Sorry for the negative post but this disorder is genuinely terrible. I was diagnosed a few months ago and from the report I received it seems like I have an extremely bad case of it.
I lost 8 percent of my final grade in an operating system class because I submitted the wrong file.
Fine, I have syncthing setup between my desktop and laptop so I’ll just check if the assignment is on my shared folder in my desktop. It’s not.
Ok, I’ll turn on my laptop and grab the file itself. Oh, I have a boot error and now I need to open up the recovery environment to see if the hard drive is even being recognized.
It’s not. Now I have to open up the laptop and reconnect it.
At this point it’s been 30 minutes of me scrambling to get my laptop up and working again and I found the damn assignment there. I emailed my professor and I’m praying that he reevaluates the assignment because the earlier submission had nothing on it. It was just the default assignment.
None of this shit would have happened had I taken just one second to check over what I submitted a month earlier.
I hate reading articles pertaining to ADHD as if it’s some quirky condition that just takes a little bit of time and medication to work through. Its not. I have to constantly remind myself that I’m even conscious in order to function at all, and now I have to sustain extra mental effort to do a relatively hard task.
The only thing that keeps me going is my boss saying “nice work” when I diagnose an issue successfully. It feels infantilizing, as if he knows there’s something going on with me that’s making it hard to cope with the demands of life but “atleast he’s trying his best, atleast he shows up to work, this customer said he had a friendly attitude”.
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My therapist recommended a book about how ADHD can be a “superpower,” but as I read the book I noticed that nearly every single example they gave of some famous person that “leveraged their ADHD into success” was rich to start with.
Like, it obviously wasn’t ADHD that made them successful, it was generational wealth - classic “pull yourself by your bootstraps” BS. I couldn’t even finish the book, because it was just making me angry.
Out of curiosity, what was the book?
The ADHD Advantage
Disclaimer: I only made it like 2 chapters in, so it might not be fair of me to discredit the book.
Thanks! I sometimes like to look at clearly bad examples as a “how not to explain things”
40 Ways to Maximize Misery does this really well, intentionally.
There are only a few symptoms of ADHD that Id consider useful:
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Novelty seeking. If you are able to explore and experiment i.e you are financially secure and/or well connected, this can make someone a great scientist/artist etc. But as other people noted, a lot of this is the result of having the freedom to do more things. If you cant explore or experiment, it’ll just make you feel trapped.
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Greater capacity for creativity. Creativity comes from allowing your mind to wander and jump from one thing to another and thats basically pure ADHD.
That said, ADHD is classified as a disorder for a reason. It can theoretically have positive traits but no one jumps through the hoops to get diagnosed, goes through therapy and takes medication to treat it because things are going better for them because of it. ADHD can be, and often is, debilitating. It can cripple your social life and cause you to either jump from job to job because you are bored to the point of physical suffering or be fired if it isnt controlled. And because emotional dysregulation is common, you are probably going to be emotionally exhausted or even outright traumatized. And of course, school is going to be harder for you than everyone else at some point.
The one thing that is super handy for me about ADHD is that I tend to fall into fits of hyper focus, and I like learning, so contrary to what many people have said, ADHD makes me potentially a better student.
I don’t have another me without ADHD to cross compare it with but the fact that I can easily sit down and read a 400 page textbook from cover to cover in a couple of hours and retain the majority of what I’ve read has been incredibly helpful.
I’ve always thought I don’t have ADHD because I love learning new things and didn’t have problems in school. I was lucky enough to like most subjects. For the few I didn’t like, such as geography and economics, I got OK grades if I just briefly skimmed the textbook before the exam. More recently, the fact that sticking with a topic is hard, that I simply could not concentrate at all on a live video instruction that I was supposed to do with my colleagues (it just went too slowly) and that I keep “overtalking” even when I know people are not interested, started to add up. Also household chores. Really realy difficult, much worse than actually difficult problems such as physics or debugging.
I feel like to be the way you are, there must have been something that conditioned you to feel like reading and knowledge acquisition is fun.
I enjoy learning and getting a full understanding of things, but I can only really do it by videos or projects. Reading is super difficult for me
I can read, but the comprehension from what I’ve just read is nearly impossible due to racing thoughts. Like read a paragraph 5 times and still be thinking about whether the neighbor has mowed yet and not remember what was read so I do it again. Wash, rinse, repeat when it comes to reading comprehension.
I would add being a few steps ahead of most others in the group, project etc because of all the over thinking you’ve done instead of sleeping or completing other things.
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ADHD makes you work 2-3x as hard all the time about everything you care about so when compared to a regular person we are fucking superstars at working our asses off just to get along.
Unfortunately nothing is measured in effort and caring alone. So until you also get good at whatever it is you’re doing, you don’t get any notice. So we appear from the outside to go from okay to amazing at things pretty quickly and faster than other people, but it’s really because we’re either working 200% or not at all.
