Interesting Quotes
Money never made a man happy yet, nor will it. The more a man has, the more he wants. Instead of filling a vacuum, it makes one.
Benjamin Franklin
Never forget that justice is what love looks like in public.
Cornel West
The really frightening thing about middle age is the knowledge that you’ll grow out of it.
Doris Day
Sometimes I lie awake at night and ask, “Where have I gone wrong?” Then a voice says to me, “This is going to take more than one night.”
Charlie Brown
Dating Site Match.com Claims There Are 31 ‘Genders’
To make sure you’re dating someone with whom you are gender compatible, Match.com now gives customers lots of choices. Click here to read full article.
Scientists Find Brain Mechanism Behind Age-Related Memory Loss
Researchers at Johns Hopkins University may have found at least one of the reasons some people have memory loss as they get older, whereas others do not. I think the research isn’t as definitive as this author suggests, and I think it is very likely that there are multiple factors involved rather than only a single factor. Click here to read full article.
Army Training Says Soldiers Must Shower with Transgender Persons of Opposite Sex
The U.S army training manual says that soldiers must be willing to shower with transgender soldiers even if their transgender surgery has not been completed. Click here to read full article.
Can Your Child Safely Take a Break from ADHD Meds?
Now that summer is here, many parents of a child with ADHD ask this question. Here is a doctor who works with many parents of ADHD children who gives a very practical way of answering this question. Click here to read full article.
7 Self-Defeating Behaviors That Aggravate ADHD – and How to Fix Them
If you work with adults with ADHD, this is a very practical and helpful article. It’s probably better to give this article to them rather than tell them these things yourself, because some people with ADHD may get mad at you because they believe they can do these things and still be effective (although you and others in their lives are aware that those behaviors are causing more problems than they realize). Click here to read full article.
From InterestingFacts.com
Number of pounds of sugar eaten by the average American in colonial America per year = 6
Number of pounds of sugar eaten by the average American in 2019 = 57
Ever wonder why you never see mice or rats at Disneyworld? The answer may be about 200 feral cats, rarely seen because they hunt at night.
Spiders are known to have enormous appetites. It is estimated that they could eat all the humans on the planet in one year. Fortunately we’re not appetizing enough to spiders that they’re likely to do this.
Is your city the right shape to get rain? A recent study found that circular cities received more rain than square cities. Triangular cities received the least rainfall.
Scientists look to people with Down syndrome to test Alzheimer’s drugs
People with Down Syndrome are more likely to develop Alzheimer’s in their 40s and 50s because their extra chromosome causes changes that increase the likelihood of brain conditions that increase the likelihood of developing Alzheimer’s. As a result they are viewed as excellent candidates in the search for treatments, and because they know they are candidates for early development of Alzheimer’s they are often willing candidates to participate in such research. Click here to read full article.
Can teens detect when they are on ADHD medication?
I cannot find a way to send you a link to this article by Dr. David Rabiner, one of my favorite researchers on ADHD, so I’ll just summarize the important points. Dr. Rabiner cites a study of teens. Many teens by the age of 18 don’t take stimulant medication, believing it doesn’t help them. However this research found that on days that they took medication their academic performance was significantly better than on days they took a placebo. They also could not guess which days they took medication versus placebo at better than chance. So they attributed their improved performance to themselves rather than medication. This information could be important to share if you work with teens with ADHD or with their parents.
4 Reasons Adults Give Up on ADHD Medication
Teens are not the only ones who give up on ADHD medication when it could help them. Read what these four reasons are: some are reasons we as counselors could do something about. Click here to read full article.
The Dyslexic Advantage
You can disregard the comments about dyslexia conferring an evolutionary advantage. The major point of this article that may be helpful to some of your clients with dyslexia is that even though dyslexia does cause some activities to be harder, that the fact that dyslexic brains are different also means that those brains may also confer some things that other brains are less likely to have. Click here to read full article.
New Study Tracks Sleep Throughout a Lifetime
How does your sleep duration compare with others your age? See this short article to see. Click here to read full article.
Toddler Becomes Youngest Member of High I.Q. Society
Fascinating story about an adorable two-year-old girl who has become the youngest member of Mensa. Click here to read full article.
