Special Snowflake Syndrome

Posted on | December 22, 2013 | 77 Comments

A frightening report from the front lines of the Culture War:

Amy (not her real name) sat in my office and wiped her streaming tears on her sleeve, refusing the scratchy tissues I’d offered. “I’m thinking about just applying for a Ph.D. program after I graduate because I have no idea what I want to do.” Amy had mild depression growing up, and it worsened during freshman year of college when she moved from her parents’ house to her dorm. It became increasingly difficult to balance school, socializing, laundry, and a part-time job. She finally had to dump the part-time job, was still unable to do laundry, and often stayed up until 2 a.m. trying to complete homework because she didn’t know how to manage her time without her parents keeping track of her schedule.
I suggested finding a job after graduation, even if it’s only temporary. She cried harder at this idea. “So, becoming an adult is just really scary for you?” I asked. “Yes,” she sniffled. Amy is 30 years old.
Her case is becoming the norm for twenty- to thirtysomethings I see in my office as a psychotherapist. I’ve had at least 100 college and grad students like Amy crying on my couch because breaching adulthood is too overwhelming.

Key phrase: “Amy had mild depression growing up.”

Re-written: “Amy was diagnosed with mild depression growing up.”

That is to say, Amy was introduced to therapeutic culture at an early age, because she grew up in an affluent society that can afford for its more privileged youth to get thousands of dollars worth of psychiatric treatment to deal with their feelings. Does anyone ever stop to wonder what became of such people before the rise of the psychotherapy industry in the 20th century?

What happens is that people become defined by their diagnoses, so that sometimes you meet someone at a reception who tells you, within the first five minutes of your introduction, that they suffer from depression, bipolar disorder, ADD or whatever.

To digress: Why don’t we ever meet any really interesting nuts? I mean, it might be interesting to meet someone at a cocktail party who says, “Yes, I’ve been diagnosed with sado-masochistic compulsions stemming from an unresolved Electra Complex.”

But old-fashioned Freudian categories are out of fashion, so you never meet anyone who describes themselves as being in the throes of an oral fixation or nymphomania or something like that. Neither, for that matter, does anyone ever describe themselves as a psychopath or a lunatic — “Hi, I’m Phil and I’m certifiably insane” — but instead these people usually confess to suffering from mood disorders which, to the contemporary way of thinking, means that they are sympathetic victims, rather than outright kooks.

Ever since Prozac started making headlines back in the 1990s, I’ve been dubious about the “brain chemistry” approach to treating mood disorders with SSRIs, because of a common-sense skepticism toward the claims of scientific “experts.” Is it really a smart idea to be loading people up on complex chemicals with all kinds of potential long-term effects? I mean, how many people who start on anti-depressants in their teens or 20s ever actually get well?

That is to say, shouldn’t the goal of psychiatric treatment be to get patients to the point where they don’t need treatment any more?

And yet I can’t remember anyone ever saying, “Yes, I was diagnosed with chronic depression, but I took these pills for six months and it went away, so now I don’t need the pills anymore and I’m as cheerful as a songbird all the time.” But I digress . . .

Encouraging kids to think of themselves as suffering from mental illness, e.g., Amy’s “mild depression,” is great for the pill merchants, but I’m not sure it’s really good for the kids. Helplessness is a learned condition, and if you start telling kids that they are helpless victims of their moods and feelings, well, maybe they’ll believe you. And if they are truly helpless . . .

“[T]herapeutic morality encourages a permanent suspension of the moral sense. There is a close connection, in turn, between the erosion of moral responsibility and the waning capacity for self-help . . . between the elimination of culpability and the elimination of competence.”
– Christopher Lasch, The Culture of Narcissism: American Life in an Age of Diminishing Expectations (1979)

Describing the problems he sees with young people, psychotherapist Brooke Donatone writes that “the ability to address hardships is lacking in many members of this generation” who have had too much parental assistance and supervision:

The researchers suggest that intrusive parenting interferes with the development of autonomy and competence. So helicopter parenting leads to increased dependence and decreased ability to complete tasks without parental supervision. . . .
Rates of depression are soaring among millennials in college. A 2012 study by the American College Counseling Association reported a 16 percent increase in mental-health visits since 2000 and a significant increase in crisis response over the past five years. . . .
If parents are navigating every minor situation for their kids, kids never learn to deal with conflict on their own. . . .
Amy, like many millennials, was groomed to be an academic overachiever, but she became, in reality, an emotional under-achiever. Amy did not have enough coping skills to navigate normal life stressors — how do I get my laundry and my homework done in the same day; how do I tell my roommate not to watch TV without headphones at 3 a.m.? — without her parents’ constant advice or help. . . .

