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u/Blastoisealways

Image 1 — 35F SAHM, looking for others with a similar brain/life situation
Image 2 — 35F SAHM, looking for others with a similar brain/life situation
Image 3 — 35F SAHM, looking for others with a similar brain/life situation
▲ 12 r/cognitiveTesting

35F SAHM, looking for others with a similar brain/life situation

Hoping to find a few people whose profile is similar to mine and might be in a similar situation.

Life:
SAHM since I was 19, professional gigging musician since 17. I’m 35 now. Diagnosed ADHD (combined but mostly inattentive).

Four neurodivergent kids, all AuDHD. Was a gigging musician for years which I enjoyed but had to scale back for the kids’ health stuff. Husband’s moving to a 4 day week soon so I’m about to have a bit of breathing room for the first time in honestly forever, and I’m trying to figure out what to do with it.

Where I’m at:
I love my kids, and I do genuinely believe parenting is valuable work. But I can’t shake the feeling that I’m unfulfilled and a bit wasted at home. The boredom is constant. I feel like I’m losing time I won’t get back, and it doesn’t seem to matter how much I rationally know that raising four ND kids matters, the feeling of something’s not right here for me just doesn’t go away.

My brain just generates full ideas constantly. Love problem solving and fixing things. World builds for fun. Makes things, music, flower arrangements, full on art installations for family parties. Picks up most skills fast which sounds great but makes it really hard to know what to actually focus on. Reads people quickly. Hates repetition. Suffocates in the sameness of domestic life even though I love being there for the kids.

I struggle socially - because I sound like I’m jumping about a topic when I’m talking and I struggle to articulate what I can see in my head. I’m Not sure how to get any of these ideas from my head into a format that I can share with others, unless I just go ahead and build/make the thing I can see. Which is fine if it’s something tangible I can physically make, but harder if it’s a business idea or a story. I can’t seem to get the whole “thing” into a sequential set of steps or fine where to begin at anything.

I took this to try and understand what I’m good at a bit better and where I might be able to go from here in terms of strengths/weaknesses. I feel a bit on the older side to just be starting out career wise as well
And have kids to think about. Just not really sure where to begin!

Any advice from anyone in a similar situation would be great.

u/Blastoisealways — 15 hours ago
▲ 172 r/AskDocs

6F with severe snoring, gasping, drooling & visible chest retractions while sleeping - waiting on NHS ENT referral, is this urgent? (Scotland)

Age: 6 (just turned 6 in February)
Sex: Female
Location: Scotland (NHS)
Medications: None
Duration of complaint: Ongoing for 2+ years, significantly worse in the last year
Relevant history: Identical twin - see below, prematurity, awaiting Autism/ADHD assessment.
Background:
At age 4, both my twins had overnight oxygen monitoring sleep studies due to persistent mouth breathing, snoring and reduced growth in Twin 1.
• Twin 1: Had significant oxygen desaturations. Put on urgent list, Went in for tonsil reduction, but during surgery they found her adenoids were completely blocking her airway and removed them too. This wasn’t expected from the pre-op assessment, she lost a lot of blood from the adenoid removal and needed a transfusion.
• Twin 2 (the one I’m posting about): Oxygen dips were minimal at the time, so no intervention.

Current situation:
Two years on, twin 2’s snoring and gasping have got dramatically worse. I saw the GP about it last year as one of her tonsils is much bigger than the other, and was told she’d likely grow out of it as she was nearing 6. She hasn’t - if anything it’s worse.

•	Loud snoring, gasping and whistling every night, all night - audible from my bedroom  
•	Visible throat/chest retractions (sucking in at the throat) while she sleeps   
•	Speech sounds like she has a permanently blocked nose  
•	Tonsils visibly very large; I strongly suspect adenoids are the same given her sister’s history  
•	Mouth breathing day and night, drooling

- waking with sore head, dry mouth.
- prone to sore throats and sore ears.

GP has re-referred her to ENT, but it’s been 2 months and we’ve been told it could be months more before she’s seen. Then a wait for a sleep study. Then potentially a wait for surgery.

