Hi...my name is Jen and I very recently found out through the AMEN site that I probably have inattentive ADD. I am in the process of trying to find a good psychiatrist for a formal diagnosis and I am not asking anyone here to diagnose me but I would love to get your opinions. I NEVER have considered the fact that I may have ADD...to me, ADD'ers were kids who climbed the walls....I was a well behaved kid who was a classic underachiever in school....im ashamed to admit that i graduated in the bottom ten percent of 350 kids....i had trouble concentrating and always daydreamed in class and trouble following directions at times....i barely ever did homework no matter how much trouble my mom threatened me with....I really WANTED to do well but just couldnt find it within me to motivate myself and get some focus.....and now that im an adult in my 30's i am just feeling like a freak....i have a job where very little is required of me because i am not motivated to take on more responsibility...I feel like I am as intelligent as anyone in my company...its like im a go-getter trapped in a lazy persons body...my house is a wreck, my finances are just shot....luckily, i have good friends, husband and family or God knows where I would be today.....i make big plans and never follow through with them....heck, i dont well following through with small plans......my family Dr. diagnosed me with depression and i have taken prozac and wellbutrin...they make me feel good but my life is still the same....can I have your opinions please? If anyone has these same obstacles in their life, I would be interested in learning their coping strategies. I am SOOO ready to live life and not let life just happen to me. Thank you!

Hi. I just wanted to tell you that my life has gone through a very similar path as yours. Stick around here and you will see that all of us are similar in a lot of ways.
I consider myself pretty intelligent. However, my finances, employment, organization, relationships, as well as mostly everything in my life has not turned out as I have hoped. I found out about ADD a few months ago and it was an epiphany. I finally found out what the underlying problem was in all of my failed attempts to live a happy and successful life.
I, too cannot wait to live a life. I have to wait for treatment for the time being. It is verrrry frustrating! However, if you read the posts as well as ask as many questions you have time to, you will find that many of us think almost the EXACT same thoughts. This is a comfort in itself.
Good luck with your treatment and research.

Thank you Theo! It's so refreshing to read about people similar to me that I could cry. And you are right about this being an epiphany...it is....after I posted earlier, I was thinking of other things in my past and present life that may or may not be ADD related....I was a bedwetter until I was 11...and remembering people telling me i needed to "knuckle down" and not knowing how to get myself to "knuckle down"....i have to write myself notes ALL the time....i am the QUEEN Of Post-it notes......my husband gets a bit frustrated at times because i forget things easily....I even forget ( or procrastinate) to things that would be great for me, things that might be fun....these forums are so enlightening.....it really is an Epiphany.....

I did not find out I was ADHD until I was in 11th grade...by then..grades were the pits...But only reason I am not ashamed is the fact I may have grad w/ low average but at least I graduated PERIOD. Many kids drop out of school for one reason or another.

I procrastinate all the time...not that I mean too...it's just that I am thinking of other things and like so many of us...I forget...Lucky for me, mom deals with it...but in relationships...No man could handle it...thank god I am away from them...they always made me feel stupid.

Hugs! Aint it great knowing ur not alone.

Geez so many questions and not a lot of answers. I am going through the same thing. I have never had such problems as I do now. I don’t know if its the fact that I am lazy and don’t care to work or that I have adhd. If I think back I am always fishing the internet at work. I know I can get in trouble but I always take the risk. I am also almost always late if I go to work alone. My husband and I work at the same place. He is always on me about taking my vitamins, getting out of bed, going to sleep, cleaning and work. He is a total overachiever and I just feel so worthless next to him. Im afraid its affecting my marriage as well. He thinks I make things up about feeling sick or not being able to ever catch up as not trying hard enough. I dropped out of school in the 11th grade and have worked since I was 15. I just cannot focus and I cannot complete any goals. I have been border line depressed but maybe its adhd. Keep writing about this stuff. Just getting this out helps a little. Thank you.

You are not alone! I was the same way in school. Only I couldn't figure out how people in my class knew the answers to some questions. I always just figured I was absent the day they learned that. I procrastinate things I enjoy, too. Or I get distracted or bored.

Until about three months ago or so, I believed that ADHD was primarily for kids and if you had it you were hyper. I wasn't looking for an ADHD diagnosis when I went to the pdoc. It was all found because of my antidepression meds not working the way they should anymore.

Fortunately, I worked for several years in a job that required me to stop what I was doing and work on something that had to go out right then, all day long. I think that's what helped me. It allowed me to hide the fact (most of the time) that I had trouble finishing things. I found that even after I moved here and quit working, I lived and organized my life the same way. Stop, go, switch, stop, go, switch. Everything I did was that way.

ADHD and comorbidity with other disorders, such as depression, is common. There are also many disorders that mimic ADHD-like depression and anxiety. Many docs want to treat one before before diagnosing/treating the other.

