Inattentive ADD/ADHD in women in later life

[Jazzcafecoffee]

Over the last few months I have been looking at more an more articles/videos/personal accounts etc of Inattentive ADD in women and am amazed and perplexed that I can relate to it so much.
I am nearly 50 and have had mental health and other related issues all of my life, how have I reached this age without knowing this this could be me? Why has no mental health practitioner (I have seen many) not connected the dots?
I have never connected my lifelong issues to ADHD/ADD as my perception of this condition has been of the classic primary school aged male child bouncing off the walls, disrupting classes and being easily distracted. However, I now learn this is not the case for so many people with neurodiverse conditions.
Does anyone here have a diagnosis of this? What age were you when you were diagnosed and has that diagnosis changed your life in anyway?
I fear my gp won’t take me seriously, they have had me down as an anxiety sufferer for many years and that seems to be their answer to anything I go to them for! But I have always felt different, somehow, it has never felt like standard anxiety, there are too many layers, too many other things.
I now see it may have always been ADD.
I am aware of Right To Chose but see that it could mean a lengthy wait.
I don’t know if I could afford to pay privately to see a psychiatrist, are they very expensive? Can a diagnosis only be given by a psychiatrist?

I don’t have much time to reply right now. I just wanted to say that j have had YEARS of therapy and I even trained to be a freaking therapist and not once did anyone spot that I have adhd.

I was diagnosed last autumn and I’m still processing it etc but it’s not a surprise tk me that no one picked up on it. There isn’t enough awareness in mental health professionals IMO. Especially how it presents in women.

Rainbow89 thank you. I have been in and out of therapy for years too, no one ever mentioned it.

I read that woman are good at covering the ‘symptoms’ up and learning to cope and I think that’s what I’ve been doing all the years.

I was diagnosed with ADHD in my 50s and as you say it all makes sense. In my case I have children diagnosed with it, the classic naughty boy and then much later a quiet girl.

You can only get a diagnosis from a psychiatrist who is also the only person who can prescribe the meds. I was lucky in that my GP failed to diagnosed my cancer so they bent over backwards with the referral to the NHS ADHD service.

I rang up my GP yesterday about this. I'm 99% sure I have ADHD.

I only realised as my son is showing signs ( school contacted me about this and want an assessment for him ) and reading it sounded so much like me as a child, then reading about ADHD as an adult female I was like wow. This is me.

I've had depression, anxiety, anorexia, how has nobody noticed?

I havnt had a diagnosis yet but I'm pretty sure that I do have it and I can't bloody wait to get some medicine and just be normal for once in my life. I'm 30 years old. 30! 25 years of not feeling okay, it's not okay is it

Morw and morw women are getting diagnoses with ADHD these days so hopefully our future children wont have this problem

There's a neurodiverse mumsnetters board now. It's really good x

OberthursGrizzledSkipper Bajezzeuz its is how I stumbled upon this as a possibility for my issues, I believe that my dd may have it so started researching and it was a sudden light bulb moment.
I’ve had issues from very early childhood and only now at 49 this seems to be the one thing which completely resonates with me.
After years of anxiety, depression, eating disorders, low self esteem and always feeling ‘different’ from family and friends and no one even near to suggesting it.

Thanks felulageller

I was diagnosed at 34 (I'm 35). Textbook inattentive ADHD. So textbook that my psychiatrist was shocked no one had ever noticed before. I went through loads of assessments (dyslexia, dyspraxia, dyscalculia, hearing tests etc.) when I was a child and nothing. I also had terrible pre-natal anxiety and depression and was under the care of the peri-natal psyciatrist and even she didn't spot it.

Figured it out myself and had a private consultation with a specialist. I was terrified of being dismissed, but apparently she never had any doubt.

I'm on medication now and it's been transformative.

My experience is that if they think you have ADHD they will want to medicate you. So only go down the diagnosis route if medication is something you want.

allfurcoatnoknickers just amazing that no one picked it up.
Obira I really can’t answer that right now as this is all new to me tbh. I have felt lost and ‘not right’ all my life so if I do indeed have add/adhd and medication could make me understand how I function in this world then yes but if it will make me feel worse then no. I really don’t know.

Medication should be offered with a diagnosis of adhd but I still think it’s worth pursuing a diagnosis even if you aren’t interested in medication.

I was diagnosed last year at 57 via the Right to Choose route. For me it was a huge relief and made sense of how I can be so capable and simultaneously so disorganised, have such a strong sense of responsibility, but let people down so much.

I am supposedly on a waiting list to start medication, but there seem to be various hold ups and it hasn’t happened yet. However, I took early retirement last year, and find that without the pressure of work, I can cope with the pressure of life, so maybe I don’t need the meds after all.

