Reply To: Caste System for ADHD

[Wgreen]

I’m not sure a caste system is an appropriate metaphor. As some people have already noted, everybody has certain talents and certain challenges, “neurotypicals” included. If you’re not good at science, there’s little chance you’ll make it as an astronaut or doctor. If you’re not athletic or tall, it’s probably a waste of your time to try to make it as a professional basketball player. We are all limited in one way or another in that each of us—ADD or not—inevitably will lack some talents and attributes others have.

Forum members have sharp differences of opinion over the “gifts” of being ADD. But that’s not really the issue here. If we’re honest with ourselves, most of us have some notion of where our own strengths and weaknesses lie. It makes sense that we should try to leverage the former and avoid or mitigate the latter. That’s not relegating ourselves to a caste system, it’s simply employing a strategy to stack the deck in our favor. After all, it’s competitive out there. If others try to pigeonhole us, well, there’s nothing we can do about that—just know that ADDers aren’t alone in that regard. The tendency to pigeonhole is part of human nature. One day you’ll probably be discriminated against because of your age. Trust me, I know.

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