#getting diagnosed with adhd as an adult is bs

[cookie-waffle]

something people who are completely anti-self dx need to understand is that the vast majority of people with autism do not fit the stereotypes enough for them to ever get officially diagnosed. You can have VERY obvious symptoms, and people will constantly insist that you are neurotypical just because you’re afab, you’re dating someone, you can communicate, are “too old”, or some other bs reason. I’ve been told so many times that I “can’t possibly be autistic” simply because I’m chatty and because several of my adhd symptoms masc my autism symptoms

I’m not even allowed to get a proper diagnoses because my insurance won’t diagnose adults with any learning disability, even if the symptoms cause someone to struggle with their daily life.

#ftr I was almost officially diagnosed as a child but a parent didn’t allow me to be #Dont assume everyone who says they have autism is doing it for attention and with no prior experience or research

[acid-to-water]

intro!

before we get started, please keep these things in mind when looking at my blog

i am 22 years old! i am going to curse and talk about adult stuff (not necessarily NSFW). i live in NYC, and am a marijuana user, and will likely talk about it because of the impact it’s had on my life. if anything like that is uncomfortable for you, please DNI and life will be a lot easier for everyone :)

also DNI if: LGBTQ+phobic, discriminatory (racist, sexist, ableist, etc), minor, neurotypical+identify as transneuro, bullying and hate is blocked!

hi there! here’s a bunch of relevant info about myself / my blog! i’m not really sure how to format this so here we go:

name: you can call me drummer! i am not comfortable sharing my real name yet. (even though maybe I already have??)

pronouns: she/her

occupation: professional curve model and recent college graduate!!!

mental stuff: autistic & ADHD (both officially diagnosed and medicated!!)

special interests (in no particular order): TESV: Skyrim (#1), fashion & modeling, mermaids, MY CAT!!

stuff besides my special interests I enjoy:  BAGGU, Subnautica, The Kingkiller Chronicles, Lord of the Rings (LotR), The Wheel of Time Series, How I Met Your Mother (HIMYM), Diablo III (3) and Diablo IV (4), Neverwinter, Minecraft, Dungeons and Dragons (D&D), computers, (this is likely to be expanded)

i tag inconsistently, either with all the tags i can think of, or the very bare minimum (0), there is no in between

my degree is a BS in Metallurgical and Materials Engineering

i am a Celtic Pagan and Chaos Witch! (i am just starting out on my journey!)

i have been a professional curve model for almost 6 years now, 4 of which i was signed exclusively in CO, now i am signed in NY and LA with the same agency (been signed for 2 years! also no longer signed in CO)

please feel free to ask / interact with me about anything listed here! there is likely more i will add as time goes on, enjoy! :)

i am pan!

if there is anything i can do to make my posts more accessible, or if i post something harmful, please let me know! i will always try my best but i know there are lots of things i am unaware of. this post will be updated as needed. (9/12/23)

#introduction #welcome to my blog #acid-to-water #hello! #i dont know what other tags to add but here we are

[mushroomwillow]

So like

Therapy session under the cut

I’ve lived life sense I was 15yo believing that I had bipolar. I told my therapist, who I’ve only had for 4 months now, minus an unfortunate break during most of December because of holidays and shit.

She said “huh. Well diagnosing a 15yo who’s going through something extremely traumatic, or just in general, of bipolar is kind of a bold move. Let’s test you.”

I do the questionnaire first. In the middle of it she tells me, “stop saying ‘as a teenager,’ I mean as an adult. Ignore being a teen.”

We finish. She says, “the questions you answered yes to, are also yes to people who have trauma, anxiety, adhd, and autism.” (I got 3 yes’s.)

She then explains that everything we’ve talked about, all the reactions I’ve had that were violent, escapist, the anxiety and breakdowns and depression, were reactions to danger that wasn’t “just perceived” that were very real and most people would react the way I did. And as a child, I reacted the only way I knew how. As a teenager I did too. As an adult going from horrible situation to horrible situation it made sense.

I had told her that if she did say “yes you’re bipolar” I’d be ok with it. But I also said I never really felt like it was “me”.

So like, the validation of being told “no, everything you’ve told me, all the tests we’ve done to get a baseline, none of it lines up with most of what you’ve been treated for. That’s why the meds never worked. That’s why you never felt better. You can’t feel better with the wrong medication, and still being in a dangerous situation. Just won’t happen.”

Her official diagnosis is, severe ptsd, anxiety and depression due to the ptsd, and autism.

Never had a doctor, therapist, psychiatrist, or anyone professionally listen to me. In 33 years.

(I would like to say, again and again and again, bipolar isn’t something to be ashamed of. It’s very real, and the stigma against bipolar, bpd, schizophrenia, narcissistic personality disorder, etc is bs and I hate it. You are not “lesser” for having these diagnoses by any fucking means)

#mushroomwillow rambles #mental health #ptsd #tw ptsd #therapy

[zerotoahundredrealquick]

I am starting to get some answers...

