To think ADHD/ASD labels get used too casually sometimes?

[CuriousNotCruel]

NOT talking about people with genuine diagnoses. But AIBU to think some people casually label basic personality traits - introversion, distractibility, perfectionism, as ADHD/ASD online? It feels dismissive to people with the real conditions.

@ByQuaintAzureWaspOh they did indeed! I'm a child of the 70s and went to school with a few ADHD boys. It just wasn't recognised in girls because they present differently. But the lads were medicated.

The early recognition of the disorder was in 1902.

You sound like my DM who is 79, btw. Totally ignorant with her fingers in her ears going lalalalalalalala, pretending her 14yr old daughter who has the community mental health nurse round every week, has nothing wrong with her. I took myself to the doctors because I realised slicing myself up and regularly overdosing on any tablet I could find at home, wasn't a normal thing amongst my friends.

So gather up your ignorance @ByQuaintAzureWaspand do a little research.

This is total shit.

There are side effects which have to be considered.

And they transformed my dd from being too anxious to leave her room to now being able to attend university.

Yes and I’m fucking sick of it they are genuine disabilities but people slap a nonexistent diagnosis on themselves because someone on TIKTOK told them they have ASD/ADHD when they don’t it makes it harder for people who have had to fight tooth and nail to get a diagnosis to be taken seriously. It’s like when people were claiming to GF just because.

No they are not.

you’re being very dramatic.

also ADHD meds have vastly improved my DC lives and by extension our lives too.

It always amazes me how MN question certain diagnosis, I’m curious to know what makes them more qualified than those actually qualified to carry out these assessments?

This is complete rubbish. ADHD meds are highly effective. I have 2 children on them who were also given an NHS ADHD therapy workshop in addition. The risks are spelled out as is the fact it’s not a cure and you try a few until you get one exactly right, have breaks and you go on a lengthy course to learn coping strategies alongside.The meds have been life changing and I mean completely life changing. Self medication and self harming has stopped, able to access education ….

After all the above I chose not to have meds as I’m in my 50s and I am a bit phobic about any med. Many choose not to but they are life changing for those that do.

As the NHS taskforce have said- everybody needs access to the same gold standard care .

Probably because those that are qualified are very aware of misdiagnosis and how common it is for some conditions more than others.

This isn’t what’s being said. A) MNers aren’t qualified and B) those qualified aren’t saying that

This isn’t what’s being said. A) MNers aren’t qualified and B) those qualified aren’t saying that

This is absolutely not true.

And again- it’s need that gets support in education, a diagnosis gets you nothing if there is no need.

lol yeah I doubt most MN are actually qualified to make any diagnosis. They just think they know better than those that do. 😂

DD, diagnosed with ADHD by the NHS finds that theory really annoying. She says there is no reason why people with ADHD haven’t also suffered trauma. These diagnoses are not mutually exclusive; and diagnosing the symptoms as due to trauma, risks missing the ND also there, and people going without the treatment/support for the underlying ND for decades.

Many of those qualified are saying that.

That's why the health secretary has ordered an independent review into the rising demand for MH, ADHD and ASC services.

Probably because we’ve underfunded the whole system for so long and people who should have had a diagnosis long ago are now seeking support.

I think in actual fact you’ll find that it is under diagnosed.

No medical profession I have spoke to has said anything of a sort. Define many.

Oh yay another thread talking about this.

What bothers me as much as those who minimise autistic traits all over tiktok are those who treat traits of other disabilities (such as learning difficulties or cognitive/intellectual disability, etc) as part of Autism, then label it the 'severe kind of Autism'.

I do want to ask those who like to play top trumps, where do those of us who aren't on either end of 'acceptable autism' and 'not the right kind of autism' go? What label diagnosis should those who neither smear poop (and are either verbal or semiverbal) nor live a 'normal life' get? It pisses me off that people talk about Autistic traits as if it's either or when many are in the middle.

