is rampant in your family, you should try to keep dietary fat under 10% unless it’s in a whole plant food (nuts, seeds, and avocados are fine because the oil is bound to fiber and phytonutrients and your body absorbs much less of it). Saturated fats (from dairy, meat, eggs, refined oils) gum up receptors in your muscle cells and block a chain reaction that needs to take place for your body’s insulin to ferry blood sugar into your muscle cells… when your cells are gummed up with saturated fat, your your insulin is stuck hammering at doors with stuck locks until it can finally find one that it can open. You can learn more about this at nutritionfacts.org, a nonprofit devoted to reviewing nutrition research and providing science-backed nutrition education
Russ Barkley kicking ass again on all this useless nonsense we hear uninformed people say to us all the time.
Reactive hypoglycemia and adhd
Are there any studies on how adhd may present in patients who likely have inherited it versus those who have had high lead exposure? Given the two different causes, would they respond the same way to medication or would they respond differently?
This sounds like a result of ADHD, based on the evidence presented as opposed to a cause of ADHD.
no shit
Hey dr Russ!
I was wondering, given that your audience is probably mostly people with ADHD, do people stop watching your videos after a couple minutes a lot?
I like your videos but I find myself getting distracted while watching unfortunately.
I ate a lot of sugar before: liters of cola a kgs of sweets per day
I Am extremely ADHD, I am 66 years old, I'm sorry to be commenting in this video about a previous video. it comes with the territory 😊. Anyways I don't agree with your time blindness theory, I could even say that at times my experience is opposite.
ADHD with Anxiety and mild Depression,
For adult, as a student and mother
What is your recommendation for the best medication please
Anxiety and depression should decrease with medication and lifestyle changes… if you have adhd, they are likely symptoms of it not being managed. Eat more whole plant foods and try to get 10k steps per day. Make positive psychology exercises part of your everyday routine. For medication, that’s something you need to figure out based on your own brain chemistry. What are ways you’ve been self-medicating, and what kinds of things do you get lost in? You may need a medication that increases dopamine, norepinephrine, or some combination of both depending on the specific chemistry of your body.
Thank you for covering this. Wouldnt the entire united states have adhd if sugar was the causation?! 😅 this subject will always irritate the life outta me, including caffeine being the cause too! 🫠
Wait , you’re a twin? Remember your talking about your brother, was he ever diagnosed with ADHD or did he show the symptoms only?
Our whole family has adhd (my mother has it as did my grandpa, as well as my sons).
Sugar doesn’t cause it, but it definitely doesn’t alleviate our symptoms. 😂
We also found that gluten and a high-carb diet is AWFUL for adhd symptoms. I can feel the change within hours of eating a gluten-filled meal. My kids grades decline.
I have found the same as you and trying to convince my entire family with adhd to try it for themselves too. zero carbs and high fat for the brain fuel. I never gained any weight for switching from carbs to fat for brain fuel.
Maybe all those Bonkers Brutus ate made him bonkers! 🤪
Dr Barkley, can we look further into predisposition of consumption, addiction? My teeth are hideous as an adult with adhd.
I dont know if you mean plaque, but in my 40's and been on a zero carb diet for nearly 4 months. And surprisingly my teeth plaque that was very bad has nearly disappeared along with a 25 year sever autoimmune disorder that affected my gut and skin badly. I am stunned with all that is clearing up and how fast.
13:20 I have observed this in recent life, and feel vindicated having heard you confirm it! The expectation of bad behaviour on sugar. Confirmation bias?
There is ADHD psychiatrist in Poland "Jarosław Jóźwiak" one of the biggest in Europe, he thinks that borderline personality disorder could potentially be a subtype of ADHD, do you have any thoughts of this ?, personally as person with both i feel very triggered
Borderline Personality Disorder could be a trauma response that's a step above Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria, itself a trauma response to enduring persistent / repeated social rejection with some other underlying cause. In this case, untreated neurodevelopmental disorders (like ADHD) being a significant contributor to experiences of social trauma.
@@LucarioBoricua yeah, i know very well what they are !! , it's pointless to counter his argument without properly representing it, but it is basically very ridiculous, and I want to bring more attention to this trend of thought
You should talk with Dr Anthony Chaffee
I agree with him on most things but I have heard him say a few things that are def hyperbolic and made my eyebrows go cross. haha And this is one of them. But honestly I hear many many people who should know better... not know better. I am convinced 99% of the population is stuck on a stereotype of adhd and anything that fits in with that stereotype constitutes a cause for adhd.
Yes, I think that eating bad food results in bad brain activity, and of course it wouldn't be a surprise that this would cause some ADHD like symptoms, same with social media, and some people will just have some ADHD symptoms anyway, ADHD is not a definitive diagnosis, it's not like you're either pregnant or not pregnant, it's more like have you got IBS, you may have a little digestive issues or they could be life limiting caused by Chrons or diverticulitis or something, and is dependant to some extent on what you eat.
Having indigestion does NOT mean you have a bowel disease, and eating better will make it go away, not the case with an actual bowel disease, same with ADHD there is an overlap between people with some mild ADHD symptoms because of lifestyle, but it's not actiual ADHD.
Very curious what Dr.Barkey thinks of no/low carb diets in regards to adhd??? I have been on a ZERO carb/high fat diet for 3 months now. Previously was on a low carb diet and I have gone from over the top sever symptoms to MUCH milder adhd symptoms (not curable). No medication used for a few years now, as none ever seems to work (Canadian health care leaves a lot to be desired though...). No other changes that I think would be involved. Maybe something else is causing the reduction om adhd symptoms somehow but the 25 year sever autoimmune disorder I have that affects my gut and skin have also nearly disappeared comparably speaking.
