A side-effect of my ADHD diagnosis 3 months ago is that now my wife says I have lost all credibility--in other words, my judgement cannot be trusted.

In the past (pre-diagnosis), memory slips or failures to follow through--heck, just plain mistakes--could be analyzed and there might be a shadow of a doubt that maybe there were extenuating circumstances to explain the problem and my focus could shift to trying to correct the mistake and learn from it (with somewhat spotty success, of course.)

Now, (post-diagnosis) I am not only thought of as possibly unreliable--I have a paper signed by a professional diagnosing me with ADHD, which implies (according to my wife) that I am certifiably unreliable--no ifs, ands, or buts.

In the wake of slip-ups (failures to follow through, forgetting to pass along information, and just plain bone-headed mistakes), interactions with my wife follow this pattern

1. People with mental illnesses are unreliable.
2. ADHD is a mental illness
3. You have ADHD.
4. Therefore, you are unreliable and there is nothing you can say in your defense that can be deemed credible.

I am working past the denial and getting more into acceptance territory--I'm coming to grips with the truth that, yes, I can often be forgetful, procrastinating, and unreliable. Yes, I have been diagnosed with ADHD. Yes, I'm going to have to deal with this the rest of my life.

I also have a successful career, engrossing interests, a wonderful teenage son, and my health.

My wife is expanding the discussion and has asserted that my ADHD makes me unfit to manage money, exercise parental judgement over our child, maintain a house, drive a car, plan anything, and may make me unqualified for my technology management job (despite a history of great performance reviews and promotions.)

Because I'm hypersensitive right now to the possibility of self-deception, I am worried that she could be right and that perhaps my credibility is completely shot. Nothing left but divorce, job loss, life on the street, institutional commitment. Whoo.

I don't completely buy into this (at least not all the time) but the possibility worries me. Has anyone else had to come to grips with this particular spin on self-image realignment?

Regards...

No. A person's "credibility" is not taken away by an ADHD diagnosis.

Every decision a person makes isn't bound to ADHD.

If someone has the Hyperactive-Impulsive or Combined types for example, then inhibition and self-control become issues that require medication management, therapy and/or coaching.

If a person has ADHD-Predominantly Inattentive type, there's no impairment with respect to judgment.

If, for example, a person was working in an area where they have a natural aptitude for
that job, then they would be more likely to be successful.

Realisitcally, that's an "over the top" appraisal.

There's a HUGE difference between being impulsive versus psychotic or a pathological liar.

My having ADHD gives me tremendous credibility as a clinical/child psychologist who specializes in ADHD.

It really helps to read up on ADHD as much as possible.

Good Luck

It only takes away as much credibility as the person doing the evaluation of credibility wants it to. Many people are dire to find ammunition against you to argue a point, whether it is a disorder or simply being different. Others simply do not understand. At least you can educate those who don't understand.

A side-effect of my ADHD diagnosis 3 months ago is that now my wife says I have lost all credibility--in other words, my judgement cannot be trusted.
Nice.

First, educating yourself and others will help you with your "defense".


In the past (pre-diagnosis), memory slips or failures to follow through--heck, just plain mistakes--could be analyzed and there might be a shadow of a doubt that maybe there were extenuating circumstances to explain the problem and my focus could shift to trying to correct the mistake and learn from it (with somewhat spotty success, of course.)
IMO, there is nothing wrong with setting up "back-up" mechanisms to ensure that important things do not fall through the cracks. Instead of being critical and distrusting, your wife could help you with memory issues by picking up the slack, double-checking, or reminding. This doesn't have to be done in an offensive manner.


1. People with mental illnesses are unreliable.
2. ADHD is a mental illness
3. You have ADHD.
4. Therefore, you are unreliable and there is nothing you can say in your defense that can be deemed credible.
People with mental illnesses are not unreliable, unless we're talking about a number of personality disorders (such as borderline), which are not always considered "mental illnesses".

