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Health

Feeling lazy, unmotivated, and ashamed of it? Doctor says it could be undiagnosed ADHD.

"75% of adults with anxiety actually have ADHD as the cause of their anxiety."

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Doctor breaks down how to recognize ADHD in adults.

If it seems that everyone is being diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), there may be a reason and it's likely not the reason people think. Diagnostic criteria were initially based off of how ADHD presented in white children who were mostly male, so if you fell outside of that box your diagnosis was often overlooked. This is especially true in girls who then turned into undiagnosed or misdiagnosed women.

But it's not just women who were undiagnosed since the criteria mostly included ways in which hyperactivity showed up—you know, the "H" in ADHD. But not everyone with ADHD presents with the stereotypical hyperactivity bit.

That means a lot of kids fell through the cracks and, as kids do, eventually became adults.

 ADHD specialist Dr. Heather Brannon breaks down ways in which ADHD is missed and how to identify it in adults in a TEDx Talk in 2021.


adhd, adult adhd, adhd diagnosis, adhd treatment, doctors, ted talk, tedx, mental healthAdults with untreated ADHD may struggle with procrastination, being distracted, and end up feeling shame over their "laziness" Photo by Hiki App on Unsplash

In the first few minutes of the video, Brannon drops a statistic that feels mind-boggling:

"75% of adults with anxiety actually have ADHD as the cause of their anxiety." Even though I fit into that category, consider my mind completely boggled because I thought I was a rarity and my psychiatrist was a magician. Turns out, he was probably just up to date on his continuing education credits.

Brannon talks about how people who may express feelings of overwhelm, anxiousness, and tiredness and who are easily frustrated may actually have undiagnosed ADHD.

It's pretty easy to overlook ADHD that presents with more of the attention deficit part of the diagnosis than the hyperactivity part. When someone is having difficulty sitting still, talking so fast that you can barely keep up, and is constantly on the go, it's pretty easy to pinpoint there may be an issue.

But when the person is quiet, sits still but misses large chunks of conversations, or is chronically forgetful and sleepy, it's much easier to miss the signs, according to Brannon.

Brannon says many people feel bad about themselves without knowing why, so having an answer for why you're feeling this way can be helpful.

The video is really fascinating and may help others recognize signs within themselves or with loved ones. Give it a gander below:


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In the clip, Brannon introduces us to a theoretical person named Sally.

Sally is successful, creative, and has a Masters degree. She's functioning at a high level by all indications, but Sally struggles with procrastination, getting sidetracked, and feeling unmotivated. She feels lazy and ashamed of it, but she just can't bring herself to change her behavior.

Brannon says that Sally is typical of adults with undiagnosed ADHD. These are people who feel and know something is not quite right with them, but they have no idea what.

As for a little happy ending, Sally eventually finds out that she has ADHD and receives treatment. Brannon says in the video that the right medication can make a world of difference.

"Now [Sally] can have creative thoughts without having that big swirl of ideas running around in her head. She can look at an email to see if she has time to answer or she needs to save it for later. Now Sally can be on time for her appointment, and that frees up the perfectionist that was trying so hard to be on time before and was failing every time."


adhd, adult adhd, adhd diagnosis, adhd treatment, doctors, ted talk, tedx, mental healthWith her ADHD under control, "Sally" is crushing it. Photo by Brooke Cagle on Unsplash

Brannon says that over the span of her career, she would estimate about 2 or 3 out of 10 adults have undiagnosed ADHD and are living a life of difficulty and shame.

"That's a lot of people who could be feeling a whole lot better," she says.

This article originally appeared two years ago. It has been updated.

Modern Families

Military mom takes her son's 'battle buddy' on family weekend. Now she's his 'second mom.'

Unconventional families are one of the most important parts of modern military life.

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Mom welcomes son's battle buddy into family.

Military families are a rare breed. The selfless, intimate bond that they share is a unique experience. And for the families that support those in active duty military service, there is plenty of love to go around.

For military mom and TikToker @cocobutter801, that has meant rallying around her son who serves in the United States Army and his 'battle buddy'. When he needed a place to go on family weekend, she didn't hesitate for a second to open her home to him.

Her actions go beyond hospitality. To her, her son's battle buddy is family. "Here's your sign to take in your son's battle buddy on family weekend," she writes in the video's caption.

@cocobutter801

I came here for one son and left with two. #miltary #militarymom #family #son #battlebuddy #hooah #fyp

In the emotional clip that is set to Pearl Clarkin's song "Military Man", the mom can be seen standing next to her car, ready to bring her son home for the weekend. The two share a big hug, and her son is dressed in his fatigues, wearing a backpack and carrying a bag.

