Looking for Help

[Anonymous]

So this is my first time posting. I had seen the film awhile back but hadn’t really given much thought over any of it until recently.

I was given a diagnosis in early teen years off ADD with out hyperactivity. I’ve always been a constant day dreamer and of course at the time they started treatment with therapy and Ritalin. It worked well my GPA went straight up to a 4.0 and stood there for about 2 years before it started falling again.

This resulted in increasing my medication in my mid teen years in high school. I would sit and class feeling strung out from all the meds (I no longer remember the exact dosage.) but i would take water release twice a day, along with extend release, and bynedril at night to help me sleep. I remember sitting in art class in senior year feeling cold all the time and itching my arms (sometimes until they would bleed.) at that point i had become fed up with the entire idea of ADD and decided that this was some form of mental control to take creative people who think differently and make them like the general population. Angry, young rebellious I flushed all my meds down the sink and told my parents it would be a cold day in hell before I ever took it again. Ended up going threw some nasty withdrawl symptoms along with it. My grades pummeled to hell but no one noticed really because my folks went threw a divorce the same year and I won a bunch of Art awards threw scholastic and even had work hang in the white house in D.C. However my life behind me was crumbling, drugs, and booze became my new medication with out me really realizing it.

After graduation I did manage to clean my act up in go to school, however I never finished because if it wasn’t interesting I was bored. I would get up go to the bathroom and never come back to class, or not finish work. Sometimes I would drive all the way to class and just never go inside. Friends would joke about if I was going to show or not, or finish a class. Some of my professors would pass me here and there because they said I was to bright to do this to or in my Art professors case to talented. I remember one passed me though i had missed 13 assignments, and 2 weeks of class. Given all these breaks i still managed to stop going all together.

10 years later I’m realizing that all the talk that I would grow out of it was nonsense and it has become a burden on my entire life. I’ve put myself in a ton of unnecessary debt spending impulsively. I constantly fight with family members and my girlfriend, who have to deal with my ups and downs, short temper and forgetfulness. I’m good at my current job but make mistakes because I sometimes miss details or loose paperwork and have to redo it, sometimes several times or care sly figure out finances with the wrong period of times numbers ect.

My father has become very ill recently, at the same time I’m prepared for a promotion and i’m completely freaked out that I’m going to make some mistake or miss hear or completely miss some important detail a doctor tells mes. I have anxiety that I’m going to make a stupid mistake at work that will make me look like a fool or worse yet expose how much i have to rework things ect. or get fired.

I don’t talk about how I feel to anyone,. The few times I’ve told my girlfriend anything I’m not really sure she understands. I recently told her I was thinking about seeking treatment for Adult ADD and went over a questioner with her of symptoms and if she personally thought I had them and it was a mistake because I walked away feeling hurt.

I’m feeling pretty stressed out about even going into the doctor, though I have a normal check up appointment with him later this week and think I’m going to talk to him about it. The whole thing makes me think a lot about my childhood and teen years and makes me feel really emotional and upset.

I guess I’m just coming to terms that its a real thing, and I want to get my life back together, and am sick of setting myself back. I’m trying to come to terms that just because the nightmare i had growing up doesn’t necessarily have to be that way anymore because this is myself going to a doctor and not a parent telling me to take my pills or asking me if i had taken them or what not. I’m hoping in over a decade that treatment options are better and /or medication treatment has made progress. Any Advice would be most welcome.

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[Tiddler]

Hi

I understand so much of what you’re saying. The part about finding seekign diagnosis difficult because of dragging up the past particularly rang true for me. However, this is one thing that has really helped me. I had to do it a few times – talk at length about my history – and it’s helped both put it into a framework for me and helped me see how much of what has happened was outside of my control, particularly through childhood.

With time awareness and memory issues being a problem, putting the past into some kind of coherent order is difficult but a skilled doctor can help fit it all together and the bad stuff is ‘out there’ now not cluttering up my head. I’m starting counselling next week which I’m looking forward to.

There’s interesting information about treatment options in the Barkley Adult ADHD book and I notice that some of the medication can be given in patches or other slow release methods that prevent peaks and dips through the day.

Good luck. And welcome!

