This is true for every psychological condition and has only tangentially to do with grades. There needs to be a burden of suffering (German: “Leidensdruck”) in order for a psychological condition to be considered a “problem” that needs “fixing”. As long as the the person doesn’t have this and society doesn’t force anything on that person (because for example they broke the law), there is nothing to act upon. This is also why some famous and/or successful people are crazy. The FBI has done some investigations into the concept of a the corporate psychopath, which can be successful managers, which are undiagnosed psychopaths.
PS: I am no expert
https://leb.fbi.gov/articles/featured-articles/the-corporate-psychopath
Same with autism.
If you get low grades, off to special ed with you.
High grades? Oh you’re just a socially awkward dork or quirky nerd or something.
It’s like the Halo effect, but with grades.
My therapist diagnosed me with ADD, I did a lot of research and talked to a lot of people. Turned out I don’t have that, but have childhood trauma. Trauma and ADD have a lot of similar symptoms. Once I started addressing the trauma, my symptoms went away.
Anxiety too.
For me it’s the other way around. My ADHD caused depression and anxiety. Without the panic attacks, I wouldn’t have gone to a therapist in the first place.
I’m not an expert but I believe that anxiety is linked to trauma - Ie: the family dysfunction is causing your anxiety and you were never taught healthy coping skills to deal with all of that…
Same with autism. It wasn’t until I had my master’s degree in math and teaching high school at age 39 that it ever occurred to me that I was autistic. A colleague and I had a mutual student, and he told me that he thought she might be autistic and that he was going to refer her to the school’s diagnostician for testing.
So I found myself curious about the symptoms of autism, because Rain Man was my frame of reference. I researched the symptoms in the middle of a Geometry team meeting, and everything I read had my sitting up further and further in my seat, until I just blurted out “Oh my GAWD…?!” My colleagues asked what, and I said “Y’all…I think I might be autistic?” They looked at one another quizzically, like they were shocked at my personal revelation. One of them replied, “Wait…you didn’t know?!” I said, “…what, you DID know?!?” She was like “Yes! We all know that about you! You seriously didn’t know? 😂” HELL NO I DIDN’T KNOW!
I immediately called my mom on the phone to tell her that I thought I might be autistic. “Yyyyyeah…your dad and I always thought you might be.” HOLY FUCKING SHIT MOM WTF??? 😲😲😲WHY DIDN’T YOU EVER GET ME TESTED?!? "Well, you always made such good grades that we just didn’t think it mattered that much.
I have since been diagnosed with ASD Level 1, and I think back a lot on my life lived. I marvel at how much easier my life would have been if I hadn’t had to develop all of these coping mechanisms myself. I did well in school despite my autism. I earned two degrees despite my autism. I hold down teaching jobs despite my autism. The biggest problems I’ve had in my life, though, have been personal relationships. I can’t imagine how much richer my life might be right now had I known all along how to exist as a self-aware autist in a neurotypical world.
A friend of mine got diagnosed first with add and then autism in her 60s. She felt relieved because she finally understood herself.
My diagnosis was based on a number of tests. One such test was related to speeded processing, basically how quickly a person’s brain analyzes things and makes decisions. It required me to look at a series of pages (one at a time) featuring a particular design for about six seconds or so, and to then identify on the flowing page the same design from a group of four, five, or six similar designs (there were more to choose from as the test went on). If I got one wrong, I’d have a second chance to choose the correct image. Two wrong answers in a row and the test would be over.
I was told at the beginning to not feel bad if I didn’t finish the test because no one ever does. Well, I did, and very quickly. I made one mistake on one picture, but I’d had it narrowed down to two images, so I was able to quickly recover when I made that one mistake. After a while, after every correct answer, the doctor’s eyes became wider and wider, until I finished and she just said, “Welp…that was THAT test!”
When I got my test results, it had me well into the 99.9th percentile. Upon informing me of this, she asked me “Does this surprise you?” to which I replied no, not really. I’ve always felt like I think WAY more quickly than the rest of the world. And it is both a boon and a burden. It serves me well and will continue to do so in the post-apocalyptic times to come.
But it’s also caused me to queer relationships because I don’t think about things before speaking sometimes, and - as an autistic person - connections with others are sometimes few and far between. So having confirmation now that my brain really does work this way helps me feel empowered enough to work on myself and that tendency to think/act/speak too quickly, because the relationships I have with people are immensely important to me.
I don’t know the popular opinion on this, but I personally think you did a great job learning how to be your best self without having a label. Everyone is unique and everyone will have to learn how to do things their way, having children labeled as something when they already do well might just make them feel more alienated, or be like “I’m X that’s why I’m like this” instead of finding their way to be productive/have fun.
