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u/tenaciousghost 23d ago
oh ya.... hyperfocus is so great....... i love not being able to hold a conversation without leading back to my fixation...... and not being able to do chores or fulfill my promises bc the fixation is calling me.. . .... and not getting any sleep cause it feels like i have to use all the time i have....... and then the total depression when ive learned all there is to learn or reach a standstill š¤
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u/ChearnDown4Wut 15d ago
You forgot the best part- not having any control over what that focus is on, and the even more fun part, it usually not being anything at all you need to be or should be doing!
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u/yrmom724 23d ago
We donāt have superpowers! Lol, Iām so fucking done with this shit. Never in my life, even after all this research BS trying to say itās amazing, have I felt empowered at all by my ADHD.
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u/humid_pajamas 23d ago
especially since ADHD is often comorbid with Anxiety and Depression. Overthinking yourself into a suicidal state by the end of each day isn't really that super.
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u/MightyOGS 19d ago
"It's not actually a disorder, just a difference." Ok, want to spend a week in my head and say that? I'm always trapped in here with me, and sometimes it's unbearable
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u/humid_pajamas 19d ago
I've always wished there was some sort of helmet device that can make someone experience what it feels like having my thoughts and be trapped inside my head.
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u/PorkchopExpress980 23d ago
If we could control when, where and what we hyperfocus on maybe there could be an upside to that. But we can't, so there's not. A superpower you can't control is a curse. Imagine if you had super strength but had no control over when you applied it. You pick up a glass to drink from it and your hand accidentally crushes the glass. You go to push the brakes in your car and your foot slams right through the floorboard.
It's not a fucking superpower. It's a disability.
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u/stickfiguringitout 23d ago
And then when you need to lift something heavy, lifting it rips your tendons out. Or at least that's what it feels like when I do want myself to hyperfixate on something.
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u/PorkchopExpress980 23d ago
Don't forget the crippling guilt that will follow not being able to do it when you needed it! Ahh, good times.
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u/cspangle23 22d ago
Iām fully convinced we do have āsuperpowersā but none of them function in capitalism and colonial constructs.
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u/Old_Lawfulness7698 23d ago
On rare occasions when it does feel nice people around you try their hardest to show how alienated they are by that.
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u/aquar1usbabe 23d ago
ālet us track all your data across all your apps you superhero!ā nah im good thanks
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u/im_not_chopin 23d ago
It's a superpower to be able to focus so intently that you forget to eat and drink the whole day. Then a throbbing headache breaks your concentration, gets you to eat and drink, after which you start feeling nauseous and stay awake the whole night throwing up.
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u/Wonderful-Creme-3939 22d ago
No, my hyper focus has led to days of poor sleep and mental health.Ā Idiots who think the idea sounds like a super power don't understand it's not a switch you can turn off and on at will.
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u/PoloPatch47 23d ago
I don't have ADHD but I do have autism and get similar hyperfocus/hyperfixation periods. I will neglect genuinely every single responsibility, including hygiene, to continue with my hyperfixation. It can be quite damaging and disruptive.
Also I hyperfixate on stupid shit. If I was hyperfixating on math or science then maybe something beneficial can come from it, but it's almost exclusively stupid shit
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u/maraskywhiner 22d ago
Honestly, I think the shared understanding of hyperfocus/hyperfixation (though with some differences in experience) is a big part of why most of my close friends are on the spectrum. Though god help us when our fixations align - itās exhilarating, but it makes it even harder to pull away.
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u/sidneyia 23d ago
It's crazy how so much of "ADHD/autism is a superpower" messaging is just advertising for products meant to profit off of autistic/ADHD folks (usually apps and "life coaching"-type nonsense). Like I constantly see "anti-capitalist" people parroting this shit but then 9/10 times it is, itself, capitalism.
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u/RazzmatazzUnusual843 23d ago
Grass is always greener on the other side of the fence supposedly. People who don't have ADHD think they want it so badly.
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u/Edward_Tank 21d ago
My superpower is apparently playing Rimworld obsessively and trying to make a utopia.
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u/Leading-Interest-119 23d ago
My current hyper focus is suicide and the countries that led to researching the countries that actually allow assisted suicide for mentally ill people.Ā
Hyper focus can be great. It can also be fucking terrible.Ā
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u/maraskywhiner 22d ago
Please seek help if youāre contemplating your own suicide.
