Areas › Focus, starting, and ADHD › What ADHD actually is
When you speak about a death by suicide, say died by suicide or completed suicide rather than committed. Committed sets a crime beside the person's name.
Families hear these words at the worst moment of their lives and carry them for years afterwards. The wording also reaches people who are struggling and listening hard for whether it is safe to say anything at all. Changing it costs nothing, and it is worth doing in your notes as well as in the room.
Qur’an and Sunnah
We have honoured the children of Adam (Quran 17:70). That honour belongs to the person being spoken about, and it should be audible in how they are described.
۞وَلَقَدۡ كَرَّمۡنَا بَنِيٓ ءَادَمَ وَحَمَلۡنَٰهُمۡ فِي ٱلۡبَرِّ وَٱلۡبَحۡرِ وَرَزَقۡنَٰهُم مِّنَ ٱلطَّيِّبَٰتِ وَفَضَّلۡنَٰهُمۡ عَلَىٰ كَثِيرࣲ مِّمَّنۡ خَلَقۡنَا تَفۡضِيلࣰ ا
We have honoured the children of Adam and carried them by land and sea; We have provided good sustenance for them and favoured them specially above many of those We have created
Qur’an 17:70read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
What the research says
A national survey documented public reluctance to be close to children carrying a mental health label, which is evidence of a real social cost attached to how these conditions are named. It measured attitudes rather than the effect of any single word. The general point still holds: what we call things carries weight.
Martin JK, Pescosolido BA, Olafsdottir S, McLeod JD. (2007). The construction of fear: Americans' preferences for social distance from children and adolescents with mental health problems.. Journal of health and social behavior doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Why it works
The words attached to a death shape how a family carries it and whether someone at risk feels able to speak.
This one is still a draft. It is waiting on a scholar and a clinician to read it before it is published.
Near this one
When you meet a confident claim about ADHD, look it up before passing it on. A search of recent papers, limited to the last few years, takes a couple of minutes and often changes the picture.
ADHD tends to surface at the points where life asks for more organising: a new school year with seven teachers, the first term at university, a first job, a promotion into managing other people.
Use the established rating scales and a proper developmental history rather than working from the impression someone makes in a first meeting. What you see in a room is a small and unrepresentative sample.