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[Anonymous]

Thanks. I felt sOme relief just typing this out as it was the first real attempt at puttIng any structure to all of the feelings and thoughts I am having

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[Robbo]

<<” at that point i had become fed up with the entire idea of ADD and decided that this was some form of mental control to take creative people who think differently and make them like the general population. Angry, young rebellious I flushed all my meds down the sink and told my parents it would be a cold day in hell before I ever took it again. “>>

That and the rest of your reality is heartbreaking, I’m so sorry you didn’t have more solid support, you’ll find it here, and find some near you with info from here. Support is what we have here at totallyadd. I never would have graduated high school if my English teacher, and maybe a few others hadn’t “passed” me in the same way as you in college. I felt cheated… you might be the only person to understand that cheated feeling. I graduated functionally illiterate. I’m sure lot’s of folks in this camp have felt that same awful feeling of being given up on. Handed off like a hot potato… I hope it’s not exactly like that for you. It hurts a lil to think about because in my life now. I sometimes feel like a hot potato trying to get into volunteer jobs!. ridiculous, but true. I work at forgiving a lot. I can’t let myself stay angry at our health care system for not knowing how to help me. Ignorance is not a crime. I did get injured by it. Healing me is my responsibility.

Megalomantic,

This might sound like doctors orders, but I ain’t no doctor. Just been hangen out here for a while. Great post first of all, n second. Please stick around and watch the videos here. Dr. Jain’s are great!. and read his blogs too. When you find people in the forums/topics you can relate to, click on “member” just below the name, that’ll take you to the persons profile, and a list of threads they posted on. Also click on “favorites” in a persons profile. Ya probably already see a lot of what I’m writing about. This is a short cut.

You can click on “ADD to favorites” at the top of each thread, there’s a big blue star there to catch yer attention. That makes the thread easier to find in your own profile next time ya come back. Check out the Strengths video first maybe. [these are just suggestions] And be sure to watch plenty of Ricks rants to take a break from reading. He also makes excellent points about coping with ADHD. Makes it not boring. Very not boring.

http://totallyadd.com/your-personal-strengths Watch this one a lot. I have a selective memory, It refuses to remember the stuff that makes my life better… doesn’t make sense, can’t figure out why. So I just watch ones like this multiple times.

http://totallyadd.com/forum/profile.php?id=86 Dr. Jains profile, it has a list of his posts and lot’s of blogs. Lot’s of help there.

http://totallyadd.com/label-part-2/ Great!!! Funny!! Helpful.

Good luck, you’ve come to the right place. Invest plenty of time here, n maybe get some exercise too, you might have some excess energy/anger/frustration that the exercise with offload. In fact. I’m gonna put on my shoes and go for a lap around the block myself right now.

BBL

Peace

5-5-12

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[Robbo]

If you have kids, or want to. Here’s a short look into the grief you can experience if you don’t get treatment. Treatment is much more than medication. Medication can sometimes be the only thing that makes treatment possible.

Treatment, is therapy, group therapy, education, HARD WORK, following the directions other people similar to you, have given you here and in counseling.

Do life different. We cannot approach life like “other people” we are not like “other people” We are good people though. Never forget that.

This is one of many video’s out there. I recommend the ones here on totallyadd. But youtube can sometimes have good ones too. I got to the last one after watching this one http://totallyadd.com/he-can-focus-when-he-wants-to/ then this one http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMikx-vjgKc&feature=player_embedded then typed “adult” and clicked on the “adult add” guess that the youtube search feature guessed I was looking for. Got this http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=adult+adhd&oq=adult+&aq=5&aqi=g10&aql=&gs_l=youtube.1.5.0l10.194515.197323.0.201257.6.6.0.0.0.0.263.671.5j0j1.6.0…0.0.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeeN8BwDQR4 picked this one http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeeN8BwDQR4 from a big list. Cried a lot, then came here to share all this.

Consider getting some complete treatment Megalomantic. The name you chose for your identity here speaks very loudly of a person ripe and ready for this community. The grief that last youtube video triggered was very short. I forgive myself, I’ve done extremely well considering the big picture of my life. I’ll bet you have too.

For many years I’ve answered “I’ve never had it so good” when people say “how are ya doing?” It has never been more true. I used to almost always say that as a joke, then mutter something like “you don’t want to hear the truth do you?”. Because clowning around is an excellent way to avoid the real grief that we go through without treatment.

Helping you helps me. Hope to hear back from ya Megalo.

5-5-12

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