I am 52 & awaiting a diagnoses. I am being tested finally in December. I have heard alot of people on here talk about being on waiting lists to being tested or to be treated. It sounds like it is a world wide issue.
This group chat helps & it is comforting that at least we are not in this fight alone. It is hard to explain what is going on in your mind to your loved one especially when your worst faults are on display for your spouse to see & then explain where your mind is in the process of making a bad decision. My husband is OCD & it makes us wonder how we have made it 10 yrs. He was also in the military so he has trained his mind to work a certain, very structured way where that are no room for mistakes. Well, as ya'll know some days seem like one mistake after another.
When we have a disagreement about anything, I often make things worse with my mouth. I can't seem to shut it off. One of the worst parts about my ADHD is rejection sensitivity. "You don't agree with me, so therefore you're rejecting me" seems to be my motto. Those of us that are being diagnosed later in life & have formed not so good habits & they are EXTREMELY HARD to break. I have always considered myself a good person & I am starting to question that. We can come across as non-caring, non-listening, disrespectful, lazy, etc. My husband is the one that suggested that I have ADHD, it never occurred to me all this time & things have gotten worse since my parents died a couple of years ago so I have had to face some difficult things about myself. He has been very supportive in this difficult time & he is glad that I am getting tested.
I don't want to use ADHD as a crutch, but I hit a wall sometimes & I act impulsively. I want to make my husband is happy & because I have always been such a people pleaser, I start doing things around the house in order to make him happy when he complaining about something. Then he gets upset with the impulsivity...it is a vicious merry-go-round that I can't seem to get off of. Don't get me wrong, there is a lot of love & support in our marriage, I just want more understanding on both sides. Our lives have been pretty stressful especially for the last 5 years due to "life happenings" so It is truly a miracle & God's blessings that we are still here together & working through issues that come up. We have read about marriages that don't last because of ADHD & I don't want us to be a statistic or at least on the bad side of it.
Thank you for the opportunity to vent!
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Jordana1995
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When I was waiting for and then going through my own ADHD diagnosis a few years ago, I had the same doubts:
"Is it ADHD? Or do I have character flaws that happen to match up to ADHD?"
Apparently, so many of us ask ourselves this question that a psychiatrist* with a YouTube channel has mentioned this in at least a couple of his videos.
*(Dr. Alok Kanojia, aka "Dr. K"; YouTube channel name "HealthygamerGG")
ADHD isn't the only condition which can cause impulsivity and rejection sensitivity, but it is the most likely. (ADHD is much more common with and possibly overlapping with other conditions with the same symptoms. Depression or anxiety could appear like that, but they are often comorbid with ADHD. Some other much more rare conditions might exhibit the same sort of symptoms.)
Have you taken a look at the diagnostic criteria for ADHD? The disorder is classified as having three presentations: Predominantly Inattentive, Predominantly Hyperactive-Impulsive, and Combined (i.e. having both of the first two).
~~~~~
Think about the impulsivity that you experience. Apparently, you've experienced it for at least the last several years. Can you recall experiencing impulsivity going back through your life?
What about other ADHD traits and symptoms?
Have you often experienced Hyperactive-Impulsive symptoms like:
• hyperactivity
• inability to sit still without doing something
• constantly switching from one thing to another
• "nonstop" talking
• likely to interrupt other people in conversation
• struggling with self-control
Have you experienced Inattentive symptoms like:
• forgetfulness
• distractibility
• inattentiveness; difficulty paying or maintaining attention
• occasional hyperfocus (focusing so much on something that you cannot shift your focus away; losing track of time because you are so focused) ...note: hyperfocus isn't a symptom used to diagnose ADHD, but is a common experience
• seeming not to listen
• misplacing/losing track of things frequently
~~~~~
I'll go so far as to add my opinion about the question of whether it's due to having a "bad character":
Have you earnestly tried to correct these issues and tendencies that you seem to experience repeatedly?
e.g. Have you tried telling yourself not to be so impulsive? Have you tried to stop yourself from it, but been unable to change?
It's your intent to control or correct behavior, not whether you are successful or not in doing so, that shows what your character really is. I believe that a person's character comes from their heart.
