Mourning the loss of the person I might have been.
This is a followup to I have ADHD 🌧️. There is a strange phenomenon where the discovery of having ADHD late in life is followed by a grieving period.
When I was first told I had ADHD it was surprising to me. I had heard of ADHD and made some assumptions about it. I thought it would be an add-on diagnosis to the problem I really had. But it turns out that ADHD is quite serious by itself. If it is unmanaged, it can ruin lives. And it certainly has caused a lot of problems in mine.
ADHD carries with it significantly higher risk of substance abuse, incarceration, divorce, suicide, bankruptcy, traffic accidents, and many other bad outcomes. More on this in a later post... if I can concentrate long enough.
I was overjoyed to finally know what was wrong and that there are ways to manage it. But the joy was short-lived.
Fundamentally, ADHD leaves you feeling not good enough for the rest of society. Especially for someone like me who was diagnosed as an adult. I spent years trying my hardest and failing at the most basic tenants of modern life: structure, order, consistency... routine. I could not help but feel that I was missing some vital human quality that everyone else has. It not only affected my behavior in the present, but also my outlook on what is possible.
For example, in early childhood I was overly talkative and frequently got in trouble for it at school. Not only that but it tended to annoy other kids, and they unsurprisingly reacted with negative reinforcement. I became very socially reserved and anxious. I knew that I could not get social situations right. So I had to change how I approached it -- now with a lot of caution and fear. I became more isolated and did not have many friends. The ones I did have, I typically did not spend much time with outside of school obligations. Because hanging with me could be exhausting. The high school years were very hard.
I was told I had intelligence. But I did not feel smart. How is it smart to not do your homework or study for tests? I had some classes that interested me so I was easily able to do assignments and excel in those. This was evidence that I could do well "if I tried". But all my other subjects were a cold war, waged internally and externally with my parents and teachers. As much as I wanted to prove I was the intelligent person others believed I could be, eventually I was choosing easier classes to avoid the conflict.
I had dreams of going to MIT, which to me was the pinnacle of technology schools. But I knew there was no way I could get accepted there, much less complete a degree. For all my gifts I could not even manage high school well, graduating with a middling rank in my class. My 4-year college degree took 9 years, off and on. I finished at a local college and really only with the help of my classmates who had formed a study group.
I am thankful for that local college and my classmates or I might never have finished my degree at all! And in the 9 years it took, I ended up with 3 majors.
To top it off I had an addiction to video games. I could not get enough of them since I got my first Nintendo around age 10. Now I see it for what it is, self-medicating that missing dopamine. But at the time I and my parents thought it was the crippling illness that hindered my life goals.
Goals is the wrong word. I never had goals. The act of making goals is just laying a minefield of disappointment for future me. I think the right word here is potential.
The Me that never was
So at this point I go from being joyful at the discovery I have ADHD to morbid grief. The person that I was growing up never had a chance. Their own brain was fighting them tooth and nail. And that traditional future where they realized their potential is gone forever. It wounded me deeply, like the loss of a twin brother. I spent a day crying over it.
It would be easy to reach for blame here. I mean it is always the parent's fault right? Shouldn't they have seen it? Or the teachers? Well not really, no. Considering the knowledge of ADHD was not widespread back then and my brain lives to adapt (and trying to appear "normal"), it would have been hard for them to see it. When I look at how bad outcomes can be for unmanaged ADHD, I think my parents did a great job by giving me boundaries and a compass to keep me away from most of them.
The Me that is
The good (?) thing about ADHD is that I lose interest in things, including grief, quickly. (Plus I didn't actually lose someone.) I'm sure it will come back up now and again (like it did while writing this post). But there is no use playing the What If game. Also taking stock of today, I am doing well. Not sure if y'all heard but experienced programmers make a decent living. And I have managed to form meaningful relationships and keep them, by the grace of God.
So the right question is what to do now.
