#Childhood Sleep Apnea And Adhd | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

ladyinrainbowglasses · 1 year

Text

Poverty with Training Wheels

Or: How I Learned to Stop Trying and Just Accept Financial Abuse The relevant facts before I start ranting: - My father was born into and grew up on the poverty line. His father was a property manager in a tenement - they got free rent for labor and my dad began working when he was 5. He is very intelligent (don’t want to deny the good that did him) and also pretty dang lucky (he survived his childhood for one, but he also got lucky in the stock market and actually had a decent lucky streak as a gambler). He currently owns 4 houses and about 60 various acres of land. His own house is a five bedroom, three bath neo-Colonial in Northern Virginia that just underwent extensive remodeling (it’s hideous, which I will rant about at some other point). - I am disabled and have been to some extent my whole life. It got much, much worse in my teens and twenties, and when I graduated with my Bachelors in 2010, I was only really semi-functional. My list of diagnosed or waiting-on-official diagnosis disabilities are: paroxysmal dyskinesia, PCOS, adenomyosis, migraines, Mast Cell Activation Syndrome, multiple anaphylactic allergies, c-PTSD and original flavor, gallstones (removed), propensity to kidney stones, severe tonsillitis (removed after 8 months, causing permanent ear damage), ADHD, plantar fasciitis, tendonitis of the hands, bronchial scarring from whooping cough, IBS, sleep apnea, anxiety, depression, and obesity. When can you start calling it financial abuse? I grew up with wealthy parents who are also both stingy and poverty-informed. My mother passed when I was 5 and, from what I have gathered, she was as frugal as you’d expect an English teacher climbing towards a doctorate married to a bright young airman climbing the ranks to be. I have never been given an indication that she was “weird” about money, but I logically have no way of knowing. My father’s backstory has been given. My stepmother grew up incredibly rich (the daughter of an ambassador) and then lost everything. She survived poverty and abuse as a young adult and became deeply weird about money. I grew up in a big house on 2 acres of land in the Blue Ridge Mountains, about an hour from Washington, D.C. My dad worked for Air Force Communications and Intelligence. My sister and I attended private school, complete with uniforms. Dad always insisted we buy our uniforms second-hand, because of how expensive they were. At the same time, we had live-in nannies for most of my childhood. These were not professional caretakers of children - they were young women who applied for the position because it included room and board, so I imagine that was done on the cheap. My sister took horseback riding lessons, but I never got to, because Dad decided it was too expensive and too big a hassle a bit before he remarried. My family has never owned fewer than four cars at a time. As a kid, I did not realize we were wealthy, because my dad has gone between frugal, stingy, and spendthrift my entire life. In his frugal stages, we would do things like go dumpster-diving behind Costco, going to the dump and asking for stuff that looked useful, and stocking up on frozen goods, so that the primary meal I remember from ages 6-10 is TV dinners. In stingier cycles, Dad would tell us off for anything that “wasted” money. Like getting a hole in your uniform skirt (Don’t you know how expensive these are!? You can wear that until you outgrow it and if you don’t want it to have holes, don’t put holes in it.) My sister’s horse riding lessons. I got to play violin and flute, but during stingy cycles, Dad would call me out for not practicing enough, when he was “paying so much” to rent these instruments for me. My dad is also a hoarder, so his spendthrift cycles usually involve buying absolutely whacking amounts of movies in whatever format is popular, books, and power tools that he has no use for. My father’s DVD and Blu-Ray collection is somewhere in the range of 5,000+ and his book collection is at least 12,000 volumes. The foundations of the house were literally starting to crumble because of the weight of the books he was storing throughout the house. He threw away around 2,000 books from our basement that had become water-damaged. My dad, who is 82, has emphysema and a heart murmur post-heart attack, owns a top-of-the-line truck, two tractors that never work, a riding mower, and dozens of expensive power tools. During renovations, roughly $10,000 worth of those power tools were destroyed because of improper storage, so Dad bought replacements for a bunch of them. The renovations included the construction of a three-car garage, the installation of a backup generator, the complete remodeling of the previous garage into a library with built-in bookshelves and the installation of a new half bath with shower, the painting of every one of the 15 rooms and two hallways (all the same shade of mental hospital grey), the installation of track lighting in every room in the house, the conversion of the old, rotting screen porch to a sun room (complete with working sink and three permanent islands), the tearing down of the wooden deck and its replacement with concrete stairs and a concrete patio, the cutting of two skylights, the sealing of the old attic, and the creation of a mudroom in place of our former front porch. I currently work in windows and he said he is very, very interested in the 47% employee discount for replacing the 19 windows originally installed at the building in the 70′s. Part of the roof blew off at the townhouse that he owns that I live in. Our home insurance gave him $17k towards fixing it. I saw the original quotes, which were between $8-$9k (the original emails also included him straight up saying he was an elderly disabled veteran and asking if they had any discounts for any of that). He said with the material the HOA is demanding we use the price has gone up to $13k. As I work in windows and the windows at my house are garbage that drastically raise my energy bills, I told him I wanted to use whatever was left over in replacing windows. He instantly snapped, “I’m not MADE of money! I’ve got my own expenses, kiddo.” As if he hadn’t told me he had been making plans for replacing all of his own windows with his own money three days before. He also started insisting that I try to finagle a raise at work and told me not to tell my stepmother about my planned heritage trip to Norway, because she will then insist that I give all of the money I am saving for it to them. He already agreed to a scheme that I proposed somewhat tongue-in-cheek that now that I have a steady job, he garnish 30% of every paycheck I receive to pay back rent and loaned money back. For Christmas, he and my stepmother gave me $150. My boyfriend’s grandma, who I have only met twice, gave me $75, in contrast. Ever since I was 15, I have been living in poverty with training wheels. My parents are wealthy. They are not going to let me starve to death (though they will and do encourage me to go on SNAP whenever I am struggling, on the basis that they already paid for it through taxes). They let me live, mostly rent-free, in a decent townhouse in a nice city, though I must have at least one paying roommate. I pay all utilities. I have a Costco credit card and my dad pays for my cell phone, my car insurance, and the HOA fees. I hear a lot about it. Not every time I go home, but the majority of the time I go home, my dad or my stepmother lectures me about money. They insist that I work harder and keep my nose to the grindstone. One of them bemoans how hard they had it in their youth. They both tell me they are struggling financially. My stepmother, who was the head counter worker of Elizabeth Arden at a Macy’s near D.C., and who is now head counter worker at Lancome at the same Macy’s. My father, retired Colonel, with investment portfolios, a pension, Social Security, and three rental properties. Me, who has never made more than $20 per hour and was hired for my first full-time job ever at age 35. The most I have ever made in a year was $19k, and that was having a 15 hour a week early AM gig, a 35 hour a week online teaching aid job, proofreading, and pet-sitting. I currently make $16.50 per hour, despite having a master’s degree and having worked since I was 15. Starting