Identity Politics

When my telephone rings, the voice on the other end is typically that of a concerned parent.

Perhaps their child hasn’t come home for nights at a time. Self-harm is increasing. Drug use escalating. The teenager is becoming more aggressive at home. They aren’t getting out of bed for days and not making it to school. I listen intently.

“We tried therapy,” parents will say. “Nothing is working.”

I’ve experienced this call over a thousand times. Today, I find myself in a fortunate position where my goal for this phone call is not to don a sales cap and convert the concerned parent into a paying customer. I want to acknowledge that the parent is troubled by what is happening and then begin developing a narrative richer than diagnostic criteria, troubled youth, ineffective therapy, and labels.

Transforming “Problem-Saturated” Stories

In our upcoming book, “Kids These Days, “ Nevin and I took a deep dive into the rise of mental health labeling, the subsequent medicalization of adolescent distress, and the interventions that follow. Our writing contextualizes these issues against our current sociopolitical climate and identity politics, where individuals are categorized and classified based on their identity.

I can see the reader asking themselves: Mental health and identity politics?

We didn’t anticipate arriving at this juncture, either. One indication was editor Emma Camp’s New York Times opinion piece “Why I Am More and More Ambivalent About My Autism Diagnosis.” Emma’s writing perfectly captured what we discovered in the research evidence, so we contacted her to include her story in the book.

Many people feel reassured when diagnosed by a doctor or a qualified mental health professional. We’ve heard from families, clients, and our university students that it is normalizing to understand their experience and to assign a name to some of their social quirks. Take the more recent rise of “I’m neurodiverse.”

But almost nowhere in most medical interventions does the diagnosis become identity.

“I am the flu.”

“I am chicken pox.”

“I am COVID.”

“I am MS.”

On planet mental health, this is not the case. “I am” and “You are” are commonly found before most labels stamped onto youth.

“I am depressed.”

“I am autistic.”

“I am attention-deficit.”

“You are borderline.”

For serious conditions, the narrative and experience of a medical illness do impact identity. My mother is a breast cancer survivor, and I remember the effects of the surgeries, loss of hair, and fear of what awaited her following each round of testing. Her identity was tied to the diagnosis, but it wasn’t everything. She wasn’t cancer; she was a survivor, patient, mother, and manager. These latter narratives often offer a more hopeful perspective than the diagnosis itself. If anything, they create a much richer picture of who someone is.

There is so much more to the story than the problem-saturated versions we hear when youth are sent our way for therapy. More often than not, the labels don’t actually provide therapists with much information. I would say — and this is only my experience — I’d rather enter the therapeutic adventure not knowing anything. I like to think of those I work with as a blank canvas. Our co-adventuring will bring the canvas to life.

After hearing the story about why the parent wants me to work with their child, I ask the question: “What would you like me NOT to change in your child?”Imagine the shift in narrative. I hear about the spirit of youth again. I hear about a young person I cannot wait to meet.

A Thought Experiment

For those raising teenagers or working with young people, here’s an “experiment” you might consider trying.

I refer to it as an experiment because it could fail. Don’t blame me; it was merely an experiment.

This works best if you use a piece of paper, preferably a yellow legal pad.

List ten qualities that you wish will always be present in the youth you have in mind. Focus on their character traits, values, or passions. If possible, label each quality with 1-3 words for clarity. Ultimately, what makes them exceptional?

Look at your list of ten items. Now, reorder them. Which factors are most important? Spend time on this part. Really rank them.

Keep the list with you. For the next day, tally each time you notice one of the listed items in action.

Before you sign off for the night, ask yourself what you noticed about the youth that day. What was different? What was different about you? Did you change?

I’d love to hear about what you experienced in the comments. Who did you find at the other end?

Again, just an experiment.

Oh…the News

As I finished drafting this short piece for Adults in the Room, I reflected on the political divide in the West that seems based solely on labels. Are you this or that?

As a young punk in Washington DC, I was always free for a good protest. Women’s rights, same-sex marriage, anti-war, animal rights, impeaching some leader — I was there for it. The fire in me has not been smothered, but I do see these divides with a wide breadth.

No person is “just” something. Depression doesn’t look the same in everyone, and neither does ADHD, Republican, Democrat, Totalitarian, Libertarian, Ally, Religious person, or Atheist.

The best part of my work is meeting people where they’re at and seeing what happens. Labels and diagnoses are one way to look at something. But there is another way — one that is more holistic and may help preserve our democracy and capture the spirit of youth. We seek to connect, to learn more about what these labels mean and find out who people are in the process.