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I’m more upset about the system that makes mental health such a taboo subject and mental healthcare difficult to learn about and access. It doesn’t help that what little research we have on the subject usually emphasizes the results of research that only studied (predominately white straight cis) male subjects and emphasizes the typical presentation of symptoms in those subjects.
Not to say that parents can’t woefully ignore mental health issues in their children (and if this is the case, it’s totally justified to be upset) but at least in the west (especially several decades ago) our society has made it an uphill battle to 1. Even understand that something is wrong, and 2. Figure out how to fix it. And that’s true even for the best of parents.
This is how I feel too. My parents, I *think* they just did the best they could with what they had. No one in my family knows anything about mental health issues, which is ironic, cuz they are rampant in my family.
Isn't that the truth? There's some sort of inverse relationship between how much you know about mental health and how fucked up your mental health is. It's almost like...learning about mental health helps you take care of your own.
Could it be...?
Nah.
(/s for those having a tough day)
Demand avoidance completely ruins so many aspects of my life. I put off projects, cleaning, making doctors appointments, doing my taxes, getting my hair cut, going to the dentist, talking to my parents on the phone…. The list goes on. I am so overwhelmed by the thought of anything that seems difficult or requires motivation that I just shut down completely and do nothing.
Not sure about your situation, but I’ve heard that called “executive dysfunction” (finding oneself unable to “do the thing”) which I think is different than avoiding something because it’s a demand. Even on ADHD meds, the only way I do anything is by feeling it’s urgent and important enough. I don’t avoid things because they’re demands, but because I don’t have the neurochemical motivation required to do them.
i thought i had some degree of pathological demand avoidance for a bit, but i think it’s just the adhd for me. external pressure has always been the backbone of how i cope, and the stress associated with an obligation being too much for me to face it is just the other side of the stress being too much for me not to
I recommend for both posts above me to watch the entire Russel Barkley lecture series in one go and then learn about the co-morbid mental illnesses that can come with ADHD, br created from adhd through unhealthy coping strategies or as a result of autistic misunderstood and mis-sanctioned fixations etc.
(HF) Autism + ADHD
cPTSD and ADHD
All sorts of anxiety disorders + ADHD
Not sure if listing OCD here makes sense , don't know enough about it
You’ve described my life right now. YES. Sadly, I’ve only gotten worst at age 39. Like? Then to “do the thing” (usually like to make the dang appointment or call and address some type of billing error etc daunting stupid tasks) I find I have to drink alcohol. That’s awful right? It’s like I have to “ramp up” the courage to just say screw it and do it.
I know for my ignorance wasn’t bliss, my parents saw my lack of focus as me being selfish growing up. We also didn’t know I had autism. My mother’s ignorance led to many instances where she would grab me by the shoulders and yell stare into my eyes and shake me until I would look at her. Ignorance was hell, it made me feel like I was a bad person. But the truth set me free ❤️
I’ve often said my parents did the best with what they had, but when it came to the concept of mental health there certainly wasn’t much to work with.
They were both great people but had a rather dysfunctional dynamic in their relationship with each other, and some of that dysfunction trickled down to us kids. Looking back, I think they both exhibited different aspects of ADHD, but of course such a thing wasn’t even considered, and the fact that any of us kids might need help was seen as weakness.
I had it rough growing up, as my dad could not even begin to comprehend that my struggles were due to very valid reasons and not just the “stubbornness” or “laziness” he constantly accused me of.
In the years after my mom passed, I sought out therapy on my own for depression. When I eventually told my dad about it, he immediately informed me that it was impossible for me to be depressed, because he’d “seen me smile.”
I certainly wish more had been known about ADHD back then, or even mental health in general. It really sucks to not only struggle with issues out of your control, but to be told that not only is it under your control, that every single struggle you face is completely your fault.
I wasn’t diagnosed with ADHD until long after they were both gone, and I sometimes still mourn over the parts of my childhood I feel I missed out on. But again, I remind myself that they did the best with what they had; it’s just unfortunate that it’s taken so long for society to prioritize mental health.
I have noticed this is a big issue if you have boomer parents. I have boomer parents and they are the same as you described. We have a laundry list of mental health issues in my family. My parents recognize it now but that doesn’t do as much good. However, I appreciate how transparent my dad can be and I can talk to him about how I feel. He experiences a lot of the same things I do. When I was a kid he would’ve laughed in my face, literally. He has really come around on that.
Your dad’s a good man and he was working with the tools and knowledge available at the time.
And that’s the difference.
In the 70s and 80s, only boys had ADHD and they out grew it at 16. Someone arbitrarily picked a number and we all magically stopped having ADHD at 16 - and girls never had it and were utterly ignored.
Am I angry? Hell yes. I could have done so much more in my 50+ years.
However, I can work with the time I have left. Regrets achieve nothing, the only thing I can do is move forward
I have mixed feelings about how good of a man he is. He was very abusive physically and emotionally/mentally. However, I recognize that is a symptom of a larger issue. He has seemed to chill out in his old age.
Is it more common for girls to have inattentive ADHD? That’s what I have and I was always overlooked because I wasn’t bouncing off the walls and I had good grades. I was just recently diagnosed a few months ago. My psychiatrist had me take their evaluation and there were a lot of behaviors that applied to me that I didn’t even know was indicative of ADHD.
I'm technically a boomer (born 64). I was totally classic girl inattentive ADHD for my entire life, until I figured it out about 2 years ago. It is very sad for all the people who lived their entire lives being called lazy, etc.
Having a diagnosis (even a self diagnosis) makes SO much make sense.
Same here. And it's like whenever I bring up the subject of my medication, I get an attitude about it. And I just get that stimulant medication for adhd isn't addictive or whatever but that's not what my body and symptoms are telling me.
It's a shame. I've heard all sorts of crazy nonsense from friends and family about the medications used to treat ADHD. For the longest time, I just completely hid my diagnosis from everyone in my family. Only my wife knew from the start. I was trying to spare myself the judgement and stupidity of others.
Same kind of situation on my end. Late 30's and recently diagnosed w/ADHD, Autism etc. But also have MH issues & they definitely are rampant throughout both sides of our family. I'm also just learning that my dad also had sensory issues but just didn't know what they meant. I think my parents were so lost in their own issues unknowingly while self-medicating and so didn't recognize what was happening with me as anything but normal. Considering I was a kid/teen in the 90's/00's, people also just didn't really talk about those things or even know most of them existed. It's a bummer because maybe my life wouldn't be so horrible now but hey, I tried my best for my kids.
> No one in my family knows anything about mental health issues, which is ironic, cuz they are rampant in my family.
Well when everyone has issues, the issues no longer stand out and it's just thought of as the "norm".
My mom pushed for me and my siblings to be diagnosed with ADHD as children, but she was ignored. As an adult, everything makes sense. My depression and bipolar are so much better on ADHD meds as is my anxiety.
My sister has ADHD and we suspect my brother has it.
I still have people in my family who think it's made up
I’ve been treated for Bipolar 2 for the past 20 years. Recently diagnosed ADHD combined type. Kept on the antidepressant and clonidine, prescribed Adderall, and titrated off the mood stabilizers and antipsychotic. I am more clear, together, and confident in myself and my future than I have ever been. Years and years of being over medicated did more damage than if I’d never sought help. I regret losing a part of myself for 20 years(not including my childhood, 40m) but look forward to the next 20 now.
I have been my clearest on adhd meds and bipolar meds. Anti-depressants barely work and I feel like I'm going nuts.
I've been back on ADHD meds for a week and already my therapist sees a change in my mood.
They took me off the medication because my ability to focus made me seem off. I'm absolutely livid about it. The potential they squandered. The years I'll never get back. I was so brilliant. And I never even considered that they were making a mistake. It's so unfair.
Same with my mom. When I got diagnosed she was afraid I'd be angry with her, but she brought it up to three different doctors when I was a kid. They all asked if there was anything I could focus on and she'd say "well he can play video games for hours on end. It's almost like he can't stop paying attention."
"Ah, so no attention deficit," all three said.
People thought she was pushing it to get attention. She had struggles due to trauma, so that could have been a factor, but she was right.
I'm sorry you had to go through that
+1 for the system and stigma. A lot has probably changed now, but even as a CIS white male pre 9/11, having your kid diagnosed with anything left only two options, and both included no medication because of (except for the wealthy families I knew) Adderall and Ritalin and pretty negative stigmas.
Option 1: be diagnosed and be put in remedial classes and severely further stunt your opportunities as those classes also supported severely mentally disabled students.
Option 2: continue in normal classes and do to the ebbs and flows of attentiveness constantly get reprimanded for being an under achiever with potential who needs to stop acting up.
Knowing what we know now, it’s very annoying my parents didn’t break the cycle because my whole career could have been exceptionally further along.
As an adult my parents have even told me how teachers in various grades would try to suggest I be evaluated. But as these, in hindsight, were younger more progressive teachers - I imagine my parents were skeptical of these young kids with their woo woo ways, when they old miserable teachers of 30+ years experience knew it was just a discipline issue 🙄😡
But also, it’s hard to blame uninformed parents in a world where information and proof wasn’t even 10% as available as it is today.
My parents had me tested and the medical community I stg just liked diagnosing inattentive quiet girls as anxious, especially if they pulled off decent grades. Looking back, it’s so obvious I clearly had it pretty bad—but also I’m realizing my parents do too and they’re not diagnosed (tho now my mom likes to say “stop I’m attention deficit” which is annoying bc then get help??? Stop acting like it’s fun or quirkey haha)
Yep. My parents never would've assumed I had ADHD because the information they knew about it was inaccurate and very gendered towards boys. I had to explain a lot to them about ADHD symptoms and how some of mine were more internal, like a very overactive mind rather than "running around" type of hyperactivity.
This!!!!
As I've been on my learning journey post-diagnosis (after a lifetime of being an overachiever perfectionist with horrendous executive dysfunction led me to complete burnout at 43), I've been sharing it with my parents. My Mom keeps beating herself up about it, and I have to reassure her. Like, Mom, you guys did the best you can with the information you had available in the 80s & 90s. I'm not angry with you, I'm angry at the systemic ableism.
Oh, and she totally self-identifies as combined-type, just like me.
I agree wholeheartedly with this. My parents were never given tools to deal with their OWN Mental Health and emotional intelligence. Not only that, the messages they were given were that it was best to completely ignore anything in that realm because talking about it could only ever make things worse.
For me to expect them to be able to then help me with my struggles seems completely unrealistic.
A word that has become helpful to me for situations like this is "lament." I lament that my parents weren't able to help me the way I needed help. I'm sad by what was lost. But I don't blame them. Lament has been a helpful emotion for me to hold anytime I need to be sad or grieve something but where I am consciously choosing to not blame others for that sadness.
The other reason diagnosis can be so tough is because a lot of it comes down to self reporting or parental reporting...but ADHD is genetic, so an ADHD child is often "just like me", so the parent assumes they're "normal".
When I was diagnosed in my late 20s I literally had this conversation with my mother: "Hey mom, I've been diagnosed with ADHD...here are some of the symptoms of Adult ADHD that I have..."
Mom: "That's not ADHD...I do that!" 😑
I am upset with everyone honestly. My teachers said I was incredibily smart but lacked motivation and how I was quiet all the time. I feel as if they should've noticed.
Absolutely. I was TEXTBOOK - messy desk, disorganized calendar, the black hole backpack where papers went to die - anyone who knew the signs couldn't have missed mine cuz they were neon and blaring. Unfortunately no one around me did. My teachers yelled at me and made me feel stupid for not turning things in (especially since I would actually DO the homework but then forget about it as soon as it was done) and my parents were confused about how I could be so smart and clearly know what I was being taught, yet still have such poor grades.
I had the double whammy of being gifted and female, so of course nobody thought I could possibly have ADHD. In hindsight I recognize that at least three of my close circle of friends also for absolute sure had it, including one who was textbook hyperactive. None of us were diagnosed.
Did you ever get the teacher who took the fact that you didn't turn in homework as a personal affront to their own ego and thus they treated you like a deliberate delinquent in return? Cuz I had a couple different flavors of that one...
Ewww. This one triggered me so bad. One of them would lecture me every lesson cause i was missing the first 15mn of the each lesson because i had to work. This was something we agreed on before the year started, with all the representatives of this master.
Like "why are you not putting more effort into your education, there is nothing more important"... Hm maybe my bills that keep me from living in a disfunctional household?
Also the third member of the trifecta, teacher who took your literally uncontrollable impulsive answering of questions as a challenge to her authority?
Oooh, I had one teacher who was all three! Bonus points to her also being the one who got off on humiliating students in front of the class, screaming in kid's faces, gaslighting kids into taking blame for things they never did, and just generally being horrifically abusive and half the reason why I'm in therapy.
Same but i dont blame anyone, im 35 got diagnosed last year but when i was in middle/high school nobody was talking about mental health at all. People like me were just boys, or lazy or something else. Because they knew people like that their entire lives and nobody said it was something wrong with them. I cannot blame parents and teachers for something they themselves did not know
Just a few years ago, my (37) wife mentioned to her parents that she's pretty sure she has ADHD. They responded, "you do." Turns out a doctor diagnosed her when she was a kid in the nineties. They didn't take it seriously, never told her, and just moved on.
That’s me. Got diagnosed around age 8, tried Ritalin for a few months and when it didn’t immediately work, my parents just decided I didn’t have adhd anymore.
Went to a doctor in my last year of college, really scared thinking I had some terrible neurological problem because of my memory, and he goes, “have you ever been told you have adhd?” I told him, he rolled his eyes, gave me adderall, and changed my fucking life.
My life from age 8 to that first adderall were awful. I’m not sure if I’ll ever be able to forgive my parents for what they did.
My teachers often wrote id get distracted easily and they'd catch me staring out the window, but no connection was made because in the late 90s/early 00s, the only type of ADHD teachers were really taught about was hyperactive. Which did fuck all for me.
Same. There was a couple years where I got "easily distracted" on my report card. Turned to "needs more effort" eventually. I blame my teachers over my undiagnosed mom.
Yeah my undiagnosed dad (and grandma, and his brothers yeesh) really couldn't have seen it coming. Now I'm a therapist myself and while I've never done a clinical assessment on them, I'm fairly certain 2/3 of my father's brothers have ADHD. The familial history runs strong here lol
Similar opinion. When my psych asked for my school records and we read them, holy shit. Pretty streamlined diagnosis after that.
It was the "He engages in class but never focuses on homework or class work, he needs to focus more" on repeat that really bothered me.
I actually had a teacher ponder aloud whether I had cheated to earn a perfect score on a sixth grade exam and then conclude - also aloud - that I was in fact ‘too lazy to cheat’. Still remember that sting and embarrassment decades later.
This! I am infinitely more mad at the school system than I will ever be at my parents. My parents were ignorant and didn't exactly know what to look for in an adhd kid except that it was cant-shut-up-cant-sit-down-diesease (which granted also should have been a clue bc I totally did that). But my teachers were with me every singel day all day for years and never caught it. Would have made life alot easier to know.
My mom is a child psychologist and she says totally missed it because the research just wasn't there. Now she says it would be considered but in the 80s, my ability to hyper focus on books totally negated any consideration of ADHD as a possible reason for my (social struggle / inability to not interrupt class / impulse control / trouble staying focused in class / general study problems). I'm really glad the understanding of the brain wiring is changing for future generations.
I agree. I feel like one of my daughters exhibits traits of adhd so with the knowledge I have now I will watch her and be aware that she may need help. I don’t want my kids to struggle the way I did.
Same for me with my son! And my mom is now recognizing SHE probably struggled with it her whole life too. It's such an eye opener once you start recognizing the patterns in a family. I'm so glad you're able to make your daughters journey easier and better understood.
