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ADHD assessment - Part III
Nov. 11th, 2005 02:54 pmARRGH, I finally got the time to write out my last observations on my last session with Dr. Y, and THE POWER WENT OUT. Gaaah.
Okay, trying again:
Last night, my mother and I went over a "Retrospective Behaviour Checklist for Parents" together that Dr. Y gave to me to have Mom fill out. This is so she knows if my symptoms have been consistent from childhood.
When Dr. Y and I were going over a similar checklist together, we came up with 7/9 inattentive symptoms that are currently giving me grief, and 2/9 hyper/impulsive symptoms, those two being "talks excessively" and "often feels physically restless." Although it's really only the latter one that's actually a problem sometimes, because I can have a hard time sitting still enough to do work. I mostly let Dr. Y interpret the severity of my H/I symptoms, because that's not at all what I went in there for. I didn't go in trying to present myself as a hyper or impulsive adult, just an inattentive one. I never thought that I'd been anything other than an "absent-minded professor." (As my mother has called me for years.)
I did note at one point to Dr. Y that my social life as a child was utter hell - every damn kid in the school hated my guts. She asked me why that was, and I honestly couldn't tell her. I can't remember my childhood! I did say that I remember that I always seemed to say the wrong thing at the wrong time, and was burned for it. Her interpretation was that this was impulsivity at work, but I didn't agree. I insisted that I was only missing social cues. She was forced to agree that the picture I presented in her office was not impulsive whatsoever - that I was calm and quiet (without being timid) and answered her in a measured way.
( My mother has a VERY different story to tell - warning, long as hell )
Okay, so according to her...I was actually quite impulsive. She was very certain of this, even more than she was certain I was a "space cadet" as a child. At least this clears up the mystery of why the other kids didn't like me, and why descriptions of "inattentive type" children never felt right. I didn't quite meet the diagnostic criteria for Combined type as a kid - taking my mother's "lowest" responses (safe side), I come out with 6/9 inattentive, 5/9 hyperactive-impulsive, just sub-threshold. Not being the "bouncing off the walls" kid, you know.
But this makes sense, and feels right. I feel so validated, somehow! I've been trying to come up with 71-bajillion other reasons for why I fling myself around so much when no one's watching, and why I need to excuse myself from dinner tables and so on for secretive "movement breaks." I read that the "only" inattentive types only move around because they are anxious. I've been trying, awkwardly, to make this fit my experience, but it doesn't.
Now I know! Although apparently I've outgrown and internalized my impulsivity to a large degree, something that Dr. Y and I discussed.
( She's worried about my self-image )
Okay, trying again:
Last night, my mother and I went over a "Retrospective Behaviour Checklist for Parents" together that Dr. Y gave to me to have Mom fill out. This is so she knows if my symptoms have been consistent from childhood.
When Dr. Y and I were going over a similar checklist together, we came up with 7/9 inattentive symptoms that are currently giving me grief, and 2/9 hyper/impulsive symptoms, those two being "talks excessively" and "often feels physically restless." Although it's really only the latter one that's actually a problem sometimes, because I can have a hard time sitting still enough to do work. I mostly let Dr. Y interpret the severity of my H/I symptoms, because that's not at all what I went in there for. I didn't go in trying to present myself as a hyper or impulsive adult, just an inattentive one. I never thought that I'd been anything other than an "absent-minded professor." (As my mother has called me for years.)
I did note at one point to Dr. Y that my social life as a child was utter hell - every damn kid in the school hated my guts. She asked me why that was, and I honestly couldn't tell her. I can't remember my childhood! I did say that I remember that I always seemed to say the wrong thing at the wrong time, and was burned for it. Her interpretation was that this was impulsivity at work, but I didn't agree. I insisted that I was only missing social cues. She was forced to agree that the picture I presented in her office was not impulsive whatsoever - that I was calm and quiet (without being timid) and answered her in a measured way.
( My mother has a VERY different story to tell - warning, long as hell )
Okay, so according to her...I was actually quite impulsive. She was very certain of this, even more than she was certain I was a "space cadet" as a child. At least this clears up the mystery of why the other kids didn't like me, and why descriptions of "inattentive type" children never felt right. I didn't quite meet the diagnostic criteria for Combined type as a kid - taking my mother's "lowest" responses (safe side), I come out with 6/9 inattentive, 5/9 hyperactive-impulsive, just sub-threshold. Not being the "bouncing off the walls" kid, you know.
But this makes sense, and feels right. I feel so validated, somehow! I've been trying to come up with 71-bajillion other reasons for why I fling myself around so much when no one's watching, and why I need to excuse myself from dinner tables and so on for secretive "movement breaks." I read that the "only" inattentive types only move around because they are anxious. I've been trying, awkwardly, to make this fit my experience, but it doesn't.
Now I know! Although apparently I've outgrown and internalized my impulsivity to a large degree, something that Dr. Y and I discussed.
( She's worried about my self-image )
