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Last month, I attended the Annual CHADD ADHD Conference in Atlanta, USA. I found it interesting to experience that science has come a long way with respect to understanding ADHD. It was also interesting to note that public awareness about ADHD is growing, but just exactly what ADHD is all about, is generally still quite misunderstood.

One of the sessions was conducted by Dr. Kevin Murphy, who led a four hour conference on Assessment and Psycho-Social Treatment of Adult ADHD.  His words mirrored my own experiences and also reflected what I hear among people who scrutinize ADHD’s existence and, in fact, think it is a false label which has no validity. In reality, it is a legitimate syndrome, which is proven to be genetic. It is indeed a very complex and confusing syndrome.

I often come across parents who think their child deviates from other children’s behaviour and learning style. Because they do not have a clue about ADHD, they instinctively blame the school for letting their child down, and do not consider that their child may be “disordered” in anyway. Therefore, they would often deny the possibility of their child having ADHD, and dismisses the existence of it. Off course, there is no doubt ADHD kids learn differently, and of course, if these kids were accommodated according to their learning style, they would thrive much, much better.

However, we cannot deny the fact that ADHD is about global impairments in the executive skills – it is about lack of self control. Nevertheless, the ADHD population tend to beat on their own drums and succeed tremendously. It is not about the hard core IQ impairment, but rather about the regulation of the management systems, and its executions. These executive skills often manifest themselves for a student completing an assignment, for an employee closing the deal, managing ones frustration, having poor working memory and sequencing fractions in school (although that child might be good in math), over-focussing on a computer game but cannot sustain to pull through a task in school, or at work, or being blamed for having a lack of integrity like mustering “willpower”. They also manifest themselves by being chronically late, being blamed for being careless, all the while an inadequate memory had led him to forget, where he had put his keys when he came home last night. He side-tracks when talking, because his processing is not linear. His listening skill is poor, because his own thoughts interfere with his listening at hand. He is talking too much because his thinking frequencies fail to slow down enough to be on par with the person he is engaging with. This is the reason ADHD’ers often have an inadequate social life, because they do not read social cues well. They will fail to regulate their tiredness, and naturally calm down and fall asleep. This is because they have no time sense and instead push themselves until they literally go down.

The ADHD’er can be so engrossed with his activity that his system fails to regulate the need for him to go to the toilet. He has no “braking system” to allow for him to stop and plan, before he executes something not so wise, or say something that hurts other people. He fails to prioritize tasks because of his lack of time sense. He fails to organize, because the whole picture in his mind flows into one. And so on and so forth…

Unfortunately, many people do not believe in ADHD’s existence, which is quite understandable because all of the above impairments are of a character which are so basic for “normal people” that it leads people to think “just do it!” But, it is exactly here the curse is to be found.

It is absolutely imperative that people in general – especially parents to the children who are displaying the symptom do not deny ADHD’s existence. Unfortunately, in our society with strict rules and one size fits all mentality, it is difficult for the parents to admit that their child is having an “issue” and the fear of their child being rejected. It is about cultural barriers, it is about guilt and stigma that prevent them from addressing reality. If the child is not getting that diagnosis early enough, he/ she can develop a so called co-morbidity, it is a co-existing impairment as severe as anxiety, depression, or oppositional defiance. This is because they found themselves constantly being scrutinized and seen as inadequate. Often times when ADHD has not been addressed, many have found themselves developing health problems, difficulty managing money, inadequate work ethics, driving recklessly, parenting problems, and last but not least developing alcohol and drug abuse.

Parents, students, employees – go and get some help. Some people get help for their dyslexia, which absolutely has nothing to do with intelligence. Likewise here with ADHD, you have executive problems – difficulty in regulating your management system – why not then make use of the opportunities available to you. There are school student advisors, tutors, and coaches – make the choice, take ownership and deal with it.