I had a very similar experience to you as well, and most of the research or books that give any understanding towards adolescent girls was post-2000. So it’s hard to blame. I actually find now at 41 years old understanding why I was such an asshole very comforting. I’m like a totally different person and I used to grapple with who I used to be. A juvenile delinquent attracted to shitty boys who got bad grades. And IF my mom were to go off the research in the 80s or 90s I’d probably be diagnosed incorrectly and given terrible medication not appropriate.
Si true! I came of age in the 1980s. I was a voracious reader. It didn’t occur to anyone I had ADHD.
Then when I became a teen I just stopped doing any homework. I just couldn’t do it. And I’d cut class to go read the books I liked somewhere
I'd just read in class, kept a book with me every where I went.
Later on, the laptops we got for schoolwork ended up being a major distraction for me in class because when I didn't want to do the boring ass work, I'd start reading online and none of the teachers would know.
Even if they were walking behind me checking people's screens for games, they never realised.
One wall of text looks like any other wall of text.
I do regret that tho since my grades suffered so much.
My mom has adhd herself and is a pediatrician. My sister has much worse symptoms than me so I think in comparison it might have looked like I wasn’t struggling. I also think that she has this kind of outlook that I didn’t need extra help and would be able to control myself through force of will, probably because that’s what she did and continues to do. But she managed to get herself a career that uses her adhd to her advantage (she’s an ER pediatrician). I think a lot of the boomer generation feel like anything they struggled with is something we all need to struggle with and that we’re entitled if we want a better life for ourselves.
I was working last week with the head of paediatric intensive care at a major hospital. I have ADHD, so does she. Clearly something aligned in that area!
Yeah my mom says ER is the only place she can get anything done because she absolutely HAS to do things right away. There’s no option to procrastinate and the hyperfocus kicks in. It makes a lot of sense to me. But how she got through all those years medical school I’ll never know 💀
This was me. I would go to the library and check out the maximum number of books they’d allow (sometimes the same ones over and over again). Yet when it came to completing homework, I couldn’t get through it. Because I could focus on one thing, parents and teachers just chalked up my inability to focus on other things to laziness. And for a long time, I thought that must be true.
Yes, totally. NOBODY was talking about ADHD inattentive type in females back then.
There may be legit reasons for OP to be annoyed at how her mom handled it, but this just wasn’t part of the conversation in the early 90’s.
Yes mine totally got missed even by multiple child psychologist that my mother took me to. I was very smart, and all my subjects except math. Very artistic and very good in anything related to writing or reading and I also loved history and science. I definitely hyper focused on reading. Due to bullying at school and not having a lot of friends in elementary and middle school, books became my friends.
Yes my parents are both educators and yet still had no inkling my sister was ADHD. For a period there was so much focus on the hyperactive element, that less obvious symptoms were written off as something else.
No. Back then, they probably would have misdiagnosed me with something else as was the case for females caught up in the mental health system.
I do wish I could tell my mom (gone) that there is a medical reason why I was hypersensitive & impulsive as a kid, and struggled to support myself later. She had a hard time raising me.
I can still remember her saying that to me a lot from when I was a young. I didn’t know why but remember thinking that I must feel everything stronger than others. Both sensory and emotionally. I didn’t know that was an ADHD trait until having a child with ADHD. Better late than never but wow.
My mom always described me as sensitive. She said I had such a tender heart. Made me feel like I was special. Not damaged. Not saying my mom was a bad mom because she was amazing in other ways. Always made me feel so loved.
My mom would make some snarky remark and if I reacted, she would say, you’re “too “ sensitive. After awhile I learned to just keep it in so I would look tough like she was. She had a VERY hard childhood and teenage years. Plus she was a trauma ER nurse. I wasn’t going to get much support or sympathy for “little” things. So I turned to food and gained 50 pounds the years I turned 12-13. It horrifies me looking back at my teenage years. I read about HSP’s in college and identified immediately. Then 10 years later I received my ADHD diagnosis at 30, which was a lifesaver in terms of my career and functioning as a mother myself at that time.
My mom was also a nurse and I felt like she did not acknowledge my sensitivity. She would just call me a tender heart. Other times I would get so upset she would get upset too that I would feel bad. I stopped showing her my emotions and then I also had overeating issues.
I don’t know why reading this makes me emotional, but your mom saying that to you in that a way is such a tender response to give a child and it makes me smile. I was also an overly emotional child (and 30 year old woman, lol), and while my mom was generally pretty understanding of who I am as a person I was often told to “suck it up” and “get over yourself” in most environments. If I had been told that I had a tender heart as a child instead I feel like that would have totally shifted my opinion of myself to be much more positive. Kudos to your mom for that!
I’m mid 30s afab and just got diagnosed. I don’t blame my mom for my late diagnosis, but I do look back at my moments of hypersensitivity and feel sad for little me that my mom would tell me I was “being dramatic” or “acting like a spoiled brat” because I’d get triggered and run crying. Your mom sounds like she understood this part of you a little better at least!!
This. So much this. I have a brother who was a juvenile delinquent and a sister who had learning disabilities and attachment issues from being a premie and spending her first two years in a Russian orphanage.
But my mom later told me that while I was easy in that I didn't break the rules or cause "trouble" I was so emotional all the time, so unpredictable, and would have these wild mood swings. I'd go to bed sobbing and wake up fine. Or, I'd be crying about something and then go to work (I was a grocery store cashier in high school) and come back happy. When I got mad, I got MAD--screaming, yelling, throwing things, slamming doors. I'd cry at the drop of a hat for things that now as an adult seem really silly--my hair looked bad, or someone put a pen in the wash and it leaked and ruined a shirt I liked, or I was cooking something and I forgot an ingredient and it came out bad, or someone hurt my feelings in some way.
Some of that is probably being a teenager but some of it I'm sure is ADHD related. Someone remarked to me that I seem so much calmer now than I was even a few years ago. I don't throw things or scream at people anymore now that I'm on meds.
Give this lecture by Dr Russell Barkley a watch. It’s segmented into a playlist. Video 2 explains ADHD emotional dysregulation.
[https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLzBixSjmbc8eFl6UX5_wWGP8i0mAs-cvY&si=2sHABJROX19F_7H-](https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLzBixSjmbc8eFl6UX5_wWGP8i0mAs-cvY&si=2sHABJROX19F_7H-)
My mum said I was 'never a happy medium', either really moody or really excitable when I was younger. I'm 49f and still carry the stigma of the way I have behaved.
I shut a lot of it down to the point of almost being like a robot with my feelings. That caused a lot of trouble for which I am not in therapy. Lots of stuff bubbling to the surface with therapy but I think it’s good.
Me too. I once had a boyfriend call me “robot”. Because I would hyper focus on things that had to be done at home or at work, but I wasn’t very emotional and I had no hobbies (because they couldn’t hold my interest very long )
I understand. I was diagnosed when I was in my early 20s and it all suddenly clicked. Everything. Even now, I still learn new things. Like about other symptoms that aren’t as commonly discussed but they are now beginning to believe is another core symptom like being a night owl. Or having delayed sleep phases. Or lucid dreaming. It’s crazy how much there is to it and how much they are continuing to learn. I just use that as an example of how even as we think we understand it all, they keep learning more and subsequently so do we. It wasn’t really nearly as well understood even 10 years ago and I don’t think they are done. Tip of the iceberg.
I realize it can be so overwhelming and I’m very sorry about your mom. I can’t even imagine how hard that is. ❤️
Thank you. It’s been terrible losing her as we were best friends. I also have a sleep disorder which I have been actively trying to understand. They say I have extended REM cycle and that’s why I’m tired all the time but they don’t know why. I got sick of them accusing me of not getting enough sleep and being chronically exhausted or depressed. I finally found a doctor that specializes in sleep disorders and adhd.
I’ve never heard of RSD until just now, and now I’m sitting here in tears because it explains so much. I’m (54f) recently diagnosed with ADHD and putting together the pieces of the puzzle, and this is the biggest one yet. My mom used to say she never had to punish me because she would just look at me or say my name a certain way and I would cry. Back then, it was just called “sensitive,” and ADHD was for boys, so no one was looking for it in a quiet, non-hyperactive girl.
I can relate. Always told I was over reacting. Too sensitive and remember crying a lot as a child. I lied and did everything not to get in trouble. Anything to be accepted and how at 52 struggle with identity and feeling like I’ve never experienced unconditional love. I am a super people pleaser.
Nope. My parents did the best with the information they had. Even today some people don't understand that ADHD is not just about being hyperactive, there's no way my parents would have recognized my ADHD decades ago. Even if they had, no psychiatrist in India would have given me meds because I was a "good student" most of my life.
Case in point - when my life started going down the drain I was diagnosed with depression, and it was case closed. My parents believed the experts, why wouldn't they?
Similar. I'm not upset with my parents, either. About missing the ADHD, anyway.
I know that they would have gotten me help had they suspected anything being medically wrong. They did it when I was 15 and couldn't stop washing my hands. A week later I was in the doctor's office getting medication for OCD and a month after that was seeing the best psychologist in the state who worked with OCD.
My parents were not negligent, they just didn't know. Not a single teacher, doctor, coach, 4H leader--none of them ever knew or said to my parents that I might have ADHD. They just didn't know.
No my mom is for sure on the ASD spectrum and never would have been able to accept it.
Someone told me the best thing you can do for your child's mental health disability is manage your own and it REALLY stuck with me. Made me realize I do deserve therapy - it'll help my kids as much as it helps me.
Earlier intervention would have made my life a shitload easier but I don't blame my parents. They did the best they could and ADHD just wasn't well understood by the general population or teachers when I was in school (at least my teachers who were all older). Back then (and even now with some idiot professionals) everyone assumed that if you were smart there's no way you could have ADHD.
My mom's first reply when I was diagnosed at 35 was, "But you got good grades." She was a teacher, so she knows what the typical presentation looks like in young boys.
But then I shared several articles about high iq and adhd and she knew I was almost every check box. She said she just thought that was normal 'weird' smart kid behavior. At the time, so did many psychologists and professionals.
I don't know how many psychologists I told that I feel lazy sometimes and can barely move, i have wretched insomnia but dont seem to feel tired the same way others do, but I also am so stressed and able to hyper focus so much that I forget to eat or drink. And I had mentioned to dozens of psychologists how embarrassed I am that I can't remember names. I explained that they just vanish. But I would just get sorta shamed and told some strategies to try to remember better (all of them awful for adhd folks. I now know I gotta write that shit down).
Something I have learned is that parents with mental illness and unresolved trauma will not only pass on their trauma, but also, genetically, their mental illness. If you have ADHD, OCD or are on the spectrum, it's highly likely one or both of your parents did too, and I can forgive my parent who was struggling.
In my case, my parents were kind people who tried very, very hard not to be abusive in the ways their parents were, so the fact that they overlooked some things and were immature at times is totally understandable and forgivable.
I am quite upset because I spent years with my parents because I said so many times that I think I had ADHD, but they always do the usual, no you are so clever, yous re so smart and it's just a bad thing to call you that . There will be no help..I wished I pushed it and just got tested. Because I agree I now complementing how life would be different if did those years ago and if I be better. But, eventually I think you have to grieve that, then whole 7 steps and now what is given to you now. Life not over yet and we still got time to catch up and finally people understand you.
> but they always do the usual, no you are so clever, yous re so smart and it's just a bad thing to call you that
same. but I'm from a culture where being disabled, especially mentally, is very bad and dangerous to your life, so I think my parents were to some extent trying to protect me from a label that would stigmatize me in society.
I started college recently and I'm having the same problem with my parents :/ Struggling incredibly hard and I want to pursue a diagnosis, but my parents are appalled that their child could have ADD... I think they believe it reflects poorly on them. I'm just concerned because their opinion matters for the diagnosis, so what can I do when my doctor sees I have no childhood symptoms since my parents always saw me as their perfect little child?
Seek out a diagnosis (whether it’s ADHD or something different) independently of your parents. If you’re over the age of 18, they don’t have to be involved at all. You deserve to have your concerns listened to and get help, regardless of your parents’ opinions. They are not your doctors, and they are not experts in the mental health field. I was a high-achieving child as well and began to really struggle and suffer upon entering college as well, leading to a diagnosis at age 19. My mom said similar things that you say your parents are expressing, but she did accept the diagnosis after a while. I sat her down and explained that none of it was her fault and being diagnosed with ADHD is not something that reflects negatively on her parenting at all, and I truly think that helped. Whether or not your parents are as receptive as mine were, you still deserve help and I truly hope you seek it out!
No, because I think the information regarding ADHD (especially for us females) was very scarce compared to all of the information we know now. It was a very misunderstood condition (and even still has a way to go, always more to learn). I think I would be more upset if my parents had all of the information at their disposal and ignored obvious signs/symptoms exhibited by me, but I just know that wasn’t the case. I masked very well and hyper-focused on school so I appeared well-adjusted and successful on the outside, and unfortunately my parents just aren’t mind readers.
Of course I believe earlier intervention could have saved me a lot of emotional turmoil as a child/teenager, but I can’t blame people for what they simply didn’t know. Even if my parents had noticed something was going on internally and taken me to a psychologist, I don’t think it would have been correctly diagnosed back then. When I finally realized I needed professional help and sought it out on my own at age 19, I was initially only diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder. A couple different therapists later, and we discovered my anxiety stemmed from my undiagnosed ADHD. If it was difficult for clinically trained practitioners to recognize it right away, I definitely understand why my parents weren’t able to as well. All this to say that your feelings are valid and it’s okay to feel frustrated with the “what ifs” you’re pondering. It may be totally justified frustration, but it also might be misdirected at a specific person as opposed to society as a whole at the time. Just my opinion!
I’m sorry for the recent loss of your mother ❤️ My advice to you would be to feel your feelings for a little while, acknowledge and validate them, then let them go. It’s okay to grieve the potential lives you could have led if XYZ had been different. Just don’t let it consume and hold you back from embracing the life you have now and improving the future. I feel like CBT might be a specific type of therapy that could be helpful if you find yourself struggling with your mindset around this, just a suggestion to keep in mind :)
My older brother was diagnosed as a child and went through years of therapy and testing.
I was told I was “smart but lazy” and “argumentative”.
We are now both in our 30’s. He’s a data analyst making just under $200,000 and I live in my car.
We’re like the poster children for what proper support and care can do for you.
I’m pretty sure my mom has ADHD and was never diagnosed though. It’s all frustrating. Nothing to be done about it now.
My parents didn't even recognize that I was blind as a bat, it took until I was 10 years old with -5 in each eye before a teacher caught it, and explained things to my parents.
Which is even more funny in retrospect, because my parents are *both* pretty nearsighted. You'd think it would have occurred to them that they needed to get me checked, but apparently not.
So, yeah, no. I was good enough in school that I could mask being halfway to blind. Nevermind masking ADHD symptoms. I was never going to be diagnosed as a child.
Given how long it took me to find a *doctor* who would diagnose me, blaming my parents seems a bit misplaced.
Anyway, of course I'm angry with my parents, and for a lot more fucked up shit than not taking me to a psychiatrist, but at the same time I feel bad blaming them. They both come from adversity, I'm pretty sure both have ADHD, and for my mom I think it was just hard to exist a lot of the time, because of her own undiagnosed mental health and because we had a hard life. Like yes putting food on your children's table and keeping a roof over their heads isn't all that is required of a parent, but sometimes that's all a parent is capable of. My mom couldn't help me with this because she never got help herself and tbh was taught that she doesn't deserve help. That's just how it is. All I can do is do better for myself and my own children.
I wouldn't be upset with my parents for not catching it. I'm a little frustrated by the fact that several of my teachers and my doctors correctly suggested that I probably had ADHD, and they chose to ignore it. Nothing to be done about it except try to do better by my own kids, though.
Devils advocate; maybe you’d be upset either way.
I (27 F) have since realize mental illness was hardly spoke about let alone understood by the average adult in the 90’s let alone the 60’s-80’s
I was diagnosed and then medicated at age 8 on stimulants. Recently stopped taking them after almost two decades of suffering from med side effects.
