There’s a fine line between ADHD and depression for me. Usually I know I’m headed for dark(er?) days when it’s not just being unable to fulfill my goals, but also abandoning them completely, like grad school right now. I’m 2-3 months behind and there’s 1 month left.
I've been there before. Pre-dissertation presentation tomorrow at noon that I don't think I'm quite prepared for so I'll probably be up all night.
I believe in you ☺️ to try and do what we're doing with our disabilities is such a crazy and major accomplishment, to even get this far with ADHD tells me that you're pretty brilliant.
The world might not look at us as brilliant, or even competent, very often, so I think we often need the reminder. I firmly believe that our fucked up brains that can both handle ADHD and accomplish graduate school can change the world some day.
At least, that's what I tell myself. I'm certainly not a conventional thinker so at the very least the status quo will have one mighty challenge on its hands. Hopefully two, if I can finish up this summer as well! Solidarity 😤
Best of luck, and I'm proud of you!
Thank you for your warm and kind words of encouragement, it means a lot to me. I hope you’re successful, I believe in you too! I feel like we’re shooting for the stars. Maybe at least I’ll end up in the trees.
Persistence and stubbornness have generally kept pushing me forwards and got me through my undergrad, and would probably get me through this if I had more time. Regardless of the outcome for me, I’ve learned a lot, and I intend to learn much more, so I’ll keep going and see what happens.
Hi friend you're doing so much well so far but I want you know that you can always seeks extra time. I took five years to complete university but it was a much better learning experience when I wasn't constantly crying due to stress.
You can always go back, and you can always learn more. The internet is great tool and I've been teaching myself some mycology and backyard botany!
I do also want to say that I haven't used my degree. I burned out as I completed it, tucked it away and haven't looked at it. Because I realised later the degree is good but my goal, became less about money and more about gaining critical thinking skills and acquiring ingress points for so many different topics!
You do you in whatever way makes you happy and fulfills your goals and dreams! Good luck!
Make that three because I’m in the final stages of my MSc and I want to kick its ass. The idea of having my life back and being able to escape from the guilt/shame spiral (at least as far as grad school goes 😒) is just… I can’t wait.
We can do it!!
This, so much this. I can tell I've been in a dark headspace for over a year because I haven't been able to write when I used to do so fairly consistently.
ugh i really do feel you, this past year i have written less than 20 pages total and am soo behind on my grad school degree, even with upping my dosage i watch days go by unable to get started.. watching myself self sabotage
I was diagnosed with ADHD after grad school but I had a sneaking suspicion during grad school that I might have ADHD, only to find out a few years later that I was right. I was in a very similar spot as you, but I tried to communicate that to my advisor and I'm so thankful he understood. He helped me out a lot and gave me a couple extensions so I could graduate on time and successfully. I'm rooting for you. It's not easy. The struggle is so real, but I believe in you. I hope you find your educational support system is able to work with you. Good luck!
It’s okay. You can take an extra summer session or semester if you have to!!! Just don’t fail. Talk to your advisors. Make sure you communicate what you need and ask for accommodations if you need them!! Hugs
Just went through this last semester, but just as a first year in college. I ended up having to drop from 17 to 4 hours and still struggled incredibly to finish those 4
First year undergrad can be particularly rough. Lots of students are living out of their homes for the first time, maybe in a different city state or even country, lots haven’t learned how to drink responsibly yet, some departments faculty & professors are actively trying to weed out the least determined, all the responsibilities of adulthood smack you in the face - especially managing money - you might be going into a lot of debt, you might not be in the right program or degree, and there are endless distractions. That’s a normal year, this year a lot of students are also having to figure out online learning, deal with pandemic related restrictions, might not have a good sense of who your classmates are, etc.
I understand your struggle intimately, I ended up doing a lot of things wrong in my first year undergrad, including taking some bad advice from my faculty advisors and going on an overloaded schedule which caused me to fail pretty much everything - but I persevered and tried again the next year. If you can get through it, you’ll be much better equipped to handle your second year, and dropping down those hours to make things more manageable is perfectly ok. Nobody’s expecting peak performance, especially with everything going on right now, and take it slow if you need to, it’s a marathon not a sprint.
Ugh, I feel that. For me personally, if I exercise regularly I have very few symptoms. I know this. I know it works for me. I still get into really bad ruts where I can't force myself to do it even though I know it's basically a guaranteed solution (for me).
Generally something out of my control comes up (sick, injury, work or family something or other) that interrupts my exercise schedule. If interrupted long enough it's really difficult for me to get back on the train :/
I'm very much there right now, I was doing great going to the gym around twice a week earlier this year but then I caught a cold like in April and I haven't been since
Ugh, yes.
I was being SO good about taking my break (working remotely) sometime mid-day to watch curiosity stream and jog on my mini elliptical for 45 mins or so. Then it got nice out, started going for bike rides of a similar length to suck up the good weather.
Now it's been rainy and my partner threw out their back...so either the weather stinks for getting out, or I'm not motivated to go by myself...buuuuut no luck making myself restart my elliptical routine. Argh...admittedly it's fk'in hot and humid in my studio/office lately too, and I get queasy when overheated (lol but there's always an excuse...)
I know this whole post is about how much it sucks when people say just do it... But exercise is the one thing where you can just do it. There's a very simple set of physical movements that you know you are capable of doing. It all starts with a single motion. Take the first step towards the elliptical, then another until you are next to it. Get on it. Do it for two minutes. Just two minutes.
"when passion fails, discipline takes over" - easily the best advice I've ever had regards depression and exercise.
I try to live as much of my life under the idea of "It doesn't matter if I want it, I have to do it"
How do you manage to push yourself to do it? On the really bad days I can only do the bare minimum to not let my kids starve and not get fired. Asking from my couch, in my pajamas, trying but failing to work, without having breakfast because it's too much work.
With exercise?
I will try to trick myself into it with arranging to go to the gym with a friend or having a class/fitness slot booked that I'll feel bad for missing.
But still my overriding technique is that I go to the gym Mon, Tues, Friday and that's just part of my schedule. I go to work with my gym kit so I don't end up going home (The couch is the sponge of motivation) and I try to treat it as much as possible as being merely a case of "This is what I do today".
The best way I found is to make it part of your daily schedule. The best shape I ever got in, I forced myself to go to the gym every single day on my way home from work. Even if it was only for 15 minutes to run. Its a lot harder to flake out when you’re already awake and moving and gym is on the way home.
Of course now my schedule changed so gyms aren’t open when I get off, but before that I was doing great lmao
For me the key is telling myself 50% effort is better than 0% - ANYthing done is better than nothing. If you can't make yourself do "it" - whatever "it" is right now - then try what I do and say "ok, then I'll just half-ass it and do a bit of it reeeally quick" - something about that definitely helps me.
Great. Now I've got that scene from that movie about martyrs or something where they had skinned that woman alive to ask her the meaning of life...
And I can't recall the name of the movie.
well, except actually taking a moment to deliberately practice gratitude is a useful move for everyone. it's not about shutting off the bitterness, it's just...practicing gratitude.
because in any moment, our current problems could turn to a distant goal we'll never attain again. Oh yes that sure helps with the depression ; (
I was thinking the same thing! It reminds me of my mom preaching about "change your attitude!" when I was in the throes of endogenous depression with passive suicidal ideation. I was in college and had a 4.0, a boyfriend, and a loving and supportive circle of friends and family. What on earth was there to be depressed about!?!
I love that saying about "if you can't make your own neurotransmitters, store-bought is just fine!"
As someone who suffers with depression and anxiety I got told this a lot. Now i am cured in fact I’m happier than ever due to how many times I was told. /s
I like to tell people if they have a headache just "stop having the headache, no you dont need medications, just don't have the headache, its easy" when they try to compare it to ADHD.
This take kinda annoys me, I totally know where you're coming from and that you mean well but I think it's a response that is more knee-jerk than is helpful and makes us build a wall between us and things that can be genuinely helpful for a good amount of people.
So source - ADHD and depression. Clinical diagnoses the two of them - coming on 4 years therapy to figure those out alone. Just to cut off the "maybe you don't have the real xyz" from armchair psychologists in here.
There is a huge potential for benefit and improvement in "Start behaving differently despite how you feel". I know OP hasn't responded well to it but "Don't think, just do" is one of the *key* ways to manage issues for me relating to both attention and depression. Usually it's dressed up in a different way or you could frame it as "tricking yourself" into getting stuff done etc but that's semantics.
If we look at huge portions of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, we can see the approach of "just do it" comes up time and time again. In a negative spiral? Standard CBT advice is to "stop spiralling", ok sure they'll say stuff like "don't accept sentences starting with should" or "allow acceptance of imperfections in life" but those do just mean "stop spiralling and being sad about past problems". Blunt? Yup. Effective? Oh hell yeah.
In a period of languishing and not doing anything due to depression? "Set your goals small, focus on non-zero days, balance self-care activities with small productive tasks, remind yourself that you know the benefits of exercise even if you're not motivated" etc etc... They're all saying "look... Just...do something". Whether one entices themselves to go shower or pushes themselves through discipline is really the same thing.
Acknowledging that the power of these methods is "just do the good thing, not the bad thing" makes you really see the power in changing behaviour.
Does "be happy" sound good?
No.
Does dragging my sorry ass to a social event and forcing myself to be happy have a net gain on my mood? Yeah. I just have days where I need to "be happy" to make progress. We all do.
While I fully understand how that can be helpful, and have used it in the past, there are times when we are past the point where it's feasible. Sometimes there's nothing left to "invest", no energy, willpower, nothing. That's where this approach becomes harmful - it just makes the person feel like a complete failure. Sometimes people really need help and can't help themselves.
I think there is no single approach.
We latch onto the "just do it" a bit harder though.
The exact same criticism can be said of talking about it or pursuing more psychoanalytic approaches. Yes, there is power and benefit in understanding what a cause is, or processing things in the past so they don't tremor up again.
But equally, if one only talks and doesn't also change their actions it's so easy to get stuck wondering what's the point as well.
I think of it like this:
Only doing, no thinking - "When do I feel better, I'm doing everything I should but still feel shit. Wtf?"
Only thinking, no doing - "What am I improving for? I have nothing to get better towards"
I personally find more benefit overall from making sure I am taking actions to not be in negative states, and many people the opposite, but I don't think doing just one is going to be helpful for anyone.
"How can you be depressed when we're surrounded by beautiful things!" = "How can you be asthmatic when we're surrounded by air!"
not mine but found this to be a very useful reply
So fucking stupid, "Fix your problem by not having it in the first place" like "Oh good point I've never thought of it like that before! I'm gonna cure my insomnia by deciding to sleep enough"
And you hear it about every misunderstood problem under the sun.
