Why I Didn’t Think I Had ADHD
And why the stereotypes and memes don’t help
I was diagnosed with ADHD. It surprised me. I didn’t think I had it. I’d been referred by my GP by mistake while trying get an autism assessment. I went with it because I’d been curious about ADHD.
At the end of the assessment I was unceremoniously diagnosed with ADHD. Scoring highly across the diagnostic trinity of inattentiveness, hyperactivity and impulsivity.
I’d had a successful career, was organised and driven so didn’t think it applied to me. I could see it could apply when I was younger but not now.
But then I didn’t really understand what ADHD, or “attention deficit hyperactivity disorder”, was. Problems concentrating or getting started on and finishing things, being hyperactive or acting without thinking. Being scattered and disorganised. I’d seen the social media posts and memes. That wasn’t me.
Except it all was me. I couldn’t see it because I’d buried it all under systems and coping mechanisms. Then buried those under stories until it was all invisible to me. We rationalise and normalise our inner worlds.
I’d needed to do all that to function in a world not designed for me. I’d considered myself a spectacular failure until I was 32 and saw no future unless I made drastic changes. So I instituted and adhered to rigid systems and told myself it was all normal. Even at the cost of happiness. Fear of losing control. Fear of failure. Of slipping back to what I’d been and the feelings of shame.
I made it all a part of my identity. My underdog turnaround success story. I celebrated my systems and strict adherence to them.
So everything about ADHD felt like an affront to the life and persona I’d constructed. I’d overcome all those problems. If I’d had ADHD then I’d beat it. Won.
I minimised and dismissed ADHD. Other people I could see with it seemed to be doing fine. They weren’t but I would first have to go on my own journey to see that.
I turned back to what I thought were my “real problems.”
I wasn’t happy.
I’d never been happy. My life had been one of extremes. All or nothing. No plan or purpose. No sense of connection to myself or others. Unable to make life decisions, always overthinking or paralysed. Only in work could I be bold, confident and take risks. As long as the stakes weren’t mine. If they were, I’d be overwhelmed. Freeze up. I couldn’t deal with conflict or intimacy. Couldn’t let anyone in.
I’d struggled with anxiety, depression, low self-esteem, negative self-talk and had always been very sensitive to rejection or failure. To the point of avoidance or self-sabotage. Then replaying missed opportunities, beating myself up.
Outwardly confident and successful but inside stuck. Always needing external validation. Always restless and on the move. Constantly chasing the next thing. Never content.
I put this all down to childhood trauma. Parents who couldn’t be caregivers. My dad trying to homeschool me, pushing me too hard. Starting school late. Bullies. My withdrawn mum. Race, class, socioeconomics. There was a lot to choose from.
Years of therapy and self help books. Chronicling my whole life. No progress. Still blocked.
Around the time of the diagnosis I was at a crossroads. Trying to figure out what to do after 18 months of travel following burnout and packing up my life. Finally trying to settle again but feeling lost about what kind of life I wanted.
The same questions I’d been running from my whole life.
Who was I? What did I want?
I was offered a trial of medication to manage ADHD and said yes. It boosted dopamine and norepinephrine, neurotransmitters that handled reward, pleasure, motivation, alertness, focus and attention between them. I was curious. Increased focus sounded good.
I didn’t have work or any other commitments. Staying at my mums and waiting on the purchase of my flat to complete. Still unsure if I’d made the right decision. Thoughts of looking for work triggered extreme anxieties around rejection and failure. Completely untethered from reality. Finding work would not have been an issue for me.
A few weeks into medication and finally reading about ADHD I realised I’d been wrong about everything.
All the pieces fell into place.
The anxiety, decision paralysis, rejection sensitivity, depression, fear of intimacy, low self-esteem… all of it started disappearing. Gone.
I was confused. How could medication meant to give me increased concentration make all my lifelong problems disappear?
Because everything I’d been calling “childhood trauma” turned out to be ADHD. Or rather what ADHD actually was beyond the memes. I was shocked.
It was every single thing I’d struggled with my whole life.
All my systems, coping mechanisms and stories were laid bare.