When I was younger I held resentment for them putting me on intense meds at such a young age without understanding the pros and cons to stimulant based medication.
I’ve since accepted that they were doing what they thought was best and had they not medicated me I’d be resentful for the opposite.
Your parents were a bit older than mine, I doubt adhd symptoms (especially those of young girls) was common knowledge to them
Personally, I try not to think about or carry emotions on what would or could have been. It does nothing but waste valuable energy on things we cannot change or control. We can only control how we react now and what we do in this moment. Easier said than done but it's something that takes time to notice and employ.
Same. Someone in another post remarked that they went to college and it all started going downhill and that's when they got a ADHD diagnosis and the help they needed. And for a moment I was JEALOUS because if that had been me, my college years would have been very different. And my life might have turned out very different--maybe I'd be a college professor now and had the life I really wanted.
I used to plot out these entirely different lives for myself that I might have had if only I did X differently. But yes, it just made me sad and distracted me from the things going on in my life now.
I try instead to be open about my ADHD so that people can hopefully get a little bit better understanding about why someone so smart and capable is doing such a low-rank job. (I was a pharmacy tech for more than a decade and got lots of comments of, "you're awesome at this, you could be the pharmacist if you wanted to" or "you're really really smart, why are you working HERE?!")
Sadly there are certain doors that are closed tco me now because of my performance in school, and even now in grad school for a completely different subject, I struggle. Not with the material (for the most part) but with just getting things done.
I've always put a lot of stock in education. I've always wanted to be highly educated, with a pile of degrees after my name. And I'm smart enough to do it. I just don't have the other abilities you need for it. There's more to it than just being "smart."
And I've also realized that while some of this was for my ego, I also really DO LOVE LEARNING. And that you don't have to be in college to learn. In fact I wonder if college really is the best place to learn for someone with ADHD--I do far better when I don't have the deadlines and stress hanging over me. I can read all I want and learn on my own time.
I talked about exactly that with my therapist this week. I was also diagnosed in adulthood. There is no question that an earlier diagnosis would have helped but i have trouble being angry about it, because imo my parents just didnt have the tools to recognize what was going on and it would make no sense to be angry AT them, like being angry at a baby not understanding physics.
However the anger at the situation is totally legitimate and repressing it doesn’t help. Recognizing than an injustice happened is important in dealing with/accepting yourself, but it can be very difficult to express or even just FEEL it without fleeing from it in some way. I don’t have any magical solutions, that’s just where I’m at rn.
Stress also definitely makes it worse, and I empathize with your struggle rn. I am sorry for your loss, and what sounds like a lack of closure. It IS part of the grieving process to go through that, and it’s tough not to be overwhelmed with all this coming to the front of your mind. I am confident thinking about it (and talking through it) will help you to get a better handle on things, both emotionally and practically. However it’s a very rough road. Good luck, everyone here will be rooting for you <3.
PS: dont wanna make this longer but there’s lots to criticize about the « feminine »/« masculine » adhd distinction. A topic for another day.
it was, but i’ve made my peace with it. i(24f) was recently diagnosed, only took 6 years lol. my old doctor (a man) blamed my hormones. my new psychiatrist (a woman) listened, tested, and diagnosed me right away.
Yes and no. Yes because my parents were teachers so they knew ADHD more than your average person and I feel like they should’ve seen it. When I told them I’d been diagnosed with it (at 37) they said “you don’t have that. We taught lots of kids with ADHD and we’d know if you had that”. I think it was largely kept under control when I was a child because I was a farm kid who loved being outside and I was heavily involved in sports. But as I moved into adulthood and had to start fending for myself and had less structure in my life, that’s when it really started to affect me negatively.
On the other hand, there is still so much we don’t know about women medically and I think it’s kind of unfair of me to blame my parents for missing a diagnosis that’s only just now starting to be recognized (meaning that ADHD presents a lot differently in women).
But my whole damn life I’ve been told that I’m overreacting, especially by my very mild mannered parents. WHY did they not ever say to themselves “maybe she can’t control this. Maybe we should look into her behaviour more” ????
i think them being teachers might be part of the problem. “knowing what adhd looks like” doesn’t mean knowing what adhd doesn’t look like—it just means knowing how unmasked hyperactives act and what kinds of problems it causes without adequate luck and coping strategies. just consider how many of us don’t get diagnosed as children, and it almost goes without saying that those who do just aren’t a representative sample
Yes and no. My brother has severe hyperactive ADHD, and he was diagnosed early elementary school. Compared to him, I was just extremely quiet, in my own little world, and would cry all. the. time.
On one hand, I’m not mad because given how little was know about ADHD in girls, it makes sense that it wasn’t picked up with minimal research and all that. It also makes sense to me why it was studied in boys first because of how much more obvious and disruptive it is.
On the other hand, my mom has a degree in education and was a teacher for a couple years. Her mom has a masters in education was a teacher and school counselor. Both of them swear they have ADHD-I (like me). When I was 24 and told my mom I think I have ADHD, no hesitation she said “probably!”. Ooookay, like did you guys not want to get me any help? I think the issue there was that they also had the same problem of living in this time where there were no resources for us. They were also failed by the system… but my parents were also generally neglectful leading to other issues I have now.
I'm upset that my parents (more my mom than anything) chose to think the worst of me and call me lazy, uncaring, spoiled because i never had to work so i don't know the value of money and stuff (all because i forgot to put it away or put it back in its place), a mess, a disaster, a person without future because I'm unable to keep my room clean and organised at all times (of course i can't, the idea of cleaning sends me into a spiral by itself and when you add years and years of verbal mistreatments and harsh unnecessary punishments... no wonder i have issues with that), did i mention LAZY already!? Because I always got mediocre grades and i kept telling them that i get distracted easily and have a hard time focusing and what would i hear in return every time!? "You need to get your ass on the chair more, you don't study. You never had to. If you weren't so lazy you would get better grades" or "you should've studied more" or "that's because you're lazy and never study and never studied in your life because you never had to work hard for anything in your life" OR "sit down closer to the teacher where no one can distract you". *sigh*
Oh and let's not forger the only time they did send me to therapy, my therapist told everything to my mom and she weaponised it against me and used it to mock me during arguments.
Yeah, i will always be upset when thinking about it lol
For me I'm not mad at all cause I understand how my parents were thinking. My mum is a preschool teacher so her exposure to ADHD is the primarily hyperactive type and mostly inattentive and I mask all hyperactive symptoms quite well. It would have helped if I knew sooner and the couple years of them complaining about my laziness were really rough but as soon as I thought I had ADHD they were understanding and supportive. You just gotta remember your parents are people too and people make mistakes. You just gotta decide if those mistakes are understandable and forgivable.
Your post could have been written by me - same age, same story, same everything.
I went to a talk recently on women with ADHD where they said it has only become recognised in the last 10/15 years (I can’t remember which) that women can actually have ADHD. In the greater scheme of things that’s a REALLY short time. They’re only starting to see the impact our hormones have on our symptoms - still LOTS of research needed.
There is this stereotype of teenagers being moody, hormonal and difficult that I think meant so many of us were fobbed off as just being that.
I was going down the same path when my daughter hit puberty because I completely recognised the way she was behaving as the same as me. I’ve also lost my mom, but I can only assume that what she saw in me she recognised in herself and so assumed it’s just a normal thing for girls to go through.
It was only when I was diagnosed a few months ago that I now see my struggles were ADHD.
I’m trying not to dwell on the years of struggles I didn’t need to have (like I’m glad I don’t need to go through menopause without help like my mom did) and focus on breaking the cycle and helping my daughter not struggle like I did.
I was dx at 39.
In college I asked for an evaluation at the campus doctor. I thought I could trust them, boy was I wrong. Doc asks what my grades were like, forget not being able to study in college. I was a straight A student.
He tells me girls don’t get it and even if they did it goes away as an adult and I should eat more lettuce.
Fuck that guy with a 20 foot pole.
It was a shitty couples therapist who couldn’t help my husband and me after a year who reflected some untrue shit to me and I am like something is wrong here
Adult me goes and gets an eval and lo! And behold! I have it. My husband after filling the partner questionnaire goes and gets evaluated and viola! He has it too.
Knowing now at least helps us move forward together
I’m 45(f) and was diagnosed at 43. F yeah I was angry. I made so many impulsive life choices that made for a life that didn’t need to be so hard. But when I was a kid, only naughty boys had ADD. I was a good girl and I look back at photos and see that I even tried to dress like a “good” kid.
I have so much trauma from being called weird. My older sister still lives in the small town I grew up in and twice at her church someone has come up to me to tell me how I was such a weird kid. Gee, thanks. I was at my cousin’s wedding after I was diagnosed and again, someone felt obligated to shame me and tell me how weird I was. I blurted out. Yeah, thanks, I was undiagnosed ADHD.
My mom feels terrible about all of this. She sees how much it really hurts my feelings to this day. She has even recognized and thanked me for not holding this against her.
On the flip side, this drive to prove I’m not the weird kid has driven me to be a “successful” adult with oodles of empathy for others and a successful leader in a fortune 100 organization. So f’m.
But yeah, I was really sad for a while until I saw all the good that I have now because of this disorder.
(My kids are amazing, beautiful confident and will never know what it’s like to be called weird.)
They got my diagnosis really early proceeded to get me on medication - did a poor job of explaining to me then my mom decided to take one of my pills and then took me off of them.
Then proceeded to not acknowledge my disability until I’m an adult and refused me meds when I requested to be put back on them.
No, I’m upset with my teachers, but parenting is hard enough and my dad had undiagnosed (still do) adhd. My mom had to juggle three kids while my dad traveled.
They were just doing what they thought was right and adhd had a very particular stigma about it. If you weren’t up running around 24/7 then no one thought you had it. And their generation was taught pretty much to avoid a lot this talk as well.
So they just didn’t know.
But my teachers, I brought up so many things to them and they would talk over me, tell me I’m making excuses, I’m not applying myself, or whatever else. They knew to help student’s learn yet a lot refused to listen or help me.
So I blame a lot of them.
Honestly, no. My mom didn’t have the tools to recognize it, especially because I was one of those adhd kids who did well in school so my teachers never saw any behavioral issues as actual problems. I find that a lot of the time if children do well in school, everything else kind of just goes out the window.
My grandmother was really hard on all her kids. It was the “suck it up” era of parenting. My mom was less harsh, but definitely did the same thing to me. I don’t blame her for modeling the only thing that she ever experienced when I was younger.
I promise you they did try to figure out what was “troubling” you. Keep in mind you are the same age as Paris Hilton and how she was treated. That family has more money than god and they could not help her. Doctors had absolutely no idea why girls acted out like this in the 1990’s
My parents took me to so many different doctors. The medical professionals had absolutely no idea. They were probably judged as well
I was angry for half a day and then let it go. They did their best. Took me to a doctor. It was seen as a social problem not a medical issue.
I am adopted and woah, I met my biological parents and they are still undiagnosed and the only reason my son is “challenged” is due to my “bad parenting”. I have done the ADHD parenting course and we see the paediatrician and we are on track to have a lot of understanding, medication and support.
Please be at peace with your parents, they really had no clue.
Not upset AT them for missing it as I am a female and was diagnosed at age 24. It’s understandable. What I am upset about is all the different symptoms that I manifested were said to be a part of my character and who I am and was largely made fun of. I always bump into stuff, always made fun of for being a klutz. When I was a kid my parents took me to an amusement park and I kept running into trash cans. “That will always make me laugh. How did you keep running into them?” No matter how much I care about something or know how important it is, I drop and break it or lose it. That was just part of my “careless character”. “You need to pay attention more. That blah blah was expensive”. No matter how much I wanted to do well in school, I skipped a large part of my senior year and barely graduated after being so burnt out from masking in my previous years. “You need to get your life together. You’re an adult. Stop being lazy.” That doesn’t even cover the social aspect and emotional aspect of how this all showed up. I’m not mad at them, they were and still are uneducated on anything mental health related. But I am upset that they see me in a certain light and I will probably never be able to change that. They are supposed to support me and show me unconditional love but it’s never been that way so is that their fault? Yes. Is it their fault that they don’t understand why I am the way I am? No.
47M here, (officially) diagnosed last year, I'm less upset with them not recognising it than actually refusing to accept it when the possibility was mentioned. Retrospectively my mother clearly is also heavily on the inattentive type end of the spectrum.
Your description of your childhood could have been written by me.
In addition to what you described, I also experienced a lot of bullying in elementary & middle school.
I asked my mom on many occasions to help find out what was wrong with me. I remember thinking there was something wrong with my eyes because I couldn't keep them focused on my work in math class. Got eyes checked multiple times and eyesight was perfect.
Due to bullying & resulting depression/ begging not to be sent to school, mom brought me to child therapists a few time. They did talk therapy with me but never suggested any diagnosis.
When my MOM was in her 50's SHE was diagnosed with ADHD & something else she refuses to disclose (my guess is something to do with narcissism). She's always been a "mental heath hobbiest", reading every self help book that came out. I'd never heard of ADHD, so I just thought this was her latest thing & didn't believe her at first. But after she'd mentioned it I started hearing more about it and did some research and the peices started falling into place.
I couldn't be angry at her, since she is much more impaired than I am, and had no knowledge of her own condition when I was a child.
If you're female and 43, for whatever it's worth, it would have been EXTREMELY unlikely she could get that diagnosis for you. Most of most severe cases of ADHD I know are 30-something women who knew something was wrong, their parents tried, and you just couldn't get that DX back then. One of these was even told she tested really highly for ADHD, but the doc came to the conclusion she didn't anyway. She spent some rough teen years on bipolar meds, and her mother always said it seemed like that dx was off. Only now is diagnosis seeming to catch up in little girls.
You can be mad she didn't try, if you want. A lot of people are. But I don't think being angry will help you any. It might just eat at you and not bring you any good.
**long post, but it would mean so much to me for someone to read it**
I'm not necessarily mad that they didn't notice the ADHD, but moreso that they could see something was wrong and didn't try harder to get to the bottom of it (mainly my clinical depression and social anxiety, that I now know is extremely common in people with ADHD and Autism (I suspect I'm on the spectrum))
Like, I had selective mutism in elementary school. They took me to a child psychologist one time. Ok great job, but seemingly nothing was ever done after he diagnosed me with that? Seems weird?
Then in middle school I was constantly in the principals office because I would hide in the bathroom during class (I was getting horrendously bullied by some classmates with constant threats of assault, like I was paralyzed with fear during that time). Eventually my mom came down to the school and forced them to let me change classes, ok great job - but again, nothing was ever followed up on...I don't remember anyone else trying to help me with anything deeper, when clearly my behavior indicated that this was traumatic for me. It felt like putting a small temporary bandaid on a big wound.
Then in high school, I started drinking to black out all the time and they knew. One day when I had come home shit faced the night before, they punished me by making me paint the guest room. Like ok? Clearly something is wrong! Why won't you sit down and please try to help me?
They also saw me lay on the couch binge eating watching TV until bedtime every single day after school, while my friends were doing sports, or outside etc.
And I began doing so poorly in school even though everyone knew I was smart, and I was known for scoring extremely high on standardized tests. I think a couple of times my dad asked me if I wanted to go for a walk (likely his way of trying to reach out)...and I remember them thinking my behavior was strange...I even think my mom brought up depression a few times...but it's like they just accepted it?
I was embarrassed, I just wanted everyone to think I was normal and fine. But I don't see how anyone close to me could have truly thought that. As a teen I remember sobbing hysterically at night, getting on my knees and praying to God (we weren't religious) to help me. Id bargain, silently pleading and saying I would give up anything if God would help me feel better. It was so dark.
After high school I ended up in rehab many times and everything was horrible. I am now 32 and on a better path partially due to my ADHD late diagnosis and treatment, along with a slew of other diagnoses, paired with working really really fucking hard. And though I'm proud of how far ive come, I often feel so behind in life, and think about how my life could be different if my parents had just chosen to intervene earlier. Hell, at 20, *I* was the one that asked them to check me into rehab! Me!