In fact, as McTavish points out, there are a great number of highly-reliable and highly-successful ADDers. I'd add that a great number of highly-reliable and highly successful people suffer from some disorder; bipolar disorder, major depressive disorder, even agoraphobia are a lot more common than many think.

Ask your wife this: are you allowed to blame everything you do on ADD? Is it an excuse for bad behavior? If not, she shouldn't be allowed to do this either. How would she feel if every time she got angry with you, you ask her if "it's that time of the month"?

It may sound like an unfair comparison, but it's really the same thing. Both imply that what's going on is not valid. In one case she doesn't have a reason to be mad, she's just cranky. In the other, you can't be telling the truth, you're crazy.



I also have a successful career, engrossing interests, a wonderful teenage son, and my health.

Good for you! All the rest is manageable.



My wife is expanding the discussion and has asserted that my ADHD makes me unfit to manage money, exercise parental judgement over our child, maintain a house, drive a car, plan anything, and may make me unqualified for my technology management job (despite a history of great performance reviews and promotions.)

Even with evidence ot the contrary?

In my household, I manage the money, commute 3-5 hours a day (depending on what day it is), get the kids to and from school, plan everything, manage the household, go to school (finishing a PhD soon, with luck) and teach a full courseload at a university. And I'm not only ADD, I'm also bipolar and have been all my life!

Having undiagnosed disorders can actually be an advantage in the end. When you don't understand what's wrong with you, coping strategies and "work arounds" become a matter of survival. You are forced to learn ways around problems that others don't have. This can make it easier to deal with the unexpected.



I don't completely buy into this (at least not all the time) but the possibility worries me. Has anyone else had to come to grips with this particular spin on self-image realignment?

No, I haven't really had to deal with it, but I would say that you need to be an advocate for yourself. Don't buy into the ADD excuse. If you do, you're sunk.

The unreliable person is the nutball who's so far in denial that they continue to screw up everything in their life and never seek a diagnosis or treatment. The person that gets it figured out and gets help is the responsible one.

You seem like you've got it together. Don't let it take away your credibility and it won't.

Good luck!

Why would having a diagnosed mental condition make you less credible than someone who has an undiagnosed mental condition?

If anything I believe you to be more credible because you have chosen to seek treatment for a condition you did not create.

Your wife is wrong. How's that?

Here's an excellent book :

"You Mean I'm Not Lazy, Stupid, or Crazy?" by Kate Kelly & Peg Ramundo.

"ADHD is considered to be a medical condition/disorder, a developmental disability, a neurobiological/brain based disorder, a chronic health-care condition, a neurological inefficiency, a performance disorder, a pattern of behaviors that are so pevasive as to interfere with daily life,a dimensional disorder of human behavior that all people exhibit to some degree, however, for the person with ADHD, the symptoms cause impairments in daily life activities,and a disability of inhibition."

Everyone of those descriptors came from an excellent reference book entitled :

"The ADHD Book of Lists" by Sandra Rief (2003).

That isn't a "new" book in the sense that she has her own theory.

What she's done is to take the main/most important research from the last 15 yrs or so, and put them into categories (in list form);with references.

You can open her book to pages 3-4 to read those.

The point is they're evidenced based.

The mental health field (I work in a rural non-profit community mental health center in Mn),is rapidly moving towards an "evidenced based" mandate.

That means: Prove that what you just said or the technique or test you gave, has been substantiated by research as actually working for whatever you used it for.

Those descriptors are evidenced based; as the references are on page 4 :)

Oh yeah, did you see the term "mental illness?"

Exactly, it's NOT described in that way.Don't take my word for it though, look for yourself.

Last, but not least, Vincent Vangoh was bipolar and probably schizophrenic.

I think his "credibility" speaks for itself.

