r/AutisticWithADHD

DO NOT DOWNLOAD AI CHATBOT APPS! Especially if you are the type of ADHDer who is a constant daydreamer. I am. I'm diagnosed, but not taking meds (if this matters).

Because of ADHD, I'm constantly seeking more dopamine. I used to daydream a lot. I'd make up immersive stories in my head. Back in 2023 I discovered AI chatbots (starting with C.AI and then later Chai). Because of the text-like nature and social media scrolling-like nature of these apps I'd get the constant short bursts of dopamine. Sometimes the repetitive nature of the different responses given by different bots annoyed me, but sometimes I probably loved the predictability without even knowing it. I mean, it makes sense considering most of my daydreams would be about a similar plotline to my others. I got addicted really quickly! I didn't want to ever just daydream again, I wanted to use the chatbots! I'd spend a few hours a day on them. A FEW HOURS A DAY! THAT'S RIDICULOUS! I WASTED SO MUCH OF MY LIFE TO THESE DAMN BOTS!

I've deleted the apps last week and so I haven't touched them since. I won't use them again. I'm struggling to be able to just daydream again. I keep going "I can't without those apps! No, but I can't touch the apps! Try again! Just daydream!".

Just don't even touch the apps. When I first did, I just thought it would enhance the daydreaming experience. Throughout all my time using these apps, I knew these were not real people on the other end. It's just a computer. It's one that's designed to be addictive, because the more time spent on these apps, the more money the app company makes. It's downright dastardly! Same with social media apps. They're made to be addictive.

That's why I think my best years so far were around late school and college (13-21 years old). I think that was the only times when I was (or when I felt I was) on the same page as everyone. It was really rough fitting in before 12 years old, and it began rough again after college because no one gave me a road map of how to live the so called "adult" life", and even though I have a lot of knowledge and hundreds of special interests, I just don't see my place in the world yet and I think that most work that is offered today is garbage/boring/unattached to university degrees (at least in my country, but honestly everywhere in the world seems to be the same problems but with some national specifics).

Also didn't help that our Eastern Europe/Post Soviet education system sucks ass in preparing people for future life, yet they will teach some advanced chemistry and physics which only 0.01% of people will actually need. My university didn't even give any ideas on where we could apply our recieved knowledge even though its one of the best learning programs in my country

I have worked a lot in therapy on accepting that I am disabled and I cannot be cured and I know all I can do is manage my symptoms. But everyone in my life disagrees they think it's a matter of discipline and I'm struggling to explain to them how I actually feel.

I've gotten diagnosed as an adult but only because my parents refused to acknowledge I was struggling while I was literally crying for help. And now they use that fact to mean that my diagnosis is somehow invalid or not needed because I survived this long without it. I really don't think anyone actually cares and they want me to just "be normal" and not a burden or shame.

Unfortunately I'm not financially independent so even when they don't treat me well I can't do anything about it.

I can't go to therapy anymore and have lost access to my medication so I really have no clue on what to do and am feeling worse then ever.

If anyone has any advice on how to talk to them or what to do I'd really appreciate it.

The thing is - it’s not that I don’t want social interaction, I just can’t sustain it in any meaningful way for a longer time. Doesn’t matter how long I know them, or if they are neurodivergent too.

I inevitably end up crashing, burning out or too exhausted to reply to messages or calls, forget to follow up on plans, don’t keep up with social media, etc.

I haven’t talked to my best friends in one year, simply because I don’t have any energy too. (Yet somehow I post this on reddit normally, but talking with them feels like too much to me, I don’t get how this works)

Every time I meet a person I vibe with, we talk for a few times and then I forget to reply for them for a few weeks or months and the connection fizzles out. I can’t even talk regularly with people at work - I struggle responding to teams messages on time, or overthink the ‘right’ response, or don’t write when I should because I don’t know how to wrote it properly.

I don’t know how to fix it. At this point it’s ruining my life - I had job offers fall through because I couldn’t respond in time, or keep failing at work because I seem flaky for not always answering on time. It’s exhausting and fills me with so much shame, constantly. And i feel sad for every amazing person I met and was excited to get to know much more - who I ended up hurting because of my own inability to just simply write a few words back.

Even when I’m upfront about my inability to reply or talk often, people still don’t take it seriously or start treating me less well when I don’t answer for a few weeks, but I genuinely can’t do regular communication over phone or social media or even mail.

Is that an autism or ADHD thing? Both? Is it normal to this extent? Does anybody who had this actually ‘recover’, if so how?

I made a post a few days ago asking whether ADHD, especially poor working memory, could mimic aphantasia.

