Friday 20 July 2012

Folies a Deux in some high profile home educating families


I have in the past been reproved for suggesting that many home educators are a bit strange. People commenting here on the notion have reminded me that home educators on the internet may not be at all typical. That there are strange home educating parents is indisputable; every time I shave in the morning, I see one peering out at me madly from the mirror. Could it be though  that I am arguing from the particular to the universal or even projecting my own manifest abnormalities upon others? It would be a rash person indeed who discounted this hypothesis out of hand!

I want to look today at some of the high profile parents who have a great influence on how home education is viewed. They are the ones who appear in newspapers, mount campaigns against local authorities and central government, make hundreds of Freedom of Information requests and patrol the internet looking for heretics.

Before I go any further, I want to make it clear that I am not saying that all, most or even many home educators are as peculiar as those whom I wish to examine. What I am claiming is that the behaviours displayed are unique to the home educating world and that this makes them worth considering.

I have now come across half a dozen well known home educating mothers who have the following in common. They have daughters to whom they are very attached, either because they are only children or because there is a large gap between the daughter and other siblings. They are all youngest children. The mothers all claim to suffer from various syndromes and typically, doctors are unable to find anything wrong with them. They are forced to either go private, insist upon further tests or resort to alternative medicine. Alarmingly, around the start of puberty, their daughters begin to display similar unidentifiable disorders, both physical and mental. The mothers say that the child is a ‘mirror’ or ‘carbon copy’ of themselves.

Here is one mother talking about her efforts to have herself, at the age of fifty nine, diagnosed with ADHD:



Two of my kids have an ADHD diagnosis (after 10 years of trying) and I have just had mine confirmed as primarily innatentive type. I am trying to explore in a less desperate way than I did when seeking diagnosis to see if I can learn little things that can make a big difference.
Getting diagnosed was a traumatic struggle (and that is no exaggeration), the cards are stacked against you if you have ADHD due to the incompetence and tendency to lose things of the NHS. I may blog about in another post if I find I can without endangering my blood pressure, not there yet … We are going around the houses with the NHS at the moment for a diagnosis for my last child, she presents unusually as well but is almost as a carbon copy of me.




As may be seen, the mother is determined that the child will have the same disorder as she herself. A few months later, the daughter is displaying strange physical symptoms:



whenever she ate something with even the tiniest bit sugar in the same thing happened and it was accompanied by stomach pain. Reluctantly, as you can imagine with a 13 year old girl, she gave up sugar. It is very surprising what has sugar in it and there were very few things we could buy, including most sliced meats.
So all was fine for a few months then she started reacting to all food…



A thirteen year-old girl whose mother is keen for her to have ADHD is now reacting badly to eating any food. She has, ‘hollow eyes and pale complexion and lack of energy’ Can anybody see a connection here? The mother’s remedy is a crank diet and alternative medicine.

Three other mothers of thirteen year old-girls have variations of ME and their daughters develop the problem at puberty. In every case, this involves endless rounds of visits to doctors, often combined with strange diets as the parents self diagnose food allergies, gluten intolerance and so on. This is usually after GPs have told them that there is nothing wrong with the child. Four of these mothers also believe, without any diagnosis that their children are on the autistic spectrum.

I am, as I say, not claiming that this sort of thing is very common. What I am saying is that some of the well known names in British home education are martyrs to this syndrome and it affects their outlook tremendously. Some of these mothers give interviews, appear in newspapers and represent their own views as being typical of home educators in this country. What I will say about this sort of business is this. I have never heard of a woman approaching sixty who is determined to have herself diagnosed with ADHD. This is completely weird. It is curious that at puberty, the  daughters of this group should develop problems with eating, auto-immune disorders, ME, ADHD and so on and that their parent should also be victims of these things. These are extreme cases, but one cannot help notice that while the parents of schooled children tend to shy away from diagnoses of things like ADHD or autistic spectrum disorder in their children, quite a few home educating parents are dead keen on the idea. One often hears home educating parents not only speculating that their children are on the spectrum or have ADHD, but wondering whether they themselves had these things as children.

