@eldang @Yulran procrastinating making an appointment to see if you have ADHD because you're scared you might not be ADHD enough and instead are just shit seems to be a hallmark of ADHD, from my observation. Good luck in your quests for self understanding and professional diagnoses

@rubah @Yulran sadly, I did get over that hurdle, but it only got me to the next one: “indefinite wait time for non-emergency specialist referrals”, the Achilles heel of BC’s health care system.

@eldang @rubah @Yulran I’m curious what the benefit of a more formal diagnosis is? I went to a therapist, she’s like “hell yeah you have ADHD, talk to a GP for meds” then I made an appointment with a GP and he’s like “rad, here’s some pills”

@z @eldang @Yulran my diagnosis was a pretty short questioning with my psychiatrist, with whom I'd been an established patient for a few years already (anxiety and depression masking the other symptoms). I don't know how GPs handle ADHD specifically, but in my experience, they have been reluctant to manage psychiatric drugs, either only writing prescriptions for relatively tame stuff or refills of established Rx

@z @eldang @Yulran the process of finding an effective drug for me has been a balancing act, and it's resulted in removing one antidepressant and increasing another in order to mitigate some of the side effects I experienced, and while a GP possibly could navigate that, I suspect most would prefer to hand it off to someone who specializes in it

@rubah @z @Yulran that’s the biggest issue for me. I did find a GP who is happy to prescribe meds, but the first thing we tried messed with my sleep badly, so I’d rather try others under an actual specialist’s supervision.

Other concerns on my mind: is this really what my problem is? And is it only ADHD or do we also need to be talking about autism spectrum stuff?

@eldang @z @Yulran all I can say is the more you know, the more you *can* know. If you go down the path chasing ADHD and it turns out to be something else, you're still further along than if you did nothing.

@rubah @eldang @z @Yulran

My suggestion would be the GAPS book. In my mind ADHD is on the same spectrum as autism. Balancing the chemicals that you need balanced isn't easy, but starting with more natural things seems like a more solid plan than going for the pharmaceuticals.

Clive de Carle recently spoke about selenium being very effective in a boy with ADHD.

@evan @z @Yulran @rubah since we’re giving unsolicited advice, mine would be to get to know someone a bit before dropping unsolicited medical advice in their thread. What is given with the best of intentions is often received with weary frustration by people who have more prior knowledge than you’re giving credit for, and whose histories and comorbidities you can’t know anything about.

@evan @z @rubah @Yulran in my case: I’ve had ulcerative colitis for about 20 years. I’m *very* aware of the gut-psychology linkage, but can also tell you that getting those symptoms under control has made no difference to the set of things I think of as ADHD. And whatever dietary modification you think of I guarantee I’ve tried it. None helped my gut or ADHD, some made the gut much worse.

@eldang @rubah @z @Yulran my GPs have been willing to give me pills, but only after getting a diagnosis from a therapist. So there's that.

(fortunately I'm easy to drug, I did some preliminary experiments using pills that fell off the back of a truck and worked out what I wanted on my own.)

@mcmoots @eldang @rubah @Yulran haha, glad I’m not the only one who got here down that path. Wanna go do donuts in the parking lot in my Chevy nova?

@z @eldang @rubah @Yulran mmmmm, donuts

@mcmoots @eldang @z @Yulran while I've never been fortunate to run into one of those amazing trucks, I have developed a good rapport with my psych providers and they don't give me any lectures when I provide the results of any self-experimentation with my old or extra meds. Also, they're great about writing "ok to fill today" on new Rx

@rubah @mcmoots @eldang @z Bit of a tangent, but does that mean it's not normal to be able to fill prescriptions immediately? Is it a US thing or an ADHD medication thing?

@Yulran @rubah @mcmoots @eldang I was able to fill mine immediately in the US. To tangent your tangent. If the self assessments are giving you an ADHD diagnosis, chances are really high that you’ll get one from a formal evaluation. They use the same self eval a plus an interview but the self diagnostics are weighted more heavily than the interview (or at least they’re supposed to be). So, I wouldn’t be too worried.

@z @rubah @mcmoots @eldang I don't know if the french ones would scale things the same way, but that's good to hear! Here they also mention on their websites interviewing family, looking at school reports… That sounds kind of stressful.

@Yulran @rubah @eldang @z I have always been able to fill mine immediately, but the most common ADHD meds are Schedule II so there's a lot of stupid rules fuckery. Wouldn't be surprised it if was occasionally an issue when changing brands or dose, where they want you to use up the old meds before giving you more.

@eldang @rubah @z @Yulran I'm looking into coaching to help with mine, as I've already got some set coping methods, & the meds I tried left me feeling too wired. A friend found it helpful when cutting meds during pregnancy, which got me thinking about it more.

If my regrets are any help here, it's a process I wish I'd tried while waiting for a diagnosis - or, failing that, sometime after I got diagnosed 2 years ago.

@alx @rubah @z @Yulran That makes a lot of sense. I am going ahead with non-pharmaceutical interventions on the assumption that ADHD is at least part of my trouble. Starting a CBT course in a few weeks, which I think I was supposed to have a formal diagnosis to access but the same GP who was willing to prescribe meds was also willing to write me a referral for that one.

@eldang @rubah @z @Yulran Ah that's good to hear - will be interested in hearing how that works out for you.

@rubah @z @eldang @Yulran It seems to be highly variable. Carl had a GP who was like "oh you've been on ADHD meds for years? You probably just got addicted in college, try going without." My current GP (internist) is "so you're not taking anything for your ADHD? Are you sure you're okay with that?" every visit. (I think next visit I'm going to say "you know what, no, let's try it again and see how the side effects go this time.")

@gamehawk @rubah @z @Yulran Oh boy. I'm glad Carl *had* this doctor in the past and not now. One of the people in my ADHD support group has a good response for that kind of talk: "if I had diabetes you wouldn't be telling me to [take a day off insulin every week | wean myself off insulin] now, would you?"

@eldang @rubah @z @Yulran Yeah, I think the primary issue was that doc was concerned stimulants were ill-advised when trying to treat hypertension, which okay, fair.

@gamehawk @rubah @z @Yulran That sounds like a good reason to try switching meds, but that "your real problem is addiction to the thing that helps you" framing is... *something*. And annoyingly common.

@eldang @gamehawk @rubah @Yulran one tiktoker put it perfectly, “this highly addictive substance that I routinely forget to take”

@eldang @rubah @z @Yulran Yep. Because normally we'd like to not have to see a specialist every three months (the limit on Sched II prescription length in that state, IIRC) for meds that haven't changed in years. So it's nice when the GP will just sign off on it.

@rubah @eldang Thanks! Yeah, I did exactly that
Took me also a while to think that those are maybe not just trauma symptoms.