If you don't care about how your behavior affects others, then perhaps it's a character issue (if it's not another type of disorder). But if you do care about the impact that you are making on other people, then I would venture a guess that you are a person if good character, who is struggling with something that's difficult to control... like ADHD.
The ones that come to my layman's mind are: • Trauma/PTSD/Complex-PTSD
• Anxiety disorders (potentially)
• the Manic stage of Bipolar Disorder
• Borderline Personality Disorder (or the related Narcissistic Personality Disorder) - according to the literature, many people with a BPD diagnosis as an adult had an ADHD diagnosis as a child (and ADHD is a common comorbidity to BPD, but the reverse isn't as significant because BPD is much more rare than ADHD)
• Schizophrenia (potentially...I don't understand it very well, but I'm basing this off of a couple of people that I've known who each had a schizophrenia diagnosis and behaved this way; they might have also had undiagnosed ADHD, but I didn't know them that well)
• Drug abuse/substance abuse disorder
~~~~~
I did a deep dive into BPD, because I am fairly certain that at least one person that I am close to has it, particularly because of their impulsivity levels being high for some periods of time, but relatively low for other periods of time.
• When someone seems off-the-charts impulsive for several weeks or several months at a time, then "perfectly normal" for months or years, then randomly off the charts impulsive again...it makes you look for answers.
• A common trait for many people with BPD is an fear of abandonment (particularly when it's irrational in light of the reality of their relationship/s). This was a notable trait with the person I'm thinking of. This fear of abandonment can appear the same as rejection sensitivity, but I think that it is deeper-seated in the individual and extends for much longer periods of time.
... but all this is based on my best understanding as a layman.
ADHD is more common than most of those disorders that I listed (with the exception of anxiety disorders...I certainly hope that PTSD isn't as common as ADHD).
But it helps to have a mental health provider who is thorough, and doesn't try to sum up everything as just one condition. People are complex, layered, and multifaceted...and sometimes our disorders are, too.
Isn't the fear of abandonment with borderline more related to a specific person or a couple few specific people rather than feeling hurt and devastated and physical pain when anybody on the planet just looks at you cross-eyed?
Thank you for taking the time to give such a detailed answer and explanation which is extremely helpful to me especially as someone who is not just an AuDHDer but definitely has bipolar 4 , Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and carries the diagnosis of Borderline but isn't quite sure.
Yes, I think that the fear of abandonment with BPD is usually keyed to specific people. It might be centered mostly on family, close friends, and especially a romantic partner.
However, I think I've observed that the same fear of abandonment can be translated to others, like to teachers, work colleagues, or others.
• Then again, I might have actually been witnessing RSD and not fear of abandonment, in those instances. I know that RSD isn't limited to ADHD.
Well one big trait / hallmark of borderline personalities is they (we?) get a Special Person.If our Special Person behaves in a way we don't like it's devastating to us emotionally and psychologically.
A Special Person can be anyone like all the people you mentioned.
Another hallmark is the variability of the behavior. It's not cyclical, like bipolar disorder is. People with BPD can be triggered into experiencing issues by circumstances, and they might be difficult to be around at those times.
However, they can also be very passionate, capable, outstanding people at other times.
Yes.Although bipolar isn't always anywhere near as cyclical as that word would suggest.
Yes there are cycles of ups and downs but cyclical suggests that it's like every 3 weeks or every 3 months for years on end and it's not necessarily like that especially for bipolar 3 and bipolar 4.
Bipolar for made me irritable and cranky all the time. I had actually gotten to the point where at 35 years old I thought my true, core personality was BITCH.
They'd been telling me for 13 years that they couldn't diagnose me with bipolar until I was sober from Alcohol and other drugs for a year but I couldn't stay sober for a year because of the bipolar🤦🏻♀️😬🙄
I finally met a psychiatrist who knew that was errant nonsense and put me on depakote.
4 weeks later I had 50% reduction in irritability, crankiness and meltdowns!
8 weeks later I had 80% reduction!
I literally and actually became a different person in 2 months after 25 years of suffering and everyone around me suffering 😿.