I would be interested to know if readers have spotted this kind of thing happening. I am particularly keen to know if anybody has seen it in parents who are not home educating? I never have and at the moment I incline to the view that it is something which is exclusive to home educators. Not as I say all or even most, but it definitely looks to me like a well defined subset within the home educating community.

50 comments:

  1. Yes, I have sen a fair bit of this but I wonder if it is the child's 'differences' which prompt the HE, rather than the experience of HE with a particular mother which triggers the 'differences'.

    The same can be said of Dyslexia. There is more of it about within HE. I wondered why. Of course it's possible that poor teaching methods can contribute to reading problems, but perhaps it is more often because parents notice the child showing signs and then realise that school isn't going to be a good fit for the child and so decide on HE.

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  2. 'I wonder if it is the child's 'differences' which prompt the HE, '

    That is of course possible. What I found curious was that all the six girls at which I have been looking in detail were already being home edcuated and then, at or about the menarche, there was an explosion of symptoms. These varied from physical problems like rashes, blisters, sickness and stomach pains to obsessive behaviour and rituals. I have an idea that the motheres sometimes inadvertantly 'coach' their children in these things.

    Most teenage girls complain of minor ailments or get faddy about food. In the average family, such things are disregarded and the child told to pull herself together. Perhaps the trouble can start if the mother is too apt to say, 'Oh you poor thing. I used to suffer like this at your age.' In other words, maybe it is just normal childhood stuff which some parents can unwittingly make worse.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I wrote quite a rant on this subject but deleted it, I dont fancy more enemies. The short version of it though, is yes I have seen it, but not just in the HE world.

      I agree with Old Mum though, HE is usually a response to issues rather than the issues being a symptom of HE.

      Delete
  3. Some conditions are difficult to diagnose partly because the symptoms are quite general and there are currently no definitive tests for them. I believe your wife had been diagnosed with such a condition.

    Autoimmune conditions have strong genetic components so they often appear in the same family.

    I'm sure psychosomatic conditions exist but current medical knowledge makes it difficult for doctors. How long did out take for your wife to be diagnosed? I've heard that it can sometimes take years, especially if you GP is one of those who don't believe the condition exists.

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  4. Oh, Simon, you really do like to over-step the boundaries, don't you? What on earth is the point of this? You thinking you can identify a pattern in six cases (six cases!) is irrelevant and can only stress and embarrass the people you're poking.

    I can only hope that the people involved will take the advice my mum always gave me when I was being teased by my older siblings - 'Don't rise to the bait!'

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  5. ' I believe your wife had been diagnosed with such a condition. '

    True, people are often diagnosed with odd and unsual conditions. What would have rung alarm bells for me would have been if my wife was pressing for her daughter to be diagnosed with a similar disorder at the same time and then insisting that they both went on a peculiar diet. It is this 'mirroring' to which I was drawing attention. The symptoms displayed are not identical in the cases at which I have been looking, but there has been an unhealthy desire to see the child as suffering in the same way as the mother. The mother might believe herself to have OCDC and then at the age of thirteen, her daughter develops a food allergy which requires an obsessive attention to the ingredients in food. Or, for example, the mother claims to have suffered from ADHD and then her daughter starts to suffer from a mysterious auto-immune system problem that doctors cannot identify.

    Clearly, adults suffer from all sorts of problems, some of which can take years to diagnose. I am uneasy when their efforts at diagnosis involve their own children and also I am a little suspicious when girls suddenly fall victim at the onset of puberty to what look like hysterical disorders; particularly when the mothers are prone to such things. Shades of the Salem witch trials; "I saw Goody Proctor talking to Graham Badman'!

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  6. 'Oh, Simon, you really do like to over-step the boundaries, don't you? What on earth is the point of this? You thinking you can identify a pattern in six cases (six cases!) is irrelevant and can only stress and embarrass the people you're poking.'