when I got my first part-time job at age 15, the “This is your responsibility to pay for” has expanded, starting with, “You can buy your own clothes now”, in addition to the house chores I already did (including taking over the cooking almost entirely at age 16, because my stepmother started making food I couldn’t eat deliberately or started making too little food for me to eat). I have a fair amount of clothes from high school still, because I wasn’t going to mess up what I had worked hard to get. It really started ramping up when I went to college. I got a scholarship and applied for grants, but most of the money was supposed to come out of a college fund my parents had set up, and that Dad apparently put an inheritance from our grandma into our college funds. Dad complained throughout college that me living in an apartment instead of the dorm was so expensive and that he needed me to forgo pretty much every extraneous activity that would cost money. I was expected to keep working. This wouldn’t be too unreasonable, except I had begun having mystery seizures (later diagnosed as paroxysmal dyskinesia, apparently comorbid with tardive dyskinesia caused by my anti-depressants). I would go to work, have a dystonic episode, then go to class and have a dystonic episode. I also caught whooping cough. I ran up about $12,000 in medical debt. I successfully was able to appeal for financial aid to get rid of most of it, but I still had plenty left over. I also ate out on credit way more than I should have immediately after graduation, but I was struggling with bulimia made worse by a traumatic breakup with an abusive partner. My parents tried to insist that I move back in with them after college, so that I could cook for them, watch their dog and cats whenever needed, and do whatever else they wanted while I tried to find a job. I pointed out that my stepmother and I would do each other grievous harm. Dad agreed to let me live in the townhouse he had bought for my stepbrother and sister-in-law, since they had moved. The expectation remained that I would come up at least once a month and every holiday to cook and clean, come up whenever I was needed to animal sit (to the point that when the whole family went to Galaxy’s Edge, I, the biggest Star Wars nerd in the family, was left home to dog-sit because I couldn’t possibly afford the tickets and they didn’t want to pay someone else to come do it. Dad slipped me a hundred and told me to keep it quiet), and to do all of the holiday present shopping for every person in the family, as well as wrapping those presents, setting up the tree and doing the decorating myself. About 1/2 of the time, I am expected to do the shopping for holiday meals as well. My stepmother still requires me to pick presents for Dad’s birthday and Christmas, because she has no idea what he would like. This has been the state of affairs for the last 11 years. I have a house, which I must share. When I came to Dad in my mid-20′s, crying about how rotten my roommates were, he basically told me to suck it up as long as they paid rent. At one point, there were five adults living in a three-bedroom townhouse with a very small kitchen. One was an addict who was not ready to start working on recovery and another was a legit dealer who had started dating the roommate I had actually approved, so she moved him in and he immediately started fooling around with the addict, who was my adopted cousin’s fiance. I approved two people moving in, both brought plus-ones. When I finally got them out, my chosen brother moved in. He is a lovely man in many ways, but he is also disgusting. His depression and executive dysfunction make living with him a nightmare, because he rarely cleans and often does not clean himself. But he paid the rent, so he stayed, turning my house into garbage. Another roommate also contributed to this - neither young man contributed a fair share to the chores. I was a substitute teacher at the time, but I only made $65-$70 a day for doing that, and I was still having dystonic attacks all over the place. Dad would listen to me crying about how miserable it was living with these men who were basically fine living like animals and forcing me to clean up after them (on coming back from dog-sitting, I was greeted with mold in the sink and the catboxes). He never even suggested I look for new roommates, because these guys were paying. In 2015, I was assaulted in a hate crime. I am allergic to lavender and I was doing my student teaching in a high school. One student decided to spray me with lavender perfume on three separate occasions. I went into a prolonged hyperimmune response and had to stop working outside the house, because I kept going into anaphylactic shock in public. I started wearing filter masks in early 2016, so that I could go grocery shopping without risking anaphylaxis. I was never offered help with my mounting medical bills. I was told to go on SNAP and pressured to apply for SSDI. I was rejected from SSDI four times. Around when I was 30, my dad finally released my college fund/inheritance from Grandma to me. This was after my second third-hand car had finally died of old age, and after he withdrew $24k from this fund to buy myself a fairly new car. I was only partially consulted on this. After this stock portfolio was released to me, Dad immediately started telling me I couldn’t take money out of it, because I should defer to him in financial planning. Until I was 35, I humbly asked permission before I took any of my own money out of the fund that was set up for me. After all, Dad said it was for me in my old age. I successfully argued to him that I needed to make it to old age first, but he insisted that I only take out drips and drabbles, lest I make my taxes more complicated. He insists on doing my taxes - I know there are a bunch of documents labeled as being “portfolio” or “inheritance”, but I am not supposed to look at any of them. I suspect that he doesn’t have me involved in my taxes in part to hide how much wealth I technically own that he doesn’t think I deserve to have yet. The last time I mentioned my stock portfolio being an inheritance from Mom and that I didn’t think she would mind if I took a bit out to finance a life-changing trip and to have fun. He shot back, “Your mom and *I* put that money aside for you”, with a palpable hint that I should give him the money I am planning to spend. I am already discouraged from talking about my trip with my stepmother, because she will insist that I not go and instead give all the money to them, to pay them back for the rent and groceries that kept me above-ground until now. I don’t deny that I do owe them money. I don’t think it’s financially abusive to expect money loaned to be paid back. But I do think it is financially abusive to know for certain that your adult child is living in poverty through no fault of their own and to keep throwing just enough of a lifeline to keep them off the streets. All of the complaining about every nickel and dime is financially abusive. Garnishing your own child’s wages is financially abusive. Denying me the money that insurance paid out to fix the house that I will own when my father passes is financially abusive. Doing that a mere five days after talking excitedly about how great it will be to utilize my excellent employee discount to replace his own windows out of pocket is financially abusive and weird. The title sums up what this feels like. Every time the actual poverty I am in ever-present threat of experiencing happens, my parents give me a boost. They then lord it over me, bemoan their own impoverished state, and insist that I just work smarter in my broken body and I will have enough money to give them. In fairness to them, I probably owe them about $75k in unpaid rent, gas for my car, and groceries. In fairness to me, they are rich. I am supposed to inherit a lot. Dad seems to have become obsessed with how much money he will leave behind. Instead of trying to acclimate me to the wealth that we all know is coming, my parents have chosen to let me live the knife-edge of poverty experience, all while telling me about how close they are to cutting me off entirely. My father has access to my bank account and my investment portfolio and can look at them any time he pleases, while I certainly can’t get a look at his finances, let alone his will. I know this is long and rambly, but it needed to be got out.

