Is everyone ADHD/ Similar now? Does everyone have 'something'

[pontipinemum]

My counsellor/ psychologist says she thinks I definitely have some sort of ND. When I see things about ADHD/ etc it all seems mostly very relatable.

But then I see people say that everyone struggles so it is normal, that I would just be looking for something to 'blame'. BTW I am not looking for anything to blame.

I think I mask exceptionally well - it's not on purpose. I can be look calm on the outside and be absolutely melting inside. But this does make me good in a crisis. I can 100% focus on that. My brain does not stop. I mean it does not stop.
DH gets frustrated with me because of the complete and utter tangents I go off on.

I am extremely vigilant, like too on alert. I see threat and danger everywhere. It doesn't rule my life but I will assess each situation, according to my counsellor I do this to a much greater degree than most people.

My family life growing up was dysfunctional, chaotic, alcohol misuse, I was abused and neglected. But on the surface we looked like a pretty ok family. Again people keep telling me that everyone struggles with their family. But it is only now in my 30s that maybe most people do not go through what I went through.

The more outward signs - I have my nail beds destroyed. I press my finger nails down into the finger bed until it starts to break. I love the feel of it. It hurt but it is nice. I have done this since I can remeber, because I used to get in trouble for it. I used to scrath my tooth and flick my ear too but they annoyed other people - I didn't know I did it until a colleague asked me to stop. I only do it now when I have to, like now since I've thougth about it!!

In my 20s I was hugely chaotic. In my 30s now I am far more organised. BUT that is not something that is coming naturally to me. I am working super hard to help myself and make things less overwhelming. But with 2 young kids things get stressful even if you wouldn't think I am stressed. I am exhausted, I mean waking up so tired. Even though the youngest is sleeping better now, I find I am sleeping worse thinking of all the things I need to do.

Other things I have noticed:

I can easily get distracted and flit from one task before finishing the one I was at

Time blind - I am way way better at being on time for things now, thank you DH, I was always stupid early for things like flights tho. But I still massively over estimate what I can get done in a certain time frame.

Before having DC I used to drink most nights, and too much each night. I thought it helped me to relax. It did slow me down! I haven't had a drink now since around last Christmas and in general I think it is much better for me. Bar the not slowing down part.

I feel in general I have managed to find ways to make things work for me. Which I guess is what everyone does? I do have dyslexia and have found many ways to work with that.

What I am trying to figure out is, does everyone not feel like this?

@dizzydizzydizzy My mum has always struggled with fatigue and ME, although she hasn't been able to get an official diagnosis - the difficulty she's had with this has basically eroded all trust in mainstream medicine and she mostly deals with alternative health practitioners now, which worries me although I do understand her fears.

The more both of us learn about ND the more we wonder if she was ND all along. I do think the exhaustion that comes with sensory overwhelm and not being able to screen out all the extraneous thoughts and things we notice all around (like OP's example of noticing the window cleaner and the scales etc).

(General reply)

I do think the question in the OP can be read in two different ways. Sometimes people say "Isn't everyone like this a bit? Why does it need a label?" and it sounds dismissive or that they are suggesting ADHD/ASD aren't real or aren't deserving of support, research, etc.

But I also think (and I think this is where OP is coming from) if you do have the severity of impairment where it tips over into a disorder, it can be a bit like "What do you mean, everyone else doesn't struggle with these things?? I thought it was normal! I thought everyone else was just better at it than me!"

I think 50% of tbe population being ND is very unlikely. Even my ADHD psychiatrist says it’s only 4% of adults or 1 in 25. So it is common but not that common.

adhdconsultancy.co.uk/

I agree 50/50 is a bit much, though I've heard 20% as a suggested figure, not just for ADHD but to include other conditions such as autism, dyspraxia, dyslexia, tourette's syndrome, etc etc. Some are rarer than others but added up all together I think it could form a larger minority.

I mean, just definitionally this is true.

If you're talking about 50% of your population then you don't have a case of "there is clear typical behaviour, but a few people are outliers who need special treatment".

Your range of normal/typical behaviour needs to include the bulk of the people in the 50% and you need to acknowledge that normal behaviour is more of a wide spectrum.

This is the difference between, say, classrooms of 30 kids and 1 kid gets a 1-1 TA, and a classroom of 30 kids but 15 of them get a 1-1 TA. Like, at a certain point it doesn't scale and you need to figure out that 30 person classrooms aren't working for the bulk of your students, not keep giving one-off special adjustments.

