Comment on How do I get myself to actually do thing?
zkfcfbzr@lemmy.world 2 weeks agoBiting back: I didn’t diagnose someone over the internet, I offered it as a potential explanation to look into for the issue they described based on my own personal experiences.
I would also push back on that something is only considered a condition if it affects a them socially - on both fronts, actually. Some conditions can heavily affect a person socially, while simultaneously being something they find completely fine, and don’t want to change or alter about themselves at all (eg, autism), while other conditions can affect a person in ways that are essentially entirely nonsocial, but which still cause them so much distress that they still feel deeply compelled to address it (eg, ADHD effectively rendering them incapable of working, or of performing even basic life maintenance tasks, even when they have high motivation to do so). What makes the difference is how it affects that person specifically - whether the effects they experience on their life, social or otherwise, are distressing enough to them that they feel the need to seek some sort of help. I would make a wild guess that ADHD in particular is a condition a lot of people have to some extent, but simply choose not to address, because they don’t find its symptoms distressing enough to care.
Regarding the other point, about the paradox of integrating our neat and domestic human lives, which increasingly demand unmessy robotic perfection while imposing artificial goals and structures on us, with our animal side, which often includes messy and irrational bits that can react poorly to such structured or cookie-cutter environments, or at least mesh poorly with them, in ways that can then get labeled as DSM-5-recognized “conditions”? I think to an extent this also comes down to a personal decision on the part of the person in question, too.
For some, the clash between their messy animalistic side and the reality of their life as a human living in a structured society with rules, may be so complete that they have little choice other than to treat it as a condition to be addressed. It’s one thing to say that someone with ADHD is fine as they are, and don’t need to medicate away something about themselves that’s only really an issue because of the demands society puts on them. It’s another thing entirely when it turns out that condition renders them incapable of working, and it turns out things like food cost money.
But for others, that clash may be a lot less severe, and entirely manageable. Maybe OP really does have ADHD, and maybe it really does just affect their ability to start new unstructured hobbies, and they manage to integrate and survive reasonably well in society otherwise? In a case like that they could very reasonably simply choose to consider it a non-issue, and never seek to address it. Or they could. It would be their call either way. OP’s issue may not be impacting their life enough that it constitutes a fundamental incompatibility with modern society-based human lives in general, but it’s at the very least impacting their life enough to be personally distressing to them, or they wouldn’t have posted about it. If it does turn out those issues are caused by a treatable condition like ADHD, I think they’d be entirely within their rights to seek treatment on that basis alone, even if they’re already well-integrated without treatment.
Lastly, I would also argue back against your very first point - that the issue OP described is essentially something everyone has, and so isn’t a real problem that needs to be addressed. While everyone does have things they’d like to do but simply don’t do, due to lack of time, resources, motivation, or ability, we don’t really have enough information here to say if this describes OP or not. ADHD isn’t just something we call it when someone’s desires for themselves outpace their situational ability to implement those desires. It’s not really a vague or ambiguous diagnosis at all. It represents an actual difference in brain function and brain chemistry that can make things like just starting a new hobby you’re excited about, or cooking a meal, or starting work, feel impossible. In limited circumstances, it may be possible to know all of this and “transcend” it, as you said, some of the time - but in people who actually have ADHD, that’s never going to be a viable long-term solution. Going back to the previous parts of what we discussed, the conflict is in their nature itself - and in a battle of pure will vs. intrinsic nature, intrinsic nature is going to win 99% of the time, no matter how transcendental you think you are. You can’t out-will your way out of a condition that handicaps your will. But you can treat it.
kinship@lemmy.sdf.org 2 weeks ago
Thanks for the reply, very interesting points. I still don’t see how you got the idea OP has ADHD from what they wrote and still think (know?) that it will not be a condition unless it hinders them to function based on the DSM. “A mental disorder is a syndrome characterized by clinically significant disturbance in an individual’s cognition, emotion regulation, or behavior…” “Mental disorders are usually associated with significant distress or disability in social, occupational, or other important activities.” “Socially deviant behavior … and conflicts that are primarily between the individual and society are not mental disorders unless the deviance or conflict results from a dysfunction in the individual.”
