Posted on 07/17/2004 11:43:25 PM PDT by neverdem
Believe me, we know this. We are very disciplined with our parenting approach. Our kids are fine on the discipline front, we are consistent and firm. And I agree that ADD is overdiagnosed. Without a doubt it is something that helps drug companies push unnecessary medicine and lazy parents a way to control challenging children. But to those who really do have it, and the people around them, there is positively no guessing involved. Maybe in the past they had other names for it, but ADD is very real to those who really have to deal with it.
If they are lollygagging around all the time and are just late, yes. If they are constantly getting distracted into things, then perhaps not. I know a person that prior to setting up computer alarms would almost never make meetings because they were distracted by doing their projects and would get completely wrapped up in them. They had more output than any two other people for several months at a time, but would always be late, and their work would peak and valley every few months.
Of course an annual review would show that they were constantly late for work, and would go through spats of missing deadlines. It wouldn't note that they were also often late going home, and had learned how to do every job function in a diverse department.
Kinda bipolar ADHD.
If they are lollygagging around all the time and are just late, yes. If they are constantly getting distracted into things, then perhaps not. I know a person that prior to setting up computer alarms would almost never make meetings because they were distracted by doing their projects and would get completely wrapped up in them. They had more output than any two other people for several months at a time, but would always be late, and their work would peak and valley every few months.
Of course an annual review would show that they were constantly late for work, and would go through spats of missing deadlines. It wouldn't note that they were also often late going home, and had learned how to do every job function in a diverse department.
Kinda bipolar ADHD.
I respectfully suggest that it is you who needs to further educate yourself on this matter. ADD is an excuse for massively widespread child abuse, nothing more. Disorders that affect millions do not just appear out of thin air.
There are real disorders that affect children and are diagnosed as ADD, but I would estimate that those are less than 5% of all such cases.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/keyword/add
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/keyword/adhd
I'm waiting for someone who has actually been diagnosed with it, or who actually has it, to come forward with these kinds of statements. ???
Those aren't ADD symptoms... that's a bipolar disorder, something completely different. But it does go to show that ADD has become a catch-all for a lot of different things that aren't ADD.
Well in my case I'm an adult who is not really being abused by anyone. But I agree with your sentiment, though "nothing more" precludes ADD as a viable option in even one case.
There are real disorders that affect children and are diagnosed as ADD, but I would estimate that those are less than 5% of all such cases.
I actually agree with this statement. But is there a psychologist in our community who can step forward and say what they think? I get tired of "experts" who haven't been there acting like they know it all.
I need a psychotropic drug to read articles that long ...
Perhaps not what you are talking about, but certain types of misbehaving are simply "tactile learning" in an environment set up for girls (who sometimes have the same tendency, but at a much lower rate).
Are you saying that ADD doesn't exist? If so, we disagree. Or are you saying that it is over-diagnosed and a trojan horse for laziness and abuse? If so, we agree.
The problem with getting a professional psychologist's opinion is that psychologists have a vested interest in saying that it does exist. ADD = money for them.
I have no such interest. All I have to say for myself is that I did have problems as a child, that if I were born a decade or two later I would have certainly been diagnosed as ADD/ADHD and drugged out with Ritalin; that those problems were the direct result of the absence of parental guidance, too much TV, and schools which did not have the tools to provide for an intelligent child; and that later in life, when I was able to sort out these problems without outside interference, the elimination of television, self-education, and religious study were more than sufficient to cure all the legacy problems that I did have.
Thus, I believe it is nothing more than child abuse to give psychoactive drugs to children in place of taking these other, commonsense steps. In the extremely rare case where that is not sufficient, I would say a real disorder exists. The fact that, after all this time, there is still no hard-and-fast definition of ADD that can be put to an objective test, despite enormous resources from the psychology and pharmaceutical industries, is as close to proof of the non-existence of ADD/ADHD as one can get.
On a very basic level, if a child is raised by a television in a family where both parents work, and taught by government schools, one would expect an otherwise healthy child to develop all the symptoms associated with ADD/ADHD.
I'm not talking about legitimate cases(and I strongly disagree with the blowhards who claim ADD is ENTIRELY made up.) But there are a heck of a lot of persons who claim to have ADD who really are just excuse making, in jobs poorly suited to their personalities, lacking self-control, etc.
