To think that the ADHD label is masking other things in society?

[comoatoupeira]

Disclaimer this is NOT about being skeptical ADHD is a thing, my brother is diagnosed with ADHD by a doctor as well as a close friend of mine.

Through my job I have been doing a lot of research about the impacts of tech and social media and so on on young people, and also on the elderly who are becoming the first generation of elderly people who are high technology users.

It has all been making me see so many parallels between behaviors associated with ADHD and behaviors that are becoming more and more difficult to control because of the attention-stealing environment we are in, and other aspects of society today like consumerism always available in your pocket, long working hours and both parents working, the difficulty of taking those restorative breaks that are what helps us focus and take a step back.

I'm just feeling like we are looking at some milder cases of ADHD too much as an isolated medical thing rather than a wider societal ill.

I feel like the same thing has happened with depression, framing it as some sort of imbalance that can be fixed by drugs, when it's so much about the societies we live in.

I feel uncomfortable about all of these labels being used especially by young people with mild cases of things, it seems to imprison them in a fixed identity or frame them as having something wrong with them, when none of us a perfect and we all have strengths and weaknesses, and life is about living with them and being open to change.

What do you think?

I think ignorance and misconceptions also applies to people with these conditions and often prevent people from seeking diagnosis. That was certainly the case for me.

What is your professional experience? Because, if the symptoms of ADHD or ASD present after a traumatic event and have not always been present a diagnosis will not be given. Trauma is common in those with ND conditions but the trauma comes later.

In my personal and professional experience, I have yet to meet a child with ASD or ADHD who didn't have at least one parent with fairly obvious traits. Modern life and the school system are leading to an inability to cope but it is not causing the ND conditions, they have always been there but they were more easily hidden and more widely misunderstood.

Best thing I ever did for my mental health was seek a diagnosis. I had been diagnosed prior with depression and anxiety and I had lifelong insomnia. Turns out with the diagnosis I was then able to get medication which reduced my blood pressure so I came off two bp meds, one quite hard on kidneys, came off antidepressants and I now sleep. Lots. This makes life much easier for me as I know I can now sleep through the night meaning I wake up fresher and more relaxed and my anxiety is mainly gone. It has changed my life dramatically.

I'm interested in the concept that modern schooling means children are less able to cope and less able to go under the radar. In the west young people are indulged more than at any other time both at home and school. School was far stricter, more rigid and conformist in the 60/70/80s. I know a couple of adults who are most certainly undiagnosed ASD and although they didn't like school and didn't do well academically they coped far better then that their kids are coping now (kids awaiting diagnosis but certainly have asd). There was no school refusal, no mental health crisis etc. Do people really think schools were more ND friendly 'back in the day'? So ND friendly that thousands of adults coped under the radar?

I agree and it minimalises the experience of those with the condition

You must have gone to very different schools to me. In fact I think every element of your post is incorrect, where do you get it from?

I'd like to tell my story to people that often think it's overdiagnosed or a trend.

I was a late 30s diagnosed woman last year. I've always known something was wrong. Too late in my life to want to be part of a fad. I got a diagnosis to help me with reasonable adjustments at work and to understand myself. I am currently unmedicated through choice.

I often describe it as being that I've never moved to the same beat that everyone else seems to. I've been back and forth over the years, to the drs and seen counsellors because I never knew what was wrong with me and why things affected me the way they did. I noticed other people didn't seem to act like I did.

I saw a neurologist a few years before I saw my consultant psychiatrist. I realised I probably had dyspraxia. He saw something neurodivergent in me then and wrote in his discharge letter. I was so far in the masking I completely denied it.

That letter also helped me in my actual diagnosis when I realised later what I had. Also my school reports. (Thank goodness my mother kept them) I was told I should have been diagnosed as dyspraxic as a child and I had inattentive adhd.

If I had been diagnosed many years ago, I would have a different life. I truly believe that. When you judge a fish on it's ability ride a bike, it will forever believe it is stupid. That's what I believe about me and how society has taught me what I was growing up. I've actually cried at how life has gone for me and if I'd have help and not judgement, I would have gone far.