Then, she hugs her son's 'battle buddy', who is also dressed in his fatigues with bags in tow, who will be coming home to be part of their family. She added in the caption, "I came here for one son and left with two."

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The term battle buddy is unique to the Unites States Military. According to Matt Ward, an Army veteran (who is now a second lieutenant in the US Army Reserves) and YouTuber, explains the meaning and depth of what a battle buddy is. He explains that a battle buddy is anyone going through basic training with you.

"At basic training, you're always going to have a battle buddy with you. Whenever you talk to a drill sergeant, you're going to have a battle buddy with you. Whenever you go to the bathroom (latrine), you're going to have a battle buddy with you," he says. "You have to be with someone at all times."

Ward add that while there are a lot of reasons for having a battle buddy, the biggest are accountability and safety.

@cocobutter801

Sometimes I feel like motherhood just keeps getting harder the older they get. 🥹♥️🇺🇸 ##army##militarymom##nationalguard##texas

In the video shared by @cocobutter801, many military families and members commended her on her big, hospitable heart. They also shared about their experiences with battle buddies. "My son told me his battle buddy wasn’t receiving letters so I wrote 2 a week," one shared. Another commented, "People don’t realize how much this means to soldiers that for whatever reason can’t be with their 'blood' family… instead they get welcomed into a new extended family!!!! Much respect!!!"

Another wrote, "one of my best friends let me join him and his family, i cherish those memories. sadly he is no longer with us but 15 years later I still talk to his family. I'm forever grateful for their kindness." And @cocobutter801 replied, "I’m so sorry for your loss. I’m sure they love you still are in contact with them. I know I would."

In another comment, a viewer shared, "My son just asked for 2 to come home w him in May!! Load the truck up son!! ALWAYS!!" And @cocobutter801 responded, "Always!"

Humor

"How to use a printer" satire perfectly captures our frustration with modern technology

There's a word for why everything that should be awesome by now seems to be getting worse.

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Home printers are incredibly frustrating to use, and they aren't getting better.

Anyone who has ever printed a document at home knows the inevitable rage of dealing with your standard home-office inkjet printer. They're clunky, unreliable, and prone to a litany of problems—everything from drivers to ink cartridges to the WIFI is bound to malfunction at some point. And without a usable interface, they're extremely difficult to troubleshoot on your own.

The problem with printers is that they have been around since at least the 80s. And while the technology has improved in some ways, they remain incredibly buggy and difficult, and printer manufacturers have found infuriating ways to make them even more annoying and expensive to use. (Ink cartridge subscriptions, anyone?)

office space, printer, printers, home office, technology, profitsThe boys from Office Space knew how to handle wayward printers.Giphy

But YouTuber Gus Johnson is here to help. He's created a perfectly simple guide for anyone who wants to get their printer set up and begin printing documents. Let's go!

First, Johnson walks us through how to make sure our printer is turned on. It's on? OK, great! Now we're ready to print—well, after the printer installs the 18 mandatory driver updates.

Once those are all done, it's time to print. Except it turns out the ink is low—well, not low, but low-ish, which means the printer won't print until you replace all of the cartridges. And no, you are not allowed to print in black and white if your magenta is low, just so you know.

The cartridges, by the way, are not compatible between printers and often not reliably sold in stores. So, Johnson shows us how to order them online and then wait. Days later, now we're ready to print! Well, after one more new cartridge update installs, and of course given that you can figure out how to get your supposedly "wireless printer" to talk to your laptop.

Johnson's video is a gut-busting watch for anyone who's grappled with a home printer and been tempted to pull an Office Space on it with a hefty baseball bat. Watch the whole thing here:

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Printers are a really complicated piece of technology. But that shouldn't let them off the hook. Most of the problems spoofed in Johnson's video are solvable. And that's exactly the larger issue.

The Wirecutter writes that "there is some amazingly complicated technology in your printer, including the printheads, the ink, and the mapping software. You take your printer for granted, but that box can cover a piece of paper in millions of dots of precisely located, color-matched ink in a few seconds," and that most manufacturers take a loss on the actual machinery of a printer, hoping to recoup the earnings via ink sales later down the road.

If printers were the only piece of technology that seem to get worse and worse, bleeding us for more and more money while offering a rapidly deteriorating product, maybe we'd be willing to spare a few tears for the poor manufacturers. But this is a global problem affecting practically everything we touch—from social media, streaming content, journalism, and even restaurants. We pay more or the same for something that doesn't ever get any better, and often gets worse!

There's a term for this phenomenon. It's officially called "enshittification," or platform decay.

Writer Cory Doctrow, who coined the term, describes the pattern like this: "Here is how platforms die: first, they are good to their users; then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers; finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. Then, they die."