Why is this happening? I blame the American micro-family, the two-income suburban household with one or two children. The parents are college-educated and expect — no, demand — that their children follow in their footsteps, without regard to the child’s own aptitudes or interests. This kind of high-pressure parenting is basically impossible with larger families, and the child with multiple siblings must necessarily rely more on his own resources.

High-achieving professionals quite naturally expect that their children should be able to replicate their success, but investing such hopes in just one or two kids puts unrealistic pressures on them, and fails to consider the problem of deviation to the norm.

The more exceptional a parent’s success, the less likely that their children will be able to match or exceed it. If you’re a Harvard-educated neurobiologist, the temptation to treat your child as a hothouse flower in an effort to make the child an even more exceptional achiever is likely to yield disappointment, simply because most kids — even those who inherit tremendous potential and who are provided with every advantage — aren’t exceptional.

Who are Amy’s parents? I’ll bet they’re well-educated, successful and affluent and are horribly disappointed in her. She’s 30 years old and says she has “no idea” what she wants to do, but I’ve got news for her: You’re already doing it, Amy. It’s called “failure.”

Lot of that going around lately.

Category: Culture, Education

Comments

77 Responses to “Special Snowflake Syndrome”

Citzcom
December 22nd, 2013 @ 6:31 am

Special Snowflake Syndrome: A frightening report from the front lines of the Culture War: Amy (not her real na… http://t.co/GCVZdJNq42
rsmccain
December 22nd, 2013 @ 6:51 am

RT @commonpatriot: via @rsmccain: Special Snowflake Syndrome http://t.co/ZFiAe1Ps3y #tcot
smitty
December 22nd, 2013 @ 7:21 am

>That is to say, shouldn’t the goal of psychiatric treatment be to get patients to the point where they don’t need treatment any more?

Where under the sun is the business model in THAT?
robertstacymccain
December 22nd, 2013 @ 7:30 am

That’s what I’m saying: The goal of psychiatric treatment is … treatment.

Not mental health, because mentally healthy people don’t need treatment, and treatment is what the mental health industry sells. The most common prescription in America is anti-depressants, and you can’t get that prescription unless you go see a psychiatrist every so often. So it becomes a cycle, which helps the profits for the pharmaceutical companies, but I’m not sure it’s really helping the people who are getting the treatment, because none of them ever seem to get cured.
ChubbyBubba
December 22nd, 2013 @ 7:31 am

>That is to say, shouldn’t the goal of psychiatric treatment be to get
patients to the point where they don’t need treatment any more?

Stacey, luv ya man, but here you’re writing about what you don’t understand. A lot of people actually do get better after 6 months of treatment. A lot of us don’t, though. For people like me, the end point is to keep us from killing ourselves, and so far, combined drug and therapy treatment are working ok.

My diagnosis did not define me. I’m 52 and dealt with this disease all my life until it worsened to the point and thank God the first effective treatments were becoming available (prozac – there were earlier ones, but they were replete with significant side effects). What defined me was the disease, beaten into me by my dad from the age of 2 on – learned helplessness and dissociation does not go far in life without compounding consequences.

Long and short of it – You’re spouting off 1950’s pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps nonsense from a very ignorant standpoint. This is not characteristic of you.
NeoWayland
December 22nd, 2013 @ 7:32 am

Some of my reading calls it the “culture of victimhood.”

I’ve got an aunt who calls it the “poor little me syndrome.”

Whatever the label, our society has conditioned people to believe that they can not succeed without constant help, usually from government.

And if you dare succeed too much, why, you stole it from the truly deserving.
Alessandra
December 22nd, 2013 @ 7:44 am

Who are Amy’s parents?
=============
Hey by the short feature (and it tells us very little), I think there are a lot more serious problems with the parents than what has been revealed. And Amy’s state won’t allow her to even begin to grasp it, and she’s the only one telling us what this family is like. tip of the iceberg.