Do you know that actually ADHD is actually often misdiagnosed with other things? They do have overlaps with other conditions.
However, ADHD is a neurological condition, one that you are born with and is often genetic. There are a few ways it can be seen on the brain.
https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/the-reality-of-gen-z/202112/7-ways-adhd-can-be-seen-in-the-brain%3famp

I believe in getting diagnosed is a good thing. Not for an excuse, not for a woe is me but to be able to gain help. To be able to gain understanding of ourselves. ADHD had a gender biasis in diagnosis in the earlier years. Until over 25 years ago, it wasn't even recognised in adults! They didn't even know the differences between female and male symptoms.

Also when I was growing up, we didn't have half of the screens growing up and have instant society. It didn't stop me finding it hard to focus and day dreaming. And disrupting others and getting told for talking in class. The shame that came with this and the shame I still carry around to this day. I've never been good enough.

Let's just have empathy for people.

We never say that other conditions could be something else. Copd could be just a cough. That broken leg is just a limp.

Because these conditions can be seen ao they are empathised with more.

There was no school refusal, no mental health crisis etc.

There certainly was. They were taken out of mainstream school and put in 'special' schools or sent to institutions.

@ashitghost I experienced similar. I could've been given all sorts of labels years ago and now none would apply. Please can you say more about how you managed to move on from your depression / mh diagnoses?

I am 100% sure my late father was autistic and undiagnosed. He went to boarding school and was an academic high flyer, but when it came to real life, he couldn’t cope. I’d say sometimes school / college can be where some autistics thrive, as it offers predictability, routine and the opportunity to be do things they find remotely easy when it comes to academic work, but it can fall apart really quickly once the stabilisers come off.

I think nowadays now there’s more awareness of anxiety and various ND and schools have an obligation to try and be supportive of it, but this is also in conjunction with children having smart phones and being able to contact their parents to complain on their behalf, or to pick them up, and parents these days are certainly more entitled, and don’t trust professional educators to some extent to work with their children.

in the ‘olden days’ I expect those children would just fall through the cracks without a safety net to catch them, where some would thrive without an education, and others falling to poor lifestyles or low skilled work, but then it was easier to get a job and be in that job for life and afford to buy a house etc - so double edged sword I say. There are still many people in their 50’s 60’s and older who are illiterate, and I would wager that this is because there was little understanding or support for those who we now know probably were ND.

But that would be fairly extreme cases if disability. There is no way the numbers are comparable to now. The reality is that if the levels of ND being diagnosed is correct then literally thousands of ND pupils must have coped in school in the old days. I'm not saying this didn't happen I'm just saying that I would have thought it was a lot harder for them to cope in the old days when schools were far more rigid and less indulgent of difference in behaviour. I just see modern schools being blamed for the rise in diagnosis in most threads about ADHD and ASD and for me it's doesn't really seem logical. As for attendance, maybe it just wasn't recorded when kids didn't go? I don't know how long reliable records have been kept but they just keep saying there is an attendance 'crisis' is there really compared to times gone by?

@ForSereneBluePombear There are still many people in their 50’s 60’s and older who are illiterate

My dyslexia makes it very difficult to read and either listen or watch at the same time. I had three STEM based A Levels but had to sit out two years and take four attempts to pass English O level before I could start my engineering degree. Only once I started uni did anyone think to screen me for dyslexia.

With all due respect, I suspect you are just making things up. Is this just "the impression you get" or do you have proper data to back it up?

I went to school on the 70’s and 80’s. No one cared if you coasted or didn’t achieve.

I started teaching in 1996 secondary level. It was still much more relaxed. The squeeze started around 2006?

Thw introduction of data into schools is what’s driven it. That and Ofsted. Every student now has to achieve in every single minute to get into league tables

It’s an impossible situation. Being in school now is like being in a straight jacket. There’s no breathing room at all. And the stupid petty uniform rules Why?