I retired because I couldn’t keep up with work…. I spent so much of my time feeling overwhelmed, getting depressed, looking forward to the next holiday, flying by the seat of my pants. Perpetual sense of failure, despite being generally highly regarded.

It’s such a relief that now my time is my own. So I can indulge my many, many interests…. and because there is space, I can keep on top of housework and life admin, at least enough that I don’t live in a complete mess the whole time.

I was diagnosed at 35. you can pay around 500 for an assessment (I used SEIK) .. its more if you want to be medicated and will end up around £1k before you can be passed back to the NHS.

It's actually really bloody sad isn't it?

So many of us just struggling through life - diagnosed with this, that and the next thing when all along it's ADHD.

It's strange that this is just such a big area of failure for health professionals.

@Myadhdusername

It's actually really bloody sad isn't it?

So many of us just struggling through life - diagnosed with this, that and the next thing when all along it's ADHD.

It's strange that this is just such a big area of failure for health professionals.

Totallly agree. And I’m sure I read some research to suggest that it actually impacts women more in terms of affecting their life and how they feel about themselves.

@Rainbows89 without sounding sexist even just thinking of 'women's work' and how all difficult all of that stuff is for us ... would a man suffer as much? I don't think so.

Just a word of warning, I thought I had adhd for years, turns out it it was dissociation due to trauma. I would be on auto-pilot a lot, procrastinating a lot, easily stressed out by mundane tasks, hyper focused on things that interest me. So the symptoms are very similar.

I would seek diagnosis or therapy, if I were you,

Although, I have found some of the techniques for dealing with adhd helpful because of the overlap.

[quote Myadhdusername]**@Rainbows89* without sounding sexist even just thinking of 'women's work' and how all difficult all of that stuff is for us ... would* a man suffer as much? I don't think so. [/quote]
Exactly!

It's certainly worth asking for a referral and speaking to them. Remember that a lot of symptoms have crossovers such as dyspraxia or autism and these also need to be considered. ADHD awareness seems to be everywhere at the moment and some people are leaping onto it as the answer to all their problems when another diagnosis may be more accurate. Some seem to see it as a quirky 'fun' diagnosis when the reality can be utter hell.

I was diagnosed with combined type in my forties. If I was born today I would have been diagnosed as a child. They looked into several conditions when I was younger but I didn't quite fit them and ADHD was just not on the radar then.

Meds have been transformative for me. I can trust my brain again and my anxiety is greatly reduced. My life is so much better now.

Diagnosis for me meant a lot less shame and more self acceptance.

I tried medication but I don't like stimulants and didn't go back to pursue non stimulants. I found other strategies though.

I definitely would like to speak to a professional about it. Whether it’s actually add/adhd, an anxiety disorder or maybe I am somewhere on the spectrum?
I just know that I have never felt ‘right’, that every day tasks can completely overwhelm me yet are simple and easy to others, I can’t tolerate any kind of stress, my brain shuts down, that my house is full of half read books because I can’t concentrate for long and bore quickly, that I can’t even get a decent job because the minute they start talking to me at an interview my mind drifts off somewhere else and I must come across as uninterested even though I’d be great at the job, I have never been able to ‘better’ myself because I can’t concentrate enough to study, my brain won’t take it in.
I can’t go to big cities, concerts, crowded venues etc because noise, bright lights and smells overwhelm me.
As a child I had huge obsessions/ocd, was so hyper-talkative that I once talked non-stop on a 13 hour car journey and drove my parents insane, they had to drug me with Phenergan every night as I wouldn’t sleep.
I have always been called an air-head and lazy but it’s not intentional, it feels like it’s just something in me that I just can not help.
I feel a diagnosis (whatever that may be) would help me come to a place of peace, I feel I have always had an inner battle with myself and have never understood why I am not like ‘normal’ people.

I know this is azombie thread and should not be reived but I am in tears reading these posts.

As some of you, I am in my early 50s and always fels something was 'wrong' with me, but in the last fews years this got worse, coinciding with menapause.
Only recently did I realise that the way my brain 'works' during conversations was unusual and that people cannot really follow my train of thought, or that my issues with time management are not 'normal'. I simply thought that I was absent-minded and disorganised and I blamed myself.
I procrastinate and cannot concentrate, and find it almost impossible to finish tasks both at work and at home. I get very easily overwhelmed by situations that most people deal with no issues, I feel incapable of functioning normally.

The weird thing is that I have brief moments of 'clarity' when I do excell, and feel happy about myself and my achievement, but they are not frequent. Most of the time my anxiety and self-doubt are through the roof, it's unbereable.