Many adults diagnosed with ADHD will not have had a formal diagnosis of ADHD as children. What this means from a practical standpoint is that they will have to comics moon learn how to manage their symptoms without having had any previous training in ADHD symptom jav moon management.
Newly diagnosed adults with ADHD face life challenges that are very different form the challenges faced by their younger ADHD cohorts. ADHD Adults, who may have previously depended on parents for support performing their activities of daily living, must learn, on their own, how to best organize their day-to-day tasks. These adults are often learning to negotiate other challenges as well such as how to navigate relationships, how to succeed with the demands of higher education, and how to succeed in their careers.
This is a tall order for people whose ADHD symptoms have gone unrecognized or untreated. For some adults with ADHD the ADHD symptoms have been present for a long time but the symptoms did not become a major impairment because of the support of parents or other family members.
These adults with ADHD will need to learn new life skills in order to manage their symptoms. Most ADHD adults will also likely need medical intervention. Psychological coaching, medication, cognitive training and EEG biofeedback have all proved useful in the management of adults with ADHD.
So where do you start if you are an adult newly diagnosed with ADHD? Your first stop should probably be the container store. No kidding!! Organizing your personal space will go a long way to moving forward on more lofty goals. Enlist the help of a relative or friend to help get you started but be careful to not allow your relatives or friends take over the job of ‘organizing’ you. You must learn to carry out these organizational tasks on your own.
A common problem that I have seen in adults with ADHD occurs when the ADHD adult has a partner, spouse, parent, or friend who enables the ADHD adult to continue to be disorganized and unproductive. The partner or friend continuously ‘helps’ the adult with ADHD by continually performing for the ADHD adult the household and life tasks that the ADHD adult should be doing for himself or herself.
Inevitably the partner ends up resenting the one sided arrangement and the relationship ends up in ruin. If you find that you have a pattern of surrounding yourself with people who do things for you, it may be necessary for you to get professional help from a counselor and coach in order to get you on your way to learning how to navigate your life tasks on your own.
Finding the right job is important for all adults but for adults with ADHD some jobs are a better match than others. In general jobs that require repetitive tasks will be problematic for adults with ADHD. Jobs that require that you sit still for long periods are also a poor choice. Jobs such as firefighting, police work, paramedic work, waitressing, ER physician, Tour Guide, or teacher are probably better jobs than jobs in computer programming, bookkeeping, or accounting.