Do I have adult ADHD? Casual musing

[Lentilweaver]

I am in my 50s, so I grew up when nobody knew what it was. But a couple of friends who do have ADHD have told me they think I have it! I am really wary of the way every behaviour is pathologised these days, so I am not inclined to believe them. But just listing why they think I have it:

I am a very, very high energy person. I have actually become more energetic in my 50s, as I think often that life is too short, so I want to do everything now while I am healthy. I don't do wild parties, but I am always going to exhibitions, gigs, theatre, anything that is happening. This is in contrast to some ( most) others this age.
I talk a lot, very fast, and possibly too much.
I walk a lot and will always walk everywhere if I can rather than drive or take the Tube ( in London zone 3 so this is easy)
Impatient
I am very peoply and love meeting new people of all ages. I am the organiser in my friends circle.
I get bored very easily and am constantly seeking a dopamine rush: in relatively harmless ways like reading everything I can get my hands on, or taking a lot of weekend trips, or constantly joining new Meetup groups, or getting addicted to Twitter ( I have reduced that now)
I used to be very messy when younger, but I have learned to be tidier now. Will never be neat though.
I can't just watch TV; I have to be doing something else at the same time, like sorting laundry or answering emails. I am always multitasking.

I am visiting family overseas now, so taking a break from work and my usual routine. I feel almost bereft when I do nothing.

Thoughts?

You sound like a happy, energetic extrovert, OP. You don't seem to be going round in dark circles of procrastination surrounded by piles of unopened post (which turn out, once you open them, to contain bailiffs letters regarding other post you. never opened). You presumably haven't been booted out by the dentist for failing to get round to making an appointment after four reminders by email, letter, text and phone. You don't appear to have dishes of things in the fridge, all with foil covers, and all containing something that you put there a very long time ago. Or a spoon randomly lying on the floor (why is it impossible to pick up one spoon?) Or total and utter chaos everywhere you look.

That is my life, and I still haven't "got ADHD"! If I were ever to think of having an assessment, I would never get round to it, and if I overcame that first hurdle, I'd forget that I had an appointment.

This!

I have formally diagnosed ADHD and an up-to-date inbox, organised desk and no laundry issues. I also have no problem being up and out by 6am (apart from not liking it!!) and I'm very rarely late, if at all. I have a high pressure job that requires me to be very organised. I mask my ADHD incredibly well (but the masking is exhausting). Some of my closest friends had no idea I have ADHD until I shared my diagnosis with them.

As @Psychoticbreak says, no-one can diagnose you from a few posts on the internet - maybe you should share that message with your self-diagnosing friends too.

I think there is a tendency at the moment to classify a certain type of personality - usually extroverted, not super-organised, tends to go through different interests (the jack of all trades type) - as ADHD. In a lot of these cases, it isn't a clinical issue. And a bit of a cottage industry of private referrals and medication which isn’t always needed. There was a Panorama on the rise of false diagnoses of ADHD not so long ago.

Not sure where this has come from but social media is full of “I think I have ADHD” and tending to be from people who are creative, maybe a bit more unorthodox in how they get things done (but this generally hasn’t stopped them from having decent careers or getting on with life). Not sure if symptomatic of a society where discipline and hustle are prized above all else that anything that deviates is seen as an issue that must be solved?

Thus is not to undermine a proper diagnosis of ADHD which is a serious medical condition.

I have diagnosed ADHD (and ASD) and my email inbox is cleared down, I have a very organised desk, my fridge has nothing dying in there either. I do have laundry mind you in the machine since yesterday I now need to rewash but that is about it from your list!

@Psychoticbreak that's because I'm assuming you have the inattentive type that most women with autism have as a comorbidity, rather than the hyperactivity type the OP thinks she has and I'm describing 😊

@DieuEtMonTwat

My neurotypical friends freak out about my inbox. Either you're incredibly busy, or it might be worth doing a self screen!

Ha! It will join the list of things that I might get round to doing at some point. If I send myself an email to remind myself, I will delete it unread in about seven years' time.

The thing is... if I did tick whatever boxes which would suggest ADHD, where would that actually get me? I'd still be the same person with the same characteristics which even I find annoying about myself.

A lot of what you mention sound like positive traits/behaviours to have. No one would seek an assessment for something that was having a good impact on their life.
People seeking a diagnosis for ADHD as an adult struggled as kids and had their symptoms ignored or swept under the carpet, particularly women.

My ds has been diagnosed (after a few assessments in person and back ground information being looked at)

reading about all the symptoms it’s surprising how many I have (inattentive) but i don’t think I have adhd just a number of symptoms that do impact my life but I have learnt how to manage them and learning from how to best support ds is helping myself too

I had an ex that was just like you. Tons of energy, always had to be doing something. Had things scheduled every day of the week, was rarely home, he was an extreme extrovert and a social butterfly. He didn’t have ADHD, just was very high energy type.

Weird you think that. I have severe combined adhd. As well as being autistic. I never have unread emails. My room is a fucking tip though. I came back from holiday a week and a half ago, and still haven’t unpacked. I never have any out of date food, as I buy day to day, or eat sandwiches.

I’ve never understood this whole unread email thing. But everyone is different

I came back from holiday a week and a half ago, and still haven’t unpacked

I haven't unpacked from a trip 8 months ago. I fall over the sodding suitcase on a daily basis, because it's lying in the hall. I am still not sure this is pathological, though.

No, it doesn’t sound like ADHD. If you had ADHD it would be having a negative impact on 2 or more areas of your life, so for example, in your job and in your marriage. Day to day life would be a struggle and this would have been present since childhood.