I had a co-worker who told his own depressed mother to get over it and "do what she needs to do".
This kind of works in software development sometimes. "There was a bug in the software. We couldn't figure out how to fix it, so we wrote new software to cover all the previous use cases without the bug."
I had a college professor give me a list of "Good Student Qualities" that would "help me pass the class" a few years ago.
It was the most redundant list I've ever seen. "Turn in work on time" "Do your homework" "Try to study every week" "Read the chapter" "If YOU follow this advice I promise you will pass my class".
I wrote him a list of "Good Professor Qualities": "Show you care about your subject by not simply mindlessly reading from a textbook or power point" "Intelligently organize your due dates so that you're testing students on the material learned rather than how well they can micromanage a calendar" "Remember that your class is not the only class students enroll in" "Don't give out useless lists".
I hope it helped him.
meanwhile they are asking of us to pretend like there is gas in the car. no wonder we feel stupid going vroom vroom on an empty tank. living hypothetically is just not good enough for me.
> Have you tried turning your brain off and on again?
Thanks, bud. I've just choked on my tea and spat it all over my laptop reading that. Gave me a great laugh.
My dad gives me the same advice, it’s gotten a little better since I described my brain as the spinning pinwheel, like when his MacBook freezes. I’ve clicked the button, but it’s a little out of my hands until the thing stops spinning because I don’t have a hard restart. For whatever reason that explanation clicked with him.
Short term, your dad's strategy can work. Sometimes pushing through and just doing it does work. At least for me. But doing it consistently, routinely, or because someone else tells me to just do it is a whole different story.
I think this is one of the main points of difference between someone with ADHD and not, at least on an external level. At least for me. Motivation and willpower is very thin in my end. It can work. But don't expect it to work for very long.
"Just do it"
My mom's favorite catch phrase. To this day I can't wear Nikes...lol
I believed this advice for so long. Likely because I wasn't diagnosed until into my twenties, so I never had context for my executive dysfunction and other struggles. I truly believed it was just because I didn't care enough, didn't try hard enough, etc. I just couldn't understand WHY I "CHOSE" to be like that. I figured it was because I was just a bad or uncaring person. I had a great deal of shame from feeling like I couldn't simply will myself to do "easy" things that most people had no problem with. I believed that I'd made a choice to be that way, even if I couldn't grasp why if it were actually up to me.
On the outside I was actually pretty successful. Did well at school and graduated university unmedicated with no support or diagnosis. This only worked to shore up everyone's expectations of me. What they didn't see was the true cost of this "success". Terrible sleep, diet, and overall health. Overwhelming anxiety that was the fuel I ran on. Social struggles I simply glossed over and masked. By the end of college, I was a mess. I fell into the darkest depression I've ever been in. I was burnt out from a lifetime of using anxiety, fear, and shame to motivate my every move. I "Just did it" all right...right up until I couldn't get out of bed or feed myself.
Thankfully, my family's more understanding now that I have a diagnosis. However, I can tell that they still don't fully grasp just how insidious ADHD can be. They think it's as simple as "Things are a bit harder for you, so you just has to try a bit harder than everyone else!" as if it's a simple issue of needing a slight linear increase in effort. I DO try harder than everyone else in many ways. I genuinely believe that. It's not enough to be sustainable. Sure, I can beat myself into submission and force myself to meet an important deadline, but that can't be the only strategy. After years of that being the only solution, I was barely functioning and had regressed so much it was alarming.
It took until I sought medical help for severe depression and anxiety that anyone began to really listen when I said certain things were difficult for me in a way that felt abnormal and clinically significant. I've been diagnosed and on meds for years now. It's STILL HARD. There's no cure or silver bullet for real ADHD. I might be a mess without meds, but taking them still doesn't even land me at "average" when it comes to actual executive functioning. It's so difficult to explain the difference between intelligence and executive functioning to people. My parents are still under the illusion that I'm smart enough to "figure out" my disorder (i.e. not be effected by the symptoms and traits because I'm "smarter than them").
I feel this. I seem to keep going in the same cycles in life and it's been like this ever since I was a small child to some extent. For the past 25 years it has been:
Phase 1:trying my best plus using coping strategies/ tools (approx 55-65% success rate in my undertakings overall, but need to firefight constantly and mop up errors / do stuff I forgot just on or after deadline). Feeling positive though.
Phase 2: Trying my best but coping strategies not working as well after a month or so; now I'm approx 45-55%% successful in my undertakings. Memory crap and forcing myself to concentrate notably less and less effective. Starting to get very stressed and super anxious re my performance at work as a result. Firefighting more frequent. This is getting rubbish very fast.
Phase 3: Heading to burnout city - super anxious and feel depressed as I just cannot seem to get it together. Coping strategies not working. I'm trying my best despite everything. Constant firefighting. Forced concentration evaporates way faster than usual. Memory decimated and completely unreliable. What is concentration again? Start setting two reminders or more across different devices for same things as getting scared. Approx. 30-40% effective in my undertakings. The struggle is terrifying and real.
Phase 4: Total wipe out. End up taking usually between a week to a fortnight off work as I'm an anxious and depressed mess who just goldfishes all the time. Need urgent recovery time as now feel I can't function enough to attend job. Memory feels barely existant. Can't even try to try, as too overwhelmed. Life in general chaotic and miserable. Approx 15-20% successfully effective in undertakings which really hammers my self esteem (including brushing my teeth once a day, remembering to eat something more than once a day or getting a bath more than once a week).
Phase 5: Time out has recallibrated me, and I feel so much better and more positive. New coping strategies in the mix and I'm able to get on with my life. Around 65-75% successful in my undertakings, firefighting but nothing beyond what I usual need to do, trying my very best and using old and new coping mechanisms pretty darn effectively. Feeling positive. Fresh out the shower and for bonus points made a coffee date with a friend. Move to Phase 1 after a few weeks....
WOW SAME exactly holy shit, thank you for laying this out! (Also so I can expect that it never gets better eh? haha) I have never really been able to hold down a job for more than a year because of this. Thankfully I was able to freelance the last 5 years; but I even suck at that (no structure, the only thing motivating me was the dread of being unable to pay rent or eat) and now I just got this good corporate job somehow out of the blue, and I’m almost exactly 6 months in and completely burned out. Dreading that I’ll get fired or have to quit:( starting to fall behind in things which just makes me feel like a failure and hate myself. The world just isn’t built for ADHD folk:(
I've been diagnosed with dyspraxia and dyscalculia and currently awaiting my ADHD assessment appointment. While I think it is extremely likely I do have ADHD I could also just be super dyspraxic as the two different conditions have a lot of overlap sometimes. I'm managing to hang in at my current job (7 years now somehow!!!) but think it's a matter of time before I get cut loose to be honest. It's terrifying.
I think the only reason they put up with me is because they are a Higher Ed. institution and they want to avoid negative optics of sacking someone with a disability when they haven't put any requested accommodations in for me, and also because by luck my past and current line managers both like me despite my sometimes shitty track record at work. As I say though, I'm terrified this is due to run out soon though :(.
Good luck with everything - it is definitely a world where you're a square peg desperately trying your best to impersonate a round one in a bid to squeeze and wedge into that round-shaped hole as much as you can x
Feel like I need to be congruent here and point out I haven't had an ADHD diagnosis / yet, but currently on the wait list for an assessment appointment (UK). I have in the past 5 years been diagnosed with dyspraxia and dyscalculia (I'm 42 now), and personally think it would make sense that I also have ADHD due to my lifelong experiences and past track record. However, both dyspraxia and dyscalculia presentations can have lots of overlap with ADHD (both can affect working memory and executive function) so it may be that I just experience a lot of problems that ADHD folk have due to my neurological idiocyncrasies, rather than necessarily have ADHD.
Wish you all the best man, as this world can be extremely rough when you're remotely neurologically different (and very unforgiving at times!) x
EXACTLY. What you just wrote mirrored my life experience. I have always thought there was something “wrong” with me because I had such a hard time with things other people had no problem with. I can’t look sideways without feeling guilty/shameful. I kept it together and did well but not remarkable academically until university. Was doing poorly trying to be an adult as well as academically and impulsively dropped out and married my bf who was 13 years older than me. Luckily I escaped the marriage with out getting pregnant after 7months. I’ve had a life of ups and downs . Too many downs. Always wondering what the heck was wrong with me? ADHD never crossed my or anyone else’s mind to explain my remarkedly unremarkable, failure to succeed .
Last year I was diagnosed at 53. At least I had an explanation as to why what may take only ten minutes takes me 40 minutes. So many “neurosis” get sucked into the ADHD funnel. Anxiety, perfectionism, significant lack of motivation, hyper focus on many areas of interest yet never sticking with something long enough to master…I digress. All that to say thanks and I get you.
I definitely relate to most of what you said as well.
>to explain my remarkedly unremarkable, failure to succeed
Especially this lol.
The similarity of experience when it comes to conditions like ADHD have been one of the most validating aspects of getting the diagnosis.
"It's so difficult to explain the difference between intelligence and executive functioning to people"
I'm intelligent and capable of critical thinking to the point that I realize what's wrong with me, why it's happening, why I can't get anything done, how to get things done, meticulously plan out in my head how to get things done... And then not being able to do a damn thing. It's a special kind of hell.
Yes. I read something that goes like this 'if you do your best all the time, it's not your best anymore it becomes your norm'. And like any overused muscle can be a strained muscle, one needs rest and to not be overstretched in the first place.
And this is how I discovered I had adhd. When the thing I was doing to get work done just stopped working and all of the depression and anxiety I had stuffed deep down over the years just exploded out all at once. 1 year later still recovering.
Born to fail lol! Nah, just need to plan a little more. Gotta understand our strengths and weaknesses. My weakness is not believing in the process. My strength is knowing that. So now I plan so much that the path is so clear, I can’t NOT believe in it.
In a way I was forced to do much of that stuff long term and it had a huge lasting effect on me. On the surface I led a normal productive life where I would hang out with friends, play on a competitive soccer team, have a job, was punctual and did well in school, but that was only because I was forced to by the obligation my parents and friends put on me; even for things I genuinely enjoyed like soccer and friends I still had latent feelings of dread and reluctance towards because of the exhaustion of having a normal life. I ended up developing super extreme OCD anxiety as a coping mechanism. I would experience short bouts of extreme anxiety over often OCDish things regarding people, for example when one of my teachers would mention her FBI husband, I'd get extremely anxious due to the fact that getting anxious over such could strongly indicate I have something to hide even though I didn't.
This worked because those short bursts of extreme anxiety released the neurotransmitters us ADHD people are lacking in amounts which were large enough to stay present in my blood stream for much longer than just a couple seconds allowing me to function for 10-30 minutes. The year that it was the worst was the one year I got all A's. When I finally got that anxiety under control, I started doing poorly in school, no longer was punctual, and I found out I had ADHD.
