Reps for the OP.

Sounds like your parent never learned self discipline, and then you never learned self disicipline as a result.

On a spectrum? Lol @ this society's victim mentality, brb finding a way to encompass my behavior under some broad spectrum diagnosis to cope with my own shortcomings to deny responsibility for my own actions.

Brb "i can watch a movie for 2.5 hours and pay attention"
Brb "i can play sports for periods of time and pay attention"
Brb " i can pay attention to all of the things on my smartphone or tablet"

...

Brb "this math problem/concept/lesson takes to much mental energy for me cuz its not instantly mentally rewarding and i cant concentrate on it for more than 2 minutes, i must have adhd"

This.

Someone who really has ADD cannot focus even if they want to. Like that girls son I was talking about who couldn't eat if there was anything going on, and didn't matter how hungry he was, kid was miserable. However, I see these dumbasses who can play videogames for hours on end but can't do simple chores around the house or do school work. If you can focus on things you want, then it's all about self-discipline.

Parents today give their kids too many choices. They can choose what they want, and if they don't like something they are allowed to protest. They throw fits and get rewarded so they keep doing it. They will often continue all the way to being adults.

I think what you are trying to describe is hyper-focus.

One theory of ADHD is that it was formerly advantageous but is now maladaptive in some settings, like a classroom.Kind of a vague big picture version of this...the hunter type (ADHD) is constantly bombarded with a lot of stimulation at about the same "volume" for lack of a better term so it is difficult to focus in on a single task unless interest is stimulated, the original interest being survival. So all the sounds/sights/smells are coming in on the same level and focus isn't triggered unless interest is stimulated...as in "I sense something that could harm me/eat me...now I am very very much paying attention to that" or "I need food and here is an animal I could eat" or maybe even a type of organic gatherer mapping system...a system that is processing multiple inputs and finding patters for "this is a good time to go find berries at that spot" because these people didn't have calendars or maps.

Consider that being focused on something that didn't stimulate interest (wasn't important for survival)...scratching around making a picture in the dirt maybe...could mean that you don't notice the smell of a predator when the wind changes, or a rustle in the grass nearby. Being wide open and unfocused/equally focused on everything could actually keep you alive if things that were interesting triggered you.

Now in this world it is a lot noisier, flashier, smellier, so someone with ADHD can be getting triggered all the time and constantly having to shuffle through what matters and what doesn't matter.

Forgive the run on sentence...it's past my bedtime.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunter...mer_hypothesis

Not abandoning thread, but I am going to sleep. Manana.

It isn't known to be a real disease. It has so much overlap with other diagnoses. It has no objective test.

Mainstream organisations are disingenuous about the causes of ADHD. ADHDisassociated with single parents, parents on welfare and low parental education. But sometimes diagnosis is higher in richer areas due to greater access to clinicians!! There are many other associations which include certain genes. Of course it doesn't make sense to say that a welfare chequecausesADHD. But it makes plenty of sense to say that bad parenting causes ADHD. It says it right in the definition - ADHD is a neurodevelopmental disorder. Who could deny that parents influence the neurodevelopment of their child?