Uechi-Ryu.com

Sensei,

Recently a student whose daughter is also enrolled with me told me that her little girl (7) was diagnosed with "ODD", Obediance Defecit Disorder. Now am I nuts or are there too many new diaseases out there! Are we just trying to rationalize attitude problems or make labels for behavioral dicrepancies? Or is it all a way to misplace the blame for inadequate upbringing and social laxity?

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Evan Pantazi
www.erols.com/kyusho

I agree. Its like post war syndrome or shell shock or what ever they call it since the golf conflict. I feel it started in the early 70's with the sociologists wanting to pin new names on old malfunctions of the human psyche. Now that they have covered old ground. They think they should call almost anything a dissorder. Although today's society can cause some of us to go off the deep end. Take the Colorado incedent.

Evan,
Don't get nuts just becuase someone is odd...
I specifically try to practice being peculiar.
...oh, I guess I read that wrong
No-fault auto insurance
No-fault divorce
N0-fault parenting....
let's see, did I miss anyone?

I don't mean to hurt others but labels like this just don't do anyone, ESPECIALLY the kids, any good. I'm convinced they do more harm then good.

Even if the label refers to a real disease and the child legitimately has it...like epilepsy. On this point I speak from experience. I had epilepsy as a child, but no one knew it until I was in college. As a result I got treated just like all the other kids, and I benefited greatly from it!

Let's not give people excuses to fail. Instead let's lovingly help pick them up and, when appropriate, help them to get their feet soundly under themselves.

BTW - I'm not always good at this...but I am trying to get better.

No-Fault Parenmting, I love it Rick, esp. since it is against the law to give your own kid a good whack in the ass.

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Allen - [email]uechi@ici.net">uechi@ici.net</A> - <A HREF="http://www.uechi-ryu.org[/email]

ODD stands for Oppositional Defiant Disorder and is one of the subcategories of behavioral disorder diagnoses that mental health practitioners use to describe or characterize, or 'diagnose', if you will, a persistent problem in a child or adolescent. It has some utility for the clinician, since it implies that the objectionable behavior falls well outside the range of "normal" variance, but not as extreme as the more pathological Conduct Disorder or Personality Disorder (such as Antisocial Personality Disorder; what you may know by the old term Psychopath or Sociopath). Using a diagnosis on a mental health record does not create the problem in the child, it merely describes it, and says something about what one is likely to be dealing with. Just as other diagnoses, like "depression" or "anxiety disorder" or "schizophrenia" say something important to the clinician working with the patient.As far as I can see, knowing a mental health diagnosis is not directly relevant to teaching a student in a karate class... the dojo is not a clinic, after all... unless the parents are saying to you something like "please be patient and try to help my child learn better discipline and self-control. We are doing everything we can to help her improve her behavior, including having her treated by a professional, who says she has ODD". Does this put it in a different context? Mental health professionals don't "create" the problems in clients by naming them.

Paul Sensei,
I agree that the label does not make the problem, and that true and meaningful help can not always be given if the true problem isn't identified. I spent a couple of decades with active epilepsy - petit mal or absence seizures as they are now called. It wasn't until it was diagnosed that I finally got appropriate treatment.

My point was that I was greatful for ignorance in my formative years. I was not given an excuse. I was not given permission to do/be less than I could be. I lived up to expectations in many realms and I believe I would have lived down to them given the chance to shoot at a lower target.

I could wish that I was exposed to Uechi-Ryu back in the 60's and 70's... There are many lacks in my life that would have been better addressed... but in America that was far from the norm back then.

Rick Liebespach

Rick,
Your point is very well taken. Let us not make excuses for each other's bad behavior. Let us hold to a high standard as an important general principle of practice. But in order to work on shaping behavior to the standard it can be useful to know what the problem is, because that may well give us a clue as to how to begin to deal with it.(for example; I could certainly tolerate having a student with ODD, especially if he or she and the parents really wanted to work to correct it... but I would screen out a true Personality Disorder (i.e.; a conscienceless thief or exploiter) because the effect on the cohesiveness of the dojo would be enormously different.

Sensei,

Thank you for the reply. I realize that the professionals are just refining aready existing persona difficulties into more descript subcatagories. I do find it interesting that people make excuses once given one of these "Labels". To tell you the truth I have no problems with this child nor do I have problems with "ADD" students as well. I am amazed that parents are constanly comming in to say you know my child has been diagnosed with "ADD, ODD...". What does that labeling do for self esteem, or does it give the parents a way to side step some issues, or more importantly, does it give the child a scapegoat. The irresponsibility that is becoming so rampant is, IMHO, due to unaccountability, and one of these maladies being used for explaination of deviant behavior.

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Evan Pantazi
www.erols.com/kyusho

Evan
Yes. Yes. and Yes! Some people do use these excuses to avoid personal accountability, and this is a shame. They are missing the point entirely.