Tuesday, 13 October 2009
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If It Isn't Broken, Don't Diagnose It
On occasion, I am approached by a curious observer or another mom on a school campus and many times the conversation centers around autism. Sometimes the discussion turns into a declaration of “I think my child might be on the spectrum” or “I’m pretty sure my husband is autistic.” I then find myself asking, what are the symptoms and what I usually hear is a description of an extremely high functioning individual with mild behavioral issues. "He doesn’t sleep through the night, he doesn’t listen, he hits his sister, he can’t sit still..." Well, they used to call that the terrible twos, which sometimes unfortunately spills over into the threes. Seriously though, should we be calling it autism?
I don’t get it. We clearly knew before Danny’s diagnosis that he was in fact autistic. No speech, no interaction (adult or peer), no appropriate play skills, preoccupation with parts of objects, hand flapping, toe walking, head banging, sound sensitivity, food sensitivity... need I go on? It took less than five minutes before the diagnosis came down from the clinician in charge at our local regional center. There was no ambivalence, no “searching for answers,” it was clear and unfortunately it was fact. If Daniel had speech skills, parallel or interactive play skills and/or ate more than one food without throwing up, I wouldn’t have even considered that there was anything wrong.
So what causes a parent or anyone for that matter to suspect autism - or any disorder - outside of an obvious issue clearly defined? Is it a relative that knows someone who knows another someone with an autistic child or is it the online quiz that concluded, “Your child does seem to have some of the signs and symptoms that should prompt and evaluation for autism or other communication disorder.”
Aside from the increase in autism over the last ten years, there seems to be an increase in the seeking out of diagnosis of some kind for everyone with anything that may appear out of the “normal” range of behavior within a peer group. This stuff even had me briefly entertaining the idea that my 54 year old brother was autistic because he walked with an unusual gate and maybe I’m autistic because I don’t really want to hang out at Starbucks with a bunch of other stay-at-home moms. But really, why go there? Or in other words, if it ain’t broke- don’t diagnose it!
Have you ever heard of someone trying to diagnose themselves, even if something isn't wrong? Have you ever caught yourself doing this?
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About the Author
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- From: P1AutismMom@autisable
- Name: Nancy
- About Me: I am busy raising my 2 boys, Brian 16 and Daniel 14 who has autism. My hope in life is to make at least 2 people smile every day and if I'm feeling really ambitious I'll try to make them laugh :) You can follow me on twitter http://twitter.com/P1AutismMom
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Comments (14)
I agree 100000000% with this post. I am sick of people self-diagnosing themselves with diseases they don't have! Unless it is obvious or you're experiencing true "signs" that you may want to bring up with your doctor, then you shouldn't say you're autistic or depressed or blah blah blah.
Our psychology teacher made this disclaimer at the beginning of class: Just because you may feel like you have some of the symptoms of these disorders does not necessarily mean you do. It takes a trained professional to diagnose disorders correctly, so if you are wondering go see one.
With so much information available nowadays, it's easy to simply Google "headache" and come up with "brain tumor". Take everything with a grain of salt and use reasoning instead of thinking with your emotions.
Definitely agree! :) We all have problems, and we all have our oddities, but that doesn't mean we're all crazy...I hope. :P
Patients seeing drug advertising + feeling entitled to direct/demand diagnoses and treatments instead of letting doctors do their jobs + (mis)information on the interwebz + glorification of medical ailments = widespread medical student syndrome.
... and it equals billions of wasted dollars each year in the United States.
@shes_lump@xanga - @ironic_vertigo@xanga - @Lil_Firefly_25@xanga - @methodElevated@xanga - I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who feels this way. Eleven years ago when my son was diagnosed, my father and my sister-in-law passed away within 6 weeks. I was grieving and a doctor tried to shove antidepressants down my throat. I told him. Dude, I'm mourning the profound losses I've experienced in these past few weeks. I should be allowed to grieve without labeling it as "depression" so you can put your prescription pad back in your white coat.
i definitely agree, people seem to have so many more problems these days it is ridiculous.