    The point of this is simple, Allie. Many people who do not home educate think that most home educators are a bit nutty; not to put to fine a point on it. The antics of some prominent home educating parents do nothing to lessen this faulty perception. Although I am talking here of only a handful of parents, they have quite an influence on others. Lists such as Home-Ed biz and HE-UK have thousands of members. One notices that parental diagnosis of ADHD or autism for their children has grown quite common over the last seven or eight years. I am not the only one to notice this, by the way.

    I am asserting that there is a tendency towards medicalising common childhood problems such as an inability to spell correctly, or to be lazy and inattentive, to be faddy about food and so on. I think that this is being promoted and encouraged among home educating parents by some parents who suffer from what almost amounts to an illness. In fact, many people who read this piece will recognise at once what I am talking about, even if they think it a little indelicate for me to draw attention to it.

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  7. Are the families that suffer from the same condition as your wife in the quote below suffering from a this Folies a Deux? If so, it suggests the problem has little to do with HE since it sounds quite widespread. If not, then it may well explain the HE families you mention since there are similarities between ME, a condition you mention, and your wife's condition.

    "There is evidence that genetic factors may play a role in the development of fibromyalgia. For example, there is a high

    aggregation of fibromyalgia in families. [27][28] Using self-report of chronic widespread pain (CWP) as a surrogate marker for fibromyalgia, the Swedish Twin Registry

    reports: [29][30]

    Monozygotic twins with CWP have a 15% chance that their twin has CWP Dizygotic twins with CWP have a 7% chance that their twin has CWP"

    ReplyDelete
  8. "I think that this is being promoted and encouraged among home educating parents"

    I think you don't need to worry about that. Life is full of people promoting and encouraging one thing or another. Yes there are people pursuing diagnosis for what they perceive as conditions and there are also people who believe that the best course is to resist diagnosis. I have met both in the world of home ed. I think there is no evidence of some sort of mass hysteria (which you have implied here) and I think you should consider whether there might not be a little bit of sexism in your portrayal of this... Salem, indeed....

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  9. 'Are the families that suffer from the same condition as your wife in the quote below suffering from a this Folies a Deux?'

    It is an interesting question. Has anybody heard of fibromyalgia cropping up in a mother/daughter combination, with the first presentation of symptoms in the child around the menarche?

    I am not convinced that a genetic explanation covers the things which I have been discussing here. In the case at which I looked in detail, you will observe that first the mother had spent ten years seeking a diagnosis of ADHD for both her and her children and that a few months later the youngest daughter, at the age of thirteen, began to develop physical symptoms such as an intolerance to all food. This quickly became a shared hobby with the mother as they pursued crank diets and took various vitamins and enzymes. It is of course possible that both mother and daughter had not only a genetic disposition to ADHD, but also to some food allergy. The other cases which I have looked at in detail are the same, in that there is not one overall problem, but a collection of difficulties, both mental and physical.

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  10. 'I think you don't need to worry about that'

    Surely you will allow me the freedom to choose my own worries?

    'you should consider whether there might not be a little bit of sexism in your portrayal of this'

    I wonder about this. The problem is that far more home educating parents are female than male. This automatically means that any comments I make are more likely to involve women than men. If I were to be saying stuff about the general conduct of midwives, you could hardly accuse me of sexism. The fact that my observations would involve only women would be no more than a statistical artefact, not evidence of sexism.

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  11. ' and can only stress and embarrass the people you're poking.'

    A ridiculous notion Allie; these people are the most awful exhibitionists, they thrive on attention. Let me tell you a little story to illustrate this point.

    Two years ago, I commented on an online version of an article about home education in a social work magazine. I was at once pounced on by one of the crew who patrol the internet looking for things about home education. This woman said a few things about me which I was obliged to point out were false. She then told me, and anybody else reading the comments, that she had made mistakes because she suffered from a neurological disorder which had so far defied diagnosis by many experts and had involved brain scans and so on. This exchange is still there, but since it would identify the mother, I shall not give a link.
    The sequel came last year, when I discovered from an article in a magazine that she and her daughter both now suffered from something akin to ME and that her daughter's problems began at the age of thirteen.