I started reading this book that I found at my friend’s while I was house sitting with my boyfriend and the pups. Go figure, he wanted to watch TV and I can’t seem to just sit and watch TV without doing something else at the same time. I had left my kindle back at home, so decided to look around for a good book to start (and probably never finish) so that we could still both be physically on the couch with each other, but both doing separate things that we enjoy. After a quick search, one book stood out to me immediately and I grabbed it without even looking at all the other options (I had maybe seen 3 other book titles before landing upon this one.) The book is called Delivered from Distraction: Getting the Most Out of Life with Attention Deficit Disorder. I was in awe and remember being like, “Babe look! This book is meant for me!” I say “meant for me” lightly, because I actually had no idea that I have actual ADD. It’s one of those phrases that everyone throws around lightly, typically as an excuse for not paying attention or getting distracted easily. I’ve said it plenty of times to people lightly, not actually believing I have ADD, but wanting an out in certain situations. Little did I know, this wasn’t actually an excuse but rather an actuality-- an actuality that I have been living with for quite some time now. The first time I was introduced to ADD was in high school at my first job as a receptionist at the hair salon my mom belonged to. Often times, receptionists become underpaid babysitters in the sense that adults would come into the salon and bring their small children after picking them up from school and let them kind of just roam free about the waiting area. This one dad and son came in, the boy I would say was maybe 6 years old. I don’t think I’ve met a wilder 6 year old boy. The kid was all over the map, wanting to run everywhere and play with everything and get into everything I was doing. And I remember the dad brushed it off as the kid having ADHD. Here’s where I painted a mental picture of what ADHD was in my head and knew I didn’t ever want to be diagnosed with it. My idea of ADHD included: being obnoxious, not listening to your parents, bothering everyone around you, being louder to get attention, and not having remorse for being a complete pain in the ass. The thought of me having ADD wouldn’t cross my mind until very recently because that little boy and I were nothing alike in behavior so there was no way I had ADD, right?  Wrong. From a young age, I always did well in school. I was in accelerated classes, was on the honor roll and Dean’s list, achieved academic awards (along with athletic), and would go on to graduating Magna cum Laude from college. I was never disruptive and wouldn’t act out in class, but did this mean I didn’t have ADD or that I had amazing parents that wouldn’t let me be a little asshole in public? And define good student? By good student, I mean that I got nearly all As, some Bs, and rarely a C-- never Ds or Fs. From the sounds of it, it sounds like a girl like me wouldn’t have ADD, right? Keep reading. After my mom would call out to wake up my brother and I for school at LEAST 5 times, I would finally roll out of bed and scrounge to get my life in order. Breakfast was NEVER eaten at the table before school. Breakfast was inhaled in the 7 minutes it took to get to grade school in the car, while simultaneously tying my shoes, fixing my hair, and tucking in my uniform shirt. As we pulled up to school, I don’t think my mom’s car stopped moving before we rushed out of the door and sprinted to our respective classes so that we wouldn’t be late. To this day, I’ve gotten more late slips than parking tickets while living in San Francisco for college (and that list was extensive.) Running late was my brother and my jobs and no matter how many times my mom would get mad at us for it, nothing ever changed. I’m 32 years old now and without fail, I always show up to work exactly 1 minute late. My mom even got a speeding ticket on the way to taking us to our grandma’s so she could go to work, and I still haven’t figured out how to be on time for any thing. My dad is my dentist for crying out loud and I still show up 1 minute late to my appointments at his office. So maybe I am an asshole in public, just not the obnoxious type. Being late to anything and everything isn’t my only downfall though (let’s come back to this word “downfall”.) My best friends in high school envied the shit out of me because as they would start studying for our Statistics test 3 days in advance, I would break out my notes at lunch right before the test, memorize everything in my little photographic memory brain I had, and still receive A’s-- meanwhile they would get B’s and C’s. Not sure that having a great short-term memory is an indicator of having ADD, but I have now learned that procrastinating is a HUGE one. I could never figure out why I would wait so long to complete anything and everything in my life. To this day, I still wait until the last minute and every time this happens, I say to myself, “I won’t wait this long again.” And then I wait until last minute again. Interestingly enough, I actually don’t procrastinate with everything-- just things that don’t interest me. There definitely are things that I’m stoked to start, and I start them right away, but then the opposite effect happens-- often times I start right away on something that I seem passionate about, but quickly, the excitement and thrill fades, and I end up not actually completing probably 98% of the things I start. So either I do things last minute, or I don’t complete at all if there is no deadline. WHY. AM. I. LIKE. THIS. Oh, because I have self-diagnosed ADD. As I’m writing this, I’m getting over it so I’m going to stop writing now so that I don’t end up hating typing altogether. The point of this is to say, I finally found an answer to something in my life, and I hope to God that I do something with this information. I’m tired of the self-shame for always being late, always procrastinating, losing interest easily, not being able to pay attention for too long, and not being able to enjoy relaxation/down-time. I’m ready to use my ADD superpower for good. I’m ready to see these “downfalls” as advantages. I’m ready to recognize my strengths and pour into them, while finally understanding why I do certain things the way that I do. More to come. I hope. Or this could be my first and only blog post about this. Which is likely to happen. And if it happens, cool. At least I wrote ONE piece about it.  Your fellow adult with ADD, Nay Nay

#add adhd adultadd attentiondeficitdisorder awareness distraction diagnosis psychology

[autism-asks]

Hi, im sorry if this has been answered before, I couldn’t find it anywhere on your page though, but how do I go about getting an official dx?

I just did a full psych evaluation a couple weeks ago but they didn’t diagnose me for bs reasons, so I want to seek a second opinion. This evaluation was recommended to me by vocational rehab, so I was kind of streamlined into it and didn’t do any legwork.

What do I have to do to go about getting a second opinion? I’m a young adult and living in Florida.

Also what are your best tips for going about this once I get an appointment with someone? I’ve been trying for this dx for years so I really need to work very hard to convince them and need all the advice I can get

Oh, I just sent in about how to get a pro dx in Florida, I also should note that I don’t have a general practitioner so I can’t ask for a referral through one of those. I have a psychiatrist but she doesn’t believe that im autistic Bc I tend to mask around doctors

So I’m from Texas & state laws about healthcare can be very different but I’ll try to give as accurate an answer as I can.

First, and this sucks to say, a lot of people might not be willing to do another evaluation. I know some people might (and I have friends who have gotten second evaluations) but I didn’t personally get one. I even went through a process of being referred to a specialist by my college but as soon as she found out I had already been assessed, she backed out. So first make sure whoever you want to go to is even willing to do a second evaluation.

After that, getting another evaluation kinda all boils down to two big things:

1) Your insurance plan

2) Specialists near you (and this also kinda has to do with insurance but I’ll get to that)

Basically, a lot of what you can do depends on your insurance plan. For example, some plans don’t require a referral. In that case, you could just find a person and go to them. How you pay also depends on your insurance. If you have the money and are not required to get a referral, you could just go to a person and pay them out of pocket to assess you again. This can cost a couple thousand dollars (or more) if I remember correctly. Some plans don’t require a referral but depending on who you go to the insurance company might help pay. This depends on the person you go to and what insurance plans they accept/if your insurance is considered out of network, whether your insurance will pay for an out of network person, whether the person will do a sliding scale charge, and probably some other things.

If your plan requires a referral (which it most likely does since I think that’s the most common thing) then your options may be more limited. So the person in charge of referring you might get your input. Which means you need to research who you would want to go to—will cover that in a bit. That research should include (again unless you have the money for out of pocket covering the whole cost) whether whoever you want will take your insurance. Also, sometimes if you have a general practitioner they can refer you instead of a psychiatrist. So if you can’t convince your psychiatrist to take you seriously, you could try a general practitioner. I know that’s how a friend got his ADHD diagnosis.

With your psychiatrist you could perhaps try explaining that you mask really well around doctors and you feel like this applies to the relationship between the two of you. And then push for a referral despite their opinion. You don’t need a doctor’s permission to get a second opinion. If you need a referral and your current doctor isn’t giving you one, find someone who respects you enough to trust your opinion of your own brain and neurotype.

After all that I highly suggest calling your insurance company (your insurance card should have a number you can call) and finding out from them whether or not they’ll cover an assessment and what your part of the payment will be. Some companies/plans will not cover adult evaluations. And I’m also not sure if they covered it in the past, whether or not they’ll cover a second evaluation.

Now onto advice about who you should go to. I highly recommend doing a LOT of research (again if the person referring you gives you input which they should in my opinion) on who to go to. Not everyone will evaluate adults. And not everyone who says they’ll evaluate adults are actually willing to give you a diagnosis despite saying they evaluate adults. I am a good example of that. The person I went to said she would evaluate adults, then after we paid like $2000+ on an evaluation she gave a whole list of terrible reasons why she wouldn’t diagnose me which included that if I were still in grade school she would have diagnosed me but since I’m an adult she didn’t think it was necessary (despite me being there of my own volition explicitly to get a diagnosis).

I’m not trying to scare you I’m just trying to stress research. And finding the right person can be hard. If you’re able to (or you have someone who you trust who is able to) I suggest asking whoever you might see what their stance on diagnosing adults is. And maybe some other questions (like how they account for gender and race and other things like that in the diagnostic process). Don’t be afraid to interview them before going through the evaluation process. They’re being paid a lot of money and you don’t want to be taken advantage of.

I know finding a good specialist can be hard & you might not be able to find the perfect person. These are just suggestions.

Once you finally have an appointment, there are some tips we can give to help but other than being really picky (if you can) about who you go to they may or may not be helpful.

