I was born on April 29, 1982 at Georget Washington Hospital in Washington, DC. Growing up with ADD has been a challenge for me, but there have also been many good times in my life as well. I am well aware that I have had special privileges and access to more things that most kids probably don't, but I can tell you from growing up with a little extra money that money only distracts the pain, it does not erase the pain.
If you ask me, ADD or ADD/ADHD as it's often called is just a label. I believe "we fear what we know not", and when we don't know what something is or we think something is different, we will label it. Everybody is different and everybody reacts differently to different foods, medicine and to certain situations. Say you are a person who may have a lot more mood swings than the average person: well first when does the average person get upset and second of all when is it normal to have an "average mood swing?"
When you are labeled as "different" it makes you feel different and then you may feel that you are not normal and people won't want to be around you. In reality, having ADD or ADHD is not the worst thing in the world: i remember getting on an airplane to go to boarding school for the first time and I was absolutely terrified. So my mother told the ticket lady about my learning disabilities and they upgraded my seat to first class without any charge. There are many other memories that I have of learning disabilities like that. I am not going to lie to you and say that having learning disabilities isn't tough, because it is - but then again so is life. Life is tough for everybody, but because lots of times people who have any types of learning disabilities are thought of as stupid, at least during their childhood years, we have it in our heads that we are stupid or that we can't do it. Well, I've learned that we have average or even above average IQs, and we can do anything we want to.
To read more about my life or to visit a community of people living with and caring for others with learning disabilities, visit FriendsOfQuinn.com: Where learning disabilities meet support.
I am new to this site, but I have had ADHD all my life. I was not diagnosed until I was an adult and after having 4 children. I am in my 40s now (feel younger though - maybe it's because when you have ADHD, you act younger). I know I had it as a child, because I was always talking in class and got in trouble right along with the boys. I wasn't a bad kid, so I didn't understand why I was alway "in trouble", but I just had this nervous energy. As I got to be a pre-teen, some of my friends (who ended out being the popular kids in high school, cheerleaders, etc.) told me I was too immature for them. It really hurt my feelings, because I didn't understand. Lucky for me, my parents had a few acres and I was always able to play off my excess energy, and then my best friend for life moved to town and we hit it off and were inseperable. We were always bike riding all over the place, so I think that helped me alot too. Just to be outdoors and active.
I say all this because you were talking about people being different, and when is a mood swing considered normal? Who is to say what is normal since we are all created different? I truly believe the reason we have sooo much ADD/ADHD diagnosed now is not because we have something "wrong with us". It is because society has changed, and the people who are "phycially inclined", those type of jobs aren't available anymore. Now everything is stuck in an office or at home on a computer. Kids hardly go outside to play, they are on the computer or on video games. So these "problem kids", who are not really "problem kids", but just made different because they were created to be something different on this earth. How boring it would be for everyone to be made alike, and that is what society is trying to do. And we and are ADD children are being pushed down because there is no place for us to focus our energy. There are no more outdoor type jobs, or they are hard to come by. 100 years ago, everyone worked outside from dawn to dusk doing hard physical labor, so you never heard of ADHD.
I didn't mean to get carried away, but that's my thoughts on it all.
Two excellent posts. I cannot, for the life of me, understand why ADHDers are considered "disabled." We are the ones who foment change via our creativity and high-octane energy. The last time I checked, ADHD was not the cause of the economic malaise that we currently suffer. We did not steal from taxpayers in order to afford lavish residences and large yachts.
The true disorder afflicting society is GREED. I am through being sick and tired of hearing and reading disparaging remarks about ADHDers.
Your posts give me reason to believe we can make a difference in changing the incorrect perceptions rampant in our society.
Don
Author, "Dear Mary: My Life with ADHD"