Of course it’ll help people struggling but not knowing what’s wrong. But if you’re a type of person who can feel/see what works for you and what doesn’t and find solutions for yourself, you might even make your quirks your strength. One frequent thought I have is, how many of the scientists or philosophers in the past were actually autistic? Or had quirks that made them who they are, but would definitely be “problematic” when they were young by today’s standards.
TLDR: My opinion is everyone is unique, using your quirks to do things others can’t is what makes some people great. Making everyone fit a “normal”, and medicating/… everyone else doesn’t seem like a good idea.
There’s not medication for autism, and self-awareness is immensely helpful
Is it? Why does having a label for people treating you differently help with that? It mostly just turns into an excuse for others to use thank being a helpful label.
I think labels seem progressive and helpful but are mostly used to further divide people and make in and out groups.
If you know you struggle with people being told that it’s your fault cause you are genetically different somehow even though it seems ever so common and spectrum based does nothing to help you deal with people.
Everything is used to divide, someone autistic will behave in ways that “other” him regardless of labels, and people who want to hate are going to keep hating.
You don’t need them, don’t use them, but they absolutely are helpful for many people. We are nowhere near a society inclusive enough to make labels obsolete.
Beside, dealing with people’s attitude isn’t the only issue. Neurodivergent people will compare themselves to others on their own, and will struggle with their self image and self-esteem. A diagnosis will help with understanding themselves and finding better strategies much quicker.
Chicken or the egg? Do we stop labeling people and start working on their shared and singular problems to become inclusive or do we need to become inclusive first to start being able to see people as people and work on their shared and singular problems?
I think the answer is we just start doing it anyways. And don’t wait for reality to shift to some easier form to do things we should.
And I know that people compare themselves to each other all the time, I have done it and will do it to but now I try to do it when seeing if they are content only. If they have more in their bowl than me it’s not my concern, I am trying to focus on those that don’t have enough. It’s a pipe dream that labeling people makes them better at coping. People still need the compassion of others.
Chicken or the egg do we wait for a compassionate society to start being compassionate ourselves?
I’m happy you found your way and again, don’t use labels if you don’t want to. Start building the world you wish for, by all means.
You keep missing or ignoring the point that your experience is yours alone, other people find comfort, identity, community and understanding in their labels and that’s their right.
Labels are a tool, how they are used depends on the person but they don’t intrinsically imply either discrimination or lack of compassion. Be compassionate, we agree that’s the way, but as far as I’m concerned that includes letting people be with their labels when they want to, as long as they’re not being dicks about it.
I think we agree on the main point of wanting a more inclusive society, one that hopefully doesn’t need labels, eventually, but it doesn’t look likely it will happen soon, and as long as we live in this one each of us copes the way we can.
Happy holidays friend
Here’s how a label can help: I did receive a social worker diagnosis (not medical) in elementary school, but my parents had a very similar outlook to you and didn’t do much for helping me learn how to handle it. I “knew”, but could never understand why I alienated everyone. I couldn’t manage my anger, because every time I met a new kid, it would get combative quickly. I felt I was in a position to have to earn massive respect from everyone to treat me decently, and therefore got controlling when working with others. This pressure also extremely heightened the natural tendency to procrastinate associated with autism (Note, all of this is afterthought analysis not what I thought as a kid).
College and then post grad, I had to confront these issues on my own with only poor coping mechanisms I had developed growing up. I had to educate myself about autism, and I had to spend a lot of time reflecting on myself and figuring out how to manage my worst impulses. If I had been educated and informed as a kid, I wouldn’t have needed to struggle like that for decades.
Sure. If people had taken the time to work with you and find your issues and solve them you would have had it better.
That doesn’t require the label it just makes it easier to look up the information for it and see what others have done.
The association of the label doesn’t help you it would be people helping you. Labeling the pain can help you recognize it, labeling the person puts them in a group.
You also have no idea how the part would be if it was different because it wasn’t lived. It’s an easy fantasy rather than living in the present. You would have likely still struggled just differently. So what do we do now for those that still are? Do we label them or are we helping them?
Do you know why humans are as advanced as we are? It’s because we can learn from each other and build on what people before us have done. A label helps you connect with people who have the same struggles and learn what strategies they used to cope and live a fulfilling life. It’s a way to avoid having to reinvent the wheel.
That has nothing to do with labels. That creates group think and tribes.
Knowledge is not labels on people.
