Eyes Wide Open

ADHD is a condition I grew up hearing about so often that I initially thought it wasn’t a big deal. My sister has it, my best friend has it, and it seemed like nearly every kid in my classes did too. I remember my sister saying, after starting medication, that she just couldn’t sit still. As a kindergartener, I thought I understood—who wouldn’t want to run on the playground or play with Barbies instead of listening to a teacher talk about counting? But it wasn’t until later in school that I started to understand what she was saying. 

People often misdiagnose themselves with ADHD. It’s one of those terms that are thrown around inappropriately, but no one knows it’s wrong because there are misconceptions and stereotypes surrounding it. It’s similar to when someone says “I’m so OCD” when they simply just love cleaning and organizing because it’s satisfying to them. Similarly, the term “ADHD brain” has become a part of GEN Z vernacular. It’s often used to describe procrastination, being hyper, or even just not wanting to do something. But, honestly, it’s hard to tell who’s misled from who is genuinely affected by ADHD. 

As I mentioned, so many people my age were diagnosed with ADHD and most are taking medication for it. With even more people getting diagnosed as we get older, I wonder if screens and social media are a possible cause of this. I’ve learned from the book Stolen Focus by Johann Hari that attention spans have greatly decreased due to overstimulation that’s caused by constant stimuli on our screens. While I’m aware that this is an oversimplification, I wonder how or if the constant state of stimulation has affected my generation’s susceptibility to having ADHD. 

This growing rate of attention deficit in younger generations has had a great impact on the stereotype that comes with ADHD. I actually think that the more it is diagnosed, the more gray area there is surrounding what it truly means to have ADHD. Our experiences with any diagnosis are vastly different, let alone one that affects so many people. Once again, the causes of problems might be pointing right to the phones that are glued to our souls. I hope that with each day, we can distance ourselves from screens, reground our minds, and maybe find a way out of the never-ending attention deficit.