The lighter side of ADHD
The laziness thing resonates hard for me. When I am interested in something I can spend hours and hours learning everything about it and tinkering with it, when I am not interested it is incredibly challenging to muster the effort at all.
Deadlines and panic help, and if I can trigger my focus Ive been pretty successful with my efforts in general.
I still find myself doubting that I have ADD. Go figure.
Gosh, the laziness.
I taught myself every single song on my parent's electric keyboard when I was a kid, so they got me a bigger, better one and I learned every song there and then some others that I painstakingly figured out by ear.
But did I ever do my homework? Did I every get xyz done on time? Did I constantly misplace everything?
I wish I had been hyperactive and disruptive in class so maybe someone would have helped me earlier.
I was told as a child that I didn't have ADHD because I was able to sit quietly and read for long periods of time. I was only able to read for long periods if it was a fantasy novel. Now, in my 40s, my doctor was amazed I'd never been diagnosed as, according to them, I'm "textbook."
Did "long periods of time" define itself as "it was daylight last i looked up from my book" hyperfocus? That's what it was for me 😜
The "I just read a 500 page book in one sitting and now I feel empty inside, like a deflated balloon. I should maybe eat." hyperfocus has always been my style.
Por que no los dos?
Leg cramps usually hit me if i don't eat for long enough, doesn't necessarily stop the hyperfocus tho
Also in my 40's and recently diagnosed. I filled out a questionnaire, and the doc asked a few surface-level questions, then proceeded to describe my entire childhood-young adult life. He was not wrong on any detail.
I feel you
diagnosed in my 50's
always known I'm different lol
coasted subjects I liked but failed subjects I hated.
I was disruptive and constantly outside the headmasters office. in those days I got the slipper and cane..
mum called me hyperactive and blamed tartrazine from orange cordial. looking back I was casebook ADHD.
now I have a diagnosis I'm able to get the support and connections to my kids that I never had myself. teaching techniques and understanding what's going on for them when they have meltdowns.
to be fair they didn't have ADHD diagnosis on the 70's so I'm just happy I can support my kids knowing what I know and why
I got diagnosed with laziness in school.
Many years later, another doctor looked at the diagnosis and said that the first doctor had written down textbook symptoms then missed the diagnosis.
The word lazy still hurts today.
I got diagnosed with laziness in school.
The word lazy still hurts today.
This was me growing up in the 80s. I wasn't disruptive, and I aced the tests, so obviously I didn't do the homework because I was "lazy." Fuck that noise.
I've embraced the word lazy. All my coworkers know that if I'm doing something a certain way, it's because there's no better way and it needs to get done. Anything else has been automated and optimized out.
Yep, I was given a choice of thick or lazy. I was a teenager so yes, I was but my biggest issue was I avoided it because I was scared of it. Nothing I did was good enough.
It sounds like the first doctor might have been a bit lazy.
Medical ableism is so infuriating. I'm glad you were able to get diagnosed eventually. For me the word annoying is one of those words associated with like ableist trauma.
I feel that. I was also diagnosed as lazy and unable to live up to potential. Then in my 20s i was diagnosed with narcolepsy....
I don't even really like the term hyperactive. I was diagnosed at 6. I was told I was hyperactive, that I couldn't pay attention. But nothing about why I stimmed, nothing about why my emotional state was unstable and I had trouble properly managing my emotions. Nothing about executive dysfunction, time blindness, hyperfixation, over and under stimulation, or the ways ADHD impacted my ability to socialize. Everyone wants to chalk ADHD up to one thing. But it isn't. My peers at school wouldnt bully me because of being hyperactive but rather because of my failure to understand the nuances of social rituals no one explained to me. They would bully me because I stimmed especially when I did so verbally. I didn't even know those things were related to my ADHD. I genuinely just believed there was something fundamentally wrong about me that I could never fix. Once I stopped taking Ritalin in grade six because my mom decided I didn't need it anymore, I started to just receive constant ableist abuse from everyone in my life. I was always made to feel that it was my fault I was this way, my personal fault that I couldn't do group projects or get homework or projects done. I'd score poorly on everything I did in school despite being smart and capable of learning well on my own. This was always made out to be a personal failing of my own, and not a direct consequence of my untreated ADHD combined with a system wholly unsympathetic to my experience.
ADHD is so misunderstood by neurotypical people. It's wild talking to women who haven't been diagnosed and describe in vivid detail all the forms of ableist abuse they've suffered their entire lives. Incredible being able to recognize the commonalities in our stories. Society is incredibly punishing for neurodivergent people. It is only around other neurodivergent people that I really feel able to be myself, to this day. I have helped several women get diagnosed purely by recommendation after becoming close friends with them. It's wild how it feels like neurodivergent people subconsciously recognize each other.
