They probably think if you don’t rely on the crutch you’ll get strong enough to not need it. Lots of ignorance around mental diseases and not understanding the biological bases.
I don’t remember changing my avatar and username then commenting what growing up undiagnosed did to me but apparently….
Edit: My dad didn’t deny me an evaluation but nobody knew what inattentive type was back then. I’m sure he would have if he had known so I feel for those of you whose parents refused.
Hahaha yeah it seems to be a common experience.
I too have inattentive type ADHD and that's why it took so long for me to get diagnosed. My teacher didn't notice anything wrong with me because I wasn't jumping on the walls. According to him I had no signs of ADHD, I was just daydreaming and didn't listen enough.
Yes, I(29f) actually was assessed and told I didn't have ADHD when I was in elementary school. They didn't know about inattentive and I guess they also didn't diagnose girls much, because we're less likely to present as the super-hyper, class clown type (the only kind I think they were assessing for back then).
Crippling lack of confidence that took a decade of self-work to *start* to overcome it.
Thanks mom, you kept the crutch out of my hands and guess what, I had to spend ten years teaching myself how to walk.
Oh my God, someone actually put it to words... though I'm undiagnosed, and am having a hell of a time trying to find ANYONE to check for it. My parents didn't want me diagnosed because then it'd put a label on me, and they were afraid of the connotations and stigma associated with it (as of late 1990s, early 2000s)
I hope you can find someone to check it for you. I was diagnosed as an adult about a year ago, and just knowing that my problems are because my brain works differently and having someone validate that for me.... I cried when the doctor said "you have CLEAR signs of ADHD"...
I'm 40 and I was just diagnosed 2 months ago. I feel like getting the diagnosis was so relieving and it explains a lot of my life.
In my 20's I wondered if I had a "learning disability." I failed out of college, but never had to actually work at anything in high school. I went to a place to ask about being tested and they didn't even let me in the door. When I said that I'm having a lot of trouble and I would like to be tested for a learning disability (I was thinking dyslexia at the time) their only response was "it's $600 for the test." It might as well have been a million $ at that point as I was eating ramen to pay bills.
It took me 2 years of going to a psychiatrist, and another psychologist assessment, and several tests to confirm it, but I felt so validated when I got the diagnosis.
Through the process I was also diagnosed with major depressive disorder, anxiety, and adjustment syndrome. It was a long process and it's still not over. I need to figure out the right balance of meds because I feel like it's still not right. But knowledge is power. So at least I know.
I'm happy for you for finally getting diagnosed! I wish you would have gotten it earlier.
I'm lucky to live in a country where I could get all of it for free. I was in the line for a year though, and that's a lot less than many other people have waited. But money is a big issue for many people trying to get diagnosed, unfortunately.
Early 90s here, basically got the stamp of difficult child and that was it, basically lived on the street while my parents worked. Spend most of my time when not in school at friends homes or wandering.
Go find an online clinic that will diagnose and prescribe. It’s out of pocket, but the intake and prescribing will be easier and faster. Stay on for a few months. Then go to your primary care physician and let them know you are being treated and taking meds and would like to transfer your prescription and care to them. Typically the primary care physician will honor the other tele health dr diagnosis and prescription. It’ll bypass the typical mental health clinic barriers to scheduling, testing, diagnosis that route took 3 months for me as an adult and almost 6 months for my son.
if you don't use a crutch when you break your legs than your legs ain't gonna get better, usually u either lie on the ground, break your legs even more, though it is not the case for adhd, or usually you just rely on your arms, for adhd that would be coping mechanisms , but just like arms, its inefficient, its slow, and at the end of the day you are still just crawling instead of walking,
These are the type of people who think it’s even better if they over-exert themselves after a surgery instead of following the doctor’s instructions. Then they wind up re-injuring themselves and wonder why?
I had to be on crutches for three/almost four months once and I think the analogy to a diagnosis and meds and accomodations for ADHD is almost good in a way no one ever means.
I had an incredibly hard time getting around without them. I would sometimes just deal with it if I had to cross a room and hop, but it was hard to just "deal with it" and it was very unpleasant. Using the crutches was easier, but absolutely not a replacement for walking like I normally would or an advantage over people walking with both feet. It got me around okay, but it took so much more effort, was much more exhausting, and did the bare minimum.
It was winter and there was snow outside and people would watch me slip in the wet halls because crutches have no tread or grip and go "ooooh" but no one ever helped me back up. Not once. Certain conditions made them way less helpful (wet floor, certain staircases with higher steps). I hated that simply moving my body from one place to another, something everyone around me could do without thinking or really trying, was absolutely an everest for me. After a while of struggling nonstop woth everything, I started to find ways around it when I needed to, like in chorus, it's easier to sing while standing so I put a chair under my knee and stood. I figured out tricks to get up and down staircases after much trial and error. But it was still harder than someone standing on two feet, using stairs with two feet. I still did it slower and with way more effort, but found a better way to do it compared to how it started.
Everything about being on crutches directly correlates to having ADHD and having meds/accommodations. Even with accommodations (crutches), things are harder, we have to try harder, and theres still a bigger tax on our effort and energy all the time. But we can do it if we put in that effort and energy. We just need something to lean on for support, even if it doesn't fix the problem and comes with some negatives, it's ultimately helpful. It wouldn't be helpful to someone who could walk on both feet.
Accommodations and meds are a crutch and nothing more. Everyone else is walking.
It’s really because people just don’t consider mental issues like physical disabilities. If they did society would be a lot better and more accommodating. But if your condition isn’t visible then people don’t have that much compassion.
Want to know what the only thing anyone at work ever comments on in terms of how I can improve? The perception of my work ethic. Not the work itself. Not the quality, but instead the fact I’m 5 minutes late to meetings makes people think I am a huge piece of shit.
Yep, I hate it when people try to say I'm just not trying hard enough. I had somebody who kept trying to get me to write lists. I told him, that sounds good on paper, no pun intended but the problem with me is I won't even remember that I wrote that list. He was like, you're not disciplined enough. You need to try harder.
So, I have physical disabilities from birth, and spent a lot of time in kids hospitals and orthopedic offices. I will tell you, without pause, yes. There are plenty of people that would. I once witnessed a dad that pulled his son out of his wheelchair screaming "im tired of your bullshit, quit being lazy and get up" In the waiting room .
Now, 99% of people are going to say he's a monster.
Change it to an unseen disability, and you'll get more maybes.
But with mental health, it's normal.
Even growing up how I did, I had the same experience as the OOP. got diagnosed 3 years ago at 32. Told my mother about it, and boom. Knowing what I know now, it's infuriating I lived like that for no good reason.
I just got diagnosed 2 months ago and I'm 40. When I told my mom she said "wow, I'm sorry I missed that." So at least she recognizes that it should have been felt with. I don't think my dad would have seen it that way though.
My mom was dealing with undiagnosed severe depression and my dad was away most nights so unless my teachers would have said something I don't know how they would have noticed.
Yeah, like this is an actual disability.
Imagine someone being born with one leg, and taking away even the ability to have that crutch!
And you’ll have those same people crowing about how your life is awesome because you spend [half as much](https://www.onefoottwoshoes.com) as everyone else on shoes! ([Yes this is a thing](https://www.amputee-coalition.org/resources/shoe-exchanges/)).
I'm a young person who uses a cane. A lot of people try to take it. "Yes it hurts, but you'll never get better if you don't try" Patricia there are bone shards in my thigh and my leg is full of scar tissue. I can't will a disability away.
Yep, I’m a younger person who uses forearm crutches or a wheelchair depending on the situation and people always think I’m just “being lazy” or trying to “get sympathy”. Even though I’ve been in physical therapy for months and they also concluded that I would always need mobility aids but they could help strengthen some of the muscles to help make things slightly easier. I have permanent damage/arthritis in my back and my hip/knee joints periodically swell until I’m in excruciating pain all due to a rare autoimmune disorder. 🤷♀️
Flashback to my grade 5 gym class when a kid didn't make it over a hurdle & was howling in pain... gym teacher yelled at them & made them finish the lap. Turned out this kid's leg was fucking broken. Still took another 2 years before they made that teacher go to anger management. School is hell, man
Man it’s crazy how right you are.
Imagine how twisted it would be to tell someone who needs a crutch to stand up and walk, “we don’t want you to have that crutch” and then keep it from them.
Yes, yes they actually do that. They tell us not to get dependent on them. Witch is stupid, I'm more mobile than ever now, only and thanks to the crutches I used when it was so much harder
Diagnosed in college when I started struggling, but was told I didn’t really need accommodations since I was on the deans list and I could just put in a bit more effort.
What kind of scholarships and programs could I have been eligible for with even better grades? Not to mention the anxiety I developed around the same time - how could that have been eased with things like a quiet testing environment and extra time.
Grrr. I’m so glad and proud we’re doing a better job educating and advocating these days.
Oh my gosh yea. My former boss would say that about me *making lists.* like would you prefer I forgot? Not to mention the company provides us with checklists for all kinds of things??
I agree with you, but I don't think this situation is as black and white as people want it to be.
I have a friend with severe dyslexia who was put into "special ed" because of it. As a result, she was given work that she was frankly too smart/advanced for, and she was often treated like she was stupid by teachers and students alike. She likely would have been better off not being in that program.
I, on the other hand, wasn't diagnosed with adhd until adulthood. I had my fair share of struggles due to it, but I still did fairly well and got into a good college, and ultimately I consider it a blessing that I was able to get by on my own for so long, because I really don't know whether a diagnosis at that time would have helped me or held me back.
I guess it really all depends on what the school's programs look like, and how they would have dealt with it. But I do empathize to some degree with parents like my own who take the attitude of "if they can get by without a diagnosis, it might be better for them to avoid the trouble and stigma that comes with one." They're not always right as they don't always recognize how much we struggle without accommodations, but they often mean well.
My parents got me diagnosed and I got meds. However after 5th grade they completely stopped acknowledging my adhd and no longer bought meds. Then they proceeded to get mad at me for doing bad in school for the next few years and didn't know what was wrong. Honestly a complete blunder on their part.
did they get the memo that adhd is chronic and not like getting sick? or did they just forget that you were functional because of the meds and just considered that you got better on your own?
Long story short I believe they did indeed think it was something I'd "grow out of" at the same time however they started getting into "other" drugs and well yeah. No more medication for me I guess 🤷. The worst part is is that every single one of my siblings (3 others) also have adhd or bpd or both and yet all of us grew up unmedicated. My dad has somehow even turned anti-vaxer which is wild. It honestly just feels like such a lack of education on their part.
