so i guess i really don't have adhd then

[Fuzzy12]

i saw the private adhd specialist today. He too thinks it's highly unlikel that i have adhd. He said now i fit all the symptom but based on my early childhood it seems unlike in particular, he said if i did have adhd I'd never have been a voracious reader as i was as kid, i wouldn't have been able to learn to play an instrument or how to read sheet music. And the fact that I did pass most exams by cramming the night adore that with adhd i wouldn't have been been able to study at all. He said he won't st out adhd but he recommends treating the depression very aggressively. i guess i should be relieved and in a way i am. Now i don't have to worry anymore if she PREGNA worry about any potential Kids inheritating it.

[Luvmybully]

Geeze Fuzzy I don't know what to say right now.

So people with adhd don't read, can't learn to read sheet music, play musical instruments and are unable to pass a test?

Oh my.

[Flory]

awww fuzzy (((hugs))) maybe if you can get this depression under control theyll be able to gain a more accurate impression of your add/adhd type symptoms...its totally sh** but maybe its just one of those horrible hoops you have to jump through im here if you need to chat hun xxx

[ginniebean]

Fuzzy,

I was a voracious reader as a child and as an adult. It seems to me that this is simply a stereotype. Some of us do not fit this mold.

[Spacemaster]

Fuzzy, I was, still am a voracious reader. I would get in trouble as a kid for reading for hours and hours and hours. I am great at reading sheet music, and great at learning new wind instruments. Guess I better go throw my Adderall away then...

Oh, and I paid about 85% of my bills late this month. hmm.

[Lunacie]

Another voracious reader here.

My mom would come to turn off my bedside light at night and find me asleep

with my glasses on and a book open nearly every night.

I still fall asleep reading a book with the light burning half a century later.

It seems ridiculously hard to get diagnosed with ADHD in the UK,

especially for adults.

[mctavish23]

WITHOUT PRACTICING ON THE NET, I'D SAY THAT DIDN'T TELL ME A DAMN

THING.

Just sayin

[MadBodger]

I struggled with reading until Ritalin. Went from well behind to ahead of my grade. Even when I stopped medicating I continued as a voracious reader.

So I get why the Doctor would be skeptical based on that history. I also think it's possible to not be textbook and be able to read. I don't think ADHD necessarily stops someone from being a reader.

IDK man Fuzzy. Don't be afraid to question the diagnoses and seek more opinions if your gut tells you too. But definitely take the Doctor's thoughts seriously.

[crystal8080]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy12

i saw the private adhd specialist today. He too thinks it's highly unlikel that i have adhd. He said now i fit all the symptom but based on my early childhood it seems unlike in particular, he said if i did have adhd I'd never have been a voracious reader as i was as kid, i wouldn't have been able to learn to play an instrument or how to read sheet music. And the fact that I did pass most exams by cramming the night adore that with adhd i wouldn't have been been able to study at all. He said he won't st out adhd but he recommends treating the depression very aggressively. i guess i should be relieved and in a way i am. Now i don't have to worry anymore if she PREGNA worry about any potential Kids inheritating it.

Well, he did not say you DON'T have it. He wants to treat the depressive symptoms cause he thinks its not a clear cut case of ADHD. I'm not sure of his logic, but it sounds like you should ride it out. Either you have depression and no ADHD, depression AND ADHD, or depression FROM ADHD. One thing is for certain, and that is depressive symptoms, so its probably a good place to start. Hang in there Fuzzy, you are going to get through this

[alan1]

I LOVED to read as a kid. I read as much fiction as I could lay my hands on. Texts were another story. If the reading required a lot of brain power that was pure torture. So WHAT you read can make a huge difference.

[Fortune]

Originally Posted by Fuzzy12

i saw the private adhd specialist today. He too thinks it's highly unlikel that i have adhd. He said now i fit all the symptom but based on my early childhood it seems unlike in particular, he said if i did have adhd I'd never have been a voracious reader as i was as kid, i wouldn't have been able to learn to play an instrument or how to read sheet music. And the fact that I did pass most exams by cramming the night adore that with adhd i wouldn't have been been able to study at all. He said he won't st out adhd but he recommends treating the depression very aggressively. i guess i should be relieved and in a way i am. Now i don't have to worry anymore if she PREGNA worry about any potential Kids inheritating it.

Hmm. I am a voracious reader, have learned to play more than one instrument (actually more like four, although I am way out of practice now), and read sheet music.

I have also frequently crammed for all kinds of things at the last minute and managed to pull them off. Not just exams, but fulfilling writing contracts.

While I do not know whether or not you have ADHD, none of those things you listed actually rules it out.