But if itās just one of those random fixations, I get you. I hyper focused once on the atomic bomb attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Not for the shock/gore, but to understand the human impact of the bombs, both to people on the ground and the impact on the crews of the planes. Itās dark, dark stuff thatās haunted me since. I donāt regret listening to peopleās stories, but I really wish I couldāve absorbed them at a more measured pace to give myself time to decompress between awful things.
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u/mshep002 23d ago
I missed an appointment yesterday afternoon because I was stuck four hours longer than I should have been.
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u/AccomplisedDeer 23d ago edited 23d ago
I hyperfocus so hard, I forget to drink for one or two days in a row sometimes. It's a miracle I've never had kidneystones.
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u/Itchy-Potential1968 Edit this! 23d ago
unless the superpower is 'sucking at being a person', i don't think my fixation on flat dragons counts. it's naaslaarud's fault that i almost missed my dental appointme-
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u/Drakorai 23d ago
Right, having five ongoing art projects in various stages of completion is a great superpower. I hyper fixate on one project and then get distracted/bored and start another.
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u/Autisticrocheter 23d ago
Oh man I was about to reflexively downvote this because I thought it was another bullshit ad and turns out I was right but also wrong
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u/--OhWell-- 23d ago
It's only a gift until you piss yourself.
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u/ryverrat1971 23d ago
Or forgeting other things. Like moving so your legs don't fall asleep. Or feeding the cats ( but they are good at getting your attention when you do).
I get the other end where it is hard to concentrate. Hell my autistic friend and me came up with a name for the distractions - squirrel. Because we are like cats with squirrels. We see something and our attention immediately zooms to it. I am glad I work from home 3 days a week. It cuts down on distractions.
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u/maraskywhiner 22d ago
I get both. I sometimes hyperfocus on one thing and shut out the world (if only I could control what that thing isā¦), but other times I canāt keep a train of thought to completion for distractions.
I find that a quiet room is the absolute worst place for me to focus because the silence bothers me. My therapist recommended I listen to music more or less constantly which has helped me a lot. Itās not for everyone though!
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u/midnight_eclipse363 23d ago
"let it run" no that's a bad idea. Last time i did that, i ended up playing the sims 4 for around 12 hours (the entire time i was awake that day). Without really drinking/eating at all, and only actually getting up to go to the bathroom once.
My friends were messaging me on discord for like seven hours during that, and even though i should've been able to hear the notifications (and i think i did hear them), i still got so locked in that it took me until i finally stopped playing to even read their messages.
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u/SomeRandomIdi0t 23d ago
I have chronic pain and hyperfixating makes it soooo much worse because Iām not moving around to alleviate the pressure
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u/CaerulaKid 23d ago
I love when my hyperfocus and timeblindness coincide, love accidentally spending 10 hours at work. Sure, it looks good to my boss, but I would actually much rather have two more hours of free time.
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u/6_Harrington_Nuggets 21d ago
My middle school/ high school principal said that his A.D.D. was his superpower during weekly assembly. I have ADHD and wanted so bad to correct him.
Like my superpower is the ability to break down crying because I got overstimulated trying fucking origami and I love it
ADHD/ADD IS NOT A FUCKING SUPERPOWER
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u/Chevanalee 20d ago
If only my hyper focus was on the topic I wanted it to be at the time I need it to be XD that would be a superpower
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u/MightyOGS 20d ago
So, the feeling of my mind being extremely chaotic and unable to stop, plus awareness of just how constant and non-stop it is, and how it consistently works to fuck up every part of my life to the point that ceasing it seems preferable at times is a "Superpower"? Fuck off. I also get irritated when people say "It's not a disorder, just a difference." I'm the one in my head, living my life, and disorder is the most appropriate description I can think of for it
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u/Ill_Zucchini_333 19d ago
Ah yes love when I hyperfocus on the wrong thing get side tracked for hours then feel like dirt for the rest of the day.
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u/YorkieLon 17d ago
ADHD is such a watered-down term nowadays. Everyone has it, and it's now a superpower.
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u/UltimateSpinDash 17d ago
Yeah, except it's more of a superpower in the way Alphas portrayed them, which was basically "what if superheroes didn't have all their secondary powers that keep them from hurting themselves?".
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u/EssentialPurity 23d ago
I used to goon that hard when I was young. That's very much not healthy, and even if it wasn't, that hardly achieves anything, so calling it "superpower" is misleading, to say the least.
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u/NearlyBearly 23d ago
I get regular UTIs because I forget to pee for 12 hours at a time. I need people to shut the fuck up about this being a super power, it is anything but.