There’s also a number of women like Amy, although perhaps less and less, who switch from this kind of parents to similar husband. That is, some women are like children and would completely fall apart if their husband didn’t do all the adult functions in their life. That’s no solution either.
JadedByPolitics
December 22nd, 2013 @ 7:44 am

Special Snowflake Syndrome http://t.co/Gjlb9cBSqY
mt noise
December 22nd, 2013 @ 8:12 am

Because if you have a mental illness its very possible you will never be ‘cured’. Managed, controlled, etc is sometimes the best you can hope for.

Are some over prescribed or misdiagnosed? Of course! Far, far too many but for many others its a daily struggle. I thank God for the pharmaceutical companies. They’re the only things that have kept me and my other half alive for the past 30+ years.
Josh_Painter
December 22nd, 2013 @ 8:35 am

RT @smitty_one_each: TOM Special Snowflake Syndrome http://t.co/VJ4xr8jU0J #TCOT
Mm
December 22nd, 2013 @ 8:47 am

Change “Amy” to a certain deranged cyber stalker, and “depression” to a progressive neurological disorder, and a lot of this post equally applies. He defines himself by his disorder, and makes sure everyone knows about it within moments of coming across him via Twitter, etc. The disorder has become the handy excuse through which he blames all his failures, when he’s not blaming those who don’t submit to his bullying. I see a lot of this these days.
Mm
December 22nd, 2013 @ 8:57 am

I agree with you and Stacy. There are people like you, and some friends of mine, for whom either counseling or medication saved their lives. One friend sank into a profound depression that took five years to resolve through prayer and therapy, no drugs. The cause? Chronic child abuse at the hands of her entire family. In a lot of cases, these issues are like ticking time bombs that surface when there is finally stability in that person’s life.

On the other hand, what Stacy describes is what I think is one of the fallacies of our self-esteem focused culture which is, namely, what have you DONE to feel good about yourself? Amy sounds like one of those people. Was she allowed to fail with the support of her parents, then work u til she succeeded? And for those of you who do not have daughters, every single woman I know admits to some depression during puberty, a depression that resolved itself. Treatng this type of depression in girls, which is normal WITHIN CERTAIN PARAMETERS, is as misguided as giving active little boys Ritalin instead of recess.
Joe Dokes
December 22nd, 2013 @ 9:19 am

My parents were not remotely abusive but I can say with complete objectivity and accuracy that I (youngest of four in a upper Lower Class family) was not thoroughly prepared for The Real World that, ready or not, awaits us all. Do I blame them for this? No. It’d be pointless and I suspect they know it anyway, though we’ve never discussed it.

Everyone is born with strengths and weaknesses, with innate skill sets and abilities that others lack, on top of the myriad circumstances of childhood, good, bad and awful. Some of this damage – and it IS a form of damage – can be overcome or at least managed with help. Some, in time, is simply outgrown. Some is even turned into strength. Depends on the person. But there’s one thing I know from personal experience: whatever your upbringing was like, eventually a combination of simply accepting it for what it was and moving on with your own adult life is indispensable to your survival as a functioning member of society. Part of that is learning to forgive those who wronged us in the past…whether the wrongs were well-intentioned or demonically evil, agreeing to carry that emotional baggage on your back is what keeps a lot of people in some degree of perpetual childhood and helplessness. It was very tempting at one point for me to indulge such bitterness (for that’s what it is), but to do so was not only nonproductive but antiproductive, hurting no one but me.

Some things, sad and awful as they were, just have to be let go if we’re to survive as true adults. That’s why kids brought up in a truly loving homes (which includes reasonable discipline and training by adults as preparation for life) are the most truly fortunate, even if financially the family is just scraping by. Just my two cents.
Alessandra
December 22nd, 2013 @ 9:31 am

That’s why kids brought up in truly loving homes (which includes
reasonable discipline and sometimes tough training by loving adults in
preparation for life) are the most truly fortunate, even if financially
the family is just scraping by.
============
One of the world’s greatest truths.
richard mcenroe
December 22nd, 2013 @ 9:34 am

wrong thread. sorry.
Joe Dokes
December 22nd, 2013 @ 9:44 am

Yep, and it’s one that I and my wife (who had an eerily similar faulty upbringing) are implementing with our daughters. Whatever flaws the girls have, and will have, being unprepared for The World As It Is, Not As We’d Like It To Be will NOT be one of them.
Sorta Blogless Sunday Pinup » Pirate's Cove
December 22nd, 2013 @ 9:52 am

[…] The Other McCain has special snowflake syndrome […]
Mm
December 22nd, 2013 @ 9:55 am

Well said.
MattRoss
December 22nd, 2013 @ 10:00 am

I read that type of thing a lot from supporters of a certain sexual offender from Florida.
JoeDee
December 22nd, 2013 @ 10:18 am

How could you(or McCain) have missed the fact that Amy’s a lesbian?

