Adult Attention Deficit - Experience

[trailhugger]

I carry a back pack with me almost everywhere I go that has a handful of different things in it to keep me going depending on my need.

Also...



*edited for a link to a better version of the song.

 

[XJsavage]

Fear and loathing in las Vegas! You got the feeear man!!!

 

[Macdaddy4738]

Personally, I'm a firm believer that ADD/ADHD are complete bullshit. The only reason your mind is wandering is because you want it to. Sit down and do the work. If a 15 minute task takes 3 hours, there are two possible reasons for it. 1. You're bored with the work and need a change, or 2. You just don't want to do it. Sometimes I struggle with things at work because I know it's mostly meaningless bullshit and no one will read it anyways. Man up and finish your work, don't make it some "medical" problem because it's not.

 

[jeepinmatt]

Reaching out to the collective knowledge base for some advice.

Anyone here have any experience with adult ADD diagnosis, medication and response?

Ive joked for years that my ADD kept me sane as in my job I constantly have to bounce between 15 "fires"...but here lately seems my joking may become reality. In the last month alone there have been a handful of times I can sit down to do a simple computer task and just cant focus and turn a 15 minute task into 3 hours later and still finishing up.

I had largely wrote this off as getting old and being less productive until earlier this week I was in the office with a colleague and we each had to complete the same task on two separate but similar projects. I sat down and was done in 15 minutes while I watched this guy struggle through the problem for an additional half hour after I was done. Yet put us both in an office for 8 hours and he will generally produce more than I. So its not an ability or competency issue (honestly I wish it were those would be easier to handle) its a focus and motivation issue.

Even now I sit here typing this thread when what I really want to do is head home. Standing between me and home? A 5 minute report I need to knock out but have been putting off since 12:30.

This is starting to really bother me and I have been contemplating going to a doc and asking for ADD meds and see if they help. But I hate medication, I wont take pills for a headache..or allergies usually and generally avoid doctors like the plague. The fact that I am thinking about it is a pretty key indicator to be honest.

But something is going on. I have trouble remembering anything, heck even sitting down to watch a TV show unless I am deeply interested I cant focus on enough to follow plot lines.

Ive been almost zombie like all week missing turns and day dreaming while driving.

So anyone have anything useful to share or just want to pick on my post feel free.


Heck maybe I just need to go wheeling more, maybe thatll solve it.

I actually have the same problem. I can do 8hrs of work in 2hrs, but it will take me 3 days to find the motivation because everything else is more interesting. And the less I want to do a particular task, the more interesting everything else becomes. I'm very good at focusing on things that I want to focus on, but a lot of my work related stuff can be pretty boring, and just gets backburned, hoping something more interesting or urgent comes along (and it usually does). I find it's worse when I have a big project going on at home (such as designing or building my new shop) or have some other urgent need outside of work (car needs fixing, need to research a new mountain bike, want to know what the best diesel truck is now so I can buy it in 8-10 years, etc). When I am able to focus, the rest of the world stands still and my work is very fast and very good. I have nothing helpful to add, but let me know if you find a solution.

 

[GONOVRIT]

Beer

 

[ManglerYJ]

Personally, I'm a firm believer that ADD/ADHD are complete bullshit.

I used to, too...... until I met my wife and her two kids. I've seen the power of medication for ADHD. I'm not as firm a believer for the ADD diagnosed child, but for the other, I believe. I also agree that it is one of the most commonly mis-diagnosed ailments ever and there are a TON of people that don't understand it, including a lot in the medical profession.

For lack of a better word - from what I've seen first hand is that true ADHD is more of a chemical imbalance where typical stimulants act as depressants to them and vice versa - typical depressants act as stimulants.

 

[Tradarcher]

 

[drkelly]

Personally, I'm a firm believer that ADD/ADHD are complete bullshit. The only reason your mind is wandering is because you want it to. Sit down and do the work. If a 15 minute task takes 3 hours, there are two possible reasons for it. 1. You're bored with the work and need a change, or 2. You just don't want to do it. Sometimes I struggle with things at work because I know it's mostly meaningless bullshit and no one will read it anyways. Man up and finish your work, don't make it some "medical" problem because it's not.