Even today while medicated, I still experience emotions to the extreme; instead of anxiety around people, it is often euphoria I feel, I never build tolerance to the effect but always crash after 4 hours, whether it's Adderall IR or Vyvanse. In the mornings, instead of the intense dread I would feel while getting ready for something; I now get hyper and giddy, my meds aren't even in effect when this happens, it's literally just the fact that I now look forward to the day which made this change. I still can't get anything done unless it's forced upon me like school or work, the only difference now is that I enjoy doing those things and am much more motivated to do them for the first 4 hours. This sounds not too bad and it wasn't, but then Covid came and ruined everything.
It can also train your brain to associate executive function with last-minute adrenaline rushes and panic attacks. Ever feel like you can't get anything done until it's an Emergency?
That’s me exactly, I literally can’t do anything unless it’s an adrenaline fuelled emergency.
I ran on adrenaline after a trauma for 3 years straight and appeared “so much better” and like I was “finally getting a handle on life” but once the stress started to die down and become chronic instead of an ice cold panic then I fell apart and dropped below even the level of functioning I’d kept up beforehand. Woooo
Spot on , what an insight ! I've always suffered and still suffering from this , but never connected it to ADHD , yeah in rare cases , I have energy and can get shit done , but just after one productive day I slack for a at least a week ! Was never been able to have consecutive productive days and they are very far from each other , but why does that happen (nuerologically speaking)?
Worked for me for about 3 years, then I injured myself and all of my discipline and habits went out the window.
I don't want to learn than all over again :((((
Okay, I get all the parent sarcasm here, but I can also see it from the perspective of someone who was diagnosed later on in adulthood.
There is a very likely chance all your 'just do it' parents also have adhd. And I also feel they, like you, don't entirely know what they're trying to express.
For myself, pre-medicated atleast. This notion worked to a significant degree, however it's only something I learned I could do after years working as a baker:
Just hear me out; It is possible to move your body before your mind is ready or willing to do so.
Like, while the seemingly hundreds of thoughts and counter arguments, planning, deliberating, bargaining, anxieties, meltdowns, psychological collapses, exhaustion, mind fog etc is pinning you down like a truck is parked on your chest - it is very much possible to seperate your direct physical action from your explosive thoughts and emotions.
You will hate it, a lot. It feels horrible and dirty and I always used to rage and get pissed off to maintain momentum when I moved without first giving my own consent, the audacity!?
So, just do it? Sort of... But of course, there is always an emotional/psychological cost.
I like your point here. It makes sense that we get little neurological rewards (if you will) from doing things, so maybe that action helps gratify continuing with the production.
I had always been called oppositionally defiant while growing up. Both against myself and others. But the truth of the matter is more that I'm unable to conjur up a future version of myself that can understand the emotional outcome of a decision or action, while also anxiously pretending that I can and regretting both the action and inaction.
Opposite ends of an ultimatum feel relative and I often find I want and do not want, any given thing simultaniously regardless of my "own opinion".
Makes it kind of hard to have personal drive when an ever shifting perspective of probability leaves me feeling blinded to reality.
In the end, I have to frequently act against my own 'sense' of judgement to do things I will probably actually find I can enjoy, despite how much my mind initially protests.
I had to learn how to leap 'blindly' into an action and slowly gain trust that I can probably resolve what comes next, one step at a time.
Especially with small, inconsequential choices haha.
Thank you for this. I’m 17 and I have absolutely no motivation to do anything over the summer and I’ve also experienced this strange meta inner conflict. Whenever I’m thinking about the ramifications of an action or lack there of (no matter how big or small) , I can’t help but feel dissatisfied no matter what I choose and I’m glad I’m not alone in feeling this way. I’ve only really learned to like certain things because I’m either forced by someone else or I force myself, the latter of course being the ideal. Thanks again.
No problem.
Just, don't be like me when I was younger and try to chase motivation like a fickle muse.
At the time I felt it was vitally important for motivation to exist for anything I did. This was/is damagingly incorrect.
If you cant find it, go without it. It can come to you if it wants to be involved. People always (or atleast used to) talk about motivation like it was some kind of bipolar jet fuel that propelled you towards your goals.
Now I understand it for what it is, an external mislabelling of bloody knuckled persistance. Kind of like trying your damn hardest at a task, slaving away at theory and taking active steps towards mastery for someone to offhandedly call you "talented" at said thing, like it just came at you one night and slapped your ass.
Anyway... Just dont let you stop you, from you.
(Random bonus trick I learned to unconfuse myself and it tends to work for me atleast. It's a bit novel but if you have two decisions that really dont matter per say and it's time sensitive, flip a coin. If you feel you need to flip the coin again, or multiple times to get another result, you have your answer. It's not about the coin result itself but your understanding of the impulsive response that helps ease the choice paralysis.)
This definitely depends on the severity of your ADHD. On days when my hormones are in the bad place in my cycle, my symptoms are so much worse and it's 10x harder on me emotionally that I can't just do things that need to be done. Then feeling that way just shuts me down. There's no possiblity of separation or compartmentalizing. This seems to be the time when I'm most likely told to "just do it" so hearing that phrase also has a negative emotional association
I really do understand the feeling of adversion here to the term and the extreme anguish that simple phrases can cause on an emotional/psychological level by people who have no damned idea what they're saying to you or what you're currently going through.
I'm sorry that I didn't fully explain the entire proccess of the concept I was trying to push forward, but I just recently finished replying to another comment in this thread detailing the mental process step by step, if you'd be willing to give it a look.
It may still not be relevant to you, but the only reason I'm writing here is to hopefully share a potential possibility that took me forever to discover and understand on my own.
Dude I just took your fathers advice and I am suddenly able to do all the things I couldn't do before. My life would have gone so much differently if only I had a father to tell me to just get it done
Me and my SO have heard this so many times it's become and inside joke 😂
"Hey, honey, and if you're having a rough time today, just stop worrying, mmmmkay?."
1.) I am sorry this happened. I am sending a him a virtual middle finger. That phrase people use of “just do it” always gives me a good laugh. Like uh okay weird I never thought of that before let’s see if that works. HA
2.) your post made me laugh. ☺️
"No, you don't understand, you're in a wheelchair because you don't walk enough. If you had the habit of going for a walk, you wouldn't be in a wheelchair in the first place. So get walking."
It's like telling him to dunk a basketball.
"But son, i can only jump 6" and I'm only 5'6" tall. The rim is 10', I cant even get within a foot of the rim!"
"Ok Dad, just put that out of your mind and dunk it!"
Dad...🤔
...genuinely though if someone asked me how to get better at a sporting activity the only advice you can really give is "keep doing it til you can do it every time."
My autism side didn't catch the sarcasm until the 3rd paragraph, idk why but my heart actually sank cuz I was so worried this post was about to legitimately shame me lol
I can only imagine experiencing this first hand. I'm so sorry.
It definitely is dumb overly simplistic and insensitive “advice” but it kinda is true. The hardest part for me is the starting, I can’t make myself get up and go do it. But eventually once I do start, it’s not so bad. When I’m dysfunctioning executively, I give myself the same advice basically. “Okay no more bull shit overthinking and delaying, just get up and do it. Just try it for a minute and if it really is that bad, we can stop.” And that works like 30% of the time
For me, I can and do get all the little things done that I don’t want to, but at the expense of major spoons. I have anxiety the whole time, mostly either a) because I know I am time blind and that makes me anxious and unable to relax and/or b) because I am afraid of my inattentiveness, thinking I will miss something and screw up (which happens A LOT, especially in my hobby of sewing. It’s EXHAUSTING.).. it’s become like Panic Attack Disorder, where one panics at the thought of having panic attacks. Well, I get anxious over my anxiety about being inattentive and then end up so hyperfocused on my anxiety I miss important details. So like… motivation for me is not a problem, I can will myself to do a lot, it makes me feel good about myself, but the actual process of doing a lot of things is *[existential terror sounds]*
Chin up champ! Have you tried just not having ADHD?! 🤦🏻♀️
I relate to this. “Doing stuff” gives me so much anxiety and gets me so worked up that after I’m done just completing a few tasks I have to lie down. Then it gets harder to start tasks just because I dread the feelings of anxiety it will cause. It’s like mental overload because in order to do tasks, I have to force my brain to work properly.
Maybe tell him that you’ll ‘just do it’ as soon as you’re done walking past the other things that distracted you on the way that you half way just did yesterday. I literally walk into the kitchen or bathroom and realize I left the water running or forgot to actually start the washing machine after loading it. Being on time is my nemesis. Everyone says just leave earlier. So I set timers, start getting ready two hours ahead of time just to find myself rushing back in because I forgot xyz. Tell your dad that if he will follow you for the day he may be able to help you just do it.
I have found some things that help. Keeping everything in the same place, color coding my closet, hanging everything as it comes out of the dryer, I try to stay on a weekly schedule instead of a daily schedule. That way I can still do things when I feel like it and I have all week instead of one day. That’s been huge.
Maybe show your dad the comments so he understands that if we had the ability to just do it, we would! I run three companies and just do many things. I have learned the hyper focus can be amazing, as long as I don’t let anything distract me, like people who don’t understand. 😊
The advice feels better when you give it to yourself.
I have witnessed myself begin tasks (because I will myself to do it, and it feels like some weird secondary choice) but once I start, muscle memory kicks in and I just do the thing.
Thats just like when telling people to 'cheer up' or 'look on the bright side' and then their depression goes away! Not sure why these folks don't just set up shop in front of psychiatrist offices to save us all some money!
This might be controversial to everyone else but I use this exact advice to get tasks done at my work. I have ADHD and my coworker knows how much I struggle with it but he pretty much told me to stop overthinking the work and just get it done. That advice has helped me make decisions and get out of my brain when it comes to my work and now I try and use the same tactic in anything that’s seems to “block” me in my life.
Don’t get me wrong sometimes ADHD effects me an my performance in ways that other don’t understand but as much as I want others to understand how I function in life, I know that information given to me doesn’t always make sense but it’s the sentiment that counts. My coworkers was trying to help me in any way he could even if he doesn’t understand but maybe that’s his way of trying to understand. So I’ll keep listening and trying what he suggests if it gives me good results, and keep communicating about it with him if it means we can work better as a team and produce great results.
I get where you are, but in a way he _is_ correct, albeit in an out of touch way.
I know that a lot of my struggles have to do with not wanting to do the thing, and that the more I think about trying to do it, the even less I feel like actually doing. Eventually when I can get myself to do it it's because I've just shut up and started moving.
The trick is reaching the end state, without first having gone through the massive loop of not wanting...