How do you find the people with the same struggles as you without some common banner to look for? And just naming symptoms without some root cause is probably not going to be helpful. Treating leg pain from a broken bone is different than treating leg pain from a bad cramp. Similar for a lot of social/mental challenges.
Or…and just a thought…maybe people know their own truths better than you ever possibly could, and when they tell you that early diagnosis and therapy would have helped them immensely, you just believe them?
Also, I got diagnoses for Generalized Anxiety Disorder with Panic Attacks as well as Major Depressive Disorder, and having those diagnoses as a teen might have helped as well, ya know?
Would you tell someone who doesn’t have legs that they’d be better off without a wheelchair because then they’d be free to “find their own way to be productive/have fun”? Or is this reserved for disorders that you can’t see?
My medication doesn’t fundamentally change who I am, it just makes me less shit at the things I am most shit at, so that my daily life is less of a constant struggle.
And sure, it’s possible to imagine a world where having ADHD wouldn’t be such a problem, just like it’s possible to imagine a world where not having legs wouldn’t be a problem. But that’s not the world we live in!
Try not paying your bills and telling your landlord and credit card company that it’s fine, you’re just not one for rigid schedules and you’re finding your own way. Or instead of doing your job at work, do something completely different and see if your boss accepts that you’re just quirky.
I don’t know if you read it, the second paragraph goes with something like: if you’re having problems, then yes, if you’ve found ways to deal with things and be happy/productive then no need to labels things to be “normal”
If you do not have problems you will not be diagnosed. The diagnose criteria literally say that you must have problems.
Fuckin Boomers
“We were focused on ourselves, so we just left you to twist in the wind.”
How precisely is this a generational thing?
It’s not specifically, but much of the cultural inertia that we struggle with today is a holdover from the outsized Boomer population and their influence on America for the last ~55 years. And Boomers, as a cohort, are markedly narcissistic and apathetic to the plights of others, while displaying significantly lower levels of empathy and/or understanding. They are largely uneducated, but obstinate that their outdated information still holds validity, and when pressed to change, or reform, typically respond with threats and attacks. This, while gaslighting those with greater knowledge than themselves- Dunning-Kruger personified.
So it’s not necessarily limited to Boomers, but this scenario absolutely describes a commonality of experience for those with Boomer parents, particularly of Millennial-age.
That last bit reads like Weird Al doing a Madonna sendup
As long as you’re not disruptive, they don’t give a shit.
If you’re malleable enough, the machine will mash you into place.
Truth. I remember being in school in the 90s when they were giving Ritalin to everyone who didn’t want to sit still in class. Shit was wild. And then you have me, with a healthy case of ADD but since I wasn’t a social butterfly, that just meant I wasn’t motivated.
Oh man, one of my people! My parents, my school, my teachers just watched me fail with an under 1.0 average, while I scored 95th percentile in every standardized test. I was lazy, undisciplined, and unmotivated, and it made me hate myself.
I feel like this would be a red flag now, but back then, even the school counselors were only worried about my impact on other students. Since it was minimal, they let me just stay there and fail… my best friend, who’s every bit at sharp as me, got Ritalined into fucking oblivion and put in remedial classes. Jokes on me tho, he got a diploma from HS.
GED is just another standardized test. If I knew how easy it was back in my junior year, I would have saved myself a lot of time and trouble.
Dude, all the same here. I tested insanely high on that aptitude test in elementary school and was placed in their version of honors. But the teachers would get pissed because I wouldn’t do any homework, yet somehow aced all my tests and scored minimum 90th percentile on all standardized tests. I just paid attention to the lessons but had no interest in the busy work.
I ended up just doing the CA proficiency exam and got out of high school on my 17th birthday, and then got a diploma at 25 to make my mom happy.
Ritalin made me a zombie. Thankfully Adderall existed. I wish I could get some as an adult. That shit made me superhuman.
They had me and my brother on I think it was Concerta, and yeah there was something not right about that stuff. Adderall was great for getting shit done, but no way I’d want to take it everyday.
T breaks from amphetamines are (hopefully) encouraged.
T break?
Tolerance break. Even a one day weekly washout can be good enough.
Ah gotcha, thanks
Consider that the 90s was when most early Boomers had their kids in school, and of course, they didn’t want to deal with their children’s problems. So yeah, throw some drugs at them, the teacher is always right, and shut up now- Mommy and Daddy are focused on themselves.
And if you had ADD, ODD, and breaking the curve grades, they took every opportunity to lock you up in jail that they could.
At least that’s what happened to me.
And if you are disruptive, they diagnose you with odd and beat you to make you shut up. You can’t win
Turns out, the teachers just do their job. And most of the time just the bare minimum, just like almost everyone else.
