Alex McCarthyWay back in the year 2000, I had just started the first of my ADHD support groups—there were rapidly more than one.

Towards the end of that year, we were invited to attend a long-standing ADHD support group based in Simonstown, South Africa, for their next meeting, as they had invited a medical doctor to speak.

The doctor, short, rotund and owlish, strode confidently to the front of the stage and began her speech by saying, “ADHD is a curse!”

There was a short silence, then most of my group, led by Desmond, erupted in denial, some even got to their feet and pointed fingers at the hapless doctor, who staggered back to the rear of the stage.

I got to my feet and managed to restore some order. I asked the doctor to explain her words. What happened then was ADHD at its best.

For every negative statement by the doctor, one of my group got up and either provided a positive statement to counter her negative, or just a positive point that was unrelated to her negative words.

After a short while, I stood up and asked my group members to let the doctor speak without interruption. I told them that we should not ignore the negatives by focusing only on the positives.

At the end of the evening, the doctor got a good round of applause, so all was not hostile. When the host and I saw her out to her car, she asked me to make an appointment to see her at her rooms as she wanted to explore what I was doing in my support group.

I made the appointment and went to see her, but alas, it was a waste of time as all she wanted to do was prove me wrong and herself right.

At the end of the day, ADHD has benefits, and significant benefits for all mankind. Nearly every single inventor in history had ADHD! That’s just for starters.

Just because we are difficult to get on with, and are different to the non-ADHD majority, does not mean that we are defective or lesser human beings.

We are different.Banana Stock

Just like Asian people are significantly different-looking from Western people, of course, African people are different too.

And just as people with ADHD are different to one another, Japanese people are different to Chinese and Koreans, even though their main features are similar.

This absolute nonsense that we are lesser beings, and some of us have to attend special-needs schools, is simply an easy way out of not having to work at integrating us into their lives.

Those of us that have the condition have to try and adapt to a world dominated by logic, where creativity is not considered “real work,” we are the ones who have to adjust to this rigid world where everyone is considered the same, where we have to sit in rows and columns at school, and every learning period is the same length of time, and all employment is mostly operated according the same hierarchical structure.

The solution lies within the family, and that is difficult as 4 out of 5 children have at least one parent who has ADHD, and a distracted parent needs guidance and checklists at the very least.

Unquestionably, the world needs people who have ADHD. Our planet would be a much poorer place without us.

 Top Photo: Alex McCarthy  Bottom Photo: Banana  Stock