You have my prayers and understanding for your situation. The excuse makers who try and jump on the ADD bandwagon end up doing the most harm to recognition of ADD by the general public, because they are the loudest ones and those most likely to be encountered by the public, who then attaches a gereral skepticism about the existence and severity of actual cases.
Continue to Not Medicate them.
Contrary to what popular opinion is, ritalin, and it's brood....will leave your child with a sweet tooth for narcotics later in life. God help them if they ever fall into methamphetamines. Ahhh, that calm surreal childhood feeling.
Personal experience, and opinion...but you're doing the right thing.
In this persons case, the lateness to meetings was resolved with meeting software (they would always remember that there was supposed to be a meeting and when, but not in a timely manner). The variation in performance was resolved by constantly changing their tasks. Any task you gave this person would be mastered within months, and would begin to decline soon thereafter, until they'd get lost staring blankly at the screen.
Management decision: Set them to learn new (widely varied) tasks, train others to do them and take them over, and go onto new tasks. Worked fine.
Now...why would this only show up relatively recently? Well, for starters, we were designed to go chase bunnies, not to sit at a desk for years, performing repetitive functions, operating on a schedule. Lots of ADD traits would not be notable, or would be actually helpful in other environments.
A good NY Times writer is like the ol' ugly Wicked Witch of Oz: "Lotus flowers ... yes, my lovelies ... that will make them sleeep ..."
A good read? Wake up a sheep. Are you baahhing yet?
BLOWHARDIAN OR NOT ... THAT'S THE WAY IT IS.
* * * * *
The world depends on blowhards and flakes. The rest of you are just sheep, penned for the slaughter.
Right. It's a fad. Like the general "neuralgias" and "distempers" of bygone eras for which magical elixers were sold.
But it's more than that too. It's in the same line as Margeret Sanger and the racial and social purifiers. The offical eugenists who sterilized the "addled" and the negroid. It shows that official society has tolerance only for a an extremely curtailed set of behavioual patterns. A very boring and dull set, by the way. Not a very productive set, what "they" would allow.
An unhealthy attitude "they" have.
And they are just the people who buy into this claptrap, or the ones who go along with it. "They" are us.
But not me.
"I need a psychotropic drug to read articles that long ..."
Funny you should say that. Despite my ADD tendencies, I never had any trouble sitting and reading, sometimes for long stretches. I do have a nasty habit of sometimes missing whole paragraphs or sentences while reading. That cost me quite a few times on tests and exams in school.
Another type of depression is bipolar disorder, also called manic-depressive illness. Not nearly as prevalent as other forms of depressive disorders, bipolar disorder is characterized by cycling mood changes: severe highs (mania) and lows (depression). Sometimes the mood switches are dramatic and rapid, but most often they are gradual. When in the depressed cycle, an individual can have any or all of the symptoms of a depressive disorder. When in the manic cycle, the individual may be overactive, overtalkative, and have a great deal of energy. Mania often affects thinking, judgment, and social behavior in ways that cause serious problems and embarrassment. For example, the individual in a manic phase may feel elated, full of grand schemes that might range from unwise business decisions to romantic sprees. Mania, left untreated, may worsen to a psychotic state.
SYMPTOMS OF DEPRESSION AND MANIA
Not everyone who is depressed or manic experiences every symptom. Some people experience a few symptoms, some many. Severity of symptoms varies with individuals and also varies over time.
Depression
Persistent sad, anxious, or "empty" mood
Feelings of hopelessness, pessimism
Feelings of guilt, worthlessness, helplessness
Loss of interest or pleasure in hobbies and activities that were once enjoyed, including sex
Decreased energy, fatigue, being "slowed down"
Difficulty concentrating, remembering, making decisions
Insomnia, early-morning awakening, or oversleeping
Appetite and/or weight loss or overeating and weight gain
Thoughts of death or suicide; suicide attempts
Restlessness, irritability
Persistent physical symptoms that do not respond to treatment, such as headaches, digestive disorders, and chronic pain
Mania
Abnormal or excessive elation
Unusual irritability
Decreased need for sleep
Grandiose notions
Increased talking
Racing thoughts
Increased sexual desire
Markedly increased energy
Poor judgment
Inappropriate social behavior
What lepton described is not bipolar disorder, but it sure sounds that "spacey" behavior described in the article. The above definition of bipolar disorder and symptoms was from the National Institute of Mental Health(NIMH). Here's the URL:
http://www.nimh.nih.gov/publicat/depression.cfm#ptdep3
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