And if you want to teach and a student is a pain and hindering/distracting everyone else, then you kinda have to intervene. If the student isn’t motivated/concentrated its easy for the teacher to just say that the student doesnt wanna learn so he gets just bad grades.
At least thats how I see it sometimes.
Dude, so fucking real. I just got denied meds because “If you can learn a big part in a play, then you must have very mild adhd.”
I’m convinced that most psychiatrists and psychologists have control issues that they satisfy through their practice. It makes them feel powerful to be able to gatekeep, judge and implicitly control their patient’s life and get paid for it.
I wish I could talk to someone who actually knows what adhd is like, and not just some boomer with a fancy piece of paper
Man if I was a doctor I’d probably get my control kick by giving people what they want and making them happy.
Extend that to anybody involved with patient care and medicine.
I suspected i had adhd when i was 16, begged my mom to go to a psychologist. The psychologist told me i was playing too many video games ಠ_ಠ
When the video games were a symptom of the ADHD. Lol
Many of us played video games because we lacked any social structure in our lives. TV and video games make people feel like they aren’t alone, even when they are.
Its just my opinion but I think you can remedy that by creating a supporting social environment for the whole family to be part of, regardless of what hobbies someone’s into.
Edit to add: I didnt mean to imply you should go do this, its just what I think helps prevent the issue.
Yea im 23 now, 2 years ago i decided to go to behavioral health and got actually diagnosed with adhd.
Pretty rough to be dumped into adult life dealing with all that, hope things are going better! Always helps me to remember that even the best of us make tons of mistakes every day. Not sure why little phrases can have so much power though.
My first and only therapist was totally dismissive of my problems. I left them, but haven’t been able to bring myself to try another one since then 😔
It’s weird how many people on here attribute good grades to being good at everything else in life. Or minimizing the probable and unnecessary struggle some individuals go through to get those good grades because of the system they were put in. I got good grades because i worked many times harder than my peers. I shouldn’t have to. No one does. I was privileged enough to have enough resources to do as well as i did. Most people with my condition don’t. I’ve also struggled a lot more at other tasks, and in the work place. But i got good grades, so fuck me right?
Yeah. It’s so fucking shortsighted to be like, “Eh, you did fine, look at your grades. You can’t be that disabled.” Like, you putzes, are you kidding me? If I hadn’t been spending all my mental energy clearing all these pointless obstacles, I might have cured fucking pancreatic cancer by now. It’s not just about what’s convenient for caretakers, teachers, and a health team, it’s about being denied the opportunity that most other people are handed without asking to achieve everything they’re capable of doing.
Back in school I literally helped other students cram 30 minutes before a test, using flash cards I made and used all week, only to have them breeze in and get a higher score than me.
Do you know how great it would be to only barely try, and succeed anyway? I can’t even imagine.
I breezed through high school, everything was easy, never studied, was never really able to just sit and focus on stuff.
Get to college, calc is hard. Physics is hard. Electronics is hard. I have zero skills from never studying; I have no foundation to learn. Didn’t make it in college. Still really good at mental math though! Still can’t sit and focus on tasks for long.
Hitting that wall is pretty common. You learn the wrong habits as you breeze through and get good grades without effort, then encounter the first subjects that require non-trivial effort. And then maybe you take some bad grades until you eventually learn, or you drop out and never figure out how to work through more difficult learning.
Some smart people might not hit that wall until pretty late (I know people who first encountered it in grad school), but regardless of when they encounter it, whether and how they get over that hump can determine what the rest of that academic path looks like for them.
Lol getting to grad school or a PhD without studying sounds like 90%ing a game or getting stuck at the final boss
Getting that far on the highest difficulty level is already impressive IMO
I don’t think it’s that great. I was able to coast through high school but I was hindered once I reached the edge of my natural talent shortly into college. I had never really learned how to buckle down and study so I ended up struggling a lot. I can still pick things up pretty easily but I often give up when it gets to a certain point. Nowadays I feel kinda inferior to others that learned how to keep trying.
I was all ready to come back at with how I wish I had your problem, but I can honestly see how being unable to buckle down would be a huge impediment.
My results may not be as good as my peers and I may take longer, but I am able to get there eventually.
For instance, I am currently on day 4 of 25 of the Advent of Code competition, haha.
Good for you. Good luck!
being good at shit doesn’t mean I can have good grades either
My autism allows me to do it work, create servers, host websites and make my own Foss projects
This won’t however mean I’ll be getting 100 from my chemistry exam just because I can loop hello world a hundred times
Goddamn, this innocuous post brought me to tears. Been having a rough time, I guess
Hugs.
