This is when you discover checklist and day planners
Sadly not a very good solution for many suffering with ADHD and, no offense, one that a lot of us are really tired of having pointed out. We are aware that they exist. If they magically fixed us we wouldn’t be here.
I have ADHD and am simultaneously working full time and doing graduate school and keeping lists/day planners is essential for me. I have a million things going on in my life and I would be completely lost without them. I honestly don’t buy that they are “not a very good solution” for a lot of people with ADHD. If you have a smartphone in your pocket, you can install a checklist app on it. You can keep notepads at home to write down daily/weekly/whatever tasks on it. And you can buy a yearly planner-style book where you can write down daily and monthly tasks in advance and as they come up. Being prepared for life takes work.
It doesn’t matter if you don’t buy it. You don’t represent everyone with ADHD because it’s not the same for everyone. You should be well aware of this. You sound a lot more like people that don’t believe in ADHD at all than someone who suffers from it tbh. It’s ludicrous of you to insinuate that people just aren’t working as hard as you.
They forgot the ultimate weapon…
STICKY NOTES EVERYWHERE,
so you can never forget, and you get to look crazy!
Don’t forget,
WRITING ON YOURSELF!
Just for a little extra pezas on that tattoo you never got finished.
OH SHIT, DEPRESSION HAS ENTERED THE RING WITH THE CHAIR; OOOOOOH, HE NEVER STOOD A CHANCE!
Based on this diagnosis, I have ADHD, despite not having trouble concentrating on things, just hard to remember things.
Is it possible that I have ADHD but only while driving? Opening the door of my house often triggers what I supposed to get on the way, kids included.
What really scares me is that I don’t meet the classical medical criteria for ADHD, but I relate to these memes like a motherfucker…
The main thing to remember about these diagnoses is that you don’t have the disorder unless it disrupts your daily life.
A lot of people have a lot of symptoms of some of these disorders without having the disorder itself.
I mean some of us have become experts at not letting it disrup life as we had no choice. But my therapist says I’m all kinds of adhd she is baffled I never went to a shrink before. Nothing has to affect your life not even hallucinations and lack of short term memory. You pretend to be like every one else and smart phones do the rest.
I’ve had some time to think about this, and honestly at times it does disrupt my life. There are many examples in my life, which some of these memes hit really close to.
When I say I don’t meet the classical medical criteria, I meant that I don’t meet all of the multiple criteria necessary for a diagnosis. But some of that could just be from my upbringing. For example, I don’t have the complete lack of impulse control that seems to be almost a requirement for diagnosis. I also was constantly browbeat and ridiculed for my lack of patience as a child, and had to develop ways to avoid the constant criticism. I learned patience as a coping mechanism.
I am affected by my lack of planning ability. I’ll get the job done, but it’ll always take longer because I didn’t account for many different things. People constantly comment on that, because to them it was obvious how it should have been done and they can’t understand why I just didn’t do that. I try to control my budget with diligently developed spreadsheets, but it often goes off the rails because sometimes I just need to buy myself something to satisfy the itch when I’m stressed. I had serious boredom problems when I was in IT and stuck in front of a computer 8 hours a day, which might partially explain the 2-3 year layoff cycles. I loved developing code, but I hated working on the same program for more than 6 months. I also hated doing tech support with a passion, which I got stuck doing for over a decade.
I’ve just tried to pivot and work around things the best that I can. People have talked about it like it’s living life on hard mode. But it’s the only way I know how to live. It’s barely holding together with Duct Tape, bubblegum, and a whole lot of hope, but I’ve gotten this far in life like that. My fear is that disrupting that to try to find a new path might completely tear everything apart.
Always when I need more toilet paper rolls in the bathroom
Sometimes it might not be days later but weeks or months that I finally remember. At least it feels that way, I’m a bad judge of the passage of time.
