Why do people insist on labeling poor parenting as a psychiatric disorder?

Question

What happened to raising your kids?

I'm talking about parents who dope their kids up instead of being parents to them.

Answer 1

If you are referring to AD/HD or childhood depression, there are many issue involved and none of them have to do with parenting.

The health of our children was not studied until recently and we now understand a great deal more than we used to. There are children who are overly hyper in good and bad homes. This has nothing to do with parenting.

Every child suffers from depression during their teenage years, but some become much more severe. It is necessary to help them or we might lose them.

While I agree that there are more bad parents than good, I would not say that these issues are terrible disorders. I would also say that they are for the most part controllable and not due to poor parenting.

By the way, I had abusive parents so I know what bad parents are.

Take care,
Troy

Answer 2

I agree with one of the other answers. Sometimes it IS a medical problem with a parent or parents and not just poor parenting. I do know what you mean, though. It seems that there are often excuses made for poor parenting and a psychiatric disorder seems to be a big one. I think it is taken advantage of. It is also like saying ever kid that misbehaves has attention deficit disorder, too. None of it helps a kid that's for sure!

Answer 3

Because people in general want to take the easy way out. Poor parenting is rampant in today's world.. Everyone is so busy trying to make a living that they forget they even have children.. Television is raising todays kids, and tomorrows leaders, is that not the scariest thing you've heard?
People need to consider these things before having children, not after they've had two or three.
Children need supervision, hell, some adults need supervision.
We can not expect others (babysitters/schools) to raise our children, but we do, and hence we end up with dysfunctional children.. They are not suffering from any phychiatric disorder, just a serious lack of attention.
Now that's not to say some kids do have real problems, because they do, but certainly not the high percentage we think.

Answer 4

I think mostly because it's an issue that the parent has that prevents him/her to deal with raising kids and basically have the inability to do so the way most people without such issues have. I think that was it all comes down to is immaturity. In the human psyche there are traumatic events that happen in ones life that in a way stunts personal growth and maturity. Some people that have kids when either they really didn't want any or were trying to not have any and end up having them, it's traumatic and they don't have the ability or sometimes any desire to deal with the situation they have put themselves in. It can sometimes be expressed as denial, physical or mental abuse or neglect. I also think that it's a choice people have to consciously make, to take good care of their offspring and some people just decide not to make it.
At least that's what I think.

Answer 5

Interesting question: As a family based therapist I see plenty of cases where the kids do not need any of the medications that they are on, they just need consistent parenting. I also see lots of cases where the kids have serious chemical imbalances that effect behavior. These become tricky since you have to decide....how much of the behavior can be changed by helping parents to set and inforce limits and how much is biological and can be altered with the correct medications.
I would say that only 10% of the ADHD kids that I work with truly have that disorder...the rest are overzealous parents that want the "magic pill" to fix their kids. Telling them that their kids don't need medications means one thing....they look for a second opinion. Usually I work with the parents on the real issues, then when they are resolved, we wean the kid of the medications.

Answer 6

because most of the poor parents with psychiatric disorders come from disfunctional families that were impoverished retarded hillbillies who,before doping kids up,would beat the crap out of their kids at the drop of a hat if they didn't mind their parents instructions. so just about all poor parenting consists of a psychiatric disorder.

Answer 7

Sometimes poor parenting is caused by a psychiatric disorder. Sometimes it's just poor parenting. Who insisted and why? Your question needs a bit more detail. :)