Understanding Adult ADHD Symptoms & Social Media Trends | Love Counseling

If you haven't been on TikTok or Instagram much these days, you may not know that there has been a huge surge in Adult Diagnosed ADHD content creators. Everything from couples who have a neurodivergent partner, learning to work together - to individuals who seem to be a bit messy (Alexa, play "Messy" by Lola Young on Spotify). So what's the deal? Are these just people who are looking for an excuse to be lazy, disorganized, and the equivalent of children who need a babysitter? Whatever your personal take, this topic is becoming increasingly controversial and heated on the inter-webs.

Full discloser, it was 100% social media that led me to seeing my provider, getting assessed, diagnosed, and medicated for ADHD. If you want to hear that story, you can listen to the episodes of the Love Counseling Podcast where I talk about my experience. As I sit here though, I feel I have a privileged vantage point as a person who experiences debilitating ADHD symptoms, as well as being a therapist and a certified ADHD clinical services provider. I do not want to send every adult out of my office with an ADHD diagnosis, AND I want to diagnose absolutely everyone who is experiencing debilitating symptoms of ADHD. What I mean by that is that I take diagnoses seriously. I believe they serve a purpose in helping people live the best lives possible; but if a person does not experience debilitating symptoms, they likely don't meet criteria for diagnosis. Additionally, I've started to think of ADHD as an umbrella diagnosis. Oftentimes, ADHD can explain a lot of other conditions. ADHD is an old diagnosis with mounds of research. It among one of few disorders with medication that has been around for a long time and proven not only to be effective, but produces little to no long-term side effects on health. In a very strange way, ADHD is a productive diagnosis. If this is true, why is it so resisted? Possibly because the symptoms of ADHD are things we all struggle wtih from time to time, but the average person has to buck up and figure it out.

Have you ever met a person who just seemed unable to get it together? Maybe they've been in and out of addiction? Maybe they are terrible at controlling their emotions? Are they bad at reading books? Do they play way too many video games? Do they struggle to maintain relationships and hold down jobs? These indeed can all be signs of ADHD. A great deal of personal responsibility and accountability is expected of most of us, and this can cause us to feel resentful towards those who seem to be choosing to not get it together. So how do we know if a person is faking it to get some slack or is actually in need of assistance? First, we have to understand the world of diagnosing and the difference between a mental disorder that is debilitating and one that is socially disruptive.

The DSM (The Diagnostic Statistical Manual) came about in the mid 1900's. This was a time when society was primarily concerned with psychotic conditions and the majority of clinicians (as we call them today) practiced in mental institutions. Mental health, as we know it today, began from a place of pathology or problem-based branding of individuals who were often viewed as non-functional in regular society. Because of the evolution of the DSM and its many revisions since that time, mental health has integrated more with the medical world. We now have accessibility to therapy through insurance, and as well as pharmaceuticals just as the medical world does. Essentially, by the late 1980's the medical and mental health worlds merged and mental health was viewed as part of whole-person health. This began the normalization of mental illness and diagnosis formerly reserved for the institutionalized. The association of mental illness with medical illnesses made them more mainstream.

Still, there were centuries of stigma to battle. When you have a bacterial infection, and the condition will not get better on its own, no one is upset with you for going to the doctor and getting the medications you need. Mental illness still faces criticism, today. Even if a mental illness is genetic (which ADHD often is) and even if there are medications that will significantly improve symptoms that would not get better on their own (ADHD meds are highly effective) people seem to get upset about mental diagnoses more than medical diagnoses.

So if stigma still exists, why would anyone want to hop on a "trend" of self-diagnosis? Well, to be honest it is very entertaining and even exciting to see yourself in a condition. Suddenly, things about you that were once annoying or problematic to others become "not your fault." There is a whole community of people out there you can now relate to. You do feel a bit more baby, I was born this way and a little less like a total screw up. I can understand why there are broad outcries of "suck it up" and eye rolling when it seems someone was totally fine a minute ago and suddenly they have a "mental illness" that makes them feel more cool and interesting. Honestly, I have met people with actual cancer and people who make up medical illnesses to be more interesting as well. It is annoying when people use conditions to get attention. Mental illnesses are not identities - they are not who you are. Many of them do, however, impact you against your will, nonetheless. Once diagnosed, you must learn to work with your diagnosis to improve functioning - and to do that you must first embrace it.

