How does ADD/ADHD impact you?

@GrahZeymahzin

The biggest impact it has had on me personally is the stress of always being on your guard, not knowing when you'll do something impulsive or suddenly forget what you're doing or what you're talking about and risk embarrassing yourself.

I suppose that a bigger could have been the exhaustion of simple tasks taking forever to complete, but I've managed to hide from them best I can, lol.

Addition: Ironically, while the impulsivity is what has held me back from a lot of things through fear of repeating old mistakes, it's what gets things done, for example me even responding to this thread, it's not like me to write on the forums but I saw the topic and suddenly here I am posting. (Trying to remember what more I wanted to write but the thoughts just escape me, too many at once and then suddenly there are none of them left). - Taking on too much, feeling the guilt and failure, especially in failing others. Trying to find a balance between intensity and calm, so that you're not overwhelmed but still engaged enough to not drift off.

@GrahZeymahzin I only found out I have ADHD this year, so I haven't even discovered the full scope of impact. So far, I feel more sad than relieved (though relief is definitely present!) upon finding out all the little ways it has impacted my life. The most recent being communication failures. I often misinterpret things and miss out on bits of what the other person is saying. I forget my thoughts and I find myself interrupting a lot. This causes a lot of frustration for the other person as well as myself when I just can't seem to organize my thoughts and at times, a natural flow of conversation feels impossible. I'm still mourning over the end of relationship this summer where the other person failed to feel a connection with me. When asked when that was most felt, the response was "in conversation". It's not at all the first time I've heard this in my relationships and I find it really devastating. In the past, I've heard things along the lines of "you don't seem all there when we speak" and "I feel like I don't really know you...you hardly talk." I don't know how to improve it, and the more I hear things like this, the less I want to have conversations with people. I feel completely paralyzed sometimes. I find so little information on ADHD and communication problems. (Compared to the usual symptoms of lack of focus, inattentiveness, hyperactivity, and impulsivity at least...)

I get more nerveus sinc ive been bullied my whole life for being the kid that cant sit still. Every day im fear for my life. Not knowing if im gonna get beat up or stabbed cause people think im a freak

I was just recently diagnosed by my LCSW, and I have yet to go to the doctor to see about my options (whether I'm going to take meds or find another way to cope). I haven't really gotten the full scope of how ADHD has impacted me yet, but after seeing some symptoms, I immediately recognized that as something that I've almost always, or always, have had problems with...

-if I get control of the conversation, I could talk forever about what just seems like random things. It's usually socially that this happens, and I sometimes end up oversharing in those situations. But I remember one time in a class in college I was talking too much and I could see the entire class was getting bored or irritated, but I literally couldn't stop myself. It was really embarrassing. I just always feel the need to have to get everything out before somebody interrupts me and I lose what I was going to say. Unfortunately, that also means that I spill out any thoughts I have after that original thought, and I end up rambling.

-I have A LOT of problems listening to people when they're talking. I have always found myself having to force myself to focus on what they're saying instead of the thoughts racing through my head. Even then, I sometimes have problems processing what they're actually saying because I'm focusing too much on the words. I've always been fairly good at hiding it though, so if you asked anybody, they wouldn't know I've had that problem.

-At work, I've been having a HORRIBLE problem with not getting work done because a lot of my work is done on/with a computer, and so I have access to the internet. You can imagine how bad that is... I end up looking up the most random things that I think of because I'm curious, then it spirals because I see something else I'm interested in or curious about. It's a really bad habit that I'm trying to break, but have been unsuccessful so far.

-I get SUPER bored REALLY easily with things. Like work. My last job before this I only worked there for about 3 months, but I was tired of it by the end of 2. This job is the longest job I've had (I've worked here a little over a year), but I was starting to get bored about 6 months ago. Granted, it's not in my field of choice (although some aspects of it are), so that doesn't really help with staying interested. But I'm super afraid that, even if I find a job in my field that I love, I'm going to get bored of it quickly and then it will develop into a cycle that I won't be able to break and I'll never find any satisfaction in a job. I've also gotten interested in a bunch of hobbies, but I almost immediately get bored with it.

-I'm horribly disorganized with everything, and I have a lot of problems prioritizing things. Even though I know that Thing A is more important than Thing B, if Thing B is more interesting and I really want it, I'll more than likely go with Thing B, then get stressed about not going with Thing A.

-Although I've always loved reading, I've noticed recently (even before my diagnoses) that I have a lot of trouble focusing on words or skipping ahead or just not processing what I had just "read." It's incredibly frustrating when I want to get through a book or story.

-I've never been the "hyperactive" one, even when I was little (I don't think anyway), but I've always felt as though I'm bottling up a ton of energy. It's gotten worse over the past few years since I quite softball, and I don't know any other way to release my energy. I've tried running and biking and more recently roller skating (I broke my ankle my second day out, so I'm still recovering), but running sucks and I can't afford my own bike right now (my mom won't let me use her bike anymore, even though she doesn't use it, ugh...whatever). I've tried going to the gym too, but that's more of a building good habits type of thing.

-The weird thing is though, even though I feel a ton of energy inside of me, I almost always feel tired. Part of that is because I almost avoid going to sleep at night, or I just have bad habits that prevent me from going to sleep at a decent time. Another part of that I think is because I'm out of shape and overweight. I've always had a sport to keep me in shape, but I depended on that too much and now I don't know how to motivate myself to just go exercise. When I see my aunts dogs or my toddler cousins, they always have so much energy and I never feel like I want to play with them. I mean, I do. I love playing with them and spending time with them, but I can't exert the energy in order to keep up. I don't know if that makes sense or not, but that's the best way I could put it lol.

Soooo yeah. I understand not all of that is necessarily directly from ADHD, but they're just things I noticed.