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Heat, health, house damage, productivity and ... ADHD?
4 years ago
General
[ General information ] ♞ [ Commission info ] ♞ [ Open slots and commission status ] ♞ [ About me ] Dear friends and followers! I have been very inactive again lately, and I would like to give you a little update about why, and how things are looking right now.
GINORMOUS WALL OF TEXT: COMMENCE!
Summer arrived suddenly this year, with temperatures jumping from pretty nice to unbearably hot in a matter of days. There are a few things that I take very badly, and heat is one of them. For weeks it was simply so hot that I could barely exist at all, let alone do anything useful. I spent weeks sitting in my chair naked, with a fan at full speed blowing air at me, and drinking iced drinks constantly, and then opening up all doors and windows at night to cool the house as much as possible. As you probably figured, I don't have AC, so this is all I can do. And the fact that I require caffeine (more on that later) does not help either...
So yeah, for weeks I was practically just trying to survive the heat.
Finally, there came some rain and dropping temperatures so I could exist again. Sadly, however, during the heatwave my mental health suffered and now I was dealing with a new wave of depression and anxiety. To make matters worse, the heavy rain was too much for my house's old, heavily damaged roof, and this resulted in water dripping through the ceiling in the kitchen and bathroom. The latter already had some serious water damage to the ceiling resulting in large, deep cracks, and now one of those cracks practically turned into a mini waterfall causing even more heavy water damage. At this point, the ceiling plaster is pretty warped and cracked and large parts of it looked like they will come down any moment. I didn't want to touch it, because I can't tell how bad the structural damage is underneath.
Inspecting the state of the roof from the attic made it clear that there is quite some structural damage to the bathroom ceiling, and if we get more rain like this, it may eventually come down. Sadly, the roof itself is also in extremely bad shape where I can't really do any emergency fixes anymore. Most of the roof is already held up and together by two dozens of wooden supports I placed under it, and plenty of polyurethane spray foam to fill in holes. Yeah... it's that bad. We are trying to figure out how can we make some cheap DIY repairs but when talking about roofs, "cheap" already means a lot of money. And all this definitely doesn't help with depression and anxiety...
And just as a bonus, the past two weeks I had some pretty bad sleep issues again, and the past few days I was also sick (I'm better now).
All the above things obviously hit my productivity pretty badly, to the point that I've literally couldn't get myself to do any work for several weeks. I tried to work on personal art, hoping that would help but it only did so a little. I'm glad I was able to do the "Mediterranean stallion" speedpaint, which also served as a practice/experiment to try out new things I've learned. At the very least, if I'm not able to work, I try to learn - I listen to art podcasts, watch videos, and occasionally read articles so is accumulate knowledge that I'll be able to use the next time I can break through the art block. The real problem however is commissions - I really need to make progress with them.
But I have some hope that I might be able to make some progress now, thanks to some new developments, so to say, which takes us to the last point:
I knew about my Asperger Syndrome (AS) - a subtype of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) - for a long time, and this knowledge helped me to understand myself and face my problems better. But there were still many things where something was clearly wrong with me, and autism didn't really explain it. There was a lot of frustration, a lot of self-blaming, and asking "Why the fuck is this happening to me?" Now, I knew that ADHD and AS have many similarities and often get misdiagnosed as the other, but since my symptoms make it clear that I definitely have AS, I never looked into it. But then a friend of mine just told me about their discovery that they may have ADHD - and as they started to describe it, it suddenly hit home. It hit home real hard. So I asked myself: Can someone have both AS and ADHD? I looked it up, and sure enou7gh, you can. According to the CDC, 14% of children diagnosed with ADHD also have AS.
I know what you are thinking: ADHD is self-diagnosed wrongfully so much lately, that it's almost an Internet trend. Everyone and their dog suddenly self-diagnoses as having ADHD nowadays. I would go to a professional to get diagnosed, but I simply can't - my insurance is in limbo, and pőaying for it is absolutely impossible. So... I did the best I could to research the subject, including the case of having ADHD while also having Aspergers. I've found two YouTubers, one with AS and the other with ADHD (both officially diagnosed) having a conversation about the differences and similarities, and about having both. I've also watched several other videos of people with an official diagnosis talking about what it's like to have ADHD, as well as reading through the official diagnostic criteria.
Long story short: I absolutely check every single box for combined ADHD. Everything the officially diagnosed people said about what it's like felt like they are talking about me. And ADHD would explain all of those issues I mentioned before, that I just couldn't understand. Suddenly everything just fell in place.
Of course, I'm not a professional, and I could be wrong. But I don't think I am. I'll want to get a proper diagnosis when it becomes possible, but for now, I'm re-assessing my entire life based on the assumption that I have ADHD, and really, suddenly everything makes so much more sense.
