Look, I've had the same experiences since I was a child and everything I am saying believe it or not in a way is the beliefs I've developed thinking about my issues (a coping mechanism even).
>Being bored is a sign of lack of interest- being unable to focus anyways when it is boring but critically important, and you are choosing to try to focus on it but still can't would be a sign of ADHD.
I mean do you know how many people have trouble doing something like exercising despite realizing how important it is? People fail to execute control in this area and others like it despite it being literally life threatening.
Boredom, lack of interest, stimulation, focus, arousal are all related. One cannot expect someone to be focused for hours, every day on something one has no interest in, despite its seeming importance to an outside party, especially in regards to children. How do you expect a child to understand the importance of sitting quietly in class for 8 hours a day then going home and doing homework for a reward 20-25 years down the line that they can't comprehend? You're told it's important, but there is nothing within, nothing at the present or near future, that is enjoyable, fulfilling, in accomplishing these goals. Things are made far worse for example, if you as a child have social anxiety, and hate the school environment, and you drain most of your mental energy on just navigating socially, and come home hating your life.
Speaking of my experiences, truth is there is much I loved to do, could focus on for hours, and sure as shit could have excelled at. I loved reading history books on my own for example, walking around in circles and thinking about god and evolution, and writing bonkers political essays as kid. I loved video games, trouble shooting things, and making things which is how I got into programming. And absolutely none of my interests were reflected in school, which is the SOLE criteria where any outside person (and in turn, me) would judge me, my ability to focus on "what's important". And in turn all these interests largely faded away, having no backing or relevance to my real world, and all I was left with is feeling inadequate, useless, and angry as soon as I thought about the "important" things I had to do.
I still realized I knew I had to them yes, so I did the bare minimum the last minute, and it worked, so I kept doing the same. I've come to see that as a perfectly rational, functional thing to do. Now if I can't focus on something "important" like my job, I think "fuck it, it really is boring, let me see if there's something more interesting", and yay, it works.
There is a whole another class of kids which I don't imagine are reflected in the ADHD diagnosis, those that just said "fuck this" early on, didn't even care to try, and became troublemakers.
What I'd consider "critically important" executive function is things like are you able to run out your house in a fire, can you drive a car and turn left when you have to, not can you devote 8-10 hours of your life for 20 years to something you intrinsically don't want to do.
All this aside, your or my feelings about how difficult it was in relation to other people mean nothing. My criticism is, scientifically, how do you measure any of this, how do you even know what the baseline is? How do you factor things like how much someone actually wants to do something, anxiety, anger, risk tolerance, addictions etc that all come into effect when a person makes a decision to sit down and do work? How do you control for person's interests vs their environmental needs?
>This is absolute nonsense, it's like saying that getting an X-ray is harmful, because if people know their leg is broken, it might make them think they can't walk on it like normal.
Not a fan of analogies. You can recognize your defects without the label of adhd. Most of what you've said is the benefits of stimulants, a sense of community, and a sense of acceptance. An adhd diagnosis helps with all these of course as they're locked in behind the diagnosis. I didn't say it's not helpful, I said it can be harmful in some ways, or at least, I don't think its the most ideal solution.
Thanks for sharing. From your experience I suspect you have ADHD, which is why it seems to you like everyone experiences these things, when actually they don't.
People without ADHD are able to force themselves to do things they have no interest in, just because it needs to be done. I'm not saying doing that a lot is at good thing, or a recipe for a rewarding life... but the fact remains that our society is structured around rewarding and pressuring people to do things they have no interest in for advancement in school, careers, etc. My experience of school was that it was totally ignorant of the fact that some people have interests and like to learn things, and was based almost entirely on the idea of forcing behaviors with the threat of negative consequences - and for better or worse it was able to force most kids, but not the ones with ADHD.
Hyperfocusing on things you love is what you are describing in your second longer paragraph, and that is a key symptom of ADHD. In some instances it can be a huge advantage- I am a successful scientist because I hyperfocus on problems, and solve them. There are some real advantages to ADHD, along with many disadvantages, and ability to focus more deeply without distraction on things you are passionate about is a big advantage.
It's common for people with ADHD to just say "fuck it" and decide not to do what they are supposed to do, but then often feel guilty about it... not really realizing it was never a choice- they still wouldn't have been able to do it if they hadn't said "fuck it" but instead said "I'm going to just double down and do this even though I hate it." They can do the bare minimum at the last minute because the massive stress and anxiety at the last minute acts exactly like a stimulant, and suddenly gives them more executive control.
