My brain never shuts off/I might have undiagnosed ADHD

@sissy15 (12290)
United States
June 19, 2023 11:45pm CST
Growing up I found concentrating difficult at times but I don't think I ever thought that I might have ADHD. I learned how to concentrate and found I genuinely loved learning which is what ultimately helped me focus. That said my brain never shuts off. I'm always thinking. I don't just think about the mundane everyday things. I think about life, I think about people, I think about our purpose, I think about why things are the way they are, and I think about my past, present, and future. My brain just jumps from one subject to the next and I have a difficult time turning it off. I think deeply about a lot of things. Maybe one of the reasons my posts are always so long is because my brain doesn't shut off. I can't just talk about what I ate for lunch. That's not exactly how my brain works. I think about the complexities of life and the how and why behind things. I love researching things and learning about things. I read a lot of nonfiction books and when I do read fiction books they're often about things that could happen in real life even if it is pushing on the edge of reality at times. I don't care much for the fantasy genre. I have never been one who enjoys remaining curious I look for answers. During my break, I've been reading a lot. I read three books in a week. I would have read more but I ran out of books. I need to go back to the library. My brain never shuts off so I find that reading a book I enjoy helps shut out everything else and it's nice not to be in my own thoughts sometimes. My husband often gets annoyed with me thinking I'm purposely ignoring him but I don't. I can't seem to turn off my thoughts and I get lost in them. It's tough sometimes trying to stay in the here and now at times especially when there's something that sparks my thought process. I can usually control it but I can't always. My husband and I have two very different brain types. My husband is super handy. which I am not. I am more introspective and book-smart but I am horrible with being hands-on. I can be creative depending on what it is but as a whole, I'm not super creative. He just doesn't understand why I am the way I am at times probably the same way I can't always understand why he can't write down how he feels. I don't understand not being able to decipher your feelings and write them down because that's always been something I could do probably because my brain is always moving and the only way to keep up is to write it down. My mind is a lot like the book "If You Give A Mouse A Cookie" where the mouse keeps being sidetracked because he goes to do one thing but then that reminds him of something else and that's kind of how my brain works. It doesn't always make sense to other people around me because they aren't in my head but it all links up somewhere. My mind thinks at a very fast pace and I just don't know how to turn it off sometimes. My son is a lot like me. HIs one teacher told me that my son is always thinking and I could immediately relate whereas my husband's oldest son is like my husband and is very hands-on making something out of nothing. It's interesting to see how different people's minds work. I don't know how to shut off my mind a lot of the time which makes me seem as though I am not paying attention or don't care but it has nothing to do with that as much as my brain just wanders. If I were a kid today they probably would have diagnosed me with ADHD but back when I was a kid it was being diagnosed mostly by how boys brains worked. Since I was doing well in a lot of areas they didn't consider it. As a kid, I struggled a lot but ultimately wasn't doing bad enough for them to be concerned and I learned to cope on my own in my late teen years and did well in school so they never suspected anything was wrong and they've found there are probably a lot of women that weren't diagnosed with it despite probably having it because we seem to handle things differently than boys and seem to be able to cope with it better. I've talked to a lot of women who all seem to share similar traits with me but weren't diagnosed with it despite having all of the symptoms as a person with ADHD by today's standards.
2 people like this
3 responses
@rsa101 (38166)
• Philippines
21 Jun 23
I know most with ADHD are really quick thinkers though they lack the ability to focus on something their minds go from one thing to another they also absorb things around them unconsciously which is an amazing talent. My wife would tell me stories about rowdy kids in her class but still excels and absorbs even though he is inattentive in class.
@rsa101 (38166)
• Philippines
21 Jun 23
@sissy15 But I know ADHD has a behavioral characteristic to be defiant at times and rowdy at times. I do not think you are like that or maybe it is different for females as I see it as common among males.
1 person likes this
@sissy15 (12290)
• United States
21 Jun 23
@rsa101 ADHD symptoms are different in everyone and females present symptoms much differently than men. That is much more common in men with ADHD. My husband is like that at times and he was diagnosed with ADHD as a kid. It's one of the main reasons so many women weren't diagnosed with ADHD as children because they presented differently than men and seem to function better than men with it. That said it used to be classified differently too as ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder) and ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) for those that struggled with hyperactivity but later they figured out that they were the same thing it's just that it presented differently in some than others. Men are much more likely to be hyper than women with it. Some people have every symptom listed in the "what to look for" category and others only have a small handful of them. I have some but not all of the symptoms listed for women. I am definitely not hyper nor am I defiant. I did well behaviorally as a child which is part of why they never considered I may have it. My son was super hyper when he was little but not as a preteen. We never got him diagnosed but were told he had all the major symptoms if we'd like to proceed and have him diagnosed in order to get him on an IEP for school which is more in-depth than the 504 he has now. It would get him more assistance but we felt the 504 was working just fine for him. My son can have defiant moments but isn't defiant as a whole. When he was little he was extremely defiant at times. Some people grow out of it with age.
