I have had ADHD all my life without knowing and I feel that I have been doing fine..... until this year, the year of diagnosis. I’ve gotten past major challenges and I have intentionally always taken up so many of them since I couldn’t just stick to one focus. Although all my life I have procrastinated, I've been able to get to an outcome that would be considered normal for the world (never felt satisfying to me since I always thought I could do better).
It wasn’t until I started grad school that I really started to feel I was really struggling. Even then I never thought anything was wrong, I just thought that is just how I am. I had to leave my PhD mid way, only to return to it a few years down because I just wasn't satisfied with the feeling of having quit something that was such a big step of my life.
Now, I’m at the end of the degree and I am so close but it feels daunting because I have so much to do before I will be allowed to graduate. The beginning of the last year of my degree (or so I thought) was when I decided to see a doctor because things got really challenging. After 8 months of treatment (medication, very little CBT, and some mindfulness meditation), I feel that I am still at the same place as when I started. The pandemic and the lockdown did not help as staying at home for 3 months I did not make any progress at all.
Right now, I’m at a point when I have too much going on in personal and professional life, and need to close the biggest project of my life, a PhD. I need to write a thesis, while I’m still finishing up research, need to write and submit at least 3 publications, and so much more. I haven’t even started writing my thesis when I should have finished at least half of it, and am almost in panic mode, but still not really panicking because I get this feeling that ignoring my sense of time that I can get this done the last minute, like everything else in life. I need help on what I can do, when I don’t have time in the day to add another activity, to perform better in this crucial time. I just discovered this group (from the ADDitude podcast) as I was looking for sources that could help.
Can someone help? I know the ask isn’t specific enough but I don’t even know what to really ask help for? Convince my doctor to change my medication since amphetamines haven’t worked all this time and she thinks we have tried everything by combining amphetamines with bupropion? Change my doctor because a good doctor would potentially be able to get me the right help that at least the medication portion of the treatment could? Is medication not something that can help me at this point? Seek a therapist when I don’t think I even have the time for sessions? Somehow get organized when I haven’t done throughout the course of the degree? This is the biggest project I ever started and I really need to get this done the right way because my career, and ability to provide for my family will depend on it!
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ScientistWithADD
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I also somehow managed to excel until I went back to graduate school in my 50s. I had medication that helped, I realized that I was exhausted because everything I had accomplished had been totally through very exhausting deliberate hyperfocus supported by intense drive to prove to myself and others that I could do it. Being able to relax and lean on support (medication at first, then knowledge of ADHD, and now finding real support people who understand ADHD and its challenges) is what makes going forward possible. I, too, left a master's degree (in my case) incomplete despite a fabulous idea for a thesis. I am trying to find out how to get back to it, successfully!
Two things I think you should look into. Maybe three. First, yes go to a different provider until you find one who will really work with you and listen to you. Second, I do not know if you are female or how old you are, but I am next going to explore if hormone replacement after menopause can help. there is very little out there about this. It is going to take some doing to convince my OBGYN and primary doctor to let me try it, but I am going to tackle it. Third, find a ADHD coach or counselor. This is very hard to find, but very worth it. Just keep looking, asking questions, sending emails, and trust your own evaluation. When you find this professional, you will know, because everything will fall into place. Right now, I am in a dead end job, but I am thinking about maybe staying here because this job may allow me to do some of the things I really want to try to do. I need to get into a book that was recommended by my ADHD coach called First Things First by Stephen Covey and Robert Merill. Also really benefitted from the book, The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You Are Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are by Brene Brown.
Hi there I suggest going to an ADHD Coach, even if it’s only to help you come up with a plan. I don’t know if it’s an affordable option for you. Most coaches offer an initial consultation for free, so you can find out for yourself if and how they can help you. ADHD coaches are an incredibly powerful resource to work with individually. I sincerely wish you the best. You can do this, but we all need help sometimes.
1. Does your school have a student resource center? Well, maybe that's the wrong question -- I can't imagine a school that doesn't. LOTS of people are not diagnosed with ADHD until they leave the structure and supervision of home to go away to college, lots more don't find out until they go from coursework to independent research, thesis and dissertation, and lots of people are facing challenges since the pandemic that are new. And since it's education itself that's the challenge, schools are really used to helping students find ways to cope. Reach out, they should totally understand and not judge where you are at, and be able to help. None of what you're going through is going to be new to your school's student resource center. You are who they are there for.
2. One of my favorite tactics for moving from complete overwhelm to "I can handle this" is to step back and OBSERVE myself from the outside, as it were, not judging but just really paying attention, and taking notes -- when am I most/least stressed; what are the triggers; what time of day am I at my best/worst; how does exercise, music, meditation, medication, food, another person being in the room, etc. affect me -- etc. Also, start breaking down all the things (or the biggest thing) you have to get done into parts, smaller and smaller until starting seems manageable. Once you get started, the sense of overwhelm might shrink.
3. A lot of us suffer from an excess of inertia (that's me!). That is, getting started is harder than anything. If that's you, too, try giving yourself a really small, ridiculously small, daily minimum goal: i.e., "write one sentence." Then do it every day, without fail. If you make it OK to do only a tiny bit, but not OK to do nothing at all, then you will do that tiny bit -- and then you have tricked your brain into starting! And almost all the time, you'll keep going and get a lot more than that done. But you have to genuinely be willing to just write 1 sentence, or inertia will win. See minihabits.com/about-mini-h... (I love this guy)
4. I heard about this on a podcast and another forum member thought it would really work for her. focusmate.com/
I hope something helps. Seriously, though, try the university's student resource center. They've heard worse, and I bet they will have some help or good ideas for you.
I want to thank everyone for sharing their advise and for the compassion you all show. I really feel blessed to have found a community that understands me and I can turn to for sharing what I feel!
I really appreciate all the tips and suggestions and will slowly start implementing them. Do you guys know if coaching can get covered by insurance?
Some insurances do cover coaching and others do not. Call the phone number on the back of your card and ask, or go to their website.
My fiance who has been through graduate programs told me to pass on this advice;
1) Get a big wall calendar for each month and hang it up where you will see it every day
2) Start backwards with due date of your project(s)... you say a year so is everything due Sep 2021???
3) Break everything down into 3-4 hour increments for day with a goal for each day
4) Can you have an accountability partner to go over what you've accomplished each week??
5) Each section of your project should have a deadline so that each phone gets done by a certain time. If you need to break it into 1 page at a time, do it. There just needs to be constant forward movement.
6) Sounds like you have the final outcome firmly in mind; support of your family and better professional opportunities for you as well. So, make up a "vision board" with pictures of your loving family and you in your cap and gown, then stuffin the future that inspires you
Hope these ideas are helpful. Believe in yourself, you are obviously an intelligent person that cares deeply about your wife and children. Stay focused on the end prize and allow yourself to feel the happiness, glee, and pride you will feel when you are awarded your bright shiny new degree!!
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I suggest going to an ADHD Coach, even if it’s only to help you come up with a plan. I don’t know if it’s an affordable option for you. Most coaches offer an initial consultation for free, so you can find out for yourself if and how they can help you. ADHD coaches are an incredibly powerful resource to work with individually. I sincerely wish you the best. You can do this, but we all need help sometimes.
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