I agree. In fact I have many friends who likely have it that haven't been able to get medication.
I was "lucky" because I had a childhood diagnosis which really sped things up for me.
> Many of the steps you take to get on medication when you don’t need it seem trivial. To someone with ADHD, each of those steps is a barrier that they have a high chance of failing to clear because they “just forget” or “don’t follow up.”
This is truly a profound thought I hadn't thought of.
I'm embarrassed at how long it took me to just answer the first question on my ADHD questionnaire.
The amount of friction I had at just searching for help was insane.
If I compare that to me on medication though, I know that the quasi-"normal" experience of this same thing is "this is easy - just... do it?". In fact it's sometimes quite hard to have compassion for non-medicated me struggling to do a few chores while me on medication does the whole week of chores in a day.
> Needing to setup and coordinate appointments amplified by the regular required checkins, the monitoring of “steady use” in filling your prescriptions, on-again off-again potentially impacting your eligibility.
Yes, in the periods of time I've forgotten to take my medication I've missed many of these checkin appointments and was warned missing them could affect my eligibility.
> I don’t like being on ADHD medication because of the side-effects and the impact on how I communicate. So I frequently fall off the wagon. As soon as I’m off my prescription, the obstacle course starts over and I have to navigate it to get back on my medication.
I agree with this. I would give the advice of giving a buffer day where you take your medication because the first day back on for me (and probably others) is things can be quite overwhelming.
So one thing I try to do is make sure if I skip meds for Fri/Sat I take it Sun or Mon productivity will be affected by the jarring difference between medicated/not medicated.