Overdiagnosis is not a problem, but misdiagnosis may be as people are driven into the private sector by long waits, and sadly, missed diagnoses remain common —Tamsin Ford
Experts are warning that far from being over-diagnosed, people with ADHD are waiting too long for assessment, support and treatment.
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I’m seeing a lot of people here being supportive of individuals with disabilities and that’s awesome because ability is a temporary condition. We come into this world disabled and most of us leave it disabled. That being said, when you look at the number of Ivy League students in America who have these disabilities, it is very, very questionable for to say it is not being over diagnosed. Overall they’re probably trying to do a good thing, but there is a huge amount of abuse in this system and that actually leads to disabled people being overlooked and instead pharma companies just pursue a profit. Over diagnosis leads to under diagnosis as unintuitive as that sounds.
All ADHD means is that someone doesnt fit into the corporate america greed driven lifestyle. In my opinion, its not natural to live like that anyways, so I dont know that ADHD is real in the way we think of it now.
We shouldnt be trying to conform every person into the same tiny box, because we are all different.
Well then you definitely don’t understand it I guess.
Maybe, I dont think anyone does. I do know the people who think they know for sure the problem and the solution are wrong though. We can keep medicating ourselves though, I’m sure the research is sound and its all been figured out.
It might have a lot of unknowns still, but it’s been figured out a hell of a lot more than “you don’t actually have a differently functioning brain, you just don’t subscribe to American Greed ™️.”
Well I don’t think people are coming to this thread looking for medical advice, so I would hope no one takes anything anyone here says and applies it to their lives without criticism.
I’d be likely to change my mind if someone could show me evidence that ADHD happens in all human populations to some degree. I have doubt’s that there are cases of ADHD among uncontacted peoples, for instance.
“I want evidence from people that are definitionally unable to be studied.” Fuck off with that and engage the idea with intellectual honesty. Also putting the entire onus on other people to change your mind.
Why are you talking to me if you dont want to change my mind?
I’m just supposed to spontaneously come up with your idea and go with it? ADHD is mostly a bullshit excuse, whether people know it or not. If you can prove its not somehow then be my guest, otherwise kindly fuck off.
I can agree with much of that. I’ve seen people do this whole song and dance with autism, similar to saying people don’t have ADHD because they’re not annoying enough. Then they find out that autism is likely part of a cluster of mutations that always occur with certain deeply-disabiling genetic disorders, but can also stand alone. Self-diagnosis by people left out in the cold should not be necessary. A good treatment system needs to evolve to fit patients’ needs not the inverse lol
I’ll tell my friend that her Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria is actually fake and she’s just applying the Corporate America Greed Driven Lifestyle to her close relationships, that’s going to be great news for her.
ADHD is a lot of things.
Are we calling RSD ADHD now?
I get it, everything is ADHD. Makes sense.
RSD is a very common symptom of adhd because the effect of adhd on the brain creates RSD by default. There are other ways to develop RSD but it’s a symptom of adhd.
Its similar to how bleeding is a symptom of a cut, there are other ways to bleed but a cut will do it almost every time.
Well now I want to know how else we can bleed without a cut.
It’s the left-handedness chart all over again.
Paid for by the cocaine industry
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From the linked research article:
‘Over-diagnosis’ is observed when the prevalence of diagnoses made in clinical services, referred to as administrative prevalence (based on healthcare databases or insurance claims) exceeds prevalence estimates based on accurate assessments in representative population-based samples. Over-diagnosis may occur when diagnostic criteria are not applied with sufficient rigour, leading to false-positive cases. Over-diagnosis may also happen when people inappropriately self-diagnose. Notably, for individuals with milder or subclinical symptoms, a diagnosis can sometimes do more harm than good, creating stigma or leading to low-benefit treatments with significant side-effects.
So is Admin Prevalence > Prevalence Estimates where the estimates are made based on representative population-based samples?
Isn’t it strange how we discovered a lot more stars after inventing telescopes?
