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Prioritize mental health, and why communication is so important

ramones.dev

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Re: Prioritize mental health, and why communication is so important

#241

Post by astrange »

ramon156 wrote: post #167
jxckshit wrote: post #28

This sounds a lot like the shame and frustration people with ADD feel when untreated. I know several people who suffer with ADD, who are extremely intelligent and talented, and felt the exact same emotions before they were diagnosed. Those emotions were _much_ alleviated once treated, mostly through pharmacological means. Anecdotal but seems a strong pattern to me.

You're not the only one commenting this. I do have to say it's quite re-assuring to know that this is a possibility. For the people you know that have ADD, was medication sufficient? Did they still end up taking therapy for their neurodivergence? I wonder how long it takes before I can be a functional programmer again. I know it'll take a while.

I'm trying ADHD therapy now, but the thing about ADHD is that you can still do complex tasks like programming yet can't do simple things.

So the therapy is partly focused on emotional management, and partly about skills to do seemingly simple things like cook and put away laundry.

I haven't seen coaching for ADHD software engineers, but I'd be interested in it. (I'd rather take more cooking classes though.)

Re: Prioritize mental health, and why communication is so important

#242

Post by glitchc »

I read your post very carefully. I feel compelled to share my opinion, just as you should feel equally free to ignore it. Here goes:

I suspect your vocation of choice is misaligned with your personality. Software/hardware development is very detail-oriented work, not much different from a mechanic, carpenter or watch-maker. It's easy to recover from mistakes in tech unlike the more tangible fields, but not any less focused on the tiny bits. That's not for everyone and it should also come as no surprise that most good developers have some degree of OCD (things have to be _just so_). It's not a good fit for those who prefer to see the big picture, who like dealing with opinions rather than fact, who naturally gravitate to thinking of the human rather than the machine.

There is a way to test this, for you and anyone else. Try the game Shenzhen I/O. It mimics the typical work environment of an embedded developer (mix of hardware and software). Communication is minimal, you can't really reach out to colleagues to help you solve the problem, the manual is your best friend. It seems to match very closely with your current way of working. Try playing it, but with a specific focus on how it makes you feel. Does opening the inbox and seeing a new problem fill you with joy or dread? Does finding a solution make you feel elated or downcast? After you're done, do you feel like improving your design or do you prefer to never see it again? Do you prefer to see the email of the colleague trying to be funny or the colleague giving you a useful tip? It may seem like such a simple thing, yet the difference in feeling can be enormous. Let it guide you to discovery.

Software problems are essentially puzzles. Do you like solving puzzles? If not, it's totally okay. Not everyone does. It just means there are better fits than software out there for you.

Re: Prioritize mental health, and why communication is so important

#243

Post by bsoles »

bit-anarchist wrote: post #232
bsoles wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nobody attacks children. Ever heard of the Catholic Church? What does rape count as?

I didn't know the Catholic Church was promoting child rape.

Being silent about it when they fully know about it is not much different than promoting.

Re: Prioritize mental health, and why communication is so important

#244

Post by raptor99 »

m1aw wrote: post #6

I know this pattern from myself. I'm doing alright as far as my career goes, not great, but okay. Which is disappointing because me and everyone around thought I'd do great, because I/they thought I was a great software developer, since I'm smart and I know my tech and my programming. Unfortunately working as a software developer is a different story entirely, I found many times that my chase for good simple code tak…

So you know you are smart and you know your programming but you can't show it because you just happen to have a now popular, talked about, and referenced condition that inhibits you from your own known greatness. OK.

Re: Prioritize mental health, and why communication is so important

#245

Post by astrange »

yobutdude wrote: post #134

26% of social psychology is reproducible Roughly 50% of cognitive psychology is reproducible Worse or barely as good as a coin toss Here's a psychiatrist arguing Americans have become addicted to therapy and lost their nerve for normal irrational aspects of reality: https://www.theatlantic.com/podcasts/archive/2024/02/how-we-... Therapy is just the new religion; used to ostracize and denigrate and demonize people who…

Therapists have specific techniques and programs that work. Well, some of them do anyway. If you have a real serious issue like PTSD or BPD it can be mostly fixed with the right sort of therapy.

