Eli5 How adhd affects adults

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A friend of mine was recently diagnosed with adhd and I’m having a hard time understanding how it works, being a child of the 80s/90s it was always just explained in a very simplified manner and as just kind of an auxiliary problem. Thank you in advance.

In: Biology

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Anonymous 0 Comments

I recently got diagnosed too. I’ve been struggling with it my whole life, and as a result I developed anxiety from trying to cope with the symptoms, and more recently I developed depression too.

The way I described it to my friends is it’s like I felt I was constantly running around trying to keep up with everything. I was constantly in sprint mode just trying to keep day to day life going. Obviously sprinting everywhere is not sustainable and eventually you just have to stop.

When I started getting treatment (Counselling, self help, medication etc) it felt like I had been gifted a car. I could suddenly keep up with everything. I realised everyone else was sitting behind the wheel of a car and was able to move from one task to the other with ease and without using their own energy to do it.

For me starting or switching tasks is extremely difficult. It’s the actual putting myself into the right position/place or whatever to do the thing I need to do. I could spend hours *thinking* about the minutia of the next task I need to do. I could go over every muscle movement again and again in my mind, but no matter how small I break down the task, starting is a mammoth effort. Event if it’s something I love to do…

Hyperfocus is a big one for me. If left alone doing something I like I could completely forget about time. I might miss a meal or forget an appointment, it could be hours since I’ve had some water and I won’t even notice I’m thirsty. But as soon as I stop what I’m doing, I find it extremely difficult to go back. If I can’t finish a drawing/painting, short story in one sitting, then chances are it’s never getting finished.

Switching tasks is anxiety inducing at times. Even just the idea of stepping away from my desk in work to go pee can play on my mind for an hour until I’m absolutely bursting… Because I know that it’ll only take 2-3 minutes to go pee, but it might take me 30 minutes to get back into my groove, and by that time it’s nearly lunch so I might as well just wait for lunch. But then I’ll go time blind again and suddenly it’s 2 hours since I originally planned in having lunch and I still haven’t peed.

BUT sometimes I’ll be working, and generally it’s when I’m going something repetitive that doesn’t require much brain power, my mind will drift. And then I’ll have a question like “which of the Everest Sherpas has sumitted the mountain the most” and then I can’t stop thinking about that question. So I google it, and then I fall into a bit of a rabbit hole and before you know it an hour has gone by and I’ve done barely any work.

Now apply that to everything. Getting out of bed. Getting dressed. Brushing your teeth. Showering. Eating. Cooking. Shopping. Tidying up after yourself. Doing the dishes. Vacuuming. Laundry. Refilling your water bottle. Turning on the tv. Turning off the tv. Standing up to grab your guitar/controller/book/whatever hobby to genuinely want to do Going to bed. Meeting up with friends. Packing for vacation. Packing your bag for the next day. Going on a bike ride. Going to the gym. Every single thing you need or want to do takes an enormous amount of mental energy just to START.

Anonymous 0 Comments

I’ve got diagnosed with add after I graduated from my Uni. I’m 31 now. Didn’t want to do it earlier because I feared people would just think I do it for the pills to pass exams. A good friend of mine recognised the symptoms and shared his ritalin. Passed with magnum cum laude.

If you’re diagnosed as an adult, you probably always had it. For me, it’s a maelstrom in my head, best illustrated if you take a neurtypical brain, they would play “Call me maybe” the original song, while [I would have this playing.](https://youtu.be/PFpeTEVuKzM). I procrastinate boring tasks. I look for random stuff to keep me occupied while I should be working (millions of unfinished hobbies and projects), resulting in having to crunch deadlines and having anxiety. I’d like to think it makes me stress resilient, but that’s a lie I tell myself, cause my stress will leak out and affect relationships.

Speaking about affecting relationships, if find it difficult to keep in touch with everyone, it’s just so much work, until you get emotional and hyperfocus and try to make plans, and you know how that goes.