Do you have ADD/ADHD?

 

[mommucked]

In my experience prescribed drugs are hit and miss, some may help initially but eventually the dose must be raised for continued relief .......AND the long term "possible side effects" are often worse than the short term relief from the meds if they even help . I'm a big fan of simple traditional/natural/old fashioned medicines/cures and have better results w them than any pharmacy stuff, not including infections. Treating stress or mind problems w meds. often causes other problems.

 

[Hurley]

Have a lot of doctors on the forum, I see.

 

[drkelly]

Beer

I can't drink beer at work, but some days I wish I could.

 

[XJsavage]

Have a lot of doctors on the forum, I see.

I'm more of a shade tree psychiatrist lol. The human mind is a powerful thing. A gift in most respect and a curse in others. Studying it is something else. Once you start you can't stop, and there's no reason to.

 

[Ron]

I can't drink beer at work, but some days I wish I could.

This...

Its actually funny you say that. Frequently I work from home 1-2 days a week. The last time I did I went to a local spot for lunch and a good friend from HS was there...He has recently began brewing his own white liquor and gave me a sample. I was productive as hell. So it seems that give me a shot of liquor or a bump of speed and I am good to go...but at stock rpm I suck.

Interesting.

I see a Jenny Craig session in my future either way.

 

[shawn]

I actually have the same problem. I can do 8hrs of work in 2hrs, but it will take me 3 days to find the motivation because everything else is more interesting. And the less I want to do a particular task, the more interesting everything else becomes. I'm very good at focusing on things that I want to focus on, but a lot of my work related stuff can be pretty boring, and just gets backburned, hoping something more interesting or urgent comes along (and it usually does). I find it's worse when I have a big project going on at home (such as designing or building my new shop) or have some other urgent need outside of work (car needs fixing, need to research a new mountain bike, want to know what the best diesel truck is now so I can buy it in 8-10 years, etc). When I am able to focus, the rest of the world stands still and my work is very fast and very good. I have nothing helpful to add, but let me know if you find a solution.

Ah, this is an easy one: you have the "Hey doc, I'm bored by boring shit. I think I might have the ADHDs" disease.

 

[Paul]

Ah, this is an easy one: you have the "Hey doc, I'm bored by boring shit. I think I might have the ADHDs" disease.

Don't you need to change a diaper or something?

 

[GONOVRIT]

I can't drink beer at work, but some days I wish I could.

LOL, LONNGG running joke by the wheeling md's, fixes everything!

 

[shawn]

 

[Macdaddy4738]

Do you have ADD/ADHD?

I would bet that I'd see some minor diagnosis of it if I decided to go to a doctor about it. All over my house there are things in various stages of completeness. I've always been of the mindset that I just get bored easily.

 

[hoop]

My wife had the same problem, Mom to two grade school kids, not working outside the home but involved in Pop Warner, Girls scouts etc.... millions of things to do in various stages of completion, couldn't focus to save her soul and Hey! Goodfellas is on TV again !!! Finally asked the family phys who sent her to a specialist in Boston (we lived in N.H. at the time ) Diagnosed her after many tests with Adult ADD, prescribed some meds and fine tuned them over 6 months. He explained that Chemical imbalances can be brought on by many different triggers and affect different folks different ways. Now She manages a staff of 80+/- in a $3,000,000 dollar a year restaurant. Does She have off days? sure..usually if she doesn't take her meds at the right time. I get a kick out of people who haven't spent 7+ years studying medicine saying that its all bullshit..............I agree it is frequently misdiagnosed and parents often throw meds at "problem kids" but a clinical diagnosis in an adult is pretty accurate.