Obviously there was an unrelated increase in stars born at that exact time.
This is actually the most apt analogy for the whole “sudden increase in diagnosis” bullshit line that anti-vaxxers and anti-science people continually vomit out.
I’m in no way an anti-vaxxer or anti-science (I’m a researcher myself). I still think it can be justified to look closely at the large increase in, and volume of, various mental disorders. First of all: There’s no doubt that a lot more people are being diagnosed due to better diagnosis tools.
However, a major difference between psychological and somatic illness is that the divide between sick and healthy is (typically) a lot sharper in the latter case. Either you have an injury or infection, or you don’t, and we can measure that. In the case of e.g. depression or ADHD, there’s a much wider gray zone from e.g. “healthy person having a bad day” to “clinically depressed”.
The point I’m getting at is this: When a certain percentage of the population is diagnosed with a disorder, you have to ask whether we’ve started diagnosing ordinary human existence as a disease. Alternatively, you have to start looking at a systematic level for why an enormous portion of the population has a certain disorder. Where that limit should be is an open question, but I would argue that when something like 10-20 % of the population has a specific disorder, we’re no longer just looking at individual cases of disease but rather at (a) the possibility that the criteria for diagnosis are two wide, so we’re catching “healthy” people with it, or (b) we have a society-level problem (e.g. an epidemic).
I know of areas with ADHD-rates around 20 %. For a somatic illness, we would never let that kind of infection rate pass without taking a closer look at what’s going on at the societal level.
You cannot equate ADHD and spectrum mental conditions with disease. For one they are not a disease, you cannot catch them and you cannot give them to other people. They are the way people’s brains work. People are just born that way, same way people are born gay or trans, smart or dumb, handsome or ugly. You can’t have an outbreak of ADHD or autism the same way you have an outbreak of the flu or covid.
People have been searching for environmental factors for autism, ADHD, depression, and all kinds of mental conditions for years. Other than crackpot anti-vaxxers and people like RFK Jr who try to throw life saving vaccines and common medications like Tylenol under the bus with literally no literature whatsoever to back it up, there has been no links discovered. Genetics and fetal gestation is weird and people just get born different sometimes. We as a society need to accept that and stop thinking these are diseases that need to be “fixed”.
You cannot equate ADHD and spectrum mental conditions with disease.
I agree, the only way I meant to compare them is that we diagnose and treat both with medication.
We as a society need to accept that and stop thinking these are diseases that need to be “fixed”.
I also agree 100 % with this, and it’s part of what I’m trying to get at with my “option a”. As of today, there are regions where over 20 % of the population are diagnosed with, and treated for, ADHD. At that point, I’m asking the question if we’re creating a problem by treating something that appears to be within the spectrum of how “normal people just are” as a problem that needs to be fixed. My point is exactly what you’re saying here: If a large fraction of the population has this “problem” that needs to be “fixed”, haven’t we just gotten to a point where we have a too narrow definition of what is “normal” and “healthy” human behaviour? Shouldn’t we in that case rather be looking at how we can structure our society in such a way that a larger span of the population is capable of functioning in it without medication, rather that trying to force everyone to conform to the same, ever narrowing, mould?
The minority will never be adequately provisioned for without access to intervention. In theory, that can instead be legal or political. Many schools or workplaces put in provisions for ADHD, mostly because of laws. Society does have a “problem” that needs to be “fixed”. The “mould” problem is a deliberate authoritarian tool, beyond the scope of this discussion.
But you need to understand that this is access to medication, nobody is forcing this down our throats. If people want it, it exists, and it helps reduce scary mental health (we’re talking suicide), ableist restriction of access to interventions is super dangerous.
I honestly have the impression that we agree on pretty much all points here but that we’re talking past each other. I agree to pretty much everything you’re saying, and I’m all for helping as many people as possible live as good lives as possible.
