Comment by Swizec | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Swizec | Hacker News Reader

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> The most surprising thing my adult ADHD diagnosis revealed was that as I began telling friends that I had been diagnosed positive they told me they had known that since they met me. These were childhood friends.

As someone with peer reviewed ADHD but not official diagnosis, what are friends gonna do about it? They can tell you, you're always late and it's annoying but that's about it. At some point it becomes just who you are as a person, part of your character sheet. If you're not planning to change and it's mostly under control (have job, life, etc), does it even matter to put a label on the thing?

I feel like a diagnosis in my 20's would've been useful. Now it's like I got me my coping strategies and they work pretty well. If I do or don't have ADHD doesn't really change anything.

And for anyone else reading, the leading symptom of adult-diagnosed adhd is saying and thinking things like "I don't get it, ADD can't be real, that's just how everyone is"

> I feel like a diagnosis in my 20's would've been useful. Now it's like I got me my coping strategies and they work pretty well. If I do or don't have ADHD doesn't really change anything.

This is what I told myself before I started taking medication around age 30. But ultimately my coping strategies felt flimsy, and I felt like my life could fall apart at any second.

Getting medicated and getting therapy has improved my life and evened out my emotional state an incredible amount. I still feel like me, just with a bit more stability and consistency.

I don’t think it’s ever too late to start medication. If you think there’s a benefit to it, it’s worth trying out.

I didn't know - but I was adaptively self-medicating.

At one time it was Jolt Cola ("all the sugar and twice the caffeine!"), then energy drinks came along. I can drink 10 a day, because I genuinely function better that way.

But Adderall works really well now, and unlike caffeine, it doesn't set me up to lose sleep.

>then energy drinks came along. I can drink 10 a day, because I genuinely function better that way.

I did that for a bit, for the same reason. now couple of years developed issues with high blood pressure, so be carefull with that approach.

different people with ADHD have different symptoms or effects. I think yes it absolutely matters because I have always secretly been hard on myself, that I am worse than others, struggled under extreme rejection sensitivity. It matters and helps, if only to be able to be a little kinder to yourself and have the ability to decide to get help in the form of a therapist, or medication, or find strategies that worked for others.

I'm ADHD and really struggle with similar things. I've been leading a really lonely life because I tend to isolate after any friction with people, assuming they don't like me anymore.

I know to people without this problem it probably sounds very childish and silly, but it's a real problem. I lack a lot of the inner social calibration of what is a big problem and what is not so I very often have social issues because I say something hurtful (unintentionally) and don't realize why it's a big problem. Then I say other stuff that other people are actually fine (or mostly fine) with but I stress out about it and agonize and isolate myself.

I also identify with being super hard on myself. For a recent example I replaced a door in my house recently. I had never done this before. I bought a power routing saw and cut the hinge mortises myself. Two of them were basically perfect, one of them was a bit jagged and it was off by 2 millimeters when I went to hang the door. I spent the next four hours pissed off at myself for fucking up the door!

After doing a franky great job for my first ever attempt at hanging a door, and never using a routing saw before. :/

That's not normal levels of self criticism

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