    To suggest that I am likely to embarrass people who practically make a fetish of sharing the medical conditions of them and their children with all the world is absurd!

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  12. Oh well, whatever... You will discuss what you want and people should probably be more careful about what they share on the internet. I think I'll go and have a coffee and watch Black Books with my daughter. No doubt this is a lazy, dangerous approach to education but it makes us laugh.

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  13. 'and watch Black Books with my daughter'

    Oddly enough, my own daughter has been urging me to watch this with her lately. I am however shocked that you should be doing this during the daytime. It will be the Jeremy Kyle Show next; do you not know what a pernicious habit daytime television is?

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  14. As you raise awareness of conditions, people are going to see the symptoms and recognise those within themselves. It's one of the dangers of the Internet and other media. However, you will see a rise in autism etc because of the reluctance to stick a label on people during the 80s and 90s.

    It could well be there is something there that wasn't diagnosed in the parent when they were at school. They remember the struggle of school life and wish to save their child from going through similar. We're all guilty of trying to protect our children from any wrongs we felt were perpetrated against us at their age.

    I have no doubt there are one or two parents with a form of Munchausen's by Proxy, I think it's called Fabricated or Induced Illness now, who chose to educate at home for ease of caring for their 'sick' child. I don't necessarily believe that those parents would stick themselves in the limelight, maybe there is some form of personality disorder making them seek out attention, but I know a lot of people who do have some of the conditions mentioned who are just hell bent on raising awareness of their condition.

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  15. 'As you raise awareness of conditions, people are going to see the symptoms and recognise those within themselves. It's one of the dangers of the Internet and other media.'

    This is quite true. Diagnoses and treatments go through phases. At one time, diagnosing and treating glue ear was a craze, then it faded. ASD is certainly popular right now.

    It is also the case that some people whose children have had a raw deal because they have some condition or other do become evangelical about raising awareness of it. I am not at all sure that this what is happening with the parents I mention. There seldom seems to be one definite problem, rather a mixture of physical and psychological difficulties. The common factors are that even if the child has never been to school, the trouble begins at puberty and doctors prove to be useless.

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  16. 'I wrote quite a rant on this subject but deleted it, I dont fancy more enemies.'

    Don't be so craven, C; Let us see the full and unexpurgated version! As I say, quite a few people are aware of this business, but most do not wish to discuss it. I am especially interested if you say that you have seen it not among home educating parents.

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    Replies
    1. I'll pass as its not really for me to say who has real and who has perceived issues. I'll keep those kind of thoughts to myself.

      I will say though that there are definitely those in the HE world who get diagnoses for themselves then seek them for their children, and vice versa. Often there are huge doses of self diagnosis. There are also those who read something into their child's every sniffle.
      I think it seems worse within HE because we are already considered alternative within mainstream society, so add SEN and it looks worse.

      Within mainstream society there are also those who want a dx for their child. Most for genuine reasons, however some do it to get benefits and/or because they feel absolves them from good parenting. There are certain types of people who seem to be more prone to being ill and also their children being ill - all so delicate. But whether its genetics or hypochondria, who can say!

      Delete
  17. Simon wrote,
    "There seldom seems to be one definite problem, rather a mixture of physical and psychological difficulties."

    Isn't that a description of your wife's illness?

    According to the NHS the symptoms of fibromyalgia can include:

    Pain
    Extreme sensitivity
    Stiffness
    Fatique
    Poor quality of sleep
    Cognitive problems
    Headaches
    Irritable bowel syndrome
    Inability to regulate body temperature
    restless leg syndrome
    Tingling, numbness, prickling or burning sensations in your hands and feet
    Tinnitus
    Unusually painful periods
    Anxiety
    Depression

    ReplyDelete
  18. Simon wrote,
    "It is an interesting question. Has anybody heard of fibromyalgia cropping up in a mother/daughter combination, with the first presentation of symptoms in the child around the menarche? "

    Not sure about menarche for fibromyalgia specifically, but I know that the diagnosis of various autoimmune conditions such as type 1 diabetes peak in the teenage years. The added stress of bodily changes may well trigger some conditions.