#financial abuse #parental abuse #Boomer money weirdness #living on the edge #almost poverty #poverty with training wheels

3 notes · View notes

sapphicmumrik · 10 months

Text

when someone tells me I don't look disabled or chronic:

Mental health issues prevail throughout the lifetime of individuals with 22q. In stark contrast to the general public rates of ADHD, ASD, anxiety and mood disorders are greatly elevated in the 22q population. Psychotic symptoms arising in approx. 50% of adolescents progress to psychotic disorders in 10-25% of individuals.

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is the most prevalent MH diagnosis in children with 22q.

Problems with sleep are very common in patients with 22q11.2 deletion syndrome. Sleep disordered breathing, including obstructive sleep apnea is seen in about 50% of patients with 22q in craniofacial clinic compared to about 11% in the general population. There are many contributing factors: facial anatomy and palate repairs, and medical issues, for example cardiorespiratory problems. Sleep can also be disrupted with night leg pains. Many patients have anxiety and difficulty falling asleep at bedtime.

Individuals with 22q11.2 deletion syndrome are born with a genetic predisposition to mental ill-health. The majority are faced with a myriad of physical health issues, learning difficulties and a variety of mental health concerns. Poor sleep and sleep disturbances are more common in childhood but can occur at any time and for varying reasons and for some, they can remain a problem over the lifespan.

...lol

#fern.txt

0 notes

myshipmyway · 11 months

Text

OOC: Things I'm learning from ADHD assessment

Being sleepy when bored, sleepy when a car passenger (and bored), sleepy when reading a book I'm not super into (bored), sleepy when watching TV I'm not into (bored), accidentally SLEEP-sleeping instead of napping... might have sleep apnea, might not, need a sleep study.

Yes I do have a severe mood disorder. No I do not know what normal feels like and THAT is normal when you've been dealing w/a mood disorder for literal years.

Oh btw before treating the ADHD we'll have to get the mood disorder under control

Oh the mood disorder may actually be because of the ADHD yes that's true but treating the ADHD first doesn't tend to work very well

questioning about my first period and yes it sounds like you have pcos what do you mean your first doctor only wanted to treat your acne???

wow yes definitely scoring on the inattentive childhood symptoms

hm duloxetine isn't helping that's definitely something that needs to be addressed

oh ha ha we have to delve into the trauma part hm that's going to be tough with me never getting time to myself isn't it

