Considering getting tested for ADD

Some random rambling ahead.

Back when I was a kid in middle school I was diagnosed with ADD and put on Ritalin. After a few years I decided I didn’t want to take drugs every day and weaned myself off of it and that was that. I was successful at school, excelled at work and my career growth, and had no issues that I can tell that would have impacted my quality of life. Who knows if I was just misdiagnosed or I had managed to actually get it under control.

Fast forward to today and I’m noticing I’m finding it incredibly hard to focus and be productive outside a few key things. At work I can focus if I actually care about the stuff I’m working on, and just lose focus when that’s not the case. I can’t pay attention to video meetings very well unless I’m actively engaged in it (meaning I’m speaking or being spoken to).

More to the point though outside of work I used to be so good about doing side projects of all different sorts, learning new stuff, gaming, reading, etc… I never had motivation problems until now. Even while writing this I’ve clicked off of it for a few times and gone pacing around the house. I can’t get through a lot of articles without clicking off of it anymore, can’t motivate myself to go through some online courses that actually do interest me, etc.

I start working on something and always find ways to distract myself. Hell I can’t even motivate myself on what game I want to play, thumbing through my library and then tabbing through the web. Back before Covid I had a hard time motivating myself to get out to meetups etc… When I do manage to focus myself on reading a chapter of a book or a side project I have to spend considerable effort to not distract myself and focus, and I’m actually really tired after a decent spell of that.

That being said, it’s not 100% of the time this is the case, just maybe 75%. When I"m at work I usually find some angle that interests me and can be very productive then, and at home I have had short bursts of good productivity. In some ways if I can just get started and some momentum on something I’m good, until I am done with that segment and end up in several directions I can go (at which point I’m back to square one).

Anyways, I’ve come to the realization about this today and that this has been slowly the case for the last few years. Granted, there’s been some big shifts in my life in that time span as well. I lost a good chunk of my local friends (petty bullshit rifts caused by us trying to start a business together), I’ve been working remotely for the last several years (and since a lot of people I know I’ve met through work this means very little social interaction, even before coronavirus). I wasn’t happy at my previous job, and I outright hate my current job. Etc…

So who knows, maybe it’s just a general downward happyness spiral that I need to find a way to break free from. Maybe even though I wake up at my own at 8am I’m not getting enough sleep (I blame my asshole dogs for that though). Though I figure getting tested for ADD is at least a good place to start.

I don’t really have a purpose to writing this out, other than collecting my thoughts.

I’m not a doctor, but my son has ADHD. The thing about ADHD is that its symptoms can be suppressed if you’re doing something you like or you’re interested in. You’ve posted many times about how unhappy you are with your work. Maybe your recent symptoms are related to that?

Welcome to the getting old club! :D

I don’t know if my advice is applicable to your situation, but some things that have helped my concentration are, in order of importance:

  • Air quality. A few year ago I lived at a place with “sick-house syndrome”, and while I was there it completely fucked me over in terms of fatigue, brain fog, headaches, etc. Ever since then I’ve been hyper-conscious of how air quality effects cognition and mood. Can you do work or hobbies at locations outside your house, just as a test? E.g. do you have balcony or yard that you could try out (or a coffee shop in non-COVID times). Do you feel better and more clear headed after a walk, a bike ride, or a shower? If you’re interested in pursuing this avenue further, I can point you to A) some high quality and reasonably cheap air-quality sensors on Amazon that I found produced objective data that matched my subjective experiences, and/or B) a tutorial on the dark art of setting up a solarium in the backyard to do work from.

  • get plenty of protein and coffee. These are the two biological building blocks that your brain needs. Try to avoid excess sugar. I’m a big fan of eggs and egg whites, and then throwing whatever veggies you have into the mix.

  • get plenty of sleep, try to make sure you’re at decent weight/health so that you’re not waking up in the middle of the night. Sorry about the dog situation, as the owner of an asshole cat I can commiserate.

Anyway, those are my bug-bears. Good luck with your situation!

As a life long member of Club ADHD, I try to keep track of my symptoms and how my brothers and I each keep in check separately.

I’m lazy, so I just take ritalin. Nothing crazy, 30 mg a day. I used to be on 60 as a high schooler. I excelled at the classes that interested me, and couldn’t settle down for the classes that didn’t.

In any case, there are a few things that might be helpful that have impacted my life and studies.

  1. Get enough sleep. I mean, that is good advice for anyone, but some studies have found that being sleep deprived can actually cause ADHD like symptoms. So, if it can cause people to act like they have ADHD, it can really mess with those of us that have it.

