pedantry: I'm ADHD vs I have ADHD

[quibling]

I am hearing people say "I'm ADHD" when I'd rather they said "I have ADHD"
I totally get the argument against saying "he has autism" because it's not a disease, and its a fundamental part of the person. I get that its better to say 'he is autistic' instead.
But given ADHD starts for "Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder" it doesn't make sense to say "I am disorder" also, unlike autism, you can develop ADHD in later life, so its a different kind of thing.
AIBU to think this is wrong?

I agree with you. A colleague always describes people by saying things like "so-and-so's daughter is special needs" and it drives me nuts!

I think it does have an evolutionary advantage. Hyper focus is self explanatory. Impulsivity/ disorganisation might have it’s downfalls in modern life, but from an evolutionary point of view, especially before modern times it definitely has advantages. Likewise the adrenaline seeking and subsequent high.

Firstly life was simpler, less distractions and if something is necessary for survival adhd or otherwise you’re generally going to want to do it. And until relatively recently it was straightforwards to pass on routines/ coping skills, regardless of adhd. Eg remembering your spear would be like mirror, signal manoeuvre when driving. But we don’t have a one size fits all for renewing car insurance or switching the dishwasher on.
Secondly, for most of human evolution being willing and able to take risks has been beneficial for both individuals and society. And impulsivity definitely helps with that.

As to a name, I’d ditch the attention deficit part completely. It’s not accurate and just encourages people with shit memories and concentration to self dx, and implies it’s something we can fix like an nt person. Hyper focus wouldn’t be possible if our brains just lacked the ability to pay attention, ditto all the complex linked chains with which we can remember the most obscure shit.

Maybe some impressive sounding Latin phrase that means a filter that can only be on tunnel vision or off, not the standard filtering of superfluous detail that nt people do.

I don't think that hyperfocus is an advantage because as you rightly said people with ADHD are not attention deficient. We just can't control our attention. We can't control what we pay attention to. I can't imagine that trumps the ability of someone to focus on what they have decided makes the most sense to focus on. My dh, whom I used to call super NT, eg can hyperfocus (or rather focus for however long is required) when he decides that he needs to. It's so much more useful than eg my hyperfocus today on playing any online game that ends with "dle".

Anyway, no I can't rule out that in a different time, ie a hunter gatherer society it did not have any advantage but like I said at the moment I am too annoyed with myself to see it.

@MottledPie

I hear you and I rarely talk about the evolutionary biology side of things with patients because hearing it might have had an advantage in one setting isn't much help to people having a bloody miserable time in the world we're living in now.

The advantages that seem to have evidence are indeed around hunting -in tribal cultures with more ADHD genes there has been evidence of better nutritional status; and there are face valid advantages to having tribe members with a delayed sleep cycle, lighter sleep, more easily rousable than their NT counterparts; also those who struggle to maintain concentration in conversation but get distracted by the herd of bison or whatever quietly passing in the distance.

In modern life there are still people with ADHD working in unusual and competitive fields who are advantaged by things like hyperfocus, having a different take on things. But I appreciate that so many more are held back. ADHD, like Autism may not be a disability until combined with the wrong environment. But the current environment needs a lot of adaptation and accomodation to be ND friendly rather than ND disabling.

@MottledPie one thing I am forgetting to say is that when we say that something had an evolutionary advantage we don't necessarily mean to the individual, but to the population in general. E.g. it might still have sucked to be the individual with ADHD in hunter gatherer times, but at a tribe/community/population level there may have been advantages of having members with ADHD. Tribe with extra ADHD in it is more successful, breeds, grows, genes thrive...can all happen even if the individual doesn't feel personally advantaged.

Isn’t more of a colloquial thing? 🤔 As in “I’m a little OCD” as opposed to “I have OCD”.

@MottledPie

Sorry, missed your question on chronotype.

Chronotypes are about our internal biological clocks, sleep cycles etc. Night owls Vs larks etc.

People with ADHD commence sleep later, are more active in the evening, take longer to fall asleep, have lighter sleep, wake more and often have deeper sleep and are harder to rouse when everyone is waking up. To varying degrees, and not universal. Throw ASD in the mix and it gets complicated. But those are the general issues.