What I’m trying to say is basically that problematising the large volume of (and increase in) psychological diagnoses can be valid, and doesn’t have to be founded in trying to downplay those diagnoses. To take a very concrete example: Kids that are disposed to growing very short or tall can be offered growth (blocking) hormones, such that they grow to a “more normal” height. Today, very few kids are offered, or take, these hormones. Now, let’s say some area suddenly saw a rapid increase where 20 % of kids needed growth hormones to grow to “ordinary” height. I would say that we need to figure out what has happened: Is there something about the environment that has caused stunted growth to become ver common? Has the window for what is “normal” gotten narrower?
Of course, in this example, it’s very was to compare to historical records of human height. The same isn’t true for mental disorders. That doesn’t mean the same discussion isn’t worth having- at its core, this is a discussion about how we can make society as good as possible for as many as possible. That also involves discussing what should be treated as a disorder that disproportionately makes people’s life objectively worse, and what is within the “normal” range that we should rather build society around accepting.
Yeah look if we really are seeing diagnoses suddenly rise, and it’s not just “a better telescope”, maybe it is worth considering exploring environmental causes, diagnostic criteria, societal tolerance of certain traits etc. That’s fair.
But idk about the height example. People can’t self-medicate height. For adhd, people absolutely self-medicate caffeine, nicotine, illicit stimulants, grey-market ADHD meds, etc. That alone suggests there’s a real functional problem exerting pressure that needs immediate addressing. Stimulants do not work the same way on people with adhd.
What concerns me about your responses is that “investigating why diagnoses are increasing” is used all the time to cast doubt on ADHD itself. Obviously there’s a substantial body of neurological and clinical evidence that it’s real, and dramatically affects attention regulation and executive function.
So I think people who legitimately believe in it falling for this mainstream theatre, risk letting us all slide down the slippery slope to believing the condition is mainly a societal construct and we should limit access to medication, whilst people top themselves.
The point I’m getting at is this: When a certain percentage of the population is diagnosed with a disorder, you have to ask whether we’ve started diagnosing ordinary human existence as a disease.
Its pretty mich a known fact that autism and ADHD were a somewhat beneficial trait in our hunting and gathering era. Hypervigilance makes you really good at spotting prey or predators and unsatisfied curiosity pretty mich forces innovation over a long enough time. The side effects that make life aliving hell in modern society weren’t nearly as detrimental back then. People lived in more communal small tribes and being a bit weird didn’t mean you get cast out and left to die alone.
Over time it became less and less useful. When the industrial revolution came along and everyone was supposed to let go of their individuality to instead work 12+ hour shifts pretty much only the negatives prevailed.
So yes, we are diagnosing a normal part of human existence as a disorder because in today’s society it is one. Mind you, its not diagnosed as an illness, something with a cause and potentially a treatment, its specifically diagnosed as a disorder, something that disrupts normal physical or mental function. It doesn’t really matter which genetic marker is the reason for your specific case of serotonin deficite that leads to the inability to concentrate and keeps your brain on 120% to compensate. The symptoms and their treatment are the same either way.
A culture where people believe ignoring your mental health issues makes you more strong, more independent, more of a role model… They think people have been fine for generations, and all of a sudden “fine” people are now being diagnosed with all kinds of problems.
I can understand their logic when I first understand their mistakes.
I’ve always liked the left-handedness analogy, but I am definitely stealing the stars one as well. It’s very pithy.
Telescopes caused autism.
To try to explain the increase of stars in the universe without it’s correlation with vaccine rates is just disingenuous. \s
Everyone knows that if the nebula takes paracetamol during pregnancy it increases the chance of K-type star creation.
The nebula: “Cut me sing some slack, i had an astronomical headache”
I will just add one thing perhaps in contrast to this. But inasmuch as I’m offering an analysis of how people think about this, please don’t infer that I agree with them
With some things, ADHD being one, I think the grumbling we hear is not really that there can’t be all these new cases suddenly. It’s that we’re pathologizing something that’s a normal part of being a kid.
