Social death

I'm researching ADHD like somebody revising for an exam, studying everything from trials where academics administer bumper doses of fish oil to troubled children to see if it makes them behave better or just grow fins, to first person accounts where parents either rave about Ritalin, or rant about its side effects.

But hundreds of thousands of words later, only one sentence hits home. It's not flowery. It says nothing that's particularly new. It's just one bald statement among many - a casual side observation in a list of symptoms: "Children with ADHD will not have many friends and certainly won't get invited to parties," it says.

It makes me cry, because it's true. And because it makes me realise that I am as guilty of self-deception as the next parent. When whole-class parties stopped at around the age of seven, Leo simply ceased to get invitations. Once, he came home in tears because a former best friend told him he'd invited everyone else 'except you,' and I did something I'd always vowed I'd never do and called the other mother to see if this was true. Her squirming embarrassment on the other end of the phone told me everything I needed to know, but I couldn't bring myself to ask why.

Leo's not totally friendless. I share a once a week pick up from the school sports field with another mother, so the boys do their homework and then play together alternately at our house, or hers. And there's another boy, Dave, who lives round the corner and is Leo's best mate. He's also a bully, so cordially loathed by every other child in the area that Leo is the only one who'll talk to him.

I don't like him much, but with such a limited choice, beggars can't be choosers. Then, today, a silver lining suddenly appears. For all that Leo fusses, and screams and has tantrums, and flies into rages with his little sister, he can see how things are. "Dave bullies me," remarks Deborah, as we're on the way home. To my surprise, Leo confirms this. "I heard him," he says. "I told him he wasn't to do it, or he couldn't come round." Deborah nods in vigorous agreement and I come over misty-eyed all over again, which is both unusual and inconvenient, as I'm trying to negotiate an awkward right turn into a busy one way system at the time. "Mum," shrieks Beth, "Mind the lorry!" The driver mouths a stream of silent abuse through the closed windows, but I don't care. In fact, I feel pretty good, something that lasts all of one minute and forty seconds until Deborah starts to demand food, water, her choice of cd and ends up slumped down on her booster seat, rhythmically kicking the back of my seat to give extra emphasis to her demands.