I ran across an interesting statistic earlier today. Actually, I would be more inclined to call it "eye-opening" than merely interesting.
Semantics aside, this particular factoid revealed that in (Western) Europe approximately 1% of children are diagnosed with ADHD, while in the United States 10% of children are diagnosed with ADHD.
Let that sink in, for a moment.
As I can't bring myself to believe that human physiology and psychology is that different between Europe and the US I can only arrive at the conclusion that there is something fishy at play, there.
Now, I'm not trying to make some argument that ADHD is "not a real thing" and can't be a serious issue for some people... rather, I am making an argument that here in the US there's a tendency towards "medicalizing" what is actually perfectly natural and normal parts of the spectrum of human experience.
Which brings me to one of my pet peeves about the US Health"care" System, which is that one of the toxic effects of "for profit medicine" is that there is an incentive to diagnose.
But I am not blaming the medical and mental health industry, entirely.
The flipside of the coin is that people have been "trained" to expect to get a diagnosis when they come to the doctor or psychologist with a particular issue, and they're unlikely to accept accept a statement along the lines of "well, this is actually relatively normal and simply a manifestation that life is hard, sometimes."
I have often pondered exactly what the underlying "issue" is... and I can't help but think that maybe we have developed — or been taught to have — an inflated sense of how "good, comfortable and easy" are lives are supposed to be.
There's this false sense that we somehow have the "right" to live in this perpetually euphoric state of happiness... at least if the societally portrayed imagery of "the good life" is anything to go by.
So... when things stop feeling good and relatively easy, we assume that something must be wrong, and because introspective soul-searching is not a common practice, we go in search of something or someone to point fingers at and blame.
Besides, we want to be part of the "Club!"
Club? What Club?
I remember when I first became part of a couple of online support groups for a particular neurological issue — this was back in the early '00's — that a great number of the people in the group didn't really want healing; they were more interested in having a diagnosis they could then identify with...
For them, it was less about getting better than it was about being able to say "I have XYZ condition" and then applying it as a global reason for every difficulty and setback in their lives.
Another layer in the "incentive to diagnose" cake. We spend an awful look of time focusing our energy on conditions rather than wellness.
Personally Speaking...
By most societal measures (at least here in the USA) I live with what many would call "undiagnosed adult ADHD," but I have stalwartly resisted the temptation to go to a doctor for exactly the reason that I don't want to have some condition or syndrome thrust down my throat... that's going to not only cost the medical system a bunch of money and resources, but also is going to require me to be using assorted pharmaceuticals that will medicate me into oblivion.
Point being, my life may be challenging and difficult at times — and I'll complain about my short little span of attention — but I'm still functioning!
So what is the greater issue here? IS there a greater issue? I'd submit that the "issue" may to a large degree simply be that we have just been trained to expect that life comes should come with an easy button.
Newsflash! It doesn't! And that's perfectly OK!
Thanks for reading, and have a great remainder of your week!
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Created at 2023-05-22 22:13 PST
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Nicely put.
I have struggled a lot, in my life ( nothing out of the ordinary, I guess ), but one way or another, doctors never managed to put a lable on me.
Back in the days, that really frustrated and saddened me. It made me feel misunderstood - as if I was exaggerating, a hypochondriac.
Looking back on it now, I'm happy with exactly that ( no labels ).
I wouldn't want to end up medicalized into oblivion ( with all its consequences ), as happened to my dad.
Cheers!
Me llamo la atención el título y es que en mi país desde la escuela comienzan a diagnósticar a los niños, personas que no son especialistas, cuando ellos solo están siendo niños.
Igual creo que sí alguien quiere una etiqueta en parte es para entenderse.
Muy buen post saludos.