I think most probably do have some form of ADHD

What makes you think that?

If you look in to CPTSD. You’re under a psychologist so assumed it is already rules out but I think there is a lot of crossover with ADHD (in females especially from neglectful/ chaotic homes). Hyper vigilance and rejection sensitivity.

Well studies are now indicating that around 25% of people are identifying as having ADHD (includes both formally diagnosed and self-identified). Not sure that’s due to ‘greater awareness’ though, as that would indicate that throughout history roughly 25% of the population had ADHD which doesn’t seem realistic.

Also, when you start and get a number like 25%, that’s no longer a ‘diversity’, but a subset of ‘typical’ or you are looking at one hell of an unusual bell curve!

I think the study you are referring to with the 25% only included the patients of a psychiatric hospital.

ADHD UK cites numerous data sources and studies which estimate the incidence of ADHD in the global population as a whole to be around 2% to 7%.

adhduk.co.uk/adhd-incidence/

That sounds plausible.

‘My family life growing up was dysfunctional, chaotic, alcohol misuse, I was abused and neglected’

this type of adversity in childhood can create symptoms that appear similar to ADHD but aren’t. This is why assessment should be robust and rigorous, I’m not sure all private providers consider differential diagnoses thoroughly enough ime.

I would say you don’t have ADHD or anything else, you grew up in a highly traumatic home. And your symptoms and reactions have arisen due to that.

Thank you for your thoughts.

So sorry to hear about your Mum’s experience. Not getting an ME diagnosis or waiting decades for one is sadly all too common with ME in the UK, the result being that many of these people fall into the hands of charlatans who charge ££££ for treatment or a cure - which usually doesn’t work. Even people who are formally diagnosed often do this because the NHS has virtually nothing to offer and understandably people get desperate. In many NHS trusts, there are no ME specialists. It is not a particularly rare illness.

Regarding ADHD - I would add that to get a diagnosis you have to show the hyperactivity, distractedness etc is impairing your life and has done since childhood. I was diagnosed 3 months ago. Apparently I was easy to diagnose ….. I only asked for an assessment because my DC2 had one and the doctor mentioned that virtually everyone who is autistic also has ADHD. I already had the autism diagnosis and then did the ASRS screener which apparently is good at picking up ADHD in women.

Checklist for ADHD in adult women that probably generates exactly the same results as that screener:

• Do you have children?
• Are you also trying to work full time?
• Are you also doing most of the housework?
• Do you feel like you are dropping balls all the time, jumping between random tasks, unable to finish anything, never on time, and constantly getting distracted?
• Do you feel like you're drowning in your noisy, chaotic, busy life that you rarely get a break from and when you do your mind is still racing thinking about everything still on your to-do list?

Yup, you definitely have ADHD. All the NT women actually do "have it all" and are managing fine. You are an outlier who is only unable to cope because your brain is just wired differently.

I agree with PP - we should be much more demanding of a) differential diagnoses and b) critical examination of lifestyle/social factors (everything from trauma to smartphone use to WLB to job suitability) before we just jump to the easy answer of "ah probably ND, and isn't it lovely that there's so much more awareness these days!!"

I don't think it is just mum life - mum life is being interrupted, yes, but usually by small people more so than your own thoughts and ideas.

That part. I have actually got much better at doing 'things' since having children. Before I was a lot more likely to let my distractions suck me in for a whole evening. I know I have a lot more to get done now and that ususally there is a deadline - the baby still wakes. I get loads done when baby goes to sleep, I try to get all jobs done before I sit down for dinner.

Where as before I would have had loads of time after work. Then faffed around cooking. And I was really bad for putting things off.

I have put in a lot of structures in my life and they are really helping. Things like meal planning. People say I am so organised to do that. But before I would spend ages wondering what I would do. Over buying every herb and spice going. And it was just such a drain. Now I still don't like having to think it thro but it is done and on the board, I can follow the board for the week then. Like having someone tell me what to do but that person was me!

Present me now tries to help future me. Present me usen't give a crap about future me!

I have actually got much better at doing 'things' since having children. Before I was a lot more likely to let my distractions suck me in for a whole evening. I know I have a lot more to get done now and that ususally there is a deadline - the baby still wakes. I get loads done when baby goes to sleep, I try to get all jobs done before I sit down for dinner.

