24/08/2026
I watched Channel 4 's The Great ADHD Myth? I agree with its broadest message!
I have long said that ADHD may be better understood as part of normal human variation rather than evidence of a disordered or defective brain.
Society has built schools and workplaces around a narrow idea of how people should concentrate, learn, organise themselves, communicate and behave. People who fall outside that range are then expected to change themselves to fit.
Much of the disability associated with ADHD is created when a person tries to fit in with an environment that was never designed for them.
My agreement ended when the programme tried to prove its case.
The six-week “experiment” with Mason changed almost everything at once.
His medication stopped. Screens disappeared. His diet changed. Supplements, yoga, exercise, nature and more family time all changed at the same time.
Nobody could say what had caused his behaviour change. He became happier and more sociable. But he also struggled to concentrate at school and became frustrated by work he could previously do. That bit was glossed over.
Could the dose have been wrong? Could another medication have suited him better? What could the school change? What support did he need? How much weight should his happiness carry beside his academic performance?
Max Pemberton’s experiment on himself was no better. He believes he does not have ADHD, took one dose of lisdexamfetamine, disliked the feeling and used that experience to interpret what medication does to a child.
That proves how one tablet affected Max Pemberton on one day, somebody who may have been dishonest to get a diagnosis in the first place.
The programme was riddled with factual issues too.
The absence of a diagnostic brain scan does not prove the absence of a neurodevelopmental basis.
Calling ADHD medication “slow-release cocaine” is simply false. ADHD medicines include several different drugs with different pharmacology, delivery methods and risk profiles.
Diagnostic criteria require impairment across different areas of life. Reading a few common traits from the DSM and asking who doesn’t do those things strips away the part that makes them clinically significant.
I still agree with the cultural ambition.
Schools which allow movement, creativity and different ways of learning.
Workplaces which stop treating one style of attention and organisation as morally superior.
Give people more control over what support and treatment they use.
Stop treating difference as defect.
That is a huge cultural change. It will take years and probably generations.
Diagnosis currently gives people language, recognition, access to treatment and medication.
You cannot pull away that safety net while hoping that society will become kinder later.
Change society first. Then perhaps fewer people will need the label to survive it.
Channel 4 you need to try harder!