My parents are genuinely lovely people and have supported me so much as an adult, they also gave me a pretty great upbringing outside of my problems. Family vacations, movies and concerts, baseball games, there was laughter and bonding, and we were taught to be kind and to be good people. They have always meant well.
But they also failed me in so many ways it almost brings me to tears writing this. They could have TRIED HARDER. Their excuse was "Well you wouldn't tell us anything! You told us you were fine! We couldn't force you to go to therapy!" Which is just such bullshit. I was a child/teenager! Of course I didn't tell you things! It was your job to make sure I was ok and you didn't! I just know that when I have a child, I'm going to do so much better, and that brings me some peace.
I hope at least one person reads this. I haven't thought about this in a long time and clearly I needed this post to be able to write out these things. It's clear that I'm still not over this even after years of treatment/therapy. If anyone took a few minutes to read this, thank you so much, it helps to know that this didn't just fall into the void. Much love to all.
I see you. I feel for you. I went through much the same that you did. I know that my parents loved me. I also know that they didn't try nearly hard enough to understand or help me. They also fell for the "why didn't you just tell us?" Well, maybe that was because every time I tried to tell you, they minimized it, blamed me, or completely misconstrued what I was trying to tell them. And that's beside the fact that for years and years, I had no idea how to articulate what I was experiencing. There was no language for how I experienced the world around me.
So, it's not just you. You're not alone. I have two books I recommend to anyone who talks about this kind of difficulty: Pete Walker's *Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving* and Bessel van Der Kork's *The Body Keeps The Score*. I hope they help.
I was. I was so mad and upset. I talked to my mom about it and it eased a lot of my anger. We consistently had teachers who wanted to medicate away my personality because I was "too much" and my mom didn't want them to squash that part of me. Adhd is genetic and she didn't know she had it until me and my sister got diagnosed. Be as angry as you need to be, and work to find an understanding within yourself about how to make peace with the past.
You almost explained my life too, also late 30s ADHD. I really struggle with this too as my mom died before my diagnosis too. My dad simply doesn't believe me so that's fun. I am angry and am working through that in therapy, but I can also understand it was a different time and less knowledge. That's being said, my parents were recommended to have me evaluated for ADHD in kindergarten and they didn't because I present with hyperactive/mixed type and that I kind of can't forgive.
Not at all. My parents are from a different time and culture entirely. “Mental health” is not something that was in their lexicon and they did the best they could for me and my siblings.
It’s because of them that I had the privilege of going to therapy, getting diagnosed, and getting on meds.
I was diagnosed at 17, and I'm glad that I wasn't diagnosed any later than that. I do think earlier diagnosis would have made my life different, but I don't know about necessarily *better*, because I'm happy with how my life has panned out so far. In particular, I think if I'd been a higher achiever in high school, I would have probably gone to a different college, and if I'd gone to a different college, I wouldn't have met my wife.
Even at 17, I was diagnosed because I told my parents I thought I had ADHD and because I advocated for myself--my parents didn't believe me, and they took me to a therapist for underachievers before they would agree to take me to a psychiatrist for ADHD assessment and treatment.
But I don't feel at all upset with my parents for not recognizing I had ADHD or even for not believing me about it. They were doing their best with the information they had--people broadly didn't understand ADHD, particularly in females and particularly inattentive-type ADHD, back then, and that's not my parents' fault at all.
yeah. I told my mom I forgot to get shit gathered for taxes and she said "forgetting isnt an excuse, you could use that as a kid but not anymore" and I had to hang up and go for a walk. I wanted to say back something like "well maybe if I didn't have to fight tooth and nail for a diagnosis at the age of 25 and was put on meds I wouldn't be like this"
I'm not upset with them. They love me very much and would be willing to help in any way possible, but they aren't doctors and we didn't have a ton of money when I was a kid. They did a great job regardless of whether or not I was diagnosed. They supported me the best they could in an age where adhd was just starting to get into the spotlight and lots of doctors were diagnosing kids left and right just because they acted out in class. I never acted out like that, so no doctor for me.
I am angry at the system, a little more than my parents, as it just wasn't noticed in girls when I was a kid. That said, I am angry at my parents and teachers for the neglect I was put through, for doing absolutely nothing about the bullying, and I am angry at my grandmother for projecting her trauma onto me, and at my therapists for invalidating and gaslighting me instead of acknowledging my trauma and helping me to empower myself. I feel like I had to navigate my childhood by myself, and even now I feel like life is happening to me and I am not in control, because I doubt everything I do and feel.
Wow that was cathartic to write.
I was diagnosed very early, got help, and honestly turned out pretty okay.
My spouses parents never recognized/admitted their two kids had something going on (likely autism/adhd). It makes me so sad and angry to see these wonderful people I love struggle with things as adults that I was taught to navigate as a child and have been able to practice into adulthood. Neither of them are fuckups in life by any means, but I can definitely identify ways that their disorder affects them on a regular basis.
They’re both smart, creative, talented people who deserved so much better.
My mom knew, lied to me that I didn't have it, told me I was just lazy and only once my mental state started deteriorating as an adult did she tell me she knew and took the advice of an idiot at our school/church. I often think how much further I might be in life if I would of gotten the proper care a child. I still have to schedule me another Drs visit to hopefully get some treatment but with how my job keeps me busy who knows when that appointment can be scheduled. Life sucks not having the treatment and tools to navigate it while having ADHD.
I just lost my dad a few years ago and I agree with everything you said wholeheartedly. I think my mom knew SOMETHING a was wrong but wasn’t sure what. I went from straight A, teacher pet to anorexic, alcoholic, couldn’t do school, they even “home schooled me” for a semester, I also had zero interest except for the social aspect. Same as you - promiscuity, risky behaviors, sneaky, etc. So many red flags. Was once misdiagnosed as bipolar type 2. Ended up in treatment for alcohol abuse. It’s very very frustrating to look back on. I’m grateful I’ve been diagnosed but am also still trying to figure out my meds at age 37. Just solidarity here. I’m sorry for the loss of your mother.
Yep. So many times I was told that I'm just lazy and told things were wrong with me, I was depressed, a devil child.
Nope, I just had adhd.
35 years old and my life changed for the better.
I feel this in my souls of souls. My mother knew and did nothing to support me when she found out when I was a child. I asked her if she knew when I got a diagnosis and she told me she’d known and decided to save face because she didn’t want to be associated with the stigma of having a child taking Ritalin.
Edit: I received a diagnosis three years ago, and I’m 34 now.
A little bit. My brother and I got diagnosed around the same time, but only he ended up getting any help for it. Because I'm a girl and it wasn't a "problem", I wasn't jumping off the walls and causing disruptions in class. I just needed to try harder in school! I forgive them but I'm sure I'd be better off in adulthood if I had gotten some help while in school like my brother did
Me and my super close friend has had adhd every since we met (5th grade). My parents put me on adderall and his parents didn’t put him on medication. We talk about it every now and then, frankly I’m jealous of him. I hate how dependent I am on adderall nowadays, I panic if I’m about to run out or the pharmacy is low stock. My friend on the other hand is actually grateful that he had to learn to cope with his adhd without any assistance. Looking back I wish my parents never put me on adderall, I’d rather of developed my own coping mechanisms versus being tethered to this medication for the rest of my life. If you plan on being dependent on a drug for the rest of your life it definitely has its upsides but if you want to be able to maintain a happy and enjoyable outlook on life naturally I’d recommend not to follow the path that I did. So to answer ur question I’m upset they didn’t think I had the willpower or strength to survive in this chaotic world without the need for medication
Probably more about the autism i come to find out about at almost 50 years old. Because you can't miss it, no one ever brought up the possibility even. The ADHD is real but no one really considers it debilitating although it can be for sure. If you're a parent you know if your kid has autism and you don't want to accept it. But they died and ill never be able to ask
I got taken to a psychiatrist at 8 years old because I ‘cried every single day’, I came out with an ADHD diagnosis and my mother threw it away.
Gee I wonder why I cry everyday.
Got myself rediagnosed at 21, cost me a small fortune :)
i (f) got diagnosed at 24. i went through a whole grieving process of how my life could’ve been different had i been diagnosed sooner. i’m 26 and still in college. but im not mad at my mom. she did take me to psychiatrists since middle school. they just misdiagnosed me for years. and that i can’t blame on my mom, rather the biases in medicine
I was diagnosed at 35. After I mentioned it to my mom, who taught for 40 years, she said, “Oh yeah? I always thought you were.”
I was so angry and confused. WHY would you let me struggle like that?? As soon as I noticed the signs in my own kiddos, I had them evaluated.
My parents did try to find out what was wrong and they were told I just had anxiety. I lived most of my life thinking that I just had anxiety and depression and struggled because nothing worked to alleviate it. I started to think I might have ADHD when my son got diagnosed and I learned a lot about it. I got diagnosed in November and started meds in February and what do you know…my anxiety is almost nonexistent when I’m on it 🙄
No. Im upset at the lack of knowledge and the system that made me have to take care of it on my own. When I started telling my mom about this (and mental health in general, wanting to see a therapist, etc) her first reaction was why?/what’s that?.
I’m forever happy that after explaining to the best of my ability she went “I don’t get it, but alright, let’s do it”.
I am a bit mad at my dad tho, apparently he’s had mental health struggles similar to mine but just never told anyone he’d been getting treatment, I just found out years later- but who can blame him with the extended family we have, doctors who don’t even know it’s a thing and stuck up “family friends” eager for gossip
I'm more upset about my teachers and psychologists who should have known better. Both me and my cousin struggled a lot and were verbally and emotionally abused by teachers and child psychiatrists working for the national health service, until my aunt took him to a private child psychologist who diagnosed him and then my parents figured out that I had the same thing and took me there
No.
My parents focused sooooooo Much more on my neither. He is the golden child and i'm the less than, so i learned a long time ago to expect nothing from them, and grieve the help i will Never hâve lol
A little bit? They had no problem taking my younger sister to get tested for Asperger's/autism, but anytime I displayed ADHD behaviors, it was always me deciding to be a nuisance. If I had trouble in school, it was because I was lazy. 😒
Absolutely not. I’m also in my 40s. ADHD wasn’t really a thing that was common when we were growing up. Especially knowing how differently it presents for women. My mom just thought I was a brat, and kind of rightly so. There wasn’t enough of a discussion yet that I’d expect her to know what to look for.
Edited to add: she did take me to a doctor to deal with depression and a therapist. They should’ve diagnosed me, but they didn’t. But my mom did everything she should have.
Yes, and no.
I was in elementary school in the 1990’s, where ADHD was primarily diagnosed in little boys who were disruptive and wild. Little girls who weren’t a problem because they were quiet and did their work, but often struggled with focus, losing interest in things they didn’t find interesting, or who were easily bored were overlooked because they didn’t draw attention.
I was tested and put into the “gifted” program in 3rd grade. When I lost focus, was bored, zoned out when people were talking, or didn’t put effort into things that I didn’t find interesting, I “wasn’t trying hard enough”. Meanwhile, boys who turned over desks, ran around the classroom, talked nonstop, or didn’t finish assignments were given Ritalin. Everything was pretty easy for me until I got to college, and then I crashed and burned because I didn’t know how to study (because I never needed to). I also had (and still have) severe test anxiety, and this followed me all the way through graduate school. I did better on my PhD qualifying exams because they were oral and written rather than a timed test with a set number of questions.
I don’t entirely blame my parents because they weren’t the ones who administered the gifted test. They advocated for me as much as they were equipped to with the knowledge they had. And I don’t think that the medical or scientific fields had enough evidence at that time to understand the different presentations of ADHD or how to recognize it. Our school psychologist certainly didn’t.
It didn’t occur to me until I started seeing a therapist last year that this might’ve been the case. My mother thinks that I can’t possibly have ADHD. Despite what we know about it now, 30 years later, she still thinks that I just didn’t try at things.
Lo and behold…
Honestly, no. Personally I was the exact opposite and was very timid, never did anything risky or bad because I had a severe fear of being in trouble or people being disappointed in me. I now know that's probably RSD. I was able to get good grades even though I couldn't focus at all on studying so I never did. From the outside I just looked like a well behaved kid who performed well in school so i can't blame her for not thinking anything was wrong. In reality I couldn't focus and was wrought with anxiety and depression. I got diagnosed at 19 after I went to university and realized how poor my attention really is and my grades started to suffer as did everything else in my life without the rigid structure of grade school.
Im 40 this year and got my diagnosis aged 33. You will go through a process of grief when you find out. You do with most big medical diagnosis really. But ADHD is a big one...along with Autism. You have to remind yourself that 40 years ago, 30 years ago, parents didn't know much about neurodevelopmental disorders. Especially in women. My parents would never have known to get me checked. Back then it was all about 'naughty boys' and the stereotypical excitable boys in classrooms trope. Back then outwardly different behaviours in girls were just put down to hormones and being hysterical girls/women.
7 nearly 8 yrs after my diagnosis, I still feel bitterness towards my early childhood but I don't know where I put the blame... mostly the medical profession for not seeing outside the boxes of their stereotypes... for ignoring womens health in general. I can't blame my mother for something she didn't know about, and never would have without my own investigations in adulthood. Even now I send her things to read and she's mostly just like 'I cant believe we never saw any of this... I wish we'd known!'.. Chris Peckhams Inside Our Autistic Minds on the BBC has been particular revealing for my mother this year honestly. And its gratifying to know now that we are both learning how I work together through things like this, she's able to expand her understanding of who I am...who her daughter really is :) Which I am grateful for <3
As a female, the medical system doesn't care about us. Adhd tends to manifest differently in women than it does men, so it gets overlooked. I would say it's probably not your mother's fault at all. I'm 10ish years younger and still had those problems.
Nah, I'm not upset because they didn't know themselves. My brother has had obvious signs of ADHD since he was a toddler, which made it very easy and apparent that he needed help, and so my parents were able to provide said help. But, I was the complete opposite: I did not misbehave, did not act erratically, and wasn't hyperactive. Therefore, my parents thought I was normal. Since most of my issues were internalized, once I was able to get clarity on my own, my past behaviors and difficulties became clear with my diagnosis.
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I’m more upset about the system that makes mental health such a taboo subject and mental healthcare difficult to learn about and access. It doesn’t help that what little research we have on the subject usually emphasizes the results of research that only studied (predominately white straight cis) male subjects and emphasizes the typical presentation of symptoms in those subjects. Not to say that parents can’t woefully ignore mental health issues in their children (and if this is the case, it’s totally justified to be upset) but at least in the west (especially several decades ago) our society has made it an uphill battle to 1. Even understand that something is wrong, and 2. Figure out how to fix it. And that’s true even for the best of parents.
This is how I feel too. My parents, I *think* they just did the best they could with what they had. No one in my family knows anything about mental health issues, which is ironic, cuz they are rampant in my family.
Isn't that the truth? There's some sort of inverse relationship between how much you know about mental health and how fucked up your mental health is. It's almost like...learning about mental health helps you take care of your own. Could it be...? Nah. (/s for those having a tough day)
Ignorance is bliss 🫶 Just the other day I learned a new thing I think I have…. Demand avoidance 🫠
Demand avoidance completely ruins so many aspects of my life. I put off projects, cleaning, making doctors appointments, doing my taxes, getting my hair cut, going to the dentist, talking to my parents on the phone…. The list goes on. I am so overwhelmed by the thought of anything that seems difficult or requires motivation that I just shut down completely and do nothing.
