Imagine with me for a second that you have a kid, a little girl. She's in 1st grade, and is having trouble learning to read properly and write her letters/numbers correctly. She has a first year teacher fresh out of school herself, maybe in her mid twenties.
So said teacher calls you in and has a conference. She starts out sweet, pointing out all your child's pros, like her 'sparkling' personality, but avoids anything negative. Halfway through the conference with about ten minutes left she launches into a long, technical description of your child that you cant understand. You question her further and she mumbles something about how your child may have a disorder. You decide to flat out ask her what in the name of Moses she is talking about and she tells you your child has ADHD.
ADHD? What? Attention Deficite Hyperactive Disorder, that's what. So you take your little bundle of joy to a doctor, who reads over the teachers notes and gives you some meds costing you a heavy amount of green, all with a bored I-don't-give-a-shit expression.
Your darling baby girl turns into a zombie. First they give her something to calm her down. Then she's too still so they give her something to hyp her up, then of course her energy level skyrockets and she needs something else to calm her down. After twenty-something trials and a seriously drugged out kid you and the pleasant doctors find the right dose of everything. By that time your kid is on eight different drugs.
And the problem persists.
You take her
back to the doctor, and they decide to take her off everything and conduct a few tests. They do that, and after a week in the hospital, ten thousand dollars, and a year of utter stress, you get the test results back. Your kid is bipolar.
This is a true story . . . Well, maybe it wasn't a girl in first grade, but it
did happen to a family.
My Point: ADD and similar disorders
are apparent, I wont deny it, but they are MINOR problems. Something like 50% of children in the U.S. have been told they may have ADD, ADHD, or some other mental problem, probably more. I was told I had ADHD way back in 5th grade because I talked with the other children too much and fiddled with my pens, papers, etcetera. My sister, whose in 1st grade now was recently told she had ADD because she doesn't pay attention. I have many, many freinds with similair stories... and no, none of us - including myself - are on any sort of sedatives.
Her teacher is a demoted middle school teacher that is probably bitter. My sister comes home almost everyday with stories about how she yells and otherwise punishes the students. Christ, she cant even teach her kids to write their numbers properly! Teachers are paid to
teach, not to recomend various drugs for their students.
"If left untreated, the persistent and pervasive effects of ADHD symptoms can insidiously and severely interfere with one's ability to get the most out of education, fulfill one's potential in the workplace, establish and maintain interpersonal relationships, and maintain a generally positive sense of self."
But don't listen to me. Decide for youself, it's better that way anyhow.
“I know what you are.”