Some suggestions we and others have made include answering questions in the evaluation based not necessarily how you feel in that moment, but based on your best recollection of how you are in general or even at your worst. For example if they ask if you feel comfortable in large groups, don’t answer how you might answer if you’re in a good mood. Answer how you generally feel or how you’d feel on a bad brain day. Or if they try to figure out if you’re good at reading facial cues, don’t answer based on how good you are at reading cues of those closest to you (cuz due to practice and repetition, you might be good at that), answer based on meeting strangers or acquaintances.

Basically, do your best to answer how you would if you weren’t masking. Those are just some examples of how to get around ingrained masking. That’s probably the biggest piece of advice I can give you as someone who has tried and failed to get a professional to diagnose me as a young adult.

I really hope this helps and if you want more advice or I didn’t get to a part of your question you really cared about, please feel free to follow up and we’ll do our best to answer!

-Mads

#second opinion #doctor mention #evaluation #us specific #mod mads #anonymous

[shinpikurage]

I need help

For years i've been searching about adhd, and so many things about it i relate. But my family doesn't believe i have It and don't want to get me tested to comfirm

Even If i were to get tested, i'm scared that they won't do It right, in my country, it's so hard for them to diagnose girls that are nd, because they just say we are too "shy" and "dramatic", it's even harder If you aren't a child. I tried bringing it up to all my therapists but i feel like they don't listen, they just nod and ask something else

Is there something i can do? Even when i'm an adult, could i still be able to get a test without these bs reasons that the doctors have?

#adhd #nd #Brasil #Brazil

[tarysande]

Hey, I see you reblogging adhd stuff every now and when. I hope you're ok with me asking, how long have you known you have adhd? I am currently wondering if I have it and am sups unsure what to do about it.

I’m always okay with people asking about things I post!

Of course, because of the ADHD, I’m not always great at answering ;)

I’m especially willing to talk about ADHD because I know my journey to getting a diagnosis doesn’t follow the stereotypical path, and I’d be thrilled if my experience ends up helping other people out there.

My family doctor was the first person to ever mention ADHD to me. I was 36 at the time. Maybe 37. I’m 40 (wtf) now, turning 41 in a month (haha, wtf). I’ve had depression most of my life. At the time, I was deeply frustrated because my depression was well-managed, but I still couldn’t focus to save my life. When my doctor asked if I might have ADHD, I laughed and said, “With my grades*? Yeah, no.” *I was a straight-A student from elementary school through to the end of my BFA. HOWEVER, at uni I had a handful of ‘lower’ grades: a B-, a B, a B+ in classes I found A G O N I Z I N G L Y boring. I was also never a disruption in class—mostly because I entertained myself by writing novels and reading under my desk and listening to music by keeping my earphones under my long hair. The key was to answer a question in class right away, thereby diverting the teacher’s attention and leaving me to my own devices for the rest of the time.

The focus issues continued unabated. Months later, a good friend of mine who was also diagnosed with ADHD as an adult brought it up again, and this time I did a lot more research. And ... yeah, puzzle pieces started clicking together. A lot of them. 

I brought it up with my doctor, and she sent me to the one (1) psychiatrist in Vancouver who was a) covered by provincial healthcare and b) would deal with a potential ADHD diagnosis in a patient of my (advanced) age *stares into the camera like it’s the office*. He was a Real Jerk, but I did his bevy of tests and he reluctantly agreed that I matched all the criteria except that I had never done poorly in school or been a nuisance in class**. **these criteria are ridiculously outdated, often don’t apply to girls (or those who have inattentive-type or mixed-type ADHD), and should BY NO MEANS exclude anyone from an ADHD diagnosis. If, like me, you’re what they call “twice exceptional” (where being intellectually gifted can often mask the struggles associated with ADHD, autism, physical/learning disabilities), it’s EVEN EASIER to slip through the cracks. 

The psychiatrist upped my anti-depressants, which helped, but still did nothing for my focus. By the way? ADHD, especially in adults, is FREQUENTLY comorbid with other conditions like depression or anxiety. It’s almost like ... when your brain doesn’t do what you know it should do, WANT it to do, TRY TO MAKE IT DO, and you feel like a failure who’s not living up to her potential ... it makes you REALLY DEPRESSED!! Who knew?? After almost a year, I finally brought up the focus with my family doctor again, who was like, “Okay, let’s try some things, then.” Finding the right dose of ADHD meds is ... trial and error. And it’s exhausting. And sometimes you think you’ve figured it out, but you haven’t. I still haven’t landed on the BEST POSSIBLE solution for me, but I will tell you this: the difference in unmedicated-ADHD-Tara and medicated-ADHD-Tara is like night and day, even when my meds aren’t optimal. 

To give a very specific example, I’m a freelance writer and editor. My income from my first (medicated) year of running my own business full(ish) time was almost three times that of the unmedicated year before. This year, even with COVID throwing a lot of wrenches in a lot of gears, I’ve remained booked three to four months in advance, my focus is better, my self-worth is better (i.e., I charge what I know I’m worth), I’ve stood up for myself, I’ve *gasp* started planning(???). I’m not rolling around in piles of money, but I’m above the Canadian median.

I also speak to my therapist every two weeks (she’s wonderful—and she’s online, which is both cheaper and more accessible for me). I’m slowly understanding the value of meditation (if you have the Calm app I HIGHLY recommend Jeff Warren’s How to Meditate 30-day program. I’m on day 13. There’s no BS or vagueness; I love him.) I made an effort to change my diet and spend more time moving around outdoors. (Exercise is even more important for ADHD brains, it turns out.)

Now, none of this has been a magical cure-all. I’m in the middle of struggling with med dosage at the moment, which is freshly irritating. Even medicated, there are good days and bad days—which is totally normal. I just finished an editing project that nearly destroyed me because it was SO boring and I couldn’t get out of it (because I’d ADHD-procrastinated too long). Learning how to function in the neurotypical world with an atypical ADHD brain is WORK. There’s also a lot of emotion—grief, anger, frustration, joy—as you process the new information and mourn the time you spent lost, underachieving, “failing.”

One really great, really accessible resource is the YouTube channel How to ADHD. For people who want to dig into the science, I recommend Russell Barkley (HE IS SO SMART) and Ned Hallowell. There’s also a ton of information on ADDitude. Anyway, this is a lot of information, I know. There are some good self-tests on the ADDitude site. If you think you have it AND IT’S IMPACTING YOUR LIFE***, bring it up with your doctor. Know that you might run into some resistance because most ADHD meds can be (and are widely) abused, and people with actual ADHD get caught in that crossfire. Even though it’s hard because of ADHD’s effect on emotions (TOO MANY!! TOO STRONG!!), be prepared to face some scrutiny.  *** they’re always going to ask about how it’s negatively affecting your life.

#asks and answers #adhd #adhd resources #tara talks adhd #adult adhd #hope this helps!! #Anonymous

[bonsaisheep]

My experience starting ADHD meds (for the first time) as an adult:

So I started ADHD meds recently. I contacted my doctor in early December, and spent the next month or so trying to figure out the right medication and dosage via basically weekly doctor’s appointments (online). Since there was a lot I found out after starting the meds that are apparently common experiences, I figure it might help to talk about my experience with all of this.

