SimplyWellbeing logo
SimplyWellbeing logo

Delivered from Distraction – Hallowell & Ratey

BOOK REVIEWS

Delivered from Distraction – Hallowell & Ratey

Book review

The definitive guide to ADHD

In 1994, Hallowell and Ratey published Driven to Distraction to Worldwide acclaim and sales. In this follow up to “Driven to Distraction” Drs. Edward M. Hallowell and John J. Ratey (both ADHD themselves) build on their sympathetic earlier work, to offer a guide to “living a successful life with ADD”.

The book is tailored to ADHD learning styles and provides accessible, engaging discussions of every aspect of the condition, from diagnosis to finding the proper treatment regime. With profiles of patients with ADHD who have really triumphed “releasing the positive energy that all people with ADD hold inside”. The book is in four parts, providing a foundation from which to discuss the ADHD phenomenon:

  1. What’s It Like to Have ADD?
  2. Three Stories that Tell the Story
  3. Making the Diagnosis of ADD
  4. Mastering the Power and Avoiding the Pitfalls

The positive message of hope and focus on your strengths carries over from the original but includes the very latest in the world of attention differences, including current research in lifestyle changes, supplements, medication, and testing. The book is sprinkled with observations taken from Hallowell’s practice, is comprehensive and empowering. Chapters include “ADD Self-Assessment Quizzes for Adults”, “An evil, an Illness, or a Kind of Mind?”, “Conditions that Coexist with ADD,”, “Genetics,” “Are We Training our Children to have ADD?” “The Treatment of ADD: What Works Best,” and “ADD in Families.”

A fantastic update to a fantastic book.

Buy on Amazon
ADHD Coach, Andrew Lewis

Andrew Lewis

Andrew Lewis is an ADHD Coach, writer and founder of SimplyWellbeing. He has over ten thousand hours and fifteen years of experience in coaching ADHD executives, business professionals and creatives. His expertise with ADHD is personal, with decades of his own experience, bringing up an ADHD child, running a large support group and in coaching clients often for years He has published his writing via this website and has ADHD online courses in development. His business expertise comes from a twenty years career in software, from programming, through marketing, sales and running a few start-ups.

Further reading

ADHD at work
Some very ADHD-like advice in this awesome short book Mark Forster offers advice on time management that is amazingly tuned to the traits of ADHD. It seems that Forster does not realise that many of the people with the disorganised issues he mentions are most likely ADHD – struggling with weak executive functions of poor motivation, […]
ADHD at work
Being ADHD we are only too aware of the tricks our minds play on themselves, fascinating insights into our evolved craziness
ADHD at work
A comprehensive look at childhood ADHD through the perspective of executive functions
ADHD at work
Brilliant advice from father of three ADHD kids. I found it very helpful personally as a parent of an ADHD child
ADHD at work
The first ADHD auto-biography, lots to relate to
linkedin facebook pinterest youtube rss twitter instagram facebook-blank rss-blank linkedin-blank pinterest youtube twitter instagram