Again, I’m not saying ADHD is like that, just that “no one had this when I was a kid” isn’t the most on-point way to characterize people’s incredulity about ADHD. They think we’re over diagnosing it because we want to turn something into a problem, and turn boys into girls, and yadda yadda.
I have an ADHD diagnosis, and I do think this is 60% just being better at diagnosing it, but I do also believe ADHD is sort of on the rise.
There is an incredible book called Scattered Minds by Gabor Maté, which is the significant book on ADHD in the same way that The Body Keeps the Score is for trauma, which delves into the potential ADHD causes beyond it being hereditary.
Of course modern dopamine-consumerist culture is part of the problem, but it largely makes ADHD symptoms obvious, and various unmet attention needs in early childhood are significantly more linked to developing ADHD, not to fault the parent or other caregiver who may not have the availability or ability to provide that attention due to modern societal demands. It’s been some years since I read it but I really remember one part clearly; it’s basically impossible to test nature Vs nurture in separated-at-birth twins because the act of separating twins at birth spikes the likelihood of having ADHD so much.
But honestly I think the largest contributor to increased ADHD cases is not that we’re better at diagnosing it, it’s that modern society increasingly warrants its diagnoses. 12000 years ago ADHD traits weren’t a disorder, as much as having different physical strength or height to your peers isn’t. Modern capitalist society demands an efficiency of its workforce and ADHD is an inherently inefficient trait, and therefore suddenly warrants treatment.
Don’t get me wrong, medication is incredible, and has turned days I’ve barely been able to get out of bed into productive days, but that’s still valuing being productive.
Erase capitalism from this and it’s still “days I’ve barely been able to get out of bed to hunt/reinforce important relationships/create art”. Inability to focus, relentless forgetfulness, rejection sensitive dysphoria, much of the ADHD experience interferes with non-“productive” life just as much as a job and shit.
Are you under the impression that everyone was required to be functioning at 100% at all times in order to survive or be a meaningfully-contributing member of a society? Because that is so very very far from the truth. The actual labor involved in hunter gather societies amounts to a few hours a day for each individual on average, but that doesn’t mean every individual had something that needed to be done every day in order to be a valued member of their society. Most tasks didn’t happen every day, and those that did didn’t require all hands to do.
Even after the agricultural revolution, many months of the year were much slower, allowing recuperation to prepare for the labor intensive period, a schedule I’ve liked in the modern era similarly; 3-6 mth contracts followed by 6-9 mths of vibing and living off what I saved up during the working phase, supplemented by a variety of projects I find compelling to keep my spending very low or sometimes earn a bit of side money. I find it works very well to keep my adhd symptoms from being crippling during the active work phase, and I’ve been unmedicated. Then I take a month or so to ooze into the ground to recover from the burnout, and I become productive in my personal life again. It’s a decent compromise if money has to be involved, but it’s sometimes a financial struggle because we don’t value paying people properly right now, an entirely late-stage capitalism problem.
Beyond that, knowing a lot of things about a variety of specialties and being curious enough to learn, something ADHD people tend to excel at, makes for a variable worker who can be slotted in to fill different needs for others who were unable, or simply when the labor demanded more bodies. Jack of all trades were also incredibly valuable back before modern transportation, especially for smaller communities. Couldn’t really get an actual expert without months of travel if one didn’t just happen to be around. So they got to feel valuable, like they were actively contributing to the social fabric, because they were, and got to do things that were actively interesting them, and just stop doing those things if they stopped being interesting. Having that sort of self image as well as flexibility would be intensely motivating, at least for me, and help overcome a lot of the inertia and sensitivity.
I genuinely do think a lot of the dysfunction we face from adhd has to do with how we structure our modern societies to optimize for efficiency and shareholder value over the wellbeing of the people. I mean when even non-adhd people are facing extreme burnout and excessive levels of stress, anxiety, and depression, what chance do we really have without meds?
Most data suggests it is under diagnosed.
Especially in women, like by a lot.
It’s almost as if we’ve gotten better at understanding the condition overall and in nuance.