“She started online dating, something she found daunting before, and got a girlfriend”.

I guess you’ll now have that to blame for her problems or claim her problems are what created her lesbianism.
sarah wells
December 22nd, 2013 @ 11:03 am

I was a little startled by th e expectation that medicines which are effective must and usually do cure the patient. That’s really the anomaly in medicine, not the rule. Some acute conditions are managed or fixed that way, but serious chronic conditions are usually carefully managed long term or permanently with medication. Eg, Neither Advil or TNF inhibitors cure inflammatory arthritis. Benzoyl peroxide won’t cure your acne. Glaucoma patients aren’t cured by pressure-lowering eye drops. Medicines should make a person more functional or limit, slow or stop progression of illness, but when that is the case long term or even lifetime use of meds can be necessary. Someone with bi polar disorder should not stop taking medicine because he is stable and functional. Stop the meds and that person can auger into disaster. Someone with chronic depression may be helped by anti depressants, but lack of a permanent cure after a short course is no reason to call a treatment ineffective.
Evi L. Bloggerlady
December 22nd, 2013 @ 11:07 am

It is really unethical, since other professionals work toward resolution (i.e., lawyers, most medical doctors, engineers, etc.). The client comes generally with some sort of challenge or problem and the professional helps them resolve it.

Mental health industry, more often than not, does not work that way. But that is because the therapist is taking over the role of priest or minister. Instead of sacraments they hand out psychotropic drugs.

The Scientologists want in on the racket, hence their animosity to the mental health industry. That and some psychiatrist declaring L. Ron Hubbard was BSC.
Evi L. Bloggerlady
December 22nd, 2013 @ 11:10 am

Short of living on the streets, financial status does not make one happy (modest means often are better than over flowing affluence just to remind the kids that nothing is a given and life has risks), loving parents are the critical thing children need.
Evi L. Bloggerlady
December 22nd, 2013 @ 11:22 am

The big problem is not that they think too highly of themselves. Their bigger challenge is conflict negotiation, and they often are unable to think for themselves. The overinvolvement of helicopter parents prevents children from learning how to grapple with disappointments on their own. If parents are navigating every minor situation for their kids, kids never learn to deal with conflict on their own. Helicopter parenting has caused these kids to crash land.

Poor parenting leads these kids to go find a substitute, be it in a therapist. I am surprised more of them are not seeking to join cults.
Lockstein13
December 22nd, 2013 @ 11:37 am

“She’s 30 years old and says she has “no idea” what she wants to do, but I’ve got news for her: You’re already doing it, Amy. It’s called “failure.”“

BINGO. Harvesting the Trophy-For-Showing-Up sown generation, one loser at a time.
Alessandra
December 22nd, 2013 @ 11:40 am

and I guess you, without having any competence for investigating and evaluating her entire history and dysfunctional psychological development is going to claim you know the etiology of her homosexuality problem!

“How could you(or McCain) have missed the fact that Amy’s a lesbian? ”

Cause there’s a Duck Dynasty Internet firestorm and that’s a lot more fun to read about.

You can go read about Amy if you like. Keep us posted! 😉
Finrod Felagund
December 22nd, 2013 @ 11:42 am

“Tired of lying in the sunshine, staying home to watch the rain / For you are young and life is long and there is time to kill today / And then one day you find ten years have got behind you / No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun” — Pink Floyd, Time
M. Thompson
December 22nd, 2013 @ 11:43 am

I’m happy that after a certain point, my parents pretty much abandoned me. I messed up in college, and joined the Navy. I now have an idea of what I want to do with my life.
Alessandra
December 22nd, 2013 @ 11:43 am

I hope her counselor is ethical enough to dissuade her from a PhD. Given her homosexual problem, however, she could get by in a program that has other LGBT faculty – the gay mafia is all for strengthening their numbers! Especially if she is willing to give them personal attention…
richard mcenroe
December 22nd, 2013 @ 11:44 am

And keep in mind many of these Special Snowflakes have been put into treatment for someone else’s benefit, not theirs. How many normal young boys were “diagnosed” as ADHD just so bureacrats and “educators” could Ritalin them into zoned, acquiescent behavior?

