Children (and humanity) are spiritual and material beings. We have a body and a soul. However, the reductionist approach to medicine denies this reality. The spiritual aspect is denied or at best reduced to a mere epiphenomenon of chemical processes. Until we embrace a more holistic view of what it means to be human, I fear this problem you so well described will only continue to worsen.
You've done a great job of describing the root of our over-diagnosed and over medicated culture. I grew up in the days before children were herded like cattle and limited in what they could do or think.
I am very grateful to have missed the cultural need to be medicated into obedience for the convenience of those with expectations I would not have understood.
Ed-I will say what everyone is thinking but too ;nice’ to articulate…
1) these parents had no business having children-now , let the calumnies fly and the woke come out of the woodwork. I will go further, no non recovered addict has any business bringing children into the world. They will never have the bandwidth needed to raise intact children. You do t even have to invoke their much higher incidence of child neglect and abuse.
2. I have a lot of personal experience with a broad range of acquaintances, friends and family who have these diagnoses/labels/exposure to medications . In some case it has been life saving, in others gratuitous, limiting and overdiagnosed . We clearly underdiagnosed this in the past, and clearly over diagnose it now, largely because of incentives. In the past it would have been shaming, in the present it can be a crutch and an advantage. Let’s stipulate we are all going to be smarter and more defective on amphetamines. Behavioral Expectation were higher in the past, academic expectations lower, and teachers more present more capable (training, class size, social norms etc) teachers don’t have the ability or capacity to handle :l those active young male ‘kinesthetic learners’ that populated my classrooms in grammar school; at teh same time truly hyper at Ie kids are not getting the constant training and reinforcement at home that they require to function in the world and classroom. Where I certainly can agree with you is the threshold for medicating young kids needs to be way way higher. Thsi is an assume responsibly to take for any adult-parent or doctor-that is taken on far too casually. The bar for medicating anyone under age q8, and certainly in grammar school should be much much higher for. a lot of reasons. It isn’t because it makes life so much easier for parents and teachers. Thank you for reconginizing outrage real patient in this case was a neglected child.
The mental health tributary is one of the ways the anguish and suffering of the culture expresses itself as it joins the great river of despair we are all swimming in.
I have a lot of creative friends, and I've watched them receive these diagnoses. Once they get one, it begins to define them. My writer friend now blames her inability to settle down to her novel on her ADHD. But maybe it's just that she's a very creative person with a lot of ideas and writing a novel is HARD. Where once, she would have pushed on through, she now gives up, takes some pills, still has problems and gives up further. Sticking these labels onto children, labels which will follow them their whole lives and influence their perception of themselves is damaging. I bet I could define myself by a whole bunch of letters. But I don't want to know. I just let my chemicals slosh around in my head and call it "inner weather." Thanks for a great post.
Children (and humanity) are spiritual and material beings. We have a body and a soul. However, the reductionist approach to medicine denies this reality. The spiritual aspect is denied or at best reduced to a mere epiphenomenon of chemical processes. Until we embrace a more holistic view of what it means to be human, I fear this problem you so well described will only continue to worsen.
You've done a great job of describing the root of our over-diagnosed and over medicated culture. I grew up in the days before children were herded like cattle and limited in what they could do or think.
<https://dianehaugen.substack.com/p/the-magic-of-a-one-room-schoolhouse-e69c502db2a7>
I am very grateful to have missed the cultural need to be medicated into obedience for the convenience of those with expectations I would not have understood.
Ed-I will say what everyone is thinking but too ;nice’ to articulate…
1) these parents had no business having children-now , let the calumnies fly and the woke come out of the woodwork. I will go further, no non recovered addict has any business bringing children into the world. They will never have the bandwidth needed to raise intact children. You do t even have to invoke their much higher incidence of child neglect and abuse.
2. I have a lot of personal experience with a broad range of acquaintances, friends and family who have these diagnoses/labels/exposure to medications . In some case it has been life saving, in others gratuitous, limiting and overdiagnosed . We clearly underdiagnosed this in the past, and clearly over diagnose it now, largely because of incentives. In the past it would have been shaming, in the present it can be a crutch and an advantage. Let’s stipulate we are all going to be smarter and more defective on amphetamines. Behavioral Expectation were higher in the past, academic expectations lower, and teachers more present more capable (training, class size, social norms etc) teachers don’t have the ability or capacity to handle :l those active young male ‘kinesthetic learners’ that populated my classrooms in grammar school; at teh same time truly hyper at Ie kids are not getting the constant training and reinforcement at home that they require to function in the world and classroom. Where I certainly can agree with you is the threshold for medicating young kids needs to be way way higher. Thsi is an assume responsibly to take for any adult-parent or doctor-that is taken on far too casually. The bar for medicating anyone under age q8, and certainly in grammar school should be much much higher for. a lot of reasons. It isn’t because it makes life so much easier for parents and teachers. Thank you for reconginizing outrage real patient in this case was a neglected child.
The mental health tributary is one of the ways the anguish and suffering of the culture expresses itself as it joins the great river of despair we are all swimming in.
I have a lot of creative friends, and I've watched them receive these diagnoses. Once they get one, it begins to define them. My writer friend now blames her inability to settle down to her novel on her ADHD. But maybe it's just that she's a very creative person with a lot of ideas and writing a novel is HARD. Where once, she would have pushed on through, she now gives up, takes some pills, still has problems and gives up further. Sticking these labels onto children, labels which will follow them their whole lives and influence their perception of themselves is damaging. I bet I could define myself by a whole bunch of letters. But I don't want to know. I just let my chemicals slosh around in my head and call it "inner weather." Thanks for a great post.
So true. So sad. So well said!
This is very pertinent.