Bill Maher described Silicon Valley's approach to technology as, "If it ain't broke, f*ck with it."

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Doctrow even mentioned printers specifically in a recent Medium post:

"They make printer-scanners that won’t scan unless all four ink cartridges are installed and haven’t reached their best-before dates. They make printers that won’t print black and white if your $50 magenta cartridge is low. They sell you printers with special half-full cartridges that need to be replaced pretty much as soon as the printer has run off its mandatory 'calibration' pages. The full-serving ink you buy to replace those special demitasse cartridges is also booby-trapped — HP reports them as empty when they’re still 20% full. ... HP tricks customers into signing up for irrevocable subscriptions where you have to pay every month, whether or not you print, and if you exceed your subscription cap, the printer refuses to work, no matter how much ink is left."

Ink is outrageously expensive, but the printer companies exploit copyright laws to make sure you can't buy third party cartridges. When that fails, they push out security updates that break compatibility with anything but their own ink cartridges. These kinds of offenses go on and on.

In other words, long ago it was very exciting that we were able to print our own documents at home. Initial innovations focused on making that process better and better. But we're long past that now and the problems with most home printers will probably remain forever, or as long as manufacturers think they can keep squeezing our wallets. They're not really incentivized to make a printer that actually uses 100% of an ink cartridge or reliably connects to WIFI—they just want to make sure we buy the next one.

Johnson's YouTube rant is so funny precisely because it's true, but also because it finds humor in the frustration we all share at this cycle of enshittification. If we can't get our $300 printer to reliably spit out a basic black and white document, at least we can all laugh at our shared misery.

Kids

A 4th state just passed laws protecting 'child influencers' from their own parents

A former 'Youtube star' had brutal words for these parents in her testimony.

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New laws aim to protect teen and child influencers' money. It's a start.

In recent years, some big questions have popped up about the kids you see on social media. When an influencer posts a photo with their children or an adorable candid family video, it might not ring many alarm bells. But what if their kids are constantly an integral part of their every day content? What if those influencers rely on the cuteness of their kids, or the hilarious things they say, to drive engagement of their content? Content they earn money for?

In the worst cases, teens and even toddlers are not just a prop in their parents' videos, but they are positioned as the "stars" of their own social media accounts. Child influencers. I remember once seeing a shocking post about a 3-year-old girl who was "excited" to tour the country and meet all of her fans. My own daughter is that age and only cares about cartoons and mac and cheese, so it's ridiculously easy to see the parents pulling the strings behind the scenes. But social media is big business, and big money.

Finally, something is being done to protect these kids. Utah just became the 4th state to pass simple legislation designed to ensure children are at least being fairly compensated for their work online.


influencers, social media, screentime, youtube, tiktok, instagram, children, families, parentsUtah is letting kids delete content they appeared in when they turn 18. Photo by Ethan De Long on Unsplash

The new law dictates that any family earning more than $150,000 per year from online content that includes their children set up a trust fund for them, and offers guidance via a formula to calculate how much the kids are owed for their appearances. It may not end up being much, but at least the kids will be compensated somewhat for their own likeness.

Most fascinatingly, the Utah law also gives kids the right to have any content they appeared in deleted when they turn 18. That is a major win, and it gives kids some agency back when they become adults capable of making their own informed decisions.

Other states with similar protections include California, Illinois, and Minnesota — with legislation currently being drafted and debated in many more places. The monetary protections are a good start, but more will definitely need to be done to reign in parents putting kids on the Internet without their permission. The exposure, fame, and messages can do a lifetime of harm to young people.

The passing of the law hinged on testimony by former child YouTube "star" Shari Franke, who was forced to appear on her family's channel 8 Passengers as a kid. Her mother was later arrested for child abuse.

“I want to be clear: there’s never, ever a good reason for posting your children online for money or fame," Franke said to lawmakers. "There’s no such thing as a moral or ethical family vlogger. ... The only people harmed by child influencer laws are the parents exploiting their children.”

She called being a child influencer "24/7 labor" and has urged for stronger protections that go beyond just setting aside money earned.

"How do we determine how much a child should get paid for appearing in family content?" she said. "What price is worth giving up your childhood?

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The line between using your kids as props to monetize and genuinely sharing moments from your family's life is thin and grey. This area of social media is uncharted territory, and we don't even know the full impact of how growing up in the online spotlight (and not by their own free will) will affect kids. There will always be loopholes in legislation meant to protect kids. Hollywood has been trying to get it right for nearly 100 years, starting with the first law that gave child actors some control of ownership over their own wages.

It's great that Utah is taking a first step, and hopefully many more parts of the country follow suit soon.