Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Recommended Resources "Gifted Should Not Be Confused with Disorder"

Obviously, I don't know how to quote- ha!

"The 2010 American Academy of Pediatrics Task Force on Mental Health reported that 37% of children and adolescents either meet the DSM criteria for a mental health diagnosis or show some impairment in functioning."

37% ???? What is THAT?

(So... the next time you see three kids together, think, hmmm - the AAP considers one of these kids sub-functional in some way)

Are we over pathologizing variations in normal childhood behaviour?

Sorry, I know this is slightly off topic as it's not specifically related to giftedness, but that paragraph really irritated me.

(Good article otherwise.)

I don't know, parenting has been one big lesson for me in "there are a million things that are super rare - but there are so many of them that bad things happening are really pretty common" including physical and mental health problems. 37% seems higher than even I would hbe thought but I do think the number would be higher than most people expect... Depression , anxiety, eating disorders, addiction, developmental disorders are just the big and obvious ones...

CCN--that's exactly it, I think, that we are over-pathologizing normal variations.

squishys--thanks for the direction; I've seen things like that about ADHD (and heard Edward Hallowell on NPR speaking very eloquently about how ADHD is a benefit to many adults), and I've also seen an article here and there about how some scientists realize they are on the autism spectrum but weren't diagnosed as kids--because back then they were just considered geeks, or quirky.

I think it's a very bad thing, and am glad some (credentialed) people are trying to counteract it by pointing that out.

This was the scary part to me. Why would primary care pediatricians be giving out psychiatric diagnoses?

Kudos to the 90% who have the self-awareness to know they're not qualified. The next step is for them to stop doing it.

Peds diagnose ADHD and other such disorders all the time.

I have a friend who is a psych professor (specializing in child development)/child psychologist. She does not prettify her views for me. While she does not really know my DD, she has persistently argued that DD is gifted and intense/sensitive and that's really all. I gave her the scores DD got on some of the instruments she took and she was highly skeptical of her being diagnosed with depression/anxiety, saying her scores were borderline at best. It's not that she disagrees that we need better tools to cope at home, but she objects to DD being given an actual diagnosis. It's certainly interesting to know a psychologist with this POV. I doubt she would be so candid if we weren't friends.

"sub-functional"? I must strenuously disagree with that characterization of disability.

In our family's experiences, having a disability doesn't make you "sub-functional"-- but it does offer real, serious life challenges that are different from those faced by people who don't have the disability.

Recognizing these challenges allows us to find and teach the skills that offer the best work-arounds-- and the best chance to minimize the impact of the challenges. It also allows us to understand and accept these aspects of ourselves, not think we're bad or lesser people because something is harder for us.

If you don't want to label your challenges or those of your kids, that's fine by me. But the choice to use a technical label is not necessarily bad, or pathologizing. It can as easily be liberating and open up a horizon of understanding.

DeeDee

In other articcles I've read I don't like seeing things like "suffering from dyslexia" or fill in the blank for a different label. But the kids who are different because of their challenges/differences know that they are different from the time they'e very little. My DD doesn't like the words dyslxia or ADHD very much right now, but she understands her brain is wired differently and that gives her cool strengths as well as challenges. I let her choose her own "label" and she has and we use that "label" (which is very positive) to discuss her challenges, strengths and her path in general. This has been very helpful in lowering the anxiety she experienced from "operating in the dark", so to speak.

There are too many things "wrong" with the labels that put parents off, like pressure to medicate, doom and gloom of the child's future, and I think having the labels stick on the records after plans have been dropped is wrong.

And anxiety in my mind is a secondary issue that comes from a mismatch between the person and the environment or not being treated with respect of having ones needs met in school.

I think so, as well.

I find it highly distressing that we seem (as a society, certainly, and maybe as a civilization) to be rushing ever faster to NARROW our interpretation of "normal" into a picture of 'normative' that is shrinking by at least 1/4th of a standard deviation each decade.

What we used to find quirky/amusing/eccentric but tolerable or at least beneficial in certain circumstances, we are now pathologizing very early on.

I find it very peculiar when that pathologizing is related to rate of development, or affective setpoint. Not everyone develops in lockstep with "average," in terms of cognition or executive function.

One size MUST fit all now, and if it doesn't, we need to label what is "wrong" with the individual before we make any allowances for the variations.


How sad. Maybe it's not that the individual is so wrong-- but that the environment has become so INTOLERANT.

Sorry if this is OT, but it's kind of related so I just wanted to mention it in case it struck a chord with anyone else--two of the psychologists we've seen have said something along the lines of, 'oh, they don't have to meet all the criteria to have' Asperger's/ high-functioning autism.' This was because I was pointing out that while we definitely see social issues for DD (under the 'A' category for ASDs in the DSM), we do not see what is described as 'B' category behaviors (kind of the obsessive/ repetitive type stuff), or at least only sometimes in a very mild kind of way that sounds very different from the DSM descriptions--and is consistent with the description of misdiagnosis in James Webb's Misdiagnosis book. But whatever--I guess the criteria are just a loose guideline in some psychologists' professional opinions?? So what does it mean to have criteria, even ones as flexible as in the DSM (i.e., pick 3 of the following....) Same thing for ADHD--and you could line up what they said exactly with the James Webb Misdiagnosis section on ADHD (i.e., that the 'symptoms' were inconsistent with ADHD). But these same psychologists, when I mentioned the James Webb book, did not respond. What gives?? On the other hand, technically I guess we never got a real diagnosis because each of their reports just said something like 'the questionnaires [from teachers and parents] indicated a [70-90% likelihood]' of DD having each of these things. So I wonder when we're talking about the 37% number are we talking about a suggested diagnosis or a diagnosis where the psychologist has said, "this kid definitely has X."

Just saying, our experience with liberal inclusion of DD--but in a qualified way--is another part of all this that doesn't quite add up for me.