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[Urist McScoopbeard]

Thanks for the advice. I'm also doing a fair bit to kind of reorder my life. Get on a manageable schedule. Get things done. I'm not always following it, but I've been more productive since i've implemented these changes/started seeing my therapist. Combined with going back to school for art (aka something I do very much hyper focus on), I think I can begin to manage things again.

[Lupin6]

I'm glad you got diagnosed. I have ADHD myself, I was diagnosed as a kid, AND I have anxiety problems, so I can relate a lot. XD I was actually doing the pacing thing a few minutes ago. I like to walk around sometimes, just thinking things out loud (even things I've gone over). But to be fair, I remember reading that not only can pacing be soothing, but it CAN also stimulate creativity, so I also do it when I'm trying to think out an idea.

I can also suggest a couple books for you to take a look at. Saw them listed by someone else online a long time ago. One is "You Mean I'm Not Lazy, Stupid, Or Crazy" by Kate Kelly and Peggy Ramundo. It's a book all about adult ADHD, understand it and how to deal with it. I really suggest getting a copy and checking it out.

Another book you could look at is "When Too Much Isn't Enough" by Wendy Richardson. It's all about dealing with things when ADHD plays a part in getting addicted to things, because adults with it are more prone to getting addicted to stuff. Not just substances, but food or shopping or stuff like that, so it could be insightful as well.

Also, you could check out ADDitude Magazine. It's all about ADD/ADHD. I don't really use it myself, but my mom subscribed to it years ago, and it could also be useful for you.

I hope that helps. Good luck!

[Cathar]

Do you feel belly pain, headhache, have difficulty sleeping, relationship troubles and unpredictable moodswings ?

[Urist McScoopbeard]

Do you feel belly pain, headhache, have difficulty sleeping, relationship troubles and unpredictable moodswings ?

Yarp! EDIT: Seriously though, very much so.

I have been given an official diagnosis of ADHD and Anxiety. I will be going through my university's behavioral health services to be evaluated for a prescription.

EDIT: I simply couldn't arrange a session before leaving for school. Which is unfortunate, but there is a plan.

[Cathar]

Those are the usual symptoms of chronic stress. Depression share them aswell, but since you're being creative, you're probably not suffering from depression (yet). Tho be very aware that chronic stress can degenerate into depression very quickly in the absence of proper support. Also it can fuck up your body permanently, which is where the belly pain come from.

Edit : I don't know very much ADHD, and I'm not a medical professional, and only a medical professional can properly diagnose you

[Urist McScoopbeard]

I used to be severely depressed and got therapy about ~5 years ago. It's been a lot easier to deal with since.

And to be clear, just in case I wasn't, I don't have much in the way of unexplained pains. Sometimes headaches, but a good bit of relationship trouble and mood swings.

[Cathar]

No, no, it's been clear. Body pains took years to develop for me. Whatever the case if you're looking for medical help you're doing something right. Best of luck in any case

[Urist McScoopbeard]

Thanks. I have had problems with stress in the past (not to the point of having to seek counseling), but the for most part after being in therapy again, I think a lot of it was directly caused by the ADHD and anxiety.

[Lupin6]

The body pains could be related to anxiety. I myself suffer from psychosomatic symptoms, psychologically generated, so I have gotten quite a few weird sensations or mild aches that aren't actually real. Trust me, it's still pretty freaky when it happens, and that it happens at all.

The mood swings too, could be ADHD. Changes in mood are a symptom. ADHD can be co-morbid with other disorders like bipolar disorder or clinical depression, but it can also simulate the symptoms of those things, like the mood swings and bipolar disorder. Except when it's pure ADHD, the mood swings occur to quick to be the actual disorder.

Still, I'd talk to your doctor about these things. Oh, and if you're looking into medicine, be careful. You could need to go through a few, and even some dosage adjustments. Some medicines don't work for everyone, or they have rather strange reactions. In that first book I mentioned before, they said that some kids actually ended up being LETHARGIC on STIMULANT medication. Yeah, go figure. But that's the way it goes sometimes with ADHD. Some medicine work, some don't.

Also, medicine isn't the end all cure. It just opens up the possibility by trying to balance the neurotransmitters in the brain.

[Urist McScoopbeard]

Aight. Let me lay it out more clearly. I think maybe lack of updates has caused undue speculation.

