What I mean is that I have ADHD, I got diagnosed this summer, but sometimes I feel like I don't have ADHD in the right way. I struggl with ADHD a lot, and it really affects me, but for some reason I feel like I'm using it as an excuse or faking my symptoms. Even though I know I'm not?

ADHD affects me very negatively and it makes being in college way, way harder for me than other people. But hyperactivity is less of a symptom for me than other ADHDers (but still a thing), so i feel like im faking my condition.

Like, I have an official, medical diagnosis. Nobody thinks I'm playing up or faking my symptoms. So then why the hell do I get like this?

Also I very likely have autism but diagnosis is very expensive so that's another issue

do any neurodivergence havers also have the issue of trying to balk for like a good few turns from a conversation where you tried to bring up a point or suggest an alternative to something but you misread the room and it turns into what I can only perceive as the other person taking what you thought was an off-hand idea that you have no real attachment to and turning it into their own personal mission to, I honestly can’t tell why so I'll just say how it looks to me, submit to their way of thinking? Maybe they want to change my perspective? Maybe they want to win in the marketplace of ideas?

Anyways, then you’re like stuck in a dialogue loop where you keep saying “I literally have zero real attachment to this idea and I brought it up for the sake of conversation” and they scold me for deigning to bring the other idea up and we will not stop talking about this until I physically exit the room or grovel at their feet in tears begging for forgiveness for my dastardly nonsequitur? Or something else that I genuinely don’t understand? Am I missing something? It feels like a dominance routine from my perspective and it’s happened to me enough times that I think I’m just misunderstanding something?

I thought it was a neurosis I picked up from my conflict-avoidant behaviors but my sister is more confrontational than me and she also has this issue sometimes so I’m wondering if it’s an ADHD thing. Had a convo yesterday with a friend of mine that was like this and I genuinely felt like shit afterwards, it's one of the instances where I genuinely don't know how to amicably resolve it, I'm trying to be pliant and flexible here, please let me exit this conversation naturally I don't want to make this an issue I am trying to communicate that please let me leave please please please

This has happened to me dozens of times and every time it feels like the realization of a nightmare. I’m so genuinely actually sorry for attempting to help you by wantonly-suggesting alternative perspectives to cover what I perceive to be unnoticed angles in what you are saying hoping that maybe it could be rolled into a consensus point that might be helpful, I didn’t think this was a venting/rhetorical discussion, If it was I missed those cues, it will not happen again to you now that I know you do not gel with it, I’m sorry, I’m Harrier DuBois the sorry cop, this is my sorry song, please dismiss me from this conversation so I don’t have to literally walk away, I don’t want to leave lingering resentment for something I genuinely thought was innocuous

you don't have to describe them in detail with dates, not trying to get you to doxx yourself

but it's kind of A Thing with neurodivergent folks to have tried a lot of different jobs, and I'm curious about everybody's count

I think I'm up to 21 that I've filed taxes for, which doesn't seem that extreme for 42, except when you consider that I've been unemployed most of my son's 17 years of life because I couldn't handle parenting and that level of outside obligations, so most of those happened before I was 25 – so 20ish jobs between 15-25

how bout you, how many things have you tried?

Just kinda wondering if any other comrades have this specific thing.

I started hair pulling when I was like 8 or 9 and ended up giving myself a bald spot on my crown for a couple months. My parents noticed and scolded me, no other intervention.

Thankfully, I was able to restrain myself enough to prevent it showing on my scalp. To this day I continue on abnormally dark or coarse hairs, and now that I'm finally getting some grays it is so hard to resist spending and hour or two in the mirror getting them all.

I know this probably sounds weird or gross to most people, I've never been diagnosed with any sort of mental disorder so talking about it is a little weird to me.

I know it has overlap with OCD, and I've had other slight OCD symptoms.