So I am medicated for my ADHD for the first time in my life at 27. There were two attempts when I was a kid, but neither of them worked out. The first when I was in fourth grade (I was diagnosed somewhere between first and third grade, I can’t quite remember), it was decided the side effects were not worth it, and a second attempt in middle school, but I refused to take it since I bought into a lot of the BS around brain meds. Its only in the last few years as I have learned more about ADHD have I learned exactly how it is effecting me. I managed to do well enough in high school to get into a good college (after doing really poorly in jr high). Managed to get an engineering degree (in 4 years with research, I was hella burnt out by the end of that) and managed to get (and hold) a job as an engineer shortly after college. Basically, since I could at lest fake functional and manage well enough (mostly because I was taught a ton of coping mechanisms by my parents as a kid), I just, never realized how much it effects me. I have been living an interesting and fulfilling life (as long as you ignore my mail bathtub).

After learning more and realizing that it was my ADHD was the source of a lot of the frustrations and struggles (I am basically a human checklist of the symptoms), I started to consider medication. The biggest reason for me is that I wanted to be able to focus on my own hobbies. I am incapable of hyper-fixating on anything that involves sitting down (or like, in general I am really bad at sitting down). I put off doing anything about if for years because well... executive dysfunction is a thing. It is really because of my roomate I finally went through with getting on mediation. This summer I moved in with a couple of close friends, one of which is also a cis women with ADHD who was diagnosed in elementary school. After not being interested in medication herself for most of her life, she recently decided to pursue it after some long conversations with another of our roomate’s girlfriend (I am one of 7 people in my friend group with diagnosed ADHD). Basically it was an accountability thing. We both held each other accountable for contacting our doctors.

Ok so after that very long introduction, what exactly are my experiences then? One of the things that surprised me was that I didn’t really run into too many barriers regarding getting on meds. In my case, I just talked to my general practitioner and she was like cool, lets start with XYZ. She actually didn’t want my original diagnosis since it was so old that she felt like any proposed plan would be out of date. (This is compared to my roommate who had to get a copy of her original diagnosis and even then her doctor was mostly comfortable prescribing meds because she is in talk therapy). (Though she has also pointed out I have been seeing my doctor for a bit now and therefor have a repor with her compared to her own doctor who was basically randomly assigned to her by her insurance and she met for the first time (online) when she contacted him to discuss meds)

I was originally prescribed Wellbutrin, a common off lable option for ADHD (it is a non stimulant, and by extension less bad side effects). My doctor wanted to go with it due to my really bad anxiety since it could potentially help with both. Unfortunately it made my anxiety way worse and I had a panic attack for the first time in years so we quickly stopped it and switched to other options. The next thing we tried (which is what I am now on) was extended release adderall. This is the most common stimulant prescribed to adults with ADHD. From what my doctor was saying, it is preferred for adults since it lasts all day (and with pretty even effects), it helps cover both work and the evening since most adults have additional responsibilities in the evening. In my case, due to how I responded to the Wellbutrin she also wanted to make sure I was on something that would not spike my dopamine. When messing with the dosage, I found that the amount that seems to help is also the amount that make my insomnia worse, so I am take a slightly lower dosage of the extended release, and make up the small difference using the short release.

Regarding side effects, the two noticeable ones that did not go away after a week (I initially had problems with a high heart rate, but that went away after a few days) are thirst and hunger suppressant. There is not much I can do about constantly being thirsty other then drink a ton of water. I was able to talk to a friend about the hunger thing, so I was able to implement quite a few tips and tricks that help me eat something during the day.

The two odd side effects I was not expecting is that caffeine actually effects me now and I also have way less of a sweet tooth. My doctor warned me about the caffeine thing, and my coffee drinking has really gone down. I went from at least two cups a day to a mug of half caff in the morning (I can’t cut it out entirely due to withdraw symptoms (so you know addition)). Regarding the sweets, I don’t know if I crave sugur less, or if it is improved impulse control. A good portion of my impulse control issue revolve around food so I am unsure.

Also I am running into a thing a friend was telling me about. The meds help you focus end of statement. This means you can end up focusing on things you don’t want to be focusing on.

As for the positives, well, I guess I was expecting more. I knew that meds weren’t some magic bullet and I was still going to need to use all of my coping mechanisms, but I guess I thought that the focus issues, would, just go away. But this is not how meds work. The way my roommate’s girlfriend describes it is that it gives you 15% more spoons, and that makes a ton of difference (for some people, this can be the difference between stuff like being able to hold a job). It is also really hard to tell if your meds are working. I texted a friend asking about how to tell, and he basically told me that it was the million dollar question (meaning there is no clean answer). Honestly, I still don’t know for sure if they are working or if I am just saying that. Part of it is that i literally can’t remember what I act like or feel when I am not on meds (and if I take a break for a day, vice versa). I am currently going with the assumption they are though.

For me, what I have been finding is that while I still get distracted from tasks I don’t like, I return to them faster. So rather then getting bored, getting on my phone and like, fucking around for a long time. I might just briefly check social media and then return to my task (meaning I get more done faster). I have also found it is making the executive dysfunction way easier for me. It is still difficult to start tasks, but, it takes distinctly less energy to do so meaning I generally start tasks sooner, or in some cases, do them at all to begin with. It helps curb some of my impulse control issues, mostly around stuff like food and impulse purchases of going out for lunch or coffee. It might be helping with the emotional dysregulation, but I have a hard time gauging that one. It’s just making things a bit easier, and well, that goes a long way.

More importantly, I am achieving my original goal. I am more able to focus on my hobbies and interest. I am starting to return to robotics, and it is already going better then when I tried it out as a teenager. I don’t know how well this will work out in the long run, but I am cautiously optimistic.

TLDR: I am not quite sure how to summarize, but if you know people on ADHD meds and are considering them (or are otherwise not on them and want to know more), it is probably worthwhile to have a conversation about them.

#ADHD #ADHD meds #I don't quite know when I was diagnosed because my parents figured out something was up fairly on #and there was a lot of testing #for stuff like dyslexia and motor control problems #I know that everything else was ruled out except for ADHD #which I was diagnosed with #(Also apparently I am hella smart via the official testing)

[lifeofmygod]

I am so sick of the gifted kid burnout thing that's been infesting the adhd community. I get that a lot of adults diagnosed in adulthood experienced that, but many didn't and I'm just tired of that being the stereotype for people like me. I sucked at school, I sucked at everything school related and had to scrape my way through high school in order to get into university. And even then my grades were scattered, never consistent As or Bs, always a C and D in there. I feel like there's only space for those who did well in school and it makes me difficult to engage in this community, even though there's no reason for me to take up more space. I struggled and still no one wanted to help me, I had to seek help myself after uni because I realised it wasn't normal to struggle as much as I did.

#adhd #sorry if this trigger someone #i needed to rant and no one i know understand this

[amberlynnwashere]

Still on this train of just writing down the thoughts as they come to my head. Now for: It Was So Obvious I Had ADHD, Why The Fuck Wasn’t I Diagnosed Until I Was 23??: Not Paying Attention Edition.

- Waiting for my grandma to pick me up after school. It was also raining. I was too busy spinning around the flagpole and singing about the rain to notice that 30 minutes had gone past (time blindness?) and my grandma had gone through the car-pickup-lane 3 times and the Yard Duty had called my name probably 2-3 dozen times. 

