Hi. I just found this site. Yes, I was underdiagnosed with anxiety/depression for more than 15 years. Zoloft was very helpful but I continued to get and loose jobs due to all kinds of behaviours not explained by anxiety/depression. I never accepted the depresssion diagnosis, I just clung to the anxiety part to explain my crazy happy then scared behaviours. It took poverty and an astute prescribing nurse to actually take the time to observe how I interrupt other speakers, go down long, interesting paths of tangential conversation before returning to the answer to the question originally asked of me. I could not be diagnosed by the HMO doctors I'd been paying for 15+ years AS LONG AS THEY ONLY SPENT 9 MINUTES OF A 15 MINUTE annual appointment speaking with me. So, I continued to take Zoloft for the anxiety/depression as well as the ADHD. Then I was switched to Adderall XR to participate in freebie program, which worked well once we upped the dosage. And now I've just been switched to Vyvanse when the Adderall XR freebie program was discontinued and the Vyvanse program began. I also take Celexa (generic is Cetalopram) for OCD (obsessive compulsive disorder) that was diagnosed once the ADHD was treated. I also take Seroquil at night in order to get a full nights sleep without interruption. I do a good deal of sleeping during the day to compensate and have to use an alarm to wake up and take the Vyvanse (for ADHD & Anxiety/Depression) and Celexa (for the OCD) then go to sleep for awhile until those meds wake me up. Needless to say I applied for SS Disability Insurance and received it within 9 mos of my application. I'm working to overcome past issues with a psychotherapist and I continue to work at my art and writing fully expecting to earn a living within 3-5 years. BRIGHT SPOT: Now that my mind and nervous system have evened out and I'm learning to live a non-chaotic life, I have really come to appreciate my artistic abilities and honor them by continuing to learn new techniques. After 35 years working in an office environment--corporate, small business, non-profit--I appreciate the ability to live within my own mental emotional cycles (the moon, the stars, menses) and NOT the 9-5 that never, ever worked for me no matter how hard I tried. Time for this ADHD'er never adds up and plays out the way it does for other folkes. I've lost a few friends who didn't believe ADD/ADHD was REAL but. after reading great books and receiving links to ADD sites through ABOUT.com, I KNOW it's very real and I'm doing the very best I can every single day to live this life as I've been given it. DID THIS HELP?
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