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@sissy15 (12290)
• United States
21 Jun 23
It seems it can be both a superpower and the one thing that can make things impossible at times. I know I have a lot of focus issues and my brain is always going from one thing to the next. Concentration really depends if I'm interested in it. I struggled for a long time with math in school because I found it boring and I just couldn't seem to pay attention but eventually, they had someone work one on one with me and I found when I actually understood it was interesting. As I type this my brain is literally moving at a mile a minute I actually stopped typing for a minute to find a song I couldn't remember the name of. It takes me a while to write because trying to focus on a topic is difficult and sometimes as you can tell it shows in my writing. One thing leads to another and at the end, I'm not always writing about what I started writing about because my brain diverges in a different direction. I can usually make it make sense when I'm writing but I can't do that when I'm talking.
1 person likes this
• United States
20 Jun 23
With all due respect to you, I don't think this is ADHD. I suffer from the exact same problem - my brain never shuts off and on other sites my forum posts have run ridiculously long. I think that being able to write and read a long forum post is not evidence of a short attention span, but rather the exact opposite - you have a longer attention span than most. Which is good in this interconnected world. I tend to hate interruptions and keep my phone notifications turned off. My long focus and my desire to stay focused on one thing for hours is an asset, not a hinderance. It's common among female human beings, and it's a gift. However, I am not a formally trained psychologist or psychiatrist, so I suggest talking to one if you think you have a mental illness.
@sissy15 (12290)
• United States
20 Jun 23
Considering I can only really focus on things I find fascinating like learning new things that I'm interested in I would say ADHD because people with it can focus but it has to be on something they find interesting which they then hyper focus. I'm not really concerned by it but it clarified things when I read the symptoms of ADHD in women and I fit into most of those categories. ADHD doesn't mean you can't focus at all just that it can be harder depending on the situation.
1 person likes this
@DaddyEvil (137257)
• United States
20 Jun 23
@laser_vision You're welcome. I hope you enjoy the site and the people you find here.
1 person likes this
• United States
20 Jun 23
@DaddyEvil Thank you, this is useful information that I shall refer to frequently. It's important to know the rules of online forums and keep track of them while posting.
1 person likes this
@AmbiePam (92524)
• United States
20 Jun 23
Are you feeling like you need to do something about it, or are you just explaining how you feel, and are content with how things are? Because if you're looking to find ways to change things for yourself, it doesn't always have to be medicine. I'm not suggesting you need ANYthing, but I just wondered if you thought you did. Personally, from what you have mentioned about your husband's perfectionist tendencies, I'd be more apt to think he needs help with how his brain works, not you. And I don't mean to be offensive; what you have told us I just find discouraging for you, although he's a good man by your report. You do sound like you have ADHD. My dad has it, but was never diagnosed. He's managed to not let it affect him, but I'm sure it is difficult.
@sissy15 (12290)
• United States
20 Jun 23
Just explaining I'm not a meds person unless it's absolutely necessary. I've learned to go this long with nothing so I'm not too concerned at this point. My husband was diagnosed with ADHD as a kid and he is also bipolar and has some PTSD from a rough childhood it's all stuff he has worked on over the years. He lacks patience and can be easy to anger at times. He definitely has been a work in progress. He has come a long way over the years though. I'm pretty mellow and laid back for the most part. We are polar opposites in personality sometimes. Sometimes we even each other out. He can be a lot and I won't lie and say he is easy to live with but he is a good guy. Despite being easy to anger at times he isn't a violent person and he has been working on controlling his anger more. He will just pick up an attitude at times or snap at me when he loses patience with something.
1 person likes this
@AmbiePam (92524)
• United States
20 Jun 23
@sissy15 I never want to downplay anyone’s difficulties, but you really don’t sound like you need anything “fixed” about you. You are doing well for yourself.
@sissy15 (12290)
• United States
20 Jun 23
@AmbiePam Thank you. I wouldn't say there's nothing about me that needs fixed because I also have anxiety and mild depression on top of a brain that wants to do its own thing but that said I'm not really looking for a fix just out here living my life the best I can and self coping which when I was seeing a therapist I was told I did really well with that because I had been doing it for longer than I can remember but it's just interesting to learn that I may have had ADHD most of my life without even realizing it. It was tougher when I was younger but now it's just me and I'm used to it and it can be amazing when it comes to honing in on things I enjoy up until I need to focus on things I don't lol.
1 person likes this