I would LOVE to be able to branch out, but as much as I’ve tried in my almost 30 years, it always ends as nothing but a wet fart. Most of the people who I do vibe with (and who tolerate me) exist in the form of potential romantic interests and it just doesn’t work out. I can’t find that “line” of platonicness and romance. From that perspective then, I guess it makes sense why my friendships/commections ceased formation in my adolescence. Doesn’t make it suck any less though lolololol

cross-posted from: https://hexbear.net/post/3796123

What do your weekly meals look like for you and your fam? I generally enjoy cooking, what I don't enjoy is the negotiations that come with cooking, and with kids, it's even worse. I'm also the kind of person that could eat the same 5 dishes for a year without much fuss or question. That's the ADHD lodged in my brain for you.

The negotiation, or even the anticipation of negotiations, makes me agitated. If I could, I'd be a food dictator, but that's not how living with people works. It's annoying enough to me that I often push it to the back of my mind and just "figure it out" on the fly. That's not conducive to making good choices, though, only convenient choices.

If I'm going to do most of the cooking, I'll want a schedule of meals, so I can both plan, anticipate, and head-off any objections. I struggle with being assertive on this point, and I'm told often, "We don't need to do that much planning." Which, as someone with ADHD into my late 30s, I know is not true, and I do need that much planning if not more. Structure is something I need, and the kids at this age obviously thrive off structure as well.

So anyway, how do you tackle this? I need to get this sorted out for myself, but also for my kiddos. Kiddo 1 just had an annual checkup and is low on iron, and is growing increasingly picky about food. Kiddo 2 is still in that "I'll try anything in front of me." phase, and getting this sorted out now hopefully means I can avoid the pickiness down the line.

I'm going to cross post this in !neurodiverse@hexbear.net & !food@hexbear.net as I think it has some clear overlap.

That’s like the one of the only ways I’ve managed to meet people (THROUGHOUT MY ENTIRE LIFE) and it sucks so so fucking much because finding someone who is reciprocative to that type of shit is so damn hard-especially in the era of instagram reels and TikTok

Is there a way to learn to socialize “normally” I’ve learned that I’m going to be very lonely if I don’t figure out how especially with my current career (god this just reminds me of how soulless my current job is)

I’m really starting to learn how my brain chemistry almost lines up with my politics (as in how I am foolishly passionate about how I would prefer everyone be forced to live with the same amount of resources and be forced to understand how it’s not about the community.

But yeah sometimes that shit comes out at inopportune times and I have legit seen it make my friends lose their jobs

But yes this still explains why I need to learn better acceptable small talk and how to approach bringing up that small talk without seemingly coming out of nowhere

I got a respiratory infection and got prescribed Prednisone to fight it. The Prednisone has been helping, but has made my symptoms of schizophrenia a lot worse, including dangerous mood swings and tweaky paranoia. Does anybody have any suggestions for dealing this this?

so horrifically in touch with everything I'm bad at, every way I just do not fit what other people expect

tell me you know that feel, please

SOMETIMES an autistic elder statesman like myself might have like, gone through a hypersexual phase and then chilled out. Which is sort of me, but also sort of not.

Also this: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DA8xUiNufSQ/

Something like those Japanese jackoff boxes that are in crowded spaces but instead it's a soundproof box with climate control and dimmable lights for calming the fuck down.

I'm at a theme park with my kids today and it's very not chill.

with the right (small-ish usually) dose, set, and setting it really is a mental performance enhancing drug. increased social performance, introspection, novel ideas, even some memory recall.

does this say something about my neurotype?

With my first day with real energy in awhile being coupled with two temper meltdowns, (theres been a recent med change I should mention, but every one we have seems to just vacciltate between these two states). I feel like Im just... Im either a destructive ragebeast OR a useless sleepy flop who cant do literally anything.

