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Ask HN: How did an adult ADHD diagnosis help you?

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Re: Ask HN: How did an adult ADHD diagnosis help you?

#71

I was diagnosed about a year ago (I'll be 34 tomorrow). I went to the therapist to ~figure out if~ confirm that I was on the Autism spectrum, and they pointed out that it sounded like there was some ADHD too, so it was something very unexpected for me. In hindsight, very obvious too. It's been very insightful. On the more personal side, it's helped me understand a lot about my life and why so many things went they wa…

“How to ADHD” is a fantastic resource. She’s honest, funny, and reaches out to professionals to make sure she isn’t fertilizing her audience.

Re: Ask HN: How did an adult ADHD diagnosis help you?

#72
post #12

So my take maybe isn't the healthiest on this, not sure. If you believe you have ADHD, and your therapist believes you have ADHD, BUT your life isn't negatively impacted by it , why start treatment now? Ask yourself if you have any negative impacts from ADHD. Ask your spouse. Personal relationships, professional work, all aspects. If the answer is no, then why bother? Source: ADHD treatments that left me a zombie whe…

> If you believe you have ADHD, and your therapist believes you have ADHD, BUT your life isn't negatively impacted by it, why start treatment now?

If your life isn't negatively impacted by it then you might be hyperactive or have trouble paying attention, but you don't have ADHD, by definition. It only becomes a disorder when it's causing a significant ongoing negative impact on your life.

Re: Ask HN: How did an adult ADHD diagnosis help you?

#74
post #12

So my take maybe isn't the healthiest on this, not sure. If you believe you have ADHD, and your therapist believes you have ADHD, BUT your life isn't negatively impacted by it , why start treatment now? Ask yourself if you have any negative impacts from ADHD. Ask your spouse. Personal relationships, professional work, all aspects. If the answer is no, then why bother? Source: ADHD treatments that left me a zombie whe…

On the other side of this, I wasn't sure if my life was negatively impacted or not. I decided to try out medication to see, and my wife and I instantly started noticing improvements in our lives. I was getting more done with less mental strain, and there were tons of tiny little things that she wasn't having to remember for me or worry about because I wasn't losing track of them.

YMMV.

Re: Ask HN: How did an adult ADHD diagnosis help you?

#75
I got a diagnosis when I was in college (inattentive type, definitely not hyperactive). It was a bit of a rollercoaster for me.

I also have anxiety and disthymeia, so meds were complicated. Stimulants send my anxiety out of control. Ultimately, I'm unmedicated for the ADHD, now.

It's been 20 years, and I'll admit, I fear any major med changes, because it can be ~1 year to get it all worked out.

I would say, make sure you are working with a psychiatrist who specializes in ADHD and a psychologist who will partner with them to aid your treatment. Their experience is key and can save you a lot of time struggling with meds, I wish I did that from day 1. I originally started with a PCP and then psychologist + PCP and really struggled from bad treatment advice.

I was "smart enough" for it to not seriously impact me until later in college. I would dive into 1 class and neglect the rest.

But my career is pretty tolerant of it. In some ways it is an asset. I have developed a ton of coping mechanisms to compensate, and have also learned to build in time to let myself go. It took me a while time to "forgive myself" for needing that, but a good therapist who also had ADHD helped me.

Taking sensory breaks is really important for me. Shifting to working from home meant I had to learn when I should take breaks from notification overload. I only allow my calendar to notify me then. I do benefit from working with people who really know me and help support.

I also cannot track time internally (I do not know if that is common or not). So making sure to schedule things like lunch has been important. It's easy for me to get lost.

My wife is also amazingly supportive. We complement each other very well and have for years. We are very communicative and that has helped a lot.

I'm sad that my one of my daughters is struggling is struggling with it early in school. School in general is just so incompatible. I can sympathize in many ways with the "inattentive" aspects, but she is also hyperactive which is foreign to me.

Re: Ask HN: How did an adult ADHD diagnosis help you?

#76
post #18

I'd recommend everyone who thinks he or she has ADHD to keep in mind that there are clinics who literally make money by diagnosing you. So make sure you don't go to one of those. This is a problem, even in the Netherlands https://www.trouw.nl/zorg/in-de-adhd-fabriek-is-de-diagnose-... I wish I could find a translated version for you. Anyways, Methlyphinidate (ritalin) should be your very LAST step. Before that, clean…

As a counterpoint, I was diagnosed with ADD (now known as ADHD-PI) a couple decades ago as a child and initially took medication for it, but complained about the effects and so my parents agreed to stop giving me medication. This kind of decision seems manageable at the time if you're bright enough that you can skate through school regardless of how much work you actually do. You cannot skate through adulthood this w…

lose focus on dull activities

This doesn't sound like a mental illness, but rather a part of the human condition, don't you think?

Re: Ask HN: How did an adult ADHD diagnosis help you?

#77

Can you all recommend any science-based books/videos/etc that one could use to improve their ADHD?

From memory: regular exercise, and emotional regulation tools such as CBT or meditation. Oh, and adequate sleep

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31921425/

Re: Ask HN: How did an adult ADHD diagnosis help you?

#78
ADHD diagnosis didn’t help me live a better life, it helped me live a normal life.

During college and my first job, I was constantly stressed and depressed from my terrible productivity. I couldn’t even bring myself to do things I wanted to do —- the only thing that mattered was the next dopamine hit. I made so many goals and failed every single one, and with each failure I blamed myself even more. The problem with having ADHD is that it causes you to procrastinate on getting the diagnosis in the first place! In the end, I had to accept that “just try harder” isn’t a valid strategy.

OP, I know my experience isn’t similar to yours at all, but just know that mental illness treatment almost always helps you reach your goals, and don’t procrastinate on it.

Re: Ask HN: How did an adult ADHD diagnosis help you?

#80
post #55

Living in Europe, my perception (AKA: anecdotal / unscientific / non-measured) is that most of the ADHD-diagnosed people I know live in the US, while I only know one European person in my network who received similar diagnosis from a professional psychiatrist. Counterintuitively, I know way more European people than Americans, which makes my perception feel even more skewed. I very well know that my sample(ing method…

At American universities, reading the DSM and acquiring an Adderall script is a right of passage, unless you're wealthy enough to buy them from other kids to avoid having that on your medical record.
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