I was diagnosed with ADHD when I was 19, in December 2016. The point at which it occurred to me that I might have ADHD was when I realised that my exams for the first year of my undergraduate degree were in a couple of weeks time, and that when I glanced at the questions in exam past-papers, I had basically no idea what they meant. This was a familiar feeling - a year earlier, during my A-levels, I took a philosophy exam on John Stuart Mill’s
Before being diagnosed, what were your struggles with reading like? Since starting treatment, in what ways have these improved? You allude to this in your post, but I’m still curious and wonder whether you’d be willing to share further details.
For context, I *might* have ADHD. One of the things I struggle with most is reading, and this is a source of great frustration and pain for me. To elaborate a bit more: I always want to read (I’m intensely curious about most things), usually like having read, and can often appreciate the aesthetic qualities of good writing *when I’m paying attention*, but more often than not the actual act of reading is a slog. I read slowly, despite feeling an urgency to finish; I have difficulty reading for extended periods of time; I have the temptation, to which I too often succumb, even regarding books I find rewarding, to skim or skip through text; I am often bombarded by far too many thoughts an connections related to the text, and while some of these thoughts are useful, they overall prevent me from focusing adequately on the text; often, I have difficulty holding the coherence of the entire text in mind, so much so that I find myself forgetting key details from earlier parts of the text or otherwise needing to reread the earlier portions several times to get the message; and I often find my head hurts or else I have a tired or spacey feeling when I push myself to read.
Are any of these experiences familiar to you pre-medication? If so, how much has medication helped ameliorate or relieve these issues?
Before being diagnosed, what were your struggles with reading like? Since starting treatment, in what ways have these improved? You allude to this in your post, but I’m still curious and wonder whether you’d be willing to share further details.
For context, I *might* have ADHD. One of the things I struggle with most is reading, and this is a source of great frustration and pain for me. To elaborate a bit more: I always want to read (I’m intensely curious about most things), usually like having read, and can often appreciate the aesthetic qualities of good writing *when I’m paying attention*, but more often than not the actual act of reading is a slog. I read slowly, despite feeling an urgency to finish; I have difficulty reading for extended periods of time; I have the temptation, to which I too often succumb, even regarding books I find rewarding, to skim or skip through text; I am often bombarded by far too many thoughts an connections related to the text, and while some of these thoughts are useful, they overall prevent me from focusing adequately on the text; often, I have difficulty holding the coherence of the entire text in mind, so much so that I find myself forgetting key details from earlier parts of the text or otherwise needing to reread the earlier portions several times to get the message; and I often find my head hurts or else I have a tired or spacey feeling when I push myself to read.
Are any of these experiences familiar to you pre-medication? If so, how much has medication helped ameliorate or relieve these issues?