As one who\u2019s always been keen on putting their hand up and admitting to their faults (a perverse form of boasting, I suspect) I was\u00a0always\u00a0suspicious of the\u00a0medicalisation\u00a0of character flaws which apparently\u00a0render\u00a0us helpless in the clammy hands of Fortuna. It was bad enough when friends who\u2019d\u00a0generally\u00a0always\u00a0seemed highly capable jumped on the ADHD bus in later life, suddenly flinching at loud noises when they\u2019d spent a good deal of their lives dancing to ear-splitting techno. But it was another sort of annoying when ex-friends who were merely awful people started blaming all their past ghastliness first on ADHD and then \u2013 still not feeling\u00a0special\u00a0enough \u2013\u00a0on autism, a serious condition which affects a tiny amount of people.\u202f\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
But if you want to create\u00a0\u2018conditions\u2019\u00a0where previously there were simply personalities, fill your boots; everyone\u00a0benefits\u00a0from having a hobby. Where I draw the line is when they\u00a0attempt\u00a0to drag me on to the bus with them. No, I am not\u00a0a\u00a0\u2018narcissist\u2019\u00a0who is\u00a0\u2018on the spectrum\u2019\u00a0\u2013\u00a0I\u2019m\u00a0simply a self-adoring show-off with a tendency to fidget.\u00a0\u2018We\u2019ll relax and take our time!\u2019\u00a0I invariably tell my restaurant companion, and if they know me\u00a0well,\u00a0they smile sceptically.\u00a0I\u2019m\u00a0already catching the waiter\u2019s eye and planning the next watering hole. But I\u00a0don\u2019t\u00a0have Attention Deficit Syndrome \u2013\u00a0I\u2019m\u00a0just greedy\u00a0for\u00a0the next thing.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
So\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0a real relief to have psychologists come\u00a0out and\u00a0call a halt to\u00a0this\u00a0new dance\u00a0craze. In the\u00a0Times\u00a0this week,\u00a0Charlotte Alt writes<\/a>: \u2018Therapy-speak, which is the casual use of psychological jargon, has made its way into everyday conversation and is thrown around in millions of videos on social media purporting to explain how to spot if someone is \u201ctoxic\u201d or if something is \u201ctriggering\u201d\u2019.\u00a0Experts warn that casual use of terms which have specific meanings in clinical contexts risk diluting their significance and\u00a0\u2018over-pathologising\u2019\u00a0everyday human emotions\u2019.\u00a0Or, as\u00a0the clinical psychologist Marianne Trent put\u00a0it:\u00a0\u2018One\u00a0of the trickier aspects of being a human is to feel awful, but it\u00a0doesn\u2019t\u00a0mean\u00a0that every uncomfortable feeling we have is a mental health condition. In the same\u00a0way, not every difficult person has\u00a0a personality disorder.\u2019\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n When I was young, people got drunk because they enjoyed it. When I was a young adult, people caught on that they could wriggle out of responsibility for things they enjoyed but which were taking over their lives (such as drinking) by blaming their mothers. Now, like the writer\u00a0Caitlin Moran<\/a>,\u00a0you\u2019re\u00a0probably a\u00a0binge-drinker because, like her, you have ADHD. Am I very\u00a0bad\u00a0for\u00a0wishing that people still got drunk for no reason more complex because they enjoyed it? Life was so simple then. Some people were straight; some were eccentric. But unless you were actually hearing voices, your mental health was not an excuse to be a bore \u2013 or a\u00a0boor.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n It\u2019s\u00a0not just me.\u00a0The similarly\u00a0jaded journalist Katie Glass recounts:\u00a0\u2018People turning up late\/forgetting plans\/not answering texts \u2013 and blaming their \u201cneurodiverse brains\u201d.\u2019\u00a0One\u00a0friend\u2019s\u00a0ex claims to\u00a0have\u202f \u2018Oppositional Defiant Disorder\u2019 which means he gets angry if she asks him to\u00a0do\u00a0anything with their children. Another one has a funny line about dating self-diagnosing men in which mental health is the new \u2018It\u2019s not you, it\u2019s me\u2019\u00a0because they all blame their selfishness on\u00a0it\u00a0now:\u00a0\u2018I\u2019m autistic, I can\u2019t help behaving badly!\u2019\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Unless you were actually hearing voices, your mental health was not an excuse to be a bore \u2013 or a\u00a0boor\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n