We all have some traits but unless diagnosed we don’t have the condition. In my work life I see so many characteristics that are destructive in nature but viewed as normal because of culture. A lot of people still makes remarks about other women or men even if married, stop studying because they are “adults”, don’t invest money, eat like shit, don’t exercise, doomscroll tiktok and Instagram, consume way too much, etc, etc. In fact they are exactly what society wants them to be. This people perpetuate the endless cycle of the so called “progress” and are rewarded for it. OP is already ahead of the curve dreaming of escaping onto his ideal world. If you are different from that, or try to be since it is very hard you will get tribalism in return and be labeled as having a condition. If society was made from the majority of people having a condition like ADHD (it could even be a self sufficient social group within a town) it wouldn’t even be considered anything, just being normal.
zkfcfbzr@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
ADHD came to my mind because OP’s description of their problem resonated with the problems I faced when I eventually realized I had ADHD. The context and severity were quite different, but the general concept of what OP is describing is essentially the same. I don’t necessarily think and definitely don’t know that OP has ADHD, but they’re looking for advice, so I gave them a potential avenue to explore toward that end. I believe my original response was sufficiently clear and responsibly phrased on that point.
And I get that you’re going for a technical definition of the word ‘condition’ (which I believe is itself a word not technically defined by the DSM, but you seem to have considered my use of the term as equivalent to the DSM’s use of the term ‘mental disorder’, which I agree is fair) there, and I kind of brought that on myself by referencing the DSM in my own reply, but to be clear: I was absolutely using it in a casual, non-technical sense. I am not a psychiatrist in any sense, I have not read the DSM. Toward that end, you’re probably correct that many of the hypothetical people I referred to in my previous reply, who have a condition that is not so severe that it significantly impacts their ability to function adequately, do not have that “condition” in the strict technical DSM-5 sense of the word. Based on your reply I think you’d agree with me that something like ADHD is a spectrum, even if it’s not described as such by the DSM - and that many people are on that spectrum without reaching the threshold required to justify a diagnosis or constitute a disability. The DSM’s own definition of a mental disorder that you quoted supports this interpretation too: its use of the extremely subjective criteria that a symptom is “clinically significant” essentially acknowledges that a huge number of people may show the symptoms of certain disorders, but that a diagnosis should only be made if a clinician thinks the impacts are significant.
But, I would still disagree with the notion that you don’t have the condition unless you’ve been diagnosed with the condition. I can agree with your general point that per the DSM, the presence of symptoms itself isn’t enough for diagnosis - that those symptoms need to actively have a significant negative impact on your ability to function. I’d also agree that something like ADHD is itself a spectrum, and that most people at the lower end of that spectrum, which may or may not include most people in general, do not have actual ADHD, both as it is generally meant and technically defined. But someone can absolutely have something like ADHD, with symptoms that actively and severely affect their ability to function, without having been diagnosed with it. Not in a legal sense, obviously - but law doesn’t dictate neurology.
I was only recently diagnosed with ADHD myself, but it’s definitely been something I’ve had without realizing it for essentially my entire life. ADHD is paradoxically both over- and under-diagnosed. The type of ADHD that presents with symptoms similar to what OP described is precisely the type that usually goes under-diagnosed.
With regard to your last paragraph, I get and to an extent agree with the general point you’re making, that there’s a huge range of extremely common and socially accepted behaviors that are seen as normal and not considered mental disorders, even though they’re actively harmful to both the individual and to society as a whole, just because they’re so common as to be near-universal - and also that society is actively set up, at least at present, to encourage many of these behaviors. I don’t think we have enough information about OP from just this post to say whether or not their stated desire to engage in hobbies is an indication of them being ahead of the curve in this regard, but it’s kind to assume they are. I do think there’s something to be said here, for sure - but I feel like it’s also tangential to the main topic and I don’t want to lose my focus here, plus it doesn’t seem to be something we disagree on anyways. I think you could make a very compelling argument that societies themselves, the actual systems rather than the individuals, can have illnesses of a sort.
I would also agree that in a hypothetical world where the majority of people had a neurology that matched what constitutes a diagnosis of ADHD in our world today, that the concept of ADHD itself would not likely exist at all. But I also feel like that’s not too interesting of a point - it’s called “neurodivergence” because it’s a divergence from the typical neurology. The difficulty comes from the fact that you’re different, not necessarily from the differences themselves. If everyone had a neurology typical of ADHD, or of autism, then society would be organized in a vastly different way, such that the traits associated with these divergent neurologies would be what’s already expected and supported. In an autistic-majority world someone considered neurotypical here may be considered to have severe social disabilities. In an ADHD-majority world someone considered neurotypical here would probably just seem like an unusually motivated person.
Sorry about the length. I appreciate that you seem to be engaging in complete good faith.