Once I stopped taking Ritalin in grade six because my mom decided I didn't need it anymore, I started to just receive constant ableist abuse from everyone in my life. I was always made to feel that it was my fault I was this way, my personal fault that I couldn't do group projects or get homework or projects done. I'd score poorly on everything I did in school despite being smart and capable of learning well on my own. This was always made out to be a personal failing of my own, and not a direct consequence of my untreated ADHD combined with a system wholly unsympathetic to my experience.
Perfectly summed up my experience. Parents took me off meds (straterra in my case) due to concerns about not eating enough, everything downhill from there for the exact same reasons.
Trying to get re-diagnosed as an adult (parents lost/shredded childhood records...) and got hit with a variation of "since you're not trying, you must be happy as you are" from a psychologist that listed ADHD as a specialty...
Trying to get re-diagnosed as an adult (parents lost/shredded childhood records…) and got hit with a variation of “since you’re not trying, you must be happy as you are” from a psychologist that listed ADHD as a specialty…
There definitely seem to be this mentality of "if you made it this far, then it's not serious" attitude to adult diagnoses.
Thank you!! I could not for the life of me put into words the vibe i got from that appointment.
"You made it this far, you seem fine"
I'd respond back that a person stuck walking on a narrow ledge seems fine, too. Nevermind that the slightest push could destroy everything. Nevermind that the wind can be pretty strong up there and it never seems to stop. Nevermind that the person may have only just now realized that not everybody lives their whole lives fighting to keep their balance, and that they actually can reach out for help.
Imagine if rescuers finally arrived and said, "They've made it this far. They must be fine," and left. How heartless would that be considered?
I wish I were surprised to hear that a woman's experiences were dismissed by medical professionals. Unfortunately, I understand it all too well. I've developed an annoying habit of explaining things that nobody asked about, in anticipation of being treated with mistrust. It's yet another habit on the long list of things I have to be perpetually mindful of whenever I'm interacting with anybody (except my closest friends, who by and large are fellow ADHD/autists.)
When I was hyperactive, I was annoying, disruptive, and poorly disciplined.
When I wasn't hyperactive, I was a lazy slacker.
The boys that shared my symptoms got treatment. I got punished.
Same all around except I got treated and punished for the side effects of the meds (appetite suppression until it wears off and then “stealing” food in the middle of the night when I was starving) There’s no winning.
So many times. Then the motor mouth starts and they start to understand..... sometimes.
I was constantly bored in elementary school and needed constant stimuli to be interested in learning anything. I cought on to most things immediately and it was easy so I never did any homework because why bother when it's just easy so felt like I was just lazy and also got called out on sloppy work because I just didn't bother spending time on it. All hand in assignments were always written the night before and always got a medium to high grade so why bother doing anything more? That severely bit me in the bum years later in university and fast forward another 10 years and I now have an ADHD diagnosis and in hindsight things are now finally making sense.
This way me! Thankfully I went into the guard right out of high-school and in basic/tech school if you fuck up then you stay longer or fail out immediately. That really helped me change my head space (so instead of literally not studying I cracked the books the night before, and post-graduate studies I'd sometimes look at them two nights before a test!).
I'm not very hyperactive. On rare occasions yes. I feel my hyperactivity is restricted to my mind. Like, it's different than a hyper focus. Like, where other ADHD people might show outward hyperactivity I feel like mine just becomes an overwhelming amount of thoughts I can't even focus on. Its almost disabling.
If I was going to play doctor I'd say it's because of my childhood. I'm a male, but grew up in an isolated and abusive family.
I find this lack of hyperactivity is much more common in the women with ADHD that I have talked to. Again, just sharing thoughts, but I feel like this similar type of abuse that I experienced is very similar to how our society expects women to act. To be quiet and submissive. Which maybe leads to a coping mechanism to hide outward hyperactivity? I don't know, but it feels like that for me.
Come to think of it. My most outwardly visible hyperactivity happens when I hang out with women that have ADHD. It's like being comfortable enough to not keep it in your head.
Wait
But that's just ADD?
I believe that's no longer a thing and it's all collectively called ADHD these days. At least over here.
Officially it's ADHD-I (inattentive), ADHD-H (hyperactive) and ADHD-C (combined).
But over here even specialists still often just call it ADD. It's less of a mouthful and more well-known. Personally I also use ADD, as it often saves the hassle of having to explain I'm usually not hyperactive.
Yeah I am personally not a fan of the new terminology as it only seems more confusing.