My cousin was diagnosed by a brain scan. She signed up to be part of a clinical trial for something else, got kicked out of the trial because her fMRI showed she had ADHD.
So if we can literally scan someone’s brain and diagnose them from a picture instead of all these vague “describe your symptom” guessing… why don’t we?
An mri would kill me because my diet includes a tablespoon of 2mm iron pellets daily.
Is this for your shotgun arm
You can’t get diagnosed with an fmri alone. It’s just one sign, a weak one, so you’d need the professional doing questionnaires anyways. They are way cheaper and faster (in terms of waiting times) than fmris too. Might as well skip it.
Money
It’s also worth noting that ADHD, as a condition, is mostly a Gordian knot of maladaptations. Built up over childhood (and beyond). While there are a lot of commonalities, you need to do a detailed investigation to pick out what bits are a problem to the individual.
If you’re going to go through that process, then you might as well not tie up an MRI machine for no reason.
Drugs can treat the base problem, but don’t work well without the follow-up care to repair the behavioural damage.
It’s quite costly to run an fMRI. Not needed if you can get the same results more or less from a questionnaire.
In my professional experience, it can be hard to tell between ADHD symptoms and CPTSD symptoms. The checklist is not a great way to diagnose people. We usually do a lot more assessments, I also use a computerized test to measure reaction time and error commission.
I wish we (therapists) at least had the option to order an MRI or recommend a doctor orders one in difficult cases (I can do the latter but they will just laugh at me).
Do you know if there any studies on whether the effects of the medicine used for ADHD could have similar positive effects on people with CPTSD?
Great question! To my knowledge, they are just starting to look into it, but with PTSD specifically, not CPTSD. There is this case study (n=1) and this pilot study (n=32) that show promise. They are recruiting people for more testing.
Preliminary evidence shows that it does help - and it makes sense. If cognitive deficits from PTSD are a result of an impaired executive function, then stimulants would help with those particular symptoms, much like in ADHD.
Here’s the thing though - the US healthcare system still doesn’t even have CPTSD as a diagnosis, so there is not too much research happening on the topic here. Considering how ADHD (especially in women) is also very understudied, there are so many variables we just don’t know or understand.
If you are interested in novel treatments of PTSD, I also recommend looking into blue light therapy. There is some promising results showing a reduction in symptom severity within 6 weeks of daily 30-min blue light exposure in the morning. Here is a systematic review that looks at 4 studies.
Wait, is there an actual chance to “see” ADHD in an MRI image? I was under the impression that we can’t do that (yet) and the only way to diagnose was through questionnaires, attention testing and such. That’s what I was told by the doctor who ultimately diagnosed me two years ago
Wait, is there an actual chance to “see” ADHD in an MRI image?
Only fMRI, which is different, and even more expensive. It’s basically the same as asking you a bunch of questions but then seeing which parts light up. Brain can’t lie.
Like @yucandu@lemmy.world said, it would need to be an fMRI, which is primarily used in research as far as I know. And while it alone could not tell you definitively “this person has ADHD,” it could help rule out other conditions (like TBI, which can also present similar to ADHD). Ultimately, your doctor is right that a standard MRI cannot diagnose it.
I like to combine the checklist with interviews (like DIVA, Diagnostic Interview for ADHD in Adults) and computerized continuous performance tests, like QBTest. Of course, there is also a lot of observation and sometimes even asking humorous questions, like “Do you have The ChairTM at home?”
The ChairTM
Thank you very much for the insight! I have had The Chair for as long as I can remember :)
Yes except the chair is the floor 😭
Aren’t a lot of ADHD (and autism) symptoms trauma responses because of being different , especially the social stuff?
Ya, it could be better. Maybe a compromise would be to go with EEG machines which are less costly and can probably still differentiate fairly well (maybe).
I would be down with that as long as it’s a viable way to diagnose (I don’t know enough off the top of my head about it).
Basically anything other than self-report and the clinician’s opinion would be nice.
