Gifted, talented and pathologized: Mood Disorders, Misdiagnosis and Medication

Gogo Lidz

Psychiatric misdiagnosis and consequent unnecessary or even destructive medication for “troubling” symptoms is an issue that impacts many gifted and talented people.

In her article My Adventures in Psychopharmacology, Gogo Lidz [in the news program clip above] writes, “Between the ages of 16 and 21, I was prescribed more than fifteen different stimulants, antidepressants, antipsychotics, and mood stabilizers. The cure was worse than the disease.

She continues, “But the Ritalin made me feel spacey. Classes were easier to sit through, but if a teacher asked me a question, I’d answer with a disoriented “Whaaat?” When I explained this to Dr. Titrate [her psychiatrist] at our next session, he turned pharmacist. Over the next few months, he plied me with a small galaxy of ADD drugs: Metadate, Dextrostat, Dexedrine Spansules, Adderall, Adderall XR, and Strattera, alone and in various combinations.

“The stimulants turned me into a tweaked-out whiz kid. It was as if I had been nearsighted and now had X-ray vision. Adderall XR was my drug of choice. It turbocharged my brain during the school day, but when I got home, I crashed hard. Sometimes I’d lie in bed for hours and sob.”

Anna Rexic

As a supplement to the Adderall XR, she was prescribed the short-term amphetamine Dextrostat, but so many stimulants “made it hard to sleep more than six hours a night. It also made me rapidly lose weight. At first, I liked this side effect. But when my classmates started calling me Anna Rexic, the thrill faded. I always felt queasy, and food tasted like sand.

“Hopped up on stimulants, I gained confidence… A C student in tenth grade, I was pulling A’s by the eleventh… I got a near-perfect score on my SAT. I turned from a basket case into an overachieving young adult. But I was dimly aware that the ADD medication was also doing something else, something I didn’t like. I felt impatient, irritable, explosively angry. I’d scream at my father for buying me the wrong toothpaste. I’d scream at my sister for borrowing my hairbrush. I’d scream at my car for running out of gas.”

From drugs to DBT

Now she is back in college and has been “free of manic feelings and suicidal thoughts. I’ve got a new therapist, who specializes in dialectical behavior therapy… The therapy is different from any I’ve ever had. I feel like I’m taking a college course on myself.”

Didn’t fit the profile

For another personal story, see the Huffington Post item BiPolar – The New “Must-Have” Disorder, by Bruce Genaro – “For years I told doctors that I thought I was manic depressive, and, because I didn’t fit the profile that they understood.. they dismissed the idea and kept trying to treat me for depression. My current therapist is as bit savvier than the others…”

Genius The genius of ‘difference’

This image is from Genius! Nurturing The Spirit Of The Wild Odd And Oppositional Child – by George T. Lynn and Joanne Barrie Lynn – a premise of the book is that the genius – the “guiding spirit” – of neurologically different / attention different children is necessary for the advancement of culture: “The creative genius of children diagnosed with AD/HD will show itself in athletics, the performing and visual arts, and in entrepreneurial endeavors.

Related article: The Misfortune of Gogo Lidz, by Maia Szalavitz

Related Talent Development Resources pages:
ADD / ADHD
dysfunction / disorder resources
Bipolar Disorder
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