I really dont want to live. I really dont want t fucking live. I'm so tired of this constant fucking struggle. I cant just have a good fucking day. I'll never accomplish anything and Ill keep hurting people and i just. Im so fucking exuasted (not literally because i still have energy, just tired of this gbullshit)

generic Adderall is back in stock at my pharmacy 🎉 was really starting to worry they weren't going to get more until next calendar year or whenever the annual quotas reset or whatever, but I got both 30 mg xr for me and 20 mg xr for my son

so, check yours, it might be back for you, too

also, the one tech at my pharmacy that has never once been anything but barely civil with me was finally nice to me this week, which has given me another little data point that affirms my impression that pharmacy staff treats me better after having bought the name brand.

have you had that experience?

the same thing happened at two other chains: there would always be a couple people on staff who were a little gruff with me in a way they weren't with other people in line ahead of me, until the day I bought name brand from them.

(a third place treated me so poorly after they pulled my info up in the computer the very first time I went that I cried on the way home and never went back. )

my suspicion is that they're generally skeptical of anyone getting stimulants, but if I'm "willing" to pay a couple hundred per prescription per month for it, then I become less sketchy because obviously I and my kid "really need it."

it's possible that they just suddenly see me as pitiable; I'm sure my voice and face change drastically in the seconds after they tell me the generic isn't available.

or maybe I seem less likely to sell it if I can "afford" hundreds of dollars for the name brand.

nevermind the actual situation, which is that I'm only able to "afford" it or "willing" to pay that because I can beg my family for help, and there are plenty of people (who need it to have any executive function just as much as my kid and I do!) who just Do Not Have That Option.

when this happens to me, it makes me wonder how they treated everyone who couldn't afford the name brand. are they even more suspicious of them now?

I don't have a better theory for their line of thinking, and surprise surprise, the logic doesn't even hold up, imo. I could even see someone being more tempted to sell a couple day-off doses to recoup some of those hundreds they spent on the name brand – you do occasionally need to eat, after all.

thank you, Puritanical Culture and War on Drugs

I am currently re-researching ADHD management (for gods know what time already) after wasting the entirety of the past two days.

Wherever I go, I only see people talking about medication. How good it is, how to approach it, what to expect from it, how it was impossible before meds, how to treat them, etc.

I cannot obtain meds. Stimulants are illegal in my country. Strattera isn't, but I am afraid that I will not be able to pursue diagnosis for reasons I am not going to share here. Please do not tell me how good meds are - there is nothing I can do to have them.

I tried organising my thoughts, having a schedule, and so on (org mode in emacs), but I have forgotten about it, every single time I tried it. I have set up a periodic notification to remind me of it, I quickly started ignoring that.

What can I do to make it better? How can I make sure that I will not just forget to do the things that make it better? How can I make sure that I will not outright ignore the things that help me?

If I have to go through and delete or check off each of the 20 preset tasks one by one I am uninstalling your app

My org has like 8 events on the calendar for this upcoming week and I'll need to attend at least 2-3. The first one isn't until tomorrow but seeing those updates just drained me of energy and now all I want to do is lay down and tune out the world.

so i've been in therapy for a couple years and it's been working sort of. like i've gotten better at processing and understanding my shit. so instead of being lost in a forest, i feel like i'm following a trail in the forest.

anyway the only problem was that while i was dealing with all that internal turmoil, i wasn't able to prevent physical symptoms. which had gotten very severe in the past few months. the palpitations, fidgeting and bad sleep were one part. but more frustrating was my increasing inability to just do things. i just wanted to be left alone and not leave my room and not see anyone. but i've done isolation before and really really did not want to go down that path again. so i discussed it with my therapist and visited a psych today, idk what i expected but Doc basically said your anxiety is a lot and there is way too much noise in your head. and prescribed me Fluoxetine and Propranolol daily. and Trazodone only on nights i'm struggling with sleep. but they said it's apparent i'm doing work at therapy because i'm connecting things very well, but i need meds to support my current inner work because otherwise it's very hard on me.

