4 ms·

I was diagnosed as a kid, I never really took the meds consistently. My perspective now is that adhd people are a minority tribe, very chill people living in an

by jmogly 1y ago

I was diagnosed as a kid, I never really took the meds consistently. My perspective now is that adhd people are a minority tribe, very chill people living in an unchill world. I feel blessed that I have the ability to function and find my place in this world without taking the meds, not everyone with the “disease” is so lucky. Having adhd you feel alot like an alien most of the time, which can of course be alienating but also very liberating. The question I pose to the “it’s a disease, medicate it” crowd is; is the person maladapted or is the culture maladaptive?

draw_down 1y ago
[dead]
fsiefken 1y ago
It's not necessarily that black and white, it can be both. When my girlfriend asks me to do the dishes quickly and I've still not done them after an hour because something objcetively less important was more interesting to me - then there's a problem as it's a fair request. The unconscious unhelpful thoughts and behaviours you develop because of ADHD work against you - because at the end of the day you also have to take care of yourself (cut your nails, floss your teeth, wash your clothes), not only the household. The connections you have with colleagues, friends, family and yourself are something you have to manage consciously - either with sports, meditation and journaling or medication - or both! It's easy to say, society is maladaptive. you could say, let all these adhd people just do creative work or teaching - but then they still have to organize and care for themselves. Alternatively give all those diagnosed a free pass to not meet demands and expectations of society and give them a basic income. I'd rather help myself or let myself be helped to meet the minimum demands and expectations of work and significant others - the alternative is: he can't be a responsible human being, cannot be asked to do a simple job, as he's always with his head in the clouds. Of course ADHD is also a superpower, but a handicap as well (to me).
alexrp 1y ago
> The question I pose to the “it’s a disease, medicate it” crowd is; is the person maladapted or is the culture maladaptive? Overwhelmingly the former in my case. I'll have projects that I desperately want to work on for weeks or months, but just can't bring myself to actually get started on without the extra push from Vyvanse. It would be nice if society could be just a bit more accommodating for people with ADHD, but that would do nothing to fix this problem for me.
- thelaxiankey 1y ago
  the thing about being human is you internalize cultural values as your own. if you lived in a society that valued, i dunno, tracking and hunting down giraffes in small groups, would you have the same struggles? what if just participating in society required ~20 hours of athletic activity a week? i'm not entirely convinced you would have this problem, based on the anthropology i've read. the signal of a maladaptive culture is not 'i feel like the people around me have a moral failing'. It is 'i, and many others, feel like we've all got basically the same moral failing.' personally, this has been a very helpful reframing. If I simply can't bring myself to do something, that means not that I am bad and my willpower is bad, it just means that something is materially wrong and I should consider addressing it by doing things that my body will let me do.
  - alexrp 1y ago
    My desire to work on said projects is intrinsic; no one around me expects me to do so. In fact, quite a few of my projects add no value to broader society and exist only because I found doing them interesting. I don't imagine the surrounding culture valuing the hunting of giraffes would particularly affect this one way or the other. (Except if said culture doesn't have computers, I guess.) > personally, this has been a very helpful reframing. If I simply can't bring myself to do something, that means not that I am bad and my willpower is bad, it just means that something is materially wrong and I should consider addressing it by doing things that my body will let me do. To be clear, I don't think I'm "bad" or that I have a moral failing just because I can't bring myself to do some things. (If anything, that sounds like an internalization of some unfortunate cultural norms...) In my case, it's a contradiction: I want to do a thing for intrinsic reasons, but I can't bring myself to do the thing due to insufficient motivation/focus (for lack of a better term). It can be maddening at times. But if we take a more typical example that many ADHD people struggle with like, say, doing the dishes or cleaning the house... I guess I don't really understand what might be "materially wrong" here, or how doing something else addresses whatever that is or, more to the point, actually gets those chores done...? This sounds a bit hand-wavy to me.
    - 1y ago

by jmogly 1y ago

draw_down 1y ago

[dead]

fsiefken 1y ago

It's not necessarily that black and white, it can be both. When my girlfriend asks me to do the dishes quickly and I've still not done them after an hour because something objcetively less important was more interesting to me - then there's a problem as it's a fair request. The unconscious unhelpful thoughts and behaviours you develop because of ADHD work against you - because at the end of the day you also have to take care of yourself (cut your nails, floss your teeth, wash your clothes), not only the household. The connections you have with colleagues, friends, family and yourself are something you have to manage consciously - either with sports, meditation and journaling or medication - or both! It's easy to say, society is maladaptive. you could say, let all these adhd people just do creative work or teaching - but then they still have to organize and care for themselves. Alternatively give all those diagnosed a free pass to not meet demands and expectations of society and give them a basic income. I'd rather help myself or let myself be helped to meet the minimum demands and expectations of work and significant others - the alternative is: he can't be a responsible human being, cannot be asked to do a simple job, as he's always with his head in the clouds. Of course ADHD is also a superpower, but a handicap as well (to me).

alexrp 1y ago

> The question I pose to the “it’s a disease, medicate it” crowd is; is the person maladapted or is the culture maladaptive? Overwhelmingly the former in my case. I'll have projects that I desperately want to work on for weeks or months, but just can't bring myself to actually get started on without the extra push from Vyvanse. It would be nice if society could be just a bit more accommodating for people with ADHD, but that would do nothing to fix this problem for me.

thelaxiankey 1y ago
the thing about being human is you internalize cultural values as your own. if you lived in a society that valued, i dunno, tracking and hunting down giraffes in small groups, would you have the same struggles? what if just participating in society required ~20 hours of athletic activity a week? i'm not entirely convinced you would have this problem, based on the anthropology i've read. the signal of a maladaptive culture is not 'i feel like the people around me have a moral failing'. It is 'i, and many others, feel like we've all got basically the same moral failing.' personally, this has been a very helpful reframing. If I simply can't bring myself to do something, that means not that I am bad and my willpower is bad, it just means that something is materially wrong and I should consider addressing it by doing things that my body will let me do.
- alexrp 1y ago
  My desire to work on said projects is intrinsic; no one around me expects me to do so. In fact, quite a few of my projects add no value to broader society and exist only because I found doing them interesting. I don't imagine the surrounding culture valuing the hunting of giraffes would particularly affect this one way or the other. (Except if said culture doesn't have computers, I guess.) > personally, this has been a very helpful reframing. If I simply can't bring myself to do something, that means not that I am bad and my willpower is bad, it just means that something is materially wrong and I should consider addressing it by doing things that my body will let me do. To be clear, I don't think I'm "bad" or that I have a moral failing just because I can't bring myself to do some things. (If anything, that sounds like an internalization of some unfortunate cultural norms...) In my case, it's a contradiction: I want to do a thing for intrinsic reasons, but I can't bring myself to do the thing due to insufficient motivation/focus (for lack of a better term). It can be maddening at times. But if we take a more typical example that many ADHD people struggle with like, say, doing the dishes or cleaning the house... I guess I don't really understand what might be "materially wrong" here, or how doing something else addresses whatever that is or, more to the point, actually gets those chores done...? This sounds a bit hand-wavy to me.
  - 1y ago