Categories: Kids

ADHD and My Love/Hate Relationship with Sugar

I lreally ove Candy

I have a love/hate relationship with sugar.

If i didn’t have ADHD I probably wouldn’t even notice or care about sugar. I’d be just derping along, eating like everyone else, skittles, ice cream, toblerone, grandma’s home baked cookies, and sour patch kids, like it’s no big deal. Some of this , a little of that, like a normal kid with normal impulse control. I have no control when it comes to sugar and I don’t like it.

The thing is, for me, sugar either makes me really high and happy or sucks the life out of me, there doesn’t seem to be an in-between.

When I was in 4th Grade, our school had a cake decorating contest and it was finally something I could win. You can tell by my enthusiasm in the video that I LOVED making that incredible, delicious, sticky, sweet award-winning sugar-loaded best-decorated cake!

Like lots of things in my world, sugar is something I can’t seem to control. It’s all or nothing. I promise myself I’m going to just eat “some” ice cream and the next thing you know, Dad is hollering from the other room “WHO ate my mint chocolate chip?” !!

When I was at camp last month we had waffles and syrup for breakfast. It was my day off from volunteering so I went into town with friends and I ended up buying three candy cups and a couple of foot-long sugar-filled pixie sticks for lunch. 🙁

I forgot my meds that day and was so HIGH on sugar by the evening, I was running around the camp at 10PM like a zombie. Fortunately for me, my parents were there. They took me off-site for the night to calm down.

I don’t have an “I’ve had enough” switch when it comes to sugar.

Last week I ate NO sugar. I was trying really hard and I felt way better. This week is not so good, there is nothing sweet left in the house and it’s my fault.

I’m starting to think about food and how it makes me look and feel. I don’t like how much sugar controls me. I’m calmer when I don’t eat sugar, with or without my medication.

I love sugar. I hate sugar.

Thoughts?

~ Jeff

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Jeff Rasmussen

[content-block title="Meet Jeff Rasmussen" color="orange"] Age: 18 City: Langley, BC Diagnosed with ADHD in Grade 7 Biggest Dream: I want to change the world for younger kids like me who are punished daily for having ADHD. Fave Class: Mechanics "I've got the plans in my head for a motorized scooter with a gas-powered engine that I'm actually capable of building." ADHD Superpower: "If I'm determined to do something, literally nothing can stop me. Nothing. Not bribes, not bullets... nothing." Fave Food: Hashbrowns (the kind you buy frozen, in a bag) Career Goals: Telecommunications Guru Life-Changing Event: Winning the WDS Scholarship for Real Life School Achievement: Completing Math & Socials 10 in just 8 weeks this summer. "School's like 99% fluff. Summer school is that, minus the fluff." Biggest Struggle: Even though I take medication I still have trouble staying on task, doing boring homework, remembering not to swear when I am angry or staying still through assemblies. (That's where some of my strategies come in.) [/content-block] [content-block title="An Average Kid with ADHD" color="purple"] My ADHD has been really bad and given me every bad experience you can imagine for a kid. Before medication teachers took away my recess, my gym classes, they put me in the hall, I have been suspended from school, and I never did my work because even though my tests say I’m “gifted” I couldn’t do it. When I first learned I had ADHD I was so happy that I wasn’t bad or broken, it had a name and an explanation for what was going on. [/content-block]