I am going to study up on this heavily now.
Thanks DOC!!!!
I do remember the Doc mentioning somewhere, maybe an older lecture, to sip some sugar throughout the day. I am finding that any carbs at all makes me real foggy the next day. Is this just me somehow making up this correlation between carbs and my brain fog along with a host of other symptoms that affect my cognition?
How about exacerbation of adhd symptoms in adhd people and sugar consumption or other addictive behaviours?
water caused my ADHD. I drank water as a child. Other things that led to my adhd - air, video games, basketball and curse by jesus himself. Or I am genetically born this, I don't know.
😂😂
Dr B is at pains to distinguish a specific disease pathology from general lifestyle impacts...
Which is fine in academia, but in the wild west of society where influencers of all types have direct effects on people... It's a very asymmetric battle.
Going also to posit Dr B has the education intelligence & lifestyle to approach a virtuous wellbeing regime that most people never achieve.
In terms of mental control, the random crap we put in our bodies on a daily is a massive contributor to cognition, motivation, mood... Mostly negative.
But correlation is not proof of causality of course.
There's hardly anybody in the 'developed' world not already addicted & toxified by the laundry list of 'foods' we love to abuse.
People who say they're fine are usually delusional. The vast majority will have a measurably shorter life and major physical health deficits from their lifestyle choices, especially what (& how much) they 'choose' to eat. Mostly folks just don't think at ALL.
Many do know they have a problem but are powerless to effect change. It's the curse of abundance & freedom we enjoy.
In the perception of media, linking this toxic soup with ADHD is understandable - They know the zeitgeist term ADHD gets clicks & views so truth never gets in the way of a chance to sell something...
I don't disagree with some of your analysis, especially about media looking for clicks by using ADHD to create stories, or globally how we are effected by influencers or advertising etc...
On the other hand I have a bit of an issue with equating intelligence and making health directed decisions in your life.
Maximizing one's life span is not the ultimate goal for most people, it's usually a factor in decisions we make, but we mostly seek ''happiness'' (however one defines it for themselves).
Many doctors smoke, many nutritionists are overweight, many academics will make poor scientific conclusions or fall prey to their biases, that is not a sign of lack of intelligence, but just of being human.
I believe you are attributing ethics to what Dr. Barkley is explaining in this video, whereas you will never hear doctors, psychiatrists, or psychologists, tell you how to live your life. They will give you information on how your body works and available treatments, but in the end the decision is with you to follow that or not.
Many people make risky/dangerous decisions every day that aren't optimal, or healthy, or even safe, but make them happy. Like smoking, eating unhealthy foods, extreme sports, drugs etc... That's not a sign of lack of intelligence, but of that individual making decisions that satisfy them.
I for one would rather be happy and live to 40 then be unhappy and live 80, but each person gets to make that decision for themselves.
@@FlynnaTH-cam Very well said. The trick with ADHD is to avoid labelling people less intelligent, as it's a flaw to implement the knowledge, rather than the knowledge itself.
You went further into self-determination, freedom of choice, maybe destiny... A popular scientist called Sapolski(?) has recently released a book on the subject of free will ( or lack of it).
I don't have any solutions... my general point was that 'regular' folk are FAR from virtuous, and yet want to label others as ADHD i.e. deficient. Stones/ glass houses!
@@jonr6680
Oh, yeah for sure, I very much agree with your last general point.
I think the major issue is that there's an implicit appeal to normality within most people, if not all.
Therefore most people will try to fit in, by copying behavior, speech, appearance, ideas etc... which isn't intrinsically a bad thing, except that anything that goes against that norm will be seen as abnormal, weird, or strange...
We see it about skin color, gender, sexual orientation, handicap whether it's physical or mental, and as early as childhood, which is most likely learned behavior, with casual bullying about clothes, height etc...
I don't have any solutions either, seeing how history repeats itself, and these perceptions have not changed with time does not bode well for people who diverge from the norm, which I personally do on many aspects.
@@FlynnaTH-cam Absolutely well put!
Except ADHD is highly genetically related. What you're saying is the equivalent of blaming a particular excess of some micronutrient in one's diet to shortsightedness
But have you seen this in children who do keto? I noticed my attention span is way better on keto. It practically fixes everything.
Keto is not healthy… for-profit entities promoting keto have pumped millions into trying to demonstrate benefits of keto and gone bankrupt… it decreases your lifespan (heart disease, increased cancer risk, etc), and the only people who keto is medically recommended for are ones with severe epilepsy where the brain changes involved in keto reduces their incidents of seizures and the benefit of less severe and frequent seizures outweighs the negative outcomes of being on a keto diet. People who feel better on keto or paleo generally haven’t been doing it very long and are experiencing a combination of the placebo effect + they replaced high carb low fiber highly processed foods in their diet with greens and low-carb veggies as part of their dietary change and then they misattribute the improvement to the diet in its entirety instead of the subset of healthy swaps they made when they adopted the diet. I would challenge you to try getting 50-100 grams of fiber from food (not supplements) per day and see how that impacts your ADHD, depression, energy, and lipid/metabolic panel numbers.
You CANNOT be Addicted to Video Games or Marijuana.
Video games are designed to give you dopamine hits, similar to social media. That can most definitely be addictive, especially for someone with a dopamine deficiency.