    As to mother/daughter connections, this is taken from WebMD:

    "Like other rheumatic diseases, fibromyalgia could be the result of a genetic tendency that's passed from mother to daughter. Some researchers believe that a person's genes may regulate the way his or her body processes painful stimuli. These scientists theorize that people with fibromyalgia may have a gene or genes that cause them to react intensely to stimuli that most people would not perceive as painful.

    ReplyDelete
  19. 'Isn't that a description of your wife's illness?

    According to the NHS the symptoms of fibromyalgia can include:

    Pain
    Extreme sensitivity
    Stiffness
    Fatique
    Poor quality of sleep
    Cognitive problems
    Headaches
    Irritable bowel syndrome
    Inability to regulate body temperature
    restless leg syndrome
    Tingling, numbness, prickling or burning sensations in your hands and feet
    Tinnitus
    Unusually painful periods
    Anxiety
    Depression'

    And if my daughter had started to complain of these at around the time that her mother was diagnosed, I would have smelt a rat! It was this to which i was drawing attention, mothers who talked of their thirteen year-old daughtes as being 'carbon copies' or 'mirrors' of themselves. I was not suggesting that any diagnosis of any syndrome more complicated than the common cold should be viewed as a sign of psychiatric disturbance!

    ReplyDelete
  20. Plenty of examples of parents and children sharing the condition here. If it is psychological, it's not specific to HE.

    http://chronicfatigue.about.com/b/2011/10/27/is-fibromyalgia-hereditary.htm

    Simon wrote,
    "And if my daughter had started to complain of these at around the time that her mother was diagnosed, I would have smelt a rat!"

    Some genetically connected conditions are thought to be triggered by a virus, which might explain why family members might develop a condition quite soon after another. Again, type 1 diabetes is an example of such a condition and my brother and his child developed diabetes within a year of each other. Are they a Folies a Deux or showing signs of psychiatric disturbance, or does this only apply for conditions that are less easy to confirm with medical tests?

    ReplyDelete
  21. Simon says:
    "What I found curious was that all the six girls at which I have been looking in detail... "

    I think you need to get a new hobby Simon. This sounds a bit intense and creepy to me and this has nothing to do with home education.

    ReplyDelete
  22. 'showing signs of psychiatric disturbance, or does this only apply for conditions that are less easy to confirm with medical tests?'

    Not in the least. What I was drawing attention to here was things which struck me as being very peculiar, so peculiar that I have never encountered them before anywhere. A woman of almost sixty spending years finding doctors who would diagnose her with ADHD, for instance. I have never heard of an adult doing this. When this is combined with an attempt to have her thirteen year old-daughter diagnosed with the same condition at the same time; this is curious. Is the child mirroring the parent or the other way round? In this case, the child then went on a few months later to become allergic to literally every food. Combined with other things, this leads one to examine one hypothesis which would explain the whole thing.

    The other five cases at which I have looked have similar characteristics, I do not propose to go into too much detail.

    ReplyDelete
  23. R says,

    'I think you need to get a new hobby Simon. This sounds a bit intense and creepy to me and this has nothing to do with home education.'

    I would not say that this is my hobby. These parents have come to my attention over the last few years; I have not been conducting an analysis! In every case, they drew themselves to my attention spontaneously, I did not seek them out. When people tell me voluntarily that they suffer from neurological problems and then a few months later I see in the paper that they are claiming that their teenage daughters are also suffering from neurological problems, I am bound to be intrigued. When all these people are also militant home educators, it is scarcely to be wondered at that I look a little closely in order to work out what on earth might be going on.

