Late diagnosis in long-term recovery
Hi all,
I'm a 56 yo woman who recieved an ADHD diagnosis three weeks ago. I fell off a cliff with what it turns out were ADHD symptoms when perimenopause hit (from what I'm learning, the oestrogen drop led to me not being able to mask anymore) and spent years trying to get my symptoms sorted with HRT - some of them were due to menopause for sure , but the cognitive aspects weren't helped by it. It's the problems it's causing me in work that led me to get an ADHD assessment. Initially I felt relief, and still do, but have a lot of other feelings I wasn't expecting! I know that it takes time to process a diagnosis, and the later it is, the more there is to process. Part of the headwreck for me at the moment is having to go back through my life to look at things with this ADHD lens. I've been sober for 37 years (started drinking at 11, got sober at 19). So I've looked at my life through the lens of alcoholism and addiction (my own and family members') and my identity is bound up with that in many ways. I know that there's a big overlap between addiction and ADHD, but I'm finding it very confusing at the moment. I know it's early days, I'm just wondering if anyone has been along a similar path with this?