[vaindil]

I both agree and disagree with you. I think neurodivergence has become a bit "trendy" lately, and some people have latched onto these labels when they may not be clinically appropriate. However, these evidence-based diagnostic tools aren't perfect.

My sister was properly diagnosed with ADHD several years ago, and she encouraged me to get tested. My tester, a PhD psychologist who specialized in neuropsych testing, said the evidence was borderline, but ultimately refused to give a diagnosis because I did well in high school and that's unheard of in "true" ADHD. I promise I'm not exaggerating--I have the report to prove it. He completely ignored that I never had to pay attention in school because it was so easy for me, and I only started to run into problems in college when the material got more difficult.

Thankfully my psychiatrist disagreed with that and started me on medication anyway, and since then I've actually been able to understand why I am the way I am and work through my issues. (I found out a year later that my parents actually had me tested in first grade and I was diagnosed then, but they intentionally kept it from me my whole life.)

I know this is just one anecdote, but it's a common discussion point online that mental healthcare like this isn't always the most accessible. I think well-intentioned research and self-diagnosis can certainly have their place, depending on one's circumstances, and as long as care is taken to avoid unscientific information.

[brulard]

Same here. No ADHD if you are not failing miserably in school, work, etc. Doesn't matter that you struggle every meeting understanding what's going on as you have trouble listening to one sentence from beginning to the end.

[fwsgonzo]

Same for me, except I'm nearing 40. All my brothers have it to various degrees, and since I have a job and doing OK, I cannot be helped. It's extremely annoying that access to medicine is gated by the personal opinions of professionals (and that the medicine is jail-worthy to begin with). Specifically, I was denied because too old, in writing.

[keeganpoppen]

i had a very similar experience as well... who knew that you can't have ADHD if you do well in school, even if school (even college) was easy enough to not ever need to dig deep in the way that you have to do every day in real life (if you're ambitious, anyway).

[hirvi74]

I constantly read people that have experiences like this, then on the other hand, I know countless people that lied about having ADHD and received treatment with virtually no issues at all.

I do not advocate for drug-seeking behaviors, but I find it wild how there are such contrasting diagnostic experiences.

I wonder if professionals would be less adverse to treatment administration if patients were more willing to trial non-stimulants first?

[keeganpoppen]

it’s true. i have a friend who got prescribed via “knowing the right answer”… and honestly i didn’t know myself whether my honest answers were “honest” or not. i vowed to never tell a lie throughout the diagnostic experience, but a lot of it is super ambiguous… i feel confident in my self-understanding now, but i certainly didn’t then, and i was absolutely an adderall enjoyer at the time (now i portion out my pills fastidiously, because days without them suck ass, and i didn’t want to self-inculcate any sort of adverse relationship with the medicine that unambiguously makes my life better… but i absolutely was not as mature on the whole concept at the start.).

[AppleBananaPie]

Just like engineers every profession has a huge range in quality of the professionals.

It's just far more concerning in the medical profession than for the average software engineer.

[ndndndnd]

they once told me "if you had ADHD the assessment paper you filled out at home would have come back all crumpled up and dirty"

[seba_dos1]

"it totally would, but people were being mad at me for that exact reason so many times that I now have this elaborate system to keep such papers straight and clean that took significant chunk of my attention"