#ooc #adhd adventures

1 note · View note

webnewsify1 · 1 year

Text

Sleep Apnea in Childhood May Harm the Developing Brain

According to a recent study, teens with the sleep apnea illness may have brains that differ slightly from those of their peers. About 100 teenagers had their brains scanned, and the researchers discovered that individuals with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) tended to have thinner brain tissue at the surface as well as mild inflammation in a memory and learning-related brain region. According to senior researcher It is yet unknown what these changes in brain structure entail, according to Dr.Raanan Arens, chief of respiratory and sleep medicine at Children's Hospital at Montefiore in New York City.But, the findings, which were just published in the journal Sleep, do imply that OSA can result in perceptible changes in children's brain development. According to studies, between 1% and 5% of kids have obstructive sleep apnea, a condition in which the neck muscles tighten while they are asleep, producing frequent breathing pauses and starts. The most noticeable sign is loud snoring, but daytime tiredness and focus issues are also cause for concern. According to Arens, these breathing pauses can occur numerous times every hour. Moreover, the brain briefly "wakes up" when breathing ceases while you are asleep. According to Arens, OSA could harm children's developing brains for two main reasons: it frequently interferes with the brain's oxygen supply and prevents children from getting the deep sleep needed for normal brain growth and function. Arens and his colleagues enlisted 98 teenagers to undergo MRI brain scans in order to learn more. Of those, 53 had OSA and were overweight or obese, while the other 45 were within the same weight range but did not have sleep apnea. Obesity is a risk factor for OSA, but children of any weight can get it. The two groups of children were compared to see if there were any variations in the hippocampus, a region of the brain involved in memory and learning, or the thickness of the cortex, the brain's outermost layer. The study found that teens with OSA had a thinner brain cortex and a larger volume in part of the hippocampus when compared to kids without the condition (which could signify inflammation or edoema).And the extent of those brain abnormalities increased with the severity of the apnea disease. The key question is whether the structural changes in the brain result in issues with memory or learning, or with emotions or behaviour. As per Dr. Shalini Paruthi, a spokesman for the American Academy of Sleep Medicine who was not involved in the study, "This study specifically helps enhance understanding in the field of brain effects — cortical thinning and hippocampal volume — from obstructive sleep apnea in teenagers." According to Paruthi, who is also the medical co-director of St. Luke's Sleep Medicine and Research Center in Chesterfield, Missouri, "larger trials with many more kids with OSA may help further elucidate how changes detected on MRI affect learning, attention, mood, academic performance, and more." Another crucial element, according to Arens, is the lack of OSA therapy among the study's teenage participants. The effects of treatment on the MRI-detected variations in the brain are the subject of ongoing research. Sleep apnea in children is frequently caused by chronically irritated tonsils or adenoids (tissues high in throat). According to Arens, the typical treatment in certain circumstances is surgery to remove the tissue. In some situations, children might have to use a device that softly blows air via a mask placed over their nose while they sleep to keep their airways open. Although the implications of the brain changes shown in this study for children's daily lives are not yet evident, it is well known that sleep apnea can make kids grouchy and fatigued during the day if left untreated. They might exhibit behavioural issues, learning difficulties, and attention issues that resemble ADHD (ADHD). Both experts advised parents to consult a paediatrician if they notice any potential OSA symptoms in their child, such as loud snoring at night, daytime tiredness, or issues with learning or behaviour. To check whether the tonsils and adenoids are blocking the airways, Paruthi said that some children would need to be referred to an ear, nose, and throat expert. To identify and treat the issue, other kids may require a sleep medicine specialist's evaluation. Read the full article

#sleep sleepapnea child childhood brain brainsell developingbrain memory teenagers research webnewsify

0 notes

queenofthursday6599-blog · 2 years

Text

Sleep failure

As an insomniac sometimes you’ve just got to accept that sleeping just isn’t going to happen. Not even after laying in bed for more than 5 hours straight trying your best to convince your body that this whole thing is necessary.

Sometimes I’ll have a period of time where getting to sleep happens so effortlessly that I’ll just forget [because of the ADHD] that I’m an insomniac for a little while. Before a single thing on the “things I must do/have in order to be able to get to sleep” list doesn’t manage to fall in line and I spend the rest of the night laying in bed while still very much awake.

There’s a lot of things I have to consciously consider that I just outright can’t do or else I won’t get a full nights sleep. Some of them are flat out unhealthy.

Like drinking water before bed. I can’t drink water right before bed, because if I do I’ll have to get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom. And if I do that it’s a coin toss if I’m going to be able to convince my body that it’s still sleep time. So I’ll often wake up somewhere between normal-levels-of-thirsty and so dehydrated that my lips and the inside of my nose will threaten to crack open and my eyes will literally try to stick to my eyelids. But even after nights where I’m so thirsty, that the first thing I do when I wake up is stick my head under my ensuite sink tap and chug until I feel less like crap first thing in the morning. I’ll still do the exact same thing of not drinking anything before bed later that same day before I go to sleep.

Because having one bad night will more likely than not lead to a series of bad nights, and not before long my previously functional sleep schedule is no more but a passing memory.

Also as I’ve gotten older falling out of my sleep routine and returning to nightly insomnia instead of just the occasional bad nights, runs the risk of triggering (completely random from what I can tell) Nocturnal Panic Attacks. Which is where a panic attack triggers while you’re asleep, which you do not sleep through because your body thinks it’s having a heart attack. So your body wakes you up because it thinks you’re dying, because you obviously need to address whatever is threatening you with impending doom.

Or at least this is what I assume is happening to me. I know I shouldn’t self diagnose, but considering the only other thing that lines up with my symptoms is literal heart failure and this has been happening on and off since my teenage years and it’s been more than five years now [which is typically when you die of untreated heart failure]. I think it’s pretty safe to say that I get occasional Nocturnal Panic Attacks when my insomnia gets too bad*. Which makes sense because from what I’ve read Nocturnal Panic Attacks can be triggered by stress. And insomnia is a stress response for my body, which gives me more stress, and I’m assuming the NPAs are what happen when my brain gets past a certain stress threshold due to sleep deprivation. Considering I only tend to get them after weeks of less than a couple hours a night.

