I feel I should make my own take clear here: I don't buy this model that ADHD is totally caused by RSD, but the reverse doesn't seem true either. They seem like separate things which interact painfully with each other. (thread) https://twitter.com/captain_mrs/status/1274780469884747776

ADHD is its own cluster of things: difficulty regulating attention, focus rapidly redirected by interest, difficulty with short-term memory/working memory, difficulty staying on one task (because our minds wander off), not having good executive function "brakes"...

But RSD is its own, separate, cluster of things. Intensely triggered feelings of rejection, social fear, "nobody will love me like this". Hyper-vigilance and perfectionism.

All the things that look like c-ptsd emotional flashbacks!

The ADHD made the RSD worse because being loud and clumsy and ditsy and oblivious as a child put me into situations that reinforced my feelings self-disgust and self-hatred

The RSD makes the ADHD worse because you know what's worse than getting distracted and forgetting something? Getting distracted and forgetting something and then getting stuck in a negative emotional spiral and losing the whole damn day to it.

If I imagine a world where I didn't have RSD, the ADHD itself is... Not that bad?

I am gradually picking up tools and techniques to help direct my attention and supplement my memory

Note-taking methods and productivity software I love, mindfulness techniques I enjoy

Without RSD and with the aid of tools and techniques, my forgetfulness/distractability only causes occasional, low-impact problems

ADHD, _at the severity I have it_, could just be a quirk that makes me fun and creative (as long as I'm meticulous about note taking)

But with RSD it's much worse: in a spiral of negative emotion, I reach for bad coping mechanisms rather that the ones I've learned that are helpful

I end up in chronic cycles of procrastination, fear and self-loathing

Which makes all the executive function problems worse

Even worse, before I picked up techniques for healing c-ptsd trauma, those feelings literally stopped me from learning the tools and techniques that take the teeth out of my ADHD

I was too ashamed and angry to learn mindfulness meditation for a long time https://twitter.com/captain_mrs/status/1256992456408694785?s=20

To use the "ADHD is having worse brakes" analogy, it's the difference between having safety barriers around your racecourse, protecting your car and installing better steering to compensate, and having walls of fire around your racecourse that wreck your car every time you crash

So my goals now are to use the tools and techniques for c-ptsd to gently heal my traumas, and take the power out of my RSD negative emotional spirals

When I've done that, I think the ADHD itself will be not so bad

What's wrong with being a bit forgetful and impulsive anyway? I'm capable of learning ways of mitigating the risks and problems they cause!

And there are definite upsides in creativity and empathy for me, with my cluster of ADHD traits

When I think about it, it seems awful that so many of us learn to be so ashamed and critical of ourselves as children that our neurodivergences become literally debilitating to us

But while our neurodivergences can't be changed, our emotional traumas can be healed.

And when we take the teeth out of RSD/C-PTSD, I really believe the ADHD itself won't seem so awful.

As ADHD adults, we can learn to give ourselves the kindness and compassion that was owed to us

And if you work with ADHD children, please love them, be there for them and protect them from a future of self-loathing!

(end thread)