The last dream, this time, for the last time.

(A small continuation)

(GEEZ I DID IT)

Family portrait?

The final chapter is out :) Lemme kno what u think!! Happy Giramie week once again :P

having a manic episode today wheeeeee

actually got shit done tho which is nice

I SIRVIVED THE DENTIST B))))

gotta do math work !! then i get to play roblox !!!

i hit those 50k for camp nano for the first time ever 😭😭

god I would be UNSTOPPABLE if I was capable of consistently initiating tasks. just you wait. you'll be waiting a while but just you wait

The other day I told a friend of mine that I never forget to take my ADHD meds because I fucking love my ADHD meds. I'm in my late 30s, I didn't finally get a diagnosis and meds until less than two years ago, and they have changed my entire life.

And he raised his eyebrow at me. We'd been discussing addictive medications a few minutes before, like the Tramadol I finally got from the pain specialist to take once a week or so to give me a break from my chronic pain, so I reassured him that methylpenidate (Ritalin/Concerta) is not addictive (at least not in people with ADHD).

His response? To raise his eyebrow even harder and say "Well it sure SOUNDS like it's addictive!"

And I had to explain to this man - who works in a healthcare related job by the way - that just because medication makes you feel good and helps you, just because you look forward to taking it, that doesn't make it addictive or dangerous. And he wasn't convinced.

The simple fact that I was excited to take a daily pill that has literally changed my life, after decades of fighting to get that medication, made him think I shouldn't be taking it so often. That it must inherently be dangerous.

I'm not even in America, but I'm pretty sure this attitude began there and then spread over here to Europe. This Puritan idea of "if something feels good, you must beware of it. Pleasure is dangerous, it is sinful, it is addiction, it is evil."

I know too many people who subconsciously believe that pleasure = addictive = dangerous = bad. Joy is a slippery slope to hell.

So here is your reminder for today that you don't need to be afraid of feeling good. If something improves your life, use it. Even if it is addictive - learn what that addiction means, whether the addiction is inherently dangerous or not, and whether the benefits outweigh the drawbacks and risks.

My ADHD meds are, in fact, not addictive. But I will take them every day because they make my life orders of magnitude easier. I will enjoy them every time I take them.

My tramadol is addictive. I will still take it. I will keep it on a schedule to avoid becoming addicted, primarily because addiction in this case would mean reduced effectiveness. But I am not afraid of my painkillers. They are life changing.

Take your meds, everyone. Don't let anyone scare you away from doing something that improves your life.

Gojo "Touch Starved" Satoru

let’s talk about the early stages of hyperfixation where you can literally feel your brain getting doses of serotonin because of a show or a movie or a person or a character and mentally you’re like ‘ooooh no’ but it’s like a blackhole you can’t run or escape from so you just gotta ride it out knowing full well the next few months maybe even years are going to be spent mindlessly obsessing over this thing

Me: how do I study as a neurodivergent person?

Google: how to help your autistic child study

Me: how to study as an autistic adult/teen

Google: teachers guide to how to deal with autistic children

Me: how do I study as an autistic teen/adult

Google: study tips for autistic people(-written by this allistic man that will talk about autistic people like they're zoo animals)

Me: how to study as a neurodivergent adult, tips from neurodivergent person to neurodivergent students, on how to study independently as an autistic person, no reliant support needed

Google: high functioning autism and school

Me: fuck just. How do I focus during this test that I'm in rn as an AuDHD person

Google: ok, so, to focus on this thing that you currently are doing and need to get done TODAY; weeks before the test you'll need to eat healthy and exercise, meditate, study, set timers, take breaks, drink water, sleep, find the secrets to a happy life, adopt five children, sacrifice a goat, take short showers, brush your teeth

Executive dysfunction:

My fucking deadline:

Neurodivergent people are never undiagnosed. We are misdiagnosed. Our symptoms don't go unnoticed, and people will always attribute them to some sort of cause. They'll just attribute them to personality and blame the individual for their symptoms.

For example. My autism is not undiagnosed, it's been misdiagnosed as "too sensitive," "awkward," "rude," "obsessive," and "too intense." My brother's adhd wasn't undiagnosed, it was misdiagnosed as "lazy," "impulsive," "annoying," and "can't seem to get any work done."

Growing up without a diagnosis is growing up believing that you are to blame for your differentness. Your symptoms are a personality flaw. You are diagnosed by everyone around you as "weird."

Edit: Some people have pointed out that I'm using the word misdiagnosis here rather loosely. I'm aware that it isn't quite correct definitionally, and I don't mean to say that medical misdiagnosis and the type of social misattribution I'm talking about are identical--just that they are related phenomena, and neurodivergent people are often victims of one or both. There isn't an exact term for what I'm talking about here, so I used the closest one I knew of. Terminology is important and some words need to be used with precision to retain their influence. At the same time, sometimes meanings change, and bending words to fit new circumstances is a natural way that language evolves. I'm not sure which situation this falls under, so while I don't want to change my post (not even sure what to change it to), I thought I'd edit and add clarification. Additional feedback on this is welcome.

They don’t want us medicated (“do you want to be dependent on that for the rest of your life?”), they don’t want us unmedicated (“please stop doing xyz, why can’t you do abc?”), they just want us to stop being neurodivergent.

ADHD is not remembering wether you took your meds this morning so you dont take them later in the day because you dont want to accidentally take too much and then only when its too late to take them you start feeling like actually you totally forgot to take your meds

Walking through why I can't just DO the THING

NeuroWild

Sometimes terms mean certain things and belong to certain groups of people and are not meant to apply to people outside that group. And that is on purpose and valid. You can make your own terms to describe your own experiences, you don't get to take terms from other people, especially people more vulnerable/less privileged than you. If multiple people tell you that the term is not for you, respect that.

When terms get used for many different situations they get diluted and trivialized. Remember "trigger"? It was a specific medical term and is now used to mean "something that pissed or upset someone". Brain fog is now turning into abled people just being a little sleepy or out of it, not literally a clinical term for brains not functioning correctly due to various illnesses. I tell someone I have brain fog and they say lol me too XD no you fucking don't. "Spirit animal" was taken from indigenous peoples so white people could make funny haha relatable t-shirts. Two spirit almost got taken by queer white people as well (although I think most people have backed off on that hopefully).

Not everything needs to apply to as many people as possible. You don't need to and can't relate to everyone. We can still support each other while respecting differences.

(Edited ver)