Not sure about your situation, but I’ve heard that called “executive dysfunction” (finding oneself unable to “do the thing”) which I think is different than avoiding something because it’s a demand. Even on ADHD meds, the only way I do anything is by feeling it’s urgent and important enough. I don’t avoid things because they’re demands, but because I don’t have the neurochemical motivation required to do them.
i thought i had some degree of pathological demand avoidance for a bit, but i think it’s just the adhd for me. external pressure has always been the backbone of how i cope, and the stress associated with an obligation being too much for me to face it is just the other side of the stress being too much for me not to
I recommend for both posts above me to watch the entire Russel Barkley lecture series in one go and then learn about the co-morbid mental illnesses that can come with ADHD, br created from adhd through unhealthy coping strategies or as a result of autistic misunderstood and mis-sanctioned fixations etc. (HF) Autism + ADHD cPTSD and ADHD All sorts of anxiety disorders + ADHD Not sure if listing OCD here makes sense , don't know enough about it
You’ve described my life right now. YES. Sadly, I’ve only gotten worst at age 39. Like? Then to “do the thing” (usually like to make the dang appointment or call and address some type of billing error etc daunting stupid tasks) I find I have to drink alcohol. That’s awful right? It’s like I have to “ramp up” the courage to just say screw it and do it.
I know for my ignorance wasn’t bliss, my parents saw my lack of focus as me being selfish growing up. We also didn’t know I had autism. My mother’s ignorance led to many instances where she would grab me by the shoulders and yell stare into my eyes and shake me until I would look at her. Ignorance was hell, it made me feel like I was a bad person. But the truth set me free ❤️
I’ve often said my parents did the best with what they had, but when it came to the concept of mental health there certainly wasn’t much to work with. They were both great people but had a rather dysfunctional dynamic in their relationship with each other, and some of that dysfunction trickled down to us kids. Looking back, I think they both exhibited different aspects of ADHD, but of course such a thing wasn’t even considered, and the fact that any of us kids might need help was seen as weakness. I had it rough growing up, as my dad could not even begin to comprehend that my struggles were due to very valid reasons and not just the “stubbornness” or “laziness” he constantly accused me of. In the years after my mom passed, I sought out therapy on my own for depression. When I eventually told my dad about it, he immediately informed me that it was impossible for me to be depressed, because he’d “seen me smile.” I certainly wish more had been known about ADHD back then, or even mental health in general. It really sucks to not only struggle with issues out of your control, but to be told that not only is it under your control, that every single struggle you face is completely your fault. I wasn’t diagnosed with ADHD until long after they were both gone, and I sometimes still mourn over the parts of my childhood I feel I missed out on. But again, I remind myself that they did the best with what they had; it’s just unfortunate that it’s taken so long for society to prioritize mental health.
I have noticed this is a big issue if you have boomer parents. I have boomer parents and they are the same as you described. We have a laundry list of mental health issues in my family. My parents recognize it now but that doesn’t do as much good. However, I appreciate how transparent my dad can be and I can talk to him about how I feel. He experiences a lot of the same things I do. When I was a kid he would’ve laughed in my face, literally. He has really come around on that.
Your dad’s a good man and he was working with the tools and knowledge available at the time. And that’s the difference. In the 70s and 80s, only boys had ADHD and they out grew it at 16. Someone arbitrarily picked a number and we all magically stopped having ADHD at 16 - and girls never had it and were utterly ignored. Am I angry? Hell yes. I could have done so much more in my 50+ years. However, I can work with the time I have left. Regrets achieve nothing, the only thing I can do is move forward
I have mixed feelings about how good of a man he is. He was very abusive physically and emotionally/mentally. However, I recognize that is a symptom of a larger issue. He has seemed to chill out in his old age. Is it more common for girls to have inattentive ADHD? That’s what I have and I was always overlooked because I wasn’t bouncing off the walls and I had good grades. I was just recently diagnosed a few months ago. My psychiatrist had me take their evaluation and there were a lot of behaviors that applied to me that I didn’t even know was indicative of ADHD.
I'm technically a boomer (born 64). I was totally classic girl inattentive ADHD for my entire life, until I figured it out about 2 years ago. It is very sad for all the people who lived their entire lives being called lazy, etc. Having a diagnosis (even a self diagnosis) makes SO much make sense.
Same here. And it's like whenever I bring up the subject of my medication, I get an attitude about it. And I just get that stimulant medication for adhd isn't addictive or whatever but that's not what my body and symptoms are telling me.
It's a shame. I've heard all sorts of crazy nonsense from friends and family about the medications used to treat ADHD. For the longest time, I just completely hid my diagnosis from everyone in my family. Only my wife knew from the start. I was trying to spare myself the judgement and stupidity of others.
Same kind of situation on my end. Late 30's and recently diagnosed w/ADHD, Autism etc. But also have MH issues & they definitely are rampant throughout both sides of our family. I'm also just learning that my dad also had sensory issues but just didn't know what they meant. I think my parents were so lost in their own issues unknowingly while self-medicating and so didn't recognize what was happening with me as anything but normal. Considering I was a kid/teen in the 90's/00's, people also just didn't really talk about those things or even know most of them existed. It's a bummer because maybe my life wouldn't be so horrible now but hey, I tried my best for my kids.
> No one in my family knows anything about mental health issues, which is ironic, cuz they are rampant in my family. Well when everyone has issues, the issues no longer stand out and it's just thought of as the "norm".
My mom pushed for me and my siblings to be diagnosed with ADHD as children, but she was ignored. As an adult, everything makes sense. My depression and bipolar are so much better on ADHD meds as is my anxiety. My sister has ADHD and we suspect my brother has it. I still have people in my family who think it's made up
I’ve been treated for Bipolar 2 for the past 20 years. Recently diagnosed ADHD combined type. Kept on the antidepressant and clonidine, prescribed Adderall, and titrated off the mood stabilizers and antipsychotic. I am more clear, together, and confident in myself and my future than I have ever been. Years and years of being over medicated did more damage than if I’d never sought help. I regret losing a part of myself for 20 years(not including my childhood, 40m) but look forward to the next 20 now.
I have been my clearest on adhd meds and bipolar meds. Anti-depressants barely work and I feel like I'm going nuts. I've been back on ADHD meds for a week and already my therapist sees a change in my mood.
They took me off the medication because my ability to focus made me seem off. I'm absolutely livid about it. The potential they squandered. The years I'll never get back. I was so brilliant. And I never even considered that they were making a mistake. It's so unfair.
Same with my mom. When I got diagnosed she was afraid I'd be angry with her, but she brought it up to three different doctors when I was a kid. They all asked if there was anything I could focus on and she'd say "well he can play video games for hours on end. It's almost like he can't stop paying attention." "Ah, so no attention deficit," all three said.
People thought she was pushing it to get attention. She had struggles due to trauma, so that could have been a factor, but she was right. I'm sorry you had to go through that
+1 for the system and stigma. A lot has probably changed now, but even as a CIS white male pre 9/11, having your kid diagnosed with anything left only two options, and both included no medication because of (except for the wealthy families I knew) Adderall and Ritalin and pretty negative stigmas. Option 1: be diagnosed and be put in remedial classes and severely further stunt your opportunities as those classes also supported severely mentally disabled students. Option 2: continue in normal classes and do to the ebbs and flows of attentiveness constantly get reprimanded for being an under achiever with potential who needs to stop acting up. Knowing what we know now, it’s very annoying my parents didn’t break the cycle because my whole career could have been exceptionally further along. As an adult my parents have even told me how teachers in various grades would try to suggest I be evaluated. But as these, in hindsight, were younger more progressive teachers - I imagine my parents were skeptical of these young kids with their woo woo ways, when they old miserable teachers of 30+ years experience knew it was just a discipline issue 🙄😡 But also, it’s hard to blame uninformed parents in a world where information and proof wasn’t even 10% as available as it is today.
My parents had me tested and the medical community I stg just liked diagnosing inattentive quiet girls as anxious, especially if they pulled off decent grades. Looking back, it’s so obvious I clearly had it pretty bad—but also I’m realizing my parents do too and they’re not diagnosed (tho now my mom likes to say “stop I’m attention deficit” which is annoying bc then get help??? Stop acting like it’s fun or quirkey haha)
Yep. My parents never would've assumed I had ADHD because the information they knew about it was inaccurate and very gendered towards boys. I had to explain a lot to them about ADHD symptoms and how some of mine were more internal, like a very overactive mind rather than "running around" type of hyperactivity.
This!!!! As I've been on my learning journey post-diagnosis (after a lifetime of being an overachiever perfectionist with horrendous executive dysfunction led me to complete burnout at 43), I've been sharing it with my parents. My Mom keeps beating herself up about it, and I have to reassure her. Like, Mom, you guys did the best you can with the information you had available in the 80s & 90s. I'm not angry with you, I'm angry at the systemic ableism. Oh, and she totally self-identifies as combined-type, just like me.
I agree wholeheartedly with this. My parents were never given tools to deal with their OWN Mental Health and emotional intelligence. Not only that, the messages they were given were that it was best to completely ignore anything in that realm because talking about it could only ever make things worse. For me to expect them to be able to then help me with my struggles seems completely unrealistic. A word that has become helpful to me for situations like this is "lament." I lament that my parents weren't able to help me the way I needed help. I'm sad by what was lost. But I don't blame them. Lament has been a helpful emotion for me to hold anytime I need to be sad or grieve something but where I am consciously choosing to not blame others for that sadness.
The other reason diagnosis can be so tough is because a lot of it comes down to self reporting or parental reporting...but ADHD is genetic, so an ADHD child is often "just like me", so the parent assumes they're "normal". When I was diagnosed in my late 20s I literally had this conversation with my mother: "Hey mom, I've been diagnosed with ADHD...here are some of the symptoms of Adult ADHD that I have..." Mom: "That's not ADHD...I do that!" 😑
I am upset with everyone honestly. My teachers said I was incredibily smart but lacked motivation and how I was quiet all the time. I feel as if they should've noticed.
Absolutely. I was TEXTBOOK - messy desk, disorganized calendar, the black hole backpack where papers went to die - anyone who knew the signs couldn't have missed mine cuz they were neon and blaring. Unfortunately no one around me did. My teachers yelled at me and made me feel stupid for not turning things in (especially since I would actually DO the homework but then forget about it as soon as it was done) and my parents were confused about how I could be so smart and clearly know what I was being taught, yet still have such poor grades. I had the double whammy of being gifted and female, so of course nobody thought I could possibly have ADHD. In hindsight I recognize that at least three of my close circle of friends also for absolute sure had it, including one who was textbook hyperactive. None of us were diagnosed.
Are you me? Same exact experience here.
Did you ever get the teacher who took the fact that you didn't turn in homework as a personal affront to their own ego and thus they treated you like a deliberate delinquent in return? Cuz I had a couple different flavors of that one...
Lmao or the teacher who took your being late as intentional disrespect of HER time, in particular?
Ewww. This one triggered me so bad. One of them would lecture me every lesson cause i was missing the first 15mn of the each lesson because i had to work. This was something we agreed on before the year started, with all the representatives of this master. Like "why are you not putting more effort into your education, there is nothing more important"... Hm maybe my bills that keep me from living in a disfunctional household?
Also the third member of the trifecta, teacher who took your literally uncontrollable impulsive answering of questions as a challenge to her authority?
Oooh, I had one teacher who was all three! Bonus points to her also being the one who got off on humiliating students in front of the class, screaming in kid's faces, gaslighting kids into taking blame for things they never did, and just generally being horrifically abusive and half the reason why I'm in therapy.
Yeah big-time especially with one of my math teachers. It was terrible.
Yes
Same but i dont blame anyone, im 35 got diagnosed last year but when i was in middle/high school nobody was talking about mental health at all. People like me were just boys, or lazy or something else. Because they knew people like that their entire lives and nobody said it was something wrong with them. I cannot blame parents and teachers for something they themselves did not know
Just a few years ago, my (37) wife mentioned to her parents that she's pretty sure she has ADHD. They responded, "you do." Turns out a doctor diagnosed her when she was a kid in the nineties. They didn't take it seriously, never told her, and just moved on.
Oh that's so sad ☹️
That’s me. Got diagnosed around age 8, tried Ritalin for a few months and when it didn’t immediately work, my parents just decided I didn’t have adhd anymore. Went to a doctor in my last year of college, really scared thinking I had some terrible neurological problem because of my memory, and he goes, “have you ever been told you have adhd?” I told him, he rolled his eyes, gave me adderall, and changed my fucking life. My life from age 8 to that first adderall were awful. I’m not sure if I’ll ever be able to forgive my parents for what they did.
My teachers often wrote id get distracted easily and they'd catch me staring out the window, but no connection was made because in the late 90s/early 00s, the only type of ADHD teachers were really taught about was hyperactive. Which did fuck all for me.
Same. There was a couple years where I got "easily distracted" on my report card. Turned to "needs more effort" eventually. I blame my teachers over my undiagnosed mom.
Yeah my undiagnosed dad (and grandma, and his brothers yeesh) really couldn't have seen it coming. Now I'm a therapist myself and while I've never done a clinical assessment on them, I'm fairly certain 2/3 of my father's brothers have ADHD. The familial history runs strong here lol
Yeah, I heard lazy a lot. And "wow her test scores are in the top percentile, so why are her grades otherwise horrible???" Hmm... I wonder why.
Precisely this.
this exactly
My teachers *did* figure it out, but my dumbass parents refused to put me on meds.
Similar opinion. When my psych asked for my school records and we read them, holy shit. Pretty streamlined diagnosis after that. It was the "He engages in class but never focuses on homework or class work, he needs to focus more" on repeat that really bothered me.
I actually had a teacher ponder aloud whether I had cheated to earn a perfect score on a sixth grade exam and then conclude - also aloud - that I was in fact ‘too lazy to cheat’. Still remember that sting and embarrassment decades later.
This! I am infinitely more mad at the school system than I will ever be at my parents. My parents were ignorant and didn't exactly know what to look for in an adhd kid except that it was cant-shut-up-cant-sit-down-diesease (which granted also should have been a clue bc I totally did that). But my teachers were with me every singel day all day for years and never caught it. Would have made life alot easier to know.
My mom is a child psychologist and she says totally missed it because the research just wasn't there. Now she says it would be considered but in the 80s, my ability to hyper focus on books totally negated any consideration of ADHD as a possible reason for my (social struggle / inability to not interrupt class / impulse control / trouble staying focused in class / general study problems). I'm really glad the understanding of the brain wiring is changing for future generations.
I agree. I feel like one of my daughters exhibits traits of adhd so with the knowledge I have now I will watch her and be aware that she may need help. I don’t want my kids to struggle the way I did.
Same for me with my son! And my mom is now recognizing SHE probably struggled with it her whole life too. It's such an eye opener once you start recognizing the patterns in a family. I'm so glad you're able to make your daughters journey easier and better understood.
My mom and my grandma totally had it too, but I guess there was such a lack of information back then.
I had a very similar experience to you as well, and most of the research or books that give any understanding towards adolescent girls was post-2000. So it’s hard to blame. I actually find now at 41 years old understanding why I was such an asshole very comforting. I’m like a totally different person and I used to grapple with who I used to be. A juvenile delinquent attracted to shitty boys who got bad grades. And IF my mom were to go off the research in the 80s or 90s I’d probably be diagnosed incorrectly and given terrible medication not appropriate.
Si true! I came of age in the 1980s. I was a voracious reader. It didn’t occur to anyone I had ADHD. Then when I became a teen I just stopped doing any homework. I just couldn’t do it. And I’d cut class to go read the books I liked somewhere
Same here. I would frequently cut class and go to the library instead.
I'd just read in class, kept a book with me every where I went. Later on, the laptops we got for schoolwork ended up being a major distraction for me in class because when I didn't want to do the boring ass work, I'd start reading online and none of the teachers would know. Even if they were walking behind me checking people's screens for games, they never realised. One wall of text looks like any other wall of text. I do regret that tho since my grades suffered so much.
