Predominantly Inattentive ADHD child in School and Beyond

I, like many children with ADHD, did very poorly in school.  I, in fact, almost did not graduate from High School despite being in a vocational work program.   The Vo-Tech program only required that I spend 4 hours a day in school taking very basic courses.  I spent the rest of my school day working in a hospital.  

On my last day of high school I found myself begging the assistant principle to sign my paperwork and allowing me to graduate.  I had a 1.9 average.  I had thought that this was a 'C' average and that this is what I needed to graduate.  The assistant principle informed me that, even though a 3.9 average was an 'A' average and a 2.9 was a 'B' average, a 1.9 was considered a 'D' and therefore I had not passed my senior year.

I asked where, if anywhere, it was stated that a 1.9 average was a 'D'.  He responded that no one had ever bothered to quibble about whether a 1.9 was a 'C' or a 'D' so that it was not written anywhere.  I explained to the assistant principle that if any one had informed me of this arbitrary lack of consistency on the part of calculating grade point averages that I would have done what I needed to do to get that extra tenth of a point.  When he asked me how on earth I would have done this, I carefully spelled out the exact process that I would have completed to get that extra tenth of a point.  This process involved not being late for school on 'X' number of days, not skipping school on 'X' number of days, (at this school 9 tardy days would count as an absence, and absences would cost you a deduction in the your grade for that particular class).

When I was finished explaining to him the rather complex math formula with which I had gone through high school getting the exact tenths of a point that I needed, in this class and that, to accomplish that 1.9 average, he was horrified.   He had counseled me a million times about skipping school, about being late for school and he was shocked that I had made such a mockery of the point system.  Children with ADHD can spend a great deal of energy at school focusing on things, like this, that they find interesting and which require, in the end, much more energy than simply completing the school work.

I knew, for a fact, that this man was sick of seeing me in this office.  I pleaded with him explaining that another year of this misery was not going to do anything but drive him and me crazy. He told me that if I had spent less time finagling the system and more time in class I would have been much better off.  I told him that this was probably true but that I skipped school so much because, like most kids with ADHD, I hated school with a passion.

The turning point was when he asked me why I hated school. I told him the truth.  I said, "I do not learn this way, I learn by doing, look at my transcript folder, I have never missed a day of work.  I have a 4.0 average in the Healthcare vocational program."    He looked at my folder.  I had started off working as a nurse's aid but had been promoted to the position of Operating Room Technician based on glowing references from the nurses that supervised me.  "Not everyone can do this classroom stuff." I told him.  A light bulb came on in this man's brain and he, to my immense relief, signed my graduation paperwork.

Children with ADHD do not learn the way other children learn.  Most children with ADHD will do much better in programs that do not involve sitting quietly in a classroom listening to a lecturer.  The hyperactive children need room to move and the inattentive children need help to stay engaged.  Unfortunately, the majority of school classrooms are structured in a way that do nothing but torture Children with ADHD.

People who know me today cannot believe that I barely graduated from High School and ask me how I ever got into college.  The answer is, it was an uphill climb. I took a gap year where I lived in Europe.  It was there that I discovered the U.S. Embassy Library and started reading.  It was there that I discovered that I like to learn and it was there that I decided that I would do what I had to do to go to college.  

It was a tremendous amount of work but I was relieved to find that in Junior college and then at the University that professors did not care if I ever went to class providing that I learned the material.  I developed my own unique ADHD way of studying, of using the class lectures only if they helped me, and of, at times, getting individual help from professors.   I thrived in college.

I was fortunate to have been surrounded by people who respected me despite my failings at school.  I am grateful that my mother, my family,  my friends, and my co-workers never once made me feel as though I was stupid.   I think all children with ADHD should have this kind of support network.  It is the only way to ensure that even if they fail in school, they will not fail in life.