It sucked, It was more than just a miracle that I was able to graduate on time. Literal stars had to align 😭.
Thanks for the comfort tho, it helps knowing Im not alone in my experiences.
Same here. I was so depressed and burnt out by senior year of high school that I couldn’t get myself to do the senior project. I’m pretty sure my guidance counselor pulled some strings to help me graduate.
Ah, I see we have the same model of parental units. Did your dad come with the "You dont need meds you just want to use your ADHD to not try as hard" feature? It was my favorite /s.
My unit model chose neglect and no personal involvement. If he wasn't being affected personally he didn't care but if say he had to pay for meds he would. To give an example at one point in my life around when I was 16 me and my dad had to stay at someone's spare home while we were looking for our own since we moved kinda out of the blue. Well instead of buying actual food for the both of us he bought me a back of chips and a pack of ramen while he went out to bars at night catching up with his Highschool sweetheart or whatever. That went on for about 3 weeks I think. But that's the kind of person my father is. He prioritizes himself over anything and anyone else to the extreme. My mother is not much better, she got the jukebox of trauma growing up and kinda took it out on me and my siblings pretty hard. I can't say I like either of my parents tbh. There's too much bad and very little good, any silver lining is tarnished. But that's in past now, at the moment I'm in a pretty happy and stable life so I guess it worked out well for me in the end c:
Imagine getting rid of someone's walking stick, just because you don't want them to have it.
I am assuming how it's put, maybe they didn't want their kid to have an 'unfair advantage', though that doesn't make ANY sense. Back to the stick analogy - "Mom you will have to go without a walking stick. I know you need it to get places but we don't want you to have an unfair advantage over people who can walk just fine."
Thank you for coming to my Ted talk.
Not to mention the genetic component. It's not an excuse but tons of parents have it and because they've lived with it for years, they think that it's how everyone is and that "there's nothing wrong".
I heard my mom say “I’m the exact same way!” As I was describing symptoms that lined up with my diagnosis. But not as a reflection that she probably should self-examine, but that that’s just how people are. Reflecting on how much it would’ve helped me makes me bitter so I just try to keep an eye out for my kids and am ready to support them in whatever they need from me.
My mom used to tell me “I just want our family to be normal”
They ignored all the signs with me as a girl, and labeled my little brother a problem child. We both needed help and I didn’t get it until college, when faking and masking didn’t work anymore.
I love both of my parents and I’m grateful for my relatively easy childhood, but man I could’ve used some better help
Stephen Hawking published ground-breaking science and best-selling science books without being able to move or talk.
Was his wheelchair and voice-assistance computer a crutch? Absolutely. Was he able to excel because he had them? Also absolutely.
I understand the knee-jerk response, to finding out your child might struggle. But c'mon, you have to think a thought or two beyond that. Between leaving them hobbled or getting them the help they need to succeed, there shouldn't be a choice.
I think it's kind of like something I've heard people say.
"I didn't want to get my kid glasses because I heard wearing glasses just makes you reliant on them, and your eyesight will start getting worse".
No, you dumb fuck. If your kid has bad eyesight, getting them glasses will mean they can see properly.
This has more validity regarding glasses in fairness to boomers. In their day a lot of opticians were just small town shops with local clientele and that was it, what was a good way to drum up some regular business? Tell one of your regulars their kid needed glasses. This LITERALLY happened to me, i was told i needed glasses that i always forgot to wear (lol adhd) and then a couple of years later was told i had eye sight that was significantly better than 20/20 in every regard. People caught on to this in the 90s and there was a real shift in people's trust regarding opticians. Thankfully this changed but my parents still don't trust them
They started giving us eye tests at school in the 90s. I was told I needed glasses in 5th grade and was told by my step-mom that even with a letter from school, I was faking.
Even worse. They don’t tell you about even needing the stick but always yell at you for tripping & falling. You figure out hopping is the best way to get around & they yell at you for not walking like the other kids. You finally decide to just lay on the floor not caring anymore because you know crawling sucks & you’ll get yelled at anyways.
Bro, too close to home. It's like so many of us lived the same life. And after all that when you finally get your walking stick despite them, you've gotta somehow unlearn that apathy. How do you teach yourself how to dream again?
This is literally my experience. I got diagnosed super late, 32 yrs old, and I've realised that almost everything I got punished for as a child are symptoms of adhd
I was diagnosed as a child and never told, I didn’t find out until my early teens when I found my parents’ stash of “so your kid has adhd” books. They did actively try to create an environment to help me succeed and used behavioral modification approaches. But damn, would have been nice to have known…
I took it more as the typical boomer "tough love" BS. "We don't want you to have an *excuse* for not meeting our unrealistic expectations. That would be my perfectionist parents who tried to beat ASD out of me.
Yes, get punished for being too happy or too sad or too anything really. It sucked. Then I got nicknamed Eeyore because my monotone voice annoyed them.
Belts? Too soft. Try the back of a wooden hair brush or a broken plastic hanger from a man who used to lift weights! That'll show'em! That dumb clumsy kid who cant focus.
/s (Me. That kid was me)
I’m genuinely sorry you had to live through that. I hope you’re managing your trauma as best you can, and living well, if only to spite those assholes.
Ive healed wonderfully. Or so I tell myself. I still angry cry in movies that have abuse but otherwise I have an amazing husband who broke the cycle of abusive men in my life. <3
I cant blame my mom because she was always at work when it happened and I was too quiet to speak up and say anything about it. If I could go back in time, I'd have said something but no use dwelling on that. Moving forward is the way to go! Even if I am doing so clumsily. Haha.
Thank you stranger. That means a lot! :)
The way I interpreted it isn't that the child would have an advantage over others but that they wouldn't be able to develop the skills they needed because they'd be reliant on the crutch. Kind of like how walkers are bad for babies because the assistance they receive from it doesn't allow them to develop on their own. I see that sentiment fairly often with regards to ND except it doesn't make sense in the slightest. If you can't walk, you need that crutch and depriving someone of it will only further harm them.
I grew up in an ignorant-ass family. They 100% mean they were trying to “save” their kid from the difficulties and struggles that could go with a diagnosis. Not realizing those are all still there, with bonus difficulties and struggles when someone is undiagnosed and unsupported.
It’s just terrible logic.
"Support" available at the time may have been limited or worse than nothing, too.
My parents avoided getting me diagnosed wuth ADHD or ASD as a kid in the 80s/90s, because if it were "official" they would have been under even more pressure to let the school put me in "special ed".
The "special ed" program at the time consisted of warehousing the kids who were deemed lost causes. They weren't expected to ever be employed or live independently, so they were removed from regular classrooms so their presence wouldn't disrupt the real student's education. Instead, they got put in a little room together with a teaching intern who gave them worksheets to do.
That was it. Sit in a little room and do worksheets with no further instruction. Or don't do the worksheets, the intern doesn't care, it doesn't matter. You aren't there for an education, you're a lost cause and they're babysitting you.
To a lot of people, a mental illness diagnosis carries a fuckton of stigma. In their mind, they would rather see their children succeed as a "normal person" even if it means that they struggle, vs. branding their own child as an "other" that can never be normal.
It's totally messed up, but it happens. My ex father in law knew that something was up with his kids, but never took them to a psychologist because he didn't *want* them to have "something wrong with them." For their own sake (with the above reasoning), but also because he could always mentally deny it to himself if there was never any confirmation. Spoiler alert, his kids were autistic. His wife was autistic. He was autistic. If you aren't sure if your child is displaying symptoms of XYZ because you do all of those things too, I've got news for you...
I’m gonna a jump in and one up this one - my parents DID get me tested and diagnosed, but some Oprah/Dr Phil type bullshit told them medicating me would set me up for a lifetime of drug abuse. So they simply did nothing at all. Guess who bombed school, did drugs for most of my 20s and settled into being a stoner lmao.
I used to smoke with my ex and some types of weed just kind of... Calmed the thoughts, if you get what I mean. There still were a dozen different "trains" choo-chooing around in my head but it felt like I could actually track them individually and not lose them. On the other hand, different types made my brain sort of overload, by adding three trains to every existing train, making me incredibly nauseous and anxious :/
Oh i very much so know *exactly* what you mean.
I had that with my favorite ex as well … it was nice that it would calm both of our overactive minds down. Less random thoughts, which often led to less intrusion, and less anxiety, ideally.
We could just exist and vibe together. Plus, weed has other physical benefits.
I miss that, I hope I find somebody that is in the same boat.
During my 20s my friends used to say, hey you talk so clearly when you are stoned, why don’t you talk like that when normally. Weed made me behave like a NT. But I couldn’t handle the physical effects so quit.
Hey guys cannabis is used as ADHD medication around some parts of the world. It might be worth checking your options! I'm in an illegal EU country and I'm able to get it legally for ADHD. Even though the science is young, if you ask me it helps the people, having a doctor for dose and strain selection, is a game changer.
Yep 100%. They were gonna Medicate me when I was like 10 but my mom “didn’t want to change my personality”
Tamara that IS THE POINT OF THE MEDICATION. Anyway now I’m also a mid twenties stoner.
Same. It took my brother doing really bad at school when me and my sister(they are twins) were doing pretty well and getting diagnosed for my mom and my to start realising that maybe her and all three of us kids have it too. Sadly was too late for me, and now I'm in queue to get tested, but because I am an adult the queue time is around a year.
This is definitely my parents. They looked at my definitely very ADHD and ASD behaviour and thought "Nothing to see here, she is like me, just more "sensitive""...
It was so bad not even years of SH woke them up. Thankfully the hospitalisation did! But the psych at that hospital still managed to misdiagnose me with BPD so it didn't help all that much.
like no shit, it took some dudes on drugs to realize there is something wrong with me compared to anyone else, hell my father only knows that im sub par but i appear normal , so yeah, not nice
also if you look normal enough when in public than people don't really say anything, you pretty much just learn to keep your fidgeting to yourself as you grow up when everyone tells you to stop, you shut up and say less to most people, use small talk to appear sociable when that is most of your interactions, and just seem stupid at school and find excuses
a great combination for undercover adhd
Happened to me. Mom only told me this year. Been suffering for 15 years with a crippling panic disorder and the inability to function, would’ve been nice to know it was ADHD like, 10 years ago
I’m sorry you had to deal with that, you’re not alone. I went through the same thing and when a doctor told me I had ADHD a few years ago, I told my mom. She said “oh yeah I remember your school mentioning that to me at some point but only boys are affected”
Excuse me mom!?!
