Review: A Chicken in the Wind and How He Grew by Frank South

Life can be messy and complicated – throw ADHD into the mix and you’ve got A Chicken in the Wind and How He Grew: Stories from an ADHD Dad, a spirited memoir by Frank South.

During his lifetime, South has held many “former” titles: a former English teacher for adjudicated teens, a former Off-Broadway playwright, a former television writer and producer, and a former alcoholic. He writes about what he knows – life as an adult struggling and coping with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, commonly referred to as ADHD.

Together with his loving (and somewhat long-suffering) wife Margaret, they are parents to two ADHD kids – daughter Coco and son Harry. South spent years self-medicating with alcohol, which eventually led to a breakdown at age 49, before being diagnosed with “abnormally high ADHD scores along with a number of pronounced comorbid disorders,” made all the more difficult by raising children with similar issues, and the knowledge that ADHD is hereditary.

At first glance (especially at the cover), this might not seem like the stuff for a compelling story, but it is a gripping narrative in large part because of South’s brutal honesty. Each vignette comprises a small segment of South’s daily life with his wife and kids, while also recounting stories from his childhood to his young adult years where alcohol and erratic behavior controlled his life. He’s forthcoming about the heights of his career when he and the family lived in a sprawling house in Pasadena and “the Hollywood money” that fueled a certain lifestyle, including his alcoholism, and then his family’s subsequent move to Hawaii where South was able to heal and mend his fractured relationship with his wife and children.

These poignant vignettes expose readers to a tumultuous life filled with drama, tension, frustration, temper flare ups, and love as South struggles with his role as a husband, father, and son, trying to cope with anxiety and short-term memory problems, while also trying to guide and support his children through their own life battles with ADHD. He recounts binge-watching a television show about a “butchering psychopath with monstrous murder daddy dreams” to foster communication with his son, dealing with a difficult move from Hawaii to Georgia, and the deterioration of his elderly father’s health and its collateral damage.

There are positive messages woven throughout the book, which can be taken to heart by those who don’t suffer from ADHD, though those with ADHD will benefit most from the book. South is emphatic in his belief that ADHD has taught him that the only thing certain is uncertainty, and that acceptance of his impairments won’t stop him from doing anything he wants in life – only that these problems make things a lot more interesting. It’s clear that getting diagnosed and getting sober have helped him become more honest and comfortable with himself. He brilliantly sums up his chaotic life by stating that “the fight may never end but it’s the love we have for each other that gives all of us the reason and power to stay in the ring.”

All in all, A Chicken in the Wind and How He Grew will draw you in with its laid-back narrative, but it’s South’s self-effacing humor and humility that will keep you turning the pages.

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