And then the fire nation attacked

“Gifted child, if only they’d apply themselves”, turns into “Average adult, not always reliable and my god have you seen their <thing we ignore because we don’t have the bandwidth> but usually gets things done.”

Took me getting fired from one job and almost a second before I finally got my coping mechanisms figured out. It's still a struggle and it's also cost me a significant amount of my ability to enjoy my free time (have to severely limit my investment in anything not work related so I don't accidentally get consumed by it and lapse at work), but I'm 'functional' now.

The problem is that responsibilities seem to grow faster than I can create coping mechanisms...

To be fair, ADHD is a developmental disorder that sometimes can present as delayed development rather than halted development. I.e being behind in executive functioning development but eventually “catching up” to peers.

That said, the severity of cases is still often determined through the lens of “how well do they fit in/mask it” and not “how is their emotional/mental wellbeing”, which definitely gives the impression of kids “growing out of it”.

They don't necessarily lower their standards. Sometimes, they simply "pay" by other means.

Made this for ya while procrastinating

There's also a tendency to experience a diaspora after, or in the immediate years after, school. Say, your mid-20's or so. That's potentially a big chunk of your support network disappearing from your life.

Building a routine of healthy habits and sticking to it can make a world of difference.

Exactly. Those coming to diagnosis and support while young stand a chance to be trained and armed for independence, and an adult life of holding one's self to one's own standards (hopefully). For many of us oldsters, being diagnosed later, or only learning about mindfulness and CBT well past our formative years, it's a huge struggle to cobble together habits and a better mindset.

That's a valid point. Although I'd add that, as you get older, it's not only the significance of the stimuli that increases, but the overall levels of stimuli increases. More responsibilities, more burdens, more stress, and less likely to be given any concessions due to being young.

No, it gets worse. Adults don't have the amount of mental plasticity that younger people have. While it's possible to make things easier through CBT and learning to cope and deal with certain challenges. The mental load of keeping up with daily life ultimately has its toll. Life is getting harder every year for everyone, and having ADHD makes that mental load just that much harder.

Realistically, it's utterly dependent on one's life situation.

When you're in school, your main focus is trying to get through school, get home, and not get hassled about keeping up with yourself and your things.

Later on, some jobs, are congruent or even complimentary with symptoms, some jobs aren't. Some partners help compensate, some don't.

It absolutely will get worse for some, better for others. Some may have consequences that are an issue, some may have circumstances that defuse the consequences.

laughs in being born a woman (Obviously, I don't know what your gender is, I'm just speaking generally.)

Saw 3 psychologists (one was a student) and they all blew me off because I was an older woman.

Finally got diagnosed two and a half years ago in my early 60's.

I didn't get diagnosed until I was just under 30, medication has done wonders for myself since. I don't think my parents had a clue, I was quite smart, if I had medication in my school days I can only wonder what I may have achieved, but I'm a university dropout. Doing okay but I do wonder sometimes.

I was diagnosed last year, age 41. I think back to one of my earliest memories, where someone took me out of 2nd grade class to give me tests in some big closet or boiler room. I am convinced I was diagnosed at that time with at least ADHD, but my mom didn't believe in mental health treatments despite desperately needing them herself. She's dead so I can't ask her what those tests were about.

unfortunately a lot of people still use the bar of needing to be unable to live a functional life to entertain any sort of treatment. if you've grown up with a life and job, you'll not be taken seriously a lot of the time.

it's a double edged sword. ADHD meds have definitely been over prescribed to a certain degree the past decade or so and docs have been gatekeeping ADHD treatment a bit more these days.

this is what I hear from my wife who is a pediatrician.

Doctor leaves appointment with Droggelbecher

"Get the Chancellor on the phone immediately."

Set auto payments for all the things!

Oh, my workaround for that is easy, just develop lifelong crippling anxiety and still forget about 10% of them anyways!

This is kinda why I ended up as a manufacturing engineer. It's technical, well paid, and doesn't require hard physical labor. But I'm constantly "putting out fires" and going to some forgotten corner of the factory to figure out what broke. "Oops sorry I skipped the meeting - the production line was stopped!" Neurotypicals view this chaos as stressful, but it's the only way I can flow through the day without hating my job.

Lucked out big time.

So far, what do you think ADHD is?

Great reminders about the lack of physiological markers. The (or one?) elephant in the room, to me - I'd phrase it as - to what degree a kid's just naturally well- or poorly-suited to the public school environment itself.

A child that finds it difficult to sit in one place and listen to words about abstract material for hours every day...I mean does that sound divergent in any way?

One of the fundamental markers of childhood in my experience is a certain...animation, just this almost irresistible urge to move around, negotiate whatever activity is occurring and in what way, with whoever is nearby...switching activities and modes of play fluidly. Seems like the most normal shit ever to me lol.

I do recognize we need a standardized way to educate our kids in a modern society, but as we learn more about young brains, we gotta start developing a more diverse way to accomplish the learning and development of self-discipline. The one-size-fits-all approach just obviously leaves many underserved, and worse, leaves them internalizing a lot of frustration with self, not to mention taking all kinds of drugs to "treat those symptoms".

True

But it is also be true that the insight "most people loose ADHD by adulthood" is in itself kind of flawed as people can develop coping methods which can mask the ADHD. If there's a significant people complaining/reporting then, it would be something to look into.

People are more open about having adhd into adulthood as compared to in the past where it might have been seen as a childish thing and hence undesirable to report. And not a problem enough to report it to someone who could help with that.

These are assumptions based on personal and shared anecdotes, so I guess you could still argue what you said is right.

Does learning how to deal with it, but still struggling more than an average person count as getting better?

Exactly. This sounds like selection bias in action. If you're sampling adults who have ADHD and asking if it's better from when they were kids, you've already skewed the results beyond repair. You need to follow kids with ADHD into adulthood and see if it gets better.

Mrs. Warp Core is also going through this very thing. Basically the wild hormone swings hit her hard, right in the executive function. ADHD meds helped, but ultimately weren't enough. HRT has helped tremendously. That said, we're now terrified to roll off of that.