ABCs of ADHD

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(Source: me on twitter)

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See, the funniest thing is that I actually have significantly more spoons than I did a handful of years ago. But because I only got diagnosed at 20, I have two decades of inattentive power saving habits.

I have that thing where we feel we can only do one thing at a time. The magical one thing that we will be interested in that will motivate us through it all.

I don't quite know where you got the 20% figure from, and I couldn't find anything specific for ASPD.

I did find figure online saying that conduct disorder, which is apparantly a precursor to ASPD as children can't be diagnosed with ASPD, is highly correlated with ADHD, with 25 to 50% of children with CD also having ADHD.

And that half or so kids with CD growing up to have ASPD so perhaps the 20% value makes sense.

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ASPD shares a lot of common symptoms with ADHD like feeling bored, impulsivity, emotional issues and so on, so experiencing anger strongly doesn't necessarily means you have ASPD.

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And having ASPD doesn't automatically mean you are a bad person.

ASPD means you can struggle to relate to someone or struggle to understand/ empathize with others' emotions, which mixed with the impulsivity can lead to hurting others.

But having ASPD doesnt mean you will definitely go out and hurt others.

And hell, I'd say there's a lot more people who don't have ASPD and don't struggle relating to others, yet still hurt others.

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Guys, anything else to add?

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I've been on Tumblr in some capacity for nearly 15 years now so I've seen a lot of people called cringe for their harmless interests.

The sheer toxicity of the sentence hit me only after fully typing it out, oof.

I know I hid a lot of my interests to avoid being called cringe or weird. And they were just like, liking Yu-Gi-Oh and Pokémon as a teen.

Oh, and according to Dr Russell Barkley, the developmental lag is around 3 years (rule of thumb). This is naturally more pronounced when the ADHDer is a child/ teen.

Emotional regulation is an executive function.

Executive functioning skills aren't fully present at birth, they develop as we grow up. So children learn to manage their emotions from their care givers.

This isn't unique to ND folks; you can see how bad some NTs are at regulating their emotions.

The prefrontal cortex (in the front part of our brains) manages executive functions. ADHD is a neurodevelopmental disorder that affects the prefrontal cortex.

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As you said, getting overwhelmed easily and having breakdowns is a thing common with emotional dysregulation.

Basically, we can struggle to notice, understand and manage our emotions.

This can result in mood swings, getting overwhelmed, extreme outbursts, and so on.

We struggle to feel and deal. I found my emotions very painful, so I avoided them for years, as maladaptive coping. I didn't know how else to deal.

This would often result in me bursting into tears when my emotions overflowed.

Here's the thing..

The concept of laziness is bullshit. As a whole, but let me focus on adhders (pun unintended).

What is laziness? "Unwilling to do work".

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ADHDers (and other ND/ chronically ill folks) are often called lazy cause NTs see us as 'unwilling' to do work. A personal choice.

They are saying we don't care enough to do something.

But that's rarely the case.

Why would we not want to improve our lives? Who WANTS to struggle?

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The ADHD diagnosis process is bullshit, especially if you are afab. The diagnostic checklists focus on grades, and hyperactvity mostly.

Inattentive and internally hyperactive symptoms can be near identical to anxiety and depression. In fact, I was initially diagnosed with depression and anxiety.

And if you managed to do well in school, which ADHDers can do for a variety of reasons, well, you're kinda dismissed.

It took my sisters years to get a diagnosis. The only who took her seriously was a female psychiatrist. And mind, this was after years of counselling, and being on antidepressants and anti anxiety meds for years, and still struggling.

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So now back to the initial point.. is it laziness?

Well, you don't seem unwilling, but rather unable.

If you never cared enough to try, ie, unwilling, you wouldn't be feeling discouraged.

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Final point is this: if you relate to ADHD symptoms, you are obviously struggling.

Even if it's not ADHD, it doesn't mean it's nothing.

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ADHDers are more likely to face addiction issues than non ADHDers.

For example, ADHDers are much likelier to start smoking from a younger age and have harder time quitting.

Meds have been shown to help with this yes. I found it much easier to quit caffeine and nicotine when on meds.

Personally, it helped me manage my gaming and internet addiction.

Treatment can become more complicated if the ADHDer has co-occuring substance abuse issue.

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(source: me on twitter)

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Twitter doesn't leave much room for nuance but lemme add that the percentages don't necessarily matter hugely (on an individual basis I mean; the percentages are averaged from multiple sources).

The point of this thread was that we are frequently struggling due to more than just the ADHD.

And everyone's experiences and symptoms can be especially different.

(And if anyone if wondering about the autism statistic, I wasn't very clear.