  2. ADHD is based on a deficiency of Dopamine. Ritalin, as a reuptake inhibitor, helps with that, but there are are plenty of other ways to tackle it. One of my brothers exercises regularly. This can release extra dopamine, helping you balance out. My other brother uses fear of failure to release extra dopamine. These are three things that can help because the keep the Dopamine that people with ADHD can’t get enough of, in balance.

  3. Keep in mind, you are always looking for your dopamine fix and sometimes, you just don’t have the will power to do it. That’s why reddit and youtube are evil. They are the empty carbs of dopamine when you are too hungry to get what you really need (such as Video games, or hanging out with friends). I haven’t followed a lot of videos on this subject but there are some interesting videos on how to ADHD. If you don’t mind overly chipper people.

I hope that helps a bit. It sounds like prior to this you had a great handle on your ADHD. Maybe you just need to retrace your steps a bit.

In any case, if you feel like you do have ADHD, get tested. It effects adults, as well as kids. We just handle it different.

That video was actually extremely enlightening, thanks for that. The critical part for me was the dopamine cycle, as in if you have high dopamine levels it’s easy to feed off of that and focus/motivate and keep the real dopamine activities at the forefront, but if your dopamine levels are low you need something to push a high dopamine activity to the forefront.

I think this is EXACTLY my issue. Outside the last two years I had a really good social circle that kept me busy plus jobs where even the bad ones actually gave me a ton of mental stimulation. If I understand the video right, all those activities gave me a huge rollover of dopamine that I was able to successfully utilize for things in my personal time and keep me heavily productive until I went to sleep.

Now that my local social circle has collapsed and simultaneously I have a job that has too many politics that completely blocks stretches of interesting mental activity, my dopamine levels rarely reach high enough for me to capitalize on, and when it does once I hit a stopping point everything drops.

I exercise pretty much every day (3-4 mile walks or 11+ mile bike rides), so that’s not seeming to provide enough of a dopamine hit to kick start things.

This has given me some really interesting things to think about and put a lot in perspective, thanks!

You are very welcome. I don’t follow her advice as much as I should (Because of my ADHD) but just helping me understand what is going on has been a huge breakthrough and made my wife a lot happier with me.

If you are at loose ends, don’t beat yourself up if you decide to try Ritalin during this time. We are in a rough time period that is especially hard on people with ADHD. You might just need something to carry you through Covid-19 until you can get your usual routine back in order (or help you find a better more stimulating job).

Again, it sounds like, before Covid-19, you were doing really great, so I hope you get back there. Just don’t beat yourself up because this isn’t a situation of your making. I had to leave my old job of 3 years because I just couldn’t settle down anymore. It had gotten too stale for me, and with the new job, I’m probably going to need to up my Ritalin dose because it’s online training. When training is over, and I can work in an office, I think I’ll be fine, but until then, I take Ritalin for the same reason I wear glasses. So that I can get along in a world.

I am not sure I have ever met someone who this wasn’t the case for. Doesn’t everyone struggle to learn things that don’t interest them? It just took extra work in school to get good grades in those classes I didn’t care about.

There are a lot of people that could take the most boring classes in the world and still do very well. Take a look at anyone with an Accounting Degree if you have any doubts.

The problem with ADHD is not an extra effort. It’s getting the minimum required focus. You are already starting at a disadvantage because you aren’t getting as much Dopamine from day to day activities as other people. So, where everyone else is happy enjoying life or making the best of a boring textbook, you are searching around for anything that will spark just a bit of extra dopamine, just to get you through the day.

When something is pleasurable, enjoyable, or just novel (Think the Behavioral Approach System in BIS/BAS Gray's biopsychological theory of personality - Wikipedia), your brain is releasing extra dopamines. That great for regular people, but it’s a godsend if you are ADHD, and need it just to get to levels that everyone else is at already. This is also lead to Hyper Focusing. You’re basically getting high off your dopamine, creating a positive feedback loop of sorts. It’s one of those odd things that can be a real advantage… or waste a whole day with nothing to show for it.

When something is boring, you are at a huge disadvantage. It’s a little bit like being really hungry. Your day revolves around getting some food, making it hard to focus. ADHD is similar, but instead of looking for food, you are looking for anything to give you a bit of extra dopamine, to balance you out. Dopamine that everyone seems to have in spades, everyone but you. So, as you are sitting there, trying to focus on that giant textbook, you find your mind wandering, your eyes looking around for anything that can feed that hunger. Exercise, fear, Medication, they can all help a lot, but all are investments of some sort. Plus, you need enough foresight and focus to get some exercise, or fear the coming events, or take medication (it’s part of what makes routines almost necessary for people with ADHD. The less you have to think about something, the more likely it is you will do it.)

