Scattered: How Attention Deficit Disorder Originates and What You Can Do About It

by Gabor Maté

The derivation of sensitivity is from the Latin word sensir, “to feel.” Degrees of sensitivity reflect degrees of feeling. Of the various Oxford Dictionary definitions of sensitive, it will be useful to keep three in mind. Each is exquisitely apt as a description of the ADD child: 1. Very open to or acutely affected by external stimuli or mental impressions. 2. Easily offended, or emotionally hurt. 3. (As of an instrument) responsive to or recording small changes. The word has another connotation, that of being empathetic, respectful of other people’s feelings. The two meanings may coexist in the same individual, but not in every case. Some of the most sensitive people in terms of how they react may be the least mindful of the feelings of others. Some human beings are hyperreactive. A relatively negligible stimulus, or what to other people would seem negligible, sets off in them an intense reaction. When this happens in response to physical stimuli, we say the person is allergic. Someone allergic to, say, bee venom may choke, wheeze and gasp for air when stung. The small airways in the lungs may go into spasm, tissues in the throat may swell, the heartbeat may become irregular. His life may be in peril. The nonallergic person, had she been stung by the same bee, would experience no more than a momentary pain, a welt, an irritating itch. Was it the bee sting that sent the first victim into physiological crisis? Not directly. It was his own physiological responses that broug...