Taking ritalin makes me really blunt and impatient with people, and hyperfocus it gives can make me seem distant. My SO doesn’t like when I take it, so I try not to take it over the weekend. But then I’d procrastinate on chores, which again stresses the relationship. Can’t believe she stuck with me for 10 years already.

As a tip I can give you, small victories man. Don’t do something tomorrow if you can do it today (I know this sounds like saying “be happy” to a depressed person) but chopped into small tasklets, the progress itself will give you enough dopamine to reinforce that behaviour. Anyways, back to work I’ve been procrastinating.

EDIT: I also can’t relax. Like some people can go sunbathing, and just lie there and get roasted by UV. I’m unable to do that. Well, maybe 5 minutes. But lemme check what the beach bar has on the menu. Hey they sell fishing gear over there!

Anonymous 0 Comments

(ADHD sufferer here. Diagnosed at 35 at the urging of friends. Medication changed my life).

ADHD is at its core a brain chemical deficiency.

ADHD brains do not produce enough of the usual “happy juice” – the chemicals that, in short, make you happy. There’s a lot of them.

Human brains need this happy juice to encourage us towards normal human behaviors. Everything you want – food, fun, self-improvement, social activity, even sex, is driven by happy juice. Additionally, human brains make a low level of happy juice (which you get used to) to mitigate the sudden spikes when it makes a bunch of happy juice at once to encourage you to do something.

ADHD sufferers don’t make enough of this low-level happy juice. Just imagine the passive contentment that you feel every day plain *gone*, replaced by a nonstop feeling of boredom and pointlessness. This has the side effect of a very high incidence of depression (the comorbidity of ADHD and depression is ridiculous). But it also means that ADHD sufferers get *strongly* encouraged by anything that creates this happy juice.

One of the things that generates this happy juice is thinking about interesting things. Boring things don’t make much. But boring things are sometimes important. The bad news for ADHD people is that their brains will start rigging their behavior to ignore the boring but important thing to hyper-focus on the interesting but less important thing.

There is also a certain continuity to this interest. It’s a misconception that ADHD people are easily distracted – they’re the opposite. Instead they are hyper-focused on a single train of thought and all the stuff other people think is important is what is trying to “distract” them, to no avail. The happy juice is too strong. This means a lot of impulsiveness.

Imagine a starving man who only gets to eat every few days, while you get your regular meals. When food does arrive, the starving man is going to chase that food much harder than you. You’re wondering why this fool is so obsessed with a few slices of toast, not realizing he doesn’t get to eat the toast you have for breakfast literally every morning.

Now we talk medication. Stimulants (we’re not sure why entirely) suddenly make the ADHD brain produce happy juice. Stimulants have hours-long durations, so while they are in effect, ADHD sufferers suddenly have their happy juice deficiency eased. For a long-time sufferer, the effect can be quite dramatic. This is not perfect or universal – different people react differently to different drugs. The big two are methylphenidate (Ritalin) and amphetamine (Adderall). About 70% of sufferers will have a major positive reaction to one or the other.

Look up there – does amphetamine ring a bell? If you watched Breaking Bad, you will know that this is (same name, different salt) part of the name of a street drug called meth. Meth also eases the deficiency on ADHD sufferers, though abusers tend not to be properly regulating their doses and can go overboard from the (mental) addiction to the happy juice. ADHD sufferers have a VERY high rate of addiction to meth, and this is progressively viewed as a desperate attempt at self-medication.

If you’re wondering if this might extend to addiction to other things, you’re absolutely right. Lots of ADHD sufferers end up addicted to specific things of varying healthiness (sports is generally good, video games not so good, drugs pretty bad). The thing these addictions have in common is a proven source of happy juice that they’ve gotten used to.

