Chapter 33 My AuDHD Story Part 4: my thirties & early 40s

[@mdawnt1]

Thank you for putting into words what so many of us who are late diagnosed experience.

[@amineurodivergent]

Thank you for commenting. Just hearing from others that they experienced much of all this too feels .. not great obviously because we all seem to have gone through a similar version of what was really quite a shi**y internal experience at times .. but great in that it wasn't just a thing we all went through alone, and great that the more the awareness of this increases that hopefully less of us will have to go through in the future.

[@neridafarrer4633]

I'm a newly diagnosed AuDHDer. I'm getting a lot out of you sharing your story. Im a 50 yr old, mother of 7 "twice exceptional" artistic , musical, peer support Autistic (actually ASD2 due to trauma and neglect) ADHD combined type AuDHDer. I'm really grateful to you for sharing. Getting my head around my diagnosis of less than 2 months

[@amineurodivergent]

It's gonna be a journey! Thanks for sharing, and for watching my vids. This one was another rough one to get through but done enough of bottling it all up at this point. I hope you're feeling great about the new self-knowledge right now, there can certainly be some ups and downs.

[@Marc-lx1qj]

53 and after a 3 year NHS wait have just got the letter for a diagnosis apppontment. Sad from researching and self diagnosis that I now know why the last 50 years have been a struggle and wasted but hope to now have an easier ride to the end.

[@amineurodivergent]

Think of it as having got OFF the presumed straight-line and uncomfortable ride to the end, with an unexpected opportunity for a second ride you never even knew existed. A second ride that could go anywhere you point it. That mindset's getting me through right now.

[@clairedot657]

These are my favourite videos on KZbin at the moment.

[@amineurodivergent]

Thanks!

[@autumnpendergast9151]

Me too!

[@homesteadgamer1257]

"I've kind of sleepwalked through much of my life, ridiculously trying to be happy by trying to make the world happy with me, using entirely the wrong operating manual." 😩 This is exactly how it feels. It's like almost everyone else got handed a completely different manual for how to live life.

[@donatiennebrasseur5025]

Hear, hear! different universe, same story... thanks for putting words to it

[@dutchgirldreams4726]

Thank you for creating these videos. I find them to be super helpful. You have a wonderful way of sharing many of the same things that I am feeling but don't yet have the words to express. I'm at the tail end of my assessment process and will likely be diagnosed AuDHD as well. The last 10 minutes were particularly valuable to hear, I was thinking - yes exactly! I'm 51 and happy to have finally figured it out but also really angry that no one else even considered this as an option.

[@amineurodivergent]

Yeah, I'm struggling a bit again with the anger and grief at the moment. You can think you're in a better place and then it floors you a bit again. It's a process and you can't necessarily guide it, I guess, just observe it and listen to it and be in it if it's telling you that's what's needed, until it's not. We'll get there!

[@toaojjc]

Thank you again for sharing your experience. Makes me see some of my own experiences in a new light. And Happy Hollidays!

[@amineurodivergent]

Thanks - and to you are yours!

[@McSquiggins204]

"Trying to be happy by trying to make the world happy with me..." The source of so much trauma, paralysed by fight/flight and constantly triggered every day. Our stories do seem to link in some ways. The work contexts, the consulting thing, the Masters degree, the late nights/allnighters, the perfectionism, inertia, the chasm between outside appearance in inward perception. The thing that looks easy fuelled by the hating, and the anger and the drowning and the sense that there was something I just wasn't getting that others did. Another incredibly powerful video. You articulate those AuDHD contradictions so very very well. Please take care and we'll see you when we see you :)

[@amineurodivergent]

Thank you very much. Take care of yourself too over this period.

[@blamedthegnome]

Thank you so much for these videos. I'm struggling for words a little today, but please know that you sharing your thoughts and experiences has been very helpful and validating to me. I'm looking forward to your video on rediscovering values as that's something I've been contemplating myself recently.

[@amineurodivergent]

Thanks for the nice feedback, and you're very welcome. It'll be into the new year before I do the rediscovering values one, as it's one I want to give a lot of thought to. Cheers and all the best to you on your own journey!

[@elenayaganova9796]

It's all soooo painfully recognizable. I've got myself on a waiting list for a diagnosis. You videos helped me take this step. Thank you! 🙏

[@AncTreat5358]

Thanks for an excellent recap video! The two narratives approach you followed really helped better understand myself. One thing I could identify with in particular was doing well and getting promoted, only to feel out of my depth and a sense of overwhelm. One thing I struggle with is that I test highly for AuDHD, but a neuropsychologist tested me somewhat for ADHD, and said I did not fit the profile. But then again, this was before my autism identification.