I'm in the DFW metroplex. There are a lot of good pdocs here. A lot of them will recommend therapy as well. I found it's been really helpful. I've been through before, but this time I went in with a goal and answers to some of my past problems.

I hope all goes well for you!

Can't decide where to begin, can't remember what you said in your post, gotta scroll up, ok,

I like this thought----lazy is not doing things you have to do, depressed is not doing things you enjoy doing

opps, can't remember if you mentioned depressed, going to scroll up again...

ok, yes, I see you mentioned depressed. And school, I have a Bachelor's degree. I am very good at basic math, did pretty well in phys. ed. class, and got mostly C's in everything else because I was EXCELLENT at cheating! Wrote stuff on my arm, cheat sheets, copying off the smart kids. Otherwise I don't think I would have made it past 10th grade.

scroll up, again

can't complete goals! Absolutely. Even simple stuff, I have been out of business cards since November. Have put it on my lists a million times.

I am married 25 years with 2 kids. My wife would leave me if I hadn't drained all the bank accounts.

scroll up again

Spouses are the ones this hurts the most, try to get your husband to read some of the posts here that are for spouses. He probably never fully understand what you are going through. But the reality of the situation, is that you never will fully understand what he's going through either

up again

BR549's job situation sounds like something that I would enjoy. Tasks that are solve able in short order. I did much better when I was in a job that had tasks that could be completed in hours, not days.

You CAN change some things for the better, not all things, but some. Get a good Dr., find a support group, work together with your husband whenever possible on this.

We're here for you, and you are here for us, keep venting, discussing, learning, etc.

Hi...my name is Jen and I very recently found out through the AMEN site that I probably have inattentive ADD. I am in the process of trying to find a good psychiatrist for a formal diagnosis and I am not asking anyone here to diagnose me but I would love to get your opinions.
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There is no Hyperactivity ADD, just ADD, there is not even a inattentive type, these are just symptoms based on severity.
However you may want to look at SCT, ADHD

Sounds a lot like me, seriously seeking treatment now.

THis video will help you a lot more than me :)

Management of ADHD
Youtube.com/watch?v=q3d1SwUXMc0

Welcome to the forums!

Yes from a quick glance you could have inattentive ADHD. Have you checked out the DSM-IV list of criteria for ADHD?

As for management, it's hard to write it out all here so I reccomend two books; Delivered from distraction by Ned Hallowell MD. Really the 'bible' of ADHD. The other one is ADD-Friendly ways to organize your life, by Judith Kolberg and Kathleen Nadeau. They're both packed full of useful information, organized nicely, and I've applied a lot of what they've said.

A word about medication; yes medication is a part of my ADHD management. Ultimately, it's your body and only you can decide if medication is what you want to include in your life. I do warn you; it's not a magic pill. It won't solve all of your problems. What it's meant to do is put your mind in a place where you can learn new things.

Put it this way; have you seen those viking ships with all those oars sticking out of the boat. An ADHD mind has those oars going all over the place. Well, doing that your boat isn't going to go very far. Meds gets all those oars together in sync. But where to navigate the boat? If you have no destination, the boat still won't get very far.

Anyway, I do hope you get your diagnosis soon. Best of luck to you!

I can definitely relate to where you said you make big plans but can't follow through on them.. or the small plans for that matter!

I dream big, huge as a matter of fact but I never even thought of devising a practical step by step plan to achieve my dreams until the ADD diagnosis came along! However parts of my dreams have come true through sheer persistence, persistent daydreaming that is! no, I had to work hard for what I have achieved and it only happened because it was in an area that I was interested in and excelled in.

That's just one part of my life, there are so many that are consistently derailed due to ADD related behaviors that it really depresses me at times. Treatment helps but you still have to look within yourself and really figure out how you're going to make it work for YOU. What makes YOU tick, that kind of stuff is what works for me. That and the Ritalin.

On the topic of jobs. I've done EXTREMELY well in sales. I've won all kinds of awards, gone on trips, etc.. One was inside sales where the customer came in. There were no reports to run, etc.. It was just taking care of the customer. Every 5 seconds there was a new distraction: new customer, new conversation, new phone call, new "emergency" and this job catered to my ADHD very well.

My next career was also sales, but outside. I still won awards, a trip to Sydney, Australia, made TONS of money, but because I didn't have people walking in a door to keep me on task, I wasted a LOT of time.

My new job is based out of my home and is outside sales. RECIPE FOR DISASTER. In fact, it's what led me to a psych for a diagnosis. I'm still waiting on one final test to come in for the "official" diagnosis (they ran out and told me I'd have to come back when it arrives which should be any day) but honestly, am looking forward to a medication that will allow all my oars to go in the same direction!

Bottom line is, you can be extremely successful with ADHD if you find a career that caters to your symptoms and your interests. Anything else has the potential to be disastrous.