ADHD is not a condition I would wish on anyone. Even in the best case scenario it makes your life needlessly more difficult. At the worst it can compound with other disadvantages (poverty for example), making the combination impossible to solve without intervention. Keep in mind that no matter how difficult a life situation is, there’s probably someone who has that *and* ADHD. Every time I look back at the difficulties I overcame, I wonder where I would be if I didn’t have to deal with ADHD at the same time.

A diagnosis and proper prescribed medication can be a literal lifesaver for us. For many of us it’s the first time we feel like a normal person – and I mean this in the most primal, fundamental sense. It annoys me to no end that ADHD constantly gets maligned in news and media. There was a very important paper published about how lots of child ADHD diagnoses are wrong – this has had the effect of people suspecting adult ADHD is not real.

I happen to be a straight-A student because I was obsessed with science, math and reading. But my professional life was basically so much hell keeping afloat that I tried to kill myself in my late 20s. Am on Ritalin now and things are finally livable.

Anonymous 0 Comments

I’ve never had a formal diagnoses, but have all of the symptoms. I took Sudafed as a stimulant for many years and eventually found a sympathetic doctor to prescribe adderall – without it I just wander from room to room accomplishing nothing. I’m a 70 year old woman and a successful lawyer with a family. Don’t give up! Find what works for you.

Anonymous 0 Comments

It’s a nightmare. Imagine your head running at 100 mph all the time thinking about nothing, because it’s just 100 mph of TV static. Makes it a struggle to socialize when most of the time your head is a blank slate. Memory is shit, attention span is shit.

Anonymous 0 Comments

It’s a common misconception that ADHD simply means being hyper and/or being unable to focus, when a more accurate way to describe it would be not as an attention deficit, but as an [executive function](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_functions) deficit. That’s why so many parents of children with ADHD are skeptical of the diagnosis–they see that little Timmy has trouble sitting still and paying attention to homework and chores, yet he can sit down in front of a video game for hours at a time! *See, he must be slacking off, he doesn’t really have trouble focusing!*

A true ELI5 on how this actually affects people is ‘ICNU’: Interest, Challenge, Novelty, and Urgency. If something doesn’t meet one of those four categories, someone with ADHD just isn’t going to be able to do it. Let’s use doing the dishes as an example–is it interesting? Not even slightly. Challenging? Not really. Novel? Nah. Urgent? Not *yet*–but once that person with ADHD actually needs clean dishes, *then* it gets done, because it now meets one of those four criteria. In that sense, putting things off until the very last second is essentially a coping mechanism for ADHD, rather than a symptom of it itself.

And on a related note, that’s also why video games in particular are like *the* stereotypical ADHD hobby/addiction–most video games check all four of those ICNU boxes at once. They were practically *made* for us.

Anonymous 0 Comments

This is great to hear everyone talk about it. It’s nice to see that it’s not “just me” and I’m not a total failure because of this.

My business partner had to take some time to learn about adhd to understand how to work with me, and stop being on my case all the time about me switching between projects

Edit: spelling

Anonymous 0 Comments

I’ve noticed when I don’t take my meds I’m extremely unmotivated, will take naps, and I have a lot of trouble following conversations. I’d say the biggest impact is on work ethic and communication, which is huge.

Anonymous 0 Comments

It’s a constant state of want. Those with ADHD lack stimulation, so the brain puts a priority on finding it.

It’s like hunger. When the body lacks nutritian, it _demands_ that you find food and eat it. All you can think about is finding and eating food.

With ADHD, it’s stimulation you’re lacking, so the brain switches gears and demands that you find it. That’s where the concentration problems come into play – a lot of tasks don’t offer stimulation, so the brain forces you to look for it elsewhere.

It’s basically clinical boredom.

Anonymous 0 Comments

I work at a high school in a position that is more or less a combination of teacher and counselor roles. I have ADHD, 27, and have a lot of students that I work closely with on executive functioning and academic coaching. Diagnosed in 1st grade, medicated 1st- 8th then from college to now. Pretty much researching my whole life on it, and am involved in a lot of intense intervention work with ADHD students. This is going to be long, but I promise it’s worth your while.

