I know this has to be a common thing or at least I assume it to be but whenever I hear people talk about ADHD they describe the procrastination but also mention that usually their anxiety/fear of missing a due date pushes them to do it last minute and I just don’t feel this. I never feel that anxiety about missing and assignment and I don’t get that extra motivation to do it so it usually doesn’t get done. Then when it doesn’t get done I say oh no and move on, doesn’t cross my mind until I look at my grades and wonder how this could have possibly happened.
Idk where I’m going with this but it is a behavioral pattern I noticed about myself and don’t like. I think it originated from gradeschool because I was able to get by without doing any homework so I trained myself to not care about those but thats mainly speculation.
Anyone know how to idk mitigate this? I can’t be the only one
I have ADHD inattentive and this was me before the urgency thing developed but it developed like fucked up so that it was just a source of anxiety. Dont look at it like a personal failing, you might need accommodations. I really wish that stuff existed when I was in school. It took me a long time to undo some of the ways I fucked myself up over the years. Some I’ll probably never undo. Take this seriously!
I’d love to know how to mitigate this too. It used to be the case that eventually the anxiety about not getting something done would outweigh my anxiety about doing something, and I would always get stuff done at the last possible moment. But I got too overwhelmed a while ago and it stopped working. Nothing feels real anymore. I get anxious about stuff and then immediately it stops being real and I can’t do it.
It sounds like your anxiety is triggering disassociation. You should tell someone and check in about it.
I did tell my therapist but I haven’t been able to do any of the things she suggested. That’s like a problem I’ve been having: how do you do anything to work on a problem when the problem is that you can’t do anything?
Unfortunately this isn’t a one and done type thing. Are you in the US? I had to fight like hell to get my symptoms recognized for what they are, but its easier when you are younger. I know its like a self defeating thing, but these feelings are really complex. And outside observers, even trained ones, can’t see it. Honestly I think that Mental Health Therapy, the therapists aren’t doing the job that we think they are. I don’t know how to explain it…its like these are usually very conscientious professionals, but their job has all these weird contradictory rules. The best therapists seem to be the ones who either 1. Have a specific psychiatric focus that they follow more closely than, but doesn’t contradict with, established MH practice 2. Are savvy enough to know which rules to bend, and a philosophy about why. Unfortunately you can’t know the second one until you get to know them. Do some of your own research and start using mh terminology. Find out if your therapist has a focus in the thing that you think is what you are experiencing, and make sure that they really do. Its different going to someone who has a general focus than someone with a specific focus on ADHD for example.
Anyway I’ll stop info dumping at you. I’m on a couple of non narcotic meds and I’m like way more productive. I have bandwidth for a job, and personal development, hobbies, organizing, and a social life. Its like i still have all of my strengths but fewer of the severe struggles. I don’t lose time as much as I used to, and my thoughts are much more organized.
What I did was really lean into my anxiety disorder and become a hypervigilant mess unable to relax
I do not suggest this, it’s painful and hard to undo
One thing that really helped me overcome that complete lack of a stress response and learn how to study after avoiding it until college was putting myself into the right environments for certain things. I had no issues actually getting stuff done in class but at home there’s no external motivator to getting stuff done, I learnt i’d have to force myself to walk to the library every week at the same time to get any studying done.
Works for a lot of facets of life, if I want to workout I know I have to drag myself to the gym every week because i’m not going to workout regularly at home, if I want to watch a movie i’ll go see it at the cinema because i’ll pause it every 15 minutes if I watch it on TV.
I do have a sense of urgency but it’s insufficient to actually motivate me into doing something. I would recommend trying to block out times for you to work on things in advance, but ik this can be it’s own issue. Going somewhere else to do work can help too
