Be careful with caffeine. Depending on what's really causing the hyperactivity and lack of focus, it could actually ramp up those behaviors. Our Difficult Child was diagnosed with ADHD as a young child, was placed on stimulants and became increasingly violent and aggressive. He was later diagnosed with bipolar disorder and taken off the stimulants and placed on mood regulating medications. He is much, much better now. Our Difficult Child is currently having neurofeedback sessions once a week. When the initially EEG was done, they found that he had lots of high beta waves, which cause excess energy, irritability, anxiety and fearfulness. The therapist said that about 60% of kids who exhibit ADHD symptoms have too many theta waves, so their brains are going to sleep.The stimulants increase the beta waves and help them focus. For the 40% of ADHD kids like ours who have too many beta waves, it just increases the problem. The neurofeedback that we're doing now helps retrain his brain to reduce the beta waves. It takes about 30-40 sessions to really get results, but we started seeing an reduction in those symptoms after 8 sessions. Based on our experience, I would proceed with caution when using stimulants and monitor your child's behavior carefully to make sure it's really helpful.