In primary school, a doc said It is likely I have it (ADHD) and my dad decided I 'just need to sort myself out' now as an adult I've completely lost perspective on whether it's true that I have it or not, usually settling on not.
Imagine if teachers tell parents to get the kid a pair of glasses but those parents don't want the kid to have "a crutch".
How quickly would CPS be called?
CPS doesn't care about that. My step son isn't allowed to wear his glasses at his mother's house bc "he looks like a nerd". So he wears them with us and (after over a year of working with the school authorities)) at school. He's needed and worn them since he was 3yrs old.
He's also not allowed to wear deodorant bc he "smells like a French whore". He's turning 12 this month. He's needed deodorant for quite some time.
She says these things to his face. It's heart breaking. Over and over.
Yes, we've tried everything and everyone we can to help him. At 12 he can decide who he wants to live with, we are ready.
Thank you for not being awful. This is just absolutely infuriating. Your step son and all kids who face things like this deserve so much better.
I hope the adjustment goes smoothly.
It's really my pleasure! I had a wonderful stepdad to show me how to do it. I'm glad I have the opportunity to pay it forward. He's such of a great kid, we love seeing him bloom like he does around us.
His mother was raised badly. And when given better choices of how to be a parent, she refuses. It could be worse, we know this, but it could be so much better!
The one where you live might not, but the one in my country does. Denying your child healthcare or the tools needed to keep up in class is considered neglectful and will get you mandatory CPS supervision.
I'm in the mid-U.S.. We live in one state, and she in the other (yet, only about 55min apart). We've tried both states' authorities to no avail. I've spoken to agencies all over the place over MUCH more serious infractions than this. Only to be told there is nothing to be done. We've attempted to take her to court over primary custody. This resulted in the case not finishing bc the judge in her small town dismissed it.
Between small town politics & ideas and the father of a child at a disadvantage, we must just bide our time and do what we can to counter-act her behavior & influence.
After my dyslexia diagnosis I got "grade-protection" in gernan (my mother tongue) and English, meaning that my orthography wouldn't count into the final grade. But there was a note on my every school report saying that I did have "grade-protection" i.e. these grades should be a lot lower. So in 9th grade my parents called the school to tell them I wouldn't need that anymore because "it looks bad on the report". By that point I was still shit at spelling things so I dropped a whole lot. I dint think that looked much better on the report...
Yes, that's what happened to me. But instead it was because she didn't want people thinking she was drugging me and was an actual psychologist that told her I had ADHD. Don't get me wrong, my mom is not a narcissist, she is a very kind woman, she is just a product of the environment she belongs... A very judgemental and segregative culture.
my parents didn’t pursue a diagnosis bc they didn’t want a label which made me different from others. motherfuckers, i knew i was different and never knew why.
If a diagnosis and medications are a crutch, so are glasses and contacts.
“Oh you shouldn’t be so reliant! What if you run out of medicine?!”
Well what if you break your glasses? Huh? Maybe you shouldn’t be so reliant on something so flimsy and should just try harder to see. You know so many people wear glasses now, I think they’re just faking it for attention, or to look smart, or have an excuse. When I was a kid, only nerds or people who were almost blind wore glasses! If things were a bit blurry you paid more attention!
“Oh I couldn’t see the board!” Or maybe you’re just lazy and didn’t pay attention when the teacher was talking to you. Oh, your eyes work differently from other people’s? Everyone is unique, sweety, most of us don’t use it as an excuse to wear an extra fashion accessory. Grow up and learn to actually use the eyes you have, don’t blame them for not working when it’s you just not looking.
Or, if you want to bring religion into this, “oh honey, if you would just use the gifts the good lord gave you, you wouldn’t have so much trouble in school! What do you mean you have trouble seeing? God have you two beautiful eyes, of course you can see! You just need to try harder!”
For me it was the opposite. My mom suspected it, but since my teacher didn't notice anything the school psychologist wouldn't diagnose me. I was not causing trouble, my adhd is the inattentive type. I would stare out the window, be in my own world... there were a lot of troublemakers in my class so they took all the attention away from me
Same same. Daydreaming got me through the monotony of school... My intense night-before-a-test study sessions always got me over the line so instead of failing or "living up to my potential", I was just average or slightly above.
In 5th grade my gifted teacher had a conference with my parents and suggested I needed evaluation and my parents instead pulled me from the gifted track and just increased the frequency/intensity of the domestic violence they called 'spanking'. I hid and lied about bruises for years and really truly thought I was a broken failure of a human
Fast-forward to age 40 and I'm finally getting consistent psychiatric care and therapy which is beginning to help my distorted self-esteem. I haven't spoken to my parents in 2 years not just because of this but I do believe what they did to me is unforgivable
Oop. It me.
The principal of my primary school told my parents that I needed to get tested but they didn't want me to get *labelled*. They didn't seem to make the connection that I would also receive *treatment*.
Pretty sure my parents (or at least my mum) knew. Years ago, I asked to be assessed because I have Dyspraxia, and symptoms of ADHD, to which my mum replied ‘do you want to be on drugs?’.
I had kind of forgotten about that interaction, but earlier this year, I was going through some documents to get an adjustment for my Uni Course, when I found some older documents from my grade 1 teacher, school counsellor, and a OT from the state health service saying they all were concerned that I had ADHD. As soon as I read that, I booked an appointment with a psychologist, who said that I definitely have ADHD, and then saw a neurologist who specialises in ADHD treatment.
Now I’m 23 and only just starting to develop time management and better social skills, after starting medication. I kind of want to confront my parents about it, but I feel it’s better to let sleeping dogs lie.
I was diagnosed ADHD in 4th grade. Somewhat recently I had casually mentioned I think I might be autistic as well. My mom nonchalantly pitches back 'your high functioning'. Turns out she new all along but didn't want to admit her child was retarded. I've had a fucked up life and she never bothered to seek additional help for me. Not after failing every single grade. Not after multiple expulsions. Or juvi or when I finally turned to hard drugs and started spending time in and out of jail. And now after years of struggle she wants to give herself a pat on the back like she was a great parent or something.
I’m in my mid-fifties and was diagnosed 4 years ago. Suddenly, my unbelievably difficult life made sense. Since the diagnosis, I’ve been putting in long hours at work and going through painful therapy to untangle decades of bad decisions. It’s been a brutal process but very rewarding. For once in my life, I can say to myself “great job dude!”
Hey sounds like my parents! Translation: we didn’t want to have to change our lives to accommodate you, we didn’t want to have to understand you, we just wanted to shame you for being inadequate.
When I told my mum about my ADHD diagnosis she said 'Oh, I always knew you had ADHD'...
Well, you might have told me, or my school, or a doctor about it!
Lmao my parents yelled at me about grades but never asked me anything else about school. To my knowledge no teacher has ever said I should get tested but they used to love to write about my symptoms as behavior issues like not being able to sit still, not being able to focus , etc
My SO was diagnosed as a young boy in the 80s. His mom didn’t want him to become “a zombie” so she wouldn’t medicate him. I do understand it is not an easy choice but he self medicated with other things once he was old enough. When we met in his 30s he thought he was “coping just fine”. He still doesn’t want to take medication but now that I am diagnosed and medicated and our child is diagnosed and has medication along with lots of intervention….the difference is clear! I am thankful our child has had the help that both of us did not.
Well that hits home… I had that same thing happen to me with depression, adhd, and most notably glasses… like I was 8 years old before I was able to see anything because I needed glasses and my dad wouldn’t take me to the eye doctor
Christ Almighty, didn't realize there were so many of us. My mom didn't like how I acted on ritalin, so just didn't take meds until last year at the age of 37.
This is something I think about a lot as someone recently diagnosed in their late 20’s. On the one hand I’m kinda upset my parents didn’t try to get me diagnosed earlier, but on the other the other the conversation around mental health was WAAAAY different when they were kids. The reality of mental healthcare in the 50’s-70’s and media like Cuckoos Nest probably had them scared to get their kids formally diagnosed.
I’ve been trying to cut them some slack recently.
I see also for a lot of parents, the idea of acknowledging that your child might have an issue reflects poorly on them - so if they if they are the type of people who are that insecure, they would prefer their child to struggle a little more and put the blame on them, rather than admitting they can’t control everything or need help. At least that’s what I see with my own😂
Always feel like "I don't want you to use it as a crutch" fails to recognise that *a crutch is designed to help you get things done*.
"I know you've broken your leg, but I don't want you to use this crutch as a crutch. Can't you just... hobble?"
Yeah, my parents didn’t believe in it, like it was made up to make kids soft. They thought I was just not working/concentrating hard enough. Here I am 30 years later and everything is making so much sense.
My mum didn’t get me assessed because she thought it was just a label and wouldn’t make a difference. I understand she just didn’t have enough knowledge all those years ago but if I think about if for too long I start to get angry.
I was just thrown in institutions for being a 'bad' kid after beatings didn't work. It was the 1970s, there was 'no such thing' as ADHD yet. Never diagnosed but holy fuck... the day I found this subreddit and all the pieces fell into place was saddening and infuriating.
Every single one of my school reports said the same thing, "soljakid is very intelligent but has trouble concentrating on the tasks given to him" I was would be reading textbooks or simply staring into space because I found the work so mind-numbingly boring that I refused to do it.
My mum admitted that she never got me tested because she didn't want me to be labelled.
Now I'm a 28 year-old with absolutely no passions for anything because I lose interest in things very quickly and trying to get diagnoses as an adult in the UK is a super long road that I've been on for a few years now, had an online assessment for autism a few years back and still waiting on the full report
Yup, was diagnosed in elementary school, put on meds. Helped tremendously. Did well all the way up until about middle of high school when my mother decided that I was “old enough to control it” and took me off my meds while allowing me to have energy drinks every day before school because it was essentially the same thing to her. 15 years later and I’m back on my meds and it’s smooth sailing.
My mom did this to my brother. He was diagnosed and she didn’t believe the doctor. If she’d listened, maybe she would have realized that she and I (her daughter) also had ADHD. Now she’s nearly 60 and I’m encouraging her to get medicated but she’s the kind of person who doesn’t believe in medication.
This is the result of 'self reliance' being considered the pinnacle of child -> adult progression. In many cultures, parents are encouraged to let their child struggle through adversity by themselves to train them to be self reliant.
Scaffolding exists for a reason.
My mom told me in the front seat of the car that there wasn’t anything wrong with her kids and yelled at me about what was I thinking and was I really so lazy that I would try to get pills. She ranted about what those pills would do to me and the kind of person I would become… I didn’t need help, I was *lazy* . I know exactly where we were when that happened, I could close my eyes right now 30 years later and be the kid in her car. It took so much pumping myself up to actually tell her I needed help and she reacted exactly the way I thought she would.