 

[UTfball68]

I actually have the same problem. I can do 8hrs of work in 2hrs, but it will take me 3 days to find the motivation because everything else is more interesting. And the less I want to do a particular task, the more interesting everything else becomes. I'm very good at focusing on things that I want to focus on, but a lot of my work related stuff can be pretty boring, and just gets backburned, hoping something more interesting or urgent comes along (and it usually does). I find it's worse when I have a big project going on at home (such as designing or building my new shop) or have some other urgent need outside of work (car needs fixing, need to research a new mountain bike, want to know what the best diesel truck is now so I can buy it in 8-10 years, etc). When I am able to focus, the rest of the world stands still and my work is very fast and very good. I have nothing helpful to add, but let me know if you find a solution.

I'm in the same boat...as I type this, I've been sitting at my office for 2 hours already surfing the forums and playing on my phone, putting off stuff that I put off doing all week last week too. Most folks it would take a solid day for them to do, but once I decide to do it, it'll take me 2-3 hours. I just find things that interest me more, and I'll procrastinate until it flat out has to get done. When I first started doing the same work, I'd rip it off in no time, as time wore on, just became boring...I mean, who really wants to do balance sheet reconciliations, or SOx testing or Quarterly Operation Reviews.

That said, I'm similar in the fact that I hate prescriptions and hate doctors. For the better part of the last decade I've been 100% homeopathic treatments. A lot of folks say it's fruity 'medicine'...and whether it's sugar pill medicine or not, I've healed quicker, recovered sooner and kept 'disorders' under control, and most doctors I have seen for an actual diagnosis can't believe it. Broken bones have healed in under 12 weeks when a doctor wanted to perform surgery that would take me out of commission for 12 months. Heart conditions I have, have improved. And yes, even diagnosed ADD has been kept at bay when I notice I start having difficulties focusing. Might be worth googling homeopathic focus enhancement or something along those lines and see what you can come up with. Worst case scenario, it doesn't work and you're no worse off.

 

[RatLabGuy]

Reaching out to the collective knowledge base for some advice...

Sorry for the delayed reply, you know I would have been on this sooner but been out w/ Scouts happily disconnected since early Fri.

Have a lot of doctors on the forum, I see.

yeah no shit

OK so here's my 2 pesos. Worth what you paid for it.

Regarding the value of meds vs not comments:
Your brain is a machine. A really, really complex, convoluted machine w/ > 200 billion electrical parts and probably around 0.2 quadrillion connections. Yep its super complex and confusing and nobody knows how all of it works completely yet - and to make it even more fun this machine changes over time and responds to things by changing itself. But its just a machine just like a car or boat or a computer.Your "mind" is just an epiphenominal manifestation of the outcome of how that machine works.
And just like all machines, sometimes things break or don't work right, either right out of the box, or b/c of some kind of change.
And, also just like all machines... natural or manmade... they can be modified or "fixed" to overcome deficits.

I think of it like this. Imagine you have a truck w/ a fuel flow problem that causes a low or erratic idle. What would you do? There are several pproaches to this. One is to go right in and adjust something to fix the flow - adjust the A/F ratio, replace a fuel pump, etc.
Another is to find a quick-fix way around it - when not moving, pop the trans in neutral and give it gas... or, complete behavioral modification and just use the truck for high-RPM applications... or, figure hey maybe its just shitty gas, I'll let a few tanks run out and see what happens... or maybe add some additive to your gas to perk it up or clear it out...

The point is you can change behavior of your brain w/ physical intervention just like a car or any other machine. The biggest difference is, we (or at least somebody) already knows how the car is supposed to work, and what all the parts are, b/c they built it... w/ human brain, its 100% reverse engineering, w/ limited option for what we CAN do to fix it.

Medical doctor = glorified mechanic, a mechanic who relies on nerds like me to tell him what we know from reverse engineering.