So how do you recognize ADHD scientifically? There is a pretty thorough system to clinically evaluate people that involves extensive question and answers about situations in your life, as well as interviews with multiple 3rd party people in your life. It's not perfect, but it's constantly being improved and is pretty good.
Sure, an ADHD diagnosis could have some disadvantages, but overall it is a very serious and very treatable condition where the treatment has well documented improved outcomes. ADHD has a shockingly high mortality rate, and treatment with medication causes a drastic reduction in mortality from unnatural causes like accidental injury and suicide.
I have an ADHD diagnosis. I think the diagnostic criteria is a joke (and I know at least 3-4 people who have gotten a diagnosis because they just wanted stimulants, so its not as hard as you might think), and having thought about all these things for a long time now I just have an entirely different interpretation. I used to 100% believe and push the ideas you are talking about so grant me the belief that I am not coming from a place of ignorance or hatred.
>People without ADHD are able to force themselves to do things they have no interest in, just because it needs to be done.
I don't think this is substantiated, or at least is far too simplistic. What do you consider needs to be "done"? As I said for example, to me this would mean life critical things, like you press on the brakes when you need to, you run out of fire when there is one, not you focus hours a day on something for a goal 20 years out because it will make your life a better one in the future. Thats not something I "need" to do, its something I wish I wanted just to avoid the consequences of being berated, feeling inadequate, etc. And if I found that I am able to get away with it doing things with the least possible effort, then that seems like a perfectly rational and functional thing for an animal to do. I tell ya, if I could go back, what I'd do is give far less of a fuck.
I think you have far more "executive control" than you think, I think its the narrow criteria, the one pressured by the existing societal/economic structure, you are evaluating against.
How many people have trouble exercising for example, despite knowing how important it is? People fail to control their urges when it comes to their eating habits, sexual urges, their emotions, addictions and all manner of things.
>My experience of school was that it was totally ignorant of the fact that some people have interests and like to learn things, and was based almost entirely on the idea of forcing behaviors with the threat of negative consequences - and for better or worse it was able to force most kids, but not the ones with ADHD.
I don't know about that. I'd say in a class of ~500 people, maybe 50-75 were actually all that focused on succeeding, and most of them were from well off with wealthy families and good homes. The bottom 100-200 didn't give a flying fuck, and ditched classes, smoked weed in school, cheated as much as they could. The average person Id say maybe cared somewhat, but wasn't all that motivated and did what they had to do to get by. I only felt like I had adhd because I felt that I cared more than the rest of the kids, but wasnt able to do my work. But what was required was so far off who I am as a person that looking back its unreasonable that Id be able to have. I mean it would literally make me angry thinking about stupid the assignments were, thats all I could think about trying to do them.
>Hyperfocusing on things you love is what you are describing in your second longer paragraph, and that is a key symptom of ADHD. In some instances it can be a huge advantage- I am a successful scientist because I hyperfocus on problems, and solve them. There are some real advantages to ADHD, along with many disadvantages, and ability to focus more deeply without distraction on things you are passionate about is a big advantage.
So imagine you were in a different environment that catered to your interests or style of learning. Now all of a sudden you're motivated, succeeding and everyone wants to be like you. Do you feel troubled, wanting to go to a psychiatrist to be diagnosed? Imagine you put all the "normal" people into an environment void of social interaction, non concrete assignments, and whatever other characteristics of normal school, and evaluated them and berated them on the tasks you're able to focus on. Do you think they'd just be able to adapt? And would failing to do so would grant them a diagnosis?
Another thing I found really surprising is that when I got my second job, all of a sudden I was insanely happy, motivated, focused at work and outside it. Then things changed again. I'd pretty sure Id get an ADHD diagnosis any year before that, but those two years? No way. I was more focused and motivated than now where I am taking 30mg of adderall every day. How could that be? The answer is a difference of a bunch of life factors, like the fact that my job now is boring as hell, I dont have much friends, Im not physically active as I used to, etc. These are all CRITICAL factors in focus, and its not something the diagnostic criteria is really even able to factor out.
Now, it does make complete sense that people's brain vary and some us are wired differently, with some people being more risk tolerant (and thus not caring as much about future consequences), some people needing more stimulation to feel motivated, etc. But IMO, what we consider ADHD is far more complicated than a lack of "executive control"
My apologies for assuming you were ignorant about ADHD. I agree what I was saying about focus is too simplistic, I was incorrectly thinking you weren't understanding even a simplified explanation of ADHD.