I’ve sent the video to my GP and requested the referral be upgraded to urgent, but not sure if I am overreacting.

My questions:
1. Does what I’ve described (audible gasping all night + visible retractions on video) clinically meet the threshold for an urgent referral, or is this considered routine?
2. Given the likely NHS wait times, how worried should I actually be? Is it possible this looks worse than it is, or is ongoing untreated obstructive sleep apnoea in a 6-year-old something that causes real harm in the meantime.
3. Would you recommend going private at this point? It would cause financial strain but we will find a way to make it work financially if the situation genuinely warrants it - I just don’t want to jump the gun if waiting is medically reasonable.

Any guidance hugely appreciated. Thank you.

u/Blastoisealways — 1 day ago
▲ 11 r/mounjarouk

Week 1 done, down 10lbs

35F | SW: 242lbs | Height: 5’4” | GW: 160lbs

TW: childhood trauma/neglect

I’ve had weight issues most of my life, with lots of different contributing factors. I have CPTSD from childhood trauma (I grew up in a religious cult), ADHD, and the classic disordered relationship with food that comes with that: being made to finish everything on your plate, anxiety around food waste, etc.

I’ve been medicated for my ADHD for nearly two years now, and therapy has massively reduced my disordered and binge eating. But I’ve still struggled to establish regular eating patterns, often going all day without food, then eating too late at night.

I’ve also struggled to shift weight despite swimming 3 miles most mornings. I’d burn myself out, stop for a few weeks, then start again. My weight has been pretty stable for a few years now.

I also have four children, ages 14, 6, 6, and 5 — all neurodivergent, two born very prematurely with complex additional support needs.

My pattern looked like this:
Going all day without eating, with no recognition of hunger signals until I was so hungry I felt sick. I’d wake up with hunger pangs so severe I’d sometimes actually be sick, which understandably put me off eating breakfast and created a lot of anxiety around it. By evening I’d be starving, and after finally getting the kids to sleep, I was so exhausted we’d just order takeaway — but even then I’d still feel sick, and would often struggle with the sense that there were very few foods I could actually tolerate. I’d assumed this was a sensory issue. Mounjaro has completely removed that. It’s just… gone.

I wore a continuous glucose monitor for a month and learned this was all driven by massive blood sugar swings, though I don’t have diabetes.

This week has been absolutely incredible.

Not only have I been able to notice actual hunger cues, the extreme, sickening hunger pangs are gone. I’ve been able to eat little and often, and there has been zero desire to snack late at night or binge. I’m not waking up shaking and nauseous, desperately reaching for food.
Other things I’ve noticed:
• More energy, less joint pain
• My ADHD medication, which used to wear off around 5pm, is now lasting the full day, making the evening routine with the kids noticeably easier
• I’ve been able to tackle emotionally draining things I’d been putting off (including getting the ball rolling recording an album I wrote — which is huge for me!)
• I’ve started recognising when hunger is driving my mood. I’d never noticed before that being hungry or thirsty was making me feel genuinely depressed and was triggering quite old emotional patterns/spiralling anxious thoughts. I was literally viewing needing to eat as something to be avoided, which ties in with the issues I have from childhood anyway (not allowed to have any needs, just push through and fix everything!) That realisation alone has been enormous.

My weight is prone to big water/inflammation-related swings, so I’m sure some of the 10lbs will be water — and that’s completely fine. Honestly, I’m just overjoyed to be free of that waking, shaking, sickening hunger.

I know one week sounds like nothing, and maybe some of it is placebo, but I’ve lived in this mental state long enough to feel fairly confident it isn’t.

This feels like way more than just a weight loss drug for me. I really hope it continues and I’m looking forward to seeing where this takes me❤️😭

Thanks for reading. I just wanted to share in case anyone is on the fence in a similar situation — I was on the fence for nearly a year before finally going for it, and I’m very glad I did.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

reddit.com
u/Blastoisealways — 12 days ago