But yeah borderline personalities do have very volatile moods and changeable emotions and inconstant thinking patterns.😿
My mom was originally diagnosed as having Depression, then as Manic-Depressive (now Bipolar 1), then as having Bipolar 2.
She actually tracked her mood carefully for a very long time and figured out that she has I think three overlapping cycles that affect her mood.
• One is a few weeks, probably in sync with her menstrual cycle. (Now that she's gone through menopause, I'm sure it's not an issue, but she might have to be on hormone replacement therapy, HRT.)
• One is annual, and after moving north by 1000 miles it got severe enough that she finally got it diagnosed: Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)
• And then there's her bipolar cycle, which I think she said is roughly 3 months.
I've gotta appreciate my mom's studious nature, to figure it out like that. (I think she could have been a professional researcher or scientist, but instead was a waitress for most of her working career.)
She is overly reactive to medications. Antidepressants above a child's dosage kick her into a manic state. Lithium kicked her down into a depressed state.
So far, the best treatment for her bipolar 2 has been: Retirement.
(I think that having the purpose of taking care of my grandma has also helped. She and her mom are very close. That makes me a bit worried to think about, because Grandma is almost 100...still sharp as a tack, but very frail.)
I'm happy for them that they have that special bond.🤗
I am extremely impressed that your mother was able to keep track like that.😯
She probably didn't do what I did which was self-medicate with alcohol and other drugs which made being able to know what was going on not possible.🙄
Retirement it turns out is very beneficial for a lot of people 😆
Having a Very Important Purpose is also very helpful.👍🏻
Interestingly enough I have the same three cycles meaning my female hormones wreaked havoc monthly before I started menopause, I get some form of seasonal affective disorder in the winter (I literally just talked to my therapist today about trying to get outside every day between 10:00 and 11:00 for 10 to 20 minutes so that I'm not super depressed in February again) and I have the bipolar for which I was diagnosed Manic Depressive in 1982 when I was 16 and then later bipolar 2 and then later when they realized there were more than two kinds of bipolar it got diagnosed most correctly as bipolar 4.
Thank you again for sharing which I appreciate.🧡🕊️🎻
A lot of times there are comorbidities with ADHD too (other diagnoses that happen more often if you have ADHD). I see people joking about having hotline personality disorder if they have ADHD and autism undiagnosed for a long time. Oct, ptsd, depression and anxiety are definitely more likely with people who have ADHD. Mine was misdiagnosed as anxiety almost 20 years before my ADHD was figured out.
I got diagnosed with anxiety and ADHD at the same time...but I was in counseling to treat feelings of anxiety and asked the counselor if she could also assess me for ADHD.
After 6 out of the 8 sessions that I went to her, she gave me the dual diagnosis. The next week, I had an appointment with my doctor, and he used different assessments (computer based ones that took about 30 minutes total), and he confirmed both diagnoses.
I think that if I had been assessed years earlier, I probably would have only gotten a diagnosis of anxiety, or perhaps depression.
For far too long, doctors tried to find any other explanation for adult attention issues besides ADHD. Finally, their mindsets are shifting.
And it complicates things with symptoms being across the board with adhd. My symptoms are quite different than my partner’s. Mine are more female typical. My step kids are more typical of a male, though he was assigned female at birth.
I just read this , and can totally resonate . And there is no doubt it’s bloody hard . Myself and wife are the same with this . I was diagnosed ASD and adhd at 47, now 50, and lost my parents to around diagnosis time , and have hit a wall as you say . The people pleasing part along with the rsd really really gets your head spinning out of control doesn’t it. Were you very close to your parents ? I know i was , and then being gone has left me feeling oh so vunerable, so I get that . My wife has her own issues , our youngest son diagnosed ASD and we pretty sure the other 3 and wife are neuro diverse , so it’s a real mish mash of feelings , people pleasing , sadness , anger , confusion .
It’s surprising with adhd how much havoc jt can cause . I never realised , so maybe if you are diagnosed it may shed some light . Do get further support if at all with it , some guidance on working through things ? It’s tricky , and sadly the support isn’t always there at all .
Be kind to yourself , and Husband !! And , so give each other space !!!!