If you thought ADHD was just a condition young school boys had, but they grow out of it, that would be because despite teacher's and parents' best efforts to try to make some kids sit and listen, they just couldn't. The child was problematic to everyone else so at some point he is referred for an evaluation to get him under control. Raise your hand if you were like me and felt extreme shame if the teacher ever called your name out for getting distracted in class? The experience was so humiliating for me that it often made me cry (secretly of course). I was so disproportionately embarrassed when I got in trouble that I would tell myself to never ever get in trouble again. Because there is the external experience of ADHD and then there is the internal experience of it. There are the symptoms that people see, and then there are the ones they can't see.

See, if diagnosing begins with society, parents, teachers, employers, looking at a person and saying, "Get it together!" we often don't care what the course of action is as long as that person is not problematic to the setting anymore. When that person says, "I might not be ok" if they aren't bothering anyone else, why is it our initial response to say, "oh come on! You're fine!" ADHD impacts several areas of behavior including:

1. Emotional regulation (disproportionate emotional responses to everyday situations)

2. Executive functioning (working memory, impulse control, problem solving, focus, time management, planning, etc)

3. Co-morbidity (unmanaged ADHD can often manifest as other disorders such as anxiety, depression, OCD, addiction, etc)

4. Lack of social awareness and immaturity (loud, interrupting, long winded, missing social cues, inability to interpret or over-interprets social interactions).

5. Hyper fixation (an intense interest or obsession in one thing at a time that may pivot to some other interest spontaneously).

If a person is experiencing any of these at a debilitating level, we may not be concerned if it does not impact us, but what if it impacts them greatly? It does not feel good to be late everywhere. It does not feel good to constantly let people down. If I am using anxiety to keep me on time and my OCD to keep me organized, I may look functional to you, but I'm am not ok on the inside. These behaviors are not sustainable which is why so many people are not diagnosed until adulthood. All of these methods for maintaining function or masking symptoms, eventually reach a burnout period. People suddenly find themselves completely unmotivated, depressed, struggling to keep deadlines, forgetful, etc.

We may think people are making excuses, but ADHD tools are really effective! That means the guy who is always late to work does not get a pass because he has ADHD. It means he should know that he has time management problems and will need to rely on external cues such as alarms to make him a reliable employee. He needs more consequences and structure to motivate him to be accountable for his behavior, not less. He needs to get assessed and diagnosed and medicated (if that is right for him) to meet the expectations of a neurotypical world. All meds should be taken with thoughtful consideration and used in conjunction with other tools such as therapy and skill development. Sure, meditation and diet would help if I (and others with ADHD) was motivated to do them properly. The truth is I am much better at both when I am medicated. Without a strong support system, it is difficult for a person with ADHD to make behavioral improvements by sheer will.

I don't know if the ADHD social media trend will last. I don't know if we will look back on this time and regret supporting mass diagnosis for those who seemed to want a diagnosis. What I do know is if a medication works for you, take it because you want to, not because someone else wants you to. If a diagnosis helps you cope with life, take advantage of the research and treatments available to you because you want to - it's no one's business if you do. If you suspect that you may have ADHD or any other specific mental illness, go through the proper channels of meeting with an appropriate clinician to get diagnosed. Do not self diagnose. Diagnosis is serious business intended to help people. If social media helps you feel seen and understood in your diagnosis, I am happy for you! Seek out community and resources to help you live a better life.

This article was written by Dazholi "DD" Love, MFTC. If you are seeking counseling in the Grand Junction, Western Slope and Mesa County areas, you may contact DD by clicking this link here

DD Love, MFTC

640 Grand Ave,

Grand Junction, CO 81507

(970) 852-0687

Available Monday - Wednesday from 9am-7pm, Fridays from 9am-12pm (in-person and online)