[salleh]

This is a specialist ????????????? how ? ...add in another voracious reader here....been reading 1,000 words a minute since I was a kid ....has no bearing on my ADHD.....actually maye it does....I will often, and have always,, read, rather than do what I am supposed to be doing ....compelled to "see what happened" ....


those are the weirdest reasons to say you don't have ADD....


Are your bill paid on time .??

Do you constantly forget stuff....constantly being the operative word....

how many unfinished projects do you have ?


How well do you deal with buearacy ...( gotta learn to spell that word ) ....ok red tape ? .....taxes fone on time ? ....

how do you feel about heavy traffic ? ...lots of us will go the long way round taking more time ...just to avoid traffic jams,,,,


HOw often do you blurt things out and then think....oh heavens did I say that ????

do you often have your foot in your mouth

how often do you burn dinner, cause something else caught your attention ...

oh there's lots and lots more ....

treat the depression ...true ...but if you have ADD, and I am not real convinced this person knows what they're talking about ....sterotypes.....is what that person is going by ....ADD and it's manifestations have come a long way ....


that;s like saying ...if you didn't bounce off walls when you were a kid ...you don't have it ...


yah right ....

[avjgirsijdhtjhs]

I realize that most, if not the vast majority of this stuff probably isn't new to you. I just hate all the *******ry you and everybody else has to go through. I mean what has more of a chance of hurting the OP and those around her - letting her try a stim, or protecting her and those around her from her getting her evil, grubby little hands on some stims that will end up making the world a worse place with her use of them? I think ******* up the OP's life, and dying an early death from cancer, pulmonary disease, or whatever (I watched this vid three years ago, and I think that like three quarters or so or something into the vid, he mentions or says a little or something about how nicotine works like Methylphenidate (What about electronic cigarettes? I know salleh's got experience with them...)), would probably hurt the OP and those around her super damn ultra ******* bigtime.

text excerpts link, vids are originally from here

Click on the red circled stuff at the bottom for more vids.

Originally Posted by Fuzzy12

And the fact that I did pass most exams by cramming the night adore that with adhd i wouldn't have been been able to study at all.

I'd say "go show him this video", but I wouldn't be surprised if even that failed to convince him to let you try a stim. What about talking to other board members from your country about who they go to? I had never hear of the Maudsley until samson2211 mentioned it, but right now I ran a forum search for it and saw this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wF1YRE8ff1g

Originally Posted by Fuzzy12

he said if i did have adhd I'd never have been a voracious reader as i was as kid

Page 25:

This is the definition of an emotion in psychology: It’s a motivational state. If you can’t internalize
emotion, you can’t internalize motivation. The third executive function is the source of intrinsic
motivation. Let me give you a few words that laypeople use for intrinsic motivation: persistence,
determination, ambition, drive, willpower. AD/HD children are not inattentive; they’re impersistent.
AD/HD children don’t have an attention deficit; they have a motivation deficit. And the motivation
deficit is an intrinsic motivation. They cannot generate the [internalized] motivation to get to the
future. All future-directed behavior, all goal-directed behavior, all planned, thoughtful behavior requires
intrinsic motivation. Why is that? Because the future hasn’t happened yet. How can it motivate you?
You have to generate the motivation yourself. And if you can’t do this, you will not get to your goals,
finish your projects, follow through on things, pay attention when things are boring. You will not be
able to persist.
Now notice what this tells you. AD/HD individuals do not have difficulty when the motivation is
provided in the environment. As long as you reward them for everything they do, they will do it. The
problem they have is when there’s no reinforcement. And what’s a classic example of tasks that do not
involve reinforcement? Schoolwork. Homework. Now you know why they can play Nintendo but not
do their homework. Nintendo provides the motivation, the immediate consequences for everything
you do. Homework does nothing. It just lays there. Solve a problem, no bells, no whistles, no coins,
no flags, no sound effects, nothing, that’s it. Problem solved, right? To do homework you must have
intrinsic motivation. To play Nintendo, you don’t.
So now you know why they can’t persist. Why they have a motivation deficit. One last thing, by the
way. Part of motivation is level of arousal, which means they can’t regulate arousal either. It may be
why they fall asleep, get bored, fade out in boring situations.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3VuV5Jvazs

Nice page 27 quote when he's talking about motivation:

So AD/HD is a disorder of doing what you know, not of knowing what to do. It’s a disorder of
performance

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Page 22:

Finally, the third kind of inhibition develops. We call it interference control. When you are engaged in
thinking, when you are using your executive functions, when you are using these private behaviors
to yourself, you have to protect them from being disrupted from the environment. And if you can’t
do that, it will destroy your thinking. It will disrupt your executive functioning. It will destroy your
ability to manage yourself. This tells us that people with AD/HD are not distractible all the time under
all conditions by everything, but that distractions will only hurt them when executive functioning is
needed in that task. When thinking is needed. When planful, thoughtful behavior is crucial, distractions
will devastate them. But as long as they’re doing things that don’t involve executive functioning,
distractions will not hurt them any more than anybody else. This is why they can play Nintendo for
hours but you put them at homework where executive functioning is crucial and distractions will
destroy them.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Working memory related (well, that's an assumption on my part), and elaborating complex stuff (page 26):