You can’t change the past but you can change the future.
Can you though? At least in most of the US if you aren’t already getting psychological help, you have to pay for it yourself, and will just have to figure out a self medication schedule that works for you.
I pay for both a psychiatrist and a psychologist and while my psychologist knows for sure I have ADHD neither of then can prescribe me stimulants so instead I’m on Lexapro so at least I don’t have to care.
Right but your scenario presumes a great deal, and millions of Americans can’t pay for therapy, nor the medicines required to live a better quality of life. Even people with “good jobs” can have awful health coverage with enormous deductibles and other hoops to jump through.
And the kicker is that we pay more than any other industrialized country and get the worst ROI because it’s all been allowed to be run by private corporations, for maximum profit.
As a parent of a child with ADHD, I’m cautious about using stimulant medication unless it’s clearly the best course of action. My main goal is to help my child succeed, and academics is a big component of that.
I see many of my son’s ADHD symptoms in myself, and I believe I may have also had/have ADHD. Despite this, I’ve been successful in my life. This personal experience makes me hesitant to automatically turn to medication as the solution for my child. I prefer to explore other options first, unless there’s a strong reason to consider it, such as struggling academically.
When my son entered high school he became mature enough to participate in the decision-making process regarding his own treatment. Because of that it was easier for me/us to get him a prescription of Adderall and feel good about it as parents.
Edit: since it seems to not be clear, my son is on ADHD meds and has been for the past three or four years. We talked to him about it and he prefers taking the medication and has had input in the dosage that he’s taking.
Unsolicited advice incoming:
Help your kid get a diagnosis ASAP and try to find a medication that works. The drugs are just a tool, but your kid won’t know whether they help without trying them.
At some point, they may find themselves unmedicated and down in an ADHD hole — having the diagnosis and knowing which medications may help is crucial to dig out of the hole.
Sorry, if it wasn’t clear, he has a diagnosis of adhd and he’s on meds.
Counter point.
The medication worked. Suddenly i could pay attention and my grades went up. And those where the main “problems” adults perceived.
My parents where skeptical about medicine first but opted to try because the backlash people gave me for lacking an attention span was affecting me hard. They ultimately believed they where doing the right thing.
I slowly become less social then i already was, lost my appetite, stopped feeling many emotions in general and eventually sank into a deep twisted depression.
I was unable to understand it was the medicine doing this. I was unable to communicate any of it properly because i thought what i was (not) feeling was just normal life and puberty. It was not.
I know and respect that those drugs can help some people. But they completely destroyed me, afterwards it took many years of controversially self medicating with cannabis to restore my original self and feel my emotions properly again. (The mail reason I started was because i read it could be used for adhd/autism and my first experience left me feeling normal and able to take public transport without suffering intens social anxiety)
I fully agree on your diagnosis part though. And i al also not saying medicine cant be the correct tool but its definitely not a clearcut choice.
The lack of emotions is awful. Going to family events or friends parties and it might as well feel like I’m at the grocery store. People tell funny jokes and I make a weird mouthy smile to pretend I’m normal.
They might make it easier to do work you otherwise would not want to do, but the cost is absurd in my opinion.
Seriously. Get them meds and a proper therapist ASAP who has a clue about ADHD. While their brain is still plastic you can train it early with the hope of having a future where coping mechanisms are already there and potentially reducing or getting off their meds entirely. Once you are an adult, it is over. Opportunity lost and time to learn the hard way.
He’s on meds (has been for 3 or 4 years), and he has an ADHD diagnosis… What’s the therapist for? I haven’t seen any actual issues that warrant a therapist, what are you thinking I should be watching out for?
Right now he’s doing pretty good in school, he’s a little less social than I would like, but that’s nothing new. Other than that, he seems a sharp well-rounded kid without any behavioral or emotional issues.
Couldn’t think of the word, but not a “talk” therapist. Behavioral or cognitive therapist. Basically, they fill in the gap that medication doesn’t and can reduce your dependence on medication later in life. They give you strategies on how to handle the emotional dis-regulation, motivation issues, lack of dopamine, etc. You don’t need to be in “rough” shape, or have a really bad case, or anything like that. Medication only helps so much, so getting those strategies in early can make a big difference. Even as an adult it can help and may be something you want to pursue yourself. Half the battle is understanding what behaviors you exhibit is due to ADHD.
I wish I had been diagnosed early in life and got the help I needed, but with the stigma, poor family, and lack of healthcare, I never had a chance. I missed the part where they are a teenager. Please don’t assume they are fine because everything looks good on paper, so to speak. Best thing is to present the option and continue to support them and yourself.