Or the rush of parents dragging their kids to shrinks to be tested for Asperger’s after an episode of “Big Bang Theory”. The answer, “Kid’s fine, you just raised an asshole” would not have gone over very well.
Alessandra
December 22nd, 2013 @ 11:47 am

This whole “drug the children” culture is barbaric!! Nothing that I’d like to see more is for these kids to grow up quickly so they could send some of these garbage of psychiatrists to prison
Alessandra
December 22nd, 2013 @ 11:51 am

. Instead of sacraments they hand out psychotropic drugs.

The Scientologists want in on the racket,
===============
Exactly – two sides of the same shameless racketeering coin

“Brave new world” – Huxley brilliantly predicted it decades ago – scary
Shawny
December 22nd, 2013 @ 11:51 am

Diagnosed with depression? Sounds more like undiagnosed (or parentally denied) developmental disability…..or “special snowflake syndrome”. Parents still keeping her focused or on task at 30? And she didn’t start her freshman year until then and was still living at home? Note that she “had” to dump work and laundry (which mom likely did for her at home)…..but not socializing. Yet with all that freed up time she was still up till 2 a.m. doing homework. Maybe. Or maybe it’s learned behavior. I’m not a mental health professional. But as a single parent I did raise two daughters now in their 30’s so I have some clue how that works. They all get anxious or depressed sometimes but if this lady truly is depressed then she needed a second opinion or another doctor or a different medication a long time ago.
Alessandra
December 22nd, 2013 @ 11:59 am

And!!! there’s this: JoeDee just mentioned Amy has a homosexuality problem.

Which brings us to: you all have heard about how homosexual activists, supported by liberals (and fat nightmares like Christie), are going around the country trying to ban therapy for teens with a homosexuality problem, alleging that the kid cannot give consent to treatment.

Which kid can give consent to being drugged out of their minds because some psychiatrist wants the kid made artificially happy?

Liberals have no qualms about drugging kids with any kind of problem (including those caused by their dysfunctional parents), yet, all of a sudden, it’s a problem if you try to solve a kid’s dysfunctional homosexuality problems with therapy.
WarEagle82
December 22nd, 2013 @ 11:59 am

It appears that the parents of this “girl” has managed to enable their child to extend adolescence, if not childhood, into nearly mid-life.

Of course, it is may not be all the parent’s fault. The “girl” has to bear some responsibility for her own action, or inaction.

Letting go of your children is tough but you have to turn your children loose and let them go. They are always your child but they are not always children.

And somebody seems to have allowed this child to live in “never-never land” far too long.

I don’t know what role meds play in all this but clearly, we are a very over-medicated nation at this time.
NoLongerOverMedicated
December 22nd, 2013 @ 12:08 pm

This is far too true. I was on medications for several years. And of course, I had to see my doctor every year to get the prescription renewed. Then they said I had to see the doctor every six month just to get the meds renewed.

The ONLY questions the doctor EVERY ASKED were:
1) How do you feel?
2) Do you feel the medications are working?
3) Would you like to increase your dose of meds?

There was no medical testing done. Just “pushing” more meds. I recently read that doctors can reap $160,000 or more from drug companies for dispensing products.

My “doctor” was more of a “pusher” than medical provider. Finally, I weaned myself off the meds and stopped seeing the doctor. I have been medication-free for 8 or 9 years now.