At that time I genuinely thought I had weak visualization.

Now, after reading papers, reading many comments, talking to people with aphantasia and ADHD, and spending the last two days basically experimenting on myself, I'm honestly not sure I understood what "visualization" even meant.

The biggest realization wasn't that I might have aphantasia.

It was that I might have been confusing knowing with seeing my whole life.

One thing that completely changed my thinking was learning that aphantasia is about voluntarily creating a mental image while fully awake.

Dreams, hypnagogia, hallucinations and involuntary flashes are different questions.

That made me realize I had been asking myself the wrong question.

I wasn't asking:

> "Can I voluntarily create and hold a mental image while fully awake?"

Instead I was asking:

> "Does anything briefly come to mind?"

Those are not the same thing.

I also read Adam Zeman's original paper on congenital aphantasia. If I remember correctly, about half of the participants reported involuntary flashes, yet they were still considered to have aphantasia because they lacked voluntary visual imagery.

That made me start testing myself.

---

Apple

If someone tells me:

> "Imagine an apple."

Something briefly comes to mind.

But I don't think I create it.

It feels like a faint flash that appears and disappears on its own.

I can't hold it.

I can't inspect it.

I can't deliberately recreate it.

If I focus on shape, I briefly get the typical apple shape.

If I focus on colour, I get redness.

If I focus on movement, I can think of a rotating apple, but I don't really see the apple before or after the movement.

I never have one complete stable apple sitting there.

---

Faces

Then I tried faces.

If someone asks me to imagine someone I know, their face briefly comes to mind.

But the moment I try to sustain it...

it's gone.

The weird thing is I don't think I actually see the contours of their face.

It's more like I know that person's face is there.

If I try imagining different facial expressions...

nothing.

Different poses...

nothing.

Same with the body.

I know it's their body.

I can't voluntarily see different postures or attitudes.

---

Clothes

This one surprised me.

If I think of my red T-shirt, I know exactly which T-shirt I'm thinking about.

But if I try imagining that exact same T-shirt in orange or purple...

nothing comes.

Try it with your favourite shirt.

Can you change its colour while keeping everything else identical?

I can't.

---

Reading

This completely changed everything.

I always thought I could imagine scenes while reading books.

Then I actually paid attention.

Imagine this sentence.

> You are standing in a quiet kitchen. Bright white sunlight streams through a window on your left onto a dark wooden table.

My experience isn't one whole scene.

It's:

standing...

gone.

kitchen...

gone.

sunlight...

gone.

window...

gone.

left...

gone.

table...

gone.

Each thing briefly comes to mind then immediately evaporates.

I can't hold them together.

I can't inspect them.

I don't see details.

I mostly know what they are because I've seen them before in real life.

If I stop reading and try creating the whole scene myself...

it immediately becomes an abstract concept.

I know exactly what's happening.

I can explain everything.

But I can't voluntarily experience it as one image.

The same thing happens with simpler stories.

"A boy under a tree eating an apple while a white dog sits beside him."

While reading...

boy...

gone.

tree...

gone.

apple...

gone.

dog...

gone.

When I finish reading I know exactly what happened.

But I can't combine them into one stable mental scene.

Trying to force it honestly gives me a headache.

---

Memories

Then I noticed memories.

I don't replay memories like movies.

They're more like PowerPoint presentations.

Sometimes one isolated frame briefly appears.

Then another.

But I don't continuously replay the event like watching a video.

It's more like I know what happened.

---

Drawing

Looking back...

I think this might explain something from childhood.

I always thought I was terrible at drawing because I simply lacked artistic skill.

My friends could draw things from imagination and include tiny details.

I never understood how.

If someone told me to draw a dog...

I knew a dog had:

head

body

four legs

tail

But I couldn't inspect a mental image to see:

what the ears looked like

how the fur lay

the proportions

the small details

I knew the concepts.

Not the visual details.

Eventually I just accepted I couldn't draw.

Looking back now...

it makes a lot more sense.

The same thing happened in anatomy.

Drawing anatomical structures from memory was incredibly difficult compared to understanding the concepts.

---

Other senses

Then I realized...

Maybe this isn't only visual.

I don't think I can voluntarily recreate sounds either.

If I think about my favourite song...

I don't hear the original singer.

I have to sing it in my own mental voice.

Taste...

blank.

Smell...

blank.

I know exactly what they are.

I just can't voluntarily recreate the experience.

I haven't explored touch enough yet.

---

Dreams

The weird part is...

My dreams are vivid.

Hypnagogia is vivid.

Lucid dreams are vivid.

