[idlewords]

Any prolonged pattern of distracted behavior will get you an ADHD diagnosis, provided you say it's (1) part of a pattern dating back to childhood and (2) affects multiple areas of your life. That in turn will get you a prescription for powerful stimulants, and it's up to you to decide whether the artificial focus those provide is a solution to your problem, or a cop-out from it. (I personally don't believe there's such a thing as 'ADHD', though I don't doubt the existence of the constellation of feelings and behaviors that cause people to seek out that label.)

Have you considered taking a vacation, maybe one without any use of computers or cell phones? It's not a cure-all, but stepping away like that will give you a fresh perspective once you get back to your day to day, and that in turn might bring insight into what has gone wrong. And if the real issue you're facing is burnout, then it will go a long way to fixing the problem.

[vcxy]

That's interesting. I thought it was obvious that ADHD does exist because it's just a constellation of behaviors that some people indeed do exhibit. I feel like we agree completely on the base facts and somehow have arrived at opposite conclusions.

[nosefurhairdo]

That's more a semantic disagreement than an opposite conclusion, considering you both agree the constellation of behaviors exists.

The degree to which any medical diagnosis exists is on a spectrum. A cancerous tumor obviously exists, high blood pressure exists but is relative, schizophrenia - and psychiatric diagnoses generally - exist but can be more difficult to observe externally.

The behaviors associated with ADHD are so common and relatable to most folks that the diagnosis seems less legitimate. To my knowledge, you cannot scan the brain of someone with ADHD and point out an abnormality associated with the disorder. Yet we give 8 year old boys stimulant medication because they can't sit still in a classroom for hours a day.

Fwiw I have ADHD and take stimulant medication daily. But I also understand folks' resistance to accept ADHD as being as legitimate as other medical diagnoses.

[iamflimflam1]

The behaviors associated with ADHD are so common and relatable to most folks that the diagnosis seems less legitimate.

There’s nothing more annoying when people respond to you with “yeah, well, everyone feels/behaves/think like that”

[DigitalBison]

> To my knowledge, you cannot scan the brain of someone with ADHD and point out an abnormality associated with the disorder. Yet we give 8 year old boys stimulant medication because they can't sit still in a classroom for hours a day.

I'm not well-versed in the risks of stimulants given to children so I'm not commenting on that specifically, but I want to push back on the insinuation (if I understood you correctly) that ADHD or its treatments are any less legitimate because we haven't yet figured out if we can use brain imaging to diagnose and measure treatment efficacy.

It would be great if all medical disorders could be externally measured and quantified objectively, but when they're not, we often rely on evaluating and diagnosing them based on the (often somewhat more subjective) impact of their symptoms. That's not ideal, but it seems better than nothing to me.

Full disclosure: I'm also diagnosed with ADHD and take daily stimulants. Apologies if I came off as combative, I'm relatively new to my ADHD journey and genuinely curious to learn more about the medical/scientific aspects.

[nosefurhairdo]

> ...but I want to push back on the insinuation (if I understood you correctly) that ADHD or its treatments are any less legitimate because we haven't yet figured out if we can use brain imaging to diagnose and measure treatment efficacy.

I was playing devil's advocate to explain why someone might feel that way. My personal opinion is that every adult should have the right to assess for themselves whether they feel stimulants can improve their quality of life. The question of whether ADHD is "real" or legitimate is totally unimportant to me. And I agree with your take: if we can identify symptoms and effectively treat them, that is more important than uncovering some underlying "legitimacy" of the treated condition.

Congratulations on getting diagnosed. ADHD has the highest treatment success rate among psychiatric conditions. Be sure to keep up with all the other healthy habits for improving focus (sleep, exercise, nutrition, hydration, etc.).

[idlewords]

It doesn't follow from the constituent behaviors being real that a concept is real. Take neurasthenia as an example; it was a popular American diagnosis in its day, and I don't think anyone argues that millions of people were faking it. But we draw different lines around these constituent symptoms today, and no longer see it as a coherent condition.

The search term "culturally-bound syndrome" makes for interesting reading in this area.

[pyr0hu]

Feeling the same as OP and I've tried the vacation/detox thingy and I just came back worse. First I passed it as "just still in vacation mode", but as the days kept passing by, it did not get better. Might have to look up a doc too :|

[DigitalBison]

Please don't be hard on yourself for a vacation not "fixing" whatever is ailing you. If you're depressed or have ADHD or similar, you should consider seeking professional help (e.g. therapy and/or medication, if appropriate), and "just take a vacation and turn off your phone" is about as helpful as telling a diabetic to "just produce more insulin".

[moltar]

I’m sort of aligned on your ADHD view and would love to hear more from your point of view. Any book rec’s? Blogs? Podcasts?

[idlewords]

So far I've been too distractible and absent-minded to do a proper nerd-out on the topic. :-) But I found section I of this blog post to be pretty interesting: https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/12/28/adderall-risks-much-mo...

[DigitalBison]

I genuinely don't understand what point you think this article is making that backs up what you've said here -- would you mind elaborating?

Full disclosure, I am diagnosed with ADHD and take stimulants daily, and initially felt pretty defensive when reading your comments here and starting to read that article. I have some problems with the article and generally find that author pretty insufferable, but the article concludes that the risks of medically-supervised stimulant use are low enough that the author personally finds stimulants worth prescribing to patients who benefit from them.

Even Section 1 which you specifically referenced, and which admittedly made me pretty annoyed until I read it a few times, and even though the author certainly seems to be trying to insinuate that ADHD isn't real, doesn't really seem to be actually backing up that point. His main point or objection seems to be that ADHD is diagnosed using arbitrary subjective criteria rather than objective measurements like other spectrum disorders (isn't blood pressure also a normally distributed trait, where we* "arbitrarily" draw a line and say people on the wrong side of that line have hypertension and should be prescribed beta blockers?).

I'll admit to feeling a little argumentative after reading some of the comments here but I do genuinely want to understand these points better, and I feel like I must be missing some fundamental context or point that the article is making.

*for various definitions of "we", since different countries and organizations define hypertension differently.

[idlewords]

I don't much like the author either, but this is his area of expertise and I think his perspective is valuable.

In my reading, his main points are that (1) ADHD diagnosis is very wooly and (2) amphetamines have a similar effect on everyone, whether or not they believe themselves to suffer from ADHD. The second point in particular is one that is always disputed on internet forums, where it's held as gospel that stimulants have some kind of paradoxical calming effect on the neurodivergent, and that this is one way to distinguish 'real' ADHD sufferers from people who just want better focus.

So the upshot is, there's a powerful focus-enhancing drug that is available to anyone provided they believe in the existence of a condition called ADHD and know how to tell the right stories about it to gatekeepers.

[nosefurhairdo]

Brilliant article. I came to similar conclusions in many months of research culminating in my seeking out and receiving an ADHD diagnosis.

[peyton]

> I personally don't believe there's such a thing as 'ADHD'

There’s a lot of evidence and some decent work on neural circuits. What’s your take on autism? Just a label?

[galaxybrain25]

I agree without doubt to this. It's just an excuse for settling down with your 'temporary' problem and not actually working on fixing it. From what i think, like previously mentioned, rigorous practice of eliminating any kinds of distractions and focusing on what you actually intended to do with the right diet and proper intake of water should be the ideal way to look at it.