re: Sunday AMA: SECdragonmaster

quote:

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In your opinion, is Oppositional Defiance Disorder (ODD) a real disorder in children? If not, is it due to bad parenting, a symptom of another mental illness, or none of the above?

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Great question. Answer is multifactorial. It’s real in that it is a commonly seen and reproduced clinical picture. But it’s not real in the sense that it has no genetic basis and no application across other cultures.

A terribke set of parents cannot make a good kid turn to ODD.

However, a stubborn kid with a parent that is too focused on “loving” their child over “limiting” their child will almost always produce a kid with ODD.

In 20 years, I have never seen a kid with ODD that had a strong set of parents(2 who were in agreement and set appropriate boundaries). The problem is that when you have a stubborn kid, you can be the best mom/dad in the world and if your partner is weak - you end up with an ODD child. When I say weak, I mean they never follow through on consequences, they make vague threats, they constantly try to explain and justify and educate the child instead of just following through with the consequence.

I feel bad for the child every time. It’s not his/her fault they are not being taught how to succeed in life.