Robert Toth
I stayed back in the fourth grade three times. I was a straight-F student. The school called my mother and told her to send me to a private school, which she couldn’t afford.
Then, at 14, I had an epiphany.
Two teachers put together a scientific demonstration in class one day. It was very visual. As soon as I saw it, it was as if I awoke from a long sleep. It excited and inspired me. My teachers discovered that I was a visual learner, which was something my mother, a painter, knew intuitively.
I enrolled in art school at 21, and started my own design firm when I was 26. I sculpted busts of famous people, many of whom were thought to have learning disabilities — Einstein, Mozart, Edison, da Vinci, Frank Lloyd Wright. Some of the busts are in the Smithsonian.
When I sculpt and paint — things I love to do — I don’t need medication. I don’t feel like I have ADHD.
There is hope for ADD children. My mom was the making of me. You can be the making of your child.
A version of this article appears in the Summer 2009 issue of ADDitude.
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