Originally Posted by Dayvan Cowboy

I have ADHD, (I don't know where adhd and add begin) and I have it bad. I just read the wikipedia article on ADHD and it paints a perfect picture of me. I'm easily confused, a little "slow", I can't concentrate and I can be defiant, violent, angry and selfish because of it. I have a billion thoughts racing through my mind at every moment so I tend to slur words and mix up letters with other letters because I'm thinking about two things at the same time. If you've ever tried typing while you were talking at the same time it's a bit like that.

I was made fun of a lot in elementary. I was violent, did awful in school. I am Primarily the Hyperactive type. I act without thinking and fidget a lot and didn't hesitate to blow up when I was angry with something. When I finally found out I had ADHD when I was seven, I was ashamed of myself and thought of myself as some kind of retard incapable of properly functioning. I used to hide the fact that I had to take pills at lunch time. during my elementary school years, I was able to find ways to cope with it and manage it. I had to do behavioral therapy and had and accommodated education plans which made me still feel useless, but I did them anyways because I had no choice, which was for the better. I learned to control my anger and try my hardest to focus.

the hardest part about having adhd was seeing my parents stressed about my school performance. mom brought herself close to tears because of my defiant behavior and I felt awful about it afterwards because I didn't realize what I was doing until afterwards. My parents started believing that I had no sense of guilt and that I was a souless, inhuman brat. This actually led me to being even more ashamed of myself and because of the combination of pills (which can cause depression if you use them extensively) and shame, I became shy, irritable and withdrawn. In the sixth grade I hit a bit of a low point and was put into special ed. MY parents seemed to be even more disappointed in me.

I haven't touched on my focus problems yet. I used to be more interested in drawing dragons and pokemon than schoolwork. I would do my work for one minute and be completely distracted by something else. The slightest sounds would distract me from my work and it made my elementary teachers stop trying with me. they'd send me to a quiet place to do my work and I'd get distracted by something else. they'd put me in the office and I'd get distracted by the posters. they could put me wherever and I'd still not even care about my work.

As you may have noticed, most of my problems were in elementary. I actually managed to calm down quite a bit, and I usually joke about my ADHD and how I can sometimes forget things like my own name and phone number because of it. I no longer take pills because they were giving me heart problems (I had to go on a heart monitor a while back to see if everything was all right) and I ended up being really glum and depressed as a side effect. I still get distracted but I can manage it easier now because I know that there are consequences to my actions that I need to think about before doing something. As an effect of me being ashamed of my condition when I was younger, I still have really low self confidence and I don't really like myself all that much but I like to think that I've made it a long way since the days when I used throw screaming fits if something didn't go my way.

probably didn't help any but whatever. thought I'd post this.