'BreezyPeachGoose · Today 07:03
The other difficult thing to consider with an autism diagnosis is the differential diagnosis of trauma / ACEs etc'

I always wonder why certain ND's are more often talked about than others, and how much the lack of (pharmaceutical) treatment plays into it. Estimated prevalance if FASD in the UK is 6-17%. For ADHD it is 5%. FASD is massively underdiagnosed and presents very similar to ADHD. Why there is no national information programme or social media presence for FASD?

The NHS published a report 2 or 3 months ago about ADHD.

It found that adhd was underdiagnosed in the U.K. and the underdiagnosis was costing the country something like 70 billion quid.

I find the whole discussion around autism so toxic and I dont find it a useful way to describe what my son is like anymore. I've left autism to the neurospicy now. I just say he has disordered development and is fortunately making progress at his special school.

There is a difference between the concept of whether ADHD or ASC are overdiagnosed or not, and the fact that there are many, many misdiagnoses happening.

Dr Mario's Adamou who set up one of the 1st adult ADHD clinics in the UK for a start.

He sits on the board of the adult ADHD network and he among other ADHD experts led to the Panorama expose in 2023.

Who said at the time that 50% of the private diagnoses who came to his NHS clinic would not be diagnosed by the NHS and the assessments were often not worth the paper they were written on.

Dr Mike Smith, clinical lead of the Adult ADHD service in Leeds who featured on the Panorama programme who said the same thing.

There are many others. Who have been stating this for years.

Dr Allen Frances who chaired the body which led to the widening of diagnostic criteria for ASC in the DSM has publicly expressed regret for doing so and personally feels the condition is now overdiagnosed.

Statistics may say that a condition is not overdiagnosed at a population level but that is not the same thing as there not not being a crisis of misdiagnosis.

I've got ADHD with autistic traits awaiting asd assessment.Ive also had horrible anxiety so bad I couldn't leave the house.Have to wait for dh to go with me into town on occasion.
I've never been on a plane barely been in a cinema or theater.
I have zero friends as I don't socialize due to crowded places.
It's like anything people will claim to have something not realizing the crippling effects of living with it everyday.

What makes his opinion the right one and not the private one?

you do know many private providers also work within the NHS?

so two people then?

Over diagnosis of ADHD and autism?
No.

Not sure who said this, but it's a good image:
“When the telescope was invented there wasn’t a sudden increase in the number of stars, we were just able to see them. Similarly, improved diagnostic methods have merely enabled us to see those neurodivergent people who were previously missed.”

I think it's great that the stigma of these conditions has evaporated to the extent that people want to label themselves as neurodivergent. These conditions have always been prevalent, but people has instead used labels such as scatty, a loner, disorganised, prefers his own company, chaotic or highly strung, which are all negative. And perhaps this is why people want a condition to explain why they are poor time-keepers, don't enjoy social situations etc... Moreover, who are we to judge what is going on in someone's head? They could be masking every time they leave the house.

I get that if you are struggling with a child or family member who has complex needs due to their neurodivergence, it can be hard to accept that others who seem 'perfectly fine' share that label. But likewise, my DD (ADHD and mild cerebral palsy) has always claimed it is much harder to deal with her conditions because she is so aware of her differences than a child with profound learning difficulties.

ADHD is probably over diagnosed. Different styles of parenting are known to make a difference. When I was at school no child threw furniture or was repeatedly badly behaved. Yes boys had the odd scrap but nothing serious and I’d like to know what’s changed in children?

I think this is a good point. Studies suggest that around 90% of persistent absence from school is among ND children. If we didn't have such a rigid education system, we may find that fewer feel the need to seek a diagnosis because their needs are well met and fewer would be falling apart and avoiding attending.

The old style UK school system post-war was bad for social mobility, but I have often said that ND didn't seem to be as prevalent back then because children had other options open to them. My father almost certainly has adhd, he left school at 15, learned manual skills and became a builder and a plumber. He earned well from it, and enjoyed those things.

These days, there's a lot of snobbery within education and an insistence on pushing children to achieve in the more 'academic' and heavily theoretical subjects like maths, science and English. Children's enjoyment and engagement with those subjects is heavily dependent upon the kind of teacher they have. Some will do ok, or even very well, others won't.