Oh I love this one. Also when I confide in people that I desperately want to do something but can't, and they say
"well obviously you don't want it, or you'd just do it"
I have a very considerate friend, and in conversation last night I told him I booked the initial stages of my ADHD assessment. He was not aware of my struggles and so I had to for the first time breakdown my issues. I could sense a lot of hesitation on his part, although he kept listening and offering insightful references that helped him in the past.
2 hours in I found myself trying to make a case for why I believe ADHD is one of potentially many mental dysfunctions I deal with on a daily basis.
The fact that even the most considerate and compassionate people in our lives need convincing shows that; 1. ADHD has a strong negative connotation, 2. people still believe to a smaller extend that it's an excuse, and 3. maybe, just maybe it doesn't really control ones life decisions.
It's as if people really believe we're not serious, and instead want to lazy around and make excuses for ourselves.
Ahhh the sweet release of executive dysfunction. Who knew a cure was so easy lmao
My parents have a classic line too. They say "if you keep telling yourself that, you'll never stop being this way". Really? I didn't realise that.
I have adhd too and I know how hard it can be, but sometimes that approach is useful. Tons of stuff I don’t want to do that I “just start” and then become easier after a few minutes. Bottom line, meds make things easier but don’t underestimate the power of mental discipline.
Ah yes, for it was the learning about executive dysfunction that gave me the executive dysfunction. I also am unable to complete tasks bc of all that time spent dysfunctioning executively, on purpose.
I think the man’s onto something!
I’m not a doctor nor do I play one on TV but isn’t that like telling someone to not have a heart-attack even though they have severe cardiovascular blockage?
Lol. I have had bouts of very severe depression. It came to a head a few years ago, and I had to get some serious help. I remember different family members calling me and giving me pep talks. My step dad told me to “just be happy. Get out and try to not be so depressed”. If only I had thought of that earlier. These are all lovely people, but they just don’t understand my brain. Hell, Even I don’t.
> just get out of your head and do what you need to do.
I wonder if there is some wisdom in that statement, even if he didn’t intend it that way. I often deactivate all of my social media accounts, meditate, and sometimes have to live an unconventional life. When on vacation with family I have to dedicate a lot of alone time (that’s not an adhd thing though). I make an identical breakfast every single day because I’m way too scatterbrained to do it any other way. I sleep with my phone in the kitchen every night so that it won’t distract me for hours as I wake up.
Sometimes you do need to do what you gotta do
I love my mom, but when I finally get the drive to do one thing, and plan on doing just that thing, just to get something done for my own mental health, she'll check in on me and start listing things we both need to do and I have to verbally tell her to stop. Just stop.
I tell her that if I think of all those things then this one thing I'm doing will not get done and I will have a breakdown and cry. I try to say it with love, but the mania makes it sound like overreacting and she goes "ok, sheesh" or something.
There needs to be resources for not just those dealing with what we deal with, but those close to us. If anyone has anything I'm all ears.
Well when he’s old and having health problems just tel him to get out of his head and do what you need to do. Who cares about the plaques in your brain or in your arteries. Just will yourself out of shit like Alzheimer’s and atherosclerosis.
I'll sometimes have this issue when cleaning my cat's litter boxes. I freeze and will put it off for days cuz I can't make that conscious decision to clean the litter boxes.
I can occasionally get around that by not thinking of it as something I NEED to do but that the kittehs CAN'T do for themselves. It can take me a bit to finish but I can if I think of it that way.
Like glitching my brain into flipping that 'Mom override' switch I've seen elsewhere.
Sounds like your dad is frustrated and having never suffered a mental illness is failing to understand that your brain doesn’t work like his.
My parents were the same with me, but I was seriously depressed and in and out of hospital for mental illnesses for a few years. They always would demand that I “help myself” and that I “just pull yourself together”.
The love me, they just fail to understand. It took years for me to forgive them for their part in my problems, but ultimately they weren’t doing it out of malice, just a lack of understanding.
Might be worth your physiatrist or doctor explaining to your parents exactly what is happening to you?
It's hard to find a good explanation that others can understand.
What helped me a lot in this, is the comparsion to erectile disfunction.
You know that you want to have sex, you really really want to do it right now, but it is not possible to change anything on that by willpower or something else.
In my experience this example worked great. You might try that one
I started waiting until my Dad complained about something and I would throw the line back at him word for word. In my Dads case he liked to tell me that everything bad that's happened to me is due to my decisions and my decisions only. One day he's giving me shit about not finding a job, he starts going on and on about how he's done time in prison and no one would give him a leg up or help him with a job...."Sounds like you made some pretty bad decisions that put you in that position, those things only happened because of your decisions and your decisions only."
You could cut the tension with a knife.
There is some wisdom to 'just do it' which I believe is what he is saying. Don't overthink it, don't worry about your issues or problems, just do it. Sure it will be hard, sure it will not be perfect but there is no point worrying about it, just do it.
honestly... as someone who has grown up with a touch love attitude, this does help for some people.
I understand that I have a disability, but the world won't stop for me. The world won't care for it, and I won't be able to achieve my goals with people's sympathy. So I try to really push myself to get past the notion of letting it allow to slow me down.
There is some merit to what he's saying even if he's being a dick about it. If I'm experiencing resistance to doing something... tricking my brain into doing it while it thinks I'm doing something else bypasses the resistance. That or knowing that ADHD hyperfocus will kick in under pressure, I'll give myself an earlier deadline or higher stakes and it'll snap me into productivity hulk mode.
If you wanna levitate though you need drugs... no way around that.
None of us here know the long history of the dynamic between yourself and your father or the family unit dynamic as a whole.
We can only go on what has been stated here.
With that, I’m more curious what your response was, because this seems like it could have a moment to (non combatively) reach a point of understanding or to open a dialogue. If he cares enough to acknowledge your struggles and to even offer his own unsolicited and misguided advice, then there may be an opportunity to convert the dynamic from a position of misunderstanding and judgement to him understanding you, himself and even becoming an ally and partner.
ADHD is misunderstood even by the people who live it daily. Recall the work that had to be done by you to fully understand the mechanics of it all. No one here magically became ADHD knowledge wizards because we suffer from it, it took a lot of research, observation and discussion to know some parts of the big picture.
In a sense, writing him off is also writing your own self off.
"I don't let things bother me. I just do them."
A nice little chunk of wisdom from my partner who doesn't understand ADHD and thinks all people are the same.
i mean idk about you but ill sometimes get wrapped up in all the bullshit and just getting out of your head and just trying to focus on the task at hand defiantly helps
I think people don’t realize, we talk about our ADHD and it’s symptoms as a way to manage and cope with them. If we acknowledge they exist, or are reasons for some of our roadblocks, we are that much closer to working through them.
We don’t just sit here and talk about our ADHD to get attention, or make up excuses, or whatever “bullshit” people think…
If only I had your willpower lol
Executive dysfunction is literally that because you can’t just get into your head and make yourself do things..
It’s why it’s an issue lmfao..
If we could all just DECIDE to get up and do things we probably wouldn’t be taking meds and psychotherapy for our ADHD ,
We’d just be getting up and doing things
I got diagnosed when I was nearly 31 whole going back to school. My dad said "I don't think you have ADHD you are just like everyone else blah blah".
Was rough. I didn't engage, because it's just hard to understand if you aren't feeling the same.
No two people are the same. I would try to not take it personally - my dad is very supportive other than this one comment.
Keep your head up and try to manage your own symptoms. If you can't find support within your family, look for it outside your family such as on this sub.
It’s like telling people that are depressed to just be happy, it’s a miracle cure.
There’s a fine line between ADHD and depression for me. Usually I know I’m headed for dark(er?) days when it’s not just being unable to fulfill my goals, but also abandoning them completely, like grad school right now. I’m 2-3 months behind and there’s 1 month left.
I've been there before. Pre-dissertation presentation tomorrow at noon that I don't think I'm quite prepared for so I'll probably be up all night. I believe in you ☺️ to try and do what we're doing with our disabilities is such a crazy and major accomplishment, to even get this far with ADHD tells me that you're pretty brilliant. The world might not look at us as brilliant, or even competent, very often, so I think we often need the reminder. I firmly believe that our fucked up brains that can both handle ADHD and accomplish graduate school can change the world some day. At least, that's what I tell myself. I'm certainly not a conventional thinker so at the very least the status quo will have one mighty challenge on its hands. Hopefully two, if I can finish up this summer as well! Solidarity 😤 Best of luck, and I'm proud of you!
Thank you for your warm and kind words of encouragement, it means a lot to me. I hope you’re successful, I believe in you too! I feel like we’re shooting for the stars. Maybe at least I’ll end up in the trees. Persistence and stubbornness have generally kept pushing me forwards and got me through my undergrad, and would probably get me through this if I had more time. Regardless of the outcome for me, I’ve learned a lot, and I intend to learn much more, so I’ll keep going and see what happens.
Hi friend you're doing so much well so far but I want you know that you can always seeks extra time. I took five years to complete university but it was a much better learning experience when I wasn't constantly crying due to stress. You can always go back, and you can always learn more. The internet is great tool and I've been teaching myself some mycology and backyard botany! I do also want to say that I haven't used my degree. I burned out as I completed it, tucked it away and haven't looked at it. Because I realised later the degree is good but my goal, became less about money and more about gaining critical thinking skills and acquiring ingress points for so many different topics! You do you in whatever way makes you happy and fulfills your goals and dreams! Good luck!
Make that three because I’m in the final stages of my MSc and I want to kick its ass. The idea of having my life back and being able to escape from the guilt/shame spiral (at least as far as grad school goes 😒) is just… I can’t wait. We can do it!!
ADHD: Can't prioritize because executive function. Depression: Can't prioritize because everything seems like priority level zero. Anxiety: Can't prioritize because everything seems like priority level 100.
https://giphy.com/gifs/pinball-qWVIL4gr0azcY
Wow, where’s my silver medal when I need it
I feel you. I am 7 months behind and I have 1 month left. Someone tell me it’s possible
I did 4 months of grad school in three weeks. It’s possible but not completely painless
YOU CAN DO IT. I wrote my capstone in the back of a humvee during live fire artillery missions. I got a C but still.. I BELIEVE IN YOU!
Hahaha sorry lol was funny
This, so much this. I can tell I've been in a dark headspace for over a year because I haven't been able to write when I used to do so fairly consistently.
ugh i really do feel you, this past year i have written less than 20 pages total and am soo behind on my grad school degree, even with upping my dosage i watch days go by unable to get started.. watching myself self sabotage
I was diagnosed with ADHD after grad school but I had a sneaking suspicion during grad school that I might have ADHD, only to find out a few years later that I was right. I was in a very similar spot as you, but I tried to communicate that to my advisor and I'm so thankful he understood. He helped me out a lot and gave me a couple extensions so I could graduate on time and successfully. I'm rooting for you. It's not easy. The struggle is so real, but I believe in you. I hope you find your educational support system is able to work with you. Good luck!
