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I have, for some time, been coming to the conclusion that I probably have ADHD.

And my god, the “resources” online are just so very very terrible.

They’re all basically, “have you tried not being that way?”

Er, yeah?

in reply to Sarah Brown

Aside, a lot of the really bad advice online seems to be aimed at parents with ADHD kids. This is presumably because kids are largely unable to self-advocate and when they tried presenting the same facile bullshit to adults with the condition, they were told stop talking shite and shove their stupid ideas up their arses.
in reply to Sarah Brown

I have ADHD (not just from usual clinical diagnosis, but also ten years of prior counselling, as there will be replyguys saying it's a fad).

You're right about the terrible, terrible advice. It seems to come down to many people treating a neurological problem as psychological.

When you say that, people assume you're trying to get out of "trying" or avoiding blame, but actually it makes things easier to come up with strategies to beat it, 'cos the problem is simple and mechanistic.

in reply to kæt

For example, kids in particular can be shocked out of loops by surprises (good or bad). There's no real deep psychology to it, it's just an unexpected input that breaks the loop. While folk are thinking of it in terms of naughtiness or deep psychology that is counter-intuitive but it's unsurprising when you think of it mechanistically. Without a frame shift it's going to seem refractory.
in reply to kæt

@chiffchaff Surprise jolting one out of loops works for me too (not numerically a child)...

(Me: ADHD, with dx and long suspected. Not had much luck with drugs but that's very unusual among people I know.)

@kæt
in reply to kæt

@kæt I’ve long been at the “using caffeine to help me sleep” stage.
@kæt
in reply to Sarah Brown

Oh yes! I do that too. When you need your brain to go up a few floors from "sludge" to "tired".

The only thing with caffeine for me, I think, is keeping the differential there, separating the land from the water etc, and not letting my just general consumption rise to the point of tolerance.

Most advice out there on *when* / *which* activities need it is total nonsense as I'm guessing you've found.

in reply to Sarah Brown

Heh. You're not alone, and it's not just online. For the past month and a half, until today, I've been working with a counselor that is not experienced in ADHD, and some of her advice was to think less because our "skull is only large enough to keep so much in our heads" and "you know, ADHD wasn't even a thing until 35 years ago". And a lot of the online stuff I've seen is focused on crises-level things. Having conversations with diagnosed people has helped me the most.
in reply to Kris Hardy 🌮

@Kris Hardy 🧐 I don’t feel in a crisis to be honest. I’d quite appreciate the ability to manage to actually be useful during the actual day, and not lie awake at 2am having bilingual arguments with myself in my head and reading weird shit on the internet while I should be sleeping.

And not getting weirdly defensive when my partner suggests minor changes to plans and stuff.

But apart from that, and the sudden need to clean the oven and install a fresh raspberry Pi (did you know they’ve broken the Docker install packages?), at weird times, it’s all good.

Oh, and not picking fights on the internet, but I’m getting better at that.

in reply to Sarah Brown

@nonlinear I read this as installing a fresh raspberry pi in the oven. The mind reels from the possibilities.
in reply to Sarah Brown

That's good. Crises suck. I read ADHD 2.0 and it helped me understand a bit of what was going on. I also expect that each person's path is different, and what works for one doesn't necessarily work for another.
Unknown parent

Sarah Brown

@Ghost of Hope further to this. Last night I tried a strong cup of coffee at 10pm (never done this before). Quickly felt sleepy.

Went to bed.

Just woke up.

GOT UP.

Why did I get up? I never do that? I lay in bed until my bladder makes me.

Weird