It's because the differences between them are less distinct and the names are just more of an indicator of which side you lean to the most for how it affects you.
ADD hasn't been used as a diagnosis for a while. It's called the inattentive type ADHD now.
There h is always there, just not always visible on the outside
That's my whole basic "speech" when I have to tell someone: "I've got ADD; I don't have the H".
I think in some places they don't use ADD anymore, but I can't really keep up ...
Aye, although I like to say that instead of being "hyper" I'm "hypo".
This is why it took me 3+ decades to realize I have it
here! I was also not disruptive to others in a classroom, so obviously I didn't have adhd. I just spent my time reading something else or doodling or something, never able to pay attention
I mean, everyone around me agreed that I definitely wasn't hyperactive but highly inattentive so it was a matter of putting 2 and 2 together
Especially when you’re older and tired all the time anyway.
I'll be honest, it has really prevented me from accepting the fact that I screened positive as an adult for ADHD based on other symptoms, because I'm older and when I was in elementary school non-hyperactive ADHD wasn't really much of a thing. (Side rant: why can't we go back to calling it ADD if it's not hyperactive? Why did they ever decide to erase the distinction and call them the same thing?) But having a son with non-hyperactive ADHD has forced me to admit that it exists, and see signs of it in myself. Unfortunately the side effects of meditation are not worth it in my case, so I can't do much with this insight.
Took Adderall a few times in college and got the zombie effect instead of the energy/focus boost you usually get when taking it without having ADHD. Never had performance issues in school or had trouble sitting still or anything. Always been kinda curious what’s up with that.
Maybe you took an interest in enough things to do well? Personally, I'd get distracted from lessons with trying to figure out alternative ways to think about or solve problems for things like math and I liked practicing mental math, so used normal classwork as a way to do that.
More surprised I was able to deal with classes like English and history though. But I've just been lucky enough to have a good memory for certain things school cares about.
"Why do you think you have ADHD? You're so successful!"
When I hear that, I am inwardly proud of myself in spite of being ADHD.
It feels like the rest of the world is running on a flat surface, and I'm running uphill. It's not fair, but it is what it is.
I attribute most of my success to luck, but also in finding a career path in my 30's that actually rewarded my neurodivergence. I took 6 years to finish undergrad, after changing majors a few times. I started and aborted 3 different career fields before finding the one that works for me and actually gives me an opportunity to use different knowledge and interests across completely unrelated fields. Now that I'm a lawyer in civil litigation, I only need to have knowledge and experience in court procedure, but most of my work is spent on research techniques and translating the real world messiness of whatever random thing has gone wrong into proper analogies for legal arguments. My tendency towards new rabbit holes to explore actually works at learning a new industry or new company just enough to be able to represent someone in it, and then getting out and starting over to do another thing in another case.
To extend your analogy, it's like I'm in thick brush where running fast on a flat surface isn't the most useful skill. If I were forced to fend for myself in an open field, I'd be fucked, but I thrive where I am because I'm good at the things that matter in this particular environment.
I got lucky as a kid. I’ve struggled with executive dysfunction my entire life and was diagnosed in the 90s, but I had teachers that helped me catch up on my work and devise ways to track progress. They had me keep a journal and I would write down a checklist of school work I had to finish. I remember one day when I was finally caught up on all my work, one of my teachers had me announce it to my peers in class, and they cheered me on. It was nice to experience the feeling of getting a win and not constantly being behind. I had a couple teachers that were patient and kind, and would help me work through stuff I was slow at or just generally struggled with.
When I got to high school, it was a different story. If I struggled and fell behind, no one was there to help, or they simply didn’t have the time due to how full my classes were. I remember in anatomy and physiology, we all got partnered up so we could dissect things with another set of hands. My partner transferred out of class almost immediately and that’s when I knew I was cooked. When I couldn’t keep up, we met with my teacher and he refused to acknowledge that I was struggling, nor offer any help. I remember saying to him “dude… I have an F in your class…” and got nothing back. I ended up transferring out of the school entirely.
My upbringing was a mixed bag. I don’t remember being called lazy outright, but it was definitely conveyed. When I finally got a diagnosis and tried meds, they put me to sleep in class because they weren’t intended for non-hyperactive adhd like what I had. I quit taking them immediately because of how much worse they made things. It was all still such uncharted territory back then that a diagnosis was essentially a dice roll.
I’ve definitely felt the sting multiple times of feeling looked down on, like I was less intelligent. That’s the worst of it all. I didn’t care as much about the lazy labels as I did the intelligence labels. I had a college reading level in 6th grade, I was great in biology and science, but I was “slow” in everything else.