Healthcare Training Institute - Quality Education since 1979
Psychologist, Social Worker, Counselor, & MFT!!

Section 1
Track #1 - Introduction and Adult ADD Challenges

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Welcome to the Home Study Course sponsored by the Healthcare Training Institute, homestudycredit.com.  This course is entitled, Treating the Locking In and Blocking Out ADD Adults.

Our primary intent for this home study course is to provide quality education to foster your professional growth.  The Institute has provided quality education since 1979.
 
Hi.  My name is Jared Baxter.  I will be the narrator of this CD set.  We appreciate that you have chosen us as a vehicle for you to earn your Continuing Education Credit.

The purpose of the course is to assist you in increasing your knowledge regarding how to treat patients, clients, etc. dealing with ADD.  As each case study is given, if the concepts seem to be applicable to your situation, I encourage you to turn your CD player off and make a few notes regarding the application of the principle to your setting.  However, these notes are for your purposes only and are not to be sent to the Institute.  Also each track is very content dense.  So feel free to replay the track to review the content either for your own purposes, or if you feel appropriate play the track in an individual or group session for client education.  Also permission is granted to reproduce this CD.  We encourage you to duplicate give copies of this CD to colleagues, clients, etc. as you deem appropriate. We feel the information on our CD's is valuable.  Thus, we have an interest in distributing CD's in as many ways as possible, to benefit the greatest number of people, who have a need and are receptive to this practical information.

The questions in your Answer Booklet are sequential and deal with the section of content that preceded it.  For this reason, to facilitate the answering of each question, you might read the question from the Answer Booklet prior to listening to that CD track.  By knowing what the question is ahead of time, you will then know the content to listen for that contains the answer.  So just a hint, after you write down the answer to a question in your Answer Booklet, read on to the next question in order to give you a “heads up” to listen for the content that contains the answer to the next question.

Merely write the correct letter on the corresponding blank line in your answer booklet. Each answer is only used once. Keep in mind there is nothing trick or hard about these questions.  They are merely intended to verify the playing of this CD.

For the purpose of brevity, most generally, I will use the term “therapists” or “mental health professional.”  However, don’t let these terms deter you from applying the concepts to your situations.  When you hear the word “therapists,” if your job title is social worker, psychologist, marriage and family therapist, mental health counselor, professional counselor, resident director, program assistant, etc. merely substitute the appropriate term that is the most meaningful to you. In short, don’t let my use of the term “therapists” cognitively set you off track from hearing the content because your job title is school counselor, for example.  I will also use the term “client” for the purposes of brevity.  However, if you deal with patients, residents, students, consumers, etc., transpose “client” for the term that is the most meaningful to you in your work setting. 

On this CD set we will discuss such topics as: Adult ADD Challenges, Intense Feelings and Distorted Senses, the Five Steps of Memory, Controlling Methods of Coping, Passive and Aggressive Methods of Coping, the Five ADD Stages of Grief, Balancing Issues, the Moral Inventory, Slippery Social Situations, Group Interfacing, One-on-One Interactions, Interfacing on the Job, Communication in the ADD Family, and Comorbid Conditions.

So  let’s get started.

On the rest of this track, we will discuss four closely linked problems that ADD adults may have with switching gears and multi-tasking. These four problems are the One Channel Operational System, the Locking In and Blocking Out Phenomena, the Defective Filter, and the “I Hate Details” Dynamic. Sound interesting?

Troy, age 31 diagnosed with ADD, complained of his difficulty switching gears from one task to another, especially on the job. Troy stated, “I work at a psychiatric unit, where I share the responsibility for answering the phone. I have trouble switching gears fast enough to pick up the phone after a few rings. Usually, I don’t hear it ring at all! Other staff members resent that I don’t answer the phone. They think that I think I’m too good to do it. But they’re wrong! It’s just not as easy as it seems!”

I explained to Troy that the first common problem I find in ADD adults is the One Channel Operational System. I explained that the reason his fellow staff members held this grudge about answering the phone was that their minds operate on a different channel system than Troy’s. I stated, “Most people give everything the opportunity to grab their attention. It’s like they use a scan button on the radio to pick the channel that comes in clearest. When the signal for one channel fades, they easily switch to another channel.” As you know, for most adults with ADD, the “scan button” doesn’t work as well. I explained this to Troy, stating, “Instead of pulling in the strongest signal, your mind is pulling in every channel, and you end up losing track of the station you were listening to.”

Troy protested, stating, “But I can usually pay attention to whatever it is I’m working on. I just can’t think to answer the damn phone when it rings!”

I explained to Troy that the One Channel Operational System is sometimes related to the second problem I find common in ADD adults, the Locking In and Blocking Out Phenomena. As you know, many ADD adults can be overpersistent. I explained to Troy, “When ADDers like you get locked into a task, they work hard to block out all those other channels that may be trying to come in. If you’re Locked In to a filing task at work, you’ll usually Block Out all other tasks, including the task of answering the phone.”