I hope you don’t take any of this as me saying you are a bad parent or anything like that. I don’t mean it that way. I am really passionate about it and a lot of the stigmas against medication has done a lot more harm than good.
This is probably a good call. In the first place a common problem with stimulant meds for adhd is that tolerance goes up quickly, requiring the user to increase their dose over time. The dependency is hard to break. I was prescribed on it for only a few months and made the mistake of abruptly stopping taking it - and even that was enough to go through one of the worst depressions of my life.
There is also evidence of heart risks with long term use, and given that cardiovascular disease is already the western world’s number one killer, another blow to our hearts is that last thing anyone needs.
And then there’s the regulatory and supply issues. Pharmacies often struggle to keep enough of a supply to meet demand, which is the worst thing for a substance with such a high-risk dependency situation. Plus because it’s a schedule 2, you must see a doctor for every refill.
And of course the insurance companies make all of this all the more ugly. Really not worth it.
Edit: oops, didn’t catch the last part. Welp, hope it works well for them.
Can I add, anecdotally, how many times ive seen people who take adderall daily try another stimulant like coke or meth and say something like: “This doesnt feel much different than adderall at all,” or “I thought this stuff would be stronger.”
Its like people taking oxycontin but thinking heroin is this scary potent drug. People have no idea what they are playing with.
My experience is completely the opposite of what you describe, not that I disregard anything you’ve stated. I’ve been on nearly the same dose for nearly 40 years and do not perceive any changes in the effect I receive. And I’d rather live without my medication while waiting on temporary shortages than live my life without it.
Hey if it works well for you, that’s great. I hope it keeps working well too.
Wait till you see what they let you do if you’re good at sports.
Wait till you see what they let you
doraw dog if you’re good at sports.Ftfy
Cheerleaders, teachers, whatever you want. The football players at my high school could do no wrong because they won state once.
Pretty much, my mom didn’t notice that I had adhd. But my little brother was a poor student, and ended up on several different medications for his adhd… meanwhile, my mom made fun of me for having like 5 water glasses scattered throughout the house all the time bcz I forgot I had a water glass, and where it was.
TBF if any condition isn’t causing problems then it doesn’t need treatment. Don’t get me wrong, ADHD can cause problems beyond just school/work, but often that’s one of the most common primary problems it causes
Who says it isn’t causing problems? We had a similar issue with my oldest. He is a brilliant kid who can’t get his shit together because of his disability. However he can skate through school.
It was a constant battle to get him services and accommodations, because he “is not failing”. The school system thinks he doesn’t need treatment because he’s not failing. We think he deserves treatment because he isn’t living up to his abilities and struggles to do basic stuff
Thank you for fighting for your son.
I never really had issues in school, I was doing fine. But teachers kept telling me I wasn’t living up to my potential. I was chaotic. Forgetful. Years later, I developed an anxiety disorder I didn’t understand so I went to therapy. Turns out I also have chronic depression (oh, life is not so bleak for everyone??) and it’s all because of severe ADHD and the attached problems. I’m almost 30 now. And while my therapist did a lot of structured tests, she is not qualified to actually diagnose ADHD. It’s gonna be another year until I can get my formal diagnosis and medication.
I often wonder what could have been had the adults in my childhood been more attentive to my -in hindsight- obvious and severe problems.
This was me. Had some good, caring teachers, and some bad, but I was really struggling. Ended up going to a private school on student aid because the public schools didn’t care to help. Started caring a lot more about school. Things also got a lot easier when I moved out of the house and had more space to collect my thoughts and goals.
I mean this is technically right (so the best kind of right) but as someone that got okay grades in school and only passed because I could ace a test on pretty much anything, knowing I had ADHD before I was in my mid 30s, stressing over why work was getting harder and harder and trying to explain to my wife that i genuinely just forget to clean up after a project is done would have been hugely helpful. So diagnosing ADHD in kids and teens getting good grades may end with just therapy as treatment if they are otherwise doing well, knowing that other treatments (like medication) are options if after school they start struggling more. Keep in mind it’s much more difficult to get an ADHD diagnosis as an adult than as a kid.
I got diagnosed and medicated at 39. A couple of years go by and I’ve improved my shit enough that I get offered a promotion from tools to office.
“Great”, I think, because I’m finally getting my shit together.
Couple more years have passed, and it turns out that even with medication it’s real fucking hard to be self-led management when you’ve got a brane that is not at all interested in working with you.