My wife is expanding the discussion and has asserted that my ADHD makes me unfit to manage money, exercise parental judgement over our child, maintain a house, drive a car, plan anything, and may make me unqualified for my technology management job (despite a history of great performance reviews and promotions.)
I'm in a somewhat similar boat, but thankfully my wife is growing to become more understand of this. I'm a senior technology manager with a successful career history but ADD symptoms started causing problems over the past few years up until my diagnosis last Spring.

I just started reading Delivered from Distraction (written by two M.D.'s with ADD) and they do a really good job of describing how to deal with this, and a have a really positive attitude about it. I'd recommend you get HER to read this book-- to realize that ADD can be a GIFT (and not just a burden) for those who figure out how to manage it. There are MANY, HIGHLY successful people in this world with ADD who simply may not be good at actively maintaining things like managing a household.

I just wish all those non-ADDers (spouses especially) would simply realize that our ADD brains are wired differently (not better or worse) which in turn means that we can be VERY successful in some areas (creativity, problem solving, risk taking, etc.) but have challenges in others (menial tasks, forgetfulness, housekeeping, etc.).

I told my wife directly- I refuse to allow ADD to be an excuse, but rather a way to explain why I do (or don't do) the things I do (or not). :eyebrow:

SystemsThinker and Hoodoo, you both say you are successful in professional careers. I would say I have been successful too; we are not wealthly but we are able to live very comfortably with my wife as a full-time homemaker. It would be hard to imagine having my wife question my capabilities when it came to the career side of things.

In the meantime, however, I need a lot of help to function in my daily life. I'm lucky that my wife is willing to play that supporting role for me, yet is still able to respect me as a man and a husband. And I in turn respect her contributions greatly. I can't picture a relationship flourishing without mutual respect.

The abuse itself wouldn't bother me all that much -- I have enough confidence, plus enough practice hearing such denigration, to handle such comments -- but the lack of respect would really poison the relationship IMO. All I would say is to give it time, as there are usually some bumps after a major change like a diagnosis.

Many thanks for all of the helpful perspectives on my question!

And thanks for the references to the additional books. (I have to confess that I have been reading the books mentioned in this thread for sometime--even pre-diagnosis--when I was in the bargaining phase of "well, I might have ADHD, but I don't know for sure, but adopting the coping mechanisms sure wouldn't hurt....")

My wife and have both read _Delivered from Distraction_, too.

A dynamic that informs the credibility issue, I think, is what I call the "Cockroach Factor". You know, the thing about about cockroaches is that if you see one in your house, there are probably a whole bunch of cockroaches that you haven't seen.

It's another way of saying that one part of a system affects every other component. And that there are hidden factors that need to be considered. That's where the fear comes from when my wife (who has a Masters degree in Systematic Ecology!) starts asking if the entire integrity of my system can be trusted if, in essence, one part of my brain set-up is so definitively off-kilter.

So I appreciate the perspectives--that there is no "normal" brain and that even though ADHD affects the individual's system, it doesn't necessarily mean that the whole system is going down the tubes--just that the system is "different".

Regards....!

Why would having a diagnosed mental condition make you less credible than someone who has an undiagnosed mental condition?

I was thinking the exact same thing. Did she think he suddenly caught ADD like it was some flu going around.

LOL I think it's funny how often people attribute something superficial to a negative characteristic. They try to act so smart and superior with their negative comments but most times those comments make them sound like they have half a brain.

The ADHD label makes you unreliable :rolleyes: That's like saying a tattoo makes you violent or baggy pants makes you lazy.

The diagnosis changes nothing. It merely describes, more accurately, the situation that pre-existed.

If she considers you unreliable, that's one thing. But being diagnosed in no way made you unreliable. If anything, the treatment that'll follow will help make you more reliable.

And besides, the first step of fixing a problem is figuring out what the problem is. If the boat's sinking, you aren't going to do much banging on the pipes and wiggling the wheel if there's a giant hole in the hull. While we ADDers tend to learn coping mechanisms out of desperation, they're often akin to bailing frantically; we don't know why the boat's filling, we just know we can bail almost as quickly, so BAIL DAMMIT!