So first things first, I do not have any pain in the manner that you are thinking. I am generally (aside from a few isolated periods of time where I really let myself go) a relatively healthy person, there are very few past injuries that bother me (being young and all, asides from a really bad roll on my left ankle which causes tightness). I have gotten headaches from compulsively clenching my muscles. To be specific, usually the muscles at the base of my skull or my levator scapulae (my right shoulder sometimes locks up to the point where I can't relax this muscle in particular), this is caused from me stressing out about stuff, a lot of which stems from the anxiety. Meditation and personal training do a lot to alleviate any lasting pain.

That aside, I've been in therapy for ~2 months now? Already, my therapist has helped me a lot in setting reasonable goals for myself, keeping productive, and helping make use of any resources I'll have once I get to SCAD. Don't get me wrong, I am not flying off the handle with excitement about medication--I stopped taking my depression meds as soon as I felt I had dug myself out of the hole and I know there can be bad side effects and there's some degree of experimentation required to see which ADHD med might work best for me, but my ADHD (which is now looking very certain; I am officially diagnosed with it) and all the symptoms therein are pretty bad.

Truthfully, I have no idea how much or how little ADHD medication will help me. But for me to function in this society and make a living for myself without losing my shit, something has to change. I don't want to claim I am victim or anything, I've certainly made a lot of bad decisions on my own, but the ADHD and the Anxiety make 99% of small mistakes, missteps, and hiccups huge, sometimes embarrassing problems (It's hard to reach your potential when you're too distracted to practice).

It is difficult for me to explain the tangible effect on my life--there's just too much to say--but the most important part is how difficult it is for me to work. Sure, when I'm hyperfocused, there's no problem, I can bang out 20 pages of writing, or 6 pages of comic sketches, or whole term papers in a night. But other times... I can only explain it like having a thought slip through your fingers. You want to do something, or even NEED to do something really vital, you know it's important, but you just... can't. I wish the previous analogy was just colorful description, but I have literally fought for 12+ hours a day to keep a project in my head, the process of formulating content and organizing information becomes like mental quicksand, and the even thinking about thinking about it becomes difficult. But truly the best description is that you just... can't. You try your hardest and nothing comes out, it's like racing someone faster than you, you want to go faster and you think you might even be able to, but no matter how much you try in the moment you just... can't.

I don't know what meds will do for me, but I hope that if I'm having a bad day they'll be the difference between putting it off until later and just doing something now, the difference between zoning out of a conversation part way through and staying engaged the whole time, the difference between being able to read a whole paragraph rather than skip to the end, etc. etc. etc. That's all just a small part of the many intangible, unbelievable-sounding, and hard-to-explain ways that ADHD messes with me. Not to mention the anxiety (which I never really considered as anxiety until I was forced to look at how I worry about stuff and how often it stops me from doing things/affects my behavior).

So ya.

[Urist McScoopbeard]

So, my appointment to be evaluated for medication was cancelled by the clinic due to some kind of yearly administrative stuff, they offered to reschedule but didn't have anything before I moved to Atlanta.

I have, at the least, set up an appointment with SCAD Atlanta counselors so that I can hopefully just stay in therapy. It's helped a lot thus far, and I think continued life coaching will probably be good for me.

But I've also still got to consider medication and inevitably there's going to be even more delay (having to explain the situation to a new therapist, getting my old therapist to send over her diagnosis, etc. etc.) I think I will be okay for now, but I was hoping to have things wrapped up around this time. Such is life I suppose, the important thing now is to just keep at it, mentally, that is.

[Sime]

Poor concentration, lack of motivation and mood-instability are a common symptom of many mental-illnesses.

Just try to make certain that your attention issues aren't mostly the result  of untreated anxiety or depression, because in my personal experience being incorrectly
diagnosed with ADHD when the underlying condition was depression caused me  to suffer a long delay in finding correct medicinal treatment, without which I had no chance of recovery.

[Urist McScoopbeard]

Well the silver lining of changing therapists is getting a second opinion, so cool. My therapist did diagnose me with ADHD AND Anxiety so... we will see what the school's therapist has to say.

[Urist McScoopbeard]

Considering my therapy session is Tuesday, I'm gonna go ahead and roll this thread into my other life advice thread (because, let's be real, I am not at all worthy of two active life advice threads, lol)

I. DECLARE. LOCKED.