More U.S. Children Being Diagnosed With Youthful Tendency Disorder
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http://www.theonion.com/content/news/more_u_s_children_being_diagnosed?utm_source=EMTF_Onion
More U.S. Children Being Diagnosed With Youthful
Tendency Disorder
September 27, 2000 | Issue 36•34
REDLANDS, CA–Nicholas and Beverly Serna's
daughter Caitlin was only four years old, but they
already knew there was a problem.
More U.S. Children Being Diagnosed With Youthful
Tendency Disorder
Day after day, upon arriving home from preschool,
Caitlin would retreat into a bizarre fantasy world.
Sometimes, she would pretend to be people and things
she was not. Other times, without warning, she would
burst into nonsensical song. Some days she would run
directionless through the backyard of the Sernas'
comfortable Redlands home, laughing and shrieking as
she chased imaginary objects.
When months of sessions with a local psychologist
failed to yield an answer, Nicholas and Beverly took
Caitlin to a prominent Los Angeles pediatric
neurologist for more exhaustive testing. Finally, on
Sept. 11, the Sernas received the heartbreaking news:
Caitlin was among a growing legion of U.S. children
suffering from Youthful Tendency Disorder.
"As horrible as the diagnosis was, it was a relief to
finally know," said Beverly. "At least we knew we
weren't bad parents. We simply had a child who was
born with a medical disorder."
Onion Med Watch
Youthful Tendency Disorder (YTD), a poorly understood
neurological condition that afflicts an estimated 20
million U.S. children, is characterized by a variety
of senseless, unproductive physical and mental
exercises, often lasting hours at a time. In the
thrall of YTD, sufferers run, jump, climb, twirl,
shout, dance, do cartwheels, and enter unreal,
unexplainable states of "make-believe."
"The Youthful child has a kind of love/hate
relationship with reality," said Johns Hopkins
University YTD expert Dr. Avi Gwertzman. "Unfit to
join the adult world, they struggle to learn its mores
and rules in a process that can take the entirety of
their childhood. In the meantime, their emotional and
perceptive problems cause them to act out in
unpredictable and extremely juvenile ways. It's as
though they can only take so much reality; they have
to 'check out,' to go Youthful for a while."
On a beautiful autumn day in Asheville, NC,
six-year-old Cameron Boudreaux is swinging on a park
swingset–a monotonous, back-and-forth action that
apparently gives him solace. Spotting his mother on a
nearby bench, Cameron rushes eagerly to her and asks,
"Guess what?" His mother responds with a friendly,
"What?"
Common YTD Warning Signs
With unbridled glee, Cameron shouts, "Chicken
butt!"--cryptic words understood only by him--before
laughing and dashing off again, leaving his mother
distraught over yet another baffling non-conversation.
"I must admit, it's been a struggle," Mary Boudreaux
said. "What can I say to him when he says something
like that, something that makes no sense? Or when he
runs through the house yelling while I'm trying to
balance the checkbook? You can't just say, 'Please,
Cameron, don't have a disorder for just a few minutes
so I can concentrate.'"
Cameron's psychological problems run even deeper. He
can name every one of his beloved, imaginary Pokemon
characters, but the plain realities of the actual
world he inhabits are an enigma: Ask Cameron the name
of the real-life city councilman sponsoring the
referendum to renovate the park just across the street
from his house–a park he plays in daily–and he draws a
blank.
According to Dr. Dinesh Agarwal, director of child
psychiatry at NYU Medical Center, such
disconnectedness from reality is a coping mechanism
for YTD sufferers. "The Youthful child is born into a
world he or she does not fully understand," Agarwal
said. "Their brain pathways are still forming, and
they need to repetitively relearn how to assimilate
into society. These disassociative play-fantasies
apparently help them accomplish that."
Debra Cottle of Malden, MA, discusses her daughter's
recently diagnosed YTD with pediatric neurologist Dr.
Amy Yuan.
But such fantasies come at a price, producing in
Youthful children a disinterest in the everyday
responsibilities of life bordering on contempt.
"Jesse knows when it's his turn to take out the trash.
We've gone over the house rules a dozen times," said
Richard Torres, a Davenport, IA, father of three whose
nine-year-old son Jesse was recently diagnosed with
YTD. "And still he neglects the job time and again."
Slowly, methodically, through an elaborate system of
rewards and punishments, Jesse has shown improvement.
But the road ahead is long.
"We get a lot of platitudes from the so-called
experts," Torres said. "We hear a lot of, 'Oh, he'll
grow out of it, just give it time.' That's easy for
them to say–their kid's not running around the
neighborhood claiming to be Superman."
Help for families struggling with YTD may soon be on
the way. At last month's annual AMA Convention,
Smithkline-Beecham unveiled Juvenol, a promising YTD
drug which, pending FDA approval, could reach the U.S.
market as early as next spring. Already available in
France and Sweden, Juvenol, the Swedish newspaper
Aftonbladet reported, resulted in a 60 percent
decrease in running and jumping among users.
But until such help arrives, the parents of YTD
sufferers can do little more than try to get through
each day.
"I love my child with all my heart," said Alexandra
Torres, Jesse's mother. "But when he's in the throes
of one of his skipping fits, it's hard not to feel a
little envious of parents with normal, healthy
children."
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