Well you are reading it. I am sharing my story and raising awareness. A lot of people still think ADHD (and mental health in general) is like having brown hair, not a big deal. Or like the Easter Bunny, not real. Or like the opioid crisis, a pharma conspiracy. Or like spoiled kids, a parental problem. It is none of those things. If unmanaged it can devastate lives, not just of those who have it. It is torturous to watch a loved one struggle and self-destruct!
So my call to action is to educate yourself. Not every problem is going to turn out to be ADHD. But if you've done everything you know to do and still just "don't feel right" or "can't do right" talk to someone who has the training and tools to help you figure it out. And if you have kids who are struggling in that way, get them to the right people. Why waste another moment?
Managed ADHD is a gift
I forgot to add this part initially.
From what I have researched many people with managed ADHD (through medication or developing skills or both) are glad to have it. We tend to have certain characteristics that make us really good at specific and rare things that society and businesses need. Even though mine is not managed to the degree I want, I know that I bring a unique x-factor to our team that helps it succeed.
I'm left to wonder whether thinking differently is intrinsically a disorder or whether modern society just hasn't got around to making space for us yet.
Top comments (6)
Wow, I feel what you are saying. I tried to go back for my master's degree. I believe you can do it, but you will have to work 10x harder than the next person because of having to fight your own brain. It does not seem fair. At least you are not alone. Lots of us out there. I dunno how things work in Japan, but finding a root cause diagnosis might entitle you to accommodations in universities. These are exactly for people whose situation has made it extra difficult for them.
My understanding is that diagnosing an adult can be challenging because we have layers of adaptation. For example, I developed social anxiety I think because my default mode (vomiting words indiscriminately) drives people away. Depression too because I consistently fail to meet basic expectations. But anxiety and depression probably aren't the core issue. (Although still responses I'll have to unlearn.) But that's me. For some people those are the root cause or something other than ADHD. Working with a professional can be a big help to figuring it out.
I hadn't thought far enough ahead about being emotionally dependent on medication. I can see that happening and being burdensome. I think a major key for me is finding a position that plays to my strengths and limits the things that my brain naturally fights. Then the medicine won't feel as required for everyday life. But we will see. I am still trying to find that position. I believe it is really common for non-typicals to be entrepreneurs to create that job. Not sure that is for me though. What about you?
I find myself being very resistant to using apps. I think it is because whenever I've tried to use assistive tools, after a while I just stop using them. They become oppressive to me rather than supportive. And a cycle of self-loathing ensues. To that point, I have pared down the tools in my life to where I only use as-needed tools and just for their core functionality. I customize my desktop and editors as little as possible to still be suitable for the task, for example.
Something I have found helpful when I am doing support work is a written log. This helps make up for the fact that my working memory is limited. But when I am coding I just use code comments to augment working memory instead. I have always thought my coding process was probably strange. It's like a shotgun blast of bits and pieces that I code and then wire together at the end.
I cannot manage to make (or accept from others) personal TODO lists. For me these provide negative pressure to perform the tasks that make them impossible to focus on. Although when someone asks for in-person help, I cannot help but do so enthusiastically. Friends and family ask me to fix their computers and I tell them plainly. "If you give me this computer to work on in my own time, it will never get done. If you invite me over or sit with me while I work on it, I can take care of it on the spot." (I never charge for it.)
I believe I am going to need medication for times when life demands more structure.
Thank you so much for sharing your experiences. ❤️ It helps me. Much care and blessings to you.
I wanted to offer one more thing. There is a book called Delivered from Distraction. It was recommended by my therapist and I just started reading it today. Here is an excerpt, starting with an example conversation.
The patient goes on to talk about how alcohol, marijuana, exercise, sex, etc help temporarily but are not sustainable. I haven't read much past there yet. The point being that this book seems to "get" me. Maybe it will get you too.
How interested would you be in interpretations of the biology of ADHD, and ways to ameliorate its effects based on research, even those that most would consider politically incorrect?
I have a feeling this conversation would involve the power flower. (Yes, I had to lookup a funny synonym.)
I intend to ask in a future post how people have self-medicated their ADHD. My guess is that most people who have it have self-medicated in some way. Our brains crave that missing dopamine and there are a lot of different ways to get it.