Autism has taken over what ADD/ADHD used to be. The lines between the two blurred when someone could be "slightly autistic". There is almost no difference between a "slightly autistic" and someone with ADD/ADHD. That's part of the reason why if someone has ADD/ADHD tenticies they are more likely to say they are 'slightly autistic". Autisium has become the number 1 systom nowadays that's why people say it.
Also if someone knows the systoms of a disease. Why pay hunderds of dollars to get "diagnosed" if you don't want medication? I know I proabably have depression but i'm not gonna go to a doctor just so I can have a piece of paper saying I am. That's proablably another reason why people do it.
@P1AutismMom@autisable - I agree and wow, that's just messed up. o__o
Sadly, I think lots of people want attention, or worse (and I know a mother like this) wants something to blame her child's behavior on, rather than the fact that the kid is a "brat" and/or they are a bad parent who can't/won't make the kid mind.
In the case of the woman I know, it's that her child is bratty but she does NOTHING about the behavior, which leaves me and others with the impression that she is a bad and lazy mom who can't make her kid mind, so she want a "answer" for him to be bratty when the answer is her.
Lots of people fall into the trendy disorder category, where for whatever reason, they WANT to be able to say me/my child/husband/someone I know has that.
@Bluekiller2025@xanga - That is exactly what I think, and know I woman with kids that range from about 18 to 6 and she thought the older ones all had ADD/ADHD and not then the youngest was possibly Autistic.
@prettyboy78@xanga - I actually know a special ed teacher that has managed to get one child labeled PDD-NOS yet she tells everyone he's autistic. He has been on anti-psych meds since before he turned 3. That is criminal in my view. Now she wants to get her 5 year old diagnosed with something and she talks about it constantly. Her kids are as normal as most kids that age. She loves the attention she gets when she laments over a sleepless night. It really makes me crazy especially when she complains to a mom who's child just spent the day in her class, strapped to a chair so he would not hurt himself during a long procession of seizures. Finally one mom called her out on it and said "I wish my kid was suffering as much as your kid" It kept her quiet for about a day.
@Bluekiller2025@xanga - It's Just a Big Mess and someone needs to step in and say enough is enough. Autism has become the catch all diagnosis. There is a definition and a diagnostic criteria if clinicians would care to use it. Some do but Sadly A Lot of Them Don't
@nerdishh8D@xanga - Messed up is just the tip of this big, looming iceberg. We expect these toddlers, Kindergarteners, lst graders, etc to be productive citizens when we're altering their brains so profoundly with medication.
@zoedark@xanga - I think just as the old saying goes "Idle hands are the devil's playthings" maybe idle minds are psychiatrists' playthings.
My mom is an elementary school counselor and she has seen many many parents doing this with their children. Especially along the lines of ADD or ADHD. It's sad though because schools don't take it as seriously when something really is going wrong. I know their was a little girl they had that's mom asked for her to be tested for a learning disability, because she wouldn't interact with her peers and was disorganized a lot and often acted sad. But of course the tests came back negative and the school wrote her mom off as "one of those parents", but years down the line they found out the little girl was being sexually abused through much of her elementary years and later committed suicide and left it in the note.
The other thing is though that Autism is so difficult to diagnose. I mean there's so many different functioniny levels. You can go from very low functioning to like aspergers. I guess it's a very misunderstood thing in general. If I were you I would just be like "I don't know" I mean without seeing the child you would have no idea. Asperger children/adults seem completely normal to the naked eye. Unless you've dealt with autism before and you've spent time with the person in question. My step dads brother spent 55 years of his life living with his mom, and cleaning hospitals, but he could you tell everything about astronomy you want to know. Walks and talks like a normal person, aside from some social flaws. But a decade ago finally got diagnosed with aspergers.
yup. hypochondria much.