ADHD Isn’t A Metaphor

Let’s say that rates of ADHD diagnoses among kids in America are continually rising. Let’s say that stimulant medication use — both prescribed by doctors, and as the result of illegal trade with friends — is on the rise, too. What do we make of that information? What do we do with it? In particular, how do we use it to improve children’s and teenagers’ lives?

The answers speak volumes about where we are as a society and where we ought to be headed.

The default response, every time we get news about any sort of uptick in the diagnosis and treatment of children’s mental disorders, is to issue condemnations of bad parents, bad doctors, bad teachers, and bad schools. (Not to mention big bad pharma, of course, which, it seems, will never rise from the bed of nails it has built for itself over the years.)

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