Rodent Regatta

This morning’s mention of John Rosemond’s article brings another quote to mind:

Too many American children today are reaching full size during toddlerhood, the result of child-centered families, enabling parents, a lack of persuasive discipline and an emphasis on the child’s feelings rather than his or her behavior. This is not ADHD, but TIP, Toddlerhood in Perpetuity.

To avoid losing this article as archive links expire, I’m quoting the whole thing here:

Posted on
Tue, May. 20, 2003
The Tallahassee Democrat

John Rosemond: ADHD is price we pay for bad parenting

A fellow recently approached me at a speaking engagement and asked if it was true, as he had heard, that I ”don’t believe” in ADHD.

My reply: I absolutely believe that a significant percentage of children in America exhibit the symptoms of attention-deficit (hyperactivity) disorder. Are these behaviors problematic? Yes. Are these behaviors caused by a gene or biological condition? I don’t believe that they are, nor have I seen proof of that hypothesis.

”So you think ADHD is caused by improper parenting?”

Yes, but I’m not blaming individual parents. Just as a culture can embrace a dysfunctional political system, a culture can embrace a dysfunctional parenting philosophy. America did exactly that in the 1960s and ’70s. You can’t be blamed for thinking that the way 98 percent of your neighbors are raising their kids is the right way to raise kids.”

I am convinced – and I am definitely in the minority, but I am not alone – that ADHD is one of many prices we are paying for adopting, 30 to 40 years ago, a ”psychological” approach to child rearing, an approach that has absolutely nothing in common with the child rearing practiced before that time.

The simple fact is that you cannot raise children two entirely different ways and arrive at the same outcome. In the 1950s and before, parents and teachers did not have the sorts of problems with children that parents and teachers are having today.

Although some researchers are convinced that a biological smoking gun will eventually be found, the fact remains that one has not been found; its existence is speculative.

Pediatrician and author William Carey, who wrote ”Understanding Your Child’s Temperament” in 1997, says, ”The assumption that ADHD symptoms arise from cerebral malfunction has not been supported even after extensive investigations” and ”No consistent structural, functional or chemical neurological marker is found in children with the ADHD diagnosis as currently formulated.” Carey is one of many investigators who have arrived at this conclusion.

”So, what do you think causes ADHD, John?”

The symptoms describe a child who is impulsive, unfocused, unwilling to apply himself to a task, inattentive, distractible, cannot wait his/her turn, and intrusive. That describes a typical toddler, a ”terrible two.”

The fact is, nearly every toddler ”has” attention-deficit (hyperactivity) disorder. Furthermore, and again according to published diagnostic criteria, nearly every toddler ”has” oppositional defiant disorder and bipolar disorder of childhood.

The typical toddler is unfocused, inattentive and impulsive – attention-deficit (hyperactivity) disorder. He screams ”no!” when his parents tell him to pick up a toy (oppositional defiant disorder) or stop throwing his food. He flies into rages during which he hits, then bites and screams like someone possessed of demons (bipolar disorder of childhood).

Can you imagine the carnage that would transpire if, as is the case in the animal kingdom, human children reached full size within 2 years? Battered parent syndrome is not a pretty picture.

The pertinent question: Do the child’s parents, with a combination of powerful love and powerful discipline (not harsh, mind you, but full of power), ”cure” this anti-social state before the child’s third birthday? Do they turn him into a pro-social human being? Or do they – out of ignorance, fear, or downright laziness – fail to properly discharge their responsibility to the child and the rest of us?

Too many American children today are reaching full size during toddlerhood, the result of child-centered families, enabling parents, a lack of persuasive discipline and an emphasis on the child’s feelings rather than his or her behavior. This is not ADHD, but TIP, Toddlerhood in Perpetuity. And indeed, it is carnage.

John Rosemond is a family psychologist. Questions of general interest can be sent to him at Affirmative Parenting, 9247 N. Meridian, Indianapolis, IN 46260
and to his Web site: www.rosemond.com.