Other What's ruining your life right now?

A full day of fever, today it seems to have calmed down now but now she has a positive result for Covids

Frickin annoyed.

 

Wasps.

Over the couple of months, the little gits have started becoming more and more frequent visitors in my kitchen. Working away from home during the week, I come home at the weekend to find a lot of them dead on my window sill (they seem to like buzzing about between the blind and the window). Today, I must've hoovered up about 30, using my little handheld Dyson as a 'zapper', and bunging up the end with a bit of kitchen roll to make sure they don't crawl out. I'm not sure if there's a nest or not - I can't see one.

Anyway, a couple of sprays and powders ordered. Next weekend, it'll be Waspgeddon.

 

... or pete-ageddon

 

Or, waspocalypse...

 

Poxy car.

 

Went to my first major RTC lastnight, drunk drivers are the ****ing worst.

 

Don't hesitate to use the Police Counseling dude, you're are unfortunately going to see some horrific things.

 

nah its good man, thankfully no one was seriously hurt but the level of irresponsibility was insane, the entire junction was absolute ****ing wreck. thankfully we managed to to get off on time due to the lates coming on 10 mins beforehand but that could have easily left us on cleaning up until ****-am™

 

Finding out that my private medical cover does not exclude pre-existing conditions... but then also finding out that assessment/diagnosis of ADHD and ASD is not covered. Back to either a 20+ month wait on the NHS, or paying for private assessment out of my own pocket (typically £600-£1000 for ADHD, £1500-£2000 for ASD).

About 6/7 years ago I started wondering whether I might have what I understood to be called asperger's syndrome at the time (now it all comes under the wider diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder, ASD). I even got a referred to a psychiatrist, but there was a good 4-6 month wait for the appointment, and in the mean time my dad became terminally ill. The psychiatrist's advice at the time boiled down to "yeah it does sound like it's worth further investigation, but I think you've got bigger things to worry about at the moment so deal with that first" (which is pretty much what I thought going into that appointment anyway). But then I kinda let it drop... In the intervening years, my brother got diagnosed with ASD and during that process my mother was also told that she had strong indications of ASD and that it's likely that I will have it as well.

More recently over the last couple of years I've started to realise that I also strongly identify with having ADHD. A good friend from school was diagnosed a couple of years ago, a friend from work also got diagnosed very late last year, and in both cases they have gone through very similar experiences to me. The more I read and the more I understand, the more I think that either ADHD needs to stop being so god damn relatable or I need to go see a clinical psychiatrist again. Can't concentrate on one thing for more than what feels like a few minutes at a time, attention wanders constantly, very easily distracted, will procrastinate and not start tasks, will leave things until the last possible moment, struggle to organise tasks or break them down into smaller chunks, struggle to finish projects, frequently swap and change hobbies (often after spending a lot of money), hyper-focus on something I'm interested in and lose track of everything else around me, forget to do really important things, forget really important appointments, go into a shop for something and come out with tons of stuff and totally forget the one god damn thing I went in for, having lists and reminders so that I don't forget stuff and then ignoring the lists and delaying the reminders... and so on...

More recently I'd also been thinking that my other half also displays a lot of behvaiours that are typical indicators of ADHD. I'd been meaning to talk to her about this stuff for a while, I haven't said a word to her about any of this in years, not since that first appointment 6 years ago, because... y'know... Men Simply Don't Do "Feelings"... But then she brought up the subject totally unprompted on Saturday evening when we were in the car - that she identifies with a lot of ADHD behaviours/indicators, and maybe even ASD also.

I still feel like I'm talking out of my arse and should just get on with it, I don't need to waste the time of medical professionals because I'm just ****ing lazy. But it's getting harder to ignore, and the price of talking to a professional is either £600-£2000 (or £1200-£4000 for the pair of us) or a 20+ month wait. I feel like if I'm going to pay out of my own pocket then I can probably stomach the cost of ADHD assessment, since that does tend to be a lot cheaper. ASD will have to wait for an NHS referral.

 

Why does getting assessed matter so much? It’s not going to change anything.

