The ADHD Report Card. Every Single Yes.

Someone sent me one of those ADHD symptom lists recently, the kind that goes through every classic sign and asks if it resonates.

I said yes to all of them, every single one, and then some.

So here's mine.

School

Left every assignment until the night before, sometimes the morning of, and I was so strategic about it, what do I need to do with the least effort to pass this class, like I had a whole system for it. If I wasn't interested I was working out the bare minimum path to a passing grade. Maths was my literal worst nightmare, science was also my worst nightmare, and shoutout to my best friend Hannah for letting me copy her tests, she's been my best friend since I was seven, thank you Han.

There was one time I sat in a maths test, opened it, looked at it, and closed it without writing my name or attempting a question. My teacher sat there watching me with absolutely no idea what was happening, and I was like, I'm just not doing this, and I wasn't being difficult, my brain genuinely could not find a starting point, it was a blank canvas with no way in.

Meanwhile I could ace an English essay the morning it was due, top of the class in psychology because I was obsessed with it. Did I study? To this day I have never studied a single thing, my brain just picks up what it needs to get through whatever it needs to get through.

Did I daydream through entire classes? Yes, always, I still do it, my friends call it going to fairyland, I'll be mid-conversation and just gone, still listening, but also somewhere else entirely at the same time.

The practical stuff

Sunglasses? I stopped buying $600 Ray-Bans, I get $10 ones from the servo now because those are gone the second I put them down and I've made peace with it.

I didn't even have a calendar for years, I was relying entirely on my brain to know where I had to be, and I didn't realise how taxing that was until I finally started using one. I'm still training myself to actually look at it every day, it's a process.

Walk into rooms and forget why? At least 10 times a day. I'll also start a sentence with "oh hey, before I forget" and then forget, while saying the words before I forget.

Small tasks feeling like huge projects? Massive. Putting away clean laundry is my actual idea of hell, not dirty laundry, that goes in the basket and stays there, but clean laundry that needs folding and putting away, I would rather do almost anything else and I genuinely cannot explain why. It just sends me.

Food and the fridge situation

Every single week with produce. The other week I bought raspberries because they were marked down, put them in the back of the fridge, completely forgot, and this is weekly behaviour at this point. I've now set up my fridge so nothing is hidden anywhere and everything is visible at all times, because if I can't see it, it doesn't exist.

Money

Impulsive purchases, yes. Started hobbies with Olympic level enthusiasm and abandoned them two weeks later, 100%. The subscriptions I've never cancelled. Parking tickets are my nemesis, I have such a specific and ongoing conflict with parking inspectors, they obviously love me, I'm their best customer.

The big ones

Emotions at full volume? Yes, it used to hit really hard, doesn't as much now, but only because I've spent years surrounding myself with people who are emotionally aware and know how to deliver information to each other. Sometimes I'd cry from pure frustration, overwhelmed by something completely disproportionate, and now I know it has a name and I'm a lot less confused by it.

Replying to emails? If it's not direct and clear about exactly what someone needs, I genuinely can't follow it, so I now copy confusing emails into AI and ask it to tell me exactly what this person wants in one sentence. That's my hack for now, I'm 31 and haven't found a better one.

Read a whole page and not know what it said? 100%, which is why I don't read books, I can watch documentaries for hours and learn anything that way, but a book is my worst nightmare because I can read an entire page and retain absolutely nothing.

The medication thing

The first time I took medication and my brain went quiet, I looked around and thought, is this what it's supposed to be?

I remember sitting there and being able to complete a thought, and then another one, without seventeen other thoughts crashing into it. I had no idea that was even an option, my brain had been running at full volume my entire life and I had no reference point for what quiet felt like.

I want to be honest though, it wasn't instant. I have tachycardia, which means stimulants are complicated for me, and finding what actually worked for my body took time. If something doesn't feel right, push back, you're allowed to.

The thing about Soft Chaos

Starting this is the only thing I haven't abandoned. Every other hobby, side project, business idea, Olympic level enthusiasm, two weeks, done. This one I'm still building, still adding to, still thinking about at 3am.

I think it's because it's actually interesting to me, not in the I-should-care-about-this way, in the I-literally-cannot-stop-thinking-about-it way.

That's the only signal I trust at this point. When my brain won't stop, that's the thing worth following.

If your report card looks anything like mine, the Late Diagnosis Survival Kit is free on the site.