Hi all, just stopping in to introduce myself. As I stated in my bio, I was diagnosed with depression over 20 years ago and have been on medication ever since. I never knew that Adult Attention Deficit Disorder existed. I came here to try to find any relationship between depression and ADD that might tell me what is happening in my head all of sudden.
Hope to make some new friends, become supportive, (helping others is what I do), and chatawhile.
I totally get everything you're saying. I wish I had an answer for you. I'm 58 and I'm still trying to find my way.
Check out my reply to unseen4. Can you relate?
I can absolutely relate. I'm working now at a job with low pay, no benefits and no pay increases in sight. Here's the kicker: I have a chance, through a friend to get a better job but I don't want to go through that whole ordeal of having to try and learn something new. It took me a while to get this. When I try to listen to what is being explained to me, it's like they are speaking a different language. I catch myself focused on their hair, the mole on their face, earrings or anything else except being able to tune in to what they are saying. So I stay at this job because I'm now good at it and it feels safe.
We are comrades, unseen4. I was Diagnosed with depression in 1982 at age 28, with a major breakdown at 33, recovery 35-45 with another break in 1999, ADD dx in 2000 and limping along since with a pending application for Social Security Disability. If I were to guess what is going on in your head, I would say it is a cotton-headed feeling where the information that goes into your brain doesn't stay there. Focus and concentration are at an all-time low. The people who know you best are asking you what is wrong and your life seems to be coming to a grinding halt. Mine did. For years I convinced myself that I just needed to rest and take some time to figure out what to do before starting a new career. That career ended up being pizza delivery; a job from which I got fired 14 years later due to the behavioral problems associated with my diagnoses. I'm 63 now, on SS retirement and fighting an appeal for my disability. Yes, it has been ugly. But I try to redeem it by sharing my experience with those who need it. Let me know if you do.
Hi Unseen4giveness, I'm winterr56 just read your post. I'm 63 and have dealing with depression most of my life, then a crack cocaine user over 20 years I stopped at age 53 so I'm coming up on ten years sober. Just sober, still experiencing trouble focusing, concentrating jumping from one thing to another, etc.. I just recently found a ADHD therapist and hopefully I'll have a good outcome. I'm more open to meds now not the upper kind like Ritalin and Adderall. I promised myself I would continue to complete the overdue paperwork I have to have ready by tomorrow. I came to this online community through CHADD I'm not familiar with posting and the last time I tried posting like this and clicked the reply button all of my replies went to my yahoo email. I hope you get this one. It's very frustrating not being able to move on to a life you were born to, but yet you keep trying. Well I'd better go now and get back on the paperwork, but wait, as always there will be something else to distract me.
Nice chatting with you and take care. Is it okay to say hello to gabesmom... on your post? It's good to talk to all, I don't feel so alone with this.
winterr56
Sure that is okay. As I was reading your reply I see alot of what you described is exactly how I feel. Also what Davidkd responded. My mind is always jumping around non-stop. So much, in fact, that I go days without being able to sleep or even rest my mind for a minute.
I am very well aware of the person I was before this began. I was happy and aloof. I think if I could just figure out at what point in my life it was that I lost myself, then maybe I could get back to good.
I am not on any ADD medication. Just the Effexor ER to treat my depression. I am currently being treated by a new doctor who has doubled the dosage on that medication so we can see if I am feeling any better. Some days I think I feel worse. And what is really upsetting is the number of people who do not think depression is a serious matter.
I wish you the best of luck and hope that we can all overcome this.
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Starting a new therapist tomorrow