This was vv true for me as well! When I was at school, I was constantly getting my homework done the night before, it never even occurred to me to start it earlier. Once I got to GCSE/post-16 and projects which were laid out over a longer period of time which I was expected to manage myself I really struggled with this, would do a blazing start with a fantastic amount of detail, then burn out and do nothing for weeks and then panic when it got close to the deadline, lots of late nights trying to finish and always fall short.

When DS1 was nearly 2, I enrolled at university (luckily they accepted me even though I had never actually finished either my BTEC or my A Levels!) and because I knew that he would need attention when I was at home, I really got into a good routine with blocking out certain study periods on campus even though I didn't have timetabled lectures or seminars. I got a fair bit done then, and then I had an academic year calendar on my wall on which I wrote out all the essay dates and drew a line back from each of them showing how far in advance I needed to start working on them. I tried to get things in 2-3 days before the deadline to give me a "buffer" in case he was ill or wouldn't sleep etc. When I did have a free evening where he went to bed easily, I knew I couldn't just waste it and needed to use that working on whatever was coming up next.

I did very well with that structure, and I do best now when I have certain days of my week blocked out too. I tend to fall apart a bit when everything is unstructured because I always feel like "Oh I can do that later" and it doesn't really ever get done.

Obviously everyone needs to have structure, and work their other responsibilities around childcare, so it's when you're already doing this and it's not enough IME that it might mean something else is going on.

It's not true that the screener comes out positive for every mum, and the screener in itself is not asking about feelings of overwhelm or chaos. Besides, a screener is only a first step - a full assessment takes a lot more into account.

I've been referred to see if I "officially" have it. 3 year waiting list, but I have enough strategies to cope I think, more or less. It's peri-menopause that's made mine much more apparent.

I'm now looking for books to explain it in a more medical fashion to my DH. He is very supportive but doesn't "get" that there is a difference in the wiring of my brain and that just because I can and look okay on the outside, doesn't mean I'm not sinking. From his perspective, a lot of my coping mechanisms could be more learnt behaviours. For example, my having to see everything out on the bed because otherwise I forget what I've packed (object permanence issues) is a learnt behaviour because my DM did the same. I suspect I know where I inherited it from!

Any suggestions would be good. Most of the books are more from a coping with standpoint not a "wiring" perspective.

I recognise so much of what you say, and only started to reflect on myself when my DD was diagnosed (such a stereotype!)

firstly, middle aged women with adhd mask very naturally as you know. It’s embedded into your personality, and you’re used to being exhausted by it. Like you my brain never stops and I am constantly flooded with cortisol -jumpy, snappy, angry, frustrated.

it’s only in middle ages I’ve started to reflect on how much it’s impacted my life. For example, I’m 25 years into my profession. It’s all been spend people pleasing, copying behaviour, needing ie strong leaders as alone I get extremely stressed. I’m good at my job yet I can’t describe to others what I do or its purpose- every day is such a challenge to hold it together under constant fear of being disliked or found out- that I can’t even stand back and explain what it’s all about.

according to Chris packhams documentary adhd is under diagnosed in the uk compared to how many people would have it in an average population, so people like us being diagnosed in quick succession are undiagnosed being “found”

Is it wiring? My understanding is it’s naturally low levels of dopamine. If it was the wiring in your brain why would it be impacted by peri menopause? (Dopamine levels are further impacted by peri menopause so that makes more sense?)

There is evidence to suggest that ADHD brains have different connectivity patterns (in the prefrontal cortex for example) as well as neurochemical differences such as dopamine.

I probably use the phrase more flippantly than I should - it's easier to downplay that way.

A lot of people I know do seem to have ADHD diagnosis. It's funny as I have often thought they were more narcissistic than any particular processing issues, but they are apparently linked. If you tend to have a high opinion of yourself compared to others it might be ADHD, it's the side a lot who have it don't like to talk about because it's not as useful to explain things away... It makes a lot of sense when you see the men on dating shows all saying they have it and they are almost incapable of not being distracted by a new woman on the scene.

@OneAmberFinch what was the housework book you found found useful?

Brains aren't circuits so the term "wiring" is a bit misleading - and forgive me as my understanding is a bit rough as I am not a neuroscience expert, but I understand it's to do with electrical signals, neurons, neurotransmitters and so on.