*[It can’t be sleep apnea because I shared a bedroom with my sister for literally 80% of our childhood. Including our teenage years, we shared a bedroom right up until she left home to get married at age 18. She’s also a morning person who’s extremely regular when it comes to sleep, and runs on 5 hours a night like clockwork with no issues. So while she’s obviously sold her soul to some sort of dark force to escape the family sleep issues, she’s still my sister and would tell me if I snored or breathed out of my mouth. Even to just complain or make fun of me. Not to mention the whole waking up gasping for breath in a panic and thinking I’m dying only happens occasionally after a particularly long/bad bout of insomnia.]

SO- how was everyone else’s night?

#sleepless night #here's hoping to a better one sometime tonight

0 notes

coolkoalameditation · 11 months

Text

#coolkoala #bedtimemeditation #meditationforkids #kidsmeditation #childhood sleep apnea and adhd #adhd meltdowns at bedtime #adhd bedtime meltdown #adhd meltdown triggers #adhd sleep medication #adhd sleep problems in kids #adhd sleep problems #adhd meltdown symptoms #hyperactivity at bedtime #adhd bedtime battles

1 note · View note

empowering-minds · 9 months

Text

Breaking the Stigma: Addressing Misconceptions about ADHD

In a world where information spreads quickly, misconceptions about various topics can take root and perpetuate. ADHD, or Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, is no exception. As an ADHD psychiatrist, I encounter these misconceptions regularly and am committed to setting the record straight. In this blog, I'll shed light on some common misconceptions about ADHD, as well as its connection to sleep patterns.

Dispelling Common Misconceptions about ADHD

Misconception: ADHD Is Just About Hyperactivity: While hyperactivity is one of the core symptoms of ADHD, the condition goes beyond that. It also involves difficulties in attention, focus, and impulse control. Many individuals with ADHD don't exhibit hyperactivity but struggle with other aspects of the disorder.

Misconception: It's Just a Childhood Condition: ADHD doesn't magically disappear with age. While symptoms may change over time, many individuals continue to experience challenges related to ADHD well into adulthood.

Misconception: It's Just Lack of Discipline: ADHD is a neurobiological condition, not a result of laziness or lack of discipline. Individuals with ADHD often have structural and chemical differences in their brains that affect their ability to regulate attention and impulses.

Misconception: Medication Solves Everything: While medication can be a helpful tool in managing ADHD symptoms, it's not a one-size-fits-all solution. A comprehensive approach that includes therapy, lifestyle adjustments, and support is often necessary.

ADHD and Sleep: Unraveling the Connection

Sleep plays a significant role in overall well-being, and its connection to ADHD is notable:

Sleep Disorders and ADHD: Individuals with ADHD are more prone to sleep disorders, such as insomnia or sleep apnea. These disorders can further exacerbate ADHD symptoms.

Impact on Executive Functioning: Poor sleep quality can impair executive functioning, making it even more challenging for individuals with ADHD to regulate attention, impulse control, and emotions.

Cyclical Relationship: ADHD symptoms can disrupt sleep, and poor sleep can worsen ADHD symptoms. It's a cycle that needs to be addressed for effective management.

Treatment Considerations: Addressing sleep issues is an integral part of managing ADHD. This might involve optimizing sleep hygiene, seeking treatment for sleep disorders, and working with an ADHD psychiatrist for a comprehensive plan.

Conclusion:

Breaking the stigma surrounding ADHD is a collective effort that starts with accurate information and understanding. By dispelling misconceptions and recognizing the intricate connections, such as the link between ADHD and sleep patterns, we can pave the way for more effective management and support. If you or a loved one is dealing with ADHD, remember that accurate knowledge and professional assistance are key. Reach out to resources like Faith Behavioral Health to embark on a journey of accurate information, understanding, and effective management.

#adhd psychiatrist #adhd problems #adhd #adhd brain #psychiatrist #psychiatry #psychology

0 notes

deregirls · 3 years

Note

i don't know if this is relevant but from someone with lifelong insomnia: insomnia is a symptom, not a disorder. you don't get diagnosed with insomnia. insomnia is either not being able to sleep within a certain amount of time or waking up in the middle of the night or early in the morning and not being able to fall sleep again. sometimes a doctor is needed to determine if someone does experience insomnia because your perception of how long it takes to fall asleep isn't accurate, but it can be determined on your own. sleep studies also don't show most causes of insomnia, they can only detect specific sleep disorders and false negatives do happen though i don't know how common that is. insomnia isn't a sleep disorder in itself so you can have sleeping problems but come up with nothing if you don't have a sleep disorder. i have had severe insomnia since early childhood and almost never feel rested due to anxiety/PTSD/ADHD and have had multiple sleep studies that came up as nothing, even though it was a severe issue and i had no idea what the cause was at the time

also because insomnia can be caused by anything (ex. sleep disorder, neurological disorder, mental illness, sleep apnea, poor sleep hygiene, etc.) and what each person needs varies, they can't really give you a solution in a lot of cases. you could need to find certain sleep habits to help you, they could recommend a cpap machine, or you could need anxiety medication. i don't know how much this helps you but i hope it was informative at least because a sleep study isn't an end-all-be-all. it could help a lot and fix everything but it also might not, it depends on what they find, if anything

in the meantime i'd recommend small doses of melatonin for no more than a week at a time if you can't sleep. no more than 10mg, the higher it goes the less effective it is and the more likely you'll become dependent. it's a really useful quick fix if you need it

Okay, that last bit was eye opening. I always took larger doses bc i thought it would help more, and it only helped about half the time

I honestly think what i have is a delayed sleep cycle bc i tired as hell throughout the day but wide wide WIDE awake from like. Midnight until 6am. I just don't know what to do about it

1 note · View note

maryellencarter · 4 years

Text

excessively detailed headcanon meme from camshaft22 about Wes

What does their bedroom look like? Lots and lots and lots of extremely colorful pillows and blankets. Not a hell of a lot else. And Kettch.

