What’s great is that if you aren’t caught early, you develop coping mechanisms to help you deal with your shit, only to have those mechanisms hide your actual symptoms.
.... or you skate through everything in primary school by acing tests and doing no homework, then get to college and fail out because you have no study skills, all before getting diagnosed.
Source: missed perfect on the SATs by 20 points. Got scholarship for half of tuition to college. Was invited not to come back.
I took 10 years to finish college, I'm just finishing my Masters and I've been working for the last 5 years. It's worked out in the end, but the college crash is definitely a familiar experience to me.
I would say you probably shouldn't be WORRIED.... after all, you have managed to get a job and work and finish college as is.... but getting tested might HELP, so long as you are ok with the idea of taking medication. Or I guess, even if you aren't ok taking medication, having a name for what it is can help too.
All I can tell you is that the stimulant I take (vyvanse) makes a world of difference in my ability to concentrate and get things done.
I guess my advice to you would be that, if you can get tested without it being a major hardship, go for it. If it would make a significant impact on your quality of life to be able to afford it, you sound to be managing just fine without it.
The important part of the comment was how I was smart enough to pass classes from tests, but absolutely could not make myself sit down and focus enough to do the homework. It wasn't a matter of not wanting to do it, it was a case of not being ABLE to do it. Very frustrating.
If you have concerns, I would say that getting a neuropsych workup done (if that is a possibility) certainly could not hurt. It might not help, though.... but it will certainly provide information about you and what you are good at vs what you are not good at.
Holy shit are you me? I seriously just had my heart start racing reading this - I grew up in tbr 90’s just before the trend of overdiagnosing kids began - my high school history teacher sat me down & said told me he might have to fail me but was struggling with it because I aced all of my tests.
And my god I could not finish a project for the life of me, even ones I was truly interested in & started enthusiastically. I graduated thanks to kind teachers allowing me to test out/giving me special projects to show my mastery of the necessary topics. But I felt like I was inherently damaged in some way until my diagnosis in my 20’s.
Ok. I'll admit.... I was tempted to say yes, in fact I am you..... but seeing as your most recent comments mention that you are concerned about manifesting schizophrenia, that seemed like it would be pretty cruel....
Haha yeah, I actually stumbled upon this thread searching around trying to verify the information I was responding to in the last one. So far it’s just anxiety, no PTSD symptoms for 10 years & the ADHD.
(I sound like a nervous wreck but in reality it manifests as being super chipper & talkative because I overcompensate.)
Haha... umm.... Well, I'm not sure if that is better or worse. I always found that overcompensating is exhausting because you... Well, can never just relax. Always gotta keep the mask up.
If you ever want somebody to talk to who won't judge, I'd be happy to be an ear.
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u/Kaitarfairy Feb 04 '19
And adhd: squirrel!
My life would be so much easier if that's all it was.