Yes, I do know that (that evolutionary advantage means at the population level). Maybe the ADHD hunter was used as cannon fodder or as bait by their tribe and you can't blame the tribe for that when the ADHD hunter had forgotten their spear for the tenth time in a row. At least they were impulsive enough to have had ten kids by then thereby ensuring that their lovely genes lived on to trouble their poor descendants ever after. :-)

Ah that's fascinating. Thanks for explaining!! (All of that applies to me except that I'm easy to wake. )

I sit in meetings where a huge amount of knowledge is necessary. Sometimes, they'll mention something and despite having absolutely no idea how I know something, as it's not my role, I'll have an answer. I do it with remembering where I've seen something on my walks around site even though I didn't know I'd noticed it. I'll wander off and let my mind ping around a thousand things or focus on one and suddenly a solution to a problem swims into view. I'm distracted by everything but I remember a lot of it. I learn things quickly. I don't mind change because it's not as scary as being stuck doing the same old thing forever. And I'll have a go because whatever it is could be interesting, exciting or entertaining.

All of those things could be advantages when looking for food, noticing weather changes, possible threats, having an idea for a tool, making a decision to move rather than sit tight when the volcano doesn't feel quite right or wondering 'these make a good noise. I wonder what it sounds like if I make another hole in that bone like the natural one?'

Oh, and not sleeping until 3am probably came in useful as well for security.

@MottledPie

Yeah the deep sleep is hard to come by and only arrives, if it does, when you don't want it to. Mostly it's just poor quality sleep.

ADHD is just hard. I can totally understand why you'd reject discussion of "advantages".

@MottledPie of course, hyper focus isn’t always an advantage because as you say we can direct it in the least constructive way too. But when we use it constructively I don’t think there’s an nt person, or very few that could do the same with the ease we do. And I hope that even if it doesn’t feel that way for you now you’ve had and will experience it as a positive.

More importantly, don’t beat yourself up. I’m a firm believer that a lot of how you cope with it is down to circumstances/ luck rather than a reflection on you.
I was dx as a child and born horse obsessed, grew up with them at home, am still horse obsessed and long before I was even aware nobody else seemed to struggle with things I did, or what my adhd even meant, I was aware, in a very factual none boastful way I had advantages round horses my peers didn’t. By the time I realised the disadvantages I could view them as a flip side to the advantages. Because I cared more about horses than anything else so they were a small price to pay. I think if I’d grown up in a city without them I would think differently.

I do a job that suits me and live a lifestyle that does. Yes there’s coping methods and routines etc that help, but I think the chance to find advantages and modern life in general makes it harder to manage adhd as society evolves.

This made me laugh I don't have ADHD but I have also been titting,around on the internet all day I have a machine load f freshly washed washing still waiting to be sorted which I will.have to re wash in the morning its also been glorious here today and I could have washed and line dried loaded of it!😂

Adhd is a neurodevelopmental disorder so no it can’t be developed as an adult because it’s caused by brain structure and organisation?
people can identify however they want. Perhaps it’s time for a better term to be used than adhd, it’s a pretty poor descriptor

I’m very fat so this wouldn’t come across the way it’s intended 😂

YANBU. It does sound dumb when people say I'm ADHD.

Yes. It was the head paediatric psychiatrist at CAMHS.

I've recently done a weekly course for parents and they said the same.

I suppose it's one of those situations on medical matters were one discipline will disagree with another. Neurologists would say that everyone is born with it because the brains of those who have ADHD are different. From a psychiatry pov they may consider the point were it develops as the start. It's quite dangerous if CAMHS are saying this as gospel, because it isn't.

You cannot "develop ADHD in later life" it's a neurodevelopmental condition - suggest you educate yourself before starting a pedantry thread on such a topic

The problem is that it's easy to say "I'm autistic" because there are two names for the condition - "autism" and "ASD". There isn't for ADHD, so all that's available are colloquialisms and individual cutesy names for it.

For example, my other half prefers to say "I've got squirrels" or "Are my squirrels showing?".

As for the whole "can develop ADHD later in life", that's absolute rubbish. If any medical professionals come out with such stupidity, it's usually because they've ignored all the research that's been done in the last 20 years or so (often wilfully), just like my GP who told me it wasn't possible for me to be autistic because I've got a job and I'm married (yes, that was the reason for refusing my referral).

Well dc had no traits at all until the year before diagnosis so I can understand why they say develop. I'm aware there is a growing area of research that says things like trauma and environmental factors can affect the structure of a child's brain so it makes sense to me. Perhaps people are genetically predisposed to it but other factors then trigger it.

The parenting course required by the health trust before the meds are prescribed made a point of saying as the brain further develops many kids grow out of ADHD so the converse would make sense I suppose.

I had to evidence the problems i had were present in childhood when being assessed as an adult, if they were not I would not have met the criteria for diagnosis.

You can not develop WDHD later in life. You are born with it. This is why they look at your childhood and schooling when making a diagnosis.

*adhd

Slightly different but I have bipolar distinct from I am bipolar because it's not the only thing that defines me as a person.