So you were posting in the Air Marshall thread about how the cavemen didn't need drugs...but did not mean to diss drugs for organs with good PR departments, just for brain related diseases?

Gotcha.





Anyway - ADD and diagnoses like that are very fuzzy concepts....and misapplied by a huge number of interests.

Its a real condition, but, because it gets public schools extra money for kids diagnosed with it, it has become way more popular than its actual occurance.

Dyslexia is another one like that....trouble reading, slap it on and get more $ for the school, etc. But, it DOES exist, just not as often as its diagnosed.

As for people with mental ilness blaming their lack of success on their illness, it is crippling, and can keep them from normal activities....or it could be an excuse...just like stuttering, a limp, hearing loss, and other disabilities that can hinder some people more than others.

One guy loses a leg, and begs the rest of his life, the other guy loses a leg, and goes on to win marathons with a fake one....and sometimes its because they just have that type of personality, and sometimes its because they could never scrape together the money to go to the doctor and get a fake leg....there are variables in all of our lives.

Judging everyone by our own lives or circumstances is bound to lead to erroneous conclusions.

The walk a mile in another's moccasins before saying anything negative about them concept...that way, you're a mile away, and, you have his moccasins....

....and, you have some insight as to how this type of thing happens, and that just because YOU have the resources, financial, mental, physical and community, etc....to overcome what they are experienceing, doesn't mean that they do.

So -Sure, ADD and so forth are over diagnosed, and, can be used as an excuse in school, yadda yadda yadda...but if you really HAVE it, its a real drag...and, while your school might give you extra time to take a test, etc...

Your employer is not going to give you more time...he'll give you a pink slip.

So, once out of the coddling school system...its sink or swim....and those A's you got by getting 2x as much time on the test are worthless if you can't produce in the real world.

Brattiness is another issue.

My kids learned no. Period. They have NEVER had a tantrum if they couldn't have something, and they have always respected others.

I have a kid with ADD....and he is outgrowing it. He got worse grades in public school, and is in college now on the honor roll, graduating this year.

He learned to compensate for it. ADD doesn't mean permission to be a brat....it means the attention span bounces around, etc...behaving and being restless, isn't the same thing.