According to the journalist, ADHD is the most common mental health disorder in children, but can "ravage" adult life



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Yashar Ali is often frustrated when he tries to explain, to an adult, the difficulties encountered with ADHD to friends or colleagues.

"People will say things like," Oh, well, everyone's ADHD these days ", which is just not true … or people will say," Oh, you're going to procrastinate, "said New York Magazine and HuffPost reporter, who recently shared his story on Twitter.

It's not that people are joking about the psychiatric disorder "with mischief," Ali said. The flow Duncan McCue guest host. It's that they just do not understand.

Diagnosed at age 13, Ali still struggles to stay organized, to focus on tasks or to launch projects – like his Twitter ticket, for example, which, he says, swirled in his head for three weeks before # 39; writing.

"So, when people tell me," Oh, I'm so ADD today, or I'm so ADHD today, "Well, I'm like this every day," he said. he declares.

General implications for health

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder is the most common childhood mental health disorder. according to the Center for ADHD Awareness, Canada. But one expert said we had to start thinking of it as a broader public health problem.

"For decades, we have known that it is a mental health disorder that affects education, professional functioning, your social life and your emotional life," said Russell Barkley, Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the Center. Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center, Richmond, Virginia.

"But about a decade or more ago, we started seeing newspapers … showing that there were health implications."

People will say things like, "Oh, well, everyone is ADHD nowadays," which is just not true.– Yashar Ali

Researchers found that people with ADHD smoked tobacco, drank alcohol, and had a higher carbohydrate diet more often than others, had higher rates of obesity at the same time. adolescence and adulthood, had sleep problems and consequently had higher rates of heart disease. Barkley told McCue that these health issues

Women with ADHD are also more prone to eating disorders, he added.

In his own study published in the Journal of Attention Disorders in December, Russell discovered that ADHD can take many years of a person's life – an average of about nine years for people diagnosed as a child, and an average 13 years for people with ADHD persists in adulthood. I said.

"Talk about a punch," he says. "We were amazed at the result."

"Embarrassing" for adults

If nothing is done, Ali knows that ADHD is a problem that "can ravage your life" and be "embarrassing" for adults.

In the past, he said, he had to warn potential employers that he could not always concentrate in an open environment and that he could be led to "lock himself into a another room "so that things go well.

Yashar Ali explains to Duncan McCue, host of The Current show, why having plenty of towels helped her manage her ADHD. 0:58

Her hope is that sharing her own life story with ADHD in adulthood helps others understand it.

"I felt that … I should make others more aware of the nuances of this disorder, with which you have to live, and millions of others, with," he said.

Click "listen" at the top of this page to hear the entire conversation.


Written by Kirsten Fenn. Produced by Jessica Linzey, Danielle Carr and Sarah-Joyce Battersby.

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