[melindajb]

What in your background makes you qualified to make this assertion vs decades of peer reviewed science?

It's fine to have opinions, it's not fine to spread mis-information.

No one can tell by looking at or talking to someone whether they are self diagnosed or not. The fact is that ADHD is very challenging to treat as not all cases respond the same way to the medication and therapy. Executive function is quite complex and deeply related to environment as well as genetics. For example, if your parents blame you for being "lazy" vs helping you find coping strategies, that's bound to impact confidence and thus performance.

When lay people such as yourself pass judgement it makes it harder for those of us with the condition to get the accommodations we are legally entitled to.

I will remind you that ADHD is more heritable than height. Many adults over a certain age were actually under diagnosed.

Please also note that ADHD has one of the highest co-morbidity rates of any mental condition, that is, it is most likely to be accompanied by anxiety and depression for the precise reason that others like to judge people for character on things like forgetting small details. If you treat for anxiety and depression and NOT ADHD you can have very serious, long lasting problems.

ADHD is a lack of control of attention, and hyperfocus is an example of that. IT's usually a reason people go undiagnosed. the parents say, "oh johnny can focus when he wants to, he's just lazy."

I encourage anyone who thinks they have this condition to first read "driven to distraction" and then use its advice to seek out a qualified psychiatrist for a proper evaluation. Do NOT rely on family doctors or your average therapist. Get a specialist. It's worth it.

Now while I'm at it, to your point on "modern life." We all get depressed some times, but there's a wide gulf between that and clinical depression, which I'm sure you would agree with me on.

To that end, here's a post by one of the top ADHD writers, Gina Pera, based in silicon valley, on this very topic:

http://adhdrollercoaster.org/myth-busting/myth-4-modern-life...

I quote:

"Does that mean, however, our fast-paced life causes ADHD? No, Quinn says. Too much stress can impair anyone’s brain function, but it doesn’t cause ADHD. She offers this bottom line: “When you remove stressors, people with ADHD still have ADHD. In other words, it’s not purely stress that inhibits their functioning. It’s the lack of skills required to meet challenges.”

Moreover, our fast-paced world can make someone with ADHD function worse than they might have in earlier times. In fact, some experts say, that is another reason ADHD is being more widely diagnosed: because modern life is demanding more of us than ever before."

edited to add this additional quote:

"Moreover, ADHD’s recorded history might span at least 2,500 years. That’s when the Greek physician-scientist Hippocrates apparently observed a condition sounding suspiciously like ADHD. He described patients who had “quickened responses to sensory experience, but also less tenaciousness because the soul moves on quickly to the next impression.” No mention of cell phones and video games as causative factors."

[throwaway90135]

> What in your background makes you qualified to make this assertion vs decades of peer reviewed science?

I think you've misinterpreted my post.

I'm specifically avoiding revealing my background here for several reasons, but my basis begins with DSM-V and ICD-10 criteria as well as a large body of research on the underlying biology of the disorder.

If you want external confirmation, please search for the term "Hyperfocus" in PubMed, or through psychiatry textbooks, or any other well-vetted source of information. It's not there. However, you will find the term heavily used on internet forums as well as in seminars and books from a handful of doctors/authors who see ADHD everywhere, but the problem is that they're usually trying to sell you something (seminars, books, products, etc.).

You seem to have taken offense at my comment, but I please realize that I was defending the concept of ADHD as an actual diagnosis. The parent comment was the one insisting that ADHD was not a real diagnosis. I personally have relatively severe ADHD as a result of a traumatic brain injury, so I'm perhaps uniquely qualified having personally experienced both sides of the diagnosis.

[melindajb]

I understand that you think you are uniquely qualified and "have been on both sides." I also clearly understood you are defending the concept of actual diagnosis. At the same time your comments seemed to suggest that you had disdain for others who didn't manifest the condition in a way you thought was appropriate.

Please note that those of us who were born with this have a very different life experience, and greatly outnumber those who acquired the condition through a head trauma, infection or other acute condition. Women manifest very differently than men. For example, girls are way underdiagnosed relative to boys at approximately 10:1 though it is improving I hear lately to 3:1. Why? because hyperactivity in girls manifests often as over talkativeness, and instead of screening the girl for the condition, her parents and teachers shame her for "talking too much." I was one of those girls. Boys who talk too much rarely get that criticism but because ADHD leads me to act outside of gender norms, the backlash is far greater for girls than it is for boys in many, many cases.

ADHD also manifests very, very differently in many people due to the various ways executive function develops in children. I have no difficulty getting places on time, but some ADHD folks couldn't get anywhere on time without significantly more effort.

When you say hyperfocus is only used by those who want to sell you something, I question your veracity. Hyperfocus is listed, if not a symptom in the DSM, then as one possible manifestation/result of the condition that is commonly seen. Others can include emotional outbursts, driving accidents, drug abuse, etc. For clarity's sake of those reading: hyperfocus is defined as the inability to direct one's attention to what is desired; being drawn into something in an irresistible way in a way that impacts functioning. Hyperfocus can also manifest as being incapable of switching away from that which is undesired.

This means that while the presence of hyperfocus doesn't definitively diagnose ADHD, it is a common presentation.

I see one of the world's top specialists in the matter, an MD who is the head of the department at a major teaching hospital in the Bay Area. He is a scientist first and foremost, which is why I picked him. He's very clear and direct with me about what we know and what is unknown. I want you to understand that the presence of uncontrollable hyperfocus is absolutely a manifestation of the disorder that is very commonly seen.

Without apology I do take what you say personally, because you are talking about a condition I have lived with my whole life, that has affected nearly every corner of my life in ways that were surprising to me and to everyone around me from my parents to my closest friends. You have only had the condition in your adult years and most likely do not have the same form I have. So yes, I do resent any suggestion that there is one way to have this disorder.

Net: I'm explaining to you regardless of your intent, you are spreading misinformation that can be used against people with the condition to further perceptions that this is "made up" and thus the conditions to which we are legally entitled should be withheld.

So please, stop. You are qualified to speak of your own experience and should, but when you generalize to the rest of us, you are doing real harm.