- My day camp used to have a couple vans to take kids to school if they didn’t go to the school that the day camp was located at. I was so invested in playing with legos that I didn’t notice when the van driver lady called us to get on the van and go to school. Worst part was that my 2 friends who also took the van to school were sitting on either side of me, and I didn’t think anything of them getting up. It wasn’t until all the other kids who actually went to the school we were located on were gone that I realized something was wrong. (time blindness/ hyperfocus? I loved legos and could play with them all day without stopping to eat/drink or anything)

- Teacher had us go to the computer lab. When we got there, she had us all line up and turn in our homework before we could go to the computers. I didn’t have mine, even though I completed it. How did I miss her telling us to grab our homework or else we wouldn’t be allowed to play on the computers? How did I not notice everyone carrying their homework papers to the lab? 

---my favorite part about ^That^ memory is that I lied to my teacher, too. Instead of saying, “I didn’t hear you tell us that”, because I knew she’d translate that into ‘I wasn’t paying attention’ & scold me, I had told her “last night some guy was driving around with a mega phone and he screamed in my ear and my hearing has been off ever since” B/C it was the day after Halloween. But THEN I started crying and apologizing BECAUSE I lied to her & I told her the truth. It’s not like she didn’t believe me or anything, I just felt guilty for lying! 

- Another teacher had requested me to run to the office, get some information for her, and come back and tell her. I went to the office, got the information, and came back. When she asked me what the answer was, I just stared at her. “...I forgot, should I go back and ask?” She was obviously annoyed, and just sent another kid. 

- The way I write. IDK how true it is, but I’ve heard it said that ADHDers have bad handwriting b/c we’re thinking of the next sentence before we’re done with the current word & just trying to get it all downHOLY FUCK I THINK ONE OF MY FRIEND’S MOM’S KNEW I HAD ADHD

- Okay sorry but hear me out

- She literally said to me, as a child, “Oh sweetie don’t worry, I have bad handwriting too. It’s because we have so many thoughts in our head that we want to get them written down before we forget them.” Which isn’t a big deal BUT when I told her a while back that I had been recently diagnosed with ADHD, she just smiled and nodded knowingly. I HAVE SO MANY QUESTIONS AND HAVE TO SET A REMINDER TO CALL HER TOMORROW. 

-Does She have ADHD? Why didn’t she say anything to my mom? She ALWAYS called other parents out on their BS. Did she talk to my mom?? Would she even tell me at this point if she had spoken to my mom about it?? I mean I wonder if she’d try to protect my (dead) mom’s image for me?? She seems like the kinda person to do that. It also would make sense that she has ADHD just by behaviors I’ve noticed from her over the years. Holy crap. Holy crap this is really interesting fuck if it wasn’t almost 11pm on a Thursday night I’d fucking call her right now. 

-Yikes.

Well. 

Either way. 

- This is just a cute thing that I my friends and I realized earlier: One of my best friends recently realized that she is autistic (confirmed by her therapist but not officially diagnosed b/c getting official diagnosis as an adult female is hard).I distinctly remember multiple times in our childhood of us having a conversation, and she’ll say something related to something from multiple topics ago, and we’ll both end up confused. I’ll be confused as to why she brought up a topic from forever ago, and she’ll be confused as to why I don’t understand the meaning of her comment b/c it has to do about the topic we were “just” talking about. Now that we’re older and more aware of how our brains work, we’ve come to the conclusion that it was a likely mix of my brain switching to different topics extremely quickly, while her brain is still latching onto that original topic about something she was very interested in. And I just think that’s really neato that we were able to still have a thriving relationship and be such close friends 12+ years later. 

#adhd #fun therapy discussions I should have #maybe

[literalnobody]

I’m so frustrated and tired and I hate the Irish healthcare system so much. Like aside from having an undiagnosed problem in my back for 9 years now that causes me chronic pain that apparently isn’t “concerning” enough to warrant further investigation, I tried to approach my doctor about the possibility of having ADHD or some kind of attention deficit problem because I have struggled with focus for years, I get overwhelmed sometimes by certain sensory issues to the point where I’ll want to scream or start crying or curl up in a ball, I can try and focus on something repetitive and menial and I will WANT to do it and i know EXACTLY what I have to do, and the steps necessary to execute it, and my brain just won’t do the thing and I end up crying because I think I’m lazy and pathetic and I don’t know WHY i can’t just do the thing I want to do and know how to do and it’s so frustrating.

So I went to my doctor (I’m a 25 year old woman) and I said “I think I may have ADHD” and she immediately said “no you don’t.” This doctor hasn’t seen me very often aside from a few times when I was a teenager first having back problems, because since I went to college at age 18 I saw a different doctor. Anyway, so I said “Well I haven’t even told you why I’m feeling this way,” and she said “If you had ADHD someone would have noticed by now. So I know you don’t have it.” I said, “Well, I noticed.” She said, “Nobody is going to diagnose an adult of your age. It’s just your mood making you feel this way.” and that was really the end of the conversation. I asked for a referral to a psychiatrist who could diagnose me properly and she said it would be a waste of my time and money, really discouraged me from bothering.

But here’s the thing, when I was a child and a teenager I did really well in school, and I think that’s one of the reasons nobody noticed anything was going on with me. And mostly the reason I did well was because I was genuinely extremely interested in my subjects, I WANTED to know the information, and I have an excellent memory. I would only need to hear something said out loud once and I’d remember it word perfect for years, so for the classes I was interested in, and I was listening in, I absorbed a lot. I never had to study for classes I liked for the entire time I was in school because I had excellent recall of things verbally said to me (that I actually listened to). But the rare subject I was disinterested in was BRUTAL. I would spend hours, basically my entire alotted “study time,” on like one subject I didn’t enjoy, staring at the same page, reading a sentence 40 times over and over again, and I’d close my eyes and try to remember it and it would be like my brain was doing the shrug emoji. And I would sit in those classes I didn’t enjoy and think “This is important information!!! LISTEN!!!” but it was like, my brain was a stalling car engine, no matter how desperately I tried to force myself to listen, the words didn’t go into my brain. So I would get my grades back like 6 As, 2 Bs, and 1 D, and my parents would wave it off like “Oh well, she’s just not meant for that one subject.” Even though that subject was the ONLY ONE i devoted time to actually TRYING to study in. 

On top of this, my brother has a major personality disorder, he’s antisocial and violent, and thus took up the majority of my parent’s concern when I was a teen. My sister was not academically inclined and got middling grades, and I invested so much of my teen years trying to make things easier on my mum because of my brother’s behaviour and other factors, that I just tried to be whatever my parents needed me to be, and they never worried about me because I was their “successful child.” This pattern continued throughout college, and my parents only realised I was not a normal, happy, functioning person after I suffered a massive depressive episode and became suicidal. I had suffered from depression and anxiety from the age of 17 onwards, which I had tried to get diagnosed as a teenager, but the psychiatrist I was seeing refused to diagnose me because I told her that “sometimes when I’m with my friends, I can forget how I feel and have fun and laugh for a little while.” I’m not kidding, for this reason ALONE a licensed psychiatrist refused to give me a diagnosis and I went untreated until I made plans to take my life in college. Anyway, bc of the depression and my continually adequate grades in college, I never entertained the idea that I could have ADHD, I just put down my concentration issues to the depression.