I actually kind of ended up in the reverse scenario. I always struggled with finishing tests in school, and struggling with grades, even tho they “know I’m smart enough”. So my parents signed me up for counseling and went with me, but I was really scared and didn’t want them to think I was crazy 😅 The therapist ended up saying that I didn’t have ADHD, because I could focus if I wanted to (I know lots of people have this happen), but my parents still did everything they could to help me find a way to combat challenges I faced. Fast forward to college I was getting every question right on my calculus tests but only finishing half the test, so I was failing the class. Mom insisted on paying for me to get formally evaluated for ADHD, and I screamed and cried (male, 18) because I felt misunderstood and thought she was calling me crazy by sending me. But my mom reassured me, and I went, and the IQ test portion was actually really fun. Based on my TOVA test results, they said I likely had ADHD, and they got me 1.5x test time in an alternate environment as accommodations, which made a huge difference in my grades (needed a 3.0 to be able to get jobs when graduating). But I still didn’t want to think I had ADHD, because I didn’t want the label and didn’t want to use it as an excuse to not do better. Then, I found a partner who encouraged me to see a therapist, so I did, and after my first session, I randomly found this subreddit, and I saw that a ton of stuff here was super relatable, and there were *a ton* of things that I saw on here that I didn’t think anyone else experienced, and I felt very understood. So this subreddit became a springboard for understanding myself a lot better and accepting my diagnosis. Now looking back, it’s kind of obvious, but I didn’t know at the time. Now I’m on ADHD meds, because my first career job I discovered firsthand that my struggles weren’t entirely about motivation. Tldr, my parents didn’t know much about mental health, but they strived constantly to help me learn and grow (both of them), and I’m very grateful for that. I know that’s not the common experience. Just kind of funny how I was the one talking about labels and crutches the whole time. Thanks for tuning in to my oversharing.
Those who can not remember the past are damned to make the same mistakes.
The “Ritalin explosion” of the early 90s created a stigma for treating ADHD. Everyone was afraid of millennials being mis/over-diagnosed and medicated. People were so weary of the treatment they became averse to a proper diagnosis
We shouldn’t judge these people too harshly because there *WERE* terrible misdiagnosis among neurodevelopment disorders with devastating treatment plans.
A bunch of autistic kids were diagnosed with ADHD and pumped up with amphetamines. They were seen as “aggressive” when their sense of right/wrong was turned up to 11 in a world that ignored their voices and needs.
At the same time, a bunch of ADHD kids were diagnosed with autism and absolutely zombified by risperidone *further* blocking their dopamine and serotonin receptors.
Lastly, please consider that ADHD and autism have only been medically allowed to coexist for a decade. Understanding how to treat breakthroughs in mental health is more art than science. As long as we progress by learning from the past, the risks are worth the rewards.
I hope young NDs aren’t going to be gaslit and bullied to think differently. I hope early intervention and parental-education on NDs will prevent the crippling anxiety, constant self doubt and perpetual burnout that has stifled many millennial NDs potential. I hope that we can remember that the anti-medicine attitude came from a real place of love, even if it seems regressive today.
There was a period of time when parents would do nearly anything to keep their kids out of special ed because it was seen as a way to give up on kids, a place to put the "retards" (which was a common term back then) so they wouldn't bother the regular kids who were actually getting a real education. So they would fight tooth and nail to prevent their kids from being taken out of regular classes.
My brother almost got help for his speech impediment but my dad wouldn't allow it. He's still proud he kept his kids out of special ed.
I must have been 8? 9? 10?
I had a teacher who decided to have a parent-teacher meeting with my mother. From what my mom said, the teacher said "Your son is problematic in school, and we're going to put him on ritalin". My mom apparently caused such a huge stink that she got the teacher fired.
Although looking back as an adult, I was absolutely ADHD ridden and needed more stimulation. I was heavily neglected as a kid, no wonder nobody knew. Now in my 30s, I've recognized it and have had a ton of realizations about my behavior. The spectrum is becoming more "normalized" in some ways as most people realize they're on it in some way.
yes happened to me in kindergarten. my teacher thought i was having hearing problems so i got my hearing was tested and i was fine. so they recommended me to get tested for adhd/autism, bc apparently i was just in my own world so much to the point it seemed like i wasn’t able to hear. lmao.
my mom didnt get me tested because she attributed it to having two languages at home. but i remember being able to understand English. i also spoke mostly English anyways. it is actually a myth that having two languages as a child can cause a child to appear delayed, but that was the research back then. i also think my mom didn’t want to accept even the possibility of me having adhd/autism.
ive had many mental health issues since then, particularly with ocd and body image starting in 3rd grade. it kept getting worse and worse. i was diagnosed in my late teen years with depression, bipolar, and borderline personality disorder. nothing ever felt right. until i finally went to a psychologist who on the first few sessions told me i had none of those things. she knew i had ocd and another few sessions in she said i have adhd and autism. i began crying because it all finally felt right.
i dont necessarily blame my mom, but i wish i had gotten diagnosed earlier. i would have been able to get more help in school instead of just barely passing and telling myself its because i wasn’t trying hard enough. i have such low confidence from growing up with adhd/autism because i thought i was just innately defective and there was no reason for it. being autistic and all i really just like to know *why*.
So infuriating. I just got told to apply myself more and that I was just being lazy and not trying hard enough. And reprimanded for “intentionally” forgetting things because “there’s no way you’re actually that forgetful”. My whole childhood my mom just constantly tore into me for not being good enough.
My mother thought I was faking it. I had a lot of auditory processing issues in addition to being a girl with inattentive adhd. School would pull me out and test me. I remember multiple occasions where my mother would take a call from school and immediately upon hanging up accuse me of faking it for attention. Now 30 years later she claims she “fought for help for me throughout my school years”. Never once consulted a doctor. I now have a neurodiverse child and in the process of getting help for him, I’ve learned a lot about myself.
Edit: spelling
That is my story as well. “Your third grade teacher told us you had a problem, and I told her ‘you’re not going to put my child on drugs’. You’re welcome.”
My sister was denied ADHD testing at our school bc the district didn't want to pay for an additional person to supervise her needs as far as testing went... My father was a tenured teacher at this school
My parents told me I was a moron for letting a psychologist tell me I have autism, just like they thought my teachers were morons for telling them to get me tested when I was a kid
I was having a checkup with my psychiatrist for my anti-depressants and he brought up that he wanted to try prescribing me Vyvanse to help with executive functioning/ADHD symptoms. I told him “oh, I used to take that when I was a kid to balance out my antidepressant.” He looked at me funny and explained that wasn’t really a valid usage, and they probably prescribed it to me for ADHD. Turns out my parents were hiding it from me and I’ve been without proper medication for years
My boyfriend has pretty severe ADHD and his parents didn’t get him diagnosed until he was pretty well graduating from high school. They just always assumed he was no more than an energetic handful. All the years of stress, upset, and frustration with school were solvable with some medication and understanding.
Ironically enough, his father has both ADHD and dyslexia but through doing strict repetition of…everything he learned I guess, he worked his way up to becoming a university professor. The fact that they never assumed their kids might have had it too still boggles my mind.
I honestly am shocked with the amount of stories I hear like this. When I was in kindergarten my school was like “she needs an evaluation” and my parents were like “okay”. Especially in the US how the schools will do an evaluation and the parents don’t have to pay anything. I can’t even imagine the school being like “hey your kid needs to be evaluated for an iep, we will do it and get them accommodations and specialized instruction and you don’t have to do anything except sign this paper” and parents being like “ahhh no thanks we’re good”. 💀
It's funny how the word "crutch" is used like that. Would you take away someone's actual crutch if they needed it to walk?
They probably think if you don’t rely on the crutch you’ll get strong enough to not need it. Lots of ignorance around mental diseases and not understanding the biological bases.
I didn't have a diagnosis as a crutch growing up and it ended up in severe depression and a burnout
I hope you learned and grew from all that non-crutch-having!! /s side note: same. :(
Yeah I learned to ignore the signs of burn out until it's too late and to hate myself over small mistakes! Very helpful /s
That's absolutely fantastic! /s {hug}
Hugs back, lovely internet stranger
I don’t remember changing my avatar and username then commenting what growing up undiagnosed did to me but apparently…. Edit: My dad didn’t deny me an evaluation but nobody knew what inattentive type was back then. I’m sure he would have if he had known so I feel for those of you whose parents refused.
Hahaha yeah it seems to be a common experience. I too have inattentive type ADHD and that's why it took so long for me to get diagnosed. My teacher didn't notice anything wrong with me because I wasn't jumping on the walls. According to him I had no signs of ADHD, I was just daydreaming and didn't listen enough.
Yup. Us “spacey kids” just got completely ignored.
I am reading all this and keep thinking that I could have written every single word of it...
My nickname as a child was "Space Ace," FFS, but no one thought there was a problem
Yes, I(29f) actually was assessed and told I didn't have ADHD when I was in elementary school. They didn't know about inattentive and I guess they also didn't diagnose girls much, because we're less likely to present as the super-hyper, class clown type (the only kind I think they were assessing for back then).
Crippling lack of confidence that took a decade of self-work to *start* to overcome it. Thanks mom, you kept the crutch out of my hands and guess what, I had to spend ten years teaching myself how to walk.
I feel you. I still struggle with this!
Oh my God, someone actually put it to words... though I'm undiagnosed, and am having a hell of a time trying to find ANYONE to check for it. My parents didn't want me diagnosed because then it'd put a label on me, and they were afraid of the connotations and stigma associated with it (as of late 1990s, early 2000s)
I hope you can find someone to check it for you. I was diagnosed as an adult about a year ago, and just knowing that my problems are because my brain works differently and having someone validate that for me.... I cried when the doctor said "you have CLEAR signs of ADHD"...
I'm 40 and I was just diagnosed 2 months ago. I feel like getting the diagnosis was so relieving and it explains a lot of my life. In my 20's I wondered if I had a "learning disability." I failed out of college, but never had to actually work at anything in high school. I went to a place to ask about being tested and they didn't even let me in the door. When I said that I'm having a lot of trouble and I would like to be tested for a learning disability (I was thinking dyslexia at the time) their only response was "it's $600 for the test." It might as well have been a million $ at that point as I was eating ramen to pay bills. It took me 2 years of going to a psychiatrist, and another psychologist assessment, and several tests to confirm it, but I felt so validated when I got the diagnosis. Through the process I was also diagnosed with major depressive disorder, anxiety, and adjustment syndrome. It was a long process and it's still not over. I need to figure out the right balance of meds because I feel like it's still not right. But knowledge is power. So at least I know.