Troy looked defeated, so I added, “The good news is, you can use it to your advantage. I’m willing to bet you file faster than most other staff members at the psychiatric unit.” Troy smiled, chuckled, and answered, “Yeah, everyone else usually gets sidetracked. They’re impressed by my speed.” I stated, “The bad news is, Locking In and Blocking Out can be counterproductive. You may be the fastest filer in the office, but that doesn’t solve the problem of the ringing phone if you’re the only person there to answer it.”

As you know, ADD in adults does not just cause problems with switching gears. For Joel, age 27, his ADD caused problems with multi-tasking that were starting to threaten his marriage. A mechanic, Joel was usually able to focus on a car in his shop for hours but sometimes had trouble following conversations with his wife. Joel stated, “Lots of times I’ll come home after work, and we’ll sit down to have dinner. She’ll be talking to me, but I’ll get distracted by the TV. The next thing I know, she’s yelling at me, saying things like ‘You’re not even listening to me! You just spent two hours working on some guy’s truck, so it’s obvious you can pay attention when you want to. Don’t even try to blame your ADD!’ Then she cries. It’s not that I don’t want to pay attention to her, but I just can’t focus on her the way I focus on cars.”

In addition to the One Channel Operational System and the Locking In and Blocking Out Phenomena, the third problem for ADD adults is a Defective Filter. Because of his familiarity with cars, I tried to explain Joel’s Defective Filter in terms of car parts. I stated, “Your brain works at peak efficiency when it can select what it needs to concentrate on and keep out other distractions. Your mind works like the oil filter in a car. Tell me, what happens if you have an old oil filter?” Joel perked up and answered, “Well, you’ll get a lot of dirty bits and useless particles in your oil that runs through the engine. Clean oil makes the engine run a lot more efficiently.” I stated, “The ADD adult mind works a bit like an old oil filter. It doesn’t always keep the useless particles, like what you’re seeing on TV, out of your engine.”

Joel stated, “That makes sense, I guess. But sometimes we’ll eat dinner with the TV off, and I still won’t always follow what she’s talking about. A couple of days ago, she bought a new brand of dog food. First, she had to tell me what we’ve been getting. Then she explained how she ran into her friend at the store, who recommended another kind of dog food. Right about then I stopped paying attention because she just gave all these stupid little details that don’t matter! She does that with everything she tells me, then wonders why I don’t listen anymore. I just want the big picture – that we’ve got new dog food – but by the time she gets to the end of her story, I have no idea what the point even was.” Sound like a client of yours?

As you can see, Joel’s problem was the fourth common problem I have found in adults with ADD, the “I Hate Details” Dynamic. I explained this dynamic to Joel, stating, “Your filter may be letting in too many bits of detail which keeps you from attending to them all. When you try to remember sequential details, you may lose the first detail before you can assimilate the second. This is probably why you can’t follow your wife’s long, drawn-out stories.”

For Joel, I found the “Asking for Clarification” technique helpful. There are two steps to the “Asking for Clarification” technique. Listen as I explain how the two steps worked for Joel. First, I asked Joel to have a conversation with his wife. I stated, “When you start the conversation, just listen to what your wife Nora has to say.” The second step is for the listener, Joel, to interrupt the speaker, his wife Nora, when he realizes his mind is wandering. I felt the “Asking for Clarification” technique appropriate for Joel since he stated, “My wife is really getting angry because she feels, as she puts it, ‘not heard.’” I replied, “As soon as you realize you aren’t listening to Nora anymore, let her know.” Joel asked, “How can I do that?” We brainstormed and role-played some statements which included “You know, Nora, my mind started to wander when that bee flew by and I lost track of what you were saying.” Or  “I sort of blanked out for a minute. Could you repeat what you just said?” or “I know this is really important to you, but I sort of lost track. Can you repeat the sentence you just said?”

Do you have an ADD client like Troy who struggles with the One Channel Operational System and the Locking In and Blocking Out Phenomena? Or is your ADD client more like Joel, who faces problems with a Defective Filter and the “I Hate Details” Dynamic? Would your Troy or Joel benefit from the two-step “Asking for Clarification” technique of listening then interrupting when their mind starts to wander and ask for clarification?

On this track, we have discussed the four problems that ADD adults may have with switching gears and multi-tasking. These four problems are the “One Channel Operational System,” the “Locking In and Blocking Out” Phenomena, the “Defective Filter,” and the “I Hate Details” Dynamic.

On the next track, we will discuss the problems ADD adults face with intense feelings and distorted senses. I have found that there are three aspects to the ADD adults difficulties with intense feelings and distorted senses. These three aspects are the Intense Emotional Roller Coaster, the Bottomless Pit of Needs and Desires, and the Time Tyrant.

QUESTION 1
What are four challenges that ADD adults may have? To select and enter your answer go to Answer Booklet.