One thing with ADHD is that, unlike autism, it can be significantly helped with medication. ADHD meds are generally stimulants - and generally, both people with ADHD and actual medical experts agree that there is plenty of evidence suggesting that caffeine can be used to medicate ADHD, even if much less effectively than the "proper" prescription meds. But the thing is... I'm already consuming a lot of it, because I noticed that it helps me just... functioning better in general. I never understood why, I thought it must be just alleviating the chronic tiredness stemming from depression and other problems, but actually, it helps me be more focused and relaxed. Yes, caffeine makes me relaxed - which sounds weird. You know how it's common knowledge that drinking caffeinated stuff before sleep is a bad idea and will make it hard to fall asleep? Well, not for me - the opposite. Caffeine helps me sleep. You may think that's nonsense, but guess what, it's actually the experience of many people with ADHD - stimulants, including ADHD meds, caffeine, and nicotine (the latter being the other thing that I noticed to be helping to calm my mind) have a relaxing effect.
For the time being, I'm experimenting with caffeine. I've ordered some strong yerba mate, a herb high in caffeine that is used as a traditional drink in South America. Many people who try to self-medicate ADHD said that yerba mate is effective for them. And so far, it seems to be effective for me too. The thing is that until now, I drank caffeinated drinks when I felt tired, and I never really paid attention to if they have other effects on me, although I've noticed that they kinda help with being productive. But now I'm drinking yerba mate thorough the day (since it can be refilled with water several times before the herb washes out, one serving lasts me through the day) and pay attention to how it affects me. And it helps. I get calmer and more focused. And I don't care if it really works or it's placebo, as long as it has this effect. And if I eventually get a diagnosis... I'll consider the possibility of prescription medication.
A lot happened these past two months. My productivity has hit pretty bad but discovering that I most likely have ADHD actually helped to make sense of a lot of things. So right now I'm in a phase of practically re-evaluating my whole life. I guess this is what they call soul searching? But it seems this was the missing piece I was looking for all these years. So now I'm trying to figure out how can I use this new understanding to turn things around. I'm hopeful and positive. It will take quite some time to process this... but I think it will be worth it.
As for productivity, I'm positive, and I think there is already an improvement, the past two days I'm feeling more and more motivated to paint. Actually, I'm about to get started with some commission work once I'm done posting this. And hopefully, I can start streaming again in the near future.
So stay tuned!
GINORMOUS WALL OF TEXT: COMMENCE!
Heat
Summer arrived suddenly this year, with temperatures jumping from pretty nice to unbearably hot in a matter of days. There are a few things that I take very badly, and heat is one of them. For weeks it was simply so hot that I could barely exist at all, let alone do anything useful. I spent weeks sitting in my chair naked, with a fan at full speed blowing air at me, and drinking iced drinks constantly, and then opening up all doors and windows at night to cool the house as much as possible. As you probably figured, I don't have AC, so this is all I can do. And the fact that I require caffeine (more on that later) does not help either...
So yeah, for weeks I was practically just trying to survive the heat.
Health and house damage
Finally, there came some rain and dropping temperatures so I could exist again. Sadly, however, during the heatwave my mental health suffered and now I was dealing with a new wave of depression and anxiety. To make matters worse, the heavy rain was too much for my house's old, heavily damaged roof, and this resulted in water dripping through the ceiling in the kitchen and bathroom. The latter already had some serious water damage to the ceiling resulting in large, deep cracks, and now one of those cracks practically turned into a mini waterfall causing even more heavy water damage. At this point, the ceiling plaster is pretty warped and cracked and large parts of it looked like they will come down any moment. I didn't want to touch it, because I can't tell how bad the structural damage is underneath.
Inspecting the state of the roof from the attic made it clear that there is quite some structural damage to the bathroom ceiling, and if we get more rain like this, it may eventually come down. Sadly, the roof itself is also in extremely bad shape where I can't really do any emergency fixes anymore. Most of the roof is already held up and together by two dozens of wooden supports I placed under it, and plenty of polyurethane spray foam to fill in holes. Yeah... it's that bad. We are trying to figure out how can we make some cheap DIY repairs but when talking about roofs, "cheap" already means a lot of money. And all this definitely doesn't help with depression and anxiety...
And just as a bonus, the past two weeks I had some pretty bad sleep issues again, and the past few days I was also sick (I'm better now).
Productivity...
All the above things obviously hit my productivity pretty badly, to the point that I've literally couldn't get myself to do any work for several weeks. I tried to work on personal art, hoping that would help but it only did so a little. I'm glad I was able to do the "Mediterranean stallion" speedpaint, which also served as a practice/experiment to try out new things I've learned. At the very least, if I'm not able to work, I try to learn - I listen to art podcasts, watch videos, and occasionally read articles so is accumulate knowledge that I'll be able to use the next time I can break through the art block. The real problem however is commissions - I really need to make progress with them.
