> We definitely are not trying to pass as a medical service.

> HSA/FSA-eligible.

Try harder?

healthcare and medicine aren't synonymous

psychologists, mental health therapists, physical therapists, occupational therapists, pharmacists, and so on, do not practice medicine - but the services they provide can be paid for with HSA and FSA money

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allied_health_professions

Technicalities don't matter, explicitly calling it out creates a false connection in readers brains. Like how some snake oil treatments say "FDA cleared" because they know consumers don't know what it means.

I disagree. This isn't about technicalities. I think it's about you assuming that others draw a "false connection" just because you saw one. Most people don't see HSA/FSA and automatically assume that a service is medical care. HSA/FSA funds are for healthcare-RELATED expenses and cover lots of things that aren't medical co-pays or medication: sunscreen, condoms, breast milk pumps, glasses or contacts, health-related home improvements (e.g., wheelchair ramps, hand rails), transportation for medical care, weight loss programs, menstrual care products, band-aids etc. All of those things are healthcare-related, but they're clearly not medical care.

There's nothing wrong with stating the objective reality that the cost of Shimmer is HSA/FSA-eligible. HSA/FSA-eligibility is directly relevant to one of Shimmer's key goals, making ADHD coaching accessible to people who can't afford traditional coaching. Using HSA/FSA funds brings down the overall cost significantly, so it's going to be a factor when budgeting. It isn't even close the same thing as snake oil treatments claiming to be "FDA cleared." Consumers may not realize that "FDA cleared" is an absolutely meaningless phrase, but I think we can agree that most adults know the difference between a condom and a licensed medical professional dispensing FDA-approved medication.

"HSA/FSA-eligible" is a legitimate, accurate phrase to describe the services Shimmer provides. Plus, anyone who has a HSA/FSA has most likely received education or literature about it through the company providing it for them (typically their employer). They're not reading this post thinking, "Since I can pay for this with the account that I use to buy sunscreen and band-aids, I will surely see a physician and get drugs." Personally, I thought, "Gee, I wish I had a HSA/FSA so I could use it to pay for this health-related service." All brains are different, especially ADHD brains. It's unhelpful to assume they'll all draw the same false conclusion as you did.

I don't think that's a particularly fair point - HSA/FSA eligibility is a billing related question. There are plenty of counseling services that aren't run by formally accredited folks that can achieve HSA/FSA eligibility. The billing arrangement isn't particularly relevant - I do agree that it'd be good to be more forward about the fact that you'll be talking to someone without formal accreditation.

Thank you for this comment, we've changed the language to reflect this last point on formal medical accreditation, and clarified that even if they do have medical credentials, in Shimmer's capacity they will be practicing ADHD coaching

It's absurd to claim that you're not trying to pass as a medical service when you're offering coaching for a neurological condition.

You can argue medical vs healthcare or whatever semantics you want but if it quacks like a duck it's a duck.

Is my golf coach a physical therapist or a physical movement coach? He's been helping me improve my swing around an injury I had dirt biking.

If your golf coach is helping you with your golf swing, I'd say that he's a golf coach.

My grandma once helped me with my math homework, was she a mathematician?

You might get lucky with your golf coach. There are people that went to medical school for that though. Your choice.

She was able to help you though. You don't need a PhD in mathematics to be able to answer some math questions.

Positive human interaction goes a long way.

A good school would provide this. Does that make them a medical service? Or is this actually educational?

[delayed]

You honestly could have fooled me. The amount of preaching, unfalsifiable theories and casuistry that goes on in the ADHD space is beyond the pale.

Executive function theory, delayed rewards theory, everywhere you go, when the axioms of the presenter changes, so does the "root cause" of ADHD change.

Granted it's common for these problems to pop up every where in online media the past five years or so...

... but when Law and Order SVU episodes from the 90s have more empirical cause-and-effect rigor to their detective stories than half the opinions-masquerading-as-theories in the ADHD space, then I find his skepticism understandable and I empathize with it.

I wish it were not true. I deeply, deeply crave a scientist in a lab coat to point to a chain of chemicals that describe the problem in concrete unarguable terms. The smoking gun, if you will. Something Feynman and Einstein (so to speak) could analyze, criticize and come up sucessfully defeated in attempting to prove the theory wrong, admitting the shown evidence and resulting theory is true.

We see instead research universities pouring money and big minds into Diffusion Tensor Imaging, doing hundreds/thousands of high resolution scans on kids' brains who obviously have ADHD and not only being unable to find the root cause of the problem, but they cannot even show a difference in the data that relates to ADHD at all.

Wtf is going on...

It is probably deeply impolite for me to say this, because I'm directly challenging your livelihood and it's 'more good' if I just ignore your website and move on.

To be clear, I don't work at Shimmer or any place centered on treating ADHD or helping people with it. Idek if Shimmer's services are useful.

I just want to push back on the notion that 'this is a neurological disorder' is the only acceptable or useful way to think about ADHD.

To your point, I think it's clear that the world hasn't really figured out what ADHD is yet. That is, we haven't figured out the best way to think or talk about it, let alone treat it.

That's why I think it's important to hold onto that label with a light touch, and an understanding that our conception of the problem is likely to change a lot in the future. The 'real core' that we do know about ADHD is in the common struggles of people, situated as they are, who have ADHD-like symptoms and experiences. Those are worth addressing with anything that helps, and if you have those struggles yourself you know you can't wait for an ideal 'final answer' from scientific or other authorities to try to improve your life.

All that said it's way easier to be comfortable with non-commercial, community-oriented efforts of people sharing their experiences and trying to figure out what works for them in an ad-hoc way. Companies offering solutions to people, especially people who fear that their ADHD-ish struggles might cost them their livelihood or are destabilizing their lives, do have to prove themselves trustworthy and effective somehow and there's a lot of room for scammy bullshit with something like this. I don't disagree with the skepticism so much as the scientism and medicalism.