Do they have any daily rituals? Um. Not particularly, I think? He’s spent his entire adult life in the military, which pretty much defines what he has to do when.

Do they exercise, and if so, what do they do? How often? Yes. We know that Wes is fairly good at hand-to-hand combat. I figure he also does weight training and cardio.

What would they do if they needed to make dinner but the kitchen was busy? Tricky question, as it often is for characters from military canons. But I’m thinking he’d either barge in and work around the other people using the kitchen, or if all the stoves/ovens/etc were busy, find a ration bar or something.

Cleanliness habits (personal, workspace, etc.) We have pretty much nothing on this in canon. I tend to have his workspace covered in datacards and so forth, because he has that sort of ADHD vibe where your brain needs more than one screen to spread thoughts across. We do know that he has quite a good sense of smell, so he’s probably fairly cleanly in his personal life.

Eating habits and sample daily menu? Again: military. He eats what’s there to be eaten. Probably a fair amount of it, because all that muscle needs a lot of calories. I suspect during the Rebellion he helped supply the cooks by hunting for meat.

Favorite way to waste time and feelings surrounding wasting time? Good question. He’s not as hyper as Shalla; there are a couple of points in the books where we see him lying down doing nothing when he has some free time. (Once toward the beginning of Iron Fist iirc, when the three ersatz Zsinjes are discussing plans, Wes is lying on a sofa with a glass of brandy while they talk, and then when Myn goes to find him for the “you can’t look dignified” talk he finds Wes lying down in bed though he has a chair in his quarters.) He’s probably always thinking about random shit and entertaining himself.

Favorite indulgence and feelings surrounding indulging? I think it really depends on the context. On Adumar, we see him cutting loose and enjoying the fame and adulation, and also capes and swords. In the Wraith books, he’s more disciplined, because his quacklings need him to be, but he definitely enjoys pranks, and also setting up the sort of prank-like training methods he uses. I don’t think he really has any guilty pleasures as such, not that he would consider guilty.

Makeup? I kind of doubt he’s been in a context to encounter it much, other than Face’s stage makeup. In universes where he has, he definitely likes body glitter, and has probably experimented with using contouring techniques on his biceps.

Neuroses? Do they recognize them as such? You can’t be a Wraith without neuroses. He sits on them pretty effectively, but he’s a mess around the whole business with Kell’s father, and he’s fairly fatalistic about his own prospects of survival.

Intellectual pursuits? Good damn question. We know he’s smart, good at numbers, remembers obscure training protocols. We don’t know if he reads philosophy or writes poetry or... what exactly are “intellectual pursuits” anyway?

Favorite book genre? There are a lot of these questions that we don’t especially have answers to. I mean, I know this is a headcanon meme, but a lot of them I also haven’t pondered much. I don’t think we ever see Wes reading for fun, although I speculate he reads NR training manuals in order to figure out ways to mess with his students. I’ll have to ponder on this one.

Sexual Orientation? And, regardless of own orientation, thoughts on sexual orientation in general? Wes is pansexual aromantic. He pretty much respects that everybody has different orientations, but finds romance confusing and occasionally distressing, especially when it interferes with his friendships.

Physical abnormalities? (Both visible and not, including injuries/disabilities, long-term illnesses, food-intolerances, etc.) Um. Not really? The whole Star Wars bacta thing takes care of a lot of that. I have been messing around with a completely self-indulgent little sleep apnea headcanon, because you could just wear a specialized rebreather to sleep instead of a CPAP machine. I haven’t done anything with that, though.

Biggest and smallest short term goal? At what point in the story? That’s the trouble with a shared universe that spans 44 years at least.

Biggest and smallest long term goal? Ditto.

Preferred mode of dress and rituals surrounding dress? Ahahahaha yeah. XD Wes is famous, or infamous, for his unique sense of style -- although apparently there are things even he doesn’t want to wear, because Wedge was able to threaten him with letting Hobbie choose his clothes on Adumar. He likes bright colors, capes, shiny things, weaponry, and glitter.

Favorite beverage? I have no headcanon about this. Star Wars foodstuffs are difficult.

What do they think about before falling asleep at night? Probably ways to cause minor trouble and cheer people up. Or maybe he tells himself stories.

Childhood illnesses? Any interesting stories behind them? Well, I decided the “Hesken’s fever” that kept him out of the first Death Star battle was space chicken pox, and that he had it as a kid but it didn’t take, because I had chicken pox twice as a kid myself.

Turn-ons? Turn-offs? Sexually, or what? I’m old enough in internet years that I’m never quite sure whether we’re using this in the sense of things that you generally like and don’t like. Also, for as much Wes smut as I’ve written (it is a lot), I don’t really feel that I can produce a list.

Given a blank piece of paper, a pencil, and nothing to do, what would happen? Paper airplanes, possibly decorated with dicks.

How organized are they? How does this organization/disorganization manifest in their everyday life? Honestly, Wes is pretty damn organized when it comes to squadron stuff. I feel like this could go either way -- that he’s also super organized about his personal life, or that he’s completely and utterly disorganized outside the military structure.

Is there one subject of study that they excel at? Or do they even care about intellectual pursuits at all? Wes Janson, Ace Statistician. XD Honestly, he could probably be good at most things, he’s a lot smarter than he acts sometimes.

How do they see themselves 5 years from today? Again, at what point in the story?

Do they have any plans for the future? Any contingency plans if things don’t workout? These are really difficult to answer without specifying a timeframe.

What is their biggest regret? Definitely the Doran Incident.

