My mother does not believe my diagnosis. The Bipolar or the ADHD. :(

Why? (obvisouly no one knows the answer to this but her)

I have not heard from her so I can't even ask her.

In one aspect, it does not matter to me but in another aspect it angers me and hurts me. How could she believe that anything I did as a child/teenager/young adult/adult have been normal? (During my moments) Grrrrr....

Thanks for reading, just had to vent.

Please share any experiences you had upon initial diagnosis with your parents, if you'd like. It would definately help. Thanks.

Hi

I am in the process of the same thing. My mother has never believed in such things. She just thought I was a brat, trouble maker, etc.
But now that I am an adult, she realizes I actually done something with my life and still have some problems that are unexplainable to her. She does believe in ADD. But if I had of realized this years ago she would have just said "thats just an excuse".

I also told her that she might be as well. She did not take well to that. But it was just a suggestion, it is up to her to get help if she needs it. I also have a sister with ADD and co-morbid depression.

Like I said, my mom is coming around, your mom will have to eventually. I am assuming she is not a doctor, so when you have a diagnoses from a doctor she should face it...no questions asked.

I know how frustrating things can be just living with something like this, let-alone someone saying the don't believe it.

Hang in there:)

Please share any experiences you had upon initial diagnosis with your parents, if you'd like. It would definately help. Thanks.

Although I do not believe my experience would be very helpful I do know parental rejection of their off-springs ADD diagnosis isn't all that uncommon.


others experience this also. (http://www.addforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=32346)

Even some parents with ADD deny it's existence (http://www.addforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=33932)

How could she believe that anything I did as a child/teenager/young adult/adult have been normal? (During my moments)
Well... any chance she either does not remember those "moments", or is there any chance she did the same things when she was at the same age? Both of those diagnosis have a hereditary component, so could she possibly have one or both diagnosis too?

My husband's mother insists that he's no more forgetful than she is, so he must be "normal". Well, since I'm 100% convinced she's an undiagnosed ADHDer, that's no surprise! In her case, she's not rejecting his diagnosis nearly as much as she's rejecting the fact she herself may have it.

My mother was the same way, but my Dad and Stepmom both said "Well, that sure does explain alot!"

My dad can be like that sometimes. He doesn't understand why I do these things, and refuses to let me use it as an "excuse", although I don't use it like that. It's more along the lines of an explaination. My mom doesn't understand how hard it is for me to focus, even though she knows I have ADD. Sometimes, it makes me feel like giving up the thought that I do have ADD, if nobody realizes it's my weakness that needs to be overcomed. But, your mother has to realize that it ISN'T an excuse, it's an explaination. And that with this information, it will help you become a better person because you know your weaknesses, and it's fixable.

My point: Let her think what she wants, but YOU know what's going on with you; you know you have it, even if your mother doesn't realize it. If she doesn't want to believe it, ah well.

You have been given the diagnosis, which has given you the insight and something to move forward with in your life. She has chosen not to do that. I think a lot of it is probably guilt - that 'if there was something wrong i should have known about it and done something, so I'll just stick my head in the sand and pretend there wasn't because then i'm not responsible".

I confessed to my mum that I thought I had ADHD and I got given the "I have problems with that too, you just need to try harder" type talk. According to her, I'm just a creative person, and creative people are always messy and daydreamy and don't finish things.

It's so frustrating. But in the end it doesn't make any difference to YOU. You have to do what is right for you, and start making your own changes to achieve your potential. Although I know for myself that this sort of setback makes me second guess myself and then I find it harder to keep going. Just take small steps at a time, and take advantage of your knowledge.

My mother does not believe in ADD and it drives me crazy. I was diagnosed when I was a teenager and went to live with my dad. I just dont talk to my mom about my ADD or Depression. One thing that really bothers me though is that I am positive that my little brother has ADD (he is 16 now) and she will not even get him tested for it because she doesnt believe in it. I just know that he would do a lot better in school if he was diagnosed but there is nothing I can do about it. My only suggestion is not discuss it with her.

this is the same thing with my mother, when i was a minor she would not take me to get help after i recently had a suicide attempt. I later came to find out that it is a.d.d and possible bipolar, and depression. But it drives me insane! im glad to hear that im not the only one, it makes me feel like she doesnt care enough to hear me out and believe me, she thinks its some desparate cry for attention.


But then again, me and my mom have had a very messed up relationship for a very long time.

Sometimes parents need to have denial about their child having a serious illness...

Bipolar is a pretty serious diagnosis.

I guess you can go one of two ways: (a) keep wanting to convince her, or (b) decide that you do not need her validation, and get out of the "child role" of needing her 'approval' for your own emotional wellbeing.

If you want to convince her, you could tell your Psychiatrist that your Mom needs some Bipolar Education, and get Mom to go talk to your Psychiatrist.

I can certainly see how this would cause you a lot of distress. :S

I think one of the common issues here is that mental illness/disorder is not physically obvious and is sometimes difficult to understand by those not afflicted. Really, the same thing applies to many situations -- many people have a difficult time understanding what they have not experienced themselves.

Some parents though may feel as if blame is placed upon them for such a diagnosis as he or she may feel as if he or she should have known, as opposed to being able to blame the difficulties solely on the child (for the self-righteous parents out there...)

Others may be so intolerant of individual differences that even though the difficulties are obvious, some may purposely ignore those differences to enact a false sense of normality (i.e. enforcing conformity).

Perhaps even some may see the differences, but withhold knowledge as a leveraging point for enacting blame upon the child or other person (other parent, divorced parent) in order to shift attention away from their own deficiencies...

In the last ten years or so ADD has become a household word. During the mid-nineties there was a lot of hype about the overuse of the diagnosis. There was talk that possibly the number of children being diagnosed was getting out of hand and that parents were even going to great lengths in order to have their children diagnosed so that they could take advantage of the system:rolleyes: So the whole idea that ADD was a valid condition was met with a LOT of sceptisizm. This of course has made it much more difficult for people to be tested for ADD.

My point is that ADD has had a bad wrap in the past and it influenced a lot of people to put it off as psycho=babble. That IMOP is one of the main reasons why many don't want to believe it or accept it, and/or don't want to discuss it.

As far as my own mother is concerned it doesn't really exist. She's not negative about it nor does she doesn't put me down. She just doesn't believe in it as a medical condition and she doesn't see why a set of symptoms that could be seen in just about every person on some level (her opinion) has to have a label.

My sister and I get a kick out of this and have to laugh because she such raging case of ADD that I have ever seen :D

My mother does not believe my diagnosis. The Bipolar or the ADHD. :(

Why? (obvisouly no one knows the answer to this but her)

I have not heard from her so I can't even ask her.

In one aspect, it does not matter to me but in another aspect it angers me and hurts me. How could she believe that anything I did as a child/teenager/young adult/adult have been normal? (During my moments) Grrrrr....

Thanks for reading, just had to vent.

Please share any experiences you had upon initial diagnosis with your parents, if you'd like. It would definately help. Thanks.Hi. She doesnt believe you, then why not get the doctor who diagnosed you to talk to her. Parents are usually sceptical to accept that their child might suffer from some kind of depressive illness. You numerous attempts may not yield anything, so better let the doctor enlighten her.

I've been taking medication for depression for almost 20 years. My mother knows this. She thinks it's some fad of mine and when she talks about it, always refers to "that problem with your hormones."

I would never even mention my ADD to her. God knows what she'd come up with for that.