    Incidentally, the capital 'R' is interesting. A few years ago, somebody signing him or her self only as 'R' was claiming on the HE-UK list that I was a colleague of Graham Badman. Surely this cannot be the same person?

    ReplyDelete
  24. No it isn't the same person. This is Raquel and that person was not me as I have the email in my gmail. Sorry to disappoint. I am just concerned that you seem to be diagnosing someone from afar with what is a serious claim. I don't think personal blogs are people telling you voluntarily. You have sought them out thus "looking in detail".

    ReplyDelete
  25. p.s. I have always used this avi pic on your blog. I am not trying to hide my identity.

    ReplyDelete
  26. 'I don't think personal blogs are people telling you voluntarily. You have sought them out thus "looking in detail".'

    I am not talking about personal blogs. I am talking about people commenting on online articles in newspapers, telling reporters things, making submissions to select committes, posting on open lists and coming on here without my twisting their arms. These people are eager to tell the world of their problems; I hardly need to seek them out!

    ReplyDelete
  27. MS used to be called the hysterical disease and also runs in families. I wonder if similar conversations were held about that condition?

    ReplyDelete
  28. I suffer greatly from PTSD, and guess what? My 4 daughters suffer from it but not my 3 sons. Fancy that! I must have passed it to my girls.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You've passed PTSD to your daughters?
      That can't happen.
      Post Traumatic Stress Disorder isn't a condition connected to genetics, the only way you could have passed PTSD to your daughters is if you've abused them.

      Delete
  29. 'This sounds a bit intense and creepy to me and this has nothing to do with home education.'

    ' You have sought them out thus "looking in detail".'

    As a long-time connoisseur of hypocrisy and double standards, I must be sure to save these two quotations for my scrapbook! Three years ago, when I wrote a couple of pieces for the papers, people all over the lists to which Raquel belonged were delving assiduously into my past and coming up with all sorts of things. One could not help but notice that Raquel's views on this sort of activity were apparently quite different; at least, I do not recollect her saying anywhere, 'Gosh, this all sounds a bit intense and creepy to me and has nothing to do with home education.'

    Still, as readers might remind me, people change. Perhaps in the intervening years Raquel's feelings about that sort of thing has changed. If so, then I would have thought that a week ago when Mike Fortune-Wood was stirring up trouble and trying to get people to dig up some dirt on me, you might think that she would have said, 'Hang on a minute, this sounds a bit intense and creepy to me and has nothing to do with home education.'

    Alas, Raquel said nothing of the sort and it is only now that her conscience has become so tender! Why do you suppose that she feels that it is fine to, as she puts it, 'look in detail' at my life but not at the lives of others? I dare say that she will soon explain all this.

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  30. 'I suffer greatly from PTSD, and guess what? '

    For Heaven's sake, what are you thinking of? Another alphabet soup syndrome; give it a week and half the people posting on the HE-UK list will be trying to get their doctors to diagnose this in children. Most irresponsible.

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  31. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  32. 'I will say though that there are definitely those in the HE world who get diagnoses for themselves then seek them for their children, and vice versa. Often there are huge doses of self diagnosis.'

    What is fascinating about this is that anybody who knocks around with groups of home educators has come across this kind of thing. I am guessing that the people commenting here are all aware that this goes on; it is just thought to be bad form to talk about it openly. The six cases which I describe above are fairly extreme, but there are many more parents who, in casual conversation, tell one that they think they or their children, 'might have a touch of Aspergers'. I bet most people reading this have heard remarks of this sort. They are never made by people who have actually a diagnosis but, like dyslexia, this is presented as a way to excuse some aspect of their child's or their personality.

    I might mention here that I am rude and abrasive, my social skills are negligable and I am lousy at spelling. I could, I suppose, attribute these shortcomings to being on the autistic spectrum or suffering from dyslexia; but that would be a cop-out. The truth is, I am a rude and impatient man who was very lazy at school. This is enough to explain my difficulties. I could easily direct readers to various blogs and so on run by equally rude and abraisve home educators and former home educators who excuse their their manner by claiming to be autistic.

