Your ADHD Can Actually Be An Advantage

Healthy Gamer: makes video specifically targeting people with ADHD Also Healthy Gamer: makes the video over an hour long

Who dropped what they were doing to switch to this video immediately?

I’ve found that an easy identifier of when my ADHD is bad is when I’m trying to read something that I really don’t want to read. I’ll gradually shift from reading normally to reading each word individually without actually processing the meaning of those words when put in a sentence. My mind just dumps any literary information the second I go to the next word, and looking back in the sentence, I couldn’t tell you a single word that was in it nor the meaning of the sentence. I would essentially go through the motions of reading.

I’m a paramedic, for a long time I’ve realized my brain worked tremendously better while on chaotic runs. I always told my wife “my brain just works at a different pace than everyone else’s”. As it turns out, that’s true! In fact if you polled paramedics at my work, about half of us have ADHD.

People often say ADHD is a gift. There are many times if that were the case, that I would like to return that gift 😂

ADHD is so crippling sometimes that is hard to think of it as an advantage

One of my most common ways of explaining my ADHD is it does not let me do the things I want to do. I will sit in my bed on my phone and want to do school work but I simply won't get up to do it... FOR HOURS, I shit you not.

Listening to this in the background while making a sugar cane farm in Minecraft was eye-opening. I've never been diagnosed with ADHD, but I relate with EVERYTHING HG said. From having to be sleepy or "slowed" to focus and be 100% mentally capable, having a bad memory and getting distracted easily, to loving videogames because they are attention-heavy activities that reward alertness and scrutiny. What an absolutely beautiful video this is. It's a shame many people will probably avoid it because of the duration.

almost burst into tears at around 19:40 talking about compensating for adhd by being a night owl because the fatigue slows down your mind. I haven’t been able to fix my sleep schedule for months because night time is the only time I’m able to function. the recognition was so validating it was both relieving and painful

Some people shame ADHD medication especially in regards to it’s application in children. Now this is purely anecdotal, but as someone who suffers from ADHD (predominantly inattentive in my case) and went undiagnosed all through school, I was slapped with the gifted label and went straight to advanced placement, but my grades suffered immensely due to constant distraction, procrastination, daydreaming, forgetfulness, careless mistakes, etc. What many people fail to realize is that from my perspective, I can’t get all those years of missed potential back. This disorder made a significant detrimental impact on both my performance as a student and my success as an adult.

Psilocybin saved my life. I was addicted to heroin for 15 years and after Psilocybin treatment I will be 3 years clean in September. I have zero cravings. This is something that truly needs to be more broadly used in addiction treatment.

I’m a 15 year old girl with diagnosed ADHD, Anxiety and depression. I’ve had depression since 3rd grade and still now in 10th grade. The depression is so bad the psychiatrist said I probably don’t know what true emotions feel like anymore. It made me feel very seen because that’s how it is. I struggle with overstimulation. I try to stay in my room because I know there is a certain safety to it. I now have a Vitamin D deficiency, so I’m trying to go outside more. MY room is MY controlled environment. I control 95% of everything that comes in and out. I’ve been placed in the “gifted” group of students. But I’m pretty bad at testing so my teachers always gave me help understanding instructions. Truth is I’m really struggling. I long to feel true emotion and true connection with people. I feel the constant need for feedback and and hate the feeling of rejection. I’m hoping the depression is just hormones and I grow out of it after puberty. I feel like I don’t really have true connections with friends. I long for a true connection. It’s all purple on my end though. I have a good effect on people while feeling like I’m drowning inside of my own head. I know this was kinda a vent but I want anyone who read this that your struggle is real. You’re not making it up, you’re not overreacting, you’re feeling ARE valid. I wish you the best in your endeavors. Much love ♥️

And people with ADHD need constant feedback. Like playing a game, and getting a constant response to your actions (good or bad). This fits in with the hunter mindset too.

I have clinical ADHD and the work from home shift absolutely tanked my productivity. Yes the environment allowed me to be more flexible but the structured environment of the office kept me from getting too distracted. With virtually nothing stopping my attention from jumping to whatever it felt like I was more at the mercy of my ADHD than ever before and shortly after lost the job. I am genuinely curious the experience of others with ADHD on this matter. I feel like a lot of the listed advantages were actually places my ADHD is most vulnerable, and I would say less that society is moving towards a place where ADHD is advantageous but more towards where ADHD is exploited. Your attention is a currency now, and Twitter, Tik-Tok, Youtube all do an excellent job of keeping you distracted, and if you're prone to this sort of thing (ADHD) you're consumed by it.

I always wondered why I'm able to focus better sometimes when I'm tired

03:07 The bell curve of attention in population. 05:30 Farmer vs Hunter traits. 07:22 Farmers won, and thus we ended in a cities society. 08:56 School selects for ones who can sit in a chair for a long time. 10:05 Student-to-teacher ratio. 10:52 Disorder = genetic vulnerability + environmental cicrumstance. 12:34 Professions for ADHD people. 14:55 What is ADD/ADHD? 17:08 Hyperfocus. 17:45 Lack of focus. 18:22 Why ADHD is misdiagnosed. Grades. Class/environement. Developmental idiosyncrasies. 22:38 How ADHD is misdiagnosed. Behavioral problems, not listening as a defiance which gets shamed and punished. Forgetfulness. 25:46 How memory works. 28:53 ADHD and gaming. Disordered attention. Focus = bliss. Unfocus = anxiety. Flow inducing machines. 33:12 Being ADHD in the modern world. 35:04 Attention can be transformed both ways. 36:58 Content trends. 38:14 Discussion trends. 39:17 Dating trends. 41:01 Getting away from farmer principles. 43:23 Movement towards ADHD in society. 45:01 ADHD and work from home. 47:05 Block summary. 49:08 Questions section start. Can you have short attention span without ADHD? 51:46 Start of ADHD medication talk. 53:40 Brain development times. Delays in frontal lobe maturation. 54:42 Link between ADHD and giftedness. 55:13 Meds as a wheelchair for mobility issues analogy. 56:35 ADHD and neurotypicals. 57:28 Downsides of meds. 59:53 ADHD-caused inferiority complex. 01:02:32 Inspiration and environment beats structure and discipline. 01:03:55 smoking 420 and ADHD. 01:07:07 "Am I ADHD or just lazy?" 01:10:33 Self-medicating with caffeine. 01:12:08 ADHD and drug addiction. Mentioned video on this topic is here: /HNje-HuIYdI 01:13:52 Does Dr. K have an ADHD? 01:14:40 Can students with ADHD succeed at top universities? 01:16:29 Is it ok to check bloodwork before being diagnosed with ADHD? Mentioned lecture is here: /UOLB-4MbrSw

As a junior in college with adhd, I can definitely agree that I have missed significant developmental checkpoints along the way because nobody thought anything was wrong with me until i hit a wall and started performing poorly

On meds vs CBT: this "medication is easy" perspective is counterproductive for a lot of people with ADHD. I spent 2+ decades trying different techniques (like CBT) because I had a similar perspective, but none of them stuck until I started stimulants. In an ideal world, maybe 9/10 of us ADHDers could use mental techniques to overcome the issues it causes, but we don't live in that world.

When he described anxiety as unfocused thoughts, and it sunk in, I could feel that part of my mind calm down immediately

As someone with ADHD I self-medicated with THC for years for my executive dysfunction and my urge to smoke disappeared within 2 months of starting WellButrin as a prescribed med. Being so dependent on weed for so long also ruined the fun I used to have with it. Because now I associate it with being anxious about getting things done smoking for leisure results in me just feeling anxious more often than not now