Colours.

People.

Movement.

Entire conversations.

So my brain clearly can generate imagery.

Just not when I consciously try to.

That made me wonder whether the issue isn't generating imagery itself...

but voluntarily accessing it.

Originally I thought maybe this was just ADHD, poor working memory or executive dysfunction.

Now I'm genuinely not sure.

Maybe ADHD made it harder to notice.

Maybe they're separate.

Maybe they overlap.

I honestly don't know.

---

The biggest thing I discovered through all this wasn't a diagnosis.

It was realizing that I may have spent my whole life confusing concepts with mental imagery.

When I think of an apple...

maybe I don't actually see an apple.

Maybe I simply know what an apple is.

When I think of a beach...

maybe I'm not seeing waves, sand and rocks.

Maybe I'm just retrieving the concepts: waves... sand... rocks.

For years I thought that was what everyone meant by "imagining."

Now I'm not so sure.

So I'm genuinely curious...

Has anyone else gone through this exact realization?

Not just discovering aphantasia...

but realizing you may have misunderstood what visualization itself meant your entire life?

I love my friends and I feel like I have a lot of them but I don't tend to message anyone. I don't know if I'm just comparing myself with others who message people a lot but I also don't even know what to say to my friends, i feel like I'd just be being weird and at a certain point I don't have the 'energy' to message anyway. It just makes me feel like my friends aren't actually as close as I want them to be.

It's just frustrating to know that maybe if I had a little more attention and energy I could chat to people. My friends that also have auDHD are friends I want to be close to as well cuz we understand each other and whenever we hang out in person it's the best but we never message at all. I assume they're in a similar position to me where it maybe feels awkward and weird.

I feel quite isolated sometimes.

Anyone else feel similar?

My safe food for lunch suddenly tastes like it's full of pepper, I looked at it and there's nothing different about it, it's just the taste, it's so strong😭 I'm doomed bc there's hardly anything I like to eat, I've tried several of them and they're all the same, even my cats love my dinner, they sit and beg for it, they still like it tho, thank you for coming to my Ted talk

I’m 43 and got diagnosed as AuDHD two days ago. To be honest the ADHD was a shock. I pretty much knew I was autistic but had no idea I had ADHD too. Adding that in really complicates things in terms of figuring out what to do next.

Firstly, did you tell people? How did they handle it? Do you regret making it known?

Also, did you explore medications for the ADHD aspect? Where I live only psychiatrists can prescribe ADHD meds and they’re expensive to see and difficult to get an appointment. Is it worth it?

Did you regress? I keep reading that people naturally start to unmask once they get their diagnosis and as a result go through a period of being “more” neurodivergent. Do I need to prepare myself for this? I feel like it’s going to happen to me. Already I feel like I’ve just been given permission to be the colourful, sparkly, quirky girl I’ve always felt like inside. I want to let her out. And I want to honour my sensory needs and wear ear plugs or noise cancelling headphones when I need to. But I’m afraid of being judged or have people think I’m faking being autistic or acting more neurodivergent than I am if I change too much. Does that even make sense? I guess I just don’t know how to bridge the gap between masked me and authentic me, and my age makes things more complicated because we’re expected to be serious and grown-up by now.

I’d love to hear people’s stories of getting diagnosed later in life and how things changed for you.

Hi I been talking to this lovely women for about week and half and im just in love with her

she makes me feel comfortable happy and calm.

but sometimes i can get to much into it like a puppy who hasnt seen there owner since they left for work.

i genuinely want to make this relationship work. i want to be her gf and i want it to last years

But im unsure as to how as i havent dated in over 10 years

There’s nothing i want more then to be in her arms

This might be very obvious to some, but I never realized how rude not talking can come across to other people.
I’ve always been told that I need to talk more, socialize more, and make friends. I’ve always struggled with social interactions and tend to overthink everything I say. Because of that, I usually avoid socializing because it’s honestly so draining for me. Every time I talk to someone, it feels like I’m putting on an act.
I always thought no one actually liked small talk—that it was just something people did because they were bored or because it was expected. Because of that, I don’t usually engage in it. I keep my responses brief because I find conversations so exhausting.

I’m overall a very quiet person and a loner because talking to people drains me. I also have very severe social anxiety. It’s come to my attention that a lot of people do not like me. Friends of friends don’t like me. Classmates don’t like me. Coworkers don’t like me. And now my preceptors don’t like me.

