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I've been recently hearing and reading that it's just a made up disorder for pharmaceutical companies to milk money. I was talking with this guy at the Bus stop earlier today about it and he said to me. "ADHD and all that other crap is fantasy, pal. Move on." I don't know what to think. Does that mean all mental conditions are fake and made up? I've been vigorously watching and reading debates on the topic all day long.

((And I'm new, so if there is another topic on this, feel free to guide me there.))

New: STOP POSTING, I GET IT. JUST LET IT DIE.

Welcome to the forums.

To answer the question: Take the same question and replace the noun with some other medical condition. For example:

I'd say-
not made up at all, but not very well defnied, which makes it easy for the companies to encourage overdiagnosis and milk money.
but many of us (myself included) defnitely have very real mental conditions.

Thanks for the input guys! I need to research this much more.

Lots of times the people that say add is made up say that aspergers is just a name for people that are ssocially awkward.

Aw s**t, not another one of these topics... Welcome to WP, OP. Is ADHD real? It's as real as the air we breathe, as sleeping and waking. Whoever told you about ADHD at the bus stop needs to get their facts straight, because they're wrong, they're misinformed and/or uninformed. If they suffered with it maybe they wouldn't have said what they did.

The real question is, is it really a disorder or is it merely a natural evolutionary variation in a persons biological/neurological make up and/or a personality difference.

Society does like to label anything that does not conform to it's norms and expectations as a disorder. Is it really a disorder or is it more of a difference to the norm...

I am sure the medications make them more normal, (whatever that is so) that they can quietly go away and conform to societal expectations of what a human being is supposed to be. If social humiliation or ostracising someone does not work in regards to making them just like everybody else in the culture they live in they are drugged up and brain washed by a therapist until they behave like good little boys and girls and do exactly as society dictates they should.

If not they are branded as mentally disturbed, stigmatised, discriminated against and generally seen as defective.

Poor souls.

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As you can tell I have a lot of respect for the psychology profession etc. <<<<<sarcasm.

Of course there are disorders that really are maladaptive evolutionary variations, but not as many as the psychology profession likes to list and provide medication for.

Is ADHD made up in the sense that the chap at the bus stop meant it, no, but I still think it may be more of a difference than an illness. It is just a difference that does not conform to societies expectations and society really does not like that!

I have it (in addition to AS), my husband has it, all 3 of my kids have it. It is real. It does respond to medications in most cases (thankfully, including mine). While I think the meds are overpriced, I do not believe it is just made up. I think the drug companies are gouging.

And no, I really don't think it's "just a difference". I function so much better with medication.

~Kate

Coffee is one of my favorite things.
But adderall is the only thing that allows me to keep somewhat organized. I feel like a zombie when I'm not on it.

Modern lifestyles are actually a fairly unnatural way for a human to live. Living in such an unnatural way does create problems with functioning because, in many ways, societal and cultural norms and behaviours go against our own genetic and biological wiring.

Diet is one example. The foods that we eat now are vastly different from those we evolved to eat. Grains were not a major part of our ancestors diet and neither was tooth decay (apparently)...that's a modern problem brought about by a high carbohydrate diet which we have only been consuming for the last 10 thousand years or so. For hundreds of thousands of years before that our diet was very different. According to isotope studies done on bones from palaeolithic fossilised remains our ancestors also consumed larger amounts of many micro-nutrients than we do and, in some ways, they were stronger, faster and healthier than we are. They also had much better teeth..they were worn down from eating abrasive foods, but they were not rotten even though they had no dentists or toothpaste!

Another is the way we are all crammed up into cities, exposed to modern day forms of stress that just did not exist when our species was evolving. The fight or flight system we genetically inherited was not designed for the lifestyles we lead and basically cannot cope as it has not yet adapted. So mental health problems are on the rise as a result.

Human cities have been likened to Human zoos. In a regular zoo, animals in captivity will start to suffer from something called stereotypy, where they adopt repetitive pointless behaviours in order to cope with the stress of captivity. Humans can do the same, only in our culture they are branded as mental illnesses and medicated.

How many disorders really are disorders given that our lifestyles have become so unnatural and would they still be disorders if we still lived the primitive lifestyles we are genetically adapted to live?

How much of a part has the creation of society played in the creation of mental illnesses and how many really are natural maladaptive variations in the process of evolution?

I refuse to take meds for add

I agree about the part about modern cities being like zoos. There are many different breeds of people living in the urban jungle that I live in. My apartment is my refuge from all that madness. People aren't meant to live in such environments.