[@chillwinstonuk]

I'm so grateful that today I found your videos brother. Firstly so much respect to you for putting yourself out there and sharing so honestly and in so much detail. Your videos will have had, and will continue to have, such a huge impact on AuDHD adults. Thank you. Keep up the brilliant work. Another late diagnosed ADHD man here (pending ASD assessment and diagnosis). Something I find particularly interesting is the common experience of those who receive their ADHD diagnosis first, and then treatment (meds). I hear so often from friends and others saying "Once I had a bit more of a handle and understanding of my ADHD self, another part popped up it's head and quite loudly, this part being my autistic part"

[@amineurodivergent]

Thanks for your comments, I've had moments where I've thought I've been too "over-sharey" and should maybe delete these super personal videos, but comments like this help me keep them up online. Thanks again and good luck on your own path.

[@idontwannapickanametho]

"why is diagnosis important if a person is coping?" Because "coping" is usually only true externally. We're managing to look okay while being anything but.

[@InTheOpines]

This series has been such a roller coaster but also very helpful to listen to. There's been a variety of things I've learned from and related to in your words, I wouldn't even know where to start, but I do want to say thank you.

[@amineurodivergent]

Thank you!

[@alejandro-314]

I've been in the same situation of faking working to my partner. When I moved from South America to Europe, the only job I could find was as a door-to-door salesman. Can't think of a worst job for an undiagnosed autistic. Every morning I got suited up, take the bus and simply expend all day in any square or park that I found along the way. I was sitting all day, no drinking or eating anything. It was such a big change moving to another country. After that, I've found myself going to burnout stage every 3 years or so. Needing to change job to reset "my personality" (didn't know what masking was). I every time I've changed job I've thought "I can't hold on to this new personality I created, next time I need to be less extroverted or more whatever". So I changed jobs, and in every iteration finding a more sustainable mask. Until in one of those iterations I couldn't keep going anymore. Edit: this is way too relatable "AuDHDers are good at rationalizing and justifying the coping reactions". Been doing this my whole life. When I was living in South America I always thought "I feel so alien here because my family is from Europe, hence it must be a cultural thing". Then I moved to Europe and I was still feeling like an alien in another planet. I'm finding these videos focused on your personal experience and life story really emotional. I'm usually completely blank regarding externalizing emotions, but I'm tearing tears right now. It's like someone else is telling me the story of my life. It's also a relief to know there are people with similar experiences. Thanks again for sharing!

[@amineurodivergent]

You're very welcome - thanks for sharing some of your experiences, the door to door sales and just sitting all day unable to push yourself through something that is inauthentic to you, as well as the need to constantly 'reset' your personality and iterate it until you finally get it right is also very relatable to me. It makes me quite sad/ angry still that so many of us seem to have gone through such similar, soul-destroying journeys before finding out the 'why'; it makes me sadder still that so many others are going through it unknowingly as we speak and still feeling themselves to be an alien in this world that needs to be somehow 'corrected'. The message that we're all ok, all of us, needs to be screamed from mountaintops.

[@aeorling]

Cheers, mate. Whatever you want to share, whenever you want to share it. Here for it. :)

[@amineurodivergent]

Thanks for watching

[@AsAmsterdam]

I really relate to this, hot coal in hand. Thank you for talking about your experience. It’s helpful.

[@janhillier2463]

Thank you for these last videos, I have just caught up. So grateful to you for being so generous in sharing your experiences in order to help others. You are making a difference in the world no doubt about that. I hope they are cathartic too and that your anger lessens with the sharing or at least is instrumental in the change that is happening for this generation. I share your frustration with the lather, rinse, repeat, ad infinitum scenario because there was no one to recognise the pattern and understand the reasons. At least for me retirement is providing a respite from needing to conform to a “proper working life” It doesn’t stop me from judging myself however ,even if it is my ability to perform the role of a typical nanny Beating ourselves up for not being normal is still a work in progress for me…

[@amineurodivergent]

As it is for many of us. Thanks for sharing your experiences.

[@kmcq692]

16:56 wholly Mac corral! Yup. I was so happy to get in at my institution. No structure and massive expectations. Ugh.

[@homesteadgamer1257]

The people who ask why we need a diagnosis so late in life have never had to mask their entire lives. They don't know how painful and exhausting and lonely life has been.

[@homesteadgamer1257]

48:21 Exactly. I feel cheated, almost betrayed.

[@StarShade-l7q]

Ok so first, high five to your partner. That was a lot and I honestly dont know of my partner would still be around after all that. Second maybe I got lucky as a 18yr old when i stumbled into Zen Buddhist ideas i think the idea that a lot of pain comes from holding onto our expectation when actual experience is different and meditation in general helped more than i could have known. Finally as much distress as UPS brings me in some ways I think its probably been a net positive for my AuDHD brain when it comes to burnout etc.

[@amineurodivergent]

Yeah, these last few months have not been easy on that front and things definitely broke a little. Work in progress.

[@StarShade-l7q]

@@amineurodivergent when things break, we put them back together like Kintsugi. :)

[@Barkentin]

🤗❤