Don’t sweat the grade. You’ve now burned into your memory this failure and you will have an easier time remembering to stop and check your files for that kind of error before submitting. I’ve been in the workplace 20 years now and I have 1000 past disasters whispering in my ear every time I do something so my work is exemplary compared to my coworkers and I look like I have a superpower. I just have a lot of experience failing first.
The book ADHD 2.0 calls this out. It’s like “you may hear that ADHD is a superpower. It is not. Anything that you can do with ADHD can also be done by neurotypical people. Thinking like this makes it harder for people with ADHD to accommodate their limitations.”
hahaha superpower.
more like monkeys paw wish.
I wish I could understand many complex things. Granted, but you don’t get to choose them, and their relevance is rare.
I wish I could notice small details no one else could. Granted, but you can’t analyze them, and each thing triggers your anxiety, hundreds of times a day.
I wish I could specialize in something. Granted, at least until the dopamine kick ends.
I wish I had motivation to do things. Granted, but it’s anything other than what you need to do.
I wish I had super hearing? Granted, but the doctors will grow concerned because your ADHD meds can cause psychosis.
I wish I had great memory. Granted, but you only recall images and never a conversation or video.
This is beautiful and just a perfect description. Even though this sucks day to day I will say very rarely but sometimes, this can spin to our benefit. I recently had an electrical contractor fuck up some work I needed done…well, that’s an understatement my entire home needed to be rewired, and I wanted wiring so I didn’t have to keep charging my doorbell camera.
Now my mind goes thought everything as it normally would, I pay large amounts of money and I’m told everything is done. Well my doorbell camera isn’t charging. Out of the entire house that’s all I can focus on. I have an endless list of stuff that needs to get done but I want my doorbell camera to have power. The guy adds the wire for the doorbell and I’m happy. Until I see it isn’t charging. Trace the wire and it isn’t connected to anything, talk to the guy and he gives me some excuse, it’ll be done soon. Wait when I followed the wire for the doorbell I didn’t see anything connected to my roof above my bathroom. Okay they also didn’t install the exhaust fan correctly.
Now my house still needs 80% of a total renovation but he didn’t fix the doorbell and I just don’t want to keep charging it. So I’m scared of messing with any electricity, which is why I paid someone to do my electrical work. But maybe I can just hook up a doorbell. Well a weekend of researching and I still am not sure how to do it, but I found a copy of the national electric code because I think the exhaust fan is supposed to be going up through my roof.
Long story short the guy didn’t do half the work I paid for. I now have a log of every wire that was run, every junction box that was placed, every switch, every outlet, everything, including if it is up the code of the exact code that it is violating. Along with a note about the expected electrical load, that should be on each circuit, how much is can candle and how much more I can add to still be within code for continuous load. I also have the manufacture date of every wire that was placed and found a bit of damage to an exterior and a door wall that wasn’t there and found it caused by the contractor that are both is areas I said do not touch.
So now, I have all this information and if I am successful in suing him I will have gotten a great deal on having the house rewired considering I now know how to rewire an entire house and have improved a few circuits in my house, but I’m not an electrician so I can’t actually do anything with this information. But here I am on lemmy writing about this instead of doing what I planned on doing today with no idea how to actually sue someone and an existential dread of trying to figure out how to or if I should hire an attorney.
It’s great. I mean awful… well actually both, but also neither.
man I followed that entire story like it happened in my own head. maybe neurodivergent isn’t the right term. maybe we’re neurocohesive and everything sticks together
Damn! You hit the nail on the head! Thanks for putting this into words
There’s this movement nowadays that tries to spin every bad thing into a good thing, to the point where people are proud of having ADHD, autism or mental illness. I mean it’s great that you accept yourself, but to be PROUD of having a mental health issue us just weird
I can kinda understand Autism, to an extent. Certain forms of high-functioning autism - like the one I have - are more akin to mild learning disorders. Deliberate practice and effort can mitigate a great deal of the issues.
On the other side, I’ve seen people with more extreme forms of the condition and I can’t imagine having to deal with that. I know I can be difficult to deal with and I work really hard to try to mitigate my shortcomings with others - especially people who don’t know me well - but I pale in comparison to the difficulty of people with more extreme forms of Autism.
In this way, I think ADHD and Autism are probably similar - there’s a spectrum of impact the condition has. The milder forms of the condition may actually feel like a superpower to those that shape themselves to utilize their quirks in their favor. The problem arises when all forms of the condition are considered beneficial when they are demonstrably not.
Hell, even I have problems that no amount of learning can ever overcome. You can’t exactly teach yourself how to pick up on the subconscious body language queues that most people just know inherently. I’m totally blind to that stuff and it makes intense conversations incredibly difficult and a little terrifying.