Who do they see as their best friend? Their worst enemy? Best friend is Hobbie. Worst enemy is probably whoever Wedge is currently pointing him at. Wes doesn’t really have a lot of personal enmities.

Reaction to sudden extrapersonal disaster (eg The house is on fire! What do they do?) Go extremely organized and make everything happen that needs to happen.

Reaction to sudden intrapersonal disaster (eg close family member suddenly dies) Sit on his feelings until they stop bothering him.

Most prized possession? Kettch.

Thoughts on material possessions in general? He really doesn’t need much. I tend to figure he likes comfy cozy cuddly things and fancy capes, and other than that he mostly does with what the Rebellion / New Republic gives him. Hobbie probably invests his money for him (Ralltiir is a banking planet), and Wes doesn’t pay much attention to it. By the time he gets out of the military at last, he probably has a pretty fair pile.

Concept of home and family? The Fab Four are his family. I forget why, but I also decided he has some attachment to Taanab and probably goes back there to live once he musters out. The air and gravity just feel more correct there.

Thoughts on privacy? (Are they a private person, or are they prone to ‘TMI’?) Wes gives the impression that there’s not a thought in his head that doesn’t come out his mouth, but at the same time he has secrets he doesn’t tell anybody until he has to. So, some of each? It’s a balancing act.

What activities do they enjoy, but consider to be a waste of time? Um. I’m not sure he has any. I mean, this is a guy who unabashedly bounces on his bed to make a point.

What makes them feel guilty? Not much. Except the Doran incident and things that remind him of it.

Are they more analytical or more emotional in their decision-making? Emotional, to the point that he’s made a principle out of it.

Would they consider themselves a Type A or Type B personality? I honestly don’t know what this means. *googles* Well, I have learned a lot about tobacco lobbyists in the 1980s... ;P If I’m understanding what these mean, though, Wes is definitely not a Type A personality, and therefore is by definition a Type B personality.

What recharges them when they’re feeling drained? Being around people. Having fun. Conversation. Cheering other people up.

Would you say that they have a superiority-complex? Inferiority-complex? Neither? Probably neither. Sometimes he pretends to have a superiority complex as a form of goofing around, which is much more difficult to do when you actually have one of these complexes. (Compleces? Plurals are complicated.)

How misanthropic are they? Ahaha. Not very. Hobbie does all of that for him. XD

Hobbies? BEHOLD A PUNE *koff* Sorry. I don’t really know that Wes has any particular hobbies, although I suspect he can sew for purposes of making Kettch new outfits. Somebody had to make that gray Hawk-bats flightsuit.

How far did they get in formal education? What are their views on formal education vs self-education? Well, he definitely left school on Taanab by the time he was about eighteen at the oldest. I feel like he was probably kind of self-conscious about being a Rimworlder for a while (all three of the others are Coreworlders), and that might mix into his feelings about having left school early, if he did.

Religion? When I write Wes, he’s kind of an agnostic. It so happens that he never refers to the Force at all in the X-wing books, in any way, so I’ve riffed on that to a view that, while he’s seen Luke do things with the Force and knows it exists, he ascribes it a lot less power than the Jedi do. He sees the Force basically as a nonsentient temporally-amorphous ocean of impressions, which Jedi can use to foresee things like blaster bolts (which is useful), but when Jedi get larger and vaguer impressions about the “will of the Force”, he’s pretty sure they’re projecting. This doesn’t do too much harm when Luke does it, because Luke is a ball of sunshine who just wants what’s best for everyone, but it means that Sith and other fucked-up people have their own really dangerous views on the Force’s will. ...I may have thought this out rather a lot.

Superstitions or views on the occult? He probably has them. I’m very fond of space superstitions but I don’t think I’ve written any myself. Wes seems like the sort of guy who would laugh over ghost stories and then accidentally scare himself in the middle of the night.

Do they express their thoughts through words or deeds? Ummm I’m not quite sure what this means. *ponders* Nope, I’ve got nuthin’.

If they were to fall in love, who (or what) is their ideal? That’s also a hell of a question. Like does it mean who would they fall in love with? Are we talking that Anne of Green Gables shit about only being able to fall in love with a tall dark stranger with a melting voice?

How do they express love? Snuggling. Also annoying you into cheering up.

If this person were to get into a fist fight, what is their fighting style like? More or less a mixed martial arts thing. We see him use some wrestling moves and spinning kicks. I suspect Shalla gave him some lessons after she joined the Wraiths, because he seems a lot more confident about his hand-to-hand abilities on Adumar than in the first Wraith Squadron book.

Is this person afraid of dying? Why or why not? Nope. He knows he’s going to die very soon; he’s a soldier in a war with an extremely high rate of attrition. His goal is to have as much fun as possible before he goes.

#wes janson #wes janson ace statistician #rogue squadron #star wars legends #meme

14 notes · View notes

washipuppy · 4 years

Text

Where is my mind (this time)?

Personal stuff? On MY Tumblr? Yep, it's happening. I need to ramble, and where the feck else am I gonna do it but Tumblr?

I was supposed to go in for an Autism assessment today with my therapist. It's been constantly on my mind it all week, to the extent that I think I might actually ne worried about it, and I have no feckin idea why. It's not a test.

Anyway, it was cancelled and re-scheduled for next week. I took the day off work for it too, since it was gonna be a couple of hours, but I went back to work because I'll need to take next Thursday instead. So I guess I'm having another week with this oversized, unresolved question-mark dangling from my neck.

Background will (hopefully) be under the cut so that most of you aren't bothered by all this:

Background 1 - My therapist is kind of flakey.