The effects continued as the weeks passed. Cumulative realisations and epiphanies as my whole life flashed before my eyes and was rewritten.
Raising dopamine and norepinephrine had bolstered my fragile nervous system too. No longer easily overwhelmed. Allowing strong emotions to be felt and releasing long held pain, anguish and grief.
This is really what ADHD was about. Attention deficit and hyperactivity are only a couple of surface symptoms.
And that “childhood trauma” was either long healed or had a chance to come out and depart now the neurological block had been lifted.
It had all been ADHD this whole time. My whole life.
People had tried to talk to me about this. Those who could see it. I’d listened and then ignored what they’d said. I wanted to hold onto my underdog story and turnaround success story. The struggles and the pain. The stories. The blame.
Letting go of it all was painful. But I had to. Over days and weeks my whole world turned upside down. I had to forgive myself. Forgive my parents. It wasn’t my fault. It wasn’t their fault. It just was. I’d been living with this invisible disability my whole life. A bundle of coping mechanisms and stories trying to make sense of the world.
It also explained everything about my parents. Both of them. My mum’s lifelong anxiety and odd behaviours which I’d always found triggering. My dad dying 20 years before. Misunderstood, isolated and alone.
I see it in others too. I can’t tell them directly. So I share my journey. Describe how it affected me. My overthinking, anxiety, rejection sensitivity and other issues. The recent breakthroughs I’ve had. It resonates with many. Some want to look into getting assessed. Others say it sounds like their trauma or “it’s just the way I am.”
That used to be me. It was “just the way I was.”
We are not really who we think we are. So much comes down to neurochemistry.
I was surprised to find many diagnosed people also didn’t have a good understanding either. Some said it was only something to fix for work, rather than something that had fundamentally shaped every choice they’d made in their lives. Defined who they are. I’d realised that quickly about myself. ADHD had made me who I was. The good and the bad.
I found people stuck living in loops of reward seeking or fight or flight. Normalising their issues. Creating systems mechanisms and stories.
The mind has a tremendous capacity to alter reality and only see what it wants to see, ignoring what it doesn’t want to see.
What I could see now could not be unseen. It had been there all along. Hiding in plain sight. I live in both worlds now.
Looking back through my journal entries and online posts I was surprised to see how much of the language of ADHD I’d been using to describe what I thought had been my own unique issues. “Survival mode”, “fight or flight” and many other terms. If I collected all that together and edited it I’d have a book on ADHD without ever having intended to write one. Or been aware.
I hadn’t realised what I was describing was ADHD. I thought ADHD was “some other thing.” Like many others think.
Until it turned out to be the answer to my whole life.
I would never have accepted it. Even when I got diagnosed I didn’t want to know. It wasn’t until medication that I really started to look into it. I probably didn’t want to accept that I’d lived with a disability my whole life.
It very much is a disability. Having a fragile nervous system cutting off into fight or flight and not letting me feel intense emotions is bad enough without the other symptoms. How did I live so long without really living and not even realising it?
It severely limits opportunities for happiness.
Which is why I choose to remain medicated. It allows a version of me that is confident, able to make decisions, take risks and most of all, be present. Sit with my thoughts and feelings.
It’s let me finally know who I am and what I want.
An estimated 3–4% or up to 1 in 20 people are like me. 80% or 2 million are undiagnosed in the UK. Likely half the prison population has ADHD too.
The term “ADHD” or “attention deficit hyperactive disorder” is loaded with connotations and stereotypes. It’s difficult to get to the core of the issue: a lack of executive functioning and emotional regulation leaving people stuck, struggling and suffering. Many not realising why.
Are you stuck? Constantly worrying and overthinking?
It’s worth looking into.
1 in 20 people.
A lot of who we think we are is neurochemistry. The set of rules we operate to. How we think, feel, act and respond. The choices we make. Our personality. Our preferences. Change the mix, change the rules, change the person.
It can be painful to find out the stories you held onto may not be true. Or to face the regret of missed opportunities, misunderstandings and mistakes. That was a different you.
Change is good but it comes with pain. So does growth.
What have you got to lose?
What might you gain?
Good luck.
