Undiagnosed ADHD.. searching for help with evaluation in WA state.

[lovelylavish]

Hi you all,

I’ve recently been down the rabbit hole of researching ADHD. I’m grateful and lucky that I stumbled across a 60 minutes interview with Trevor Noah about his depression stemming from his ADHD. I’ve struggled with depression and anxiety my whole life, and have been treating it with medication and psychotherapy the last year or so. It has helped a bit with my depression, but my anxiety is still rampant.

I’m 35 years old. After hearing Trevor’s comment, I started researching ADHD, and while I don’t have a specialists’ evaluation, looking back through my life has been epiphany after epiphany. And many aha moments. I am almost certain I have adhd, and talking to my mom, and partner of 7 years, they weren’t surprised or dismissive about this prognosis. My psychotherapist and my behavioral health doctor were also sympathetic as well, as things/my behaviors seemed to suddenly come into clearer picture.

My behavioral health doctor is going to do an hour long evaluation in a few weeks. She mentioned this is not an in-depth, often 10 hour evaluation that ADHD specialists would undergo, but at least would be a little more in-depth than our 20 min visit last week. She is not a specialist, but is knowledgeable. She can prescribe medication, but not adderol or riddillin, etc.

However, I’m already a little discouraged. My income is inconsistent because of my lack of focus and ability to complete my work efficiently, I get by paycheck to paycheck and don’t have savings. I have Molina healthcare which is a plus, but from what my behavioral health doctor has said, in-depth ADHD evaluations are very costly and don’t take Molina healthcare.

Another side-note is I live in a very rural area with not much diversity/access to different aspects of specialty health care.

Is there anyone else who lives in Washington state who has had similar challenges and has still succeeded in getting a professional ADHD evaluation?

Any help is greatly appreciated❤️

-L

[BlessedLady]

I wonder why you doctor said she could not prescribe Adderall or Ritalin ? If a doctor can prescribe other drugs. They can usually prescribe Schedule II drugs. Unless they have lost their ability to prescribe those drugs due to disciplinary action. If you have Medicaid. That might be the reason she said she could not prescribe Schedule II. It is not that she cannot. but t some state Medicaid programs are strict about prescribing Schedule II drugs to adult Medicaid patients.

Unfortunately it sounds like you will have to pay out of pocket if you want indepth testing done. Did someone tell you indepth testing was required for ADHD if you wanted stimulants like Adderall or Ritalin ?

[lovelylavish in reply to BlessedLady]

Hi blessedlady. Thanks for the reply. Those are good points! My behavioral health doctor is an ARNP, maybe she can’t prescribe schedule 2 drugs I’m not sure :/ I just want to make sure I have in-depth testing before I start taking adderall or ritalin.