Does anyone think they DONT have ADHD?

[Frenchtoastie]

I keep seeing posts on instagram with various reasons why someone has ADHD and then hundreds of comments below reporting these people also have all of these symptoms.
Just wondering if anyone reads these and doesn’t relate to them? To me they are just part of being human, but maybe I am completely wrong and I have ADHD🤣

the posts generally include statement along these lines…

• I find it hard to get going or impossible to stop
• I can put off a tiny task for weeks but worry about it for hours but when I finally complete it it takes 5 minutes
• I can distracted and start cleaning after the shower and suddenly I’ve cleaned the whole house whilst wearing my towel
• Having a chair covered in clothes
• having multiple drinks on the go in the house
• needing a calender because if not I would forget appointments

Thanks for the reply. I think my question is, how do you tell the difference between arithmetical stupidity, etc. and ADHD? Maybe from an employer's perspective? How would an interviewer differentiate without a diagnosis? Or even with?

I'm going to call you out again cause lol, I have both ADHD and MS and apparently you don't understand that neurological conditions can affect people to vastly different degrees. Some people with MS are unable to walk or require full-time care while others run marathons so by your logic, do I not actually have MS because I can walk? Should I hand back my diagnosis because I'm functioning too well for your liking?
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Your brother's struggles are real, but the most severely affected people are not the diagnostic benchmark for everyone else. Having a degree, holding down a job, driving, or maintaining a relationship doesn't magically cancel out ADHD. A person can function successfully while still experiencing significant impairment. That's really not a difficult concept and frankly, using your brother's difficulties as some sort of measuring stick to dismiss everyone whose ADHD doesn't look exactly like his is rather insulting to people with the condition, not the defense of them you seem to think it is. You don't get to decide whose diagnosis counts based on whether their life looks sufficiently dysfunctional to you. 🙄

People with ADHD don't generally have a problem with numbers unless they also have dyscalculia. It isn't adding up numbers that would make me a bad accounts clerk, I got a top grade at O level maths.

I don't have adhd, I'm NT and am surrounded by ND people. Sometimes what really pisses me off is when people don't own their issues and make it other people's problems. It's different with kids they need support but I keep telling my DSs that they need to find ways to figure out what works for them. Dh too, I absolutely refuse to help him. I know that seems mean but I could literally be 24/7 running around after all of them. Everyone expects me to remember where they left their phone or water bottle or to remind of an appointment and sometimes I get completely overwhelmed by it all and feel like I'm having a meltdown. Meanwhile the ND folk are having an easy life with all the support. I know they face challenges I will never face but at home I sometimes feel being the only NT person feels no different to what being the only ND person must feel like. No one understands me or how my brain works. They also assume ordinary life stresses are different for them. I hate traffic jams because I have adhd, I can't remember my appointment time next week cos I have adhd. I have to remind them that no love everyone hates traffic jams and most people can't remember specifics like that.

I'm sick of seeing these reels on facebook and insta with (mainly) women announcing 'this is how ADHD brain / Autistic brain shows up in people who appear to function completely well on the surface'. Then they go on to list half a dozen things have probably applied to almost everyone at some point in their lives, and in many people their whole lives, even though those people would never get a diagnosis in a month of Sundays.

I have a daily checklist on my phone with about 60 items on it in time order.

It's a spectrum isn't it? And humans have just decided where on that spectrum we have to be in order to be labelled with adhd. I'm not diagnosed but only because I'm already diagnosed with autism and I don't feel it's necessary.

That's understandable. I have to do all that for my son and I have adhd (inattentive) myself. It's hard enough managing my own life.

Kind of, I was fairly sure I was autistic from my life history and genetics but was screened for both autism and ADHD as part of the initial paperwork during the autism assessment, the final result was yes to autism and no to ADHD, as expected. Both were checked because I do have many traits which are commonly found in people with ADHD, but in my case they are all things considered to be symptoms of autism as well - there is a large overlap.

The criteria for diagnosis is also that the issues are persistent enough to be disabling, which acknowledges that everyone forgets things or gets distracted sometimes (etc) without it being anything out-of-the-ordinary.

It can be. Exhaustion can do that. Stress can do that. Worry can do that. Anxiety can do that. Grief can most certainly do that.

But, they’re not a symptom of anything other than normal human emotions. 🤷‍♀️

What easy life and support are those of us who are ND getting? I've certainly received no post diagnosis support despite asking

I get you. I'm NT & do ALL the executive functioning for DS2 & DS3. It's a bloody hard shift.

I have NT DS1 & DP at least to bounce off of. I symathise, I really do. Please try to take time for you whenever you can or you'll burn out.🩷

I'm a qualified accountant with audhd!

Wait we get support from somewhere? Direct me to this please. As a sole parent working a full time job and juggling everything life throws at us all I would love to see where, as a neurodivergent person, that I am getting all this support from?

I'm not usually one for the "oh everyone thinks everyone has something now" but even I was perplexed the other day - my husband mentioned to a friend that when we watch murder mysteries/crime dramas I always guess them right off the bat. And this friend was like "oh, I didn't know your wife was ADHD" and he said errr she isn't and this guy kept insisting I was based on basically nothing 🤷

I use a diary to keep appointments and make shopping lists but I don't think that's a definitive sign. I do not have autism or anything else.