It’s only since leaving college and undertaking intensive treatment for my depression (I’m in remission I guess lol) that I’ve started to realise that ADHD may be the reason my brain is so non-compliant when I am trying to focus. It’s disrupting every single day of my life, since I’m pretty much floating in the gig economy, getting work in the theatre and art commissions that require me to have a high degree of self discipline and focus. I feel like I’m trying to do these simple tasks but I’m underwater, or on the moon, and I can’t make gravity work the way I need it to. I’m just really drowning and I feel so low because when I reached out for help from a medical practitioner I was told that I don’t have any attention deficit issues, I must just be lazy or in a bad mood that day. Sometimes my brain stalls so bad that I can’t function for hours, I just have to go outside to my garden and walk around in circles to avoid staring at the same spot on the wall and zoning out.

Sorry, I don’t really have a way to end this, I’m just ranting and I feel bad

#long post warning #rant #personal #suicide mention #do not reblog please

[actuallyschizoid]

Do any of you guys experience concerningly low empathy? How about limited emotional range, like a spectrum? What about sensory process meltdowns, similar to autists? Do you feel almost no emotion until hit with intensity? How about falling inlove and a best friend? Any previous ddx of anxiety or depression or adhd? Ever made stock friends for the sake of benefits? Rather One night stand than relationships or is it all to disinteresting? Any comorbid SzPD and APD out there? How did you get diagnosed? Views on religion? Im sorry for asking alot, recent ddx and idk what this means for me, never met the average schizoid to paint the picture. Some of these questions have to do with relatability to my symptoms, I guess.

Thanks for submission! Interesting questions. For me personally:

Empathy. In fact, it gets better over time. At least cognitive empathy - which is pretty much psychoanalysis on the go, i.e. taking into account what you know about each person and trying to extrapolate what would they feel, how would they react based on those feels, etc. It isn’t really connected to being able to understand their feelings on your own experience, and way more dependent on one’s knowledge of human psychology, experience observing people and just general live experience. It can be trained for anyone with some effort, but for those who lacks natural emotional empathy it generally gets better just due to having a constant reason to practice it. 

As for emotional and other kinds of empathy... eh, mine’s pretty much limited to laughing along when someone’s laughing their ass off. Yeah, tiny bit of mirroring is all I get, it’s pretty useless. Though, I must say, I do get easier time to relate to feels of other schizoids, autistic people and pretty much anyone who struggles relating to average kind of people.

Emotions. Now that I’m 32, it’s probably not as limited as when I was in my 15-to-25 years, but less of a mess than it was before 15. Still those are pretty... uh, alternative emotions. I still don’t often get the “correct” one triggered on same triggers as most people. My natural tendency is to rationalize stuff, analyze it from system POV instead of getting sad and emotional. 

Like, yesterday there was a plain crush, the whole local internet was buzzing about how terrible it was. I can’t say that was exactly what felt, but instead we were casually discussing the technical nuances of it with a fellow schizoid. Like what effects this kind of event might have had on this or that system, how it might have been made better, what mistakes happened there and what were the means to prevent some of those deaths. I.e more from a system design point of view, where people are just numbers in statistic rather than dead kids who won’t have live, sad parents, etc etc. 

I mean, all that’s sad and all, I get it, but there’s nothing I can do to be sad about it. To me it’s no different from knowing the fact that every day on roads in my country horribly dies about the same amount of people and no one gives a single flying fuck about it. But then same people die in a plain crush and it’s a nation-wide tragedy for some reason. To be honest, if I try to dig into actual emotions I feel about stuff like that, I can find out this kind of feels look rather... wrong to me. I know people can’t help but to feel whatever way they do, and there’s no such thing as “wrong emotions”, I definitely won’t be the one to judge them. But from my POV, it’s really hard to understand this negative hype around it.

Meltdowns. Not sure I ever had an actual meltdown, perhaps as a kid. But I might not even get the idea of what it is well enough. Heavy sensory stimulation actually causes me lots of discomfort. Like, neighbors drilling their walls almost on daily basis is an utter nightmare for me. I still stick my fingers into ears like a kid, yeah. And then try to poke at my macbook’s touchpad with whatever I get left - elbows, tongue, toes... To find at least some distraction from the noise. Eh. Not sure what’d happen if I wasn’t protecting myself from this kind of stuff, tbh, I never neglected this kind of safety measures to find out if I’d be able to handle it.

About no emotions until being hit. Hmm, maybe, not sure. To me it’s more often just no emotions from one specific trigger until.. well, until the trigger is gone lol. It just never occurs if it’s not there, yet when it’s there - it’s there. 

Being in love and having best friends. Never was in love. Seriously, I doubt I’m capable of it. And not sure the best friend thing relates to me either. I had some friends, but never the kind of friends whom I could entrust much about myself. Like, the schizoid person I still consider best friend doesn’t even know I have this blog lol. Or that I write a book, for example. I feel uncomfortable with the fact that people who knows me would also know... well, me. Knowing some part of my life is ok, but no way someone would have access to everything. And the better I know people, the less I feel like sharing. Yet I have absolute no issue with writing this kind of personal stuff anonymously and hundreds of people potentionally reading it.

Previous diagnosis. At early childhood I was suspected to have autism, actually. Or, well, it was long time ago so it was more of a “some development malfunction” diagnosis. I started speaking way too late, but by the time I was able to hack into this speech thing, I already was rather fluent at it, could understand more than my peers, etc. Same happened with reading. And from then on any language, be it human or programming, I can pretty much grab and use, if I want. I can turn in some youtube video on whatever language I’ve no idea about, turn in automatically generated subtitles translated to English and understand most of it, and after few hours getting the basic structure and matching a few common words with their meaning by ear. It might be related to that “could’ve had autism”, but not sure, it’s still not something I explored much with professionals as adult. And yeah, ADHD in some of its (subtile and inactive) forms could be the case too.

Stock friends. Eh, probably? I mean, some kids used to stuck on me now and then in school or college. I didn’t care much, but I tolerated them as long as they weren’t too annoying at least for the sake of dragging at least tiny bit less attention to my own weirdness. It felt like a safer option, yet most time I still have spent alone. 

Relationships and one night stands. Well, I’m aro ace agender, so... Actual romantic relationships were always out of question for me, tbh. Never tried, never feel like trying in the future. Had somewhat of an experimental semi-relationship with a friend, but it wasn’t romantic much and never was intended as long-lasting (at least, not on my part). We’re still friends, by the way, there was no “break-up” (coz there wasn’t much to break in first place). 

As for one-night-stands thing - yeah, that’s pretty useless for me either. Not that I’d had anything against it, were I in need to have sex. Perhaps, if I had that need, it would be the way to go for me. But since nothing really drives me for this shit, I’m fine without it.

Religion. Atheist down to the bone marrow. There was never really a dilemma for me, I knew it’s all utter BS the moment I’ve heard what the fuck is the fuss about this “God” thing people are talking about. Mind you, my mother is kinda religious (not in actual practice way, but she sees no logical issue with the idea of religion, that’s for sure). But she never dared to bring me to church for that orthodox christian initiation practice, what’s it called? Probably was afraid I’d yap about what idiots they are to believe it right in the middle of being shoved in a bucket of “holy” water lol.

Ok, that’s about it. :) And what about y’all? Feel free to add, I’ll reblog.

