Scattered Minds: The Origins and Healing of Attention Deficit Disorder

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I realize this review was written quite some time ago. I’d have to disagree about a number of the conclusions mentioned here. While he is a doctor, he is not an expert in ADHD. The consensus among peer-reviewed sources is that ADHD is not caused by poor socialization or parenting. Medicine,” the Austrian philosopher Ivan Illich wrote, “tells us as much about the meaningful performance of healing, suffering, and dying as chemical analysis tells us about the aesthetic value of pottery.” Maté ran a private family practice in East Vancouver for over twenty years. He was also the medical co-ordinator of the Palliative Care Unit at Vancouver Hospital for seven years. Currently he is the staff physician at the Portland Hotel, a residence and resource centre for the people of Vancouver's Downtown Eastside. Many of his patients suffer from mental illness, drug addiction and HIV, or all three. While parenting styles can certainly exacerbate or ameliorate certain expressions of ADHD in children to a degree, ADHD does not occur or manifest because of attachment issues. There is (in the U.S., at least) an epidemic of parent blame as well as moralizing about difficulties people experience as a result of ADHD symptoms. Rather than a blaming or moralizing attitude, education about what executive function is and ways to support and scaffold executive function development would be a much more useful and more compassionate approach. Our servers are getting hit pretty hard right now. To continue shopping, enter the characters as they are shown

The parent not judging the child to pointing out faults, mistakes, shortcomings as shame will cut off the child. I was diagnosed with ADD at a young age and was subjected to the medications at doses that would have been too much for an adult. This wreaked havoc on my psyche, and I am still recovering from those years. Quitting was just as hard being on it- the fallout and withdrawal were some of the worst days of my life. For a long time, I disavowed everything about ADD- the medication, the diagnosis, even its existence for others. The pain was too great. This is something Gabor Mate understands and explains in this book.None of this is achieved by an act of will, and it is possible one will not succeed completely. That is not important. What is important is to engage in the process, difficult as that is. Healing is not an event, not a single act. It occurs by a process; it is in the process itself. (320) This means that the lion’s share of cognitive development occurs after birth. The human infant’s brain makes millions of new connections every second in her first years of life. This development is physically striking. By the age of three, an infant’s body is less than 20 percent of its adult size, but her brain is 80 percent of its adult size. The point, though, is that this development takes place in this world, among other things and other people. I don’t think Maté goes so far as to argue that ADHD is definitively caused by “poor socialization or parenting,” as you put it. Perhaps I accidentally misrepresented his position in that regard. He doesn’t deny the potential role of biology/genetics here. Instead, I think he’s suggesting that socialization and parenting (primarily attachment dynamics) are major factors that can ameliorate and/or exacerbate ADHD when it presents in young people and adults. And since these are psychosocial factors over which we have more control compared to biology/genetics, I think that’s why he’s so focused on them. They’re not the only factors that matter, but when it comes to treatment they might be our strongest leverage points, especially for individuals and families who are not interested in using psychotropic medications. Unless their parents (or primarycaregiverss) ask the child to spend time together when the child is not whining and pleading for time with the parent, children chalk up time spent together as something they received because they finally begged and pleaded enough. This book enlightens parents, teenagers, teachers, and adults with and without ADHD. Dr. Gabor Maté shares heart-wrenching stories from his childhood and medical practice while painting a vivid picture of his adult life with ADHD. Above all, this book offers tools and hope along with a deeper understanding of the controversial diagnosis of ADHD.

This opening passage shows how Maté’s deep well of compassion for others draws water from the aquifer of his personal narrative. It also displays his talent as a writer (including a flair for great analogies and metaphors), creating an overall reading experience that’s engaging and inspiring. The parent taking responsibility for the relationship; demonstrating daily that they want the child’s company. They do not wait to be invited in – they ask to join in. “The hunger in a child is eased by the parents seizing every possible opportunity to devote positive attention to the child precisely when the child has not demanded it.”

ADD adults don’t have low self-esteem because they are poor achievers, but it is due to their low self-esteem that they judge themselves and their achievements harshly. It is also, in part, due to low self-esteem that people do not reach their full potential, do not strive to locate within themselves fonts of creativity and self-expression, do not venture to embark on activities and projects where success is in doubt. They feel safer not trying, because their poor self-regard is terrified at the risk of failure. Much of my initial counseling with people is to help them recognize that in many ways the problem is not in what they have done in life but in how they view themselves. There live human beings afflicted with far more debilitating impairments who do not necessarily hold the low opinion of the self prevalent among ADD adults. One representative point for me, and I feel terrible for mentioning this, occurs when the author takes a long personal detour to talk about an early childhood lived in the shadow of the end stages of the Hungarian Holocaust. His suggestion is that this personal and family trauma led to his ADHD. The idea is an interesting one but is unsupported by any Holocaust-survivor research whatsoever (at least he doesn’t bother to mention any) or any research related to the relationship between trauma and ADHD more generally. Studies with monkeys tell us what happens to developing brains when you physically remove caregivers. Separate an infant monkey from its mother for six days, for example, and its dopamine levels will plummet. Research with human infants tell us what happens when caregivers are emotionally absent – physically present but emotionally unavailable. One cause of such unavailability is depression. Several studies show that infants whose mothers are depressed have significantly higher cortisol levels than infants whose mothers aren’t. That’s significant because prolonged exposure to high levels of cortisol depletes dopamine. Scattered is GREAT. It's one of the best books on ADD I've read yet, and I'm so glad I'm reading it. What I'm appreciating is that he doesn't pander, and he doesn't wrap it up as simply a brain function issue, which is what I've felt to be true. I'm personally convinced that my experience isn't just biology. I don't think I'd be the way I am if I didn't live in a culture that is saturated with information, that removes us far from our natural rhythms, that requires me to be vigilant all the time, that values achievement to a degree that's ridiculous, that insists on fast and "good enough" over the spacious reflection and full consideration that engenders much better than good enough... I could go on. Those things are challenges for everyone, but they are excruciating for someone who has the misfortune of a certain set of developmental sensitivities and brain function challenges. Maté has evidence that supports this instinct of mine, so it's been fascinating to see the facts behind it. Shows how “tuning out” and distractibility are the psychological products of life experience, from in utero onwards

Never at rest the mind of the ADHD adult flits about like some deranged bird that can light here or there for a while but is perched no-where long enough to make a home.”Most recently, he has written about his experiences working with addicts in In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts. At this point, we can return to ADD. Focus, attention, and impulse control are also part of a complex neurological circuit located in the prefrontal cortex. No one is born with, say, fully developed impulse control, so this circuit must develop after birth. But can we identify environmental inputs which affect its development, too? The book was published in 1999 and it feels dated. Mate calls it ADD whereas today it has been classified into a number of different types but most generally talked about as ADHD. I’ve changed it in this review so it makes more sense in 2022. I also found the science behind the genetic and biological elements of the impairment more compelling than the evidence he gave on it having such a strong environment aspect. The environmental aspect (basically that difficult family dynamics will trigger a predisposed ADHD likelihood) felt far more anecdotal. Although Maté doesn’t explicitly go this far, I believe his work has consequential implications for politics, economics, and social justice. When it comes to harm reduction and symptom control, much of Maté’s advice boils down to something like: “First, parents need to be loving, respectful, mutually supportive, and emotionally mature with each other and other adults. Second, they’ve got to spend time with their kids and devote a lot of conscious attention to them, striving always to model compassionate curiosity and patience.” Adults with ADD, of course, also benefit from these behaviors.