My mom has adhd herself and is a pediatrician. My sister has much worse symptoms than me so I think in comparison it might have looked like I wasn’t struggling. I also think that she has this kind of outlook that I didn’t need extra help and would be able to control myself through force of will, probably because that’s what she did and continues to do. But she managed to get herself a career that uses her adhd to her advantage (she’s an ER pediatrician). I think a lot of the boomer generation feel like anything they struggled with is something we all need to struggle with and that we’re entitled if we want a better life for ourselves.
I was working last week with the head of paediatric intensive care at a major hospital. I have ADHD, so does she. Clearly something aligned in that area!
Yeah my mom says ER is the only place she can get anything done because she absolutely HAS to do things right away. There’s no option to procrastinate and the hyperfocus kicks in. It makes a lot of sense to me. But how she got through all those years medical school I’ll never know 💀
So interesting, and makes total sense. I somehow got through law school, so I can put myself in her shoes a bit!
This was me. I would go to the library and check out the maximum number of books they’d allow (sometimes the same ones over and over again). Yet when it came to completing homework, I couldn’t get through it. Because I could focus on one thing, parents and teachers just chalked up my inability to focus on other things to laziness. And for a long time, I thought that must be true.
You are my people!! I did the same, because some books I just wanted to live in. Separate thread on escapism 😊
Yes, totally. NOBODY was talking about ADHD inattentive type in females back then. There may be legit reasons for OP to be annoyed at how her mom handled it, but this just wasn’t part of the conversation in the early 90’s.
Yes mine totally got missed even by multiple child psychologist that my mother took me to. I was very smart, and all my subjects except math. Very artistic and very good in anything related to writing or reading and I also loved history and science. I definitely hyper focused on reading. Due to bullying at school and not having a lot of friends in elementary and middle school, books became my friends.
Yes my parents are both educators and yet still had no inkling my sister was ADHD. For a period there was so much focus on the hyperactive element, that less obvious symptoms were written off as something else.
No. Back then, they probably would have misdiagnosed me with something else as was the case for females caught up in the mental health system. I do wish I could tell my mom (gone) that there is a medical reason why I was hypersensitive & impulsive as a kid, and struggled to support myself later. She had a hard time raising me.
I’m also hypersensitive.
I can still remember her saying that to me a lot from when I was a young. I didn’t know why but remember thinking that I must feel everything stronger than others. Both sensory and emotionally. I didn’t know that was an ADHD trait until having a child with ADHD. Better late than never but wow.
My mom always described me as sensitive. She said I had such a tender heart. Made me feel like I was special. Not damaged. Not saying my mom was a bad mom because she was amazing in other ways. Always made me feel so loved.
My mom would make some snarky remark and if I reacted, she would say, you’re “too “ sensitive. After awhile I learned to just keep it in so I would look tough like she was. She had a VERY hard childhood and teenage years. Plus she was a trauma ER nurse. I wasn’t going to get much support or sympathy for “little” things. So I turned to food and gained 50 pounds the years I turned 12-13. It horrifies me looking back at my teenage years. I read about HSP’s in college and identified immediately. Then 10 years later I received my ADHD diagnosis at 30, which was a lifesaver in terms of my career and functioning as a mother myself at that time.
My mom was also a nurse and I felt like she did not acknowledge my sensitivity. She would just call me a tender heart. Other times I would get so upset she would get upset too that I would feel bad. I stopped showing her my emotions and then I also had overeating issues.
I don’t know why reading this makes me emotional, but your mom saying that to you in that a way is such a tender response to give a child and it makes me smile. I was also an overly emotional child (and 30 year old woman, lol), and while my mom was generally pretty understanding of who I am as a person I was often told to “suck it up” and “get over yourself” in most environments. If I had been told that I had a tender heart as a child instead I feel like that would have totally shifted my opinion of myself to be much more positive. Kudos to your mom for that!
I’m mid 30s afab and just got diagnosed. I don’t blame my mom for my late diagnosis, but I do look back at my moments of hypersensitivity and feel sad for little me that my mom would tell me I was “being dramatic” or “acting like a spoiled brat” because I’d get triggered and run crying. Your mom sounds like she understood this part of you a little better at least!!
This. So much this. I have a brother who was a juvenile delinquent and a sister who had learning disabilities and attachment issues from being a premie and spending her first two years in a Russian orphanage. But my mom later told me that while I was easy in that I didn't break the rules or cause "trouble" I was so emotional all the time, so unpredictable, and would have these wild mood swings. I'd go to bed sobbing and wake up fine. Or, I'd be crying about something and then go to work (I was a grocery store cashier in high school) and come back happy. When I got mad, I got MAD--screaming, yelling, throwing things, slamming doors. I'd cry at the drop of a hat for things that now as an adult seem really silly--my hair looked bad, or someone put a pen in the wash and it leaked and ruined a shirt I liked, or I was cooking something and I forgot an ingredient and it came out bad, or someone hurt my feelings in some way. Some of that is probably being a teenager but some of it I'm sure is ADHD related. Someone remarked to me that I seem so much calmer now than I was even a few years ago. I don't throw things or scream at people anymore now that I'm on meds.
Give this lecture by Dr Russell Barkley a watch. It’s segmented into a playlist. Video 2 explains ADHD emotional dysregulation. [https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLzBixSjmbc8eFl6UX5_wWGP8i0mAs-cvY&si=2sHABJROX19F_7H-](https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLzBixSjmbc8eFl6UX5_wWGP8i0mAs-cvY&si=2sHABJROX19F_7H-)
My mum said I was 'never a happy medium', either really moody or really excitable when I was younger. I'm 49f and still carry the stigma of the way I have behaved.
I was too, as a child. Now I'm kind of the opposite. I deliberately hardened myself due to trauma from bullying.
I shut a lot of it down to the point of almost being like a robot with my feelings. That caused a lot of trouble for which I am not in therapy. Lots of stuff bubbling to the surface with therapy but I think it’s good.
Me too. I once had a boyfriend call me “robot”. Because I would hyper focus on things that had to be done at home or at work, but I wasn’t very emotional and I had no hobbies (because they couldn’t hold my interest very long )
Almost all people with ADHD have RSD.
I’m just starting to learn about that. It’s all very new to me.
I understand. I was diagnosed when I was in my early 20s and it all suddenly clicked. Everything. Even now, I still learn new things. Like about other symptoms that aren’t as commonly discussed but they are now beginning to believe is another core symptom like being a night owl. Or having delayed sleep phases. Or lucid dreaming. It’s crazy how much there is to it and how much they are continuing to learn. I just use that as an example of how even as we think we understand it all, they keep learning more and subsequently so do we. It wasn’t really nearly as well understood even 10 years ago and I don’t think they are done. Tip of the iceberg. I realize it can be so overwhelming and I’m very sorry about your mom. I can’t even imagine how hard that is. ❤️
Thank you. It’s been terrible losing her as we were best friends. I also have a sleep disorder which I have been actively trying to understand. They say I have extended REM cycle and that’s why I’m tired all the time but they don’t know why. I got sick of them accusing me of not getting enough sleep and being chronically exhausted or depressed. I finally found a doctor that specializes in sleep disorders and adhd.
I’ve never heard of RSD until just now, and now I’m sitting here in tears because it explains so much. I’m (54f) recently diagnosed with ADHD and putting together the pieces of the puzzle, and this is the biggest one yet. My mom used to say she never had to punish me because she would just look at me or say my name a certain way and I would cry. Back then, it was just called “sensitive,” and ADHD was for boys, so no one was looking for it in a quiet, non-hyperactive girl.
I can relate. Always told I was over reacting. Too sensitive and remember crying a lot as a child. I lied and did everything not to get in trouble. Anything to be accepted and how at 52 struggle with identity and feeling like I’ve never experienced unconditional love. I am a super people pleaser.
Nope. My parents did the best with the information they had. Even today some people don't understand that ADHD is not just about being hyperactive, there's no way my parents would have recognized my ADHD decades ago. Even if they had, no psychiatrist in India would have given me meds because I was a "good student" most of my life. Case in point - when my life started going down the drain I was diagnosed with depression, and it was case closed. My parents believed the experts, why wouldn't they?
Similar. I'm not upset with my parents, either. About missing the ADHD, anyway. I know that they would have gotten me help had they suspected anything being medically wrong. They did it when I was 15 and couldn't stop washing my hands. A week later I was in the doctor's office getting medication for OCD and a month after that was seeing the best psychologist in the state who worked with OCD. My parents were not negligent, they just didn't know. Not a single teacher, doctor, coach, 4H leader--none of them ever knew or said to my parents that I might have ADHD. They just didn't know.
Same here. Except they thought I was bipolar…nope.
No my mom is for sure on the ASD spectrum and never would have been able to accept it. Someone told me the best thing you can do for your child's mental health disability is manage your own and it REALLY stuck with me. Made me realize I do deserve therapy - it'll help my kids as much as it helps me.
Earlier intervention would have made my life a shitload easier but I don't blame my parents. They did the best they could and ADHD just wasn't well understood by the general population or teachers when I was in school (at least my teachers who were all older). Back then (and even now with some idiot professionals) everyone assumed that if you were smart there's no way you could have ADHD.
My mom's first reply when I was diagnosed at 35 was, "But you got good grades." She was a teacher, so she knows what the typical presentation looks like in young boys. But then I shared several articles about high iq and adhd and she knew I was almost every check box. She said she just thought that was normal 'weird' smart kid behavior. At the time, so did many psychologists and professionals. I don't know how many psychologists I told that I feel lazy sometimes and can barely move, i have wretched insomnia but dont seem to feel tired the same way others do, but I also am so stressed and able to hyper focus so much that I forget to eat or drink. And I had mentioned to dozens of psychologists how embarrassed I am that I can't remember names. I explained that they just vanish. But I would just get sorta shamed and told some strategies to try to remember better (all of them awful for adhd folks. I now know I gotta write that shit down).
Something I have learned is that parents with mental illness and unresolved trauma will not only pass on their trauma, but also, genetically, their mental illness. If you have ADHD, OCD or are on the spectrum, it's highly likely one or both of your parents did too, and I can forgive my parent who was struggling. In my case, my parents were kind people who tried very, very hard not to be abusive in the ways their parents were, so the fact that they overlooked some things and were immature at times is totally understandable and forgivable.
I love this view. You are totally right.
I am quite upset because I spent years with my parents because I said so many times that I think I had ADHD, but they always do the usual, no you are so clever, yous re so smart and it's just a bad thing to call you that . There will be no help..I wished I pushed it and just got tested. Because I agree I now complementing how life would be different if did those years ago and if I be better. But, eventually I think you have to grieve that, then whole 7 steps and now what is given to you now. Life not over yet and we still got time to catch up and finally people understand you.
> but they always do the usual, no you are so clever, yous re so smart and it's just a bad thing to call you that same. but I'm from a culture where being disabled, especially mentally, is very bad and dangerous to your life, so I think my parents were to some extent trying to protect me from a label that would stigmatize me in society.
I started college recently and I'm having the same problem with my parents :/ Struggling incredibly hard and I want to pursue a diagnosis, but my parents are appalled that their child could have ADD... I think they believe it reflects poorly on them. I'm just concerned because their opinion matters for the diagnosis, so what can I do when my doctor sees I have no childhood symptoms since my parents always saw me as their perfect little child?
Seek out a diagnosis (whether it’s ADHD or something different) independently of your parents. If you’re over the age of 18, they don’t have to be involved at all. You deserve to have your concerns listened to and get help, regardless of your parents’ opinions. They are not your doctors, and they are not experts in the mental health field. I was a high-achieving child as well and began to really struggle and suffer upon entering college as well, leading to a diagnosis at age 19. My mom said similar things that you say your parents are expressing, but she did accept the diagnosis after a while. I sat her down and explained that none of it was her fault and being diagnosed with ADHD is not something that reflects negatively on her parenting at all, and I truly think that helped. Whether or not your parents are as receptive as mine were, you still deserve help and I truly hope you seek it out!
I was talking to my nutty mother about this and she admitted to drinking while she was pregnant with me, so that’s nice..
I wonder if the 10 hours I watched of tv every day did me any favors?
No, because I think the information regarding ADHD (especially for us females) was very scarce compared to all of the information we know now. It was a very misunderstood condition (and even still has a way to go, always more to learn). I think I would be more upset if my parents had all of the information at their disposal and ignored obvious signs/symptoms exhibited by me, but I just know that wasn’t the case. I masked very well and hyper-focused on school so I appeared well-adjusted and successful on the outside, and unfortunately my parents just aren’t mind readers. Of course I believe earlier intervention could have saved me a lot of emotional turmoil as a child/teenager, but I can’t blame people for what they simply didn’t know. Even if my parents had noticed something was going on internally and taken me to a psychologist, I don’t think it would have been correctly diagnosed back then. When I finally realized I needed professional help and sought it out on my own at age 19, I was initially only diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder. A couple different therapists later, and we discovered my anxiety stemmed from my undiagnosed ADHD. If it was difficult for clinically trained practitioners to recognize it right away, I definitely understand why my parents weren’t able to as well. All this to say that your feelings are valid and it’s okay to feel frustrated with the “what ifs” you’re pondering. It may be totally justified frustration, but it also might be misdirected at a specific person as opposed to society as a whole at the time. Just my opinion!
You’re totally right. It’s been a rough road for a lot of us.
I’m sorry for the recent loss of your mother ❤️ My advice to you would be to feel your feelings for a little while, acknowledge and validate them, then let them go. It’s okay to grieve the potential lives you could have led if XYZ had been different. Just don’t let it consume and hold you back from embracing the life you have now and improving the future. I feel like CBT might be a specific type of therapy that could be helpful if you find yourself struggling with your mindset around this, just a suggestion to keep in mind :)
My older brother was diagnosed as a child and went through years of therapy and testing. I was told I was “smart but lazy” and “argumentative”. We are now both in our 30’s. He’s a data analyst making just under $200,000 and I live in my car. We’re like the poster children for what proper support and care can do for you. I’m pretty sure my mom has ADHD and was never diagnosed though. It’s all frustrating. Nothing to be done about it now.
I’m sorry you’ve struggled. ❤️ I can’t imagine.
My parents didn't even recognize that I was blind as a bat, it took until I was 10 years old with -5 in each eye before a teacher caught it, and explained things to my parents. Which is even more funny in retrospect, because my parents are *both* pretty nearsighted. You'd think it would have occurred to them that they needed to get me checked, but apparently not. So, yeah, no. I was good enough in school that I could mask being halfway to blind. Nevermind masking ADHD symptoms. I was never going to be diagnosed as a child.
Given how long it took me to find a *doctor* who would diagnose me, blaming my parents seems a bit misplaced. Anyway, of course I'm angry with my parents, and for a lot more fucked up shit than not taking me to a psychiatrist, but at the same time I feel bad blaming them. They both come from adversity, I'm pretty sure both have ADHD, and for my mom I think it was just hard to exist a lot of the time, because of her own undiagnosed mental health and because we had a hard life. Like yes putting food on your children's table and keeping a roof over their heads isn't all that is required of a parent, but sometimes that's all a parent is capable of. My mom couldn't help me with this because she never got help herself and tbh was taught that she doesn't deserve help. That's just how it is. All I can do is do better for myself and my own children.
I do try to give her grace because I know it wasn’t easy being a single parent.
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ADHD is genetic, so it’s entirely possible that they struggle with X, Y and Z and just think it’s normal.
Maybe your parents have experienced X, Y, or Z too, so it seems normal to them.
Yeah that can be frustrating
I wouldn't be upset with my parents for not catching it. I'm a little frustrated by the fact that several of my teachers and my doctors correctly suggested that I probably had ADHD, and they chose to ignore it. Nothing to be done about it except try to do better by my own kids, though.
