In May 2021 I asked my GP for an Adult ADHD Referral after reading a friends blog post and asking myself have all my struggles been related to potentially having a neurodivergent brain? Is that why I feel like I’ve been completely drowning in my adult life and have periods where I am unable to function? Is this why I have completely struggled since I can remember because I don’t feel like I fit in. I don’t know if the knowledge that I am on the lengthy NHS waiting list is a help or hinderence right now because I hate waiting.
I recently got a letter through confirming I was on the waiting list and my referral had been accepted into the stream of ongoing people however because we have an awful Government who underfund the privitalise the NHS and don’t care about working class peoples mental health, adult services for autism and adhd assessments are atrocious. In my area they are currently seeing people referred in January 2019 so it looks like I will be waiting until at least 2023 just to have an assessment. There is then another equally long waiting list for Titration which is the diagnostic perscriptive period which helps you get the right medication and dosage for your needs. It feels like I’m just caught in this huge mess of wanting to fix my problems but not being able to. For some reason my GP has misunderstood the Right to Choose NHS pathway which has been an issue and I think I would meet resistance if I brought this up again or even asked if shared care would be an option if I went privately and that is a real thing I’m considering right now.
I feel like I’m in an okay place mentally at this point in time but because I’ve tried to be so productive in getting results for my chronic headaches, issues with my sight and binge eating I feel like everything else is slipping by the wayside. I have absolutely used video games as a coping mechanism this year which is fine but between trying to fix my brain and doing something I enjoy to procrastinate my work has suffered, my impulse buying has increased which has been a real problem. I am feeling so much pressure which is leading to me having to take time just mindlessly scrolling through social media and disasociating. My general life overwhelm is just in a really strange place right now which is leading to an increased amount of choice paralysis, comparison problems, and executive dysfunction at times and periods of hyperactive hyperfocus but not on things I *should* and sometimes even *want* to do. Not to mention the body dismorphia, struggling with food and the general reduction in the usual (although still pretty minimal) socialising I would do. I think thats where video games have filled some of this void because it’s something I like, want to get better at and do a lot of, and includes a social element with other people that are doing the same.
I’m really trying to look for the positives in things honestly but my ‘negatives’ collum right now is so long its become so difficult. Being stuck in our flat sometimes makes me feel physically sick the lack of personal space I have and the amount of time we have had to spend at home. The amount of work that needs done to declutter it. I’m so unhappy here but I can’t fix anything or move or do anything about it yet and that is genuinely affecting my day to day life in such a bad way. I also have a cold right now so that is heightening all of the bad feelings. I know I said I was okay, and I genuinely am, honestly I don’t feel depressive of sad or miserable. I feel frustrated and lonely and like I’m not being listened to and a bit of a failure really.
The thing is I’m such a sensory sensitive person and right now my sensory needs are not being met. What I see around me, the clutter, the mess, the lack of space just makes me feel awful and that then leads to the unproductiveness. I know people will just roll their eyes and be like “well stop buying things” or “just get rid of stuff” or “just clean up” and I want to scream that it’s really not that fucking easy for me. But then I will go into a hyperfocus mode and stuff will get done and I’ll throw stuff away and then I’ll feel guilty for not trying to repurpose things because I’m throwing stuff away that I can’t use so I hoard stuff and then I’ll feel guilty for not using it or doing something with it or the amount of money I’ve wasted on something. That cycle really can spiral way out of control but the problem is all of this consistently happens in my head and then that manifests into fatigue, extreme exhuastion and such a high stress bad tempered enviornment.
I have really been looking into ADHD for a while and whilst I know that medication is not going to be a fix it all cure, everything requires work to improve my health and productivity but I genuinely think the validation of being like right well I have this and I need to do things a bit differently because of that. I was looking into seeing if I was both Autistic and had ADHD as I know there are some things that overlap between the two but I think some of the traits that are prevailent in both seem more ADHD centered than Autistic. The biggest link is the sensory processing struggles I have I think with certain food, textures, scents, lighting and well parts of my skin. This has turned into more of a ramble than I intended but I just basically wanted to say that it’s been almost six months since I’ve been referred and I’m feeling a huge bag of emotions but trying to cope as best as I can.
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