 

You're not alone, I have battles with procrastination, maybe worse than many but I don't know for sure.
It may be internal, but as the programme below mentioned, there is a multi trillion pound tech industry vying for your attention and using all the tricks it can, to do so...
I was listening to this episode on Radio4 this morning about Procrastination and thought it was intriguing.
My mind seems to make mountains out of molehills when thinking about and approaching tasks and jobs to do. Some stuff that is really unappealing, I find hard to face and try to ignore it.
I thought the contributor today who talked about the 'surface tension' of breaking into and getting going with a task was enlightening for me.
I do forget stuff and lose track too, and am grateful for my A5 diary and phone reminders for the important stuff.

 

That's not strictly the case. Getting assessed can bring a huge amount of peace of mind, that the struggles are real rather than blaming yourself for being lazy, or similar. There's a massive mental burden associated with not knowing.

Then the disability discrimination act applies from the point you start being assessed, so can also bring relief and feeling of protection at work as well.

So whilst an assessment might not change any of the underlying symptoms associated with the condition, it can still have benefits to metal health, and also help with finding techniques to manage day to day life more easily.

 

In my opinion, the diagnosis of anything wrong or different about you is important. In this example:

• The mental health aspects of knowing yourself better and understanding why things occur in the way they do for you
• The ability to find (or access) resources / support group to support you can be dependent on a diagnosis
• Enable access to medication / specialist treatments

At the risk of being slightly flippant, if we looked at this statement for a physical ailment, would you still stand by it?

"I'm not going for an x-ray, I know my leg is broken, so I will just stay in bed for the next 3 months."

 

An official assessment can lead to extra support, either financial or medical that can help.

 

Gareth and I (you know who I mean) have this joke about that.

We used the other week's happening as an example.

I found a really cheap crank set on Ebay. These.



The RRP was £170. I paid £35. However, the end bolts that pull them onto the splines were missing. So I ended up going down a rabbit hole. First I spent about two hours trying to find out what thread pitch these mysterious bolts were. Turns out they were 14mmx1. Only used in BMX AFAIK. So I then spent four hours trying to identify other bolts for cranks that used the same pitch. Found two sets after hours of digging, but could not find either for sale. I then sat in design software and designed a system that was male and female, that would go through the hollow axle and bolt together, pulling it all together. Now now do note, by this time I was a whole day in.

At which point it dawned on me. "Why not just Google search "Shadow Noctis Bolts".



This kinda stuff happens all the time. Both of us do it. Then, hilariously, the other will find a part that exists that we just spent all day designing.

 

I do not have a brown bear to take home. The cute fuzzy murder machines.

Silly Belgians not letting me have one. Well I suppose two would be more fair.. for company I mean.

 

The underlying assumption that "it's not going to change anything" is incorrect. A diagnosis of ADHD opens up a whole world of support that can be accessed, and in the UK it's legally classed as a disability. There's medication available that helps a lot of people with ADHD; both good friends who have ADHD have said that being on the medication means that for the first time in their life they can think straight without it feeling like their brain is constantly flicking between a dozen TV channels (and good god what I wouldn't give to have that). Even without medication there are all sorts of therapies and support availble. If I do not, in fact, have ADHD then I can start asking other questions and getting other kinds of support.

As many others here will no doubt identify with, I was the "gifted kid". The one who usually knew the answers to most questions, the one who seemed to know some subjects better than the teachers did... but also didn't really do all that well in school/college/whatever and only seemed to do enough to get by. I spent at least half of my lifetime of being told that I could achieve so much, I just need to pay attention, I just need to try harder, I just need to be less lazy, I just need to put my mind to it. That turned into spending most of my adult life berating myself for not trying harder, not putting in enough work, not having the will power to stick with something. It feels like there isn't a single day goes by when I don't ask myself "what the **** is wrong with you, why are you so **** at everything?". There's only so much self-hatred you can endure.

 

Therein lies the problem though dude. They know if they diagnose you that the support is open and that costs money. That's why two of my friends who clearly have autistic kids are still fighting for a diagnosis years later.

The funny part is that I was diagnosed whilst Labour were in power. Soon as the tories got in? you can forget it.

 

c'mon Gareth stop being defeatist - You could do a Ras Pi, sensor and auto mini windscreen wiper thing ! You could make it into a chapter in Vol 9 of your Pi books - you could even make it solar powered 'cos you're a tech writer who knows stuff.

Or, you, know, you could confuse the likkle birdies by putting a roof over it and making them think you can't even make a proper birdhouse.