Why a diagnosis isn’t a “label”
I got super far ahead and writing blog posts. I think I’ve got several queued up to post the next couple weeks. But I just have to write about something when it comes up in my practice or my personal life and I get excited to talk about it. Today I want to talk about the idea of a diagnosis being a label, in other words, a bad thing. I have heard so many people, mostly parents refer to an add diagnosis as a label. They are deathly afraid of their child being labeled, categorized, maybe even stigmatized. I’ve had clients who were diagnosed as kids and their parents never told them. And they end up in my office trying to manage their ADHD wishing they’d had a chance to start that process 20 years earlier. I think it’s really important to talk about this A lot of this comes for the underlying societal bias against ADHD. Can you imagine a parent refusing to take their child to get an eye test because they were worried about them being found to be nearsighted and then stigmatized because they have to wear glasses? Can you imagine a parent not wanting to get their kid diagnosed with cancer as soon as possible so they can start treatment and live? Would you resist saying you were diabetic, if you were diabetic? I realized there is a certain amount of denial present in human nature. But the level to which I’ve seen parents deny ADHD and sometimes other psychiatric issues, blows my mind. I just can’t think of an instance where it’s not better to know what you’re dealing with and be able to fix it, treat it, face it head on. I think it’s time we fought even harder against the stigma of…