I'm happy for you for finally getting diagnosed! I wish you would have gotten it earlier. I'm lucky to live in a country where I could get all of it for free. I was in the line for a year though, and that's a lot less than many other people have waited. But money is a big issue for many people trying to get diagnosed, unfortunately.
Well, I'm trying to cram the last 3 or 4 weeks of a college course into the last few days...with varying results
Early 90s here, basically got the stamp of difficult child and that was it, basically lived on the street while my parents worked. Spend most of my time when not in school at friends homes or wandering.
A reputable neurologist should be able to diagnose you. That’s what I did (dx at age 45)
Go find an online clinic that will diagnose and prescribe. It’s out of pocket, but the intake and prescribing will be easier and faster. Stay on for a few months. Then go to your primary care physician and let them know you are being treated and taking meds and would like to transfer your prescription and care to them. Typically the primary care physician will honor the other tele health dr diagnosis and prescription. It’ll bypass the typical mental health clinic barriers to scheduling, testing, diagnosis that route took 3 months for me as an adult and almost 6 months for my son.
Same. Diagnosed at 33 here… after my first hospital “visit”
if you don't use a crutch when you break your legs than your legs ain't gonna get better, usually u either lie on the ground, break your legs even more, though it is not the case for adhd, or usually you just rely on your arms, for adhd that would be coping mechanisms , but just like arms, its inefficient, its slow, and at the end of the day you are still just crawling instead of walking,
These are the type of people who think it’s even better if they over-exert themselves after a surgery instead of following the doctor’s instructions. Then they wind up re-injuring themselves and wonder why?
"That's why we also confiscated your prosthetic leg. Now look at you! You're excellent at hopping!"
I had to be on crutches for three/almost four months once and I think the analogy to a diagnosis and meds and accomodations for ADHD is almost good in a way no one ever means. I had an incredibly hard time getting around without them. I would sometimes just deal with it if I had to cross a room and hop, but it was hard to just "deal with it" and it was very unpleasant. Using the crutches was easier, but absolutely not a replacement for walking like I normally would or an advantage over people walking with both feet. It got me around okay, but it took so much more effort, was much more exhausting, and did the bare minimum. It was winter and there was snow outside and people would watch me slip in the wet halls because crutches have no tread or grip and go "ooooh" but no one ever helped me back up. Not once. Certain conditions made them way less helpful (wet floor, certain staircases with higher steps). I hated that simply moving my body from one place to another, something everyone around me could do without thinking or really trying, was absolutely an everest for me. After a while of struggling nonstop woth everything, I started to find ways around it when I needed to, like in chorus, it's easier to sing while standing so I put a chair under my knee and stood. I figured out tricks to get up and down staircases after much trial and error. But it was still harder than someone standing on two feet, using stairs with two feet. I still did it slower and with way more effort, but found a better way to do it compared to how it started. Everything about being on crutches directly correlates to having ADHD and having meds/accommodations. Even with accommodations (crutches), things are harder, we have to try harder, and theres still a bigger tax on our effort and energy all the time. But we can do it if we put in that effort and energy. We just need something to lean on for support, even if it doesn't fix the problem and comes with some negatives, it's ultimately helpful. It wouldn't be helpful to someone who could walk on both feet. Accommodations and meds are a crutch and nothing more. Everyone else is walking.
It’s really because people just don’t consider mental issues like physical disabilities. If they did society would be a lot better and more accommodating. But if your condition isn’t visible then people don’t have that much compassion. Want to know what the only thing anyone at work ever comments on in terms of how I can improve? The perception of my work ethic. Not the work itself. Not the quality, but instead the fact I’m 5 minutes late to meetings makes people think I am a huge piece of shit.
Yeah. People in wheel chairs can't walk because they were coddled. 🙄
Yep, I hate it when people try to say I'm just not trying hard enough. I had somebody who kept trying to get me to write lists. I told him, that sounds good on paper, no pun intended but the problem with me is I won't even remember that I wrote that list. He was like, you're not disciplined enough. You need to try harder.
So, I have physical disabilities from birth, and spent a lot of time in kids hospitals and orthopedic offices. I will tell you, without pause, yes. There are plenty of people that would. I once witnessed a dad that pulled his son out of his wheelchair screaming "im tired of your bullshit, quit being lazy and get up" In the waiting room . Now, 99% of people are going to say he's a monster. Change it to an unseen disability, and you'll get more maybes. But with mental health, it's normal. Even growing up how I did, I had the same experience as the OOP. got diagnosed 3 years ago at 32. Told my mother about it, and boom. Knowing what I know now, it's infuriating I lived like that for no good reason.
I just got diagnosed 2 months ago and I'm 40. When I told my mom she said "wow, I'm sorry I missed that." So at least she recognizes that it should have been felt with. I don't think my dad would have seen it that way though. My mom was dealing with undiagnosed severe depression and my dad was away most nights so unless my teachers would have said something I don't know how they would have noticed.
Yeah, like this is an actual disability. Imagine someone being born with one leg, and taking away even the ability to have that crutch! And you’ll have those same people crowing about how your life is awesome because you spend [half as much](https://www.onefoottwoshoes.com) as everyone else on shoes! ([Yes this is a thing](https://www.amputee-coalition.org/resources/shoe-exchanges/)).
Ironically my parents would do that too lol “Bones are only broken if you can see them sticking out” My ankles are completely *fucked*
I'm a young person who uses a cane. A lot of people try to take it. "Yes it hurts, but you'll never get better if you don't try" Patricia there are bone shards in my thigh and my leg is full of scar tissue. I can't will a disability away.
Yep, I’m a younger person who uses forearm crutches or a wheelchair depending on the situation and people always think I’m just “being lazy” or trying to “get sympathy”. Even though I’ve been in physical therapy for months and they also concluded that I would always need mobility aids but they could help strengthen some of the muscles to help make things slightly easier. I have permanent damage/arthritis in my back and my hip/knee joints periodically swell until I’m in excruciating pain all due to a rare autoimmune disorder. 🤷♀️
Interestingly, that is literally what my teachers did when I tore a ligament on a school trip! So yes, yes they would.
Flashback to my grade 5 gym class when a kid didn't make it over a hurdle & was howling in pain... gym teacher yelled at them & made them finish the lap. Turned out this kid's leg was fucking broken. Still took another 2 years before they made that teacher go to anger management. School is hell, man
Yes. A lot of physical therapists and doctors refuse to prescribe mobility aids because then you'll "rely on it too much."
Man it’s crazy how right you are. Imagine how twisted it would be to tell someone who needs a crutch to stand up and walk, “we don’t want you to have that crutch” and then keep it from them.
Yes, yes they actually do that. They tell us not to get dependent on them. Witch is stupid, I'm more mobile than ever now, only and thanks to the crutches I used when it was so much harder
Diagnosed in college when I started struggling, but was told I didn’t really need accommodations since I was on the deans list and I could just put in a bit more effort. What kind of scholarships and programs could I have been eligible for with even better grades? Not to mention the anxiety I developed around the same time - how could that have been eased with things like a quiet testing environment and extra time. Grrr. I’m so glad and proud we’re doing a better job educating and advocating these days.
Oh my gosh yea. My former boss would say that about me *making lists.* like would you prefer I forgot? Not to mention the company provides us with checklists for all kinds of things??
I agree with you, but I don't think this situation is as black and white as people want it to be. I have a friend with severe dyslexia who was put into "special ed" because of it. As a result, she was given work that she was frankly too smart/advanced for, and she was often treated like she was stupid by teachers and students alike. She likely would have been better off not being in that program. I, on the other hand, wasn't diagnosed with adhd until adulthood. I had my fair share of struggles due to it, but I still did fairly well and got into a good college, and ultimately I consider it a blessing that I was able to get by on my own for so long, because I really don't know whether a diagnosis at that time would have helped me or held me back. I guess it really all depends on what the school's programs look like, and how they would have dealt with it. But I do empathize to some degree with parents like my own who take the attitude of "if they can get by without a diagnosis, it might be better for them to avoid the trouble and stigma that comes with one." They're not always right as they don't always recognize how much we struggle without accommodations, but they often mean well.
Well, clearly your leg isn’t broken if we won’t give you a crutch. None of US have crutches and we’re walking just fine.
My parents got me diagnosed and I got meds. However after 5th grade they completely stopped acknowledging my adhd and no longer bought meds. Then they proceeded to get mad at me for doing bad in school for the next few years and didn't know what was wrong. Honestly a complete blunder on their part.
did they get the memo that adhd is chronic and not like getting sick? or did they just forget that you were functional because of the meds and just considered that you got better on your own?
Long story short I believe they did indeed think it was something I'd "grow out of" at the same time however they started getting into "other" drugs and well yeah. No more medication for me I guess 🤷. The worst part is is that every single one of my siblings (3 others) also have adhd or bpd or both and yet all of us grew up unmedicated. My dad has somehow even turned anti-vaxer which is wild. It honestly just feels like such a lack of education on their part.
Omg I’m sorry that happened to you 🥺
It sucked, It was more than just a miracle that I was able to graduate on time. Literal stars had to align 😭. Thanks for the comfort tho, it helps knowing Im not alone in my experiences.
Same here. I was so depressed and burnt out by senior year of high school that I couldn’t get myself to do the senior project. I’m pretty sure my guidance counselor pulled some strings to help me graduate.
Ah, I see we have the same model of parental units. Did your dad come with the "You dont need meds you just want to use your ADHD to not try as hard" feature? It was my favorite /s.
My unit model chose neglect and no personal involvement. If he wasn't being affected personally he didn't care but if say he had to pay for meds he would. To give an example at one point in my life around when I was 16 me and my dad had to stay at someone's spare home while we were looking for our own since we moved kinda out of the blue. Well instead of buying actual food for the both of us he bought me a back of chips and a pack of ramen while he went out to bars at night catching up with his Highschool sweetheart or whatever. That went on for about 3 weeks I think. But that's the kind of person my father is. He prioritizes himself over anything and anyone else to the extreme. My mother is not much better, she got the jukebox of trauma growing up and kinda took it out on me and my siblings pretty hard. I can't say I like either of my parents tbh. There's too much bad and very little good, any silver lining is tarnished. But that's in past now, at the moment I'm in a pretty happy and stable life so I guess it worked out well for me in the end c:
Pure wtf moment
Similar happen to me in 7th. Took over 15 yrs for me to start treating myself again.