I think it's more accurate to say that the combination of factors that influence attention is different for people with ADHD, with a lot more emphasis on interest and less on other factors. When you say "its something I wish I wanted just to avoid the consequences of being berated, feeling inadequate, etc." - I think most people without ADHD are able to choose to do those things anyways if they decide it is a top priority, and put a lot of effort into it. I have chosen to do those things, tried to put in a lot of effort and energy, to no effect. That's not to say it's even a good idea to be able to do that, but it is a fundamental difference. I've wanted things a lot badder than other people, fought a lot harder for them, and been unable to do them, when I saw other people with very little interest or desire do them easily- and they were even less fundamentally capable of actually doing them, but able to consistently sit down and make progress.
I also agree that what is defined as a psychiatric disorder or disability depends on cultural context- but it's not cultural alone, it's an interaction between the natural variability between people, and the cultural context. Where someone is different mentally in a way they can't control, that causes them to suffer, within the context of a given cultures norms and expectations, that is the origin of all mental disorders. ADHD is a 'different' brain phenotype that isn't fundamentally worse- it also has some serious advantages, and I agree that in a culture where ADHD people were normal, non-ADHD people would be seen to be disabled. They would be seen to have a "flightly" and "shallow" attention that shifts from one thing to another on short intervals, and is too influenced by things like social demands, and not actual interest or passion. People with ADHD are also used to exerting a lot more mental effort to get things done, and build a stronger will as a result. For example, I have a hobby doing competitive strength competitions, and the mental effort I usually expend to get my work done, makes it really easy to push through physically painful and grueling training and competition that other people usually can't do. It's like I'm normally pushing against a wall all day long to no effect, but in this particular activity, I suddenly have no such wall and everything feels easy when it's hard for others.
Those lifestyle factors that influenced your focus, happiness, and motivation level are huge, and are useful tools for people with ADHD. However, there is a counter cultural narrative that those type of things shouldn't matter, and that you should just double down and do your work without worrying about things like that. This narrative might work for some people, but is especially a disaster for people with ADHD, but getting a diagnosis, and getting in a community of people that help each other find tools that work can be an antidote to that. Our culture has a lot of protestant work ethic values - that it is fundamentally morally superior to just do your expected duties, even if, especially if, you really don't want to do them.
I've also had times in my life where I was in a situation where I had a lot of focus and motivation, without any ADHD medication. But I see the effectiveness of these situations as exactly supporting the narrative of executive control dysfunction - if you engineer your environment and situation so less executive control is required to meet your goals, this is a powerful tool for managing ADHD. If you understand ADHD and what factors affect the level of executive control required, instead of happening on good periods in your life just by luck, you can create them consistently. That is, I think a more powerful (but not mutually exclusive) approach than even medication. Consistently having fun, playing, and adventuring in your work and life in general is a very effective ADHD management technique.
Would you summarize your view on ADHD as that it is just a mismatch between some subset of people, and protestant work ethic as a system for motivation? And that, since the protestant work ethic is fundamentally shitty, ADHD shouldn't be seen as a disability? I can agree with that somewhat, but it's of little help to a kid suffering in school. Moreover, I find ADHD treatment to make me better at things I do love. I want to be able to finish projects I start. I want to be able to notice when I'm in a sailboat race that a sail is trimmed wrong, and not hyperfocus on something else.
> I think it's more accurate to say that the combination of factors that influence attention is different for people with ADHD, with a lot more emphasis on interest and less on other factors. When you say "its something I wish I wanted just to avoid the consequences of being berated, feeling inadequate, etc." - I think most people without ADHD are able to choose to do those things anyways if they decide it is a top priority, and put a lot of effort into it. I have chosen to do those things, tried to put in a lot of effort and energy, to no effect. That's not to say it's even a good idea to be able to do that, but it is a fundamental difference. I've wanted things a lot badder than other people, fought a lot harder for them, and been unable to do them, when I saw other people with very little interest or desire do them easily- and they were even less fundamentally capable of actually doing them, but able to consistently sit down and make progress.
My question to you, what makes you so sure that your feelings are accurate about this? We know how we feel about something, we don't quite know what other people are going through. If were to talk about this as a science, its 100x more difficult to measure and quantify these things.
But let me point a few things out here.
1. I think most people are not hard working at all. Most people to me seem like they don't have much hobbies or interests in the first place, and don't try to get into something to begin with. Most people seem unable to stick with doing things they are interested in, like playing music or picking up a sport or etc. This is pretty evident if you been in a club, or taught a class or something. Most people will simply not stick with it and drop out. I think you're comparing yourself to a rather small subset of the population.