It's like saying you only work with a personal trainer at the gym because you don't have a friend to go with. Sort of true sort of not.

Re: Prioritize mental health, and why communication is so important

#246

Post by mstagg »

shermantanktop wrote: post #125
al_borland wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No, it’s a diagnosis of the root cause - in fact, it is plausibly the root cause of everything else described in the post. Yep. I was diagnosed with ASD and ADHD about a 1.5 years ago... My whole life came into focus. Everything that didn't make sense suddenly started to make sense. What I thought were 15 different issues I was dealing with were really all just symptoms of the one (or two in my case). The internal…

Finding a label for personal problems typically results in a honeymoon of self-acceptance and relief. The honeymoon usually ends and the problems remain, but now there are possible paths forward.

the best advice I've had for any sort of neurodivergence diagnosis is - "It's an explanation, not an excuse".

I try use that as a motivator to not just blame my shortcomings on ADHD and instead keep pushing myself to work through them.

Re: Prioritize mental health, and why communication is so important

#247

Post by fwlr »

ramon156 wrote: post #160
fwlr wrote: post #29

This could be due to ADD, I am still getting tested. Granted, that's a diagnosis, not a root cause. No, it’s a diagnosis of the root cause - in fact, it is plausibly the root cause of everything else described in the post. Inability to complete work, procrastination/distraction by focusing on nearby tasks, the pervasive sense that you struggle with things that other people do not, even the depression (untreated ADD c…

I will discuss this with my GP. You're right that fluoxetine is a serotonin kicker, and it didn't stop my dysfunctional habits. Ofcourse, no pill is magical, and I have no expectations of that. At least fluoxetine fixed my sleeping habits.

Best of luck!

Re: Prioritize mental health, and why communication is so important

#248

Post by tsoukase »

kmoser wrote: post #206
tsoukase wrote: post #199

Depression is for many people the animal in the room, for some a fox and for others an elephant. You cannot avoid, ignore or hack a chemical imbalance in your brain with societal or personal measures. If you find yourself hopeless and helpless, irrespective if you have attended any form of psychotherapy, take an antidepressant. Don't hesitate and if you are in trouble, contact me, seriously. The author takes Fluoxeti…

Can you provide some insight into a) how you know somebody else should take a given drug, without having examined that person yourself, and b) whether you're qualified to prescribe that drug?

Disclaimer: I am neurologist in a psy department.

I used the second person and a direct advice deliberately to overcome the taboo and suspicion against antidepressives, which cost quality of life. Obviously, one has to reach a doctor for a proper diagnosis and therapy. Anyway, in most countries you cannot buy such drugs OTC. The end goal is to persuade to actively discuss about it with the doctor and/or in case he suggests a drug, follow it.

We definitely need the medical analog to TINLA (This is not legal advice) but TINMA is not accurate.

As for the post author, he seems to still suffer, although under a drug, and he might benefit from a change, which is a frequent situation.

Re: Prioritize mental health, and why communication is so important

#249

Post by ShinyLeftPad »

> Turns out I'm the only one. I realize that while others also have issues, they are in no way similar.

Not the only one. Well, maybe I'm luckier because I have a milder form of it, but having to test things thoroughly used to be absolutely mind crushing. I can see how a different personality would just skip over it for this reason. However, it may be possible to get over that, like I no longer find it so terrible. I'm not sure "making a plan and not making mistakes" is how it's done, maybe it's possible but I can't just follow a plan like that, to me it's more about switching myself to a bug hunting mode and feeling of shame if it doesn't work that overrides the tediousness of testing and doing it until it becomes a habit.

Agree with smuggler's comment though, don't take hn comments too seriously

Re: Prioritize mental health, and why communication is so important

#250

Post by tsoukase »

astrange wrote: post #239
kmoser wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you provide some insight into a) how you know somebody else should take a given drug, without having examined that person yourself, and b) whether you're qualified to prescribe that drug?

Their bio does say they are, but they certainly forgot some things. (Some people presenting with depression should not be on antidepressants because they actually have bipolar disorder.)

This 'some' refers to many subcategories of cases, not only unipolar vs bipolar.
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