ADHD: Everyone knows the image of the 8-year-old, way too busy, boy who cannot sit still in class and prefers to rush around the schoolyard all day long…Is it just that?! So no, ADHD goes much further than that… Is it negative and annoying in all cases, or is there also a possibility to use it in a positive sense… Fortunately, that option is there, it may cost a bit more effort, but it is doable!!
The symptoms of ADHD include:
- Continuous feeling of underachievement
- Problems organizing your life
- A constant urge for strong stimuli
- Chronic procrastination
- Problems completing projects that have been started in a hurry
- Easily bored, especially by others
- Regardless of the consequences, say what you think
- Concentration problems and daydreaming
- Little understanding for others; impatient, easily irritated
- Doesn’t care much for so-called bourgeoisie
- Impulsive in all its forms, often unwillingly
- Always thinking about: what if…
- Mood swings, restlessness, depression, self-esteem problems
- Addiction problems, small or large
- Completely wrong self-image
- Creatively
- Quickly very enthusiastic
- Having hyperfocus on interesting things
- Infinite energy
- Infinite rebound capacity (always able to get back on track after setbacks).
- Often gifted
Oh dear, what now?!
For many people it is a total surprise when they find out later in life what has been wrong with them all their lives… A feeling of recognition is often a bit scary at first, but it all soon feels familiar, especially if it turns out that you are not alone, and there are also many points that you can benefit from…
The second part of the list of ADHD symptoms contains the benefits of ADHD. These may seem few compared to the disadvantages, but they are nevertheless crucial advantages in life. If you are able to use them in such a way that things actually start to work, then you will automatically become better able to weaken the negative symptoms.
So is ADHD the end?! No; for many people just the beginning; It’s about finding the best possible balance for yourself, with or without medication, with or without fish oil, with or without a psychologist, and continuing your life in a happy way. It may take some time to get to know yourself again as an ADHD sufferer, but it is more than worth the effort and time if it enables you to use more of your positive qualities, and more and more manage to control your negative qualities…
Maybe you can even go so far that it actually gives you a positive boost…
Just think of today’s comedians, for example. Bert Visser and Jochem Meijer in particular have become very famous, precisely because of their ADHD!! There are also a lot of people of whom we now very strongly suspect that they have ADHD, or have had it in their time, such as:
- Albert Einstein
- Jim Carrey
- Socrates
- Ozzy Osbourne
- Ludwig von Beethoven
- Willem Ruis
- Ernest Hemingway
- Jim Henson
- Harry Belafonte
- Katja Schuurman
- Cher
- Prince Charles
- Wibi Soerjadi
- Abraham Lincoln
- Herman Brood
- Miss Piggy
- Dustin Hoffman
- Napoleon Bonaparte
- Linda de Mol
- Emile Ratelband
- Steve Irwin
- Winston Churchill
- John F Kennedy
- John Lennon
- Pierre Wind
- Tom Cruise
- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
- Hans Christian Andersen
An even larger list can be found at :Larger celebrity list
Own story
I only discovered that I had ADHD after watching a television program about ADHD in adults. I was very shocked by this, and I immediately called my mother… Her response was: Yes, duh, you didn’t know that?! So no…
It turned out to explain quite a number of points from my youth:
- Not getting my school diploma, while everyone knew that I should be able to do it,
- Constantly throwing myself into new projects, which were generally of no use,
- Having the strange self-image: I know something is wrong, but what…
- Falling in love very quickly (and really completely) and by very quickly I mean minutes!!!
- The passing of those same crushes very quickly (fortunately not all of them, but most of them anyway)
- The continuous mood swings problem, especially in the home situation, led to problems
Because I had given birth to a son about 5 months before I saw the TV program, and he would soon start testing my ,mother skills,, I thought it was important to take immediate action. Because when you are freaking out at an adult, it is still understandable to that adult that that is my problem, but for a child, and certainly your own child, that is a different story… I wanted not necessarily become a bad mother, because of a ,forgotten brake in my brain, because my children can do that (I now have 2 and they are doing fantastic; with a very high probability they both have it too, but that is because of the current fame in the right direction) after all, do nothing about it…
So I went to a psychologist with experience in the field of ADHD. This is important because , despite much greater awareness, there is still a lot of misunderstanding of the term ADHD; That is a fashion phenomenon after all… Yes, for some people (in most cases children) the diagnosis is wrongly made, and that is of course not the intention for any disease, hence a psychologist with the necessary experience. Fortunately, there was a lot of experience to be found in Apeldoorn, where I also lived at the time, fantastic!!!
After a referral from a very skeptical GP, I really had to convince him that I was sure, I ended up seeing a psychologist. It then turned out that in most cases the diagnosis can only be made after a year or a year and a half, because making the correct diagnosis is very important, many tests and many appointments are needed, which was quite disappointing to me. I wanted to be on time with any medication for my son.
Because of my very clear extreme form of ADHD (actually I scored on all points except for the addictions), I received a diagnosis after 3 months and a referral to the psychiatrist (who is allowed to prescribe medication, a psychologist is not, who is allowed to make a diagnosis). and talking)
A Ritalin schedule was quickly put together with the psychiatrist. That stuff worked fantastically (the first 2 months) I had peace of mind, I was calm and reasonable with my fellow man, I lost my negative feelings, I slept a lot better, and most importantly: I could cope a lot better with the ,baby stress,. But after 3 full months of using Ritalin it became a lot less fun for me: I also lost my positive things. I was just zapping on the couch, I had no more projects to get excited about, I thought it was all okay, I didn’t really care that much, but the last straw was when I got to the first steps of my son responded with: gosh-sigh-nice….
I immediately stopped taking those medications again, and thank God all the positive things came back… That’s nice…
Because now I knew what I was doing. – compared to all those years before when I didn’t see what I was doing – I was able to learn more about myself little by little, and get better control over myself. In some cases it can take a lot of effort, but if I really try, it works.
- Biting off your tongue when someone else tells a story, I find that story really interesting, but in my head an even better story automatically comes to mind. Nowadays I can bite off my tongue every now and then and keep listening.
- Don’t let out the tantrum you feel coming from inside, walk away for a moment and count to 10; IT REALLY WORKS!!!
- Make an agreement with my partner that if I walk away, he will also let me walk away
- Be more understanding of other people, after all, not everyone is as amazing as I am (for the skeptics; this is a joke!!)
Taking the fish oil capsules that have become more widely known works extremely well in my and my eldest son’s case (the youngest is simply still too small); it tempers the really unnecessary hyperactivity, and gives just a little more concentration, without dampening your positive feelings!!! Of course, eating oily fish works even better, but not everyone is crazy about the fish stall, hence the capsules.
There is a big difference in the amount of active ingredients per type of fish oil capsule, in my experience it is almost never the case that the most expensive is also the best.
Because of my current knowledge of my ADHD B, I have been able to adjust my life in such a way that it has become a lot more livable for everyone around me. I can release my excess energy during practice, but especially during the performance of a rock band where I am the lead singer… Maintaining my relationship is going wonderfully well, raising the children is very easy, I am slowly starting to find even training in small parts interesting again (after a Mensa test, I too turned out to be one of the many cases with ADHD in combination with giftedness). Actually, my ADHD no longer really stands in my way, I have been able to turn the ADHD blockage into an ADHD rail that I can use in many cases to get further than where I am now.
Of course I will always have trouble with things like; cleaning up, administration, being on time, etc. But yes, not everyone is perfect, in fact; everyone has something, so let me have ADHD, there’s a good chance it will take me further than many others without it!!