Welcome to My World

I’m pretty sure the malady we call “Attention Deficit Disorder” (ADD) is not what mainstream medicine believes it to be. Because medical science currently has distinct channels in which it is forced to operate, a great deal of useful data is excluded. In our pursuit of purely objective knowledge, a whole range of included symptoms are ignored. Those ignored symptoms may be quite useful in understanding how to treat it.

ADD is recognized as a learning disability. Government bureaucracy demands certain accommodations be made for folks with disabilities. That is as it should be, in principle, but the implementation and execution are inevitably more bad than good. The harsh chemicals prescribed for ADD/ADHD kids in school are designed to accommodate the teacher, not the needs of the students. This keeps anyone from having to worry about actually meeting the ADD children where they are, and understanding their world. It excuses not investigating further, and allows for roping in thousands of students who are not at all suffering ADD, and putting them on drugs. A class of spacey and calm kids are easier than sharp-minded learners who see what the teacher doesn’t see.

ADD is less a disability than a difference in perception. At the loss of some “normal” abilities, the ADD person gains a great deal of other abilities. Truly, the euphemism “differently abled” applies here. We know ADD kids can concentrate fiercely when something has their interest, and get more done with it, as long as they are not interrupted. There’s no deficit of attention, but simply a different use of it. On the other hand, when there isn’t something drawing that rapt attention, they see all kinds of things most people miss. Their brain is sucking in all the details around them, and they can’t shut it out. The overload makes then naturally a little wonky.

It’s socially embarrassing when you enter a room and can’t ignore that small item hidden behind the photo of Mom standing on the shelf, or the variation in the tile color due to traffic and sun exposure. You can’t help noticing your host’s ears aren’t placed vertically even from each other, and there is a really odd smell in one corner. Uninhibited children talk about these things. Most folks in polite society take offense and the kid has to be disciplined in such a way as to shut them up. Do that often enough and they withdraw into a fantasy world.

Should it be the kid is pretty intelligent, too, that fantasy world would make a great setting for best-selling fiction. Seeing the world through different eyes means creativity most people can’t match. The first question ADD minds tend to ask is, “Why not?” Because they get the wrong sort of discipline most of the time, that creativity leads to dangerous behavior. The perception of risk is completely different, with oddball neurotic fears mixed into completely fearless charging off into danger. Since conventional fears are mostly wrong anyway, this difference is fertile ground for conflict. So many ADD kids are pretty sharp, and too much ill-considered conflict will make them contemptuous of you in the long run. The most galling thing is when they prove you wrong. It only takes a 20% success rate against you for them to decide you are simply being hateful. Cultivate their creativity by helping to guide them through questioning and you’ll have one of the most loyal friends for life.

An odd and frightening feature of ADD ignored by medical science is a mechanism which leads to depression and psychosis. Recall this is an alternate path for learning, for gaining and processing information. Many ADD folks figure this out instinctively, and become introspective as they seek to keep track of what happens to information. Most people are far less introspective, and tend to assume what they experience is the norm without question. Tell them something which requires them to act, and they will process the required action. They may forget, but the programmed sequence of required behavior is still there. Thus, without much thinking, they realize they forgot.

With an ADD person, the input can get lost at several points. Because they are wired for creativity instead of conventionality, they are used to making it up as they go. Tell them something they’ll need to act upon later, and the programming itself can simply disappear. Instead, they’ll proceed as if they never got the input. When they fail to carry through, they’ll be quite certain they never got the original message. When you confront them with facts to prove otherwise, it feels to them they’ve stepped into the Twilight Zone. Making fun of them will drive them inward, making fertile ground for depression. Attempt a hostile discipline for that failure, and you are in very dangerous territory. Not only do you risk a very creative response in kind, perhaps setting up an even harsher discipline, but it serves to push them too near, if not over, the edge of sanity.

They won’t necessarily become suicidal, but may become altogether sociopathic. There is a very high likelihood of substance abuse. However, an awful lot of bad habits can emulate the relief of substance abuse, which is simply a way of avoiding the reality most of humanity knows. Since ADD people often have already some questions about reality, they are never far from such flight. Indeed, they may be just fine and simply appear nuts because they question everyone else’s interpretation of things from the start. Any attempt at forcing them to conform too strictly to “the norm” feels like hatred to them, and may generate a response in kind.

God did not create us to be uniform. When He colors outside the lines of our expectations, we find ourselves in sin by previous choices. When we don’t allow Him to introduce oddball folks into our world, we reject His provision for us to know Him better. We certainly can’t trust the fallen world of human minds to provide all the answers. Afflicted by ADD, I am the first to reject conventional things. Having weathered the storms of rejection from this world, I found safety in God’s grace and mercy. Without that, I’d have been dead long ago, for reasons explained above. His grace makes it possible for me to welcome into my world all the misfits, along with all those poor “normal” folks who just don’t understand. God made room for me in His Kingdom, so I’ve got room for you, whatever you may be.