#actually schizoid #actuallyschizoid #schizoid #schizoid PD #schizoid traits #schizotypal #schizophrenia #depression #social anxiety #ADHD #autism #self-diagnosed #officially diagnosed #submission

[nodaisieswithoutrainsies]

Need Help With Mental Health and Getting out of an Abusive Situation

Okay so here’s my deal. My mom has abused me (mostly mentally, emotionally, and financially, but there’s been a decent amount of physical abuse too) since I was about 12 years old. I’m 21 now. I went away to college for a few years but due to some unforeseen circumstances I’ve had to move back home until Fall 2020. It’s just me and my mom. We don’t talk to extended family, I don’t have a father or siblings.

When I was 14 I was diagnosed with Bipolar II, Bipoar Depression, and GAD. When I was 18, ADHD was officially added in, and within the past month I’ve accepted my ASD diagnosis. I’ve been fully medicated for the past 7.5 year’s, and in outpatient therapy with the same wonderful therapist for that entire time. When I was 15 I voluntarily (it was my idea) put myself into a partial program for a month for suicidal ideation and depression and self harm. When I was 16 almost 17 I voluntarily (again, my idea) took myself to the ER to go into inpatient therapy in psychology ward at New York Presbyterian, but was only there for a week because the counsellors there all came to the agreement that I was in better shape than I knew and released me, but with a binder of coping mechanisms and into the care of that same therapist I still have. At this point in my life, I’m very self aware, I can take care of myself and my mental healthy by myself, and I’m extremely proud of the progress I’ve made to better myself as a person and take care of my mental health. My friends, my therapist, my boyfriend of 5 years (best friend of 8), and my godmother all agree and praise me for my progress.

My mother, as I said, has abused me. Getting worse and worse over the years (as I contrarily got better). When she’s in a good mood, she dotes on me and does everything for me and lavishly spends money on me and pines for my attention. None of which I ask her to do because.... When she’s in a bad mood, whether or not because of me (when the only reason it’s “because of me” is when I’m not feeling great and liked to be alone) she takes it out on me. Hits me, curses at me, threatens me, berates me, tells me I’ve made no progress and I’m crazy, that she’s a perfect mother, that nothing is wrong with her, she attacks me with specific hurtful insults (“that’s why he doesn’t really love you!”), and holds all of her good mood antics over my head. She’s called the police on me >10 times since I was 14. They always take me for an evaluation, I’m always let go saying the cops are crazy. This past Friday, she threatened and tried to kill me. Then lost her mind rocking back and forth on her knees. So I called and ambulance. Ended up in her freaking out and calling the cops on ME for originally trying to de-escalate what did in fact turn out to be a hostile situation. I got released, but not without all the nurses and paramedics tending to me, as well as the crisis counsellor setting me free, all giving me some support saying they believed me, giving me numbers of support places in the area to help adult abuse victims.

My therapist has a lot of interaction with my mom, as she gives out her cell phone, comes to my graduation parties, has had sessions with me and my mom, and has had us to her house before. Plus my mother frequently texts her and emails her insanities and false stories, accusations, and ramblings about me. So at this point, my therapist has diagnosed my mother with Narcossistic Personality Disorder, as well as Borderline Peraonality Disorder. My mom has briefly (~6 weeks) gone to another therapist, but that was years ago. She constantly denies she has mental health issues besides her depression (which she deals with by drinking excessively, self harming, and attacking me). She denies that therapy works (yet says it does for me). She’s manipulative of the people around her- spewing lies to police officers even when I’m calm, open about my bipolar/therapy/medication, and looking for help, spewing lies to her friends who never interaction with me so they don’t know anything except that apparently I’m the problem, and spewing lies to her sister, my aunt, the only family we talk to still, and her best friend/former girlfriend/my other parent of over 35 years. No one believes me except my therapist and friends and boyfriend. No cops, not people who “love me”, and obviously not her. She frequently tries to get me arrested or admitted to a hospital involuntarily. She has ~$16k of my money in her account that she keeps procrastinating giving me.

I recently opened my own bank accounts not attached to hers. I work, I go to school. I’m an aspiring Marine Geologist and I’d like to get my Masters and PhD. When I hopefully graduate May 2021, I will move to California to go to graduate school and make my own life. Away from her, never to speak to her again.

I don’t have much money, even once she does actually give me the money from her account. To finish my BS I need a total of ~$23k. My saved money was for school, not living expenses or car insurance or groceries etc. Hence why I moved home while I completed some prerequisites around where I live. I will move out if I absolutely have to, by my 4 cats are here, two of which are senile and sick. I don’t love my mom. I can’t at this point. I have PTSD or the similar diagnosis from the trauma and abuse. I keep denying family therapy because I’m not sure it’ll work if she doesn’t accent any responsibility or open her mind to realise IM not the problem. I have a car, which is not under my name and while I could switch it I can’t afford car insurance. I have my own furniture and stuff to furnish a place that I will be allowed to take with me when I leave.

At this point, family therapy is necessary to entertain her until I leave. I’m looking for advice, resources, anything any of you can give me to help me handle this and make my life good and achieve my ambitions. I’m a generally pretty happy person; I like to read, write poetry/prose/short stories/songs, go hiking and enjoy nature, hang with my friends, make new ones, love animals, volunteer at the humane society, act, sing, improv, be in theatre, sew, and give advice and love to my friends who need it. I’m an advocate for sexual assault victims (twice in my life), mental health, animals, climate change, women, LGBTQ+ community (bisexual and genderqueer!), and eventually for abuse victims once I get out of here. (And by this I mean I actively take strides to advocate for these causes, joining clubs and marches etc, not just saying that because I experience some of them). I’m not a bad person, I don’t think. I try my hardest to always improve, and I wish I was dealt a better hand (don’t we all?). I’m not asking for money, I could never. I’m asking for advice and resources and a community. Anything yall got for me I’d appreciate more than anything. Thank you for listening/reading, I know it was a lot. If you got this far or offer help, I’ll hit you up with a follow even though that won’t be enough to repay your kindness. Ugh sorry that sounded textbook. Idk. But thank you so much. I really appreciate your time and advice.

-Jessica (I’m from downstate NY by the way)

#mental health issues #mental health #mental illness #bipolar #bpd #abuse #abuse victim #help #advice #resources #new york #therapy #adult abuse #abuse from parent #long story #long text post #trigger warning #mental health community #abuse community #advice community

[staboteur]

It’s Been Forever Since I Posted One of These so Here We Go

So I was thinking back a little bit and I realized that René displays a lot of ADHD-like symptoms? I did a little research and although ADHD is difficult to diagnose in adults, René did have a history of being a “problem child” as a kid. When he was fairly young, he was a pretty average student (like C-grades, sometimes Bs), but he had a lot of disciplinary issues like talking or fidgeting too much. He also obviously had problems with taking stuff that wasn’t his (he just,,, picks it up) and while that may or may not be related (?) he still displayed obvious “problem child”* behavior.

It wasn’t so obvious in spy school, but René’s always had trouble with the more social part of assassination, as well as the ‘hiding someplace and waiting’ part. He just needs to move, and it’s one of the reasons why he could never quite beat Renae (his spy school rival). Obviously it’s not the only contributing factor (Renae was a really good spy too, an she arguably would’ve been the better one if not for her own issues which i haven’t really developed yet, but since she’s mean to be very different from Rene, her problem is probably that she hesitates too long, in contrast to Rene’s impatience and impulsiveness). As he grew older, he’s gotten better and better at masking the symptoms, but when he’s not paying attention, when he’s stressed, and/or when he’s tired, he just Needs to fidget somehow or move. One reason why he’s so good at knife tricks is because knife tricks were his way of “studying” (but also fidgeting) while at spy school. It was one of the things that was fairly acceptable to be doing, as long as he didn’t do it in class and/or was quiet (bc the spy school was also a place where there technically were rules, but they only applied if you got caught, which honed the spy students’ like spy abilities like lying, hiding, etc). Give him a pencil, a balisong, a switchblade, anything that’s hand-sized and pointy, and he’ll be suitably occupied for awhile.

