For a number of reasons he has been tested by two psychologist (one regular and one specializing in gifted) who both strongly believed that he did not have ADHD and cautioned me that it would be very easy for him to get misdiagnosed with an ADHD. Fast forward to now where I still do not believe he has ADHD (and the behavioral issues have decreased dramatically). The people that have been suggesting the diagnosis have been suggesting it to help him get pull out services and "work the system" not because they think he has ADHD.
Wow. That is really quite shocking. Who are the "people ...suggesting the diagnosis ...to help him get pull out services and work the system?" Are these professionals? School staff? I would be tempted to report them. Seriously. That is really disturbing unless they really, legitimately feel that the psychs are indeed missing true/mild/stealth ADD or an LD. I had a weird sort-of similar situation with a pre-school teacher. I had approached her to fill evals (a check list thing, I think it was a BASC) for my DS (DS was in pre-k and had just turned 5 at the time). At the time, he had just been diagnosed with hypotonia and fine motor delay privately and was getting an eval done through the school district in order to get OT/PT services through the Intermediate Unit. Teacher and I had discussed the hypotonia and my son's alarmingly delayed fine motor skills beforehand. She filled out the form and put it in a sealed envelope, gave it back to me for me to give to the IU (I suppose she thought I would not open the envelope and look at the form; but, it is my child and I wanted, and felt I had a right to, see it). I looked at the form. It was full of reports of alarming problematic behaviors that I had never notice in my son and she had never told me she was seeing at school (seriously, things like 'has potty accidents,' which I assume I would have been told of b/c he'd a change of clothes!). I contacted teacher and director of school immediately to find out what the heck was up and listed all of the alarming things she reported and requesting further information about them and asked why I had I not been told stuff like this was happening? Teacher admitted, in writing/email, that she had "lied and exaggerated on the form in order to get my son services" (not sure what type of "services" she had in mind but her lies and exaggerations went far beyond the scope of fine motor skills). The director stuck up for the teacher saying "she often exaggerates on these type of forms" b/c she is "just trying to get kids help." I, however, was very alarmed by her behavior. I reported the incident to the IU and the teacher's reports were disregarded ( And I showed them the written (email) confession). Anyway, teacher was dismissed from her job at the end of the school year by the director. I was not the only one who had had problems with her (and quite honestly she was terrible with the children).
