It Was ADHD All Along

I’m 32, female, from New Zealand and was recently diagnosed with ADHD. I have three kids and my oldest (my son) was diagnosed probably about 4 years ago. At the time he was diagnosed his specialist lady (forget her title) said when a child is diagnosed, usually one or both the parents will have it too. At the time, I thought of his dad, who I’m no longer with.

About three years earlier, after the birth of my second child, I was first told I was depressed and was given antidepressants. Later when they didn’t help I went to a mental health clinic thing and was diagnosed with Bipolar. I don’t even know which type but I knew it was wrong. They gave me meds. Didn’t help but made me sleepy and zombie-like all the time. I researched it and it made no sense, but when researching that I found BPD and convinced myself it was that, because it sounded close to what I experienced. Not exact but close enough, so what else would it be, right? My next appointment I told them they were wrong and I didn’t have bipolar but bpd. He said ‘I believe you’ and I was given more meds. Didn’t help. I stopped taking them when I fell pregnant again and I never went back on any medication for my mental health. I’ve been generally stable in my mental health anyway, just the lows and big lows (but over soon) and my mood can change very quickly.

Over the years I did more research in order to better understand ADHD and my kid and wouldn’t you know, I could relate to a lot of this stuff. Particularly the way it manifests in girls and women. Naturally I started to have suspicions but I kept it to myself and kept researching.

Over the past couple of years I became pretty convinced I had ADHD but I felt like a total imposter telling people about it at first. This year I started actually discussing the possibility with people. I wanted to get diagnosed but at the moment general practitioners aren’t referring people unless they are in crisis (and you can’t just say you’re in crisis when you have children). Luckily, I came into a bit of money and was able to go private.

I couldn’t see a psychiatrist due to them being so overloaded at the moment, especially the ones that specialise in adult ADHD. I guess so many people are realising that it fits them and going for assessment. So they had me see a psychologist, who can diagnose but can’t prescribe medication.

My first appointment was her verbally asking me the questions on three different scales/tests and me not being able to do yes or no answers because context is important. I didn’t get a diagnosis that day, because she had to score my tests.

Days later she told me she needed to speak to either my partner or one of my parents to see more about what I was like. My partner, despite being diagnosed as a kid doesn’t really believe how ADHD impacts people and my dad wasn’t in my life much so my mum it was. We did an hour long zoom call where she asked mum questions about me as a child and now and then I waited. And waited… she told me I needed to fill out one more scale that someone else would be emailing me. I didn’t get it but figured they were busy. A week later after obsessively checking my inbox I finally told my psychologist I hadn’t received it and she said it was sent a week prior… I hadn’t received it. So they sent it again, I filled it out, and about a week later she emailed me to tell me my assessments were all in line with a diagnosis of ADHD. So now, I just have to see a psychiatrist when one is available so they can look into medication options with me.