Unmedicated me got reasonable grades at school, then managed a respectable 2:1 degree. That would have been a first class degree if I’d been medicated. But all of that shit is basically on rails, people guiding you in the right direction. I don’t have those rails anymore.
My parents just didn’t know what to do and dropped me out of school at 14. I made good grades for the first semester in school every year, then I was moved beside the teacher’s desk and had straight Fs for the rest of the year.
My daughter has developed the same problems as me, mostly after her mom was diagnosed with cancer and then passed away, but I’m trying to get her medicated (if that’s what she needs, and I think it ultimately is). She’s 16 now, on mood stabilizers as of a month ago. The doctor seems to think that will do it.
She ticked every box for adhd which didn’t surprise me at all. I think they’re afraid to give her anything too big because of a history of addiction in the family.
I don’t know. I just hope she ends up doing better than I have since she’s actually being treated.
After I got diagnosed, my kid began the journey towards assessment. Sadly for him his mother didn’t take it too seriously and delayed making a GP appointment for a few months, by which time Covid had happened. The end result is that he got formally diagnosed last February, but because of the waiting lists and a change of our county’s ADHD service provider in April, he’s still not been prescribed any medication.
It’s doubly frustrating because he’s half way through his final year of a law degree. I desperately want him to graduate knowing he did his very best, but without meds I know how impossible that might feel.
Why did you attribute a ratio to your degree? What do you mean first class degree?
In the UK (and maybe other places?) an honours degree can be passed at different levels depending on how well you do.
Top marks is a 1st Class Honours Degree, good marks gets you an Upper Second Class Degree (2:1), okay marks gets you a Lower Second Class Degree (2:2). A 3rd class also degree exists.
Most post-grad courses and some jobs would expect a 2:1 or above to let you apply.
Take a guess how many doctors and dentists you worked with barely passed medical schools, or politicians you voted for still passed with mediocre subpar scores. Hint: not zero.
You’ll do fine. So stop under selling yourself
What do you call a doctor that graduated last in their class? Doctor
Sorry, I don’t understand what you mean. Did this reply go to the wrong person?
Nope it went to the correct person (you).
What don’t you understand, so I may elaborate? Apologies, English is my first language and I’m dumb.
My marks were mere points away from being in First range. It’s frustrating as hell to look back on.
It’s a testament to how hard I worked on the course submissions (in the 12 hours before the handing in deadline) that I did as well as I did. Because honestly, when I think back to that final year of being sat in front of my computer screen, the overwhelming memory is having four different browsers open, logged into four different Facebook accounts that I used to be a dickhead troll in racist groups, winding up the racists.
None of that had anything to do with the radio production degree that I’d paid good money to study towards.
A 2:2 is also known as a Desmond, for fairly obvious reasons.
Absolutely, and inner conflict, constant struggle and unhappiness counts as a huge problem, even when external appearances are kept and things run relatively smoothly. Internal peace should always be the primary goal, and not just fitting into the gears of routine life.
Life is a constant struggle and was for basically all of our ancestors.
If you think life is only happy and free of inner conflict then that’s only because the drugs.
Why don’t you go chop off one of your arms. Since life is a constant struggle, more struggle must be good right? You should definitely make your life HARDER.
Not the same and that kind of animosity for the first world problems of not being happy or productive enough to be able to exist in the modern society without the assistance of drugs does not require me to praise the practice.
I’m not suggesting people make it harder on themselves but there were much bigger issues in just the recent past and coming in the future to not add more to that. But there are people struggling with removed limbs or malformed ones from birth who could use more accomodations, than those who think their life isn’t as easy as someone else’s who has more money than them.
In other words. What a terrible response.
So you believe that people with real diagnosed medical issues should just suck it up because somewhere else in the world people don’t have running water.
What a terrible response.
You set up your own strawman and then knocked it down. You aren’t worth responding to.
You aren’t worth responding to.
In my opinion life not being 100% free of inner conflict vs life being full of it are very different things.
The goal being inner peace doesn’t mean that one thinks absolute inner peace is possible. At least I tend to reach a bit higher than what I’m only happy with.
But even if the results are good, the process can still be very draining on the individual.
It didn’t get recognized in me until 10th or 11th grade. My grades started to slip fast when the ways I adapted to school stopped helping me keep up.
Arguably, if it’s not causing behavioral concerns, educational concerns, emotional concerns, social concerns, or physical concerns… It’s not really a condition is it?
For lack of a more relatable analogy, I’ve been using this race based one.