But then why is it when you ask them a question about homework, they don’t generate anywhere near
as much language as other children? Because the fourth executive function is delayed; they cannot
put their ideas together quickly into a sequence to explain what they read, and so they will appear
disfluent, and you will see three things that are fascinating about AD/HD. First, you will find they don’t
generate as much language as other people when asked a question. Second, you will find that they
mention only concrete specifics and miss the overarching theme of the assignment. And third, they will
get the items out of sequence. They will get the temporal order wrong. We have only started to look at
this, but the first three studies have demonstrated that is exactly what you see from AD/HD individuals.
There is one treatment that will normalize that system. It is stimulant medication. It will normalize it for
55 percent of all AD/HD children. It will improve it for 80-92 percent. Stimulant medication doesn’t
just make you less hyperactive, it also improves your executive functions.
So the children on stimulant medication, if it is effective, will have a better working memory system,
a better sense of the past, a better sense of the future, will be able to talk to themselves and their
speech will become instantly internalized. They will not need your tokens and motivation as much
as they need it off their medication because they can motivate themselves. You should see them
become more verbally fluent, their handwriting should improve, they should organize their thoughts
better, and they should be fully capable of explaining their homework assignment on medication. Stop
the medication, these all go back to being impaired, because these are not the problem. That’s the
problem; these are secondary.

[sarahsweets]

Fuzzy, the answers hes giving you make no sense! can you see somone else?

[samson2211]

Actually you do not have to be diagnosed as a child to be accepted for a referral to the Maudsley. Go to the actual website and it will say this. However, it is a difficult and drawn out process to get there. From the date of writing to my GP, being referred to a psychiatrist (who knew nothing about ADHD and still, with me as a guinea-pig, has the most frustrating assumptions about ADHD but who has been very supportive), being assessed by him, the psychiatrist then applying for funding, and then waiting for the Maudsley to agree to seeing me, it has taken 13 months. I have only just received the questionnaire which seems to contain all the usual DSM IV criteria nonsense, and need to actually book the appointment which I am terrified of doing. It feels like the end of the road. I have nothing, no money, no job or employment history, no relationship. This is it for me - and yet life will go on regardless.

I really don't understand your private psychiatrist's thoughts about reading and music playing - in all the books I've looked at on the subject they bang on about how accomplished some ADHDers can be, how many love books etc., and how the more intelligent ones can compensate to varying degrees for their problems, but at great cost and until they hit the wall, and for some that may not be until adulthood. For instance, Sari Solden's book and anything by Kathleen Nadeau and Patricia Quinn. If all this information is out there I really don't understand why so many psychiatrists cling to the old preconceived notions about ADHD. My worry when I looked at the Sari Solden book was that I seemed so much worse than the examples she gives (I was envious of some of her case studies) - my life has been a disaster from birth and yet I got into one of the best universities in the country, which was also a disaster - but I'm still scared that the ability to get into university is all someone will see. I got some of the worse mock A-Level results in my year, begged my teachers to give me good prediction grades, joined a lot of activities I never participated in to look good on my application, couldn't revise for my exams (gained 2 stone and wandered around the house instead), my class notes were just piles and piles of random stuff littered everwhere (I couldn't have revised even if I had wanted to and for some reason, nothing ever made me want to), was given extra time in my exams, and had the most gentle university interview ever. And still I'm afraid that this won't matter. I don't do anything - I'm just ideas, ideas, idea - but no cognitive energy to actually DO anything and I have been this way from my earliest memories - I've always known something was very wrong with me, and with other family members.

As for reading, I have bought 100s of beautiful books, excited by the thought of reading them, I've admired the book covers, read a few lines of blurb, and them dumped them on the floor with all the rest. If I ever, ever read anything, it usually has to be a crime novel. Anything factual sends me to sleep - this makes me feel like I'm not interested in anything. When I try to engage in absoluetly anything my brain switches off, or feels like it's climbing the walls - it's either a fog or a flea circus up there, usually a foggy flea circus in extremis. As for music, I was told I had natural ability, which makes me laugh. Grade 1 for piano and then flute, didn't practice for either, could never remember what key meant what note, can't remember the lyrics to any music despite having spent my youth married to my Sony Walkman. My piano teacher said she had never met anyone like me - she was the most fidgety, *****y woman ever and I'd sit next to her like a daydreaming Care Bear, although overall I'm much more like the offspring of a Care Bear and a wearwolf. God I've rambled. Sorry!