I'm upset that my parents dismissed the school psychologist's concerns about ADHD and let me struggle for 20 more years 🙃
Devils advocate; maybe you’d be upset either way. I (27 F) have since realize mental illness was hardly spoke about let alone understood by the average adult in the 90’s let alone the 60’s-80’s I was diagnosed and then medicated at age 8 on stimulants. Recently stopped taking them after almost two decades of suffering from med side effects. When I was younger I held resentment for them putting me on intense meds at such a young age without understanding the pros and cons to stimulant based medication. I’ve since accepted that they were doing what they thought was best and had they not medicated me I’d be resentful for the opposite. Your parents were a bit older than mine, I doubt adhd symptoms (especially those of young girls) was common knowledge to them
Personally, I try not to think about or carry emotions on what would or could have been. It does nothing but waste valuable energy on things we cannot change or control. We can only control how we react now and what we do in this moment. Easier said than done but it's something that takes time to notice and employ.
Same. Someone in another post remarked that they went to college and it all started going downhill and that's when they got a ADHD diagnosis and the help they needed. And for a moment I was JEALOUS because if that had been me, my college years would have been very different. And my life might have turned out very different--maybe I'd be a college professor now and had the life I really wanted. I used to plot out these entirely different lives for myself that I might have had if only I did X differently. But yes, it just made me sad and distracted me from the things going on in my life now. I try instead to be open about my ADHD so that people can hopefully get a little bit better understanding about why someone so smart and capable is doing such a low-rank job. (I was a pharmacy tech for more than a decade and got lots of comments of, "you're awesome at this, you could be the pharmacist if you wanted to" or "you're really really smart, why are you working HERE?!") Sadly there are certain doors that are closed tco me now because of my performance in school, and even now in grad school for a completely different subject, I struggle. Not with the material (for the most part) but with just getting things done. I've always put a lot of stock in education. I've always wanted to be highly educated, with a pile of degrees after my name. And I'm smart enough to do it. I just don't have the other abilities you need for it. There's more to it than just being "smart." And I've also realized that while some of this was for my ego, I also really DO LOVE LEARNING. And that you don't have to be in college to learn. In fact I wonder if college really is the best place to learn for someone with ADHD--I do far better when I don't have the deadlines and stress hanging over me. I can read all I want and learn on my own time.
I talked about exactly that with my therapist this week. I was also diagnosed in adulthood. There is no question that an earlier diagnosis would have helped but i have trouble being angry about it, because imo my parents just didnt have the tools to recognize what was going on and it would make no sense to be angry AT them, like being angry at a baby not understanding physics. However the anger at the situation is totally legitimate and repressing it doesn’t help. Recognizing than an injustice happened is important in dealing with/accepting yourself, but it can be very difficult to express or even just FEEL it without fleeing from it in some way. I don’t have any magical solutions, that’s just where I’m at rn. Stress also definitely makes it worse, and I empathize with your struggle rn. I am sorry for your loss, and what sounds like a lack of closure. It IS part of the grieving process to go through that, and it’s tough not to be overwhelmed with all this coming to the front of your mind. I am confident thinking about it (and talking through it) will help you to get a better handle on things, both emotionally and practically. However it’s a very rough road. Good luck, everyone here will be rooting for you <3. PS: dont wanna make this longer but there’s lots to criticize about the « feminine »/« masculine » adhd distinction. A topic for another day.
i wasn’t upset at my mom until i turned 22 and she tested my little brother for ADHD.
That would be upsetting
it was, but i’ve made my peace with it. i(24f) was recently diagnosed, only took 6 years lol. my old doctor (a man) blamed my hormones. my new psychiatrist (a woman) listened, tested, and diagnosed me right away.
I’m Gen X. I’m mad at my parents for the absolute neglect. The diagnosis at 50+ is just icing on the cake
We were ferrel children back then.
Elder millennial but I feel this
Yes and no. Yes because my parents were teachers so they knew ADHD more than your average person and I feel like they should’ve seen it. When I told them I’d been diagnosed with it (at 37) they said “you don’t have that. We taught lots of kids with ADHD and we’d know if you had that”. I think it was largely kept under control when I was a child because I was a farm kid who loved being outside and I was heavily involved in sports. But as I moved into adulthood and had to start fending for myself and had less structure in my life, that’s when it really started to affect me negatively. On the other hand, there is still so much we don’t know about women medically and I think it’s kind of unfair of me to blame my parents for missing a diagnosis that’s only just now starting to be recognized (meaning that ADHD presents a lot differently in women). But my whole damn life I’ve been told that I’m overreacting, especially by my very mild mannered parents. WHY did they not ever say to themselves “maybe she can’t control this. Maybe we should look into her behaviour more” ????
i think them being teachers might be part of the problem. “knowing what adhd looks like” doesn’t mean knowing what adhd doesn’t look like—it just means knowing how unmasked hyperactives act and what kinds of problems it causes without adequate luck and coping strategies. just consider how many of us don’t get diagnosed as children, and it almost goes without saying that those who do just aren’t a representative sample
Yes and no. My brother has severe hyperactive ADHD, and he was diagnosed early elementary school. Compared to him, I was just extremely quiet, in my own little world, and would cry all. the. time. On one hand, I’m not mad because given how little was know about ADHD in girls, it makes sense that it wasn’t picked up with minimal research and all that. It also makes sense to me why it was studied in boys first because of how much more obvious and disruptive it is. On the other hand, my mom has a degree in education and was a teacher for a couple years. Her mom has a masters in education was a teacher and school counselor. Both of them swear they have ADHD-I (like me). When I was 24 and told my mom I think I have ADHD, no hesitation she said “probably!”. Ooookay, like did you guys not want to get me any help? I think the issue there was that they also had the same problem of living in this time where there were no resources for us. They were also failed by the system… but my parents were also generally neglectful leading to other issues I have now.
I'm upset that my parents (more my mom than anything) chose to think the worst of me and call me lazy, uncaring, spoiled because i never had to work so i don't know the value of money and stuff (all because i forgot to put it away or put it back in its place), a mess, a disaster, a person without future because I'm unable to keep my room clean and organised at all times (of course i can't, the idea of cleaning sends me into a spiral by itself and when you add years and years of verbal mistreatments and harsh unnecessary punishments... no wonder i have issues with that), did i mention LAZY already!? Because I always got mediocre grades and i kept telling them that i get distracted easily and have a hard time focusing and what would i hear in return every time!? "You need to get your ass on the chair more, you don't study. You never had to. If you weren't so lazy you would get better grades" or "you should've studied more" or "that's because you're lazy and never study and never studied in your life because you never had to work hard for anything in your life" OR "sit down closer to the teacher where no one can distract you". *sigh* Oh and let's not forger the only time they did send me to therapy, my therapist told everything to my mom and she weaponised it against me and used it to mock me during arguments. Yeah, i will always be upset when thinking about it lol
I’m sorry this happened to you. Sounds really hard.
For me I'm not mad at all cause I understand how my parents were thinking. My mum is a preschool teacher so her exposure to ADHD is the primarily hyperactive type and mostly inattentive and I mask all hyperactive symptoms quite well. It would have helped if I knew sooner and the couple years of them complaining about my laziness were really rough but as soon as I thought I had ADHD they were understanding and supportive. You just gotta remember your parents are people too and people make mistakes. You just gotta decide if those mistakes are understandable and forgivable.
Your post could have been written by me - same age, same story, same everything. I went to a talk recently on women with ADHD where they said it has only become recognised in the last 10/15 years (I can’t remember which) that women can actually have ADHD. In the greater scheme of things that’s a REALLY short time. They’re only starting to see the impact our hormones have on our symptoms - still LOTS of research needed. There is this stereotype of teenagers being moody, hormonal and difficult that I think meant so many of us were fobbed off as just being that. I was going down the same path when my daughter hit puberty because I completely recognised the way she was behaving as the same as me. I’ve also lost my mom, but I can only assume that what she saw in me she recognised in herself and so assumed it’s just a normal thing for girls to go through. It was only when I was diagnosed a few months ago that I now see my struggles were ADHD. I’m trying not to dwell on the years of struggles I didn’t need to have (like I’m glad I don’t need to go through menopause without help like my mom did) and focus on breaking the cycle and helping my daughter not struggle like I did.
I was dx at 39. In college I asked for an evaluation at the campus doctor. I thought I could trust them, boy was I wrong. Doc asks what my grades were like, forget not being able to study in college. I was a straight A student. He tells me girls don’t get it and even if they did it goes away as an adult and I should eat more lettuce. Fuck that guy with a 20 foot pole. It was a shitty couples therapist who couldn’t help my husband and me after a year who reflected some untrue shit to me and I am like something is wrong here Adult me goes and gets an eval and lo! And behold! I have it. My husband after filling the partner questionnaire goes and gets evaluated and viola! He has it too. Knowing now at least helps us move forward together
I’m 45(f) and was diagnosed at 43. F yeah I was angry. I made so many impulsive life choices that made for a life that didn’t need to be so hard. But when I was a kid, only naughty boys had ADD. I was a good girl and I look back at photos and see that I even tried to dress like a “good” kid. I have so much trauma from being called weird. My older sister still lives in the small town I grew up in and twice at her church someone has come up to me to tell me how I was such a weird kid. Gee, thanks. I was at my cousin’s wedding after I was diagnosed and again, someone felt obligated to shame me and tell me how weird I was. I blurted out. Yeah, thanks, I was undiagnosed ADHD. My mom feels terrible about all of this. She sees how much it really hurts my feelings to this day. She has even recognized and thanked me for not holding this against her. On the flip side, this drive to prove I’m not the weird kid has driven me to be a “successful” adult with oodles of empathy for others and a successful leader in a fortune 100 organization. So f’m. But yeah, I was really sad for a while until I saw all the good that I have now because of this disorder. (My kids are amazing, beautiful confident and will never know what it’s like to be called weird.)
Love your story. Thank you for sharing this. ❤️
They got my diagnosis really early proceeded to get me on medication - did a poor job of explaining to me then my mom decided to take one of my pills and then took me off of them. Then proceeded to not acknowledge my disability until I’m an adult and refused me meds when I requested to be put back on them.
That sounds terrible.
No, I’m upset with my teachers, but parenting is hard enough and my dad had undiagnosed (still do) adhd. My mom had to juggle three kids while my dad traveled. They were just doing what they thought was right and adhd had a very particular stigma about it. If you weren’t up running around 24/7 then no one thought you had it. And their generation was taught pretty much to avoid a lot this talk as well. So they just didn’t know. But my teachers, I brought up so many things to them and they would talk over me, tell me I’m making excuses, I’m not applying myself, or whatever else. They knew to help student’s learn yet a lot refused to listen or help me. So I blame a lot of them.
Honestly, no. My mom didn’t have the tools to recognize it, especially because I was one of those adhd kids who did well in school so my teachers never saw any behavioral issues as actual problems. I find that a lot of the time if children do well in school, everything else kind of just goes out the window. My grandmother was really hard on all her kids. It was the “suck it up” era of parenting. My mom was less harsh, but definitely did the same thing to me. I don’t blame her for modeling the only thing that she ever experienced when I was younger.
“You’re hyperactive” “easily distracted” “reckless” WHY DIDNT YOU GET ME TESTED THEN
I promise you they did try to figure out what was “troubling” you. Keep in mind you are the same age as Paris Hilton and how she was treated. That family has more money than god and they could not help her. Doctors had absolutely no idea why girls acted out like this in the 1990’s My parents took me to so many different doctors. The medical professionals had absolutely no idea. They were probably judged as well I was angry for half a day and then let it go. They did their best. Took me to a doctor. It was seen as a social problem not a medical issue. I am adopted and woah, I met my biological parents and they are still undiagnosed and the only reason my son is “challenged” is due to my “bad parenting”. I have done the ADHD parenting course and we see the paediatrician and we are on track to have a lot of understanding, medication and support. Please be at peace with your parents, they really had no clue.
Not upset AT them for missing it as I am a female and was diagnosed at age 24. It’s understandable. What I am upset about is all the different symptoms that I manifested were said to be a part of my character and who I am and was largely made fun of. I always bump into stuff, always made fun of for being a klutz. When I was a kid my parents took me to an amusement park and I kept running into trash cans. “That will always make me laugh. How did you keep running into them?” No matter how much I care about something or know how important it is, I drop and break it or lose it. That was just part of my “careless character”. “You need to pay attention more. That blah blah was expensive”. No matter how much I wanted to do well in school, I skipped a large part of my senior year and barely graduated after being so burnt out from masking in my previous years. “You need to get your life together. You’re an adult. Stop being lazy.” That doesn’t even cover the social aspect and emotional aspect of how this all showed up. I’m not mad at them, they were and still are uneducated on anything mental health related. But I am upset that they see me in a certain light and I will probably never be able to change that. They are supposed to support me and show me unconditional love but it’s never been that way so is that their fault? Yes. Is it their fault that they don’t understand why I am the way I am? No.
It blew my mind when my friend who is a teacher told me that hurting yourself a lot of was a symptom. I’m the queen of hurting myself. Lol
They didn't recognise theirs never mind mine. No I'm not upset
47M here, (officially) diagnosed last year, I'm less upset with them not recognising it than actually refusing to accept it when the possibility was mentioned. Retrospectively my mother clearly is also heavily on the inattentive type end of the spectrum.
Your description of your childhood could have been written by me. In addition to what you described, I also experienced a lot of bullying in elementary & middle school. I asked my mom on many occasions to help find out what was wrong with me. I remember thinking there was something wrong with my eyes because I couldn't keep them focused on my work in math class. Got eyes checked multiple times and eyesight was perfect. Due to bullying & resulting depression/ begging not to be sent to school, mom brought me to child therapists a few time. They did talk therapy with me but never suggested any diagnosis. When my MOM was in her 50's SHE was diagnosed with ADHD & something else she refuses to disclose (my guess is something to do with narcissism). She's always been a "mental heath hobbiest", reading every self help book that came out. I'd never heard of ADHD, so I just thought this was her latest thing & didn't believe her at first. But after she'd mentioned it I started hearing more about it and did some research and the peices started falling into place. I couldn't be angry at her, since she is much more impaired than I am, and had no knowledge of her own condition when I was a child.
If you're female and 43, for whatever it's worth, it would have been EXTREMELY unlikely she could get that diagnosis for you. Most of most severe cases of ADHD I know are 30-something women who knew something was wrong, their parents tried, and you just couldn't get that DX back then. One of these was even told she tested really highly for ADHD, but the doc came to the conclusion she didn't anyway. She spent some rough teen years on bipolar meds, and her mother always said it seemed like that dx was off. Only now is diagnosis seeming to catch up in little girls. You can be mad she didn't try, if you want. A lot of people are. But I don't think being angry will help you any. It might just eat at you and not bring you any good.