I was also diagnosed late ( age 63) and am married to a husband with OCD. The rejection can be devastating at times, feeling like you’re disappointing everyone for not responding perfectly to every situation. Impulsivity has almost gotten me fired or at the least written up at work. I had been diagnosed about 15 years ago with depression and anxiety and have been on meds for it. However, when I had a heart-to-heart with my doctor earlier this year, she agreed it’s ADHD. The diagnosis has set me free! Finally I understand myself, and have been able to identify my symptoms manifesting as far back as 4 years old. I discovered the ADHD was the root of the depression and anxiety and am learning coping skills. My husband is more patient with me now and doesn’t take everything as a personal attack. I’m more patient with myself. Reading books on coping strategies for adult women with ADHD has been very helpful. As my husband says to me now, I’m finally comfortable in my own skin. I hope for you that you will find some peace too.
Thank you for sharing what you shared. Do you have any specific books that you found especially helpful as I also am an older woman late diagnosed with ADHD trying to learn as many coping skills as I can so I can have a better quality of life and also impact people as positively as possible
My doctor got me started with “Thanks for the Feedback: The Science and Art of Receiving Feedback Well” by Douglas Stone to help with the rejection. I’ve also been working through ADHD Toolkit for Women by Sarah Davis and Linda Hall. Also believe it or not, those short reels on Facebook that ADHD coaches post have been an uplifter. A couple of minutes invested and I feel better about myself and able to tackle the day.
Thank you I'm going to make a note of those titles and look for them.I don't have Facebook nor will I but I do check out the ADHD and autism coaches on YouTube and also have found them to be very helpful as you said.
Im the non adhd spouse but my husband was diagnosed in his 60's too, I cant help but wonder why so many people are just finding this out now? We too, survived for 25 years without knowing and looking back it all makes sense
I don't know why a man would go so long without being diagnosed TBH but for women it's because they didn't even think females could have ADHD until what after the year 2000 or even later?
By then any of us who had been alive for a while had been (often mistakenly) diagnosed with something else so they weren't looking for ADHD (or anything else).
Personally I got diagnosed with a borderline personality disorder when what I actually am is an autistic person with ADHD and Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder the latter of which I got from being an autistic person with ADHD and nobody knowing it and treating me like crap for things that weren't my fault.
It seems like people would rather think the worst of people and that we're deliberately being a pain in people's necks just to deliberately jack up their day rather than giving us the benefit of the doubt that we have a medical condition that's not our fault and we don't want to have.
so interesting! im a lated diagnosed ADHD woman n my x husband is retired military OCD!!! yes, makes for an interesting dynamic!l😜
everything u wrote deeply resonates with me.
when trying to determine if your action or lack there of is a character deficit vs adhd” ism”….. we really gotta take a close fearless look at ourselves with compassionate honesty.
there are wonderful kind people who have ADHD brains. There are also complete douchebags that have ADHD brains. ADHD is not defined by a persons “ personality”.
when you start dissecting yourself with that premise, it makes a huge difference. ❤️
I don't know if it helps, but as I've been working through my late diagnosis I have noticed that rethinking and rephraseing has helped. What is a 'good' person? Do I think that because I was told to or does it actually make sense? Does it even seem realistic? And so on. I do tend to overintelectualize too, so maybe it's too much but it seems to help sometimes.
I have Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria also so I understand how much more difficult that makes things then they really need to be.You sound like you have good character to me from what you have said in your post.
Having traits of a medical condition doesn't make us bad people or have bad character especially when someone expresses the positive things that you did like how much you love your husband and want to cooperate with him and have a great marriage and relationship.
It sounds like you're willing to look at your part in situations and not blame things only on the other person which is the hallmark of someone with a good character.
I used to live with a person that might « qualify » for OCD and I might « qualify » for adhd. We had a great deal where she would put things in order, and I would clean things.
It was the best match ever ( when we think about life at home)
For the rest, I have no solutions, but this was already making our life 70% better.
