#adhd stigma
In today’s episode of “Nobody asked you to be my armchair psychiatrist…”
(Yet again) receiving unsolicited “advice” from a recreational cocaine userwithoutanymedical professional qualifications comparing getting assessed for ADHD to recklessly doping one’s self to the point of total cognitive dysfunction just for funsies.
Did I askfor your medical input? No? Then don’t offer it.
gtubahsbro replied to your post
“telling non-adhd people that you have adhd’ checklist”
What? “You were never taught how to focus as a baby”?? How do you even teach that to a baby?¿STRAP YOURSELF IN BRO, WE’RE GOING TIME TRAVELING [IN AMERICA]
sooo after a bunch of civilization advancements (technology, food supply, modern medicine) started giving caretaker parents serious free time (1940′s-ish onwards), parents had the option to pamper their kids instead of scheduling nursing time for baby #12 between hand-washed laundry loads and making bread dough.
In the US, this meant a bunch of dudes took it on themselves to write books and make lots of money telling people to never neglect baby cries and never put kids in playpens and stuff
- (the most famous one was Dr. Spock’s Baby and Child Care, 1st edition published in 1946 but new ones published like every decade the whole century)
- people were like yeah!! that sounds like a great idea! and stopped putting their kids in playpens and scheduling nursing and whatever.
and then the civil unrest of the 1960′s and 70′s happened and everyone was like ‘OH MY GOD THIS IS BECAUSE WE NEVER PUT OUR BABIES IN PLAYPENS ISN’T IT’
- other dudes wrote other books like ‘dr. spock is wrong, buy my book instead where I tell you to pinch your baby’s neck to discipline them because lack of baby discipline is everything wrong with this country’
- other dudes said ‘well MY book says we should be friends with our kids instead of ordering them around’
- in 1976 a guy wrote an article bitching about all the conflicting parenting advice given out by dudes that you can still read online
but even though their parents were freaking out because they figured hippies were the result of free-range babies, baby boomers were like ‘this Dr. Spock guy is GREAT’ and in the 1980′s they also were all about Free Range Babies.
- I mean, his name is DOCTOR SPOCK. dr. spock
- are you not going to do what dr spock tells you to do????
- soall these babies born in the 1980′s never went in playpens and were fed whenever they were hungry instead of scheduling mealtimes and whatever
- and playpens are SO out of style that we don’t even call them that anymore and everybody is like ‘they probably fuck up your kid. they probably just fuck your kid up so bad’
ANYWAY
meanwhileRitalin was developed in 1955 and ADHD got put in the DSM for the first time in 1968.
- but it was called Kinetic Impulse Disorder
- I just realized this acronym would be KID. somebody had a bad sense of humor
- only one site calls it this. everywhere else calls it Hyperkinetic Reaction of Childhood (HRC. this would have been confusing today)
- in 1980 it got renamed ADD, and later changed to ADD & ADHD, and then just to ADHD
- (today Googlers are grateful bc ‘ADD’ would be hard to google compared to ‘ADHD’)
- we’ve known since the early 1900′s that adhd is caused by brain function issuesandin 1982 we proved diet doesn’t have much of a link
- We started using Ritalin to treat adhd in the late 1960′s
then in the 1990′s: BOOM. Suddenly all these kids born in the 80′s/in elementary school in the 90′s were getting diagnosed with adhd left and right! and it never stopped getting diagnosed a lot??? the percentage of kids diagnosed with adhd keeps going up (11-13% of kids in 2011)
- aaaaaaaah whyyyyy— oh look an article that talks about why
- (spoilers: starting in 1991 adhd got disability help, lots of publicity, standardized testing increased, cultural standards changed, etc)
butalthough Science™ had linked adhd with heredity and neurological function, not diet or parenting methods …
–
“excuse me, the explanation that Science™ gives for kids getting diagnosed with adhd does not satisfy me, a layman, and therefore I would like to seek an uninformed second opinion”
- 90′s/00′s parents, probably“did somebody say they wanted an UNINFORMED SECOND OPINION?”
- 90′s/00′s media, probably–
…. the idea that adhd is an uncontrollable inherited disorder is actually kinda scary. and if you think the stigma against mental illness and neurodiversity is bad now, man. you should have seen the 1980′s/1990′s. so even as people were getting their kids checked because they didn’t want their academic life to suffer and studies said adhd would make you a bad student for life without treatment, there was this lingering feeling that adhd was just some kind of excuse for being undisciplined.
and hey! people sure do love to tell other people what they’re doing wrong, especially if it will make them money.
so there’s plenty of people eager to write books and articles that explain that while they’re sure adhd is real …. probably………. you know, in some case study somewhere ……………. …. the large majority of ‘adhd’ people are totally normal - orwould have been, if you hadn’t been a terrible parent(!!!):
- ‘adhd’ is a lack of learned focus. playpen time helps kids learn to focus and you never put your kid in a playpen
- ‘adhd’ is really just a lack of discipline. putting infants on a feeding schedule teaches them routine. why didn’t you do that
- ‘adhd’ is really kids not knowing how to be bored b/c you give them constant stimuli
- ‘adhd’ is an excuse for inattentive parenting,medicating away behavioral issuesinstead of looking for better causes
- this one doctor wrote a totally not sensationalist book about how adhd isn’t even real!!!!! it must all be a lie
combined with the fairly reasonable assumption that we’re overdiagnosing/overmedicating adhd in the US*, this sort of reporting leans hard on how people think mental health issues are just excuses, anyway.
—
“10,000% of the time adhd is a misdiagnosis. so maybe your kid does have adhd, but it’s way more likely that they just have a short attention span, can’t stand being bored, lack self-discipline, and don’t know how to organize because you fucked up your parenting so bad!
PS and even if they do have adhd their symptoms would be less bad if you were a better parent. you ass”
- an uninformed second opinion media piece, probably—
so in conclusion: as late as 2012, something like 1 out of 3 people thought your adhd is just because your parents/guardians did a bad job raising you. they let you do whatever you want too much, didn’t pay enough attention, let you watch too much tv or play too many video games, never put you in a playpen, or something else. i don’t know. but it’s sure not neurodiversity or anything.
that’s what we get for listening to Spock about parenting.
(final but not necessary to read note under the cut!)
This is the most sarcastic thing I’ve ever written and honestly I still think I’m hilarious