And as for the other, like less ‘quirky lol fun’ traits, he genuinely does have problems with low self esteem, anxiety, and to a degree(?) keeping a job. Since BLU went to him due to his qualifications as a Spy, he’s kinda like stuck there on his contract and they can’t really fire him + don’t really care enough about the negative symptoms to fire him bc honestly these are the least of the problems when they have Pyro, Demo, and Soldier running around.

I’ve also always portrayed him as a guy who has a short fuse but has learned how to hide it really really well. Like he’ll get angry and frustrated really fast, but due to the nature of his job, he’s gotten really good at holding himself back just enough to let it out later.

The one thing that I don’t really have him down for is organization? As a Spy, he’s always had to be organized. It was kinda ingrained into him as a habit, like to keep his living space and wherever he goes neat and tidy. He also has to be organized in order to carry out plans and whatever, and in all honesty, if he wasn’t disciplined so harshly as a child and if these habits weren’t so ingrained into him, he’d have a lot more trouble functioning in society (not that,, yknow,, he doesn’t already have a lot of problems what with being a kinda maladjusted guy).

I’ve always played him as a bit more of a loner though, like he has problems with talking to people, mostly because he doesn’t want to talk to them/open up. He just doesn’t think it’s useful to have people skills beyond really surface level ones.

Oh and another thing he’s not down for: discipline. He’s surprisingly (?) disciplined about the important things in his life, but very very undisciplined by Spy standards if you get what I mean? Compared to the average person, he’s pretty good at being disciplined and organized, but compared to the average spy of his caliber, he’s not doing too hot (like a D- probably, if average is a C). Bc he ends up impulsively telling facts or acting out something unplanned, and unfortunately, those things don’t always work out. That’s always been a point of contention for me bc Spy has always seemed like a very put-together guy, and here’s Rene, a walking disaster knife goblin. Obviously like he’s heavily headcanoned, s o.... I get some leeway here. But also like Skymin said, the TF2 characters have really exaggerated traits, and people can choose to exaggerate one or another. I?? Chose to exaggerate specifically the thing about knives and under exaggerate the whole lady killer thing. I guess it’s also a little projection, but you  k n o w...

*Just wanted to note that I don’t think kids with ADHD are problem children, I personally know that they’re often super amazing and that they’re not the problem, the school system is the problem, but this was like the 1920s-30s, they didn’t really know how to deal with kids like him beyond disciplining him, which honestly honed his ability to Houdini his way out of like anything and to get Really Good at stealing things stealthily.

#{ headcanons | another day another back with a gaping stab wound } #{ the rogue } #long post #//ah yes join me today in projecting symptoms of anxiety and adhd on rene #//its just one of those things man #//a lot of the headcanons i have involving rene's mental state are slightly exaggerated versions of what im feeling #//bc like... man idk dude i don't really like self dxing only because it's just #//not my cup of tea (i don't care if other people do it i just personally won't for myself) #//mostly bc this stuff whlie interesting to know won't actually (?) change my life #//bc im pretty much functional and always have done well in school and work environments and whatever #//social is another story but that's no one's fault but my own #//well... okay maybe /one/ other person can share a little blame but that's only bc they existed at a bad time so i dont think #//they're at fault for that... so yeah its me

[actuallyadhd]

Sorry for the wall of text—just wanted to get some things off my chest and this seemed like a really supportive forum in which to do it. If this is too long to post, no worries, and consider this just a thank you for running such a great blog.

–

Within the past year I’ve finally started looking into ADHD and strongly suspect that it may be something I’m struggling with, but it’s a hell of a time for me to bring it up with professionals—I have a history of eating disorders, and the first thing everyone always says to me when I try to talk about it is “well, you know you could never be medicated for it.” I understand this, and know it would most likely be really bad for my health to be prescribed stimulants, and have gotten to the point where I lead with this so people don’t think I’m trying to rustle up meds to enable another disorder.

When I do that, though, I inevitably get the response “so then what do you want us to do about it? You don’t seem like you need help.” I’m in my mid-twenties, got good grades in school, graduated from college, blah blah blah—I know I look very functional, but I always feel like I’m just biding my time until the next catastrophe, trying to conserve my energy for some disaster that might or might not come and require me to actually function like an adult human being. 

It’s super discouraging to keep hearing this, because what it sounds like to me is “if you’re not crashing and burning, there’s nothing we can do for you.” I don’t want to crash and burn! I’ve done it before, and it’s terrible, and it hurts, and it has taken me years to crawl out of the wreckage in the past, and I’m trying to take charge of my own mental health for a change and get well. But the way things are, it feels like no one will take me seriously unless I’m actively fucking up all my positive relationships, backsliding into unhealthy coping mechanisms, and failing to maintain even a sea-level standard of living. 

(And even then, I’d probably get “well, we can’t make any conjectures about attention deficits until you’re entirely depression- and anxiety-free.” Which, good luck, I think the last time the planets aligned that way, I was seven years old.)

I just want to get the help I need without being treated like I’m a person with a perfectly functional brain who for some ungodly reason thinks it’s a good idea to procrastinate until I die, or hyperfocus on nonsense for months on end while real life takes a backseat, or take four hours to just do dishes, or collapse into a depressive spiral when I get mildly reprimanded at work. I don’t want to spend all my time fighting an uphill battle to keep my eating and sleep habits regular and healthy, only to realize that I don’t have the energy to do anything more rewarding afterwards, and then to be told that I must not be doing enough to build healthy habits in the first place if it’s not working. I don’t want to be told over and over and over again, “But you’re so SMART! What could POSSIBLY be wrong with you?” when I feel like all of my academic success was constantly at risk due to procrastination and brain fog and lack of motivation and follow-through, and when that final desperate push for a passing grade always left me hollowed out and exhausted.

I want meaningful support. I want acknowledgement that I’ve struggled and it shouldn’t have been so hard and that it was wrong I had to go it alone for so long. I want to know what’s the matter with me. I don’t want to just cope, I want to be happy and thrive. 

But I’m starting to feel like that’s all very unreasonable of me to ask.

It’s not unreasonable. At all. And it shouldn’t have been so hard, and you should not have had to struggle for so long.

An ADHD Coach is what you need, so you can learn healthy strategies that will allow you to thrive instead of just coping. Some of them do accept people who haven’t been diagnosed yet, but your insurance won’t be convinced to pay for it if you haven’t got the diagnosis. It can be pretty expensive.

So your response, when they ask why you want a diagnosis since you can’t have meds (which is BS by the way; sometimes stimulants don’t trigger ED relapse, and there are non-stimulant options that could work for you without having an impact on your appetite either way), is “So that I can convince my insurance company to pay for ADHD Coaching so that I don’t crash and burn. I’ve done that and it sucks.”

-J

#submission #ADHD #s #Actually ADHD #personal stories #stigma #ableism #questioning if ADHD