It’s becoming more and more common – children being diagnosed with mental illnesses. Modern psychiatrists are sympathetic to the harassed parents of these children. Russell Barkley, the Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder expert, says it’s nobody’s fault when a child has a disorder. It is not due to bad parenting. He advises parents to go to a doctor, and says psychotropic medication is often very effective.

But good as it sounds if you are such a parent, I don’t know if it really helps us.

One, long-term outcomes with psychotropic drugs are simply not known now. How will your child do on twenty years of methylphenidate (Ritalin, for hyperactivity) or risperidone (Risperdal, for bipolar disorder)? To tell the truth, nobody knows yet.

Two, all children respond to respect, sympathy, and good teaching. Yes, it makes us feel guilty and terrible when someone says this, and doing more seems physically impossible sometimes. Take Maria Montessori – if you are a parent of a problem child, her work will be difficult to read. She accuses parents and teachers and is totally sympathetic to children.

But her methods work. Not many people know that she was a psychiatric doctor who, unlike most of her colleagues, believed that ‘uneducable’ children could be taught. Her ‘defective’ eight-year olds from a special school, taught by Montessori herself, succeeded in passing the state examination for normal children, and in fact did rather well.

For problem children, having just one adult (parent, grandparent, teacher) who believes in them can turn their lives around. Drugs cannot do that.

Susan Vinodh Pandian

Read more about children’s disorders here:

1. Financial crises can affect children’s mental health

2. Mental disorders among child soldiers

3. Children of arrested illegal aliens develop mental illnesses

4. History of child abuse in adults with depression