Opposite in our house 🤣 I guess storylines and outcomes quickly but husband with adhd often struggles to follow the storyline and remember detail. He loses interest quickly and is terrible with long winded dialogue.

I always tick a lot of those boxes on those ‘ADHD traits’ thing but I definitely don’t think I have ADHD. Those are just parts of my character/personality. Hyper-focus on some things, impulsivity, sensitivity to noise, etc. is just me as a person. Some stuff I find harder in life than some other people and some things I find easier than some other people, and I have strategies to make the harder stuff easier. I think that’s just life for most people really. No need to pathologise it for most of us.

I have ADHD. I endured a lifetime of 'what's wrong with you?! Why can't you get along like everyone else?!' before diagnosis. Medication changed my life. So, fairly sure I have ADHD.

My mother also has ADHD. House was always a tip, she drank 10 cups of coffee a day to 'get focused,' moved houses and jobs and relationships every year. Couldn't learn to drive, keep on top of meals and food shopping, laundry, messages, paperwork. Undiagnosed until very recently - again, it was 'how can you be intelligent but unable to function?'

Funny how you have a lifetime of 'what's wrong with you?!' and then, once you have your answer - 'there's nothing wrong with you!'

Adhd and autism are such broad spectrums I think most or all of us have in some form. We all have our own idiosyncrasies, discomfort but it doesn't mean there is a need for diagnosis.

However, aha, proving some mild form means you can excuse your behaviour, allowed exemptions, claim allowances etc.

Yes I sound cynical, that's because these labels, amongst many others, are used to an extreme level. In schools, you're lucky to have a child on the register who doesn't have some sort of condition, which teachers have to aware of, prepared and accountable for!

Me? Yes, I absolutely know I have many aspects of autism, have known my foibles/ocd/sensory issues throughout my life but intrinsically recognised them and acted accordingly when I could. Probably add too or it could just be I'm very bouncy and find it hard to sit still?

I can tick all those. They are symptoms of being human. I have so many people I know diagnosing themselves, their kids etc, all privately, and think it somehow explains why they are sad/don’t have a job/can’t navigate the real world. If the real world is the social media, plastic surgery, vacuity vortex of late, then no wonder people don’t feel they can function in it.

if we carry on like this, everyone will be neurodiverse and, as such, no one will be. It’s a nonsense.

As someone diagnosed in adulthood with both Autism and ADHD (type B - inattentive), I believe you are partly right. Yes, many people have 'traits', because all of the traits of many ND conditions are - simply - traits of being human.

However the prevalence of these traits over time from childhood into adulthood and the pervasive impact that these have on your life are where the diagnostic side comes into play.

As a previous poster stated, on the outside I look like a perfectly functional adult. I have a degree. I am successful in my career, I hold down a relationship, I pay a mortgage and raise 3 children. But what I look like and what I am are two very different things.

It's not as simple as 'I need a calendar to keep track of appointments' - it's needing multiple reminders and alarms for things and still missing them or being late because I cannot simply 'will' my brain into getting going, especially is the appointment is in the middle of the day.

It's having a chair covered in piles of clothes because the act of 'doing the laundry' is actually an umbrella term for a whole sequence of tasks which eats up more mental energy than I can spare on some days and can leave me sat in a heap on the bedroom floor sobbing into a cardigan because I feel like I'm failing at life.

It's not being able to sleep because my thoughts never - and I mean, never - stop racing... from the second I am conscious in the morning (usually at around 3am) my mind is flooded with replays and analyses of every conversation I have ever had, plans and practise runs of every interaction I am likely to have in the coming day, plus the constant whirlwind of all the things I know I need to get done, panic about whether I have enough time to get them all done and the shame and guilt of all the things from previous days lists that I didn't manage and have now carried over, leaving me with an ever-growing insurmountable to-do list.

When combined with my autism (the diagnosis I first associated with) my life is a constant fight between a desperate need and craving for structure and routine but an actual life where I spend all my energy planning and then have nothing left to carry out.

This obviously only relates to my struggles with executive function and does not even touch on my myriad of sensory issues and social/communication differences. Which are a whole other essay in their own right.

I know plenty. Private diagnoses and NHS. No decisions for both Autism and ADHD assessments.

The diagnostic process in my experience is pretty thorough. I almost didn't go through with my assessment because of the sheer amount of admin the pre-assessment questionnaires entailed.

Everybody has clothes on a chair or a floordrobe. I'm sick of these cute social media posts that make out everyone is a bit adhd. Just like neat and tidy homes must mean you have ocd.

Same

Mumsnet HQ deleted a reply on mine on another thread within the last week where I said ADHD is not a disability. MNHQ (falsely) cited the Equality Act saying ADHD can be a disability (no, the Equality Act says that if someone is functionally disabled for numerous types of reasons, then they are disabled - but makes no equation of ADHD at any level of severity with disability) and said that by saying it wasn't a disability I was making light of the condition and wasn't in the spirit of the site.

The UK spends nearly 2% of GDP on disability benefits. ADHD dignoses amongst children and teens have doubled in recent years - these are all people who would be eligible for benefits over time - especially if MNHQ-type thinking becomes more pervasive that it's not nice to say ADHD in itself is a not a disability.

We won't like it if the country goes bankrupt and our debt service costs skyrocket even higher. But we can't bring ourselves to do the "not nice" thing and admit ADHD is being overdiagnosed in young people and that no, the condition is most certainly is not in itself a disability.