But I have some hope that I might be able to make some progress now, thanks to some new developments, so to say, which takes us to the last point:
So... I most likely have ADHD
I knew about my Asperger Syndrome (AS) - a subtype of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) - for a long time, and this knowledge helped me to understand myself and face my problems better. But there were still many things where something was clearly wrong with me, and autism didn't really explain it. There was a lot of frustration, a lot of self-blaming, and asking "Why the fuck is this happening to me?" Now, I knew that ADHD and AS have many similarities and often get misdiagnosed as the other, but since my symptoms make it clear that I definitely have AS, I never looked into it. But then a friend of mine just told me about their discovery that they may have ADHD - and as they started to describe it, it suddenly hit home. It hit home real hard. So I asked myself: Can someone have both AS and ADHD? I looked it up, and sure enou7gh, you can. According to the CDC, 14% of children diagnosed with ADHD also have AS.
I know what you are thinking: ADHD is self-diagnosed wrongfully so much lately, that it's almost an Internet trend. Everyone and their dog suddenly self-diagnoses as having ADHD nowadays. I would go to a professional to get diagnosed, but I simply can't - my insurance is in limbo, and pőaying for it is absolutely impossible. So... I did the best I could to research the subject, including the case of having ADHD while also having Aspergers. I've found two YouTubers, one with AS and the other with ADHD (both officially diagnosed) having a conversation about the differences and similarities, and about having both. I've also watched several other videos of people with an official diagnosis talking about what it's like to have ADHD, as well as reading through the official diagnostic criteria.
Long story short: I absolutely check every single box for combined ADHD. Everything the officially diagnosed people said about what it's like felt like they are talking about me. And ADHD would explain all of those issues I mentioned before, that I just couldn't understand. Suddenly everything just fell in place.
Of course, I'm not a professional, and I could be wrong. But I don't think I am. I'll want to get a proper diagnosis when it becomes possible, but for now, I'm re-assessing my entire life based on the assumption that I have ADHD, and really, suddenly everything makes so much more sense.
One thing with ADHD is that, unlike autism, it can be significantly helped with medication. ADHD meds are generally stimulants - and generally, both people with ADHD and actual medical experts agree that there is plenty of evidence suggesting that caffeine can be used to medicate ADHD, even if much less effectively than the "proper" prescription meds. But the thing is... I'm already consuming a lot of it, because I noticed that it helps me just... functioning better in general. I never understood why, I thought it must be just alleviating the chronic tiredness stemming from depression and other problems, but actually, it helps me be more focused and relaxed. Yes, caffeine makes me relaxed - which sounds weird. You know how it's common knowledge that drinking caffeinated stuff before sleep is a bad idea and will make it hard to fall asleep? Well, not for me - the opposite. Caffeine helps me sleep. You may think that's nonsense, but guess what, it's actually the experience of many people with ADHD - stimulants, including ADHD meds, caffeine, and nicotine (the latter being the other thing that I noticed to be helping to calm my mind) have a relaxing effect.
For the time being, I'm experimenting with caffeine. I've ordered some strong yerba mate, a herb high in caffeine that is used as a traditional drink in South America. Many people who try to self-medicate ADHD said that yerba mate is effective for them. And so far, it seems to be effective for me too. The thing is that until now, I drank caffeinated drinks when I felt tired, and I never really paid attention to if they have other effects on me, although I've noticed that they kinda help with being productive. But now I'm drinking yerba mate thorough the day (since it can be refilled with water several times before the herb washes out, one serving lasts me through the day) and pay attention to how it affects me. And it helps. I get calmer and more focused. And I don't care if it really works or it's placebo, as long as it has this effect. And if I eventually get a diagnosis... I'll consider the possibility of prescription medication.
Conclusion
A lot happened these past two months. My productivity has hit pretty bad but discovering that I most likely have ADHD actually helped to make sense of a lot of things. So right now I'm in a phase of practically re-evaluating my whole life. I guess this is what they call soul searching? But it seems this was the missing piece I was looking for all these years. So now I'm trying to figure out how can I use this new understanding to turn things around. I'm hopeful and positive. It will take quite some time to process this... but I think it will be worth it.
As for productivity, I'm positive, and I think there is already an improvement, the past two days I'm feeling more and more motivated to paint. Actually, I'm about to get started with some commission work once I'm done posting this. And hopefully, I can start streaming again in the near future.
So stay tuned!
I am curious to see if the caffeine trick works for you, as I may be able to apply it to myself.
So far drinking coffee and mate strategically does seem to help in getting more relaxed and focused. But since I also have other issues like anxiety and depression as well as mood swings, it's a bit hard to make conclusions.
I'll admit that I don't suffer from anxiety, so I can't really offer any kind of discussion there as I just don't have the life experience.
If I ever feel randomly depressive, I typically try to take the effort to drink more water. It seems a bit silly, but it is something that seems to work for me. Though, everyone is different.