I was never diagnosed with ADHD because medical professionals never noticed any symptoms on the outside. But inside, I was always suffering, I just didn't know what it was called. Once I learned about ADHD and that I checked every box, I started taking stimulants (even without an ADHD diagnosis) and they solved everything.
I think my case was just so severe that nobody saw me struggle with it, because it was impossible to fight. Plus, I'm autistic, so a lot of things were written off as autism.
> I think my case was just so severe that nobody saw me struggle with it.
Same with me but PTSD. Like the fact that I'm remarkably functional in crisis mode doesn't mean that it's not a problem I live there all the time. A surprising amount of medicine relies on having a stable baseline against which to compare and if that's not there, the tests don't work.
> Same with me but PTSD. Like the fact that I'm remarkably functional in crisis mode doesn't mean that it's not a problem I live there all the time.
Exactly! I wanna fix something wrong with me, not something preventing me from becoming a work slave. I want to be happy with myself, not just useful to society. My own happiness should trump most metrics of functionality.
I realize in hindsight how much of my resistance to help was resistance to 'help': I've grown up surrounded by adults/authority figures offering 'help' with no consideration of my actual desires or wellbeing. I know that one. Of course I was wary: I had a good reason.
You're right that it all relies around making people functional, not whole people who have come to terms with who they are and are a psychologically stable human organism.
In my opinion, the person isn't the organism, the organism makes up the person. That distinction is important when it comes to things like DID, which I have. Even "whole people" becomes questionable when a single organism contains multiple people~
But I still totally agree. My main concern when I was getting prescribed my meds was "will it help me mentally instead of just making me do things?" and the answer was "yes". I didn't actually believe it, until I tried the meds and they freakin' worked. Now I'm just so thankful and grateful I found something that worked so well. I feel like my brain is finally functioning the way it's supposed to. (Neurodivergence included of course~)
I think my case was just so severe that nobody saw me struggle with it, because it was impossible to fight. Plus, I'm autistic, so a lot of things were written off as autism.