2. You said you're a scientist. This is above what most people achieve. Now I don't know when you got your diagnosis/treatment but I assume you did well enough up until that point that this was still a possibility for you. Same is true for me, I graduated college and am software engineer and I did really well in my field. Career aside, I've got pretty into skiing, rollerblading, dancing, playing keyboard, chess, got my pilots license, etc. Now I haven't really stuck with anything more than 6 months really, but I think this is more than most people. I didn't get diagnosed until last year.
My point here is, our feelings aside, we did pretty damn well and by all accounts are functional adults capable of doing many many many things. So where is the deficiency exactly? I'd venture to say your feeling is that you haven't accomplished as much as you believe you could have.
> Where someone is different mentally in a way they can't control, that causes them to suffer, within the context of a given cultures norms and expectations, that is the origin of all mental disorders. ADHD is a 'different' brain phenotype that isn't fundamentally worse- it also has some serious advantages, and I agree that in a culture where ADHD people were normal, non-ADHD people would be seen to be disabled
Glad we agree on this. A lot of people see it as simply being a defect, and attempt to attribute all their behaviors, shortcomings or otherwise, as being fundamentally tied to the diagnosis. I saw a popular thread on /r/adhd for example saying "Trouble with eye contact during sex, does anyone else have this?", with all the comments saying "omg, thats me too!". Even without a diagnosis, I think a lot of people (and this used to be me, which is why I know its true to some extent) will start to conceptualize their issues in terms of ADHD.
This is where I see it being harmful. Yes, as a matter of treatment, like I said I don't have much qualms. I don't even care if people take illegal drugs for stress relief, so I certainly don't care even if people wanted to take stimulants to make their job easier. My issues are with the science of it.
>But I see the effectiveness of these situations as exactly supporting the narrative of executive control dysfunction - if you engineer your environment and situation so less executive control is required to meet your goals, this is a powerful tool for managing ADHD. If you understand ADHD and what factors affect the level of executive control required, instead of happening on good periods in your life just by luck, you can create them consistently. That is, I think a more powerful (but not mutually exclusive) approach than even medication. Consistently having fun, playing, and adventuring in your work and life in general is a very effective ADHD management technique.
Well this is effective for everyone ain't it? Having friends, going out, trying something new once in a while, seeing progress in your relationships or interests or work or whatever. It was a wild time because I had been depressed all my years prior, and all of sudden it made sense why. How could I have expected to be happy sitting at home all day every day doing the same things over and over again?
>Would you summarize your view on ADHD as that it is just a mismatch between some subset of people, and protestant work ethic as a system for motivation? And that, since the protestant work ethic is fundamentally shitty, ADHD shouldn't be seen as a disability? I can agree with that somewhat, but it's of little help to a kid suffering in school. Moreover, I find ADHD treatment to make me better at things I do love. I want to be able to finish projects I start. I want to be able to notice when I'm in a sailboat race that a sail is trimmed wrong, and not hyperfocus on something else.
In part, yes. Because it doesn't matter if you functionally perfectly fine in all other aspects of your life, or even if you don't function in a ton of ways, its your ability to work and succeed in this environment that will determine how you feel about yourself and whether or not you go into a psychiatrists office. It doesn't matter if you could have been a chess grandmaster, or an author or another Alex Honnold, its primarily that you can't be happy being an obedient kid doing what you hate for 20 years that determines a diagnosis.
But my view first and foremost is that human behavior is extremely complicated, and short of physical evidence, trying to tie 10 different complex behaviors into a singular unknown cause is an entirely manufactured approach. I have a lot to say about this but it goes back to my initial comment.
Categorizing something doesn't add information. Nay, it takes out all the actual details and abstracts it into something that is easier to understand. If I talk about all my issues and a psychiatrist says "we call that ADHD", they haven't discovered something new that is true about me, they have just given it a label. And if we communicate through those labels, were working with less information, not more. Then we find facts that are you true about these generalizations, and then people take those facts and thinks it applies to them, because they're part of that label. Its so silly logically. Its like if a scientist was like "all these things with fur are Jababas.", "we studied all the Jababas and found eating leaves increases their mortality by 20%", and then thinking "its got fur, leaves are good for it" Hell thats better science since at least the attribution to the categorization is definite.
I personally find it so reductive of the human experience but that's beside my point.
>kid suffering in school
Imo, get rid of the prison-like school system. Get rid of the standardized testing and required certifications like a GED. Stop advocating for this singular path of school->(high paying field degree) college->job. Give more avenues for education, different learning styles, etc. I mean hell, for anyone who actually gives a shit its easy to see that a kid with social anxiety isn't going to do so well being in school with thousands of kids. Problem is no one gives a shit and our systems are so set in stone, its very difficult to change anything.