Positive factors that affect myself and adults with ADHD:

It would help to know your friends age and background, but if he’s generally successful despite being undiagnosed his whole life, he’s developed behaviors to cope that have helped him succeed despite some of the difficulties. ADHD has given me a lot of positive things that actually have given me my success. These are the general positives, but they’re a double edged sword to the negatives. It’s all in how it’s approached by the person and their support systems.

– Hyperfocus: people with ADHD can put an incredible amount of concentration and effort into things that interest them. When used correctly, it’s an insanely powerful tool. I owe my job today to writing a rap song about metaphors and similes in my college teaching course due to hyperfocus on the task.
– Empathy: ADHD individuals tend to feel emotions stronger and are more empathetic than others. People with ADHD can make very strong leaders in fields where genuine empathy is valued as an important skill
– Creativity
– ADHD people tend to be big picture and not detail oriented

Negative factors:
– [Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria[Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria](https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.additudemag.com/rejection-sensitive-dysphoria-and-adhd/amp/)] I’m putting this first because this is the one you don’t hear about, and it’s perhaps the most important for you supporting your friend. TLDR, ADHD peeps take criticism especially hard, and can often break down because of rejection. I haven’t read into it in a while, I believe the figure was 90% of people with ADHD say it’s a factor, and 30% say it’s the most difficult part of having it. Simply knowing this was a part of it and putting a name to it CHANGED MY LIFE, and has made it so much easier to cope with. This is the flip side to the empathy piece. This is a piece that therapy helps with a lot.
– Distraction in general: This is the flip side to the hyperfocus. People with ADHD need stimulus that interests them, or it is much more difficult to maintain attention than an average person. Of course there’s a lot more to it, but perhaps the biggest aspect procrastination is a case of hyperfocus on the wrong thing for a long time, leading to poor time management. Medication helps this aspect most. The most successful people with ADHD will have the intention and plan to regularly evaluate and take concrete steps to change these habits. Therapy or some kind of other mentor can assist with this, while the medication can bolster that process to make it successful.

Success factors:
– while medication is absolutely the most effective treatment, I disagree with the sentiment that it is necessary for everyone to be successful. My dad went undiagnosed until I did, had a masters degree, and was a high up manager with a team of people under him at Coca Cola. That being said he is currently medicated as I am, and finds it much easier to function properly. Like I said before, if your friend is satisfied with the way he is handling life in terms of work, friends, and family, he probably Hs the coping mechanisms from years of building it up. Ultimately it’s his decision on whether or not it’s the best path for him.

– therapy: while on the topic of coping mechanisms, a lot of times going undiagnosed can lead to bad habits that need to be unlearned. For the HS kids that I’ve seen go undiagnosed until around sophomore year, most common bad habits i see revolve around making excuses for not getting work done to avoid embarrassment and general work avoidance due to lack of confidence in ability. Therapy can do wonders with identifying these things and making the changes you’d need to reach your full potential
– growth mindset: have your friend read into this. If he can commit to and believe in the philosophy of it, it can work wonders. Changed my life.
– support system: finally, like any person, everyone gives support plays a huge factor on whether or not a person is successful. Seems like he’s got you, which is a great sign.

Thanks for reading my novel and hope this was helpful. I skimmed on a lot of the important things, though there is much more I could write on. Please, please, please do not hesitate to ask for question or clarification, anyone! I do this for a living and would love to have something to hyperfocus on while I’m bored at home on summer, and am happy to help 🙂

Edit: this info is a combination of years of personal research, my own experiences with ADHD, experiences working with a decent sample size of ADHD students, some conferences I’ve been to for school on ADHD, and weekly meetings with learning specialists who have SPED degrees (mine is English Ed). As I say to my students, I am sometimes wrong. Feel free to correct me (gently, don’t wanna set off that RSD, haha) if something looks incorrect. I will look into it.