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ADHD, a Lifelong Struggle (2018)

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Re: ADHD, a Lifelong Struggle (2018)

#361

Post by rawoke083600 »

gnicholas wrote: post #6

For anyone with ADHD who finds this long article difficult to read, I'd suggest reading it with the BeeLine Reader browser extension (I'm the founder, and anyone who wants a free 1-month pass can email me via my profile). It makes walls of text and long articles in general easier to stick with, and is fairly popular in the ADHD community. This article works best in Clean Mode, which also reformats the text into a col…

Looks great ! if we punting extensions... I could never "find" text on a web page... Ctrl+F just highlights the text that is usually not enough for me to actually find it.. It needs to BLINK

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/blink-find-finding...

This extension makes your CTRL+F actually blink

Re: ADHD, a Lifelong Struggle (2018)

#362

Post by Mirioron »

dx87 wrote: post #36
Mirioron wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Imagine if there was a pill to reduce risk of cardiac arrest, with some increased risk of something relatively minor. (Some?) Antihypertensive drugs can contribute to harm to the liver. They're unlikely to cause anything on their own, but if your liver is already not the healthiest it can make things worse. > Yes, I get that "lifestyle changes" could help, but I don't want to change my lifestyle. As far as I've rea…

I can't speak for everyone, but regularly exercising and eating healthier foods reduced my need to take my ritalin as often. When I first started taking it, I had to take a dose every 2 hours to stay on track. Once I started eating healthier and doing ~1 minute of exercise every hour, I can comfortably go 3-4 hours between doses. I still function much better when I take my medication, but as long as I eat healthy and…

Yes, exercise absolutely helps, but a person with ADHD is much more likely to exercise if they have been prescribed medication. Without medication they will likely just stop exercising at some point, because they "don't feel like it today" and then forget that they were supposed to exercise every day. Then 3 months later they remember for a moment, commit to exercising again, but that only lasts for another 3 weeks.

Re: ADHD, a Lifelong Struggle (2018)

#363

Post by hinkley »

shrimp_emoji wrote: post #338
hinkley wrote: post #300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a pet theory that it's much easier for ADHD people to enter Flow state. But also that Flow state is often a bad way to write code. One, virtually everyone has a tremendous case of Sunk Cost Fallacy around things done in Flow state. If someone spent 10 hours in a week working on code that you say is badly conceived in a code review, you'll get pushback and grumbling. Argue with someone who did the PR in a singl…

>Two, writing code for other people requires empathy. Rumination. Flow state is considerably absent of both of those. So the problems and gotchas you know about ahead of time get handled, but anything you find along the way is very likely to get ignored. The quantity of your code goes way, way up, the quality goes considerably in the other direction. Yeah, I thought "flow" required extremely low resistance in the tas…

It doesn’t have to be that low friction. Generally you can maximize the effectiveness of your short term memory while in flow state. Part of your brain is smashing away at the low friction parts, the rest is strategizing, prioritizing.

There were times before I accepted that “massive refactor” is an oxymoron where I would keep some very complicated task lists in my head and manage to recall nearly all of them. Day to day? I can’t remember your name twenty seconds after you’ve told it to me, unless I work at it.

Re: ADHD, a Lifelong Struggle (2018)

#364

Post by JohnBooty »

khalilravanna wrote: post #80
vonseel wrote: post #47

I’m 31 and have ADHD (diagnosed in my teens) and I’m pretty sure NOBODY with ADHD is going to have the wherewithal to read this entire article! Unless it happens to magically coincide with their hyper-focus topic of the moment! In all seriousness, I skimmed parts of the article and kept scrolling and it just kept going and going and going... like the Energizer bunny. I guess the author found a doctor to prescribe sti…

That's interesting to hear about ADHD causing mood swings/anger/irritability and the stimulants doing away with them. Is that a common trait of the illness? I only noticed that after I started taking stimulants my temper became a lot more short. It's to the point that I have to be really cognizant of it lest I inadvertently snap at someone due to some biological response (really not good as a leader in an organizatio…

    That's interesting to hear about ADHD causing mood 
    swings/anger/irritability and the stimulants doing 
    away with them. Is that a common trait of the illness
For me, absolutely not.

The stimulants made me crankier and more high-strung.

However, sometimes it was a net improvement in my mood because I was getting my stuff done and therefore my stress level was lowered.

I use modafinil now which is less effective for the ADHD but also makes me less cranky.

Re: ADHD, a Lifelong Struggle (2018)

#365

Post by JohnBooty »

vonseel wrote: post #224
yonaguska wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm very fortunate that I learned how to read at a very very young age. As such, I'm an incredibly fast reader, when reading for comprehension, I'm close to 700 wpm. So reading to me is easy bc I can read faster than my mind can get distracted. I think that's the hardest part of ADHD, you'll always find some exceptions to the "rules" used to diagnose it.

Hmm, I have no idea what my wpm measure is, but I've never been able to identify with the perception of ADHD being something only low-IQ kids have. People I know with ADHD-symptoms are typically bright and creative, above-average humans.

This is my impression too, but I wonder how much is selection bias.

I think a lot of times ADHD is spotted because a kid is bright, but underachieving. There's a glaring disconnect between potential and performance... could be many reasons, many of which aren't ADHD, but it grabs teachers' and parents' attention.

But, what about a kid whose intelligence is not above average? If they are underperforming, would it be so obvious? I wonder if a lot of folks with ADHD in this category are more likely to go undiagnosed.

Re: ADHD, a Lifelong Struggle (2018)

#366

Post by tikhonj »

sgentle wrote: post #346

I liked this article, but for anyone who suspects they might have ADHD and is looking for a more concrete plan of action: 1. Take the ADHD Self-Report Scale screening survey. It's been extensively validated and it's only 6 questions long: https://www.hcp.med.harvard.edu/ncs/ftpdir/adhd/6Q_ASRS_Engl... 2. If you get a positive result, go see a psychiatrist (not a psychologist; they can't prescribe medication). A posit…

Super helpful comment. Thanks! Shame it got buried towards the end of the thread :|.

Re: ADHD, a Lifelong Struggle (2018)

#369

Post by jstewartmobile »

ADHD is a blessing, not a curse. So many things now would be better left undone.

If I were a doctor or a pharmacist, I'd be more interested in inducing this condition than curing it.

Personal procrastination deep-dives have rewarded myself and my family more handsomely and more permanently than any wage labor ever has.

Re: ADHD, a Lifelong Struggle (2018)

#370

Post by mr_woozy »

dba7dba wrote: post #334
remote_phone wrote: post #86

ADHD is not a disease. It’s a collection of symptoms that have been arbitrarily grouped together. My son’s psychiatrist who was diagnosing my son for ADHD said that it’s psychiatry’s dirty little secret. Back in the 60s or 70s ( I can’t remember what he said) people were starting to notice that kids were having behavioral problems, trouble focusing etc. So what they did was collect a group of symptoms, and then arbit…

> Back in the 60s or 70s ( I can’t remember what he said) people were starting to notice that kids were having behavioral problems, trouble focusing etc. Unscientific personal observation, but I wonder if TV has a role in this. Didn't kids start watching a lot of TV around that time? Also, I feel kids in poor countries with no TV (not that there's much of that left now) have little to no ADHD.

It's like you magically didn't read the article nor read any of the discussion herein.
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