Raising Generation RX (Mothering Kids with Invisible Disabilities in an Age of Inequality)

Recent years have seen an explosion in the number of children diagnosed with “invisible disabilities” such as ADHD, mood and conduct disorders, and high-functioning autism spectrum disorders. Whether they are viewed as biological problems in brain wiring or as results of the increasing medicalization of childhood, the burden of dealing with the day-to-day trials and complex medical and educational decisions falls almost entirely on mothers. Yet few ask how these mothers make sense of their children’s troubles, and to what extent they feel responsibility or blame. Raising Generation Rx offers a groundbreaking study that situates mothers’ experiences within an age of neuroscientific breakthrough, a high-stakes knowledge-based economy, cutbacks in public services and decent jobs, and increased global competition and racialized class and gender inequality.Through in-depth interviews, observations of parents’ meetings, and analyses of popular advice, Linda Blum examines the experiences of diverse mothers coping with the challenges of their children’s “invisible disabilities” in the face of daunting social, economic, and political realities. She reveals how mothers in widely varied households learn to advocate for their children in the dense bureaucracies of the educational and medical systems; wrestle with anguishing decisions about the use of psychoactive medications; and live with the inescapable blame and stigma in their communities.Linda Blum is Associate Professor of Sociology at Northeastern University. She is the author of Between Feminism and Labor: The Significance of the Comparable Worth Movement and At the Breast: Ideologies of Breastfeeding and Motherhood in the Contemporary United States. Winner, 2016 Outstanding Publication in the Sociology of Disability, American Sociological Association, Section Disability and SocietyExamines the experiences of mothers coping with their children's “invisible disabilities” in the face of daunting social, economic, and political realitiesRecent years have seen an explosion in the number of children diagnosed with “invisible disabilities” such as ADHD, mood and conduct disorders, and high-functioning autism spectrum disorders. Whether they are viewed as biological problems in brain wiring or as results of the increasing medicalization of childhood, the burden of dealing with the day-to-day trials and complex medical and educational decisions falls almost entirely on mothers. Yet few ask how these mothers make sense of their children's troubles, and to what extent they feel responsibility or blame. Raising Generation Rx offers a groundbreaking study that situates mothers'experiences within an age of neuroscientific breakthrough, a high-stakes knowledge-based economy, cutbacks in public services and decent jobs, and increased global competition and racialized class and gender inequality. Through in-depth interviews, observations of parents'meetings, and analyses of popular advice, Linda Blum examines the experiences of diverse mothers coping with the challenges of their children's “invisible disabilities” in the face of daunting social, economic, and political realities. She reveals how mothers in widely varied households learn to advocate for their children in the dense bureaucracies of the educational and medical systems; wrestle with anguishing decisions about the use of psychoactive medications; and live with the inescapable blame and stigma in their communities. Recent years have seen an explosion in the number of children diagnosed with invisible disabilities such as ADHD, mood and conduct disorders, and high-functioning autism spectrum disorders. Whether they are viewed as biological problems in brain wiring or as results of the increasing medicalization of childhood, the burden of dealing with the day-to-day trials and complex medical and educational decisions falls almost entirely on mothers. Yet few ask how these mothers make sense of their childrens troubles, and to what extent they feel responsibility or blame. Raising Generation Rx offers a groundbreaking study that situates mothers experiences within an age of neuroscientific breakthrough, a high-stakes knowledge-based economy, cutbacks in public services and decent jobs, and increased global competition and racialized class and gender inequality. Through in-depth interviews, observations of parents meetings, and analyses of popular advice, Linda Blum examines the experiences of diverse mothers coping with the challenges of their childrens invisible disabilities in the face of daunting social, economic, and political realities. She reveals how mothers in widely varied households learn to advocate for their children in the dense bureaucracies of the educational and medical systems; wrestle with anguishing decisions about the use of psychoactive medications; and live with the inescapable blame and stigma in their communities. Linda Blum is Associate Professor of Sociology at Northeastern University. She is the author of Between Feminism and Labor: The Significance of the Comparable Worth Movement and At the Breast: Ideologies of Breastfeeding and Motherhood in the Contemporary United States. Recent years have seen an explosion in the number of children diagnosed with "invisible disabilities" such as ADHD, mood and conduct disorders, and high-functioning autism spectrum disorders. Whether they are viewed as biological problems in brain wiring or as results of the increasing medicalization of childhood, the burden of dealing with the day-to-day trials and complex medical and educational decisions falls almost entirely on mothers. Yet few ask how these mothers make sense of their children's troubles, and to what extent they feel responsibility or blame. Raising Generation Rx offers a groundbreaking study that situates mothers' experiences within an age of neuroscientific breakthrough, a high-stakes knowledge-based economy, cutbacks in public services and decent jobs; increased global competition and racialized class and gender inequality. Through in-depth interviews, observations of parent support groups, and analyses of popular advice, Linda M. Blum examines the experiences of diverse mothers coping with the challenges of their children's "invisible disabilities" in the face of daunting social, economic, and political realities. She reveals how mothers in widely varied households learn to advocate for their children in the dense bureaucracies of the educational and medical systems, wrestle with anguishing decisions about the use of psychoactive medications, and live with the inescapable blame and stigma in their communities. Book jacket Some 22 Percent Of American Children Today Have Some Form Of Disability. In This Highly Important Book, Linda Blum Plunges Us Into The World Of Their Worried Mothers, Deciphering Labels And Pills, Fending Off Stigma, Tirelessly Advocating For Their Children. Married Or Alone, Affluent Or Poor, Such Mothers Often Feel Blamed And Too Rarely In The Presence Of Real Help. A Carefully Researched And Deeply Sensitive Portrait Of Mothers On The Rx Frontier. Mother-child Troubles, Past And Present -- Welcome To Your Child's Brain: Mothers Managing Dense Bureaucracies, Medications, And Stigma -- The Multimillion-dollar Child: Raising Kids With Invisible Disabilities In The Context Of Privilege -- I Think I Have To Advocate Five Thousand Times Harder!: Single Mothers In The Age Of Neuroscience -- En-gendering The Medicalized Child -- A Strange Coincidence: Race-ing Disordered Children -- Mothers, Children, And Families In A Precarious Time. Linda M. Blum. Includes Bibliographical References And Index. "While we read regularly about the Ritalin phenomenon and ADD kids, Linda Blum helps us to understand all of this from the perspective of mothers raising ADD-diagnosed children. Blum brings several unique lenses to this field of research: her critical medical sociology framework, attention to race, class and gender, and an in-depth interview approach, which gets at the “complex ambivalences” mothers (particularly those raising children of color) hold in relation to medicating and diagnosing their kids, and negotiating our contemporary risk culture. The result is the complex, multi-dimensional analysis that we need to balance out an increasingly hegemonic neuroscience perspective."-Meika Loe,author of The Rise of Viagra: How the Little Blue Pill Changed Sex in America