I believe that we are diagnosing at an appropriate rate (maybe even still under). I do think that we are getting better at recognizing the signs, having resources, and finding support. But I also think there is an increase not only attributed to better diagnosing. I think that the amount of unstructured screen time before kids are able to develop an independent thought is also creating a myriad of neurological disorders. Not saying that kids with ADHD or anything else aren’t more susceptible, because they definitely are, but I think we’ll start to find that it’s also part of the cause and not just a symptom.
This is a recurring issue. Too many trans people? Liberal agenda spreading!
It’s like they don’t understand causations.
According to the administration at a school I’m familiar with, at least 50% of the 5th grade class has ADHD.
So, not having ADHD is the disorder.
Their source is they made it up. Getting diagnosed is a pain and there is no way 50% of any sizable population has gone through that process, let alone received a diagnosis.
I wish this was made up. It is not.
Of children ages 12-17,
- 14.3% have been diagnosed with ADHD.
- Including 17.9% of all boys. (Source)
This data is national, but as you can imagine, there are some schools with fewer diagnoses, and some like the one I mentioned where it’s the norm.
Is it a wealthy area? That often skews things…
Yes, very.
50%?
The national stats are ~1:10 people have it. 50% is a huge anomaly. Something isn’t right.
Yes, what isn’t right is that it’s an upper class private middle school full of wealthy parents with access to psychiatrists who are financially motivated to provide a fashionable diagnosis.
It’s also a way to get extra time (accommodations) on standardized tests (time and a half or even double time) which further widens the success gap between rich and poor students.
A prescription for Ritalin /Adderall would probably help too
I know a 5 year old that the teachers at her private school complained that they were spending to much time walking to other children instead of doing school work sl the teachers recommended that she be put on medication.
Now apparently she just has horrible night terrors that has her rip at her skin each night but she’s much more calm now… Anyways the teacher ended up hitting her and the 5 year old got expelled for being a nuisance anyways.
Glad to know that because of this one totally believable piece of anecdata, ADHD doesn’t fucking exist.
That wasnt stated. You are not responding to me but your own internal issues with other conversations
Because it is not a disorder if our lives were not a prison, but here we are. Even the rejection issues wouldn’t be there if we were not beaten half to death for being a healthy kid told to sit for 8 hours. Maybe the anxiety and depression all come from that.
Go deny science somewhere else
This…doesn’t make much sense. Teacher struck the child and the child got expelled? Where do the night terrors come in? This sounds very little like ADHD.
The night terrors came after starting the medication.
But also yeah, some real bullshit with the school and the teacher. The only thing on record was that she was obstinent and difficult to deal with. Due to multiple issues with apparently that she was expelled. But afterwards her friends came forward to ask if it was about her being hit that she wasnt in class anymore.
Its honestly bad all around.
ADHD meds absolutely can cause bad dreams in kids, I don’t know about bad enough to “tear at skin”, that’s outside my knowledge area. We had to get a different script for a family member because of scary dreams and racing heart, difficulty sleeping, even after adjusting dosage. It was doing more harm than good. After the med swap it got way, way better.
Yeah, the parents were warned about the night terrors and supposedly hanging outside the room to be there to cuddle her as soon as she starts screaming is enough to subside them and get her back to bed but jeeze that is a horrible symptom to be ok with or even struggle through. Flailing and scratching, if it leaves marks I would call that instastop bad.
I am on the side of med swap but they supposedly like the results of the medication otherwise which I feel is not worth it.
Vanity diagnosis.
At what point does it just become a personality trait, like introversion vs extroversion?
When it stops having negative outcomes on peoples’ lives.
Do we ever stop and think that the negative consequences are from our newly constructed hyper engagement focused society?
And maybe we are blaming the individuals for failing to live up to an impossible standard of productivity at the behest of our abusers?It’s the other way around. ADHD gives people an evolutionary advantage in crisis situations. Surviving through war, famine, and all the worst situations that humanity has survived through.