Like many people, I have a therapist that I picked entirely because I'd been without one for several years (since my last therapist retired) and I needed to do something about the tail-spin death-spiral my brain was in. I don't get to see them too often, because I work 8:30 - 5:00, 5 days a week and they tend to cancel my appointments on me thr day they happen, but I'm too tired and worn down by existence to get another one, so it is what it is.

Background 2 - I'm not trying to be weird, please stop calling me that.

Lotta people seem to think I'm Autistic. Including said therapist, who I noticed was asking me the "Could this person be Autistic?" questions during our last session. Shortly after which I realised I recognised the "Could this person be Autistic" questions without the word ever being used. I've considered the possibility, but although I have a some traits that are associated with ASD (non-verbal episodes, repetative hand / body movements when anxious, low social situational/emotional awareness, eye contact avoidance...), I have a pretty intense imagination and I can be spontanious. If I decide I want to go shopping after work, I'll do so. If someone wants to spend time with me and I don't really have a reason not to go (e.g. a prior commitment or not wanting to spend a lot of money on something I won't actually enjoy), I'm gonna go even if it's last minute. Because they asked me specifically (General invitations offered to "the group" don't elicit this, and I'm way more likely to bail on those) and I want to keep being asked to go to things; If I say no too often, people will just stop inviting me to things. So if I'm asked to go see a band or an expo or whatever and the cost isn't too bad, I'll go. Besides, what good will it actually do me if I get confirmation that I am Autistic? It's a bit late for it to make a difference to my development, the damage has already by and large been done. I didn't see how it would actually help my life now to be diagnosed.

Background 3 - The culmination of a cascade of f**kups.

For a while, I've suspected I might have ADD/ADHD (just gonna use ADHD from now for this). It started on Tumblr, oddly enough - I follow several people here who also have ADHD and post bits and bobs about it, all of which make me go "Yes, that is a thing that is me." But I tried not to think too much about the growing idea that I might have ADHD myself despite almost everything I ever saw or read about girls having ADHD described me perfectly - From the childhood maladaptive daydreaming through to the mental breakdown in university and inconsistent job performance - because I think of myself as something of a hypochondriac* and It's trite to say "Oh, I've got ADD, I'm so easily distracted!" when the world at large is horrible and distracting.

That is, until last year. See, I left a job I didn't like in 2018 and got one I quite liked in 2019. Thing is, even though I like this job, I'm still fucking up with an alarming frequency and I can't seem to stop. I don't know why it happens or how to make it stop, and I don't know how to make myself think or be more careful or even understand how I'm doing something wrong enough to stop. It's so incredibly frustrating and distressing to know you're going to fuck up, and to try to spend your time mitigating the inevitable**. The thing that made me think I should probably actually get myself checked out, however, was my partner. I've been forgetting a lot of things lately, getting confused, been struggling to keep things right in my head - after driving across the city for an event that had in face been re-scheduled next week, my partner sent me a comic strip from the ADHD Alien that basically outlined my exact mental stateand life. It was his own gentle way of saying "I don't exactly understand what's going on with you, but I think this might be what its called". More importantly though, it's something that, if I really do have it and can be diagnosed with it, we can actually do something about it and getting it managed would actually help my life.

And now, the thrilling culmination...

So. I figure "Feck it, 2020 is the year of getting my brain sorted out or something," and I talk to my GP about how to go about getting assessed for ADHD. My response is more or less a shrug with a side of "Speak to a mental health professional about that." So I speak to my therapist. I know ADHD often comes with ASD, so I figure okay, maybe we'll kill two birds with one stone and see about getting them both assessed.

Turns out she was going to suggest doing an assessment for ASD as well. I initially thought ADHD was in that too, but nope - misunderstanding on my part again. So I need to get off my goddamned backside and track down a way to get tested for the thing that can actually be managed and mitigated, while my stupid head spins its wheels over the thing that probably won't do anything but confirm how different/ not different my brain actually is.

Whatever it is, I worry it's getting worse.

*On a related note, my partner's atitude to his health is so different to my own. I always think I need to prove that something is wrong to my GP before anything can even be looked at. For example, I'm tired a lot, to the point I slip into micro-sleeps / blackouts at work. We thought perhaps I wasn't sleeping well due to the hole in my face being a disaster zone, which I talked to my GP about. A blood-test later revealed that my iron intake was within normal levels, but it was low within normal levels (i.e. I'm not anemic, I've just got a low iron count). So I worked on upping it with more red meat and iron suplaments. No improvement, either in my being tired levels or my iron intake levels (And my sinuses are as clear as they ever get, which is still not good). So stronger Iron checks and a test for celiac disease that I still need to get the results for, despite the fact that I'm about 98% sure they won't show anything. Basically, I'm working to prove that whatever's wrong with my sleep, a sleep study will probably be needed to assess.

My partner pointed out that I could just... go do that. On my own. I don't need my doctor's permission to check to see if I have apnea or some kind of sleeping condition. I don't need to prove I have something that warrents a sleep test, I can just go get a sleep test.

**There's also the distractions that aren't helping. I'll always find something - I made so many paper roses until that was finally burned out of my system, I went through a pad of post-it notes in a few months trying to take down distractions and put them asside before re-focusing on the task before a minor hiccup interrupted that technique, I've opened new windows on my browser and immediately closed them because I'm trying NOT to get distracted, but even if I don't put an obvious distraction in front of myself, I'll stare blankly into space and daydream instead of focusing.

#Autism #ASD maybe? Or not!#I don't get to know that yet!#vent #rant

4 notes · View notes