What I Wish Family & Friends Knew about Bipolar
Those of us who have studied bipolar disorder from the outside will probably never know what it’s like to have manic episodes or experience bipolar depression. Here’s a good, brief description of why. Click here to read full article.
How ADHD Impacts Your Child’s Communication Skills – and 11 Ways to Help
Having a good conversation with another person involves several skills—I never realized how many until I read this article. That is probably why children with ADHD have so much difficulty with it—the executive functioning skills it takes to have a conversation are simply beyond them without intentional training in those skills. For those who would like to help their children, this article could help. Click here to read full article.
A Summer Job Guide for Teens with ADHD
All children, not just those with ADHD, benefit from having chores. They benefit by feeling helpful and useful, and learning to do chores also strengthens their executive functioning. Similarly, when they become teens having a job not only gives them an income but teaches them important skills that will be important in their adult lives. While this article is written for parents of children with ADHD, I think it would be helpful for most parents in preparing their teen for a summer job. Click here to read full article.
ADHD Drugs May Treat Alzheimer’s Cognitive Symptoms Effectively
I think this headline may overstate several points. There are no drugs that eliminate Alzheimer’s disease. However, this initial study does say that some ADHD drugs can modestly increase global cognitive functioning and apathy. However, none of them treat the agitation that sometimes occurs in Alzheimer’s. Stay tuned for further research. Click here to read full article.
The Myth of the Individual: Tapping into the Relational Brain
A very worthwhile article from the Psychotherapy Networker. And a method that helped a chronic rage-a-holic stop in a single session. Click here to read full article.
A Book that Could Be Useful with Certain Clients
I just purchased and read a book that might be useful if you have a Christian client who needs medication or counseling but is unwilling to consider it because he or she thinks that Christians shouldn’t need such things. The book is Finding Quiet: My Story of Overcoming Anxiety and the Practices that Brought Peace by J.P. Moreland. Moreland is a conservative evangelical highly respected philosopher and theologian who has written many several dozen popular and academic books and numerous articles for academic journals and magazines such as Christianity Today. He is very open about the fact that his mother’s family has experienced anxiety disorders for several generations, he has had two major breakdowns (2003 and 2013), he had five years of very helpful counseling and has taken medication for several years, and why he believes that it is perfectly reasonable for Christians to do these things when their situations warrant it. So if you have a client who needs these kind of treatments but has been told by Christian peers that Christians should not need medication or counseling, this might be a book to consider recommending to him or her.
How Morning Coffee Changes the Brain
An interesting article discussing the possible reasons coffee seems to enhance learning, is associated with lower likelihood of developing Alzheimer’s and Parkinsonism. It seems that for many people, drinking moderate amounts of coffee (i.e., four cups or less per day) has several advantages. For the minority of people for whom coffee produces negative effects (e.g., jitteriness), the article also discusses which teas have high levels of caffeine in them. Click here to read full article.
Pandemic Revealed Unique Aspects of Sexual Addictions
You may remember that the 2013 version of the DSM-5 did not include sexual addiction as a mental disorder despite lots of data that argued that it should have been. The International Classification of Diseases did recognize it. Now the revision to the DSM-5 that came out in 2019 does include it as a mental disorder in the section on Impulse Control Disorders. Click here to read full article.
‘Do Not Transition Your Kids’: California Teen Tells Her Heartbreaking Story
Chloe Cole told her story of how at 11 years old she immersed herself in trans stories on Instagram and at 13 she began taking puberty blockers and had her breasts surgically removed in California. At 17 she realizes that was a mistake and has “detransitioned” but fears she will never be a mother and begged parents “Do not transition your kids.” Click here to read full article.
How We Treat Acute Pain Could Be Wrong
This research, from McGill University concluded that commonly-used treatments, such as aspirin and ibuprofen, which block pain and reduce inflammation, may actually increase the likelihood of chronic pain, theorizing that inflammation is an important part of the healing process. While more research is needed before this is widely accepted, the researchers recommended using pain relievers like acetaminophen, that block pain but do allow inflammation to occur. Click here to read full article.
I Want to Medicate My Child—But My Spouse Does Not
This article has some good tips when there are differences in the family (between parents and sometimes between parents and grandparents) about whether a child could benefit from medication. Click here to read full article.
Best wishes for the coming week!
Henry Virkler