And like food, there are a lot of empty calories around. Reddit, Twitter, Youtube. If you think those are bad for ordinary people, they are the Domino’s Pizza for people of ADHD, and we’ve all been up all night, and are super hunger.

Thankfully, ADHD is not just all negatives. As I mentioned, if you really enjoy what you are doing, Hyper focusing can be awesome. You shut out everything around and the hours just pass by.
Also, our need to find constant stimuli can lead to some really creative solutions and ideas. It has been reported that people with ADHD usually end up jumping and making odd leaps and bounds in problem-solving and learning and can leap ahead of peers. Although, that isn’t a substitute for not being able to read through the first page of your textbook when it finally is time to study!

Anyway, sorry for the long-winded response. Obviously, enjoying something will always make things easier than not enjoying something but when you don’t enjoy something, the difference between having ADHD and not having ADHD in these circumstances is like comparing walking across the Ben Franklin Bridge in Philly, vs walking across the Rope Bridge in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (and of course, you have a sword, and you are just jonesing to cut the rope), One is long but definitely doable. The other… well, a lot of us just cut the bridge in half.

What you describe is me to a T. I can’t concentrate on anything that doesn’t interest me, and even things that do, I am very scattered. Never taken anything for it, I have always just worked extra hard on those things (it’s easier as an adult than it was as a kid). I find ways to keep myself focused. Like in a class I don’t care about, I had to take notes. Taking notes forced me to focus on it. I once showed my notes to a classmate and he said they were a mess, but it didn’t matter, taking them forced me to focus so I could learn it.

My nephew did take Ritalin for it, and it basically took away his personality as well. He stopped taking it sometime in HS and does well in school now. I don’t have the answers for this, it’s frustrating, but I am really not sure drugs are the answer.

The personality complaint is one I have seen in the media, but like Reefer Madness, had never been something I have ever come across.

Ritalin does make me less ‘loud’ and more present in my day to day life, as I stop seeking to be the center attention, and stop withdrawing from friends and family as I seek other forms of stimulation.

Instead of changing or diminishing my personality, it allows me to be more thoughtful and considerate, and allows me to be less impulsive in my day.

It’s nice not to be jonesing for Dopamine and instead focus my attention on my wife, my kids or just getting the day to day house hold chores done so the house is nice to live in. It’s nice to be present.

To me, having ADHD is like being a little bit ‘buzzed’ while everyone else is "sober’. You are louder then you ought to be, you have just a few less inhibitions then the people around you. You are prone to over sharing. You either are trying to be the center of attention, or in you want to be left along in your world.

Sometimes, its really nice to be a bit buzzed in life. It helps you break the ice with new people, helps you enjoy yourself. It’s nice to be slightly less inhibited then the people around you.

Other times, I just want to feel "sober’ like everyone else and be on the same wave length. For my, Ritalin helps me feel ‘sober’.

Of course, when everyone around also has ADHD, well, then it’s just a bunch of buzzed people around. Sometimes it’s great, sometimes it’s lame.

And keep in mind ADHD, like almost everything in life, is on a sliding scale.

He was quiet. Him before was always joking around, to the point of being annoying, to just being there. Quiet. It was weird.

Quiet doesn’t mean your personality changes. It just means your aren’t trying to generate as much dopamine as possible.

I can understand that the behavior change would be unnerving though and I truly understand why he wouldn’t stay on Ritalin if it isn’t necessary, but it doesn’t mean his personality changes, just his behavior.

If I may, I have an anecdote that might describe what I mean.

Although I frequently took Ritalin, I rarely took it on weekends. I was the youngest of 3 brothers by 5 years (identical twins). When I was 10 or so, my brothers would frequently have friends over and play board games or D&D (well, during the off season, otherwise it would Football, or Model UN or Track & Field, at a DoDDS, you did a bit of everything), and although, I was regularly loud, obnoxious (probably hadn’t changed much) and striving to be the center of attention, I realized that if I did these things while my brothers friends where over, I would get kicked out really quickly. So, somehow, during these gaming sessions, I was able to keep all my impulsive nature under wraps, because I was mesmerised by the games my brothers where playing with their friends. Despite my ADHD, I had no trouble sitting still and just watching (and if I did talk, God would everyone be shocked to find me there). It wasn’t the Ritalin that made me quiet or still, because I rarely took it on weekends, it was just watching them filled up all my dopamine requirements. You could say I was Hyper Focusing on it. I was still me, my personality hadn’t shifted, but my behavior would have surprised a lot of people.

Anyway, it’s just an example of behavior changes when you get enough dopamine, whether through stimulation or because of Ritalin.

Although, it does sound like your nephew had a really high dosage by your example.

In any case, having ADHD does not mean that Ritalin is the right solution for your. If you can function in society without medication, that is great.
Maybe the medication would make life easier. Like wearing glasses when you eyes are only a little nearsighted.