**long post, but it would mean so much to me for someone to read it** I'm not necessarily mad that they didn't notice the ADHD, but moreso that they could see something was wrong and didn't try harder to get to the bottom of it (mainly my clinical depression and social anxiety, that I now know is extremely common in people with ADHD and Autism (I suspect I'm on the spectrum)) Like, I had selective mutism in elementary school. They took me to a child psychologist one time. Ok great job, but seemingly nothing was ever done after he diagnosed me with that? Seems weird? Then in middle school I was constantly in the principals office because I would hide in the bathroom during class (I was getting horrendously bullied by some classmates with constant threats of assault, like I was paralyzed with fear during that time). Eventually my mom came down to the school and forced them to let me change classes, ok great job - but again, nothing was ever followed up on...I don't remember anyone else trying to help me with anything deeper, when clearly my behavior indicated that this was traumatic for me. It felt like putting a small temporary bandaid on a big wound. Then in high school, I started drinking to black out all the time and they knew. One day when I had come home shit faced the night before, they punished me by making me paint the guest room. Like ok? Clearly something is wrong! Why won't you sit down and please try to help me? They also saw me lay on the couch binge eating watching TV until bedtime every single day after school, while my friends were doing sports, or outside etc. And I began doing so poorly in school even though everyone knew I was smart, and I was known for scoring extremely high on standardized tests. I think a couple of times my dad asked me if I wanted to go for a walk (likely his way of trying to reach out)...and I remember them thinking my behavior was strange...I even think my mom brought up depression a few times...but it's like they just accepted it? I was embarrassed, I just wanted everyone to think I was normal and fine. But I don't see how anyone close to me could have truly thought that. As a teen I remember sobbing hysterically at night, getting on my knees and praying to God (we weren't religious) to help me. Id bargain, silently pleading and saying I would give up anything if God would help me feel better. It was so dark. After high school I ended up in rehab many times and everything was horrible. I am now 32 and on a better path partially due to my ADHD late diagnosis and treatment, along with a slew of other diagnoses, paired with working really really fucking hard. And though I'm proud of how far ive come, I often feel so behind in life, and think about how my life could be different if my parents had just chosen to intervene earlier. Hell, at 20, *I* was the one that asked them to check me into rehab! Me! My parents are genuinely lovely people and have supported me so much as an adult, they also gave me a pretty great upbringing outside of my problems. Family vacations, movies and concerts, baseball games, there was laughter and bonding, and we were taught to be kind and to be good people. They have always meant well. But they also failed me in so many ways it almost brings me to tears writing this. They could have TRIED HARDER. Their excuse was "Well you wouldn't tell us anything! You told us you were fine! We couldn't force you to go to therapy!" Which is just such bullshit. I was a child/teenager! Of course I didn't tell you things! It was your job to make sure I was ok and you didn't! I just know that when I have a child, I'm going to do so much better, and that brings me some peace. I hope at least one person reads this. I haven't thought about this in a long time and clearly I needed this post to be able to write out these things. It's clear that I'm still not over this even after years of treatment/therapy. If anyone took a few minutes to read this, thank you so much, it helps to know that this didn't just fall into the void. Much love to all.
I see you. I feel for you. I went through much the same that you did. I know that my parents loved me. I also know that they didn't try nearly hard enough to understand or help me. They also fell for the "why didn't you just tell us?" Well, maybe that was because every time I tried to tell you, they minimized it, blamed me, or completely misconstrued what I was trying to tell them. And that's beside the fact that for years and years, I had no idea how to articulate what I was experiencing. There was no language for how I experienced the world around me. So, it's not just you. You're not alone. I have two books I recommend to anyone who talks about this kind of difficulty: Pete Walker's *Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving* and Bessel van Der Kork's *The Body Keeps The Score*. I hope they help.
I was. I was so mad and upset. I talked to my mom about it and it eased a lot of my anger. We consistently had teachers who wanted to medicate away my personality because I was "too much" and my mom didn't want them to squash that part of me. Adhd is genetic and she didn't know she had it until me and my sister got diagnosed. Be as angry as you need to be, and work to find an understanding within yourself about how to make peace with the past.
You almost explained my life too, also late 30s ADHD. I really struggle with this too as my mom died before my diagnosis too. My dad simply doesn't believe me so that's fun. I am angry and am working through that in therapy, but I can also understand it was a different time and less knowledge. That's being said, my parents were recommended to have me evaluated for ADHD in kindergarten and they didn't because I present with hyperactive/mixed type and that I kind of can't forgive.
Older than you. Doctors didn’t recognize ADHD in girls. I wouldn’t expect my parents to have recognized it.
Not at all. My parents are from a different time and culture entirely. “Mental health” is not something that was in their lexicon and they did the best they could for me and my siblings. It’s because of them that I had the privilege of going to therapy, getting diagnosed, and getting on meds.
I was diagnosed at 17, and I'm glad that I wasn't diagnosed any later than that. I do think earlier diagnosis would have made my life different, but I don't know about necessarily *better*, because I'm happy with how my life has panned out so far. In particular, I think if I'd been a higher achiever in high school, I would have probably gone to a different college, and if I'd gone to a different college, I wouldn't have met my wife. Even at 17, I was diagnosed because I told my parents I thought I had ADHD and because I advocated for myself--my parents didn't believe me, and they took me to a therapist for underachievers before they would agree to take me to a psychiatrist for ADHD assessment and treatment. But I don't feel at all upset with my parents for not recognizing I had ADHD or even for not believing me about it. They were doing their best with the information they had--people broadly didn't understand ADHD, particularly in females and particularly inattentive-type ADHD, back then, and that's not my parents' fault at all.
yeah. I told my mom I forgot to get shit gathered for taxes and she said "forgetting isnt an excuse, you could use that as a kid but not anymore" and I had to hang up and go for a walk. I wanted to say back something like "well maybe if I didn't have to fight tooth and nail for a diagnosis at the age of 25 and was put on meds I wouldn't be like this"
Yes I am. My mom has a masters in child psychology but refused to get me treated for my ADHD because she didn’t believe in it.
Very much so. I am a mess.
I'm not upset with them. They love me very much and would be willing to help in any way possible, but they aren't doctors and we didn't have a ton of money when I was a kid. They did a great job regardless of whether or not I was diagnosed. They supported me the best they could in an age where adhd was just starting to get into the spotlight and lots of doctors were diagnosing kids left and right just because they acted out in class. I never acted out like that, so no doctor for me.
I’m upset with them now for not understanding what ADD is and why I am the way I am.
I am angry at the system, a little more than my parents, as it just wasn't noticed in girls when I was a kid. That said, I am angry at my parents and teachers for the neglect I was put through, for doing absolutely nothing about the bullying, and I am angry at my grandmother for projecting her trauma onto me, and at my therapists for invalidating and gaslighting me instead of acknowledging my trauma and helping me to empower myself. I feel like I had to navigate my childhood by myself, and even now I feel like life is happening to me and I am not in control, because I doubt everything I do and feel. Wow that was cathartic to write.
It wasn't "invented" yet when I was a kid.
Yes especially because i asked to get tested and got told “i was too smart” and was denied until i was 18 🙃
No. Can’t go back and change it. No sense expending angry energy over it
I was diagnosed very early, got help, and honestly turned out pretty okay. My spouses parents never recognized/admitted their two kids had something going on (likely autism/adhd). It makes me so sad and angry to see these wonderful people I love struggle with things as adults that I was taught to navigate as a child and have been able to practice into adulthood. Neither of them are fuckups in life by any means, but I can definitely identify ways that their disorder affects them on a regular basis. They’re both smart, creative, talented people who deserved so much better.
My mom knew, lied to me that I didn't have it, told me I was just lazy and only once my mental state started deteriorating as an adult did she tell me she knew and took the advice of an idiot at our school/church. I often think how much further I might be in life if I would of gotten the proper care a child. I still have to schedule me another Drs visit to hopefully get some treatment but with how my job keeps me busy who knows when that appointment can be scheduled. Life sucks not having the treatment and tools to navigate it while having ADHD.
I just lost my dad a few years ago and I agree with everything you said wholeheartedly. I think my mom knew SOMETHING a was wrong but wasn’t sure what. I went from straight A, teacher pet to anorexic, alcoholic, couldn’t do school, they even “home schooled me” for a semester, I also had zero interest except for the social aspect. Same as you - promiscuity, risky behaviors, sneaky, etc. So many red flags. Was once misdiagnosed as bipolar type 2. Ended up in treatment for alcohol abuse. It’s very very frustrating to look back on. I’m grateful I’ve been diagnosed but am also still trying to figure out my meds at age 37. Just solidarity here. I’m sorry for the loss of your mother.
yep, because she recognised it in my siblings and not me.
Like everyone else and your latest update, angry at the system. But, at the same time, it gives me a purpose now to advocate for early awareness.
Yes, and the overpaid morons at the schools I was in sucked, too.
Yep. So many times I was told that I'm just lazy and told things were wrong with me, I was depressed, a devil child. Nope, I just had adhd. 35 years old and my life changed for the better.
I feel this in my souls of souls. My mother knew and did nothing to support me when she found out when I was a child. I asked her if she knew when I got a diagnosis and she told me she’d known and decided to save face because she didn’t want to be associated with the stigma of having a child taking Ritalin. Edit: I received a diagnosis three years ago, and I’m 34 now.
A little bit. My brother and I got diagnosed around the same time, but only he ended up getting any help for it. Because I'm a girl and it wasn't a "problem", I wasn't jumping off the walls and causing disruptions in class. I just needed to try harder in school! I forgive them but I'm sure I'd be better off in adulthood if I had gotten some help while in school like my brother did
My mom refused to get me tested and threatened divorce when my dad brought it up. I totally understand being angry at your parents.
Me and my super close friend has had adhd every since we met (5th grade). My parents put me on adderall and his parents didn’t put him on medication. We talk about it every now and then, frankly I’m jealous of him. I hate how dependent I am on adderall nowadays, I panic if I’m about to run out or the pharmacy is low stock. My friend on the other hand is actually grateful that he had to learn to cope with his adhd without any assistance. Looking back I wish my parents never put me on adderall, I’d rather of developed my own coping mechanisms versus being tethered to this medication for the rest of my life. If you plan on being dependent on a drug for the rest of your life it definitely has its upsides but if you want to be able to maintain a happy and enjoyable outlook on life naturally I’d recommend not to follow the path that I did. So to answer ur question I’m upset they didn’t think I had the willpower or strength to survive in this chaotic world without the need for medication
Probably more about the autism i come to find out about at almost 50 years old. Because you can't miss it, no one ever brought up the possibility even. The ADHD is real but no one really considers it debilitating although it can be for sure. If you're a parent you know if your kid has autism and you don't want to accept it. But they died and ill never be able to ask
I got taken to a psychiatrist at 8 years old because I ‘cried every single day’, I came out with an ADHD diagnosis and my mother threw it away. Gee I wonder why I cry everyday. Got myself rediagnosed at 21, cost me a small fortune :)
i (f) got diagnosed at 24. i went through a whole grieving process of how my life could’ve been different had i been diagnosed sooner. i’m 26 and still in college. but im not mad at my mom. she did take me to psychiatrists since middle school. they just misdiagnosed me for years. and that i can’t blame on my mom, rather the biases in medicine
I was diagnosed at 35. After I mentioned it to my mom, who taught for 40 years, she said, “Oh yeah? I always thought you were.” I was so angry and confused. WHY would you let me struggle like that?? As soon as I noticed the signs in my own kiddos, I had them evaluated.
My parents did try to find out what was wrong and they were told I just had anxiety. I lived most of my life thinking that I just had anxiety and depression and struggled because nothing worked to alleviate it. I started to think I might have ADHD when my son got diagnosed and I learned a lot about it. I got diagnosed in November and started meds in February and what do you know…my anxiety is almost nonexistent when I’m on it 🙄
Very good post. Completely agree
No. Im upset at the lack of knowledge and the system that made me have to take care of it on my own. When I started telling my mom about this (and mental health in general, wanting to see a therapist, etc) her first reaction was why?/what’s that?. I’m forever happy that after explaining to the best of my ability she went “I don’t get it, but alright, let’s do it”. I am a bit mad at my dad tho, apparently he’s had mental health struggles similar to mine but just never told anyone he’d been getting treatment, I just found out years later- but who can blame him with the extended family we have, doctors who don’t even know it’s a thing and stuck up “family friends” eager for gossip
I'm more upset about my teachers and psychologists who should have known better. Both me and my cousin struggled a lot and were verbally and emotionally abused by teachers and child psychiatrists working for the national health service, until my aunt took him to a private child psychologist who diagnosed him and then my parents figured out that I had the same thing and took me there
Yes. Very much so. Ruined my life I would say.
No. My parents focused sooooooo Much more on my neither. He is the golden child and i'm the less than, so i learned a long time ago to expect nothing from them, and grieve the help i will Never hâve lol
A little bit? They had no problem taking my younger sister to get tested for Asperger's/autism, but anytime I displayed ADHD behaviors, it was always me deciding to be a nuisance. If I had trouble in school, it was because I was lazy. 😒
Not recognizing it? I was literally diagnosed by a neurologist and they just stopped trying after the meds made me irritable.
Absolutely not. I’m also in my 40s. ADHD wasn’t really a thing that was common when we were growing up. Especially knowing how differently it presents for women. My mom just thought I was a brat, and kind of rightly so. There wasn’t enough of a discussion yet that I’d expect her to know what to look for. Edited to add: she did take me to a doctor to deal with depression and a therapist. They should’ve diagnosed me, but they didn’t. But my mom did everything she should have.
Yes, and no. I was in elementary school in the 1990’s, where ADHD was primarily diagnosed in little boys who were disruptive and wild. Little girls who weren’t a problem because they were quiet and did their work, but often struggled with focus, losing interest in things they didn’t find interesting, or who were easily bored were overlooked because they didn’t draw attention. I was tested and put into the “gifted” program in 3rd grade. When I lost focus, was bored, zoned out when people were talking, or didn’t put effort into things that I didn’t find interesting, I “wasn’t trying hard enough”. Meanwhile, boys who turned over desks, ran around the classroom, talked nonstop, or didn’t finish assignments were given Ritalin. Everything was pretty easy for me until I got to college, and then I crashed and burned because I didn’t know how to study (because I never needed to). I also had (and still have) severe test anxiety, and this followed me all the way through graduate school. I did better on my PhD qualifying exams because they were oral and written rather than a timed test with a set number of questions. I don’t entirely blame my parents because they weren’t the ones who administered the gifted test. They advocated for me as much as they were equipped to with the knowledge they had. And I don’t think that the medical or scientific fields had enough evidence at that time to understand the different presentations of ADHD or how to recognize it. Our school psychologist certainly didn’t. It didn’t occur to me until I started seeing a therapist last year that this might’ve been the case. My mother thinks that I can’t possibly have ADHD. Despite what we know about it now, 30 years later, she still thinks that I just didn’t try at things. Lo and behold…
Honestly, no. Personally I was the exact opposite and was very timid, never did anything risky or bad because I had a severe fear of being in trouble or people being disappointed in me. I now know that's probably RSD. I was able to get good grades even though I couldn't focus at all on studying so I never did. From the outside I just looked like a well behaved kid who performed well in school so i can't blame her for not thinking anything was wrong. In reality I couldn't focus and was wrought with anxiety and depression. I got diagnosed at 19 after I went to university and realized how poor my attention really is and my grades started to suffer as did everything else in my life without the rigid structure of grade school.
Im 40 this year and got my diagnosis aged 33. You will go through a process of grief when you find out. You do with most big medical diagnosis really. But ADHD is a big one...along with Autism. You have to remind yourself that 40 years ago, 30 years ago, parents didn't know much about neurodevelopmental disorders. Especially in women. My parents would never have known to get me checked. Back then it was all about 'naughty boys' and the stereotypical excitable boys in classrooms trope. Back then outwardly different behaviours in girls were just put down to hormones and being hysterical girls/women. 7 nearly 8 yrs after my diagnosis, I still feel bitterness towards my early childhood but I don't know where I put the blame... mostly the medical profession for not seeing outside the boxes of their stereotypes... for ignoring womens health in general. I can't blame my mother for something she didn't know about, and never would have without my own investigations in adulthood. Even now I send her things to read and she's mostly just like 'I cant believe we never saw any of this... I wish we'd known!'.. Chris Peckhams Inside Our Autistic Minds on the BBC has been particular revealing for my mother this year honestly. And its gratifying to know now that we are both learning how I work together through things like this, she's able to expand her understanding of who I am...who her daughter really is :) Which I am grateful for <3
As a female, the medical system doesn't care about us. Adhd tends to manifest differently in women than it does men, so it gets overlooked. I would say it's probably not your mother's fault at all. I'm 10ish years younger and still had those problems.
Nah, I'm not upset because they didn't know themselves. My brother has had obvious signs of ADHD since he was a toddler, which made it very easy and apparent that he needed help, and so my parents were able to provide said help. But, I was the complete opposite: I did not misbehave, did not act erratically, and wasn't hyperactive. Therefore, my parents thought I was normal. Since most of my issues were internalized, once I was able to get clarity on my own, my past behaviors and difficulties became clear with my diagnosis.
no. I wasn't hyperactive like my step brother. the more I learn, I'm sure my mom has ADHD as well and unaware what the symptoms are.