Neurotransmitters are a bit like hormones and can impact on hormones and vice versa, so hormonal changes can affect this - that's why hormones can affect mood, energy levels and so on (as we know from puberty, pregnancy, etc).

There are various neurotransmitters thought to be associated with ADHD - dopamine is one which really seems to get a lot of publicity, although there are a lot of myths/bad explanations of this out there as well. But dopamine's main function is to do with rewards and motivation. Noradrenaline (norepenephrine is the North American name) is another one, a doctor explained to me once that they think this is why people with ADHD typically report they are good in a crisis, as adrenaline can fit into the noradrenaline receptors and do the same job.

Another thing seen as a pattern when you look at people with ADHD as a group vs people without as a group is the strength of the signals being sent around the brain, so they think that the pathways are sort of "leaky" or the signal is weak in the first place. Stimulant medications increase the strength of these signals.

Plus there is something which is related to the central nervous system, which is what controls how alert vs how relaxed we are. People with ADHD tend to be a bit on the side of too relaxed so you're nodding off/finding it hard to focus on anything a bit like everyone feels after a big Christmas lunch and a couple of glasses of wine. So again stimulants can increase arousal in the CNS which makes you more alert/awake and able to focus. Without medication most people with ADHD are constantly seeking stimulation whether that's in the form of self-medicating (e.g. caffeine, nicotine, drugs/alcohol) or following impulses (likely dopamine related) or sensory input or they get a job in a fast-paced area like a firefighter, entertainment industry, army, paramedic, sales, etc.

If you want to know more about it this is a good podcast (you can also find it on any audio only podcast source)

And I have this lecture bookmarked but in true ADHD fashion, have not actually watched it yet

I was under the impression that it’s the opposite i.e. that people with ADHD don’t rate themselves highly as they often experience significantly lower self-esteem and higher self-doubt than NT people. This can be a result of chronic struggles with emotional regulation, social interactions, and underachievement, which lead to feelings of inadequacy.

However, many people with ADHD are also high achievers, and some studies indicate that the severity of ADHD symptoms can negatively correlate with self-esteem.

I agree with a lot of what you saying. I do feel that everybody “has something” now.

But, by the same token, I also feel that I have ADHD.

I struggle a lot.

My house is a huge mess. I used to laugh when people said “I’m a perfectionist” when they looked anything but, but that’s now partly what I think my problem is.

My house is always a mess. But whereas a normal person would look at my messy living room and put the toys away, straighten the cushions, dust and give it a quick hoover, I am such a “perfectionist” I can’t do that.

I put it off and put it off as I don’t have the time to do it “properly”. So whereas a normal person would have taken 30minutes and have it done, it’ll take me days or weeks to get around to it.

When I do get around to it, I will strip all cushions from couch and put them on a hot wash. I will get the carpet shampooer down from the loft and start shampooing the carpets. Instead of dusting I will start touching up the paintwork.

This will all take hours, and I’ll then run out of steam. At this point the couch covers will be washed and soaking and I’ve got no way of drying them (no tumble dryer and washing line outside is already full of washing that’s been there for days), the carpet is damp, and there’s wet paint everywhere. Toys are not put away and are just lying in a heap.

I then have to wait for another burst of energy to sort the room again, and when I finally get around to it, I’ve really achieved nothing.

Rinse and repeat the above for every room in my house.

I will often have big plans for sorting the house out at weekends, but after initial burst of energy in the morning I’ll do nothing all day, just procrastinate. I won’t watch tv, even if I really want to, because I don’t like having the tv on during the day (can’t really watch tv when kids are about anyway as they are still young). So I’ll pretty much do nothing, just procrastinating and waiting for kids bedtimes so I can watch my programmes once they are in bed.

But by the time evening comes around, I realise I’ve wasted my day, have nothing ready for the week ahead and have to dash to Tesco for school packed lunch stuff, look out clean uniforms etc, and then fall into bed exhausted at 11pm, having not watched my tv programmes.

I just can’t seem to change.

I am lucky enough to be able to work from home one day a week but I’ve had to stop that as I wasn’t doing any work at all. I would sit at the computer and be back up, doing something else 5 minutes later. In the end I got so paranoid about somehow being found out to be skiving that I just work in the office now (although I lose focus there too at least I am physically at my desk).

I am early 40s and wonder if I am approaching perimenopause because it seems to be getting worse.