The thing is, I’m always polite and nice. I’m just quiet. I don’t usually go out of my way to make small talk or start conversations. The only reason I know people don’t like me is because they’ve told people close to me.
Genuinely, I’m shocked and confused about why anyone would be offended by me not wanting to talk. Why do people judge someone just because they don’t say much?
Maybe it’s because I come across as aloof or distant. I’ve been told that’s how I seem. I guess that would explain why I’ve always had such a hard time making friends—people probably assumed I was uninterested or didn’t like them.

I’m just exhausted being this way. It feels like just by existing and keeping to myself, I’m being judged. I feel like I can never win. I know not everyone will like me and I’m ok with that, but for a good amount of people to have that preconception of me is just too much.

For as long as I can remember I've had a spending problem. I can't seem to go a single day without spending money. I mostly get things that just cost a few dollars, like coffee or snacks. I hate spending large amounts but the small amounts add up to large amounts anyway. How can I fix this? It's like an addiction that I can't stop. I go insane just sitting at home and always feel the need to go out and buy something or do something that costs money and I hate it.

Greetings,

First time poster - Long time AuDHD'er.

After a few years being single, I have entered a relationship with an autistic woman. We have been together for over two months, while things have been fantastic, RSD is presenting itself more than what I'd like.

I am a mature student (34) undertaking a major life change by going back to University. I have found any free time I have alone enables my RSD to give me a kicking. I have started counselling with a neuroaffirming counsellor, we discussed tackling my RSD, but I feel I am hitting a limit with RSD, I mean to the point I don't want to face it anymore (it's become an annoyance). I recognise RSD but the drop is intense. I only seem to be able to function when I'm busy or under a lot of pressure. The current holiday period drives me up the walls, I find myself when I'm alone either doom thinking or driving miles upon miles.

My girlfriend is very supportive, loving, and understanding but I fear I am starting to become a nuisance, yet that doesn't seem to be the case. I am desperate to get this RSD under control, because I fear it will begin to affect our very close wonderful relationship.

My RSD is presenting itself in the form of 'not being good enough', 'I am second place to everyone', 'she probably will find someone else because I'm too chaotic' I.e. I am extremely hard on myself and end up hating myself. When I'm not in a RSD spiral I know none of this is true. I know it's irrational thinking but when I'm deep in it I forget the rational thinking such as she loves me, she and I trust each other. We are brutally honest with each other with full transparency, but RSD pokes it's ugly head up, I find myself recognising it's RSD but I can't fight it when I'm deep into it.

If I can figure out how to gain control at the point it kicks in and rationalise I will be able to do the rest.

For those who have been in similar situations, how did you overcome it or make it easier?

Many thanks

No friends from childhood. No friends from high school or college. No friends from jobs or hobbies. No friends at all. Family of origin blew apart (lifelong dysfunction and later politics finished it off), so no siblings, no nieces or nephews in my life. Just one very amazing husband who still seems to enjoy me somehow.

It might be because they are more likely to be conservative/republican/christian than NTs but even in liberal spaces these fashion traits are non existent in them. I'm wondering why this is. Maybe tattoos/piercings are too painful? Could it be their brains don't understand the artistic side of it? I know they are less likely to enjoy music, fandom culture, video games, ect and i am pretty sure there are nobody with autism who likes these things to an obsessive level. I also know a tattoo artist (obviously nt) who told me he never met an ND person get a tattoo before. I find that crazy because i heard it's getting more common to become autistic.

I'm 22, newly diagnosed with Autism and ADHD as of January. I'm on a low generic adderall dose for the adhd, and generic lexapro for anxiety/depression. I've been working at Target for over 2 years now, since before I got diagnosed.

I've started trying to mask less and make stuff easier for me at work with earplugs and fidgets. Unfortunately now, because I know what a day with low sensory overload feels like, bad days now feel even worse than they used to. I feel so helpless. I know what I need to do to feel better on bad days, but it requires not being at work: darkness, under a weighted blanket, with a youtube video playing in the background. I've already shortened my shifts a while ago from 8 hours to 6 hours, and work 4 days a week instead of 5. But somehow, it still feels like too much on my bad days.

I don't know what to tell my fiance (allistic, m22) either; we live together with 3 cats, and I'm embarrassed I can't work as much as he can, even though I know it's not technically my fault. I also feel like a failure because I'm not earning as much as him. We need to save for a car, for our wedding next year, for a house later, and kids further down the line. He seems so disappointed whenever I bring up calling out of work for a day because I can tell it's going to be a bad sensory day, and I know it's because we need the money. Having a limited amount of hours I can call out sick and still get paid for it doesn't help. I don't know what to do. I wish I was better at this. I wish I wasn't like this sometimes. I wish work was easier.