You're right I don't know what other people experience... it is a mystery to me why some many adults don't seem to do much. If I ask them they'll say they just don't want to- but why don't they want to? Apparently doing the same stuff is much harder for me, having ADHD, yet I do it and they don't- and I don't understand why they don't. That said, I know people that are as motivated and skilled as I am but don't have ADHD, and they are more successful than me- although in that case I am comparing myself to really a minuscule group of people. And almost none of them have kids or hobbies.
I have been very successful in my career, and it sound like you have also, but with an enormous amount of effort relative to the outcome. I have spent months stressed about getting work done and getting no work done. I had entire terms in undergrad where I did zero homework, and was nearly kicked out. It wasn't that I was slacking off, I was under enormous stress trying to do the thing, and not doing it.
I agree the label of ADHD isn't perfect, and groups a lot of potentially different things together- but it is the best we have been able to do so far, and it works. By grouping people together by a criteria we can develop treatments that apply to that group, study them, and use the ones that work best. Hopefully it will continue to evolve and improve.
As far as the school system- it was a living nightmare for me, and apparently for most people with ADHD, but I don't think most people feel that way. Most adults I talk to loved school, attend high school reunions, etc. There is no societal consensus that it sucks and needs to be fixed, no energy for the coordination that would be required. This might be another place where the ADHD label is useful - if we can prove that it sucks for people with ADHD, they will have pressure to fix it, or else be refusing to make it accessible for a disabled group.
You need to look at political and social realities to see where you can actually make things better for people with your effort, not how it should be ideally.
>Being bored is a sign of lack of interest- being unable to focus anyways when it is boring but critically important, and you are choosing to try to focus on it but still can't would be a sign of ADHD.
I mean do you know how many people have trouble doing something like exercising despite realizing how important it is? People fail to execute control in this area and others like it despite it being literally life threatening.
Boredom, lack of interest, stimulation, focus, arousal are all related. One cannot expect someone to be focused for hours, every day on something one has no interest in, despite its seeming importance to an outside party, especially in regards to children. How do you expect a child to understand the importance of sitting quietly in class for 8 hours a day then going home and doing homework for a reward 20-25 years down the line that they can't comprehend? You're told it's important, but there is nothing within, nothing at the present or near future, that is enjoyable, fulfilling, in accomplishing these goals. Things are made far worse for example, if you as a child have social anxiety, and hate the school environment, and you drain most of your mental energy on just navigating socially, and come home hating your life.
Speaking of my experiences, truth is there is much I loved to do, could focus on for hours, and sure as shit could have excelled at. I loved reading history books on my own for example, walking around in circles and thinking about god and evolution, and writing bonkers political essays as kid. I loved video games, trouble shooting things, and making things which is how I got into programming. And absolutely none of my interests were reflected in school, which is the SOLE criteria where any outside person (and in turn, me) would judge me, my ability to focus on "what's important". And in turn all these interests largely faded away, having no backing or relevance to my real world, and all I was left with is feeling inadequate, useless, and angry as soon as I thought about the "important" things I had to do.
I still realized I knew I had to them yes, so I did the bare minimum the last minute, and it worked, so I kept doing the same. I've come to see that as a perfectly rational, functional thing to do. Now if I can't focus on something "important" like my job, I think "fuck it, it really is boring, let me see if there's something more interesting", and yay, it works.
There is a whole another class of kids which I don't imagine are reflected in the ADHD diagnosis, those that just said "fuck this" early on, didn't even care to try, and became troublemakers.
What I'd consider "critically important" executive function is things like are you able to run out your house in a fire, can you drive a car and turn left when you have to, not can you devote 8-10 hours of your life for 20 years to something you intrinsically don't want to do.
All this aside, your or my feelings about how difficult it was in relation to other people mean nothing. My criticism is, scientifically, how do you measure any of this, how do you even know what the baseline is? How do you factor things like how much someone actually wants to do something, anxiety, anger, risk tolerance, addictions etc that all come into effect when a person makes a decision to sit down and do work? How do you control for person's interests vs their environmental needs?
>This is absolute nonsense, it's like saying that getting an X-ray is harmful, because if people know their leg is broken, it might make them think they can't walk on it like normal.
Not a fan of analogies. You can recognize your defects without the label of adhd. Most of what you've said is the benefits of stimulants, a sense of community, and a sense of acceptance. An adhd diagnosis helps with all these of course as they're locked in behind the diagnosis. I didn't say it's not helpful, I said it can be harmful in some ways, or at least, I don't think its the most ideal solution.