Once again, one of our media is running a campaign against sensible medication that helps thousands of children and adults to improve their quality of life considerably. It is not unknown that there are professionals who are very skeptical of almost any type of medication for mental disorders. They regularly get into the media with scare stories about how medicines are “abused” as an easy solution, because other solutions, such as e.g. therapy, is far more expensive. news has had two chronicles recently, both of which more than suggest that society diagnoses and medicates students who don’t really need it. Perhaps I should say that I am a qualified special education teacher, that I have taught children diagnosed with ADHD (formerly known as MBD) for 40 years, and that I myself have a family member who has been diagnosed with ADHD. So I think I can say that I have quite a lot of expertise in this area. The first chronicle, written by BUP staff, contains information that there is a clear increase in referrals to PUB by pupils with suspected ADHD, and that this has particularly increased after the pandemic. It is of course relevant information that should lead to some reflection, but I react to the fact that these specialists go so far as to suggest that many students are diagnosed without having ADHD, and that parents can greatly exaggerate the problems in the hope of that their child will be diagnosed and medicated. The chronicle got a sequel by a school doctor, and it is primarily the one I react to. She claims that medicating a child for ADHD is the same as “labeling or limiting the child.” I am simply alarmed when so-called “professionals”, who mostly only see the student in their office, claim that the only reason why children are diagnosed with ADHD is that the school has too narrow a concept of normality. “The understanding of normality is greatly narrowed. Natural phases in a child’s life and development are problematized and made sick,” writes school doctor Svanhild Hansen. In my opinion, this is a completely baseless claim, which runs completely counter to what teachers in Norwegian schools experience in their classes. On the contrary, the concept of normality has been expanded to the extent that student behaviour, which a few decades ago the school would have considered totally unacceptable and a major problem both for the student himself, his fellow students and the teacher, is now considered to be completely within what we must accept. When a school doctor claims that the concept of normality is greatly narrowed in Norwegian schools, I dare say that it is a mockery of the efforts Norwegian teachers make to get students, who often completely lack impulse control, to function like that in a classroom situation. The biggest problem in Norwegian schools, as I experience it, is that very many children have not learned boundaries, have not learned respect and have been allowed to express themselves far too freely by genial parents who do not dare to raise their children. But of course children do not get ADHD of bad upbringing. “Normally” difficult and oppositional children can be managed through good methods and a safe and secure teacher, who gives them safe boundaries and gets them on board with his methods. The problem is that the authorities are increasingly depriving teachers of any tool at their disposal to discipline students who fail to behave. The authorities are trying to turn the school into a “service situation” where the teachers must be submissive service people, instead of what the teachers were in the past: qualified professionals with respect and authority. So the whole basis for this school doctor’s argumentation completely falls apart when you follow it and realize what the reality in Norwegian schools is. The concept of normality in school has NOT been narrowed, on the contrary, we have almost no concept of normality anymore: All behavior is considered normal and within, even if the student never sits still, curses and scolds the teacher, beats up fellow students and constantly “clicks”, which I remember the students called it when students exploded in rage and ran around with a pair of scissors or a knife in hand and threatened children and adults. What Svanhild Hansen and many psychologists and doctors do not realize is that a good number of students have an innately difficult mind, with so many disturbing and problematic emotions that their psyche becomes completely out of balance, and occasionally explodes in despair and anger. I have seen a large number of students with ADHD who, because of their inability to control their impulses, become a terrible nuisance to their families and their teachers. And when a school doctor claims that this is because they are not allowed to express themselves freely enough, I am both disappointed, frightened and horrified. Should parents who experience a child’s uncontrolled rages, throwing food and plates, destroying doors and walls and physical attacks on the parents, also have to hear that it is their own fault, because they are trying to raise their children? I have seen for myself what a huge improvement in quality of life many of these children and their families and classmates get when they are given medication. From being violent, full of anxiety, ostracized and despairing, many find that they are able to control their temper, manage to concentrate, make friends and are included among the other children. This is as far from “labeling and limiting the child” as you can get. Fortunately, there are also serious professionals who understand that giving pupils with major behavioral problems an ADHD diagnosis and medication is not limiting them at all, but helping them to a better quality of life. If anyone thinks I’m an old, tired and grumpy teacher, I’m certainly not. I have always enjoyed my job, liked the students and had the best relationship with my classes. FOLLOW THE DEBATE:
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Naive professionals – Speech