Only if 90% of the things you do you drop before you’ve finished them, as in leave them started would I think you might be a candidate for ADHD.

The ability to multi-task is an indication of definitely not ADHD. ADHD makes it difficult to focus on and complete one task. Even in hyper-focus, its focus that can go on for 24hrs straight but the person is still not finished when they collapse from lack of water/food/sleep

Does it matter if you have something?
get on with your lovely sounding life.

What were you like at school compared with your peers?

Were you more impulsive than your friends?
Were you less likely to sit still than others your age?
Did you struggle to concentrate on mundane things more than your peers.

How do you compare on these as an adult?

ADHD isn't about energy per se. It's about struggling to focus on things other than the immediate exciting issue of the moment.

Everybody seems to have it nowadays, so probably. It’s definitely the diagnosis that all my female peers seem to be getting (or self diagnosing themselves with).

Something else fundamental has changed in diagnosis which is very relevant here. It used to be that to be diagnosed with either autism or adhd it had to affect your life / educational attainment / friendships to a much greater extent. Essentially being high functioning or intelligent used to rule you out of a diagnosis. Better understanding of how high functioning people are actually masking or not functioning at home or mentally has led to anyone with autism or adhd likely to be diagnosed now.

I suspect I may have some degree of neurodivergence, potentially ADHD, but I don’t recognise what you describe.

I am able to function relatively well in quite a senior corporate role, and am good at compensating for some of my executive dysfunction issues, but I do feel that I haven’t reached my full potential almost entirely as a result of some personality quirks that are hard baked in.

• my mind is an incredibly busy place, the commentary literally does not stop and at times I find it overwhelming. I used to think everyone experienced this
• I ruminate a lot on social situations and struggle with moderately severe social anxiety, especially following a natural high eg a really great social experience. And that could be something like a fairly innocuous drinks evening
• I do get hyperfocus, it can be useful but it can also be an incredibly annoying displacement action, eg I may be working to a right deadline but right now absolutely have to become expert in some random unrelated topic
• I procrastinate terribly, although I have learned that this is part of a process and can mostly accept and manage this. I can use procrastination to manage productive hyperfocus sometimes
• But I will, eg, most mornings wake up and then lie in bed messing around on my phone until such point I am then playing catch up
• I enter what I call ‘waiting mode’ which is where I know that I will have a meeting/call in say 15 minutes so I will quietly wait it out and do nothing of value.
• if I don’t enter waiting mode then I will end up doing something else and then be really late
• I have a constant need to fidget with my hands in order to achieve cognitive excellence
• i have an incredible memory for detail (which is unusual in an adhd-er)
• i don’t much like other people, and spend time with them on my terms (but get very pissed off if not invited to things)
• I have had two fairly significant work related burnouts in my twenties. I am mostly managing these days but I get quite sensory avoidant when overloaded
• I do pretty much everything my own way, regardless of whether that is what most other people would do. I’m logical but the logic I follow is not shared by most others
• I am incredibly determined and actually pretty resilient up until the point I break

i have a colleague who has an ADHD diagnosis and we are incredibly similar. I also have a child with ASD and am considering pursuing my own diagnosis.

The ability to multi-task is an indication of definitely not ADHD.

I disagree with this. A Stanford University research study into multitasking with ADHD concluded:

The results of this study showed that people affected by ADHD were no better or worse at multitasking, as researchers had thought, but they were less likely to be stressed-out by interruption and maintained a more positive outlook about their work, even when interrupted, than those not diagnosed with ADHD

Like so many ADHD traits, it can be different for everyone and ADHD is the cumulative negative impact of these traits rather than a black and white if you can't do x you definitely have ADHD.

I haven't unpacked a huge amount of stuff from when I moved into my house over a decade ago.

My inbox is at 0 unread emails and I have a diagnosis of ADHD so I’m not sure that’s a great indicator! I also have autism and absolutely cannot stand having any notifications on any of my apps so I always open emails immediately and always clear my inbox when I open it.

I disagree with the study, it was done on 45 men with ADHD and 42 men average age in their 30s without ADHD the interleaving portion (the bit that assigned multiple tasks) was done without monitoring how they did them so they probably just did them serially instead of switching back and forth as you would do when actually multitasking. It’s a common adaptation for working age adults with ADHD to do multiple tasks serially rather than multitask. Plus it’s a small sample size and all men.

😂😂😂
There's all that too. However, that is less irritating as I use the removal boxes as things on which to put other things.

Whether or not I have ADHD, I will never know. But I have learnt something really useful from this thread, namely 'waiting mode'. At the moment, if I know I have to be somewhere in 15 minutes, I start doing something that completely absorbs me, and I end up leaving late and stressed. I know as I start doing whatever it is that I shouldn't be doing it, but tell myself that it will only take two minutes. I am going to try to adopt this 'waiting mode' idea.

I'll let Stanford know 😂

I have a confirmed diagnosis of combined ADHD and I'm fabulous at multi-tasking. I've actually made a career out of it. My multi-tasking ability blows my ND friends out of the water.

(There's lots of evidence online that multi-tasking can actually be a strength of those with ADHD).

Possibly but unless you want to spend a fortune on meds, does it really matter? Sounds like you’ve got on fine.

i have a couple of friends with ADHD and the meds make them weird and everything seems to get attributed to ADHD! I’m pretty sure I’ve got it but I’m coping just fine with life….as I s it next to a pile of washing!