Which, of course, is stressful and inefficient. Much better to figure out there's a faulty hull, do what you can to patch the leak, and figure out how to install an automatic pump to clear what seeps through. But you have to figure out there's a hole in the full first.


You wife's saying you're a sinking ship. That may be, that may not be; that's apparently her perception. The only difference is now she's saying "Aha! You're sinking because there's a hole in your hull!"

The best response at this point is "You know, you're right. What can we do about that?"


Though I also have to say that she's going overboard. It's one thing to say "unreliable", it's another whole kettle of fish to say you can't do anything, especially things like drive a car or have an opinion on how to parent. Maybe some parts won't work as well for you; maybe long highway driving will zone you out and lead to you being distracted. Maybe being consistent with punishments won't be your strong suit. Those are only part of the whole pictures here, though, and even if you're lacking in some specific areas, that in no way means you're not very very good at the whole. Nobody is perfect, and it's utterly ridiculous of her to claim she's somehow better than you just because your problems are documented.

And marriages should be partnerships. If you're good at doing the books, do you get on your partner's case for not being good at it? Or do you just take care of them, and let him take care of those parts he does best? Same thing in a marriage. But even so, like any partnership, there's crossover; otherwise, you'd be independent contractors on a single project, not partners.

Alex,

Excellent points. Very well stated. :)

A side-effect of my ADHD diagnosis 3 months ago is that now my wife says I have lost all credibility--in other words, my judgement cannot be trusted.


I would say your wife has lost credibility ;)

I had suspected that I was ADD (ADHD as a boy, a lot of the hyperactive part is gone now). Now that they have "identified it" as a condition and have online Q&A, I am convinced I "suffer" from it. My wife is now convinced that I am ADD, but she looks on my awakening as a crutch. In a way she is right, I do make more of it since it explains so much.

I am fairly sure that since it is a mental condition that affects attention, it really has nothing to do with overall intelligence. When I am focussed I am very intelligent--enough to be a university professor in engineering. Now that I am getting up there I find myself reflecting back. I now feel very confident that had I not been ADD I would be at a higher tier university than I am, I would have gotten through the academic ranks quicker, published more papers and books and gotten more grants. I am convinced that I was able to compensate for my ADD with my intellect and that if I had not been wearing the albatross I would have gone much further. The people that I truly feel for are those who do not have the ability to compensate. They must take drugs, but then there is a different price to pay.

So, my wife thinks that if I work at it I do not need to succumb to my "condition". She is partly right, but in the end the mind wins--particulalry the part that is debilitated in some way. I will not go public with it since the stigma is not worth the hassle that it entails. Yes, there are those who have to get diagnosed and get treated, but they are the ones who simply cannot deal with it. It should not be this way, but then again, we still have people saying ****** and painting swastikas on buildings.

So, in the end I think one must weigh their options. It sounds like you have compensated too.

Voloreputo,

The overall track record for the use of stimulants (for treating ADHD ) is very positive.
(see US Surgeon Generals Report on Mental Health- Chapter 3 : Disorders of Infancy,Childhood & Adolescence ).

Stimulants have been shown to consistently boost achievement (I have the reference for that at the office).

Lastly, there are a series of 3 research studies, covering a 13 year span, that show the use of ANY stimulant can reduce the likelihood of Substance Use Disorder (SUD) by up to 85 %.

I've posted on those in the Forum,as have others.

Please read more on ADHD.

As an adult ADHD and a licensed (clinical/child) psychologist who specializes in ADHD, I can tell you that real/true ADHD is a debilitating disorder,with (research substantiated) RISK FACTORS that carry a high price for not treating it.

Willpower, which is how I (personally ) interpreted your remarks, has nothing to do with it.

I do appreciate your insights though.

If I've misinterpreted your remarks, then I apologize.

Either way, welcome to the Forum.

tc
mctavish23 (Robert)