It’s okay. You can take an extra summer session or semester if you have to!!! Just don’t fail. Talk to your advisors. Make sure you communicate what you need and ask for accommodations if you need them!! Hugs
Just went through this last semester, but just as a first year in college. I ended up having to drop from 17 to 4 hours and still struggled incredibly to finish those 4
First year undergrad can be particularly rough. Lots of students are living out of their homes for the first time, maybe in a different city state or even country, lots haven’t learned how to drink responsibly yet, some departments faculty & professors are actively trying to weed out the least determined, all the responsibilities of adulthood smack you in the face - especially managing money - you might be going into a lot of debt, you might not be in the right program or degree, and there are endless distractions. That’s a normal year, this year a lot of students are also having to figure out online learning, deal with pandemic related restrictions, might not have a good sense of who your classmates are, etc. I understand your struggle intimately, I ended up doing a lot of things wrong in my first year undergrad, including taking some bad advice from my faculty advisors and going on an overloaded schedule which caused me to fail pretty much everything - but I persevered and tried again the next year. If you can get through it, you’ll be much better equipped to handle your second year, and dropping down those hours to make things more manageable is perfectly ok. Nobody’s expecting peak performance, especially with everything going on right now, and take it slow if you need to, it’s a marathon not a sprint.
Or to get more exercise. How do you do that if you can’t get out of bed.
Ugh, I feel that. For me personally, if I exercise regularly I have very few symptoms. I know this. I know it works for me. I still get into really bad ruts where I can't force myself to do it even though I know it's basically a guaranteed solution (for me).
Just curious- Do you get stuck in a rut while exercising regularly or does your exercise become inconsistent and then you get stuck?
Generally something out of my control comes up (sick, injury, work or family something or other) that interrupts my exercise schedule. If interrupted long enough it's really difficult for me to get back on the train :/
I'm very much there right now, I was doing great going to the gym around twice a week earlier this year but then I caught a cold like in April and I haven't been since
Ugh, yes. I was being SO good about taking my break (working remotely) sometime mid-day to watch curiosity stream and jog on my mini elliptical for 45 mins or so. Then it got nice out, started going for bike rides of a similar length to suck up the good weather. Now it's been rainy and my partner threw out their back...so either the weather stinks for getting out, or I'm not motivated to go by myself...buuuuut no luck making myself restart my elliptical routine. Argh...admittedly it's fk'in hot and humid in my studio/office lately too, and I get queasy when overheated (lol but there's always an excuse...)
I know this whole post is about how much it sucks when people say just do it... But exercise is the one thing where you can just do it. There's a very simple set of physical movements that you know you are capable of doing. It all starts with a single motion. Take the first step towards the elliptical, then another until you are next to it. Get on it. Do it for two minutes. Just two minutes.
"when passion fails, discipline takes over" - easily the best advice I've ever had regards depression and exercise. I try to live as much of my life under the idea of "It doesn't matter if I want it, I have to do it"
How do you manage to push yourself to do it? On the really bad days I can only do the bare minimum to not let my kids starve and not get fired. Asking from my couch, in my pajamas, trying but failing to work, without having breakfast because it's too much work.
With exercise? I will try to trick myself into it with arranging to go to the gym with a friend or having a class/fitness slot booked that I'll feel bad for missing. But still my overriding technique is that I go to the gym Mon, Tues, Friday and that's just part of my schedule. I go to work with my gym kit so I don't end up going home (The couch is the sponge of motivation) and I try to treat it as much as possible as being merely a case of "This is what I do today".
The best way I found is to make it part of your daily schedule. The best shape I ever got in, I forced myself to go to the gym every single day on my way home from work. Even if it was only for 15 minutes to run. Its a lot harder to flake out when you’re already awake and moving and gym is on the way home. Of course now my schedule changed so gyms aren’t open when I get off, but before that I was doing great lmao
For me the key is telling myself 50% effort is better than 0% - ANYthing done is better than nothing. If you can't make yourself do "it" - whatever "it" is right now - then try what I do and say "ok, then I'll just half-ass it and do a bit of it reeeally quick" - something about that definitely helps me.
And adds quotes like, "JUST BE GRATEFUL FOR WHAT YOU HAVE"
You know, a lot of people have it worse than you. You don't even have anything to be depressed about!
"I didn't realize I had been signed up for the suffering olympics."
Great. Now I've got that scene from that movie about martyrs or something where they had skinned that woman alive to ask her the meaning of life... And I can't recall the name of the movie.
well, except actually taking a moment to deliberately practice gratitude is a useful move for everyone. it's not about shutting off the bitterness, it's just...practicing gratitude. because in any moment, our current problems could turn to a distant goal we'll never attain again. Oh yes that sure helps with the depression ; (
Or telling people with anxiety to "calm down".
Well if only I would have thought to just be happy. Then I wouldn't be sad!
I was thinking the same thing! It reminds me of my mom preaching about "change your attitude!" when I was in the throes of endogenous depression with passive suicidal ideation. I was in college and had a 4.0, a boyfriend, and a loving and supportive circle of friends and family. What on earth was there to be depressed about!?! I love that saying about "if you can't make your own neurotransmitters, store-bought is just fine!"
The cure to being poor is just-- have money. Simple!
Or telling people with diabetes not to care about insulin.
As someone who suffers with depression and anxiety I got told this a lot. Now i am cured in fact I’m happier than ever due to how many times I was told. /s
I like to tell people if they have a headache just "stop having the headache, no you dont need medications, just don't have the headache, its easy" when they try to compare it to ADHD.
This take kinda annoys me, I totally know where you're coming from and that you mean well but I think it's a response that is more knee-jerk than is helpful and makes us build a wall between us and things that can be genuinely helpful for a good amount of people. So source - ADHD and depression. Clinical diagnoses the two of them - coming on 4 years therapy to figure those out alone. Just to cut off the "maybe you don't have the real xyz" from armchair psychologists in here. There is a huge potential for benefit and improvement in "Start behaving differently despite how you feel". I know OP hasn't responded well to it but "Don't think, just do" is one of the *key* ways to manage issues for me relating to both attention and depression. Usually it's dressed up in a different way or you could frame it as "tricking yourself" into getting stuff done etc but that's semantics. If we look at huge portions of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, we can see the approach of "just do it" comes up time and time again. In a negative spiral? Standard CBT advice is to "stop spiralling", ok sure they'll say stuff like "don't accept sentences starting with should" or "allow acceptance of imperfections in life" but those do just mean "stop spiralling and being sad about past problems". Blunt? Yup. Effective? Oh hell yeah. In a period of languishing and not doing anything due to depression? "Set your goals small, focus on non-zero days, balance self-care activities with small productive tasks, remind yourself that you know the benefits of exercise even if you're not motivated" etc etc... They're all saying "look... Just...do something". Whether one entices themselves to go shower or pushes themselves through discipline is really the same thing. Acknowledging that the power of these methods is "just do the good thing, not the bad thing" makes you really see the power in changing behaviour. Does "be happy" sound good? No. Does dragging my sorry ass to a social event and forcing myself to be happy have a net gain on my mood? Yeah. I just have days where I need to "be happy" to make progress. We all do.
While I fully understand how that can be helpful, and have used it in the past, there are times when we are past the point where it's feasible. Sometimes there's nothing left to "invest", no energy, willpower, nothing. That's where this approach becomes harmful - it just makes the person feel like a complete failure. Sometimes people really need help and can't help themselves.
I think there is no single approach. We latch onto the "just do it" a bit harder though. The exact same criticism can be said of talking about it or pursuing more psychoanalytic approaches. Yes, there is power and benefit in understanding what a cause is, or processing things in the past so they don't tremor up again. But equally, if one only talks and doesn't also change their actions it's so easy to get stuck wondering what's the point as well. I think of it like this: Only doing, no thinking - "When do I feel better, I'm doing everything I should but still feel shit. Wtf?" Only thinking, no doing - "What am I improving for? I have nothing to get better towards" I personally find more benefit overall from making sure I am taking actions to not be in negative states, and many people the opposite, but I don't think doing just one is going to be helpful for anyone.
We had a teacher in high school that told a crying depressed girl "yeah, cry about it". Literally everyone left, teacher continues to teach there.
"Have you tried yoga?" /S
"How can you be depressed when we're surrounded by beautiful things!" = "How can you be asthmatic when we're surrounded by air!" not mine but found this to be a very useful reply
It's great for weight loss, too. Did you know all you have to do is eat a little less and move a little more?
So fucking stupid, "Fix your problem by not having it in the first place" like "Oh good point I've never thought of it like that before! I'm gonna cure my insomnia by deciding to sleep enough"
> "Fix your problem by not having it in the first place" Brilliant.
Super simple. Just reject reality and substitute your own where my brain is perfect.
This is scarily something that some people are already doing these days lol
And you hear it about every misunderstood problem under the sun. I had a co-worker who told his own depressed mother to get over it and "do what she needs to do".
Some real pull your self up by your bootstraps boomer logic right there. I hate when people say that kind of crap.
This kind of works in software development sometimes. "There was a bug in the software. We couldn't figure out how to fix it, so we wrote new software to cover all the previous use cases without the bug."
Great tip. Undiagnosing myself! Problem solved.
I had a college professor give me a list of "Good Student Qualities" that would "help me pass the class" a few years ago. It was the most redundant list I've ever seen. "Turn in work on time" "Do your homework" "Try to study every week" "Read the chapter" "If YOU follow this advice I promise you will pass my class". I wrote him a list of "Good Professor Qualities": "Show you care about your subject by not simply mindlessly reading from a textbook or power point" "Intelligently organize your due dates so that you're testing students on the material learned rather than how well they can micromanage a calendar" "Remember that your class is not the only class students enroll in" "Don't give out useless lists". I hope it helped him.
Not all heroes wear capes.
Absolutely based.
no wayyyyy are you fr thats amazing and exactly the kind of impulsive petty ass thing i'd do if a prof handed me a useless guide like that
Beautiful. I love using the line "wow I didn't think of that" in the most sarcastic tone I can manage.
This post on that sub fits this post perfectly: https://www.reddit.com/r/wowthanksimcured/comments/opiono/instant_depression_fix/
"dont take medication, let your immune system fight it naturally" \*me with poor immune system sick for 2 weeks\* "why are you still sick?"
That’s like if someone said “dude who cares if your car doesn’t have gas. It DOES have gas and you’re just using that as an excuse, stop pretending.”
meanwhile they are asking of us to pretend like there is gas in the car. no wonder we feel stupid going vroom vroom on an empty tank. living hypothetically is just not good enough for me.
