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Post by mighty on Aug 25, 2012 9:49:57 GMT
Hello Question for those who've been dx'd as adults. Why do you think you weren't as a child? I'm guessing some of you were pretty smart at school or well behaved despite not listening, or perhaps things were picked up but teachers didn't recommend drs or parents refused to take you, or symptoms were more favourable in childhood? Curious
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 25, 2012 10:40:04 GMT
I had god knows how many symptoms but the school was happy as long as the exam results were good, didn't matter that my school life was hell, I had no friends and was a social pariah and laughing stock. Fucking catholic schools.
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Post by dishwasher on Aug 25, 2012 12:50:17 GMT
It was more convenient for my school 'teachers' to label me as either stupid or autistic (which Im not). This justified ignoring the fact that the school was the cause of most of my problems and not the solution it claimed to be. It also allowed them to deny me any control over my life.
A reason people dont get diagnosed is that it takes someone who genuinely wants to help them making some (but not much) effort and there are a lot of vested interests in preventing ADDers from having the rights that all kids (and most adults) deserve. If any autistic people read this please dont think that I look down on autistic people but the 2 conditions are very different and being falsely labelled autistic can be devastating.
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Post by random on Aug 25, 2012 13:44:30 GMT
Because it wasn't known about when I was at school. And I did moderately well in short bursts. .Did well in exams in subjects I liked and hopelessly otherwise
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 25, 2012 14:47:16 GMT
Just a point for dishwasher. Autism and ADHD are extremely similar in their diagnostic criteria. Not very different at all. I was classified as different at school. I excelled right up to the point of starting secondary school, where more onus was put on the pupil to organise themselves. It went downhill from there. In the final year at school, I only went around 3 days a week, as I could find plenty of more fulfilling things to do elsewhere. I did most of my coursework in the last 2 days before it was due in. I went from being "gifted" (I hate being called that).To scraping through with 4 gcse,D grades and 3 B grades. Not that anyone has ever asked me at a job interview. Am I bitter that it wasn't discovered that I had ADHD whilst at school? Yes, a bit. My life hasn't been too bad, considering what I had to work with. And without ADHD, I would not be where I am today. Sorry,I got sidetracked there.
John
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Post by dishwasher on Aug 25, 2012 16:01:36 GMT
The superficial 'symptoms' of social problems etc. are similar but the causes of them are very different. I avoided eye contact with people who were making my life a misery or because I was depressed. I have no problem with eye contact in healthy situations. I gave out negative vibes to people who annoyed me by treating me like an idiot or who bullied me, not because I was unable to read their facial expressions or realise that they were trying to help me. There are diagnostic criteria used by specialist doctors (if you avoid the criminals who are sadly still respected 'professionals'). These include a detailed description from the patient of the way that s/he thinks, problems s/he has etc, carefully designed questions and tests and objective consideration of the evidence. The criteria for a ‘diagnosis’ of autism at a lot of schools are that a pupil doesn’t fit in or act in the way that teachers want him/her to.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 25, 2012 19:02:01 GMT
I have an eidetic memory, and I'm also very high-achieving when it's something that comes to me easily. I guess that, between those two, I did well enough for no one to think I was struggling - I did pretty well in exams, just not as well as teachers expected if it was a subject that wasn't a "naturally" easy one to me. I got decent grades in subjects I could not understand at all, just because it was easy to memorise enough of my notes to pass. I've also been very good at only having to do stuff I'm good at, so unless anyone lives with me or spends a lot of time with me, they won't see my generally disasterous nature!
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lisablue
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Post by lisablue on Aug 25, 2012 19:38:19 GMT
hiya,
I was a disaster in school!! I am 43 and fortunately my mum had kept an old school report from when I was 11. Every single subject teacher reported that I was either a chatterbox, easily distracted, often losing work etc etc.
An important note. despite popular opinion, ADHD is UNDERdiagnosed in the UK and over-diagnosed in the USA...and this is recent statistics! Take it back to when I was young....no chance!
Also, having a lad with ADD, ASD and DCD it took me til he was 7 for the 'health authorities' to acknowledge and treat his disorders and til he was.....wait for it....13 before he was allowed to attend an 'independent' school funded by the education authorities!
I would say....sorrily so....it is due to lack of funding this lovely country gives to developmental disorders. To acknowledge it is to have the duty to fund it! It's no easier now for those attending mainstream...IEP's have a lot to answer to!
I could go on and on regards this subject but will stop short there :-)
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bobjones
Member posts quite a bit
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Post by bobjones on Aug 26, 2012 23:53:42 GMT
Being intelligent and a fairly good long term memory. If I had problems I played the fool or hid or played dumb.
I managed to get a mediocre set of qualifications (GCSE to BSc) without doing much work at all!
Although I am about to be kicked of my current MSc course for not getting any work done, only one of my modules contained content I wasn't able to understand (but that was mainly due to a poor understanding of the mathematical notation and missing half the lectures!).
Getting diagnosed a year earlier would have been brilliant, 20 years earlier, even better!
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