The ADHD family - to think that our family life is complicated and people don't always get it

[FarStarAway]

It all started with our son being assessed for adhd and autism. The penny then dropped for me as I started exploring adhd in women and I got assessed too. My husband also displays clear signs of adhd and will also be getting assessed at some point. My husband and I also have long term clinical anxiety which obviously can be associated with adhd. Our dd is only 18 months but I worry about her too as she gets older. If we're all neurodiverse, is family life ever going to be straightforward?

As it is, we function (somehow) but life is very chaotic day to day despite us trying our best and we really do try. However, I think their are friends and family who don't get how difficult it is. Will neurodiversity be more widely understood one day? To our neurotypical friends/family we probably 'appear' dysfunctional and I feel like I sometimes trying to mask it in front of others.

i love this thread. ND family. Had a coffee with NT today. Views and attitudes sooo different. Chaos is on another level. It stops us being able to do things easily as described here - like going out on school nights and doing last minute favours for people. It can make keeping friendships v difficult. We tend to just sort ourselves out and manage ourselves day to day with minimal social stuff.

There is no such thing as a "normal" family set up. The people who you see that you assume are "NT" may well be masking too. Everyone will have some bits of chaos about them it's just being human. So you don't need to feel different to anyone else

@DepressingTimes I can relate to this.

That would be very unusual.

And the next thread will be someone who is cutting off contact with someone because they tend to be late or are terrible at presents

Of course they can claim disability benefits for ADHD

No it wouldn’t

Yes it would.

You're embarrassing yourself with this nonsense @Badgirlriri

Hi op, we are a family of 4, 3 of us with asd. There's definitely more understanding of ND families these days, and I think it's great that there is more awareness on the tv, news etc.
There's alot of things we just can't do as a family, which I do think is still not always understood. I've never been able to leave my DC overnight any where, both asd both highly anxious, as am I, I still think people think I'm just being precious.

How would it be unusual I see this everyday in my work?

I've got ADHD as has my youngest. Partner and other daughter are autistic. We manage. People would say our lives are slightly more unusual but not dysfunctional.

Another ND family checking in! I'm diagnosed dyslexic and ADHD (thank goodness for spell checker) and DD (11) has just got her ADHD diagnosis. Ex is NT and finds it very difficult to accept that our DD does things a bit differently.
Yes, it can be chaotic, very difficult when the pair of us are struggling with different aspects of ADHD but it's also a life filled with laughter.
My DP has just received his ADHD diagnosis at 49- DD reckons we are collecting people now! Looking at my family, I can see so many of my own traits in my lovely 74 year old Dad....I mention it to him and he just chuckles and carries on his wonderful, chaotic way x

And as for benefits, no you can't get them just because you have adhd, you have to prove why your disability costs you more and requires more equipment/money etc than someone without anything. Extremely hard to do and not applicable in most cases.

A few sneery comments on here as usual. Do people still not realise how difficult it is to get a diagnosis or to claim pip?

I'm the only nt person person in a family of 5. Our life has always been chaotic but i don't let it get to me. This is our normal and people who judge us can do one

I hope there will be more understanding in the future. I believe my dad had ADHD (undiagnosed and would never have considered that he might have been neurodiverse) and he always went for jobs that he considered high status and that his dad would approve of, despite hating them all. He would have had a good life in certain jobs that would have suited him far better and might have had a happier if no less chaotic life. Makes me sad.

Why does everyone need to get how difficult it is for you? We all have our cross to bear and we don't need to know all the ins&outs of everyone else's daily struggles. If you're lucky enough to have a handful of people who understand or are willing to listen then great, but not everyone is that invested in your struggles / has their own crap to deal with.

And I say this from my own experience of dealing with ND family life, not just to stick the oar in.

Your family sounds lovely OP. No diagnosis that I’m aware of in my husband or kids, but grew up with an eldest brother who has brain damage and schizophrenia. I thought he was on his own in our family with mental health struggles until I suffered a severe psychotic episode and now my emotional and mental health needs are more heightened than ever. Not everyone will understand why the need to speak up is so important, it was certainly all hush hush when I was growing up (my nan would isolate herself and say “her nerves were a bit fragile, but it’s not something we talk about dear”). It’s a shame that some people genuinely believe this is a “new thing”- it’s finally become more acceptable to talk about being different and in doing so the hope is it helps others. That’s what it’s all about, accepting each other for who and what we are.

I must admit that I do also find it important to not let anything be an excuse for behaving badly. There’s a child in my daughter’s school who can literally do whatever he wants and no changes are made to protect the other children and the teachers excuse it with “he doesn’t understand”. If he doesn’t understand, he needs more education and he needs better supervision. Similarly, when my emotions get the better of me, family still treat me how they would anyone else and tell me to calm down. It’s harder for me to do this, but I’m still expected to.

While having certain traits makes certain things more difficult to manage, I think it’s important to a) educate others but b) find a solution that works for all. I could go through my life making excuses or I can find a way to make life work for me as well as other people. I think that is hugely important.

Both my DS are ND and the youngest has severe needs - pre-verbal, learning disability. The doctors were convinced that one of us must be ND as there must be something genetic going on, but no.

Having two ND children definitely makes life more complex.

I'm not sure why people feel the need to come on here and snipe.

I may have been sceptical too until I started to see those signs of ADHD in DH and my daughter. Now I understand and I've educated myself so I can help them.

I'm autistic and DH has ADHD. Autism runs in my family - my granddad, dad, aunt and one cousin are all diagnosed.

We manage just fine but I know a lot of people think our relationship and way of life is odd 🤷🏻‍♀️ it works perfectly well for us though and we're very happy.

I may have been sceptical too until I started to see those signs of ADHD in DH and my daughter.

After reading a lot of threads about ADHD things clicked into place, and I realise that DH has similar traits. We both did an ADHD test that one poster linked to and DH scored very highly on it (I didn't). He also thinks that he is on the autism spectrum.

It helps explain why he gets in a tizz about things I take in my stride and why he gets overwhelmed by large gatherings of people.

I do get extremely irritated when people play the mental health/ND card to justify bad behaviour though.

I agree with pp that everyone seems to have something these days. Though I take that to mean that neurotypical is a bit of a myth, or at least not the standard benchmark we've assumed it is. People shouldn't need a diagnosis for basic adjustments to help them thrive.

I do know what you mean though. People try to compare their kids tantrums with mine's autistic meltdowns and don't seem to understand that we just can't socialise as much as kick back is too much.

I don’t think people will ever understand inattentive ADHD because it isn’t something they can see. I’m the only person who’s ever noticed it in my DS and that’s because I’m the same. Teachers still mostly only notice the kids who are disruptive and hyperactive.

I would recommend reading Sidetracked Home Executives. It’s a very old book but still in print I think. It involves using index cards to prompt you to do things. I don’t use it these days because I’m not that busy so I use a checklist. The important thing is to hold one task in your brain and just do it, then move to the next task. Otherwise the tasks will be jumbled up in your brain.

And to ‘those’ people, I’ve got a diagnosis of Asperger’s and GAD and I’ve applied for PIP twice and been refused. You have to be completely dysfunctional….I mean unable to leave house, never wash, house a tip, unable to hold a conversation etc. It’s awful for those of us trying hard and failing at life.

It’s not specifically for ADHD but the women who wrote it realised afterwards that this was why they were struggling.