i was just kinda unprepared i guess so i told the Doc i'll think about it. sorry for the long ass text but i'd love any advice really. is there any point in getting a second opinion from someone else? or is this fairly normal and i should take the meds? i took propranolol a few years back for migraines so i know that's fairly low-risk, but idk about Fluoxetine (never took SSRIs) and i'm probably gonna skip the Trazodone.

the past few months have been deeply miserable. panic attacks, general tingly anxiety and manic depressive episodes. i have not felt ok for a while. waiting on an appointment with the doc in two weeks to get medicated again but i would like to scoop out my brain with one of those funky ball scoops. that would help i think.

i swear this is making me feel sick. in lieu of brain scooping, what are some coping mechanisms that help you that are not drugs (weed makes it worse and i do NOT wish for another ketamine habit)

In a game I was recently playing, the chat lobby had someone that claimed to be a "BT," or "Behavioral Tech." He said that he loved his job because he saw working with autistic kids like "programming robots" then clarified "prompting AI."

I was disgusted enough that I said it'd be great if someone took a screenshot and sent it to their boss. The "BT" then said "lol my boss could (sic) care less, he hates the (I don't want to repeat the slur here so I won't) anyway."

I don't know what else to say but I feel horrible for the kids that are being seen as treat printers or robots to be programmed.

It is recommended that you use a VPN when you access TankieTube to protect your anonymity because your IP may be accessible to others while using the site

It's happening!! There is now a TankieTube channel that has started up which is dedicated to posting audiobooks for people who are neurodivergent.

This book is a real favourite with neurodivergent folks, especially if you struggle with energy, motivation, and executive dysfunction. The title says it all.

The book is quite short and it's divided up into succinct chapters so you don't have to dedicate hours upon hours to slog through it, especially if you happen to be struggling with finding enough time and energy to manage the basics.

Here's a summary of the book from the publisher:

When you are neurodivergent, have undiagnosed ADHD or are struggling with your mental or physical health, keeping on top of the laundry pile and tackling dishes in the sink can feel like climbing a mountain. But it doesn’t have to be that way.

Licensed therapist KC Davis has been there. Having relearnt the basics of self-care after an adult diagnosis of ADHD, she is here to revolutionise the way you look after your home and your mind. This gentle guide to staying afloat when life is tough shares practical strategies to create a functional home, make your space work for you rather than against you, and treat yourself with more compassion and kindness.

KC’s philosophy: good enough is perfect. With her help, your home will feel like a sanctuary again.

KC Davis appears on social media here and there so if you want more advice from her then it's worth checking to see if she has an account on your platforms of choice. Supporting her in this way will help her reach a broader audience so even if you can't afford to support her work by purchasing it yourself, you can still contribute something back by helping to raise her profile in the media by following her if you find her advice helpful.

Note that as of posting this audiobook is still in the TankieTube transcription queue so if you encounter any bugs or glitches then give it a while and try coming back to it a bit later
(It is working on my end but ymmv)

Lately I’ve just had a fucking hair trigger on crying and if I ever do anything slightly wrong or upset my partner I feel such overwhelming guilt and start crying and then my partner feels worse for upsetting me and then I feel even worse.

Like, this morning we were having a totally normal conversation, but then I said something rude that I didn’t process correctly, she was hurt, and then instead of being normal about it I had a fucking breakdown. Which sucks for me and is really not fair to her.

If I mess up cooking food or planning an afternoon I become inconsolable. Especially if it was for my partner, like if I can’t do things right for her what is even the point. I think I’ve cried more days in the last two weeks than I haven’t.

Apparently it is not normal to constantly worry about failing to notice incremental shifts in one's moral principles such that one arrives at a repugnant perspective without realizing it

A heavily internalized OCD (I know there's "pure O" but there's discourse online about how that's a misleading term) seems to fit a lot of my behaviors. I have pretty frequent intrusive thoughts, heavily developed mental regimens I use to weather and regulate them, and then intrusive thoughts and doubts about having intrusive thoughts and doubts, which feels like it shouldn't be allowed.

Anybody else have stuff like this???