Welcome to the club. I'm originally from Miami, Florida (born and lived there until I was 34 more or less). Now, I live in Wake Forest, North Carolina. At the age of 6 I was diagnosed with adhd, learning disability, and slight dyslexia. I did go to specialised school from 1-12th grade. I graduated in the year 2000 with good grades. Then I went to Lynn University. I got my bachelors in 2004. I graduated with a 3.5 g.p.a (with honours). My major was human services and a minor in early childhood education. I didn't really understand that I have adhd until about 2 months before graduating Lynn University. I started noticing more and more the issue of not having much self respect, self love, or self esteem. There were family members that were fighting a lot in front of me and (pretty often) asking me to choose a side and then belittling me if I didn't choose their side. The constant belittling, the constant being told that I couldn't socialise in certain areas, the constant being told that I can't talk about certain things to certain people, etc, led to me becoming less talkative and/or social. I couldn't find any friends that are considered successful (meaning that their degree is in law, medicine, etc). Some people criticised the friends that I have. They wonder why none of my friends have college degrees that would lead to good jobs. I've tried to tell these individuals that since they kept telling me to not talk to certain people about certain things, to not socialise in certain areas, etc, due to that fact I couldn't find really rich/highly educated friends. I suggest that you go on line and join this website called Meet Up. It's also an app on your cell phone. There are many different groups on that site. There are groups that are dedicated to playing board games, groups that talk about traveling, groups that are about fashion, etc. Maybe there may be a group that you can join and one that your husband can join. This will help some.
I went to a so-called recovery organization for 28 years that labeled just about everything an addiction or a character defect or a shortcoming that needed to be addressed by their system or some combination of the three.
So I was trying to get rid of attention deficit traits and autistic traits with a so-called recovery system that barely works for alcohol use disorder.
Of course it didn't work because I'm supposed to have those traits or else I wouldn't be born with them.
Even if our traits help us do things that are wrong or inappropriate or hurtful or toxic or whatever it doesn't mean the traits are bad it just means that we need to pay more attention and try to respond instead of reacting more often and try to think things through as difficult as that can be.
They're not a bad character or an immoral character or flawed personality.
We're triangular shaped pegs trying to live in a world made for circular shaped pegs so of course we're going to have a little bit of difficulty.
what an amazing story! I’m so glad you are looking into it. I was not diagnosed until 38 after I left my ex of 10 years and have been with my current partner of 13 years (10 when diagnosed). Both of them have ADHD too. Mine just shows a lot differently, and my parents still don’t acknowledge my diagnosis, but that’s another story.
I would look into medications. Stimulants speed up the brain and make us more alert. The constituents work better if you have anxiety like me. I just don’t have racing thoughts and as much of a need to do all of the things in the moment like they are emergencies.
Some beginning resources for you and your partner are these you tube channels and their corresponding books (though I prefer the audio versions because they read them themselves). Adhd_love (their books are dirty laundry and small talk). The holderness family (their book is ADHD is awesome), and how to ADHD (book by same name). These have been pivotal for me to find camaraderie and learn some tricks on how to handle it, as well as how a partner can be supportive. I also love this group here on Healthunlocked. We are all learning together and are a great support structure, always building each other up and problem solving rather than tearing each other down.
Thank you for all the responses!! After reading all the posts, I will also add that I do have other symptoms of ADHD. The main ones are forgetfulness, focus & comprehension issues & interrupting others so I don't forget my thoughts by the time they finish. All of the issues (including the ones mentioned in my original post) have been going one since childhood. I have tried coping with some of these things with life style changes, writing things down, setting my alarm on my phone & work computer for different things to improve my forgetfulness.
My husband has also said that understanding what is going on with me has come a long way to him being more understanding. I was close to my parents especially my mom & they passed away about 6 weeks apart. There were alot of stressful events that also surrounded their passing that made things worse. I have also read about perimenopause and traumatic events can exacerbate symptoms. I also figured out later in life that my dad was a sociopath which explained ALOT!!! So him having a daughter with ADHD (and not knowing that this was the issue because ADHD wasn't even a thing then), doing crappy in school, not really able to make & keep friends very well, and not really wanting to be very sociable because I always felt awkward around people....let's just say, thank God my mom was the great mom that she was. Sociopath & ADHD in the same house I'm sure was pretty challenging for my mom.
I am hoping to get some helpful tools & not just jump on medication. I am already on other meds for other non-related, non life-threatening conditions, so a more natural approach & having a good support system would be best for me.
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