ADHD isn’t incompatible with modern life because it got too hard. It’s incompatible with modern life because it got too easy.
Hmm. Yeah, we as a society want people who can at tedium repeat a basic task and then not interact with the world much more than that or what is sold to them.
So I wouldn’t say easy as much as easy as it is very difficult for those with it but simplified. And the toys we have created to play with to distract them/us from how basic our life is are incredibly dangerously good at mimicking progress.
That’s such a pessimistic way of looking at it. All the efforts of humanity up until this point have gone towards sparing us from the horrors of what used to be the human condition. Generations and generations of toil and sacrifice so we could be bored at work instead of dying from the plague.
I struggle with ADHD because I am one of the luckiest human beings born so far.
Meh, just cause someone tried to do something nice for us doesnt mean the outcome actually was. We can keep adjusting and trying find what actually is good for people as a whole instead of free of effort.
I don’t know but I don’t think its bad to have the opinion of the recipient as well, and its not like every day was a horror for them anymore than it is for ours. It ebbs and flows but if we made a wrong turn we can do our part to correct it.
To a horrifying degree, work does define the human experience. Removing it isn’t lucky but a part of who we are being removed and I the name of a nameless idea’s of perfection. And I think its realism not pessimism to recognize that.
If you want to completely fucking ignore science and be an ingorant fuck, then yes, you can say those things.
Let’s be clear about this shit.
Because of my undiagnosed ADHD, when I failed fourth grade and the school board tried to get my parents to sign custody of me over to the state to be put in an institution until the STATE decided to release me, when my parents said “Fuck no”, they tried to put me in a private school, but there wasn’t one close enough, so I got to be homeschooled. Which went poorly with my undiagnosed ADHD.
I managed to get to 2nd and 3rd college year level in all subjects except math (where I was at 11.5th grade level) by the time we were in the middle of the tenth grade school year, because I was “blessed” by high IQ - which is fucking useless, except it measures how quickly you can learn, and I managed to pick up enough even with all the struggles.
I got into college, but I failed - three attempts at it.
I had trouble keeping jobs, thanks to my ADHD.
I finally got my ADHD diagnosis at age 30. The therapist who diagnosed me said I was the most severe case he’d ever seen.
It was after that that I tried college a third time, but thanks to IRS stupidity - long story - we got screwed and I lost my scholarships because we couldn’t prove we didn’t owe $14k to the IRS that we didn’t owe.
Meanwhile, I still had trouble keeping jobs, so I had no healthcare. So when I was diagnosed with diabetes, they put me on metformin. I didn’t get any education. I knew to cut out sugar but I didn’t understand carbs. And what do you live on when you’re poor? Carbs. So the metformin alone did hardly anything.
So I lived for ten years with unmanaged diabetes because the metformin was all I could apparently afford. Thanks to the US healthcare system and to my ADHD.
I had a saddle pulmonary embolism and nearly died, and that’s what enabled me to convince my wife to let me look for work nationally. We ended up in Virginia from Florida and I have insurance and have my diabetes under control, but the damage was done. I’ve had six heart attacks and my kidneys failed so I’m now on dialysis. I also had to have a below-knee amputation, so I’m a wheelchair user on top of that because with the fucking anemia I couldn’t walk, so I’ve lost that ability.
Thanks to all of that, I’m 50 and I’m maybe going to see 60 if I’m lucky, but probably not.
Thanks in large part to my ADHD. I strugle every single fucking day with my ADHD and its effects.
So pardon me if I feel a little rage when you suggest that perhaps modern day life is “causing” this shit, because fuck anyone who says that. I’m sick of hearing people deny ADHD. I’m sick of people saying “we ALL are a LITTLE ADHD”. NO YOU ARE FUCKING NOT AND HOW CAN I TELL? BECAUSE IT DOES NOT FUCKING IMPACT YOUR LIFE TO THE SAME DEGREE IT DOES THOSE OF US WITH ADHD. SO HOW ABOUT SIT DOWN AND SHUT THE FUCK UP ABOUT THINGS YOU DON’T KNOW ANY FUCKING THING ABOUT AND STOP DENYING THE SHIT I HAVE DEALT WITH ALL OF MY FUCKING LIFE.