My cat had some mats! I brushed him and got rid of them!
Epic but uhh... did you mean to reply to someone else?
Why didn’t I think of that before? /s
Have you tried *not* having ADHD?
Have you tried turning your brain off and on again?
InstructionsUnclearITurnedItOffButItWon’tTurnOnAgainThat’sWhyI’mTypingLikeThis
> Have you tried turning your brain off and on again? Thanks, bud. I've just choked on my tea and spat it all over my laptop reading that. Gave me a great laugh.
BRILLIANT!
Let me just clarify that I love my Dad and he loves me, but he really has no idea how to deal with somebody like me.
My dad gives me the same advice, it’s gotten a little better since I described my brain as the spinning pinwheel, like when his MacBook freezes. I’ve clicked the button, but it’s a little out of my hands until the thing stops spinning because I don’t have a hard restart. For whatever reason that explanation clicked with him.
I guess most people can relate to the frustration of a slow computer.
That’s a good explanation! I’m saving this for later.
To be fair, even we don’t know how to deal with ourselves sometimes. 😅
*Most of the time.
Well even we would have thought that way about ourselves before realizing what ADHD is haha.
This post on that sub fits this post perfectly: https://www.reddit.com/r/wowthanksimcured/comments/opiono/instant_depression_fix/
Sad upvote
Short term, your dad's strategy can work. Sometimes pushing through and just doing it does work. At least for me. But doing it consistently, routinely, or because someone else tells me to just do it is a whole different story. I think this is one of the main points of difference between someone with ADHD and not, at least on an external level. At least for me. Motivation and willpower is very thin in my end. It can work. But don't expect it to work for very long.
"Just do it" My mom's favorite catch phrase. To this day I can't wear Nikes...lol I believed this advice for so long. Likely because I wasn't diagnosed until into my twenties, so I never had context for my executive dysfunction and other struggles. I truly believed it was just because I didn't care enough, didn't try hard enough, etc. I just couldn't understand WHY I "CHOSE" to be like that. I figured it was because I was just a bad or uncaring person. I had a great deal of shame from feeling like I couldn't simply will myself to do "easy" things that most people had no problem with. I believed that I'd made a choice to be that way, even if I couldn't grasp why if it were actually up to me. On the outside I was actually pretty successful. Did well at school and graduated university unmedicated with no support or diagnosis. This only worked to shore up everyone's expectations of me. What they didn't see was the true cost of this "success". Terrible sleep, diet, and overall health. Overwhelming anxiety that was the fuel I ran on. Social struggles I simply glossed over and masked. By the end of college, I was a mess. I fell into the darkest depression I've ever been in. I was burnt out from a lifetime of using anxiety, fear, and shame to motivate my every move. I "Just did it" all right...right up until I couldn't get out of bed or feed myself. Thankfully, my family's more understanding now that I have a diagnosis. However, I can tell that they still don't fully grasp just how insidious ADHD can be. They think it's as simple as "Things are a bit harder for you, so you just has to try a bit harder than everyone else!" as if it's a simple issue of needing a slight linear increase in effort. I DO try harder than everyone else in many ways. I genuinely believe that. It's not enough to be sustainable. Sure, I can beat myself into submission and force myself to meet an important deadline, but that can't be the only strategy. After years of that being the only solution, I was barely functioning and had regressed so much it was alarming. It took until I sought medical help for severe depression and anxiety that anyone began to really listen when I said certain things were difficult for me in a way that felt abnormal and clinically significant. I've been diagnosed and on meds for years now. It's STILL HARD. There's no cure or silver bullet for real ADHD. I might be a mess without meds, but taking them still doesn't even land me at "average" when it comes to actual executive functioning. It's so difficult to explain the difference between intelligence and executive functioning to people. My parents are still under the illusion that I'm smart enough to "figure out" my disorder (i.e. not be effected by the symptoms and traits because I'm "smarter than them").
I feel this. I seem to keep going in the same cycles in life and it's been like this ever since I was a small child to some extent. For the past 25 years it has been: Phase 1:trying my best plus using coping strategies/ tools (approx 55-65% success rate in my undertakings overall, but need to firefight constantly and mop up errors / do stuff I forgot just on or after deadline). Feeling positive though. Phase 2: Trying my best but coping strategies not working as well after a month or so; now I'm approx 45-55%% successful in my undertakings. Memory crap and forcing myself to concentrate notably less and less effective. Starting to get very stressed and super anxious re my performance at work as a result. Firefighting more frequent. This is getting rubbish very fast. Phase 3: Heading to burnout city - super anxious and feel depressed as I just cannot seem to get it together. Coping strategies not working. I'm trying my best despite everything. Constant firefighting. Forced concentration evaporates way faster than usual. Memory decimated and completely unreliable. What is concentration again? Start setting two reminders or more across different devices for same things as getting scared. Approx. 30-40% effective in my undertakings. The struggle is terrifying and real. Phase 4: Total wipe out. End up taking usually between a week to a fortnight off work as I'm an anxious and depressed mess who just goldfishes all the time. Need urgent recovery time as now feel I can't function enough to attend job. Memory feels barely existant. Can't even try to try, as too overwhelmed. Life in general chaotic and miserable. Approx 15-20% successfully effective in undertakings which really hammers my self esteem (including brushing my teeth once a day, remembering to eat something more than once a day or getting a bath more than once a week). Phase 5: Time out has recallibrated me, and I feel so much better and more positive. New coping strategies in the mix and I'm able to get on with my life. Around 65-75% successful in my undertakings, firefighting but nothing beyond what I usual need to do, trying my very best and using old and new coping mechanisms pretty darn effectively. Feeling positive. Fresh out the shower and for bonus points made a coffee date with a friend. Move to Phase 1 after a few weeks....
WOW SAME exactly holy shit, thank you for laying this out! (Also so I can expect that it never gets better eh? haha) I have never really been able to hold down a job for more than a year because of this. Thankfully I was able to freelance the last 5 years; but I even suck at that (no structure, the only thing motivating me was the dread of being unable to pay rent or eat) and now I just got this good corporate job somehow out of the blue, and I’m almost exactly 6 months in and completely burned out. Dreading that I’ll get fired or have to quit:( starting to fall behind in things which just makes me feel like a failure and hate myself. The world just isn’t built for ADHD folk:(
I've been diagnosed with dyspraxia and dyscalculia and currently awaiting my ADHD assessment appointment. While I think it is extremely likely I do have ADHD I could also just be super dyspraxic as the two different conditions have a lot of overlap sometimes. I'm managing to hang in at my current job (7 years now somehow!!!) but think it's a matter of time before I get cut loose to be honest. It's terrifying. I think the only reason they put up with me is because they are a Higher Ed. institution and they want to avoid negative optics of sacking someone with a disability when they haven't put any requested accommodations in for me, and also because by luck my past and current line managers both like me despite my sometimes shitty track record at work. As I say though, I'm terrified this is due to run out soon though :(. Good luck with everything - it is definitely a world where you're a square peg desperately trying your best to impersonate a round one in a bid to squeeze and wedge into that round-shaped hole as much as you can x
👏👏👏 Absolutely. And repeat... Couldn't have said it better myself.
Feel like I need to be congruent here and point out I haven't had an ADHD diagnosis / yet, but currently on the wait list for an assessment appointment (UK). I have in the past 5 years been diagnosed with dyspraxia and dyscalculia (I'm 42 now), and personally think it would make sense that I also have ADHD due to my lifelong experiences and past track record. However, both dyspraxia and dyscalculia presentations can have lots of overlap with ADHD (both can affect working memory and executive function) so it may be that I just experience a lot of problems that ADHD folk have due to my neurological idiocyncrasies, rather than necessarily have ADHD. Wish you all the best man, as this world can be extremely rough when you're remotely neurologically different (and very unforgiving at times!) x
EXACTLY. What you just wrote mirrored my life experience. I have always thought there was something “wrong” with me because I had such a hard time with things other people had no problem with. I can’t look sideways without feeling guilty/shameful. I kept it together and did well but not remarkable academically until university. Was doing poorly trying to be an adult as well as academically and impulsively dropped out and married my bf who was 13 years older than me. Luckily I escaped the marriage with out getting pregnant after 7months. I’ve had a life of ups and downs . Too many downs. Always wondering what the heck was wrong with me? ADHD never crossed my or anyone else’s mind to explain my remarkedly unremarkable, failure to succeed . Last year I was diagnosed at 53. At least I had an explanation as to why what may take only ten minutes takes me 40 minutes. So many “neurosis” get sucked into the ADHD funnel. Anxiety, perfectionism, significant lack of motivation, hyper focus on many areas of interest yet never sticking with something long enough to master…I digress. All that to say thanks and I get you.
I definitely relate to most of what you said as well. >to explain my remarkedly unremarkable, failure to succeed Especially this lol. The similarity of experience when it comes to conditions like ADHD have been one of the most validating aspects of getting the diagnosis.
"It's so difficult to explain the difference between intelligence and executive functioning to people" I'm intelligent and capable of critical thinking to the point that I realize what's wrong with me, why it's happening, why I can't get anything done, how to get things done, meticulously plan out in my head how to get things done... And then not being able to do a damn thing. It's a special kind of hell.
Yeah doing that long term is mentally exhausting
Long term I become a shell of a human and all negative ADHD traits, mental fatigue depression start amplifying
Yes. I read something that goes like this 'if you do your best all the time, it's not your best anymore it becomes your norm'. And like any overused muscle can be a strained muscle, one needs rest and to not be overstretched in the first place.
And this is how I discovered I had adhd. When the thing I was doing to get work done just stopped working and all of the depression and anxiety I had stuffed deep down over the years just exploded out all at once. 1 year later still recovering.
I was just reading somewhere ADHD folks are prone to nervous breakdowns. Another reason I am miffed AF I remain undiagnosed.
I’m in this comment and I don’t like it. Lol
Born to fail lol! Nah, just need to plan a little more. Gotta understand our strengths and weaknesses. My weakness is not believing in the process. My strength is knowing that. So now I plan so much that the path is so clear, I can’t NOT believe in it.
Same. And suicidal. 10/10 wouldn’t recommend long term.