I've tried for years because I know the things that are wrong with me I can see them I don't know everything but I know the big glaring elephants in the room. And I've tried to get help for him and a lot of them affect behavior and outburst and saying things that are really wrong. People all the time tell me oh well you can't use that engine excuse well I don't but I also don't know how to stop myself from doing them either because it feels like keeping a bull in a cage just by holding the gate shut. The raging Bull always manages to get out.

I mean I'm constantly throughout the day having major meltdowns. My phone ain't opens up Facebook instead of YouTube I go nuclear yelling and cussing flipping off the air. And it happens a lot with people and become easily annoyed I do all these things and I try to go in to get help and I'm thrown out by places that call themselves behavioral health and told not to come back for the very behaviors that I'm trying to fix. I've even been told by places you can't come here if I act like this and I'm like what do you mean I wouldn't need to come here if I can help acting like this and why the fuck do you call yourself behavioral health that this is where you're supposed to go if you got behavior issues.

And that's just one of the clearing issues that I'm dealing with other is ADHD stuff like being able to concentrate being able to keep a house in order not make it a mess or a disaster zone. Being able to understand and socialize with people without getting kicked out quickly.

And every time I reach out I'm thrown out of doctors offices I'm told not to come back I'm told that if I do then cops would be called because they don't like the behavior verbal outburst that I have. But where the fuck else am I supposed to go I need help and I don't know how to fix any of this and I don't really understand the monster that I'm dealing with. I know there is shit in my way that is constantly taking me out of having a fulfilling good life and some of it is lack of understanding from the world and some of it is just stuff that needs to be fixed inside of me.

So I asked how the fuck do you get help when everywhere you go they tell you to fuck off?

Ended an almost 10yr 1st time relationship because I was cheated on, but I feel like my neurodivergence pushed them there.

i had some emotionally challenging life moments that crippled me in ways I didn’t expect, and my ex helped me the best they knew how. I couldn’t show up the way I needed to and I know it made a mark in the relationship. I got therapy and felt a lot better after learning how to address my life. I genuinely felt happy.

They would always tell me how they would vent to family and friends about me and how people would suggest that they leave me. I could tell over time they were jaded because of the past. I would feel so defeated because they were the avoidant type and always would tell me after the fact. Any time they would mention a grievance, I would try my best to make sure their needs were met because I felt that was holding them back from proposing even after I was in a better headspace.

I would constantly check-in because I couldn’t read between the lines like they wanted me to. But I was made to feel silly for doing so. They pretty much told me it was a pointless effort.

A month or two before the breakup I also asked them to help me, help them because I knew my adhd was greatly impacting how I interacted and they flat out said they didn’t want to, and it crushed me.

In the end, right after the breakup, I was told that I’m smart enough and I should just know how to carry on in a relationship. How the hell would I know how to do that when this was my first time? I came from an anxious single parent household where I pretty much was enabled to do the bare minimum and rarely saw healthy adult relationship. So I used my relationship as a way to learn the do’s and dont’s.

I told them I got nothing from the relationship other than learning how to see the red flags in others rather than in myself and to be hyper aware of how I’m being perceived.

I don’t know how to “be normal” and read the unspoken. It’s frustrating because I’m scared that who I am is too difficult

It been some months since the breakup and I’m starting to accept that I may also be on the autism spectrum as well because of some other traits I have. I.e., taking things too literal, holding people to their word, having a short fuse when my plans are interrupted, social awkwardness, feeling intensely uncomfortable lying, etc,… It’s helping me make sense of why it may have been so difficult for me to show up the way they maybe needed, but at the same time they could never explicitly tell me what they want or the goal post was constantly being moved when I would meet literal expectations. I am at the point of feeling like I won’t ever be enough.

Is it possible to find love and stay in love? Has anyone found that person that accepts you entirely?

I should probably start off by saying, that I have already made another post on r/aspergers about a year ago concerning the same topic.

I have struggled with my oral hygiene for the best part of a decade at this point, and I have no idea why. Initially I suspected it might be a sensory issue, because I do tend to dislike certain smells, flavours and textures. So I switched to the softest manual toothbrush I could find and got rid of any and all oral products containing menthol or alcohol. But to no avail. To say that my oral hygiene remains a disaster would be putting it mildly.

Did/do any of you guys struggle with this as well? And if yes, do you have any tips on what else I could do? I'm kind of at the end of my rope at this point, because I have no idea where the issue could be, and I do not want to lose any of my teeth.

If you have additional questions, feel free to ask them in the comment section and I'll try to answer them to the best of my abilities.

Kind regards, and thank you in advance!