I suspect my experience is far too common. And the only ones benefiting from this are the drug companies and the doctors.
Alessandra
December 22nd, 2013 @ 12:13 pm

Sorry to hear it. And I totally agree that your experience is far too common.
Don’t know if you’re aware, but pharma companies are spending millions to develop drugs to prescribe to people with drinking problems. See? they want to be the substitute “alcohol” drug and earn billions with the same drug addiction problem. Except they’ll call it “legal” and “medical.” Science!
Your newest Mental disorder? Special Snowflake Syndrome | The Daley Gator
December 22nd, 2013 @ 12:17 pm

[…] AS described by The Other McCain. As you read his description, see if anyone you know comes to mind. I work with a lot of younger people who seem to be suffering from Snowflake status […]
Stogie Chomper
December 22nd, 2013 @ 12:23 pm

Not every affliction can be cured, only managed. Diabetes is one example, and requires insulin pills or injections for life. Other incurable afflictions may include heart disease and lupus.

Chronic depression is very real and seems to be organic. If so, those afflicted cannot merely “think” their way out of it, or overcome it by willpower alone. Medications can and do help.

Chronic fatigue syndrome is probably organic (the result of some biological defect).

People do cope with these disabilities, however, and the need to pay the rent and put food on the table is a great incentive to do so.
NoLongerOverMedicated
December 22nd, 2013 @ 12:23 pm

Of course! Why cure something when you can create never-ending dependency on a product?

So many medications themselves are damaging to the body. Did you ever read the warnings on common drugs like proton pump inhibitors?
ThePaganTemple
December 22nd, 2013 @ 12:24 pm

Now now kiddies, let’s not forget, the doctor that might someday remove a tumor from your chest probably isn’t going to be responsible for it being there to begin with.
robertstacymccain
December 22nd, 2013 @ 12:25 pm

Actually, I didn’t “miss” that, I just didn’t mention it, because it struck me as a distraction from the main theme of the Slate column. This is not to say that Amy’s lesbianism is irrelevant — it may be highly relevant — but in terms of discussing the phenomena I described, I felt it would have taken me off on a tangent I wished to avoid.
Stogie Chomper
December 22nd, 2013 @ 12:25 pm

It depends on the doctor. I have never seen a psychiatrist, but my general practitioner doctor regularly prescribes my SSRIs.
News of the Week (December 22nd, 2013) | The Political Hat
December 22nd, 2013 @ 12:41 pm

[…] Special Snowflake Syndrome A frightening report from the front lines of the Culture War […]
Joe Dokes
December 22nd, 2013 @ 12:51 pm

I have worked closely with a psychologist for some years. After seeing her interactions with others (including children) and how she speaks of them in their absence, she is NOT the type of person I want to see anyone confide in. But then, I consider much psycology to be voodoo in a shirt and tie.
ThePaganTemple
December 22nd, 2013 @ 1:22 pm

Well, if her problem is lesbianism, I’ve got the cure for that. On the other hand, her and her girlfriend probably have a bigger version, and it’s portable and battery powered to boot. Am I the only one who wnders why lesbian sex toys look like a penis instead of a vagina?
Mm
December 22nd, 2013 @ 2:07 pm

There are a lot of illnesses that modern medicine can’t cure. Ovarian cancer, PD, MS, and cystic fibrosis to name a few. I also know a fantastic psychologist, a. Lose family friend, who treats her patients with dignity and respect, and is loathe to refer anyone to a psychiatrist for medication, unless it is something like bipolar disorder or schizophrenia. My point is that there is a happy medium in the health care field, but as a society we swing from one extreme to another. Some people need medicine, others need counseling, and other need a kick in the ass. One size does not fit all.
Art Deco
December 22nd, 2013 @ 2:12 pm

Uh huh.

Did this woman start college at age 25 or did it take her 12 years to finish? What was she doing with those missing nine years? The author seeks to leave the impression that this patient has no employment history. Not too plausible.

Wagers this particular psychotherapist has constructed a composite or manufactured a literary character out of one of her patients by omitting salient details.

The usual complaint about the young is the transactional nature of their entaglements. Now we hear that the real problem is they do not salve their broken hearts with an evening of schnapps and ice cream.

Ignore this grifter.
Art Deco
December 22nd, 2013 @ 2:14 pm

I hope the patient stays away from graduate programs in academic subjects and learns a trade to which melancholics are well adapted (accounting, perhaps).
Art Deco
December 22nd, 2013 @ 2:17 pm

Sorry chum, melancholia is not a disease and mental health tradesman have vocational and ideological interests which conflict with your interest in being a passably functioning human being. They do not care about your problems. They care about applying their solutions (no matter that the solutions are ineffective). They are also earning a living, just like people who sell timeshares and pick stocks.