The nice thing about ADHD and Ritalin is that if you really have ADHD, you can’t build up a tolerance to it.

I was diagnosed with ADHD and GAD in my early fifties. If they had had the diagnostic stuff and the knowledge of these things when I was a kid, I would have been diagnosed, depending on the era, with Asperger’s or mild autism or any combo of ADD type things. Of course, back then, that was unknown so I was just weird, stuck in the corner or otherwise marginalized as no one knew what to do with me!

Like the OP, I managed to be reasonably successful and power through a lot of the issues I had, but that sort of “success” comes at a high cost. I feel much better now with meds and a better awareness of what is what (along with a therapist and a psychiatrist, of course!).

Been thinking a lot about this the last few days. I wonder if this is also why I sometimes get good bouts of focus when I put hard rock on. Despite the fact that it should be distracting, I wonder if it just gives me the initial dopamine boost to get me on track.

Interesting stuff…

There are a few studies on the matter, but generally, music with strong percussion is very helpful.

Also, it helps block out distracting noises

I have found as I get older that my ability to filter out sound has gone down the tubes. I used to be able to work on things requiring focus while listening to music, for example, or in a noisy environment (like, writing and hand-coding web articles from the floor of E3, not memories I really want to revisit!). I can’t do that now. I really need quiet, or at least an environment where sounds are not intrusive.

Even in general conversation if there are a lot of competing sound sources my brain sort of overloads.

That’s rough buddy.

Don’t know if anyone is interested but I figured I’d update this.

I never ended up getting a diagnosis. It became too much of a pain in the ass. None of the telemedicine systems I have access through (via work insurance) will touch it, they just want me to talk to my GP and get a referral. The GP I visited 3 or so years ago didn’t return call due to a transition and I should find a new one that’s closer but meh.

However, I don’t actually care that much anymore. I thought a lot about what the video lego posted above said and combined that with thoughts about aspects of my life. At the end of the day I realized I was filling up my day with a ton of low value activities all in the name of trying to keep myself stimulated at all times. So I took a bunch of corrective actions.

  • Cut down how many browser tabs I keep open. It was too easy to just change tabs when reading an article or while doing other work, and I realized I wasn’t gaining any value but what I was switching too
  • I stopped visiting several forums and online aggregates that I just wasn’t gaining real value on, I was just using it as filler. I’ve even lowered how often I have qt3 open to just 2-3 times a day because I was really watching that unread notification icon too much. In reality I’ve realized I don’t miss the other places much.
  • I stopped listening to podcasts. Any time I had dead air away from my computer I’d have a podcast on, whether it was doing laundry, going for a walk, bike ride, etc… By cutting those out it gave me a lot more time for me to just be with my thoughts, giving me a chance to think some things through and even get some venting out of my system as needed.
  • Removed myself from all slack servers except work, and muted all work ones except critical ones so I could check them on a small cadence of my choosing and not be nagged by the blue unread icon.
  • Gotten better at note taking (and to a lesser extent journaling at work), as taking notes when in boring meetings or while reading long form articles has made it easier to internalize important details and make sure I know what’s going on as I’ve repeated it in my own words.

There are probably others that I can’t exactly pin point but the crux of the matter is focus on activities that actually bring value, and take everything in moderation. I still get some of the “world is ending” news but it’s become such a minor part of my days that it hasn’t brought me down.

I really, really think there’s a significant portion of what I was affected by of trying to constantly keep myself “entertained”. When I had a good local social circle and worked at an office with co-workers I liked that came naturally and it was all positive, but once all that collapsed I had an urgent need to keep it all up 24/7 (while awake). The fact of the matter is I should be fine if I go a few hours without real stimulation, in fact I’m now convinced more than ever that this is a requirement for sanity.

It’s pretty funny too cause my wife thinks I"m weird when we go for hour long walks, and she had podcasts on and I just walk in silence. She doesn’t get it (I think she could use a break from all the stimulation she gives herself but that’s not an argument I"m going to win) but those times have provided a lot of inner reflection that has kept me focused on what’s important in life (and different scenarios).

As a consequence I’ve gotten a book and a half read, created and polished a small little software project that’s helping me learn math, gotten through a good portion of a math book for trigonometry (mostly towards the goal of creating a 3d renderer), made progress on some games I’ve been meaning to try, and learned to shrug off a job I hate without letting it bring me down. All in all, not bad for 3 weeks.

This is really cool, Kall. Sounds like you got motivated to just improve your life in a lot of little ways, which is awesome. That thing about filling every empty moment with podcasts sounds chillingly familiar. I’ll have to consider if I would benefit from ratcheting my listening back a bit.