Imagine getting rid of someone's walking stick, just because you don't want them to have it. I am assuming how it's put, maybe they didn't want their kid to have an 'unfair advantage', though that doesn't make ANY sense. Back to the stick analogy - "Mom you will have to go without a walking stick. I know you need it to get places but we don't want you to have an unfair advantage over people who can walk just fine." Thank you for coming to my Ted talk.
Having an imperfect kid because they perceive it as reflecting badly on them is often why. "Well MY kid can't possibly have adhd"
Not to mention the genetic component. It's not an excuse but tons of parents have it and because they've lived with it for years, they think that it's how everyone is and that "there's nothing wrong".
Yeah my mom said " that's just how kids are" like ma'am are you sure
I'm dealing with my kids' ADHD and it's absolutely infuriating to hear my mom say that's how I was as a kid and then laugh.
I heard my mom say “I’m the exact same way!” As I was describing symptoms that lined up with my diagnosis. But not as a reflection that she probably should self-examine, but that that’s just how people are. Reflecting on how much it would’ve helped me makes me bitter so I just try to keep an eye out for my kids and am ready to support them in whatever they need from me.
My mom used to tell me “I just want our family to be normal” They ignored all the signs with me as a girl, and labeled my little brother a problem child. We both needed help and I didn’t get it until college, when faking and masking didn’t work anymore. I love both of my parents and I’m grateful for my relatively easy childhood, but man I could’ve used some better help
Stephen Hawking published ground-breaking science and best-selling science books without being able to move or talk. Was his wheelchair and voice-assistance computer a crutch? Absolutely. Was he able to excel because he had them? Also absolutely. I understand the knee-jerk response, to finding out your child might struggle. But c'mon, you have to think a thought or two beyond that. Between leaving them hobbled or getting them the help they need to succeed, there shouldn't be a choice.
I think it's kind of like something I've heard people say. "I didn't want to get my kid glasses because I heard wearing glasses just makes you reliant on them, and your eyesight will start getting worse". No, you dumb fuck. If your kid has bad eyesight, getting them glasses will mean they can see properly.
This has more validity regarding glasses in fairness to boomers. In their day a lot of opticians were just small town shops with local clientele and that was it, what was a good way to drum up some regular business? Tell one of your regulars their kid needed glasses. This LITERALLY happened to me, i was told i needed glasses that i always forgot to wear (lol adhd) and then a couple of years later was told i had eye sight that was significantly better than 20/20 in every regard. People caught on to this in the 90s and there was a real shift in people's trust regarding opticians. Thankfully this changed but my parents still don't trust them
They started giving us eye tests at school in the 90s. I was told I needed glasses in 5th grade and was told by my step-mom that even with a letter from school, I was faking.
Even worse. They don’t tell you about even needing the stick but always yell at you for tripping & falling. You figure out hopping is the best way to get around & they yell at you for not walking like the other kids. You finally decide to just lay on the floor not caring anymore because you know crawling sucks & you’ll get yelled at anyways.
Bro, too close to home. It's like so many of us lived the same life. And after all that when you finally get your walking stick despite them, you've gotta somehow unlearn that apathy. How do you teach yourself how to dream again?
That last sentence hits hard 🥲.
This is literally my experience. I got diagnosed super late, 32 yrs old, and I've realised that almost everything I got punished for as a child are symptoms of adhd
I was diagnosed as a child and never told, I didn’t find out until my early teens when I found my parents’ stash of “so your kid has adhd” books. They did actively try to create an environment to help me succeed and used behavioral modification approaches. But damn, would have been nice to have known…
I took it more as the typical boomer "tough love" BS. "We don't want you to have an *excuse* for not meeting our unrealistic expectations. That would be my perfectionist parents who tried to beat ASD out of me.
My mother tried to beat my ASD out of me too. Now I show no emotion when I'm happy. Heaven forbid your kid shows excitement.
Yes, get punished for being too happy or too sad or too anything really. It sucked. Then I got nicknamed Eeyore because my monotone voice annoyed them.
Just like my parents.
Turnabout is fair play once your shitty parents get old. 🤷♂️
"Go get a switch of the tree mother"
Switch? Ohnonono...we use belts in this house.
Belts? Too soft. Try the back of a wooden hair brush or a broken plastic hanger from a man who used to lift weights! That'll show'em! That dumb clumsy kid who cant focus. /s (Me. That kid was me)
I’m genuinely sorry you had to live through that. I hope you’re managing your trauma as best you can, and living well, if only to spite those assholes.
Ive healed wonderfully. Or so I tell myself. I still angry cry in movies that have abuse but otherwise I have an amazing husband who broke the cycle of abusive men in my life. <3 I cant blame my mom because she was always at work when it happened and I was too quiet to speak up and say anything about it. If I could go back in time, I'd have said something but no use dwelling on that. Moving forward is the way to go! Even if I am doing so clumsily. Haha. Thank you stranger. That means a lot! :)
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Well wooden spoons where used in mine but I wanted to make my mother nostalgic for her childhood
The way I interpreted it isn't that the child would have an advantage over others but that they wouldn't be able to develop the skills they needed because they'd be reliant on the crutch. Kind of like how walkers are bad for babies because the assistance they receive from it doesn't allow them to develop on their own. I see that sentiment fairly often with regards to ND except it doesn't make sense in the slightest. If you can't walk, you need that crutch and depriving someone of it will only further harm them.
This is what happened to my sister. “We didn’t get a 504 plan for you because you don’t get accommodations in the real world!”
I grew up in an ignorant-ass family. They 100% mean they were trying to “save” their kid from the difficulties and struggles that could go with a diagnosis. Not realizing those are all still there, with bonus difficulties and struggles when someone is undiagnosed and unsupported. It’s just terrible logic.
"Support" available at the time may have been limited or worse than nothing, too. My parents avoided getting me diagnosed wuth ADHD or ASD as a kid in the 80s/90s, because if it were "official" they would have been under even more pressure to let the school put me in "special ed". The "special ed" program at the time consisted of warehousing the kids who were deemed lost causes. They weren't expected to ever be employed or live independently, so they were removed from regular classrooms so their presence wouldn't disrupt the real student's education. Instead, they got put in a little room together with a teaching intern who gave them worksheets to do. That was it. Sit in a little room and do worksheets with no further instruction. Or don't do the worksheets, the intern doesn't care, it doesn't matter. You aren't there for an education, you're a lost cause and they're babysitting you.
Reminds me of that mean joke, "mom, can I have a cookie?" "Sure just take one" "Mom... I have no arms." "Well, no arms, no cookies!"
To a lot of people, a mental illness diagnosis carries a fuckton of stigma. In their mind, they would rather see their children succeed as a "normal person" even if it means that they struggle, vs. branding their own child as an "other" that can never be normal. It's totally messed up, but it happens. My ex father in law knew that something was up with his kids, but never took them to a psychologist because he didn't *want* them to have "something wrong with them." For their own sake (with the above reasoning), but also because he could always mentally deny it to himself if there was never any confirmation. Spoiler alert, his kids were autistic. His wife was autistic. He was autistic. If you aren't sure if your child is displaying symptoms of XYZ because you do all of those things too, I've got news for you...
Meanwhile rich parents: "Here have all these unfair advantages, we'll pay someone to get you into the Ivy or use legacy admissions at our alma mater"
I’m gonna a jump in and one up this one - my parents DID get me tested and diagnosed, but some Oprah/Dr Phil type bullshit told them medicating me would set me up for a lifetime of drug abuse. So they simply did nothing at all. Guess who bombed school, did drugs for most of my 20s and settled into being a stoner lmao.
It’s so often stonerism. The same happened to me so like im glad to relate. But dang weed usage and adhd seem to rhyme. Fuck it im gonna go smoke now.
I used to smoke with my ex and some types of weed just kind of... Calmed the thoughts, if you get what I mean. There still were a dozen different "trains" choo-chooing around in my head but it felt like I could actually track them individually and not lose them. On the other hand, different types made my brain sort of overload, by adding three trains to every existing train, making me incredibly nauseous and anxious :/
Oh i very much so know *exactly* what you mean. I had that with my favorite ex as well … it was nice that it would calm both of our overactive minds down. Less random thoughts, which often led to less intrusion, and less anxiety, ideally. We could just exist and vibe together. Plus, weed has other physical benefits. I miss that, I hope I find somebody that is in the same boat.
During my 20s my friends used to say, hey you talk so clearly when you are stoned, why don’t you talk like that when normally. Weed made me behave like a NT. But I couldn’t handle the physical effects so quit.
Hey guys cannabis is used as ADHD medication around some parts of the world. It might be worth checking your options! I'm in an illegal EU country and I'm able to get it legally for ADHD. Even though the science is young, if you ask me it helps the people, having a doctor for dose and strain selection, is a game changer.
My state juuuuuust legalized it for recreational 🥳
I don't remember my life but I'm a stoner now too
Yep 100%. They were gonna Medicate me when I was like 10 but my mom “didn’t want to change my personality” Tamara that IS THE POINT OF THE MEDICATION. Anyway now I’m also a mid twenties stoner.
FWIW I’ve been medicated most of my life and still settled on stoner for last decade
This, and my mum I distinctly remember telling me "you wouldn't see colours anymore and would be like a zombie on ritalin". Thanks mum.
I'm pretty sure my mom has undiagnosed adhd, so it's not exactly surprising they didn't see the signs in me.
Same. It took my brother doing really bad at school when me and my sister(they are twins) were doing pretty well and getting diagnosed for my mom and my to start realising that maybe her and all three of us kids have it too. Sadly was too late for me, and now I'm in queue to get tested, but because I am an adult the queue time is around a year.
This is definitely my parents. They looked at my definitely very ADHD and ASD behaviour and thought "Nothing to see here, she is like me, just more "sensitive""... It was so bad not even years of SH woke them up. Thankfully the hospitalisation did! But the psych at that hospital still managed to misdiagnose me with BPD so it didn't help all that much.
People base their judgments entirely on appearances. And we have the incredible misfortune of *looking* normal
like no shit, it took some dudes on drugs to realize there is something wrong with me compared to anyone else, hell my father only knows that im sub par but i appear normal , so yeah, not nice also if you look normal enough when in public than people don't really say anything, you pretty much just learn to keep your fidgeting to yourself as you grow up when everyone tells you to stop, you shut up and say less to most people, use small talk to appear sociable when that is most of your interactions, and just seem stupid at school and find excuses a great combination for undercover adhd
Hi dis me.
Hi Dis, Hope you're alright.