So there. You shitty people want to downvote something? Go ahead and downvote that. Feel better about yourselves, but you can also fuck off and be wrong.
STOP FUCKING TRYING TO DENY ADHD. LOOK AT THE GODDAMN FUCKING SCIENCE. OR SHUT THE FUCK UP AND FUCK OFF.
I didn’t read that comment so uncharitably. I think they’re saying that society is unkind to people with ADHD.
Yeah we don’t exactly have an equal world. Or one that even allows for much deviation without heavy punishment as basically seen by… Well above comment.
Sounds rough. Don’t take it out on me.
I don’t understand why you are being hostile…
Nowhere did they say that ADHD is a made-up condition. What I got from the comment was that a lot of the difficulties with ADHD are due to societal expectations and norms rather than inherent to ADHD itself. Which I’m not saying I agree with or disagree with (it’s probably a mixture of both).
I get being upset at people denying ADHD, especially if it’s something you suffer from and have had negative experiences in your life, but that’s just not what is happening here. I was recently diagnosed with BPD by my psychiatrist and that is to my understanding one of the more unpleasant things to deal with, but projecting the frustration of dealing with a tough mental health condition outwards is not really healthy.
In my experience the majority of people on Lemmy and specifically this community are pretty understanding and I think deserve the benefit of the doubt.
When it causes active problems with life. It’s also worth noting that it’s a brain chemistry change. Where on the sliding scale you pick is, ultimately, a little arbitrary.
I personally suspect modern life isn’t helping. The pressures on children are quite different now. I suspect many children who wouldn’t develop symptomatic ADHD in earlier years now do.
it is still undoubtedly the case, however, that there are plenty that self-diagnose because people on social media make it seem “cool” or to be special in some way, without any basis on actual symptoms. Same happens for a lot of other mental health conditions too.
I was diagnosed in my late 50’s. It was a complicated process because there is another mental health co-morbidity that shares some traits.
After going through the more than a year long process, we are working on dialing in the meds.
One of the challenges for diagnosis is that the attention economy is shortening a lot of people’s attention span, causing many people to feel that they have ADHD, and diverting resources from diagnosing people who actually have ADHD. Not saying that the issue shouldn’t be addressed. The combination of these factors, and the rather long and complicated process of a proper diagnosis is a challenge.
Was it worth it at 50? How it been going?
Worth it 100%. Knowledge is power. Simply knowing why shit was happening in my life, and how to be ready and prevent/mitigate, has changed my life. Meds for ADHD and the other issue have also made my life much, much better.
All of this applies to Autism, as well.
Indeed and I still don’t get my diagnosis because I can loom people in the eyes and am friendly.
(yes, some ‘expert’ actually said that as a paid diagnosis. This is supposed to be first world but hey… Nobody gives a fuck)
Ugh I’m sorry to hear that, it can be incredibly frustrating and discouraging to seek a professional just to have them dismiss and misdiagnose you.
I wish you the best in your journey to get the answers and help you need and deserve. Please keep looking, the right fit has to be out there.
Thanks! I found most of the answers on my own and all situations in the past I was puzzled about my own behavior ist perfectly clear to me now (esp. reactions due to overload situations and masking).
I actually have no direct use for the diagnosis; it would only be the last confirmation, taking a huge load off my shoulders and providing that last bit of rest. However, I myself and my surroundings don’t need the approval to know.
I have ADHD along with many other learning disorders and trust me, ADHD is really being over diagnosed. Children nowadays spend 12 to 15 hours a day nonstop doomscrolling short form content on TikTok and of course that is gonna impact their ability to concentrate and focus.
Many doctors who diagnose those things are old (in my country, for example, it takes DECADES to be allowed to work in the field) and are so old they’re just not prepared for ts so they just flag everyone as ADHD
