> We had a thread here on lactnet a while back about our own
>members who have children with ADDH.  I wonder if they can recall if these
>children had feeding related problems (weakness of suck, lip seal problems
>- leaking milk, and reflux)  I think it would be wonderful if we would all
>tart to flag charts of infants we see who are doing these things and make
>some attempt to follow-up later to see if these babies turn into kids with
>identified ADDH.

Barbara,
This is fascinating indeed!  My oldest son, who is now almost 15 and
entering 9th grade, is mild-moderately ADHD.  I started him on solids at
5 mos, and later felt that I had still jumped the gun because he seemed
to gag a lot on his food; I was forever worrying about him choking. This
went on well into his second year of life. As far as breastfeeding went,
he was a champion nurser, though he did gag and choke a lot, which I
attibuted to my very strong and forceful MERs.  Chris nursed for 18 mos,
6 mos into my second pregnancy.

Even more interesting--- when Chris was in 4th and 5th grades, he
developed some unusual unconcious habits that made him appear a little
strange, and I am sure contributed to his not-quite-with-it social
status.  Chris would touch his tongue to his shoulder and thereabouts,
kind of feeling the clothing or whatever, and he would also frequently
chew on the necks of his tshirts, which got all stretched out of shape.
And his mouth always seemed full of saliva, as if he produces too much or
forgets to swallow often enough, slurring his speech. I even had him
evaluated by teh school speech therapist, who noted the problem and made
suggestions for the teacher to quietly remind him when he was doing one
of these things.

Over time these habits have slowly receded, but I still to this day
remind Chris every here and there to swallow so that we can understand
him when he speaks! He also had something akin to twitching of the eye. I
mentioned this to the pediatrician, and for a while he thought that
perhaps Chris had Turner's syndrome; could this be the same Turner's
syndrome?  Chris has none of the other physical traits; he is already 6'1
and is going to be tall, since I am 5'9 and his father is 6'3. His feet
are normally shaped and BIG--- size 14 mens!  (I keep telling him he is
going to have to support his own shoe expenses if he gets any bigger).

Okay, now my curiosity is piqued.

-Lisa Marasco, BA, IBCLC