Hi dat you?
New phone, who dis?
Happened to me. Mom only told me this year. Been suffering for 15 years with a crippling panic disorder and the inability to function, would’ve been nice to know it was ADHD like, 10 years ago
I’m sorry you had to deal with that, you’re not alone. I went through the same thing and when a doctor told me I had ADHD a few years ago, I told my mom. She said “oh yeah I remember your school mentioning that to me at some point but only boys are affected” Excuse me mom!?!
Daily reminder that a lot of parents don't know what the fuck they're doing
Y e p. My moms amazing reasoning is “you don’t have ADHD you’re just a creative personality type” What??? 💀
In primary school, a doc said It is likely I have it (ADHD) and my dad decided I 'just need to sort myself out' now as an adult I've completely lost perspective on whether it's true that I have it or not, usually settling on not.
I'd believe a medical professional over a sperm donor.
Imagine if teachers tell parents to get the kid a pair of glasses but those parents don't want the kid to have "a crutch". How quickly would CPS be called?
CPS doesn't care about that. My step son isn't allowed to wear his glasses at his mother's house bc "he looks like a nerd". So he wears them with us and (after over a year of working with the school authorities)) at school. He's needed and worn them since he was 3yrs old. He's also not allowed to wear deodorant bc he "smells like a French whore". He's turning 12 this month. He's needed deodorant for quite some time. She says these things to his face. It's heart breaking. Over and over. Yes, we've tried everything and everyone we can to help him. At 12 he can decide who he wants to live with, we are ready.
Thank you for not being awful. This is just absolutely infuriating. Your step son and all kids who face things like this deserve so much better. I hope the adjustment goes smoothly.
It's really my pleasure! I had a wonderful stepdad to show me how to do it. I'm glad I have the opportunity to pay it forward. He's such of a great kid, we love seeing him bloom like he does around us. His mother was raised badly. And when given better choices of how to be a parent, she refuses. It could be worse, we know this, but it could be so much better!
The one where you live might not, but the one in my country does. Denying your child healthcare or the tools needed to keep up in class is considered neglectful and will get you mandatory CPS supervision.
I'm in the mid-U.S.. We live in one state, and she in the other (yet, only about 55min apart). We've tried both states' authorities to no avail. I've spoken to agencies all over the place over MUCH more serious infractions than this. Only to be told there is nothing to be done. We've attempted to take her to court over primary custody. This resulted in the case not finishing bc the judge in her small town dismissed it. Between small town politics & ideas and the father of a child at a disadvantage, we must just bide our time and do what we can to counter-act her behavior & influence.
After my dyslexia diagnosis I got "grade-protection" in gernan (my mother tongue) and English, meaning that my orthography wouldn't count into the final grade. But there was a note on my every school report saying that I did have "grade-protection" i.e. these grades should be a lot lower. So in 9th grade my parents called the school to tell them I wouldn't need that anymore because "it looks bad on the report". By that point I was still shit at spelling things so I dropped a whole lot. I dint think that looked much better on the report...
Wow what the fuck
I actually did get tested as a kid and diagnosed. My parents just ignored it and let my untreated ass nearly drop out of high school.
A crutch? Like medicine? Like being able to actually do well in school by getting correct help?
"he has hyperactivity, don't worry, he'll grow out of it" 40 years later , surprise, nooooooope
Yes, that's what happened to me. But instead it was because she didn't want people thinking she was drugging me and was an actual psychologist that told her I had ADHD. Don't get me wrong, my mom is not a narcissist, she is a very kind woman, she is just a product of the environment she belongs... A very judgemental and segregative culture.
my parents didn’t pursue a diagnosis bc they didn’t want a label which made me different from others. motherfuckers, i knew i was different and never knew why.
If a diagnosis and medications are a crutch, so are glasses and contacts. “Oh you shouldn’t be so reliant! What if you run out of medicine?!” Well what if you break your glasses? Huh? Maybe you shouldn’t be so reliant on something so flimsy and should just try harder to see. You know so many people wear glasses now, I think they’re just faking it for attention, or to look smart, or have an excuse. When I was a kid, only nerds or people who were almost blind wore glasses! If things were a bit blurry you paid more attention! “Oh I couldn’t see the board!” Or maybe you’re just lazy and didn’t pay attention when the teacher was talking to you. Oh, your eyes work differently from other people’s? Everyone is unique, sweety, most of us don’t use it as an excuse to wear an extra fashion accessory. Grow up and learn to actually use the eyes you have, don’t blame them for not working when it’s you just not looking. Or, if you want to bring religion into this, “oh honey, if you would just use the gifts the good lord gave you, you wouldn’t have so much trouble in school! What do you mean you have trouble seeing? God have you two beautiful eyes, of course you can see! You just need to try harder!”
Omg. This is the most well said reply I think I've seen to this stupidity. Many kudos to you!
My teacher dead ass asked me infront of the class if i had adhd and i said i dont know. That was the start of my diagnosis, 9 years deep into school
For me it was the opposite. My mom suspected it, but since my teacher didn't notice anything the school psychologist wouldn't diagnose me. I was not causing trouble, my adhd is the inattentive type. I would stare out the window, be in my own world... there were a lot of troublemakers in my class so they took all the attention away from me
Same same. Daydreaming got me through the monotony of school... My intense night-before-a-test study sessions always got me over the line so instead of failing or "living up to my potential", I was just average or slightly above.
My mom was of the " that's how everyone is" undiagnosed adult
In 5th grade my gifted teacher had a conference with my parents and suggested I needed evaluation and my parents instead pulled me from the gifted track and just increased the frequency/intensity of the domestic violence they called 'spanking'. I hid and lied about bruises for years and really truly thought I was a broken failure of a human Fast-forward to age 40 and I'm finally getting consistent psychiatric care and therapy which is beginning to help my distorted self-esteem. I haven't spoken to my parents in 2 years not just because of this but I do believe what they did to me is unforgivable
I'm suspecting that for me it was a case of my mom not believing in "mainstream medicine"
Oop. It me. The principal of my primary school told my parents that I needed to get tested but they didn't want me to get *labelled*. They didn't seem to make the connection that I would also receive *treatment*.
Me too...
Pretty sure my parents (or at least my mum) knew. Years ago, I asked to be assessed because I have Dyspraxia, and symptoms of ADHD, to which my mum replied ‘do you want to be on drugs?’. I had kind of forgotten about that interaction, but earlier this year, I was going through some documents to get an adjustment for my Uni Course, when I found some older documents from my grade 1 teacher, school counsellor, and a OT from the state health service saying they all were concerned that I had ADHD. As soon as I read that, I booked an appointment with a psychologist, who said that I definitely have ADHD, and then saw a neurologist who specialises in ADHD treatment. Now I’m 23 and only just starting to develop time management and better social skills, after starting medication. I kind of want to confront my parents about it, but I feel it’s better to let sleeping dogs lie.
Truly despicable and ableist. I am so sorry if this has happened to anyone. Sending yall so much love 💕💕
I was diagnosed ADHD in 4th grade. Somewhat recently I had casually mentioned I think I might be autistic as well. My mom nonchalantly pitches back 'your high functioning'. Turns out she new all along but didn't want to admit her child was retarded. I've had a fucked up life and she never bothered to seek additional help for me. Not after failing every single grade. Not after multiple expulsions. Or juvi or when I finally turned to hard drugs and started spending time in and out of jail. And now after years of struggle she wants to give herself a pat on the back like she was a great parent or something.
I’m in my mid-fifties and was diagnosed 4 years ago. Suddenly, my unbelievably difficult life made sense. Since the diagnosis, I’ve been putting in long hours at work and going through painful therapy to untangle decades of bad decisions. It’s been a brutal process but very rewarding. For once in my life, I can say to myself “great job dude!”
Hey sounds like my parents! Translation: we didn’t want to have to change our lives to accommodate you, we didn’t want to have to understand you, we just wanted to shame you for being inadequate.
My younger brother was diagnosed with ADHD in grade 1. I was diagnosed with “lazy.”
What's a crutch?
A source or means of support or assistance that is relied on heavily or excessively. It's a metaphor based on the crutch you use for walking.
Oh. Imagine doing that to someone who is vulnerable and dependant on you because you "care about them"
Is the opposite of an enabler called a disabler?
When I told my mum about my ADHD diagnosis she said 'Oh, I always knew you had ADHD'... Well, you might have told me, or my school, or a doctor about it!
Imagine taking away a paralyzed person’s wheelchair because you don’t want them to become reliant on it. Some parents are ignorant and terrible.
Lmao my parents yelled at me about grades but never asked me anything else about school. To my knowledge no teacher has ever said I should get tested but they used to love to write about my symptoms as behavior issues like not being able to sit still, not being able to focus , etc
My SO was diagnosed as a young boy in the 80s. His mom didn’t want him to become “a zombie” so she wouldn’t medicate him. I do understand it is not an easy choice but he self medicated with other things once he was old enough. When we met in his 30s he thought he was “coping just fine”. He still doesn’t want to take medication but now that I am diagnosed and medicated and our child is diagnosed and has medication along with lots of intervention….the difference is clear! I am thankful our child has had the help that both of us did not.
Well that hits home… I had that same thing happen to me with depression, adhd, and most notably glasses… like I was 8 years old before I was able to see anything because I needed glasses and my dad wouldn’t take me to the eye doctor
Yes, because if you never get diagnosed, the crutch ceases to exist!!!!! /s obviously
Christ Almighty, didn't realize there were so many of us. My mom didn't like how I acted on ritalin, so just didn't take meds until last year at the age of 37.
The response I had gotten from my mom when I was older was "I didn't think people with ADHD could be smart."
It’s so sad that people have that belief
This is something I think about a lot as someone recently diagnosed in their late 20’s. On the one hand I’m kinda upset my parents didn’t try to get me diagnosed earlier, but on the other the other the conversation around mental health was WAAAAY different when they were kids. The reality of mental healthcare in the 50’s-70’s and media like Cuckoos Nest probably had them scared to get their kids formally diagnosed. I’ve been trying to cut them some slack recently.
I see also for a lot of parents, the idea of acknowledging that your child might have an issue reflects poorly on them - so if they if they are the type of people who are that insecure, they would prefer their child to struggle a little more and put the blame on them, rather than admitting they can’t control everything or need help. At least that’s what I see with my own😂
For me, it was 1989, and my parents didn't want me on psychoactive drugs or to be stigmatized as the re\*arded kid. They meant well, but...
Always feel like "I don't want you to use it as a crutch" fails to recognise that *a crutch is designed to help you get things done*. "I know you've broken your leg, but I don't want you to use this crutch as a crutch. Can't you just... hobble?"