ADD/ADHD (my understanding is the newest version of the DSM has eliminated ADD and its just ADHD now...?) is "just" an imbalance in some of the chemicals (neurotransmitters) that disctate interaction of certain parts of the frontal lobe, which control inhibition of relevant information. (I say "jjust" b/c, as w/ all brain stuff its really quite complicated but since our intervention techniques are pretty limited for fixing it we tend to use simple models of explanation). So, this can be "fixed" by doing something to re-balance it the way it should be... e.g. get the right neurotransmitters in there... now you can do this by taking meds, or finding the right herbals remedy, or the right kind of exercise - in the end if something works its BECAUSE IT HAS FIXED THIS IMBALANCE. It dosn't matter what you do, you;re not going to see a behavioral / perceptual change how you want until & unless you change ("fix") the underlying brain chemistry... b/c brain hardware = perception.

People can argue all day about whether ADHD is "real" or whatever... it dosn't matter what the label is, what matters is just that you find a solution that fixes the problem (w/o side too many undesirable side effects). Labels are just a convenient way of communication.

So the whole point of that long diatribe is simply that taking meds to fix some deficit in your brain is just like taking insulin to address diabetes or adjusting the A/F in a car to improve its performance - no big deal, just doing what is needed to make it work right.

Now - do your symptoms indicate ADD? I don't really know... my limited experience w/ it does sound fairly close, and it's entirely possible to show up as an adult. Frankly best thing to do is go talk to a physician. A good psychologist or psychiatrist will not be quick to diagnose, but have you take a bunch of tests and answer a million questions. No harm in starting the ball rolling.
And, as several w/ hands on experience have hinted here, it can take awhile to figure out what the right med or dosage is... like up to year or trial and error.

the drugs your talking about dont cure anything

if you start taking them you will always take them

medicine is one thing.

drugs are another the fact the anyone would endorse them for someone under 18 is a huge problem to me.

thats numbing the problem.

OK I just can't let this go.
I'm sorry but what you're implying here is asinine.
First off "drugs" = "medicine" if the outcome is positive and especially if its under the guidance of somebody that actually knows medicine.

More importantly though, there is never a "cure" if it is in fact a genuine deficit. "Cure" is a term for diseases, this is not a disease.
But you have to overcome the deficit somehow, get the right neurotransmitter in there. So why not meds? They do the job.
Maybe you can get the same effect through other means (the right exercise, diet, chronic espressos, smokin' a doobie, whatever) but in the end, the thing that works will do it by fixing the imbalance. The only difference between methods is efficacy and side effects.

I actually have the same problem. I can do 8hrs of work in 2hrs, but it will take me 3 days to find the motivation because everything else is more interesting. And the less I want to do a particular task, the more interesting everything else becomes. I'm very good at focusing on things that I want to focus on, but a lot of my work related stuff can be pretty boring, and just gets backburned, hoping something more interesting or urgent comes along (and it usually does). I find it's worse when I have a big project going on at home (such as designing or building my new shop) or have some other urgent need outside of work (car needs fixing, need to research a new mountain bike, want to know what the best diesel truck is now so I can buy it in 8-10 years, etc). When I am able to focus, the rest of the world stands still and my work is very fast and very good. I have nothing helpful to add, but let me know if you find a solution.

Technically ADD is a problem w/ inhibition, not actually attention as people generally assume. E.g. cannot inhibit non-relevant information, this is what makes it hard to focus on what you're supposed to be doing. But the key is, ADD does not discriminate, and cannot just be switched based on interest or intent... e.g. people w/ ADD have trouble w/ it b/c they find even when they really want to focus on things and are really interested, they STILL cannot do it properly. That is what separates it from just poor strategizing or prioritizing your time (or procrastination)...
I do the same thing.

Ah, this is an easy one: you have the "Hey doc, I'm bored by boring shit. I think I might have the ADHDs" disease.

I would have put it a little less assholeish but hey we love you anyway

The human mind is a powerful thing. A gift in most respect and a curse in others. Studying it is something else. Once you start you can't stop, and there's no reason to.

I'll agree w/ that...

 

[XJsavage]

The best way to understand yourself is ask. Make sure to take notes...written backwards. Spend a lot of time by yourself. If you still feel you need medication then by all means take it. But you might actually be surprised.

 

[Dylan W.]

build a bro-lite truck and lets go racing, man.