Four million American children have been diagnosed with ADHD and other psychiatric disorders despite dangerous emotional and physical side effects from psychotropic medications. Pills are not for Preschoolers draws on her years of experience with hundreds of children, teenagers and families in her new book. Join us as she shows how parents can be empowered to turn around their child’s problem behaviors safely and effectively, without the use of stigmatizing psychiatric labels or potentially harmful medications.
Show Highlights:
- Segment 1: Diagnosing ADHD: Is your child being misdiagnosed with ADHD, bipolar, or depression? When should medication be uses?
- Segment 2: 7 Natural ways to address ADHD: How can discipline work? What role does environment you create at home and diet effect your child? Is your teacher the best match for your kid?
- Segment 3: Doctors incentives to prescribe medications: Dr. Wedge provides cases when children have been incorrectly medicated. How could family therapy solve some your problem child?
- Segment 4: What kinds of questions can you ask doctors before turning to medications? What are the health risks posed by medications?
About our Guest:
Marilyn Wedge, Ph.D., is a family therapist with more than twenty years of experience helping children, adolescents and families. She is the author of two books, both published by W. W. Norton: In the Therapist’s Mirror: Reality in the Making, and Suffer the Children:The Case against Labeling and Medicating and an Effective Alternative (soon to be out in paperback with the new title: Pills are not for Preschoolers). She is a blogger for the Huffington Post and her work has appeared in Babble, The Wall Street Journal, Natural Health, People Magazineand many other publications. She has been interviewed on CBS-San Francisco,San Diego Living, The Fanny Kiefer Show, and on national public radio (NPR).
Dr. Wedge is the originator of “strategic child-focused family therapy,” which empowers parents to help their children heal without labeling them with so-called “psychiatric disorders” or medicating them with psychotropic drugs.
Dr. Wedge earned her bachelor’s degree and her doctorate at the University of Chicago (where she was a Danforth Foundation Fellow), and had a post-doctoral fellowship at the Hastings Center for Bioethics in New York. She has taught at the California State University, East Bay, the College of the Art Institute of Chicago and the Chicago YMCA Community College. She is a popular speaker at national and international professional conferences, including the Milton Erickson Foundation Brief Therapy Conference and the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists Annual Conferences.
Dr. Wedge lives in Oak Park, California with her husband Gene. They have three grown children and two grandchildren.