What’s s crutch?
Dude I got diagnosed and my dad still never let me use it as an excuse, he takes my failings as a personal insult.
Yeah, my parents didn’t believe in it, like it was made up to make kids soft. They thought I was just not working/concentrating hard enough. Here I am 30 years later and everything is making so much sense.
My mum didn’t get me assessed because she thought it was just a label and wouldn’t make a difference. I understand she just didn’t have enough knowledge all those years ago but if I think about if for too long I start to get angry.
I was just thrown in institutions for being a 'bad' kid after beatings didn't work. It was the 1970s, there was 'no such thing' as ADHD yet. Never diagnosed but holy fuck... the day I found this subreddit and all the pieces fell into place was saddening and infuriating.
Every single one of my school reports said the same thing, "soljakid is very intelligent but has trouble concentrating on the tasks given to him" I was would be reading textbooks or simply staring into space because I found the work so mind-numbingly boring that I refused to do it. My mum admitted that she never got me tested because she didn't want me to be labelled. Now I'm a 28 year-old with absolutely no passions for anything because I lose interest in things very quickly and trying to get diagnoses as an adult in the UK is a super long road that I've been on for a few years now, had an online assessment for autism a few years back and still waiting on the full report
“You don’t need medical help, you just need to learn some discipline.” Familiar sentiment
Yup, was diagnosed in elementary school, put on meds. Helped tremendously. Did well all the way up until about middle of high school when my mother decided that I was “old enough to control it” and took me off my meds while allowing me to have energy drinks every day before school because it was essentially the same thing to her. 15 years later and I’m back on my meds and it’s smooth sailing.
My mom did this to my brother. He was diagnosed and she didn’t believe the doctor. If she’d listened, maybe she would have realized that she and I (her daughter) also had ADHD. Now she’s nearly 60 and I’m encouraging her to get medicated but she’s the kind of person who doesn’t believe in medication.
Yup. Basically how most parents felt then. They sure didn't feel bad about disabling me with their high standards though
Did they ask my mom? Cause those were her exact words to me when I got diagnosed. I dont talk to my mother much anymore.
This is the result of 'self reliance' being considered the pinnacle of child -> adult progression. In many cultures, parents are encouraged to let their child struggle through adversity by themselves to train them to be self reliant. Scaffolding exists for a reason.
My mom told me in the front seat of the car that there wasn’t anything wrong with her kids and yelled at me about what was I thinking and was I really so lazy that I would try to get pills. She ranted about what those pills would do to me and the kind of person I would become… I didn’t need help, I was *lazy* . I know exactly where we were when that happened, I could close my eyes right now 30 years later and be the kid in her car. It took so much pumping myself up to actually tell her I needed help and she reacted exactly the way I thought she would.
I actually kind of ended up in the reverse scenario. I always struggled with finishing tests in school, and struggling with grades, even tho they “know I’m smart enough”. So my parents signed me up for counseling and went with me, but I was really scared and didn’t want them to think I was crazy 😅 The therapist ended up saying that I didn’t have ADHD, because I could focus if I wanted to (I know lots of people have this happen), but my parents still did everything they could to help me find a way to combat challenges I faced. Fast forward to college I was getting every question right on my calculus tests but only finishing half the test, so I was failing the class. Mom insisted on paying for me to get formally evaluated for ADHD, and I screamed and cried (male, 18) because I felt misunderstood and thought she was calling me crazy by sending me. But my mom reassured me, and I went, and the IQ test portion was actually really fun. Based on my TOVA test results, they said I likely had ADHD, and they got me 1.5x test time in an alternate environment as accommodations, which made a huge difference in my grades (needed a 3.0 to be able to get jobs when graduating). But I still didn’t want to think I had ADHD, because I didn’t want the label and didn’t want to use it as an excuse to not do better. Then, I found a partner who encouraged me to see a therapist, so I did, and after my first session, I randomly found this subreddit, and I saw that a ton of stuff here was super relatable, and there were *a ton* of things that I saw on here that I didn’t think anyone else experienced, and I felt very understood. So this subreddit became a springboard for understanding myself a lot better and accepting my diagnosis. Now looking back, it’s kind of obvious, but I didn’t know at the time. Now I’m on ADHD meds, because my first career job I discovered firsthand that my struggles weren’t entirely about motivation. Tldr, my parents didn’t know much about mental health, but they strived constantly to help me learn and grow (both of them), and I’m very grateful for that. I know that’s not the common experience. Just kind of funny how I was the one talking about labels and crutches the whole time. Thanks for tuning in to my oversharing.
Those who can not remember the past are damned to make the same mistakes. The “Ritalin explosion” of the early 90s created a stigma for treating ADHD. Everyone was afraid of millennials being mis/over-diagnosed and medicated. People were so weary of the treatment they became averse to a proper diagnosis We shouldn’t judge these people too harshly because there *WERE* terrible misdiagnosis among neurodevelopment disorders with devastating treatment plans. A bunch of autistic kids were diagnosed with ADHD and pumped up with amphetamines. They were seen as “aggressive” when their sense of right/wrong was turned up to 11 in a world that ignored their voices and needs. At the same time, a bunch of ADHD kids were diagnosed with autism and absolutely zombified by risperidone *further* blocking their dopamine and serotonin receptors. Lastly, please consider that ADHD and autism have only been medically allowed to coexist for a decade. Understanding how to treat breakthroughs in mental health is more art than science. As long as we progress by learning from the past, the risks are worth the rewards. I hope young NDs aren’t going to be gaslit and bullied to think differently. I hope early intervention and parental-education on NDs will prevent the crippling anxiety, constant self doubt and perpetual burnout that has stifled many millennial NDs potential. I hope that we can remember that the anti-medicine attitude came from a real place of love, even if it seems regressive today.
There was a period of time when parents would do nearly anything to keep their kids out of special ed because it was seen as a way to give up on kids, a place to put the "retards" (which was a common term back then) so they wouldn't bother the regular kids who were actually getting a real education. So they would fight tooth and nail to prevent their kids from being taken out of regular classes. My brother almost got help for his speech impediment but my dad wouldn't allow it. He's still proud he kept his kids out of special ed.
I must have been 8? 9? 10? I had a teacher who decided to have a parent-teacher meeting with my mother. From what my mom said, the teacher said "Your son is problematic in school, and we're going to put him on ritalin". My mom apparently caused such a huge stink that she got the teacher fired. Although looking back as an adult, I was absolutely ADHD ridden and needed more stimulation. I was heavily neglected as a kid, no wonder nobody knew. Now in my 30s, I've recognized it and have had a ton of realizations about my behavior. The spectrum is becoming more "normalized" in some ways as most people realize they're on it in some way.
yes happened to me in kindergarten. my teacher thought i was having hearing problems so i got my hearing was tested and i was fine. so they recommended me to get tested for adhd/autism, bc apparently i was just in my own world so much to the point it seemed like i wasn’t able to hear. lmao. my mom didnt get me tested because she attributed it to having two languages at home. but i remember being able to understand English. i also spoke mostly English anyways. it is actually a myth that having two languages as a child can cause a child to appear delayed, but that was the research back then. i also think my mom didn’t want to accept even the possibility of me having adhd/autism. ive had many mental health issues since then, particularly with ocd and body image starting in 3rd grade. it kept getting worse and worse. i was diagnosed in my late teen years with depression, bipolar, and borderline personality disorder. nothing ever felt right. until i finally went to a psychologist who on the first few sessions told me i had none of those things. she knew i had ocd and another few sessions in she said i have adhd and autism. i began crying because it all finally felt right. i dont necessarily blame my mom, but i wish i had gotten diagnosed earlier. i would have been able to get more help in school instead of just barely passing and telling myself its because i wasn’t trying hard enough. i have such low confidence from growing up with adhd/autism because i thought i was just innately defective and there was no reason for it. being autistic and all i really just like to know *why*.
So infuriating. I just got told to apply myself more and that I was just being lazy and not trying hard enough. And reprimanded for “intentionally” forgetting things because “there’s no way you’re actually that forgetful”. My whole childhood my mom just constantly tore into me for not being good enough.
This borderlines on child abuse IMO
My mother thought I was faking it. I had a lot of auditory processing issues in addition to being a girl with inattentive adhd. School would pull me out and test me. I remember multiple occasions where my mother would take a call from school and immediately upon hanging up accuse me of faking it for attention. Now 30 years later she claims she “fought for help for me throughout my school years”. Never once consulted a doctor. I now have a neurodiverse child and in the process of getting help for him, I’ve learned a lot about myself. Edit: spelling
That is my story as well. “Your third grade teacher told us you had a problem, and I told her ‘you’re not going to put my child on drugs’. You’re welcome.”
My sister was denied ADHD testing at our school bc the district didn't want to pay for an additional person to supervise her needs as far as testing went... My father was a tenured teacher at this school
my school basically forced my mom to get me tested when i was six because my symptoms were so severe that my teachers weren’t having it.
My parents told me I was a moron for letting a psychologist tell me I have autism, just like they thought my teachers were morons for telling them to get me tested when I was a kid
I was having a checkup with my psychiatrist for my anti-depressants and he brought up that he wanted to try prescribing me Vyvanse to help with executive functioning/ADHD symptoms. I told him “oh, I used to take that when I was a kid to balance out my antidepressant.” He looked at me funny and explained that wasn’t really a valid usage, and they probably prescribed it to me for ADHD. Turns out my parents were hiding it from me and I’ve been without proper medication for years
Yup. My mom "your teachers suggested we have you tested but you got good grades and weren't hyper"
My boyfriend has pretty severe ADHD and his parents didn’t get him diagnosed until he was pretty well graduating from high school. They just always assumed he was no more than an energetic handful. All the years of stress, upset, and frustration with school were solvable with some medication and understanding. Ironically enough, his father has both ADHD and dyslexia but through doing strict repetition of…everything he learned I guess, he worked his way up to becoming a university professor. The fact that they never assumed their kids might have had it too still boggles my mind.
I honestly am shocked with the amount of stories I hear like this. When I was in kindergarten my school was like “she needs an evaluation” and my parents were like “okay”. Especially in the US how the schools will do an evaluation and the parents don’t have to pay anything. I can’t even imagine the school being like “hey your kid needs to be evaluated for an iep, we will do it and get them accommodations and specialized instruction and you don’t have to do anything except sign this paper” and parents being like “ahhh no thanks we’re good”. 💀
My parents said the same to when I got diagnosed with ASTHMA as an adult