God I wanna make so much art (drawing/painting/wood carving/crochet/build things/etc), make comics, learn languages, learn how to deep clean and power wash, garden, make clothes, make fursuits, travel, hike, forage, make youtube videos, go urban exploring, go ghost hunting, animate, preserve animal skeletons and insects, etc etc.
But I’m so perpetually exhausted that even just planning out an idea takes a lot out of me, and it feels so unfair.
Thankfully medication has helped out a looot (I mean the difference between taking genuinely months to do anything vs being able to do so within a week or even a day if lucky is quite an improvement) but it’s not gonna make me superhuman any time soon ^^;
People used to call me little Einstein, next Bill Gates and next Elon Musk (eww lmao) many times because of my ideas. Many of them may be revolutionary, but I can’t even start working on them because I feel like my day is 5 minutes long… I feel severely disabled by ADHD
I have a pretty varied skillset. I’ve been drawing since I was a kid, I’m a programmer, and a designer. But once the work part of the day is over, I couldn’t carry out a single creative thing if you paid me. It’s crazy how debilitating ADHD can be and it’s been that way since I was a kid (I was officially diagnosed in the early 90s).
I find that meds can help but sometimes the side effects suck. If you can get your hands on a prescription, it helps a ton. It doesn’t have to be a stimulant either. There’s a lot of non-stimulant ones that do wonders. Just make sure you take it consistently. The one I was prescribed gives me hyper focus.
Can you share some ideas for programming projects? I have time but no ideas.
You could try contributing to an existing open-source project.
How about a cross-platform yt-dlp GUI made in the Qt framework?
Very specific but I’m sure people would appreciate a GUI for it.
A year ago, I discovered I have ADHD. Suddenly, everything fell into place. I’ve had many hobbies, projects, and ideas throughout my life, but I’ve rarely completed or stuck with them for long. I’m still working to develop a system that allows me to explore while helping me complete tasks over time.
I’ve thought about using medication but I don’t want to depend on it for productivity. I’m curious, has it significantly changed things for any of you?
If you know you have ADHD, give the meds a go and then decide.
Imagine if in 30 years you finally try them and see what life could have been like. If they are not for you, no problem.
It’s funny as the other commenter said about the dependence thing - most other drugs make you unproductive, and so they are harmful to you fulfilling your life goals. This is kinda different, and there are many days where I just go without because I feel like being lazy or just kicking around doing whatever.