I am officially a good Samaritan.
Yes, Diary. You are looking at the person that raised a whopping £500 for the ADHD Foundation. Hold your applause, you'll embarrass me.
Now, I know what you're thinking. I've never done anything like this before. Not because I don't want to. I've just never found the right charity to help raise money for. You know, one that touches your heart and speaks to you. There's never been one in my life. Until now, that is.
The ADHD Foundation is a group that brings awareness to individuals, families, doctors, teachers and other agencies about the condition known as ADHD. You don't know what this means, Diary. I can tell. So I'll tell you. Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. It's a childhood condition that can continue on until your all grown up. It has many symptoms. Troubles focusing and paying attention, difficulty in controlling behaviour and hyperactivity.
I know. I sound like a medical book, don't I? But how will you learn if I don't tell you? You won't. So I'm doing you a favour here, Diary. You should be thanking me. I accept chocolate and flowers. Just not lilies. I hate lilies...
But anyway. Back to ADHD. This is typically an overlooked condition. By that, I mean that parents pin this condition onto their kid because they're simply misbehaved. I've seen it. Kids just being generally obnoxious and badly behaved, and their parents throwing the letters ADHD around just to get sympathy.
No, people. Those kids are just badly behaved. I know when a kid has got ADHD. My brother has it, after all.
You know how it was growing up with Callum. He always got the attention from our parents because he was out of control. Always taking his tablets that used to turn him into a zombie, and then when they wore off it was manic. But the thing was, he wasn't brought up bad. My parents did everything to bring him up right. All sorts of classes and stuff, disciplined him, the whole lot. It was just that his brain is wired slightly different to ours, so he bounced off walls and blacked out when he lost his temper. Otherwise, he was, and still is, the politest young man in the world.
I didn't know there was a charity for them. I really didn't. Why would I, anyway? Until I got older, I just thought my brother was a pain in the bum. Ruining my fun with his out of control ways, shunting my successes just in case he wasn't lucky enough to get the same. Why would I want to contribute to kids like him, when all they did was hog the attention in either positive or negative ways?
Because it isn't his fault. That's why. And that is what I've learnt whilst growing up. Callum is the way he is because of a condition. A disability, as it were. He doesn't play on it, like a lot of kids with the condition do. He accepts that he is the way he is, and has to learn to control everything. He's a lot better than he used to be. Hyperactivity has gone down, thank God. It's the attention he struggles with. But he's getting there. Slowly and surely, he's getting there.
It was him that told me about the charity, actually. He joined some support group a while ago now. Not because he needed to, but because he wanted to. He knew how bad he was, and wanted to help kids get through it with proper support from those who've been through it. Like I said. My brother is a great guy.
But anyway. He told me about this charity. The ADHD Foundation, that is. And listening to him talking about it made me really start to think. Why hadn't my parents gotten the support from these people? I mean, I guess this was years back, so it might not have even existed. But they went through hell for help for Callum. This charity made it seem so easy. Like everything they could have needed was right there online, or on the other end of a phone, or at some other group meeting. No faffing around, waiting on referrals and all that rubbish just to get the kid seen. No. Straight forward and really interesting.
