Overdiagnosed, My Arse: A Rant
Today I woke up and broke a golden rule: Never read the Facebook comments.
There was recently a discussion on an Australian panel show, questioning whether ADHD is being overdiagnosed. A discussion, that quite frankly, is getting really, really old.
This tripe made it onto my Facebook news feed. I hadnât even had a coffee yet (or, ironically, my meds) and I was already choosing violence by clicking on the comments. They were as expected.
âThis is DANGEROUS!â
âItâs become so trendyâ
âIt wasnât like this when I was youngâ
And my personal favouriteâŚ
âRight? And it always seems to be women lolâ
Before we address why it âalways seems to be women lolââŚ
Letâs talk about whatâs actually dangerous.
Sure, a few influencers online might be casually self-diagnosing after confusing burnout or boredom with ADHD â but the real danger (besides the people spreading this nonsense and causing people to gaslight themselves) is in factâŚ
UNDERdiagnosis.
Letting people think theyâre just lazy, broken, inadequate, or not trying hard enough.
Letting them spiral â into any number of unhealthy coping mechanisms or comorbidities â before anyone even joins the dots.
Misdiagnosing them for decades (if anyone bothers to notice their struggles at all), and medicating them for the wrong thing while their lives slowly fall apart.
Another comment that was made:
If they had ADHD all this time, how have they always kept a job, or had families?
OOF.
Because we MASK.
Because CAPITALISM.
BECAUSE. WE. HAVE. TO.
Society doesnât care if your brainâs on fire and youâre crying in your car at the end of every single work day â it only cares if youâre showing up. So we do. We hustle. We push. We destroy ourselves trying to survive in systems that were never built for us. And sometimes we lose everything anyway.
We mightâve kept jobs. We mightâve raised families. Some of us have even â if you can believe it, pearl-clutchers â done further study or become scientists or teachers or leaders. THEN had our diagnosis confirmed.
But⌠at what cost?
Iâll tell you: Burnout. Low self-esteem. Meltdowns (in private, or internally). Depression. Chronic illness. Anxiety. Addiction. Disordered eating. Self-harm. Breakdown after breakdown. Years of expensive and ultimately pointless therapy without ever getting to the real issue. The list goes on.
Why it âalways seems to be womenâ
BECAUSE IT IS.
Because for decades, girls werenât diagnosed. Because we internalise instead of acting out, so externally weâre âfineâ. Because we people-please. Because weâre taught not to rock the boat.
Because ADHD presents differently in AFAB folks, and the research didnât catch up until recently.
And now weâre talking about it. Thatâs why. End of.
Diagnosis isnât easy
Letâs clear something up. People arenât just strolling into a clinic and walking out with meds. ADHD assessments are:
Expensive â often in the thousands and barely rebated, if at all
Prone to gatekeeping â especially if youâre an adult or AFAB or present in ways that donât match the textbook hyperactive Bart Simpson stereotype
Hard to access due to MONTHS-long waitlists to see a decent psychiatrist⌠or even a shit one
Often required to be done every two years to confirm itâs still present (a separate rant entirely), so that medication can continue being prescribed
Done by trained professionals who know the difference between forgetful and neurodivergent and will not throw a diagnosis out willy-nilly
NOT a matter of âtell a doctor I lose my keys sometimes and get a scriptâ
People arenât faking it. Theyâre figuring themselves out.
ADHD did not appear with TikTok
Social media isnât diagnosing anyone. Itâs giving people language to name what theyâve always felt. It gives us stories that actually reflect our lives. And for many of us, itâs the first time we are seeing ourselves clearly. The first time I saw myself reflected in a social media video, I sobbed.
Yeah, a few people might be jumping to conclusions based on a reel they saw. But for most of us? Itâs not a trend â itâs a god damn revelation.
Itâs prompting reflection. Itâs encouraging people to seek proper assessment and, more importantly, support and accommodations.
Gatekeeping diagnosis because âsome people might get it wrongâ only delays help for the people who need it most.
Diagnosis is often a grieving process
Let us go through this the way we need to. If we need to make reels about it, if we need to share our stories in some way, let us. Mute us if you have to, we donât care. Weâve just learned that everything we thought we knew â and probably hated â about ourselves, is literally because of the way our brains are built. And weâre okay the way we are. And weâre not alone. Weâve found validation, community, empathy. This is HUGE.
From the outside, to neurotypical people, it might look like weâve latched onto a label and weâre making it our âentire personalityâ. Thatâs not whatâs happening. We are learning about who we are for the first time. Weâre giving ourselves grace and learning to be okay with the traits that we were beaten up over for our whole lives.
And weâre grieving the person we might have been if weâd known earlier.
This is our time to heal. If it looks like weâre âsuddenly falling apart after functioning perfectly fine up until this pointâ itâs because we were REALLY good at masking, and now weâre in the painful and messy and liberating process of dropping the mask.
BOTTOM LINE: LET PEOPLE GET THE HELP THEY NEED
This idea that âtoo manyâ people are being diagnosed with ADHD is a distraction. The real issue is how many of us were missed. For years. For decades.
Let us catch up. Let us heal. Let us finally understand ourselves.
If this doesnât affect you, take a seat. Youâre giving âno one was gay back in my day, itâs just the fashionâ vibes. Itâs gross.
I have no doubt that someone out there saw this bullshit âstoryâ and decided against seeking a diagnosis because theyâre worried theyâre just âjumping on a trendâ, or worried about what people might think or say about them. Shoving everything back down. Iron-cladding the mask.
If youâre someone whoâs questioning whether you might be neurodivergent â please, please, please â keep questioning. You deserve to understand yourself. You deserve support. Donât let bad takes keep you from getting what you need.
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