Imagine you’re a black child in America in the 1960s and 1970s, but you somehow managed to remain ignorant of that fact until sometime in your teens or early adulthood. Maybe the area was really progressive, parents wanted to shield you from reality, whatever you need to imagine is fine. You end up not understanding this fact about yourself, and then you end up in the racist public. Now, imagine that the racist public never comes outright and says anything directly racist to you, but all of their other behavior is exactly like what you’d expect from racists in the 1970s. How do you come to terms with this reality? You must be doing something wrong for people to treat you this way.
Obviously not a perfect analogy, and I don’t really like to compare my issues as a ND person with the awful stuff done to black people back then, and that continues to be done today. Anyway, it’s not inaccurate, if anything, the differences between ND people and NT people are greater than any outward racial appearance, and worse, ND people aren’t really aware they are being marginalized, and NT people don’t really understand that they are marginalizing.
I think… you should probably stop using that analogy.
A good analogy would be being forced to use your non-dominant hand to write, maybe to play guitar, paint, use a right-handed mouse with your left, etc…
Over time and practice, you may get pretty good at it. But, you want to ask if you think you’ll ever get the speed with the smoothness and precision you would have gotten if you’ve been using your dominant hand. You’d be doing what a lot of ND people have to do, which is put a lot of valuable concentration and energy into adapting to something that while NT people have no issue, it’s completely foreign to you.
You can also think of getting the proper treatment as, at worst, switching that incorrect 5-button ergonomic mouse for a basic 3-button ambidextrous one, and at best give you the forward/back buttons, but ignoring the ergonomic design. I.E. The treatment should help lessen the disadvantages, but they would still be present.
Thanks for the suggestion, but I think it’s too shallow vs the actual experience. The depth at which ND people are marginalized is so far and away under presented today. Most of the established science is just wrong and resistant to the reality that ND led researchers are presenting. We need to do better at advocating for ourselves as an entire group with shared experiences and unique mental and physical health issues.
The next best analogy I’ve heard so far is NT people are Windows based software running in a Windows based world, ND people are MacOS software being forced to run on Windows (suspend your IT mind about how it wouldn’t work at all, and understand that for a lot of ND folks, it doesn’t). Get on the correct runtime environment and a lot of issues go away. That’s just really hard to do when the world is primarily built for the 85%-95% NT population, and many of the most capable in the ND population are either ignorant or in denial due to lack of acknowledgement, and stigmatization of anything that would be acknowledged.
People can not agree with what I’m saying, I’m sure it sounds absurd especially if you are NT. I doubt I would have agreed with it two years ago, but introspection after my own realizations that I’m autistic, after over 30+ years of living with this brain, I understand things quite differently now.
Haha, I raw dogged it until I was 23, horrible grades only
Raw dogged it until 37 years old. Sucks to start life so late 😂
45! At least I somehow got promoted and found a girlfriend. For my Christmas miracle I’m a real boy now I guess.
Gosh 1.1962222087×10⁵⁶ is quite old indeed. 😉
If you can even find someone who does adult diagnosis
For sure. I was lucky I was working for Apple (UK) so they offered private healthcare as mental health support on the NHS isn’t great.
I’m 42 and got diagnosed less than a year ago. Still haven’t found meds that actually work, but at least I know and have developed new coping mechanisms.
I’m a few years older and also wasn’t diagnosed until my late 30s.
Welcome to the world of mental health medication. It’s a complete fucking mystery to even medical “professionals” which cocktail works for you, until you give it a shot.
On more than one occasion I’ve heard, “Try this one, if you don’t want to kill yourself or anyone else, it’s probably a good one to use. Otherwise, we can switch to another one with even worse side effects and see how that goes. How does that sound?”
Good luck! It’s a long journey, at least in my experiences.
Fortunately got Prozac dialed in after a bad experience with Paxil many years ago. I’d rather the anxiety be better and the ADHD not. Thanks and same to you.
I don’t have anything and I never will because I’m never getting tested. I did get “classified” and never had a fair chance at a real education. Even failure meant I needed to be in the program and every success showed how well the program was working. I grew up thinking I would only be a drag on other people. In high school, I decided to start feeling better about myself. Something those years of being removed from class so I could have meaningless conversations with the school therapist never could. I thought the school would support my efforts to fix my education, but I only got pushed down, told “I would be happier without the risk of failure”, lied to about classes being full, withheld test results when I tried testing into better classes. I would like nothing more then to get the diploma revoked and seeing as how I never fulfilled the basic state requirements, I should be able to, but like with most things, the written law doesn’t matter if no one is willing to enforce it.
Fuck my school. Fuck the “team building” exercises they made me do. Fuck the “opportunities” they provided for me.
