ADHD is not a quirk. It is ruining my life. I am disorganized, I am in debt, I am paralyzed. I can’t even get help; I have tried navigating the maze of finding a doctor who will accept my crappy exchange insurance but I always end up throwing in the towel. I thought I found one, once, but sike, he’s an addiction counselor who refuses to prescribe stimulant medication on principle.
Not that I’m opposed to trying nonstims again, but I was prescribed Strattera in high school and it made me so drowsy I failed chemistry because I couldn’t stay awake even with a full night of sleep. Also, bonus, his profile on the site I used to find him lied, and he doesn’t actually accept my insurance. Here’s a $500 bill for our 45 minute zoom call where I accused you of drug seeking. I got his practice to cancel the charge but still.
ADHD is ugly; ADHD looks like every chair in my apartment being full of clutter (and me subsequently freaking out because I hate clutter). it looks like brushing my teeth every two or three or five days. It looks like being able to hold on to my job as a waiter nothing else. It looks like me having the money to pay my bills, me wanting to pay those bills, and then me getting sent to collections anyway. ADHD looks like ghosting an old best friend because I’m too embarrassed to keep up with him. It looks like my partner shouldering more of the housework than is fair. And I get to look back on all this behavior, identify and accept that I am the problem, and then I get to do fuck all to fix it. ADHD looks like a horizon that gets narrower and narrower every day.
And I feel alone. ADHD is not cute. It sucks to suck.
Audhd here.
yea its rough. modern world wasnt made for us. routine is hard. i get that. trust me i do.
however. perhaps consider not attempting to fit into the world. you really dont have to. its not only exhausting, its futile for most of us. it requires us to be drugged and brainwashed for christs sake.
just do whatever the fuck you want to do, when you want to do it. life is short, and we evolved this way to experience the most of it, and we evolved to adapt to the chaos faster than anyone else can. there is use for that if you can find your various and ever changing niches.
stop pretending to be something you’re not. play to your strengths, develop new ones.
this world is crumbling anyways. dont take it too seriously. its okay to be sad about things from time to time. overwhelmed. thats life. its a bitch. but its also beautiful, and interesting. there are infinite ways for you to experience it. and we get such a short amount of time just to scratch the surface. and thats okay, thats part of what makes life so special. especially for people like us. even in this fucked up world.
my advice, which was gifted to me by my grandfather in his last words to me before dying 20 minutes later.
“get an education, because once you have it, no one can take it away from you”
and to me that meant to never stop learning, period. its the only thing thats kept me grounded in the face of existential dread (which arguably is also caused by knowing too much about certain subjects) and when aimed in a constructive direction can move mountains. or at least lead to an interesting and satisfying life. and in the end thats all that really matters.
at the end of your life youll have a million talents, a million hobbies, and millions of stories to tell about all the chaotic shit you lived through and adapted to. you’ll become a living story book, and a guide to others if you let yourself.
careers are for squares, routine is for robots. we are the most authentically human people to exist in this bullshit farce of a world created and shaped by psychopathic pedophile nutjob billionaires and oligarchs. so rebel by continuing on with the indomitable will of the human spirit. then pass the torch like a good soldier.
good luck, have fun, dont die. at least not any time soon.