I work in social work/family court area. I think you might have misunderstood me. What I’m saying is in children that later go on to receive ADHD diagnosis, often there is a history of childhood/unborn trauma. In my oppinion, it makes sense that you may develop symptoms that look like ADHD to manage the trauma, particularly if there is a genetic predisposition to such conditions. My point though is, without understanding the role of environment and society pressures, alongside conditions, we a missing a big step in supporting young people in the long term.

I don't disagree that screens/ social media/ life in general nowadays can cause ADHD like symptoms, in order to be diagnosed as an adult you have to 'prove' you had symptoms in childhood, that can involve a persons parents being interviewed or digging out school reports etc.( both in my case) before the psychiatrist who diagnosed me would even consider ADHD as a diagnosis.

Looking at one branch of my family you can clearly see what branch of my family the ADHD gene is coming from and it seems to be a dominant one!

I think you are conflating ADHD, and some behaviours that may have some crossover with some ADHD traits.

That applies to me - but absolutely does not apply to my children or many of the children I know and have met via my kids and at their schools. Sorry, but trauma has very little to do with what is a brain that is wired differently to the perceived norm from birth/conception.

I would infer that the YP you are seeing are the ones who have not been supported by families/school/society - and therefore may have an element of trauma feeding their behaviours and lower ability to manage aspects of their ADHD - but they do not have ADHD because of trauma in their childhood. To suggest this is the case is one step removed from saying autism is caused by vaccinations!

But you only see the ones in court?

My Dd has no trauma. She is ADHD as is her dad. He had no trauma either.

Thw majority of people with ADHD don’t and up in court. I know they are over represented. But they still don’t and up in court.

Family court not necessarily criminal court.

But if you drew a Venn diagram of ADHD, trauma and criminal court there would be a lot of overlap.

Your DH and DD could well be outliers.

I'm just saying that I would have thought it was a lot harder for them to cope in the old days when schools were far more rigid and less indulgent of difference in behaviour. I just see modern schools being blamed for the rise in diagnosis in most threads about ADHD and ASD and for me it's doesn't really seem logical.

More group work, "fun activities" in primary rather than clean explanations and practise, busy classroom displays, fewer text books to read ahead or go over stuff more bits of paper to lose or to struggle to organise- more noise - big one for my DC especially post covid - less clear behaviour rules they often don't apply to everyone -often less breaks - they get 25 min at lunch - have to queue to eat and go to unlocked toilets in that time - much more supply or gaps in teaching generally due to lack of consistent teaching.

I don't know about all school but those have all been problems for my DC in their schools - which I think they have often been in worse position to cope with and more extra stresses they have to deal with less well they cope overall.

Well there likely is no data is there? I think it's fair to say the the mental health of youth is far worse and there is data to back this up. The big decline being the into of smart phones. My original point was anecdotal that the ND adults I know coped in school much better than their DC (also Nd are now). This follows what I often see on MN that modern schools are poor environments for ND pupils, and therefore ND is becoming much more obvious, leading to increase in diagnosis. The suggestion is that in the old days people just got on with it and flew under the radar. I'm asking why this would be the case when on the face of it schools before about the 90s were far less accommodating to any disabilities or differences.

But l used to teach in a school that had plenty of ASD and ADHD

They were never involved in courts, family or otherwise. It was in a very stable area, very few divorces, very few safeguarding issues.

Interesting post.

I think there is a % that is misdiagnosed for both ADHD & depression.

But it's difficult to judge from the outside looking in.
The difficulties that individuals and families experience are real. The question is, is this a result of other outside influences, for example living in a 25/7 world, or the actual medical condition.

Lots and lots of outliers in my part of Surrey, nearly 500 boys at a local specialist school and then their are their female siblings at the nearby mixed private next door. None of them have criminal records. Nor has any member of my family: 2 sisters and a brother (ie within my family 6 of us are ASD and/or ADHD).

I think you are mixing up the overlap between criminality and childhood trauma and incorrectly overlaying ADHD.

Actually, it is quite offensive.