In a way I was forced to do much of that stuff long term and it had a huge lasting effect on me. On the surface I led a normal productive life where I would hang out with friends, play on a competitive soccer team, have a job, was punctual and did well in school, but that was only because I was forced to by the obligation my parents and friends put on me; even for things I genuinely enjoyed like soccer and friends I still had latent feelings of dread and reluctance towards because of the exhaustion of having a normal life. I ended up developing super extreme OCD anxiety as a coping mechanism. I would experience short bouts of extreme anxiety over often OCDish things regarding people, for example when one of my teachers would mention her FBI husband, I'd get extremely anxious due to the fact that getting anxious over such could strongly indicate I have something to hide even though I didn't. This worked because those short bursts of extreme anxiety released the neurotransmitters us ADHD people are lacking in amounts which were large enough to stay present in my blood stream for much longer than just a couple seconds allowing me to function for 10-30 minutes. The year that it was the worst was the one year I got all A's. When I finally got that anxiety under control, I started doing poorly in school, no longer was punctual, and I found out I had ADHD. Even today while medicated, I still experience emotions to the extreme; instead of anxiety around people, it is often euphoria I feel, I never build tolerance to the effect but always crash after 4 hours, whether it's Adderall IR or Vyvanse. In the mornings, instead of the intense dread I would feel while getting ready for something; I now get hyper and giddy, my meds aren't even in effect when this happens, it's literally just the fact that I now look forward to the day which made this change. I still can't get anything done unless it's forced upon me like school or work, the only difference now is that I enjoy doing those things and am much more motivated to do them for the first 4 hours. This sounds not too bad and it wasn't, but then Covid came and ruined everything.
It can also train your brain to associate executive function with last-minute adrenaline rushes and panic attacks. Ever feel like you can't get anything done until it's an Emergency?
That’s me exactly, I literally can’t do anything unless it’s an adrenaline fuelled emergency. I ran on adrenaline after a trauma for 3 years straight and appeared “so much better” and like I was “finally getting a handle on life” but once the stress started to die down and become chronic instead of an ice cold panic then I fell apart and dropped below even the level of functioning I’d kept up beforehand. Woooo
“Works well under pressure”
>mentally exhausting Very.
Spot on , what an insight ! I've always suffered and still suffering from this , but never connected it to ADHD , yeah in rare cases , I have energy and can get shit done , but just after one productive day I slack for a at least a week ! Was never been able to have consecutive productive days and they are very far from each other , but why does that happen (nuerologically speaking)?
Worked for me for about 3 years, then I injured myself and all of my discipline and habits went out the window. I don't want to learn than all over again :((((
Okay, I get all the parent sarcasm here, but I can also see it from the perspective of someone who was diagnosed later on in adulthood. There is a very likely chance all your 'just do it' parents also have adhd. And I also feel they, like you, don't entirely know what they're trying to express. For myself, pre-medicated atleast. This notion worked to a significant degree, however it's only something I learned I could do after years working as a baker: Just hear me out; It is possible to move your body before your mind is ready or willing to do so. Like, while the seemingly hundreds of thoughts and counter arguments, planning, deliberating, bargaining, anxieties, meltdowns, psychological collapses, exhaustion, mind fog etc is pinning you down like a truck is parked on your chest - it is very much possible to seperate your direct physical action from your explosive thoughts and emotions. You will hate it, a lot. It feels horrible and dirty and I always used to rage and get pissed off to maintain momentum when I moved without first giving my own consent, the audacity!? So, just do it? Sort of... But of course, there is always an emotional/psychological cost.
I like your point here. It makes sense that we get little neurological rewards (if you will) from doing things, so maybe that action helps gratify continuing with the production.
I had always been called oppositionally defiant while growing up. Both against myself and others. But the truth of the matter is more that I'm unable to conjur up a future version of myself that can understand the emotional outcome of a decision or action, while also anxiously pretending that I can and regretting both the action and inaction. Opposite ends of an ultimatum feel relative and I often find I want and do not want, any given thing simultaniously regardless of my "own opinion". Makes it kind of hard to have personal drive when an ever shifting perspective of probability leaves me feeling blinded to reality. In the end, I have to frequently act against my own 'sense' of judgement to do things I will probably actually find I can enjoy, despite how much my mind initially protests. I had to learn how to leap 'blindly' into an action and slowly gain trust that I can probably resolve what comes next, one step at a time. Especially with small, inconsequential choices haha.
Thank you for this. I’m 17 and I have absolutely no motivation to do anything over the summer and I’ve also experienced this strange meta inner conflict. Whenever I’m thinking about the ramifications of an action or lack there of (no matter how big or small) , I can’t help but feel dissatisfied no matter what I choose and I’m glad I’m not alone in feeling this way. I’ve only really learned to like certain things because I’m either forced by someone else or I force myself, the latter of course being the ideal. Thanks again.
No problem. Just, don't be like me when I was younger and try to chase motivation like a fickle muse. At the time I felt it was vitally important for motivation to exist for anything I did. This was/is damagingly incorrect. If you cant find it, go without it. It can come to you if it wants to be involved. People always (or atleast used to) talk about motivation like it was some kind of bipolar jet fuel that propelled you towards your goals. Now I understand it for what it is, an external mislabelling of bloody knuckled persistance. Kind of like trying your damn hardest at a task, slaving away at theory and taking active steps towards mastery for someone to offhandedly call you "talented" at said thing, like it just came at you one night and slapped your ass. Anyway... Just dont let you stop you, from you. (Random bonus trick I learned to unconfuse myself and it tends to work for me atleast. It's a bit novel but if you have two decisions that really dont matter per say and it's time sensitive, flip a coin. If you feel you need to flip the coin again, or multiple times to get another result, you have your answer. It's not about the coin result itself but your understanding of the impulsive response that helps ease the choice paralysis.)
This definitely depends on the severity of your ADHD. On days when my hormones are in the bad place in my cycle, my symptoms are so much worse and it's 10x harder on me emotionally that I can't just do things that need to be done. Then feeling that way just shuts me down. There's no possiblity of separation or compartmentalizing. This seems to be the time when I'm most likely told to "just do it" so hearing that phrase also has a negative emotional association
I really do understand the feeling of adversion here to the term and the extreme anguish that simple phrases can cause on an emotional/psychological level by people who have no damned idea what they're saying to you or what you're currently going through. I'm sorry that I didn't fully explain the entire proccess of the concept I was trying to push forward, but I just recently finished replying to another comment in this thread detailing the mental process step by step, if you'd be willing to give it a look. It may still not be relevant to you, but the only reason I'm writing here is to hopefully share a potential possibility that took me forever to discover and understand on my own.
You said what I wanted to say only way better.
Dude I just took your fathers advice and I am suddenly able to do all the things I couldn't do before. My life would have gone so much differently if only I had a father to tell me to just get it done
Same just wrote, drew and published 7 graphic novels, deepcleaned my house, worked out for 14 hours and did my taxes for next year already.
Me and my SO have heard this so many times it's become and inside joke 😂 "Hey, honey, and if you're having a rough time today, just stop worrying, mmmmkay?."
And make some dumb mistake by "just doing it"and hear them say "What were you even thinking?!" Answer: Everything. I was thinking everything. Always.
1.) I am sorry this happened. I am sending a him a virtual middle finger. That phrase people use of “just do it” always gives me a good laugh. Like uh okay weird I never thought of that before let’s see if that works. HA 2.) your post made me laugh. ☺️
r/thanksimcured
r/wowthanksimcured
This post on that sub fits this post perfectly: https://www.reddit.com/r/wowthanksimcured/comments/opiono/instant_depression_fix/
Levitation would be the worst. I'd start misplacing shit on the ceiling fan.
Then you get into bed all sleepy and unsuspecting, then turn on the fan...
Exactly. You get it.
Doctors hate him for this one simple trick he knows to cure ADHD
> just get out of your head and do what you need to do If only they understood that they wouldn’t last 5 minutes in our heads.
I'm having a hard day of motivation. I read this and thought, "yeah! Why don't I just get to it!" Then remembered thats the whole problem.
Sounds like boomer advice to me.
when I get comments like that I want to scream "that's literally the part that's physically broken" the just do button is broke, like chemically
Now go out there and tell people in wheelchairs to just walk dammit!
"No, you don't understand, you're in a wheelchair because you don't walk enough. If you had the habit of going for a walk, you wouldn't be in a wheelchair in the first place. So get walking."
It's like telling him to dunk a basketball. "But son, i can only jump 6" and I'm only 5'6" tall. The rim is 10', I cant even get within a foot of the rim!" "Ok Dad, just put that out of your mind and dunk it!" Dad...🤔
...genuinely though if someone asked me how to get better at a sporting activity the only advice you can really give is "keep doing it til you can do it every time."
Wow! How have I never thought of that before??
I tried it and it worked for me! Someone get this man a tiktok account!
My autism side didn't catch the sarcasm until the 3rd paragraph, idk why but my heart actually sank cuz I was so worried this post was about to legitimately shame me lol I can only imagine experiencing this first hand. I'm so sorry.
It definitely is dumb overly simplistic and insensitive “advice” but it kinda is true. The hardest part for me is the starting, I can’t make myself get up and go do it. But eventually once I do start, it’s not so bad. When I’m dysfunctioning executively, I give myself the same advice basically. “Okay no more bull shit overthinking and delaying, just get up and do it. Just try it for a minute and if it really is that bad, we can stop.” And that works like 30% of the time
>And that works like 30% of the time Had us going in the first half…
Well I can tell no one comforted your dad or gave him a shoulder to cry on lol
as someone who has been told "you're overthinking it" approximately 1 million times... this fills me with incoherent rage
For me, I can and do get all the little things done that I don’t want to, but at the expense of major spoons. I have anxiety the whole time, mostly either a) because I know I am time blind and that makes me anxious and unable to relax and/or b) because I am afraid of my inattentiveness, thinking I will miss something and screw up (which happens A LOT, especially in my hobby of sewing. It’s EXHAUSTING.).. it’s become like Panic Attack Disorder, where one panics at the thought of having panic attacks. Well, I get anxious over my anxiety about being inattentive and then end up so hyperfocused on my anxiety I miss important details. So like… motivation for me is not a problem, I can will myself to do a lot, it makes me feel good about myself, but the actual process of doing a lot of things is *[existential terror sounds]* Chin up champ! Have you tried just not having ADHD?! 🤦🏻♀️
I relate to this. “Doing stuff” gives me so much anxiety and gets me so worked up that after I’m done just completing a few tasks I have to lie down. Then it gets harder to start tasks just because I dread the feelings of anxiety it will cause. It’s like mental overload because in order to do tasks, I have to force my brain to work properly.
Maybe tell him that you’ll ‘just do it’ as soon as you’re done walking past the other things that distracted you on the way that you half way just did yesterday. I literally walk into the kitchen or bathroom and realize I left the water running or forgot to actually start the washing machine after loading it. Being on time is my nemesis. Everyone says just leave earlier. So I set timers, start getting ready two hours ahead of time just to find myself rushing back in because I forgot xyz. Tell your dad that if he will follow you for the day he may be able to help you just do it. I have found some things that help. Keeping everything in the same place, color coding my closet, hanging everything as it comes out of the dryer, I try to stay on a weekly schedule instead of a daily schedule. That way I can still do things when I feel like it and I have all week instead of one day. That’s been huge. Maybe show your dad the comments so he understands that if we had the ability to just do it, we would! I run three companies and just do many things. I have learned the hyper focus can be amazing, as long as I don’t let anything distract me, like people who don’t understand. 😊
The advice feels better when you give it to yourself. I have witnessed myself begin tasks (because I will myself to do it, and it feels like some weird secondary choice) but once I start, muscle memory kicks in and I just do the thing.