It’s nice that there’s a community of people out there who suffer from the same things you’re suffering from but it’s annoying. You shouldn’t be proud of having any mental disability. It’s just that, a disability, and most of us would be far better off if we didn’t have this curse. It’s nice that I can hyperfocus when I really need to. I can study for exams & certifications last minute and still pass, but its not a sustainable strategy. People with ADHD are significantly more likely to live drastically worse lives than neurotypicals.
Some people have made their ADHD (or “neurodivergence” more broadly) a core facet of their identity and worthy of pride and praise instead of an issue to be managed like diabetes or something.
It’s a coping strategy in reaction to all the negativity they’ve endured. So they go a step past acceptance into “actually no, it’s a good thing!”
Sorry bro, it isn’t. And the more severe it is, the more clear this becomes. Life demands certain things of all of us that require executive function and the side effects of ADHD like creativity and hyper-focus, are not worth being unable to remember to pay your bills, hand in your homework, or complete basic household tasks in a timely manner.
We give ourselves grace, we love ourselves as we are sure, but we just can’t start pretending our farts smell great or we lose all touch with reality.
I was diagnosed with ADHD as an adult, and then pursued a psychiatrist to oversee my treatment, who determined I didn’t have ADHD.
The way he described my situation made the “ADHD superpower” meme make more sense than anything I’ve ever read. I’m gonna butcher it but I’ll do my best to share:
There are structural differences in the brain that contribute to a person having ADHD, but the structural differences themselves ARE NOT ADHD. The last D in ADHD is “disorder”, and there are a whole bunch of external circumstances that mental health professionals use to determine whether or not you count as “disordered”.
You can have an addictive, impulsive, obsessive, stim-hungry brain and not have ADHD.
Many children develop habits, coping strategies, or other accommodations that allow them to “overcome” the weaknesses that come along with these brain structure differences.
This is the situation where ADHD looks like a superpower.
In my case I have a very, very easy time slipping into flow state. When I’m intensely focused on a task I am time blind, I often don’t respond to questions or acknowledgements, and I have an intense temper if I’m interrupted. So I’ve used timers and meditation/CBT to manage those drawbacks.
By comparison most people I know have a difficult time motivating themselves and accessing flow state. So to those people, especially when they DON’T see the extra work I do, it could look like I have a sort of super power.
It’s not a super power, my brain just works differently and I’ve come up with ways to manage the problems and use it to my advantage.
CBT as a coping mechanism
Oh god, ow
spoiler
\s by the way
lol. I finally see myself in this thread. Timers are king.
I was diagnosed at like 8. Grappling with adhd’s weaknesses is a journey that never ends! Glad to see others cope in ways I do.
I just started meditating and I can’t believe it took me so long to find it. Only a week in and I feel it’s going to be a game changer.
Out of curiosity, how do you leverage meditation?
Superpower is a stretch. It’s more that if you can understand your ADHD you can maybe find jobs/pursuits that match up better with it.
My gf has ADHD and has found that the only way for her to stay engaged is to be in a situation of high impact/high complexity/high urgency. ADHD isnt always inability to concentrate, its switching back between that and hyper-concentration, often involuntarily, so finding an environment that fits that has helped her.
She works at the same company as me in medical software (im a dev were pretty opposite) and basically puts out customer fires. Its highly urgent and impactful (medical issues need to be fixed ASAP) to keep her engaged and complex enough that it doesn’t get boring or monotonous. She’s really fucking good at it and makes good money, but it does come at a cost. Its pretty stressful but she acknowledges this is the type of thing she can best excel at. And in other areas that arent like this - like in her personal life - she’s always slipping and needs other people to help her out (I’m pretty organized and can assist there).
I’d recommend the book ADHD 2.0. The authors, who also have ADHD, kind of echo what we’ve seen. One of them calls it a curse as the only careers that keep him engaged are stressful and relentless. But its what he does.
They had a pretty good analogy - ADHD is like a car with a super powerful engine but no breaks. You can do some things better than other people but its incredibly easy to get way off track faster than you can blink, so its important to understand how yours works and have the right guardrails in place in your professional and personal lives. And of course meds help a lot too.
That’s the problem though. I’m really good at emergency dispatch and I can do a lot of multitasking but I’m at a point where at almost 40 I need a long break if not retirement. Unless I can do my job 4 hours a day and sleep a lot more lol.
Im already in my mid 40’s. For me it helps to have a solid maximum cap of 4 things to juggle at a time. 2 is good 3 is great, 4 is OK but only 1 or more than 4 is looking for trouble.
Can you give an example of what things you juggle?
It varies quite a bit. People management, creating documentation, architecture, coding, problem solving etc. I make pretty broad jumps so it helps with resetting my focus to a new challenge. I’m a department head so it gives me some freedom in what I do. I still have the hyper focus days as well where I ignore everything but the task at hand but those are harder when you get into people management.