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  33. Woul appear that the clique have found themselves a new fall guy, I actually feel sorry for the poor fool!
    Someone to do their bidding, then able to disassociate themselves from it, when as it inevitably will, goes tits up!!

    Oh dear!!

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  34. "there are many more parents who, in casual conversation, tell one that they think they or their children, 'might have a touch of Aspergers'"

    Are you telling me you've never heard the parents of schoolchildren saying that? Or "I'm a bit OCD"? It's common and slightly flippant parlance to describe minor eccentricities - rarely a serious call for a diagnosis.

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  35. Funniest of all has to be the bipolar internet guru who gets off spreading his own peculiar brand of conspiracy theories and fusion paranoia.
    I often hope that they don't up his medication anytime soon.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I don't know who you're talking about but if they are bipolar only a low life would make fun of them in this way. My bipolar cousin committed suicide a few years back and people like you did not help.

      Delete
    2. Really?
      You are eager too judge aren't you.
      I've helped far more sufferers with bipolar disorders than you could possibly imagine.
      I'm not prepared to tell you how or why.

      Delete
    3. That just makes you comment worse, not better!

      Delete
    4. Dear god...you're harking back to something that happened to your unfortunate cousin a 'few years back'.
      What a sad and pathetic life you lead, even those coping with Bipolar disorders have a sense of humour and that humour can be very dark.
      You should have learned that much at least, it's part of the treatment.
      Your moral indignation leads me to believe that you had next to no contact with your cousin.
      But... it's evident that you're going to come back and pretend that you were always there for that particular tragic individual, you were his/her rock.
      That's how the game you play on here works.

      Delete
    5. Unfortunately...you haven't taken into account the fact that someone should be helping the HE guru to recognise that his preoccupations with conspiracy theories are not healthy.
      They should be indicating that spending great amounts of time and energy writing on the internet about the Rothschild family and the Illuminati isn't a healthy persuit.
      They should be helping him to cope with his condition.

      Delete
    6. "But... it's evident that you're going to come back and pretend that you were always there for that particular tragic individual, you were his/her rock."

      Hardly, we lived to far away to offer any practical help. But I know he suffered from bullying about his condition (including jibes about medication levels) and that it contributed to his death because this was determined during the inquest. Presumably you will now claim that of course he enjoyed the 'jokes' and the people around him know less about him than you, who though you never met him, know lots of other people with bipolar, and they are all the same.

      Delete
    7. BTW, please don't bother with any more excuses on my account since I don't intend to read any more of your poisonous comments.

      Delete
    8. As I said..
      'your moral indignation leads me to believe that you had next to no contact with your cousin'
      You said..
      'We lived too far away to offer any practical help'
      Therefore you prove that you have no real understanding of the condition and it appears that you are generally abusive to those who do have understanding of the condition.

      Those who suffer from Bipolar episodes are not all the same, they are individuals that is why I explained their humour as being very dark..they are generally very intelligent people who are acutely aware of their medication and therapy.

      Obviously you've never worked closely with them or within a Mental Health Trust setting.

      Delete
    9. The comments here are not the same as the gentle black humour shared between people with bipolar and their families or carers. This was poking fun at someone and their medical condition in order to belittle and dismiss their views. Not the same thing at all.

      Delete
  36. Well my children are in rude health, and they wipe their snotty noses on their sleeves. They will NOT use the millions of tissues all over the house.

    I think they are suffering from kiditis.

    A

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  37. 'They should be indicating that spending great amounts of time and energy writing on the internet about the Rothschild family and the Illuminati isn't a healthy persuit.
    They should be helping him to cope with his condition.'

    We are, I suppose, talking here of Neil Taylor?

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  38. I know a man who has grown up with the exact same anxieties as his mother. He is also the youngest child.

    The bigger problem is that he is now passing them on to his daughter...

    None of the three was/is home educated, although the whole family is a bit odd, so it might be genetic...

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