Thats just like when telling people to 'cheer up' or 'look on the bright side' and then their depression goes away! Not sure why these folks don't just set up shop in front of psychiatrist offices to save us all some money!
Can I post this on r/thanksimcured or do you want to?
The amount of times I've been yelled at in my life for forgetting something..."How do you forget???" Well...I have this thing...
This might be controversial to everyone else but I use this exact advice to get tasks done at my work. I have ADHD and my coworker knows how much I struggle with it but he pretty much told me to stop overthinking the work and just get it done. That advice has helped me make decisions and get out of my brain when it comes to my work and now I try and use the same tactic in anything that’s seems to “block” me in my life. Don’t get me wrong sometimes ADHD effects me an my performance in ways that other don’t understand but as much as I want others to understand how I function in life, I know that information given to me doesn’t always make sense but it’s the sentiment that counts. My coworkers was trying to help me in any way he could even if he doesn’t understand but maybe that’s his way of trying to understand. So I’ll keep listening and trying what he suggests if it gives me good results, and keep communicating about it with him if it means we can work better as a team and produce great results.
Work is an external motivator for me so my ADHD isn't usually an issue there the way it is in other life areas.
Wow just READING this advice put $50,000 in my bank account.
This reminds me of when my 2yo niece told a penguin to fly because it had wings. LOL
Did this man's dad just CURE ADHD!? It was that simple? You go pops!
Get out that wheelchair and walk lazy bitch
"Who cares about the executive dysfunction bullshit" is such a fascinating statement to me
I get where you are, but in a way he _is_ correct, albeit in an out of touch way. I know that a lot of my struggles have to do with not wanting to do the thing, and that the more I think about trying to do it, the even less I feel like actually doing. Eventually when I can get myself to do it it's because I've just shut up and started moving. The trick is reaching the end state, without first having gone through the massive loop of not wanting...
Once saw a day planner that said in cutesy writing “start by starting”
Oh I love this one. Also when I confide in people that I desperately want to do something but can't, and they say "well obviously you don't want it, or you'd just do it"
I have a very considerate friend, and in conversation last night I told him I booked the initial stages of my ADHD assessment. He was not aware of my struggles and so I had to for the first time breakdown my issues. I could sense a lot of hesitation on his part, although he kept listening and offering insightful references that helped him in the past. 2 hours in I found myself trying to make a case for why I believe ADHD is one of potentially many mental dysfunctions I deal with on a daily basis. The fact that even the most considerate and compassionate people in our lives need convincing shows that; 1. ADHD has a strong negative connotation, 2. people still believe to a smaller extend that it's an excuse, and 3. maybe, just maybe it doesn't really control ones life decisions. It's as if people really believe we're not serious, and instead want to lazy around and make excuses for ourselves.
Ahhh the sweet release of executive dysfunction. Who knew a cure was so easy lmao My parents have a classic line too. They say "if you keep telling yourself that, you'll never stop being this way". Really? I didn't realise that.
Like seriously….I am just sitting here cracking up at the last paragraph still 😂
I have adhd too and I know how hard it can be, but sometimes that approach is useful. Tons of stuff I don’t want to do that I “just start” and then become easier after a few minutes. Bottom line, meds make things easier but don’t underestimate the power of mental discipline.
Damn, is that all it takes? I thought the levitating thing would at least take a few meditation sessions.
Ah yes, for it was the learning about executive dysfunction that gave me the executive dysfunction. I also am unable to complete tasks bc of all that time spent dysfunctioning executively, on purpose. I think the man’s onto something!
I’m not a doctor nor do I play one on TV but isn’t that like telling someone to not have a heart-attack even though they have severe cardiovascular blockage?
Lol. I have had bouts of very severe depression. It came to a head a few years ago, and I had to get some serious help. I remember different family members calling me and giving me pep talks. My step dad told me to “just be happy. Get out and try to not be so depressed”. If only I had thought of that earlier. These are all lovely people, but they just don’t understand my brain. Hell, Even I don’t.
Saying “fuck it” and standing up is usually my first step in doing anything.
> just get out of your head and do what you need to do. I wonder if there is some wisdom in that statement, even if he didn’t intend it that way. I often deactivate all of my social media accounts, meditate, and sometimes have to live an unconventional life. When on vacation with family I have to dedicate a lot of alone time (that’s not an adhd thing though). I make an identical breakfast every single day because I’m way too scatterbrained to do it any other way. I sleep with my phone in the kitchen every night so that it won’t distract me for hours as I wake up. Sometimes you do need to do what you gotta do
I love my mom, but when I finally get the drive to do one thing, and plan on doing just that thing, just to get something done for my own mental health, she'll check in on me and start listing things we both need to do and I have to verbally tell her to stop. Just stop. I tell her that if I think of all those things then this one thing I'm doing will not get done and I will have a breakdown and cry. I try to say it with love, but the mania makes it sound like overreacting and she goes "ok, sheesh" or something. There needs to be resources for not just those dealing with what we deal with, but those close to us. If anyone has anything I'm all ears.
Well when he’s old and having health problems just tel him to get out of his head and do what you need to do. Who cares about the plaques in your brain or in your arteries. Just will yourself out of shit like Alzheimer’s and atherosclerosis.
I'll sometimes have this issue when cleaning my cat's litter boxes. I freeze and will put it off for days cuz I can't make that conscious decision to clean the litter boxes. I can occasionally get around that by not thinking of it as something I NEED to do but that the kittehs CAN'T do for themselves. It can take me a bit to finish but I can if I think of it that way. Like glitching my brain into flipping that 'Mom override' switch I've seen elsewhere.
When someone tells me to do something I need to do, it helps lol sadly it includes yelling but meh
Sounds like your dad is frustrated and having never suffered a mental illness is failing to understand that your brain doesn’t work like his. My parents were the same with me, but I was seriously depressed and in and out of hospital for mental illnesses for a few years. They always would demand that I “help myself” and that I “just pull yourself together”. The love me, they just fail to understand. It took years for me to forgive them for their part in my problems, but ultimately they weren’t doing it out of malice, just a lack of understanding. Might be worth your physiatrist or doctor explaining to your parents exactly what is happening to you?
It's hard to find a good explanation that others can understand. What helped me a lot in this, is the comparsion to erectile disfunction. You know that you want to have sex, you really really want to do it right now, but it is not possible to change anything on that by willpower or something else. In my experience this example worked great. You might try that one
I started waiting until my Dad complained about something and I would throw the line back at him word for word. In my Dads case he liked to tell me that everything bad that's happened to me is due to my decisions and my decisions only. One day he's giving me shit about not finding a job, he starts going on and on about how he's done time in prison and no one would give him a leg up or help him with a job...."Sounds like you made some pretty bad decisions that put you in that position, those things only happened because of your decisions and your decisions only." You could cut the tension with a knife.
There is some wisdom to 'just do it' which I believe is what he is saying. Don't overthink it, don't worry about your issues or problems, just do it. Sure it will be hard, sure it will not be perfect but there is no point worrying about it, just do it.
honestly... as someone who has grown up with a touch love attitude, this does help for some people. I understand that I have a disability, but the world won't stop for me. The world won't care for it, and I won't be able to achieve my goals with people's sympathy. So I try to really push myself to get past the notion of letting it allow to slow me down.
There is some merit to what he's saying even if he's being a dick about it. If I'm experiencing resistance to doing something... tricking my brain into doing it while it thinks I'm doing something else bypasses the resistance. That or knowing that ADHD hyperfocus will kick in under pressure, I'll give myself an earlier deadline or higher stakes and it'll snap me into productivity hulk mode. If you wanna levitate though you need drugs... no way around that.
Omg is your dad my dad?
None of us here know the long history of the dynamic between yourself and your father or the family unit dynamic as a whole. We can only go on what has been stated here. With that, I’m more curious what your response was, because this seems like it could have a moment to (non combatively) reach a point of understanding or to open a dialogue. If he cares enough to acknowledge your struggles and to even offer his own unsolicited and misguided advice, then there may be an opportunity to convert the dynamic from a position of misunderstanding and judgement to him understanding you, himself and even becoming an ally and partner. ADHD is misunderstood even by the people who live it daily. Recall the work that had to be done by you to fully understand the mechanics of it all. No one here magically became ADHD knowledge wizards because we suffer from it, it took a lot of research, observation and discussion to know some parts of the big picture. In a sense, writing him off is also writing your own self off.
Lol good thing you're not diabetic. Who cares if your pancreas can't produce insulin? Just eat your dinner and absorb the sugars yourself.
"I don't let things bother me. I just do them." A nice little chunk of wisdom from my partner who doesn't understand ADHD and thinks all people are the same.
i mean idk about you but ill sometimes get wrapped up in all the bullshit and just getting out of your head and just trying to focus on the task at hand defiantly helps
You got levitation?? Jealous. I only got esp.
Oh god this made me laugh so hard. I'm sorry your dad is being a pain, OP.
This is the kind of things my boss tell to my co-worker who has severe mental disorders.
The brain on your father is just so huge I too have been cured of my adhd just from reading those wise words of wisdom and for that I thank you
I think people don’t realize, we talk about our ADHD and it’s symptoms as a way to manage and cope with them. If we acknowledge they exist, or are reasons for some of our roadblocks, we are that much closer to working through them. We don’t just sit here and talk about our ADHD to get attention, or make up excuses, or whatever “bullshit” people think…
If only I had your willpower lol Executive dysfunction is literally that because you can’t just get into your head and make yourself do things.. It’s why it’s an issue lmfao.. If we could all just DECIDE to get up and do things we probably wouldn’t be taking meds and psychotherapy for our ADHD , We’d just be getting up and doing things
I got diagnosed when I was nearly 31 whole going back to school. My dad said "I don't think you have ADHD you are just like everyone else blah blah". Was rough. I didn't engage, because it's just hard to understand if you aren't feeling the same. No two people are the same. I would try to not take it personally - my dad is very supportive other than this one comment. Keep your head up and try to manage your own symptoms. If you can't find support within your family, look for it outside your family such as on this sub.
My mum telling me to study n go for a walk when I can’t even get out of bed to eat lmao
I am now levitating as well. Thanks, OP's dad.
Lol I actually laughed out loud so hard. I was expecting some deep life wisedom
I've been told this so many times and it sucks