Damn can’t imagine. Hope you can find a way to get that break
I think part of it is they only see intense amounts of work pulled out of thin air under pressure, they don’t see the internal struggle that led to leaving everything to the last minute
I saw a great response to that on this community (or on Reddit, can’t remember). Sure, ADHD is like a superpower. It’s like being able to fly, except you can’t choose when you start flying, how fast you fly, which direction you fly in, or when you stop flying.
One thing I am really good at is getting shit done miraculously quickly.
You know, because of all the years of experience procrastinating and having to work my ass off quickly to make it look like I’m not debilitated. Lol
So when emergency projects come up at work or timelines are laughably aggressive, I’m all “I got this” 😎
To be clear, I don’t cut corners or do the wrong thing. I do things by the book just fast. I know how to pull out the stops and get the help I need quickly. Ok sometimes I might schedule the review a little late but only after checking with the main stakeholder. To do all that you have to have built am good reputation for quality, thorough work and be empowered and authorized to make some decisions on your own and whatever.
Other than that ADHD is a curse.
Nobody does, it’s a white lie so people don’t feel as bad about being born with irregular brains.
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Advantageous irregular traits are still irregular.
I mean I wouldn’t call it a super power. but I’m working as a AV tech guy and the more stressful an event gets and there’s hundreds of things going on at the same time, the more I’m becoming calm and tackle it waaay better than all of my colleagues. so I made (at least in this regard) peace with it, to know that I choose the perfect job for it/ me.
Why does this happen? I feel like the stupidest person in the world 90% of the time. Log into work and our PostgreSQL server is about to fall over. I don’t know PostgreSQL, I didn’t setup the server and I generally don’t have anyone on to help me, but I manage to execute a complicated fix before it implodes. Then I go back to forgetting where I put my phone down every thirty seconds.
I just got diagnosed a year and a half ago or so. Reading other peoples stories has really helped me reflect on the past and put every thing in context.
I think part of the challenge we face is a larger hurdle to get engaged with a task. So we either need something very interesting or stressful enough to capture our attention. But once it has our attention, it tends to have our full attention. Also we so frequently have to solve problems in a rush because we put it off until the last minute we are familiar with that mode of operation.
Yep, at work I’m the shit when it comes to putting out fires. I’m really good at it. I cannot stand most of the day to day, but when things break, guess who the first person they call for finding answers is. Hint, it’s me.
ADHD is thought to be caused in part by a deficiency of dopamine and norepinephrine in the brain. Dopamine is often thought of as the “feel good” neurotransmitter but it is actually a lot more important for motivation. Norepinephrine is responsible for fight or flight responses to stress/danger. Which is likely why anything that increases those two neurotransmitters helps us with ADHD to feel more neurotypical. eg. stressfull situations (norepinephrine) and fun/engaging activities (dopamine)
I think the people who have mild ADHD symptoms are just trying to find a positive, but for those of us who have deeper issues it can seem like an insult when people talk about it in a positive way.
I wouldn’t call it a superpower by itself but I have definitely learned how my brain works to my advantage. Programming is a perfect example, I have found that my brain makes connections that others do not when writing code to solve a problem. I have also found that I am able to work through large complex problems when troubleshooting as well which has definitely been a bonus.
Over the years I have been able to get myself to form habits that make me check my own work or strict work so it’s impossible to miss something. For example, working in and with infrastructure automation etc ended up being a fantastic fit for me because I can hyperfocus and make the automation run flawlessly and then I don’t have to worry about using it because I already know it works.
Definitely anecdotal and might not apply to you but hope it was at least a little helpful. You are definitely not alone either, those types of things absolutely happened to me all of the time when I was in school. Thank the computer gods for version control, code linters, and unit tests 😃
In the same vein, I find that even many other programmers without ADHD find the coding process to be tedious, which is perfectly understandable (a lot of it is just sitting there typing known solutions rather than solving new ones). Somehow, I am perfectly suited to handling certain tedious tasks because I can somehow focus on the task while also being somewhere else inside my head; eliminating the feeling of boredom.
The problem is that I have no control over this ability. It happens with some things and not with others and trying to force it is futile.
Well said, after many years I learned that if I just do what it wants to do then it’s way easier for everyone. I have been lucky (and intentionally worked toward) to have a career that lets me work whenever and wherever I want and management that doesn’t care as long as the work gets done so that has helped a ton. I also have recognized and communicate to my managers that while I do like money it is boredom that will make me quit the fastest so bring me all of the interesting and “impossible” problems and I’ll be a happy engineer hah.
Coding is tedious?
Isn’t that the best part?
Like I make words on screen do things in the magic smoke box and people pay me
