Disclaimer: This diagram represents common patterns or trends associated with autism and ADHD. However, these are generalizations & will not resonate with everyone’s individual experiences. There is a lot of diversity among Autistic and ADHD people & each person’s journey is different. For more information and full write up please see www.neurodivergentinsights.com
Credit to Neurodivergent Insights
I experience half of everything on the ADHD side, half of everything on the autism side, and everything in the overlap.
The ones that fight the most are craving new, novel things and wanting to not change a damn thing about what I do every day.
The novel stimuli is what I dream of doing, while the routines are what I actually do :P
Edit: I just have adhd-pi
Damn that’s me
?Porque no los dos?
What, like… routinely change routines? You might be onto something. 🤔
It’s the beauty of AuDHD. Great at finding patterns. Shit at sticking to them. But that’s ok because here’s another one!
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Can’t confuse them if you got both. 👍
just out of curiosity, how does it work to have both? since some traits are directly contradictory
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I’m not an expert, but can you not be both?
Yes you can… It’s not fun (ಥ ͜ʖಥ)
Sounds about right.
Here!
It’s a really good match for “complex creative” careers. Like (high end) software development, maths, startups, skunkworks etc.
New and scary problem: Raaah!
ADHD: Ooh, new! enter manic mode
ASD: I’m gonna repeatedly smash my brain into this problem and see who breaks first. I will read about it, watch videos, try to solve smaller versions, try to solve it stupidly and see if that works and why not, talk everyone’s ear off about it… special interest activate
Take twice as long on the project as anyone else, but it’s done right, and then spend several days in burnout recovering from the manic session?
At worst yeah. :)
But for complex tasks it’s sometimes “being able to do the project at all”, or “faster than a team of non-autistics”.
Burnout management is a field by itself…
Yes, there’s a massive co-morbidity between the two. Something like 50% chance to have ASD if you have ADHD iirc
its the reverse; about half of people with ASD have ADHD.
In the US at least the diagnosis rate of ASD is 2.7% and the rate of ADHD is 9.8%, if I recall the odds of having ASD if you have ADHD is approx 20%
I’ve heard at least one expert confidently claim that about 50% of people with autism have ADHD.
Me: Finally I have my ADHD under control, I feel so good.
My ASD: Hold my beer.So much this!
Sometimes I feel like the upside of my ADHD cancelled out the upsides of my autism.
You mean the downsides of your ADHD?
There are a lot of negatives to be sure, but some positives too. It’s a double edged sword. Hyper focus can cause the absorption of lots of information, and the changes in attention can take someone to myriad topics. That can help create connections between areas of knowledge that might not usually mix, aiding in creative problem solving.
I don’t lament my ADHD, I just wish I knew about it earlier, so I could have adapted better.
This reminded me of something my partner, who’s AuDHD (I’m just ADHD), sent me a while back. I don’t like the term “gifted” because it’s not very meaningful, so I’ve been calling the 3rd circle “hyper connected”.
https://tendingpaths.wordpress.com/2022/12/12/updated-autism-adhd-giftedness-venn-diagram/
I am the whole diagram.
I have both and the top two are constantly at war in my body. ADHD screams we’re bored, we should go out to a movie, grab a bite to eat, hang out at the mall, my Autism is like fuck no I wanna stay home under the covers and play Binding of Isaac.
When autism wins out ADHD is like, yeah but you suck at Binding of Isaac why don’t you try something new and then I spend 2 hours scrolling my library trying to pick a new game instead of playing.
But if the ADHD wins out over the autism I’ll go a place and get overstimulated and when I come back I’ll either have a migraine, go into an autism nap for several hours, or just the burnt out and unable to focus for 2 days.
Having both sucks
I have adhd and definitely relate to craving familiarity and routine. This is a good general reference, though. I think the overlap between autism and adhd is vast and poorly understood.
yeah routine helps treat some symptoms/effects of ADHD, it’s just gotta be a flexible routine that has room for novelty.
perhaps a better way to understand it is not in what is craved but where one thrives?
What am I if I crave familiarity, routine, AND novelty and new experiences?
A mess who doesn’t know what they want in life.
Ask me how I know.
Probably AuDHD (both)
Desire for routine or at least control over the routine can show up in ADHD, esp as a means of controlling one’s own condition. the routine may not look like a routine to others lol
I have autism and numerous other disorders too.
This helps.
Yes, because only people with adhd or autism have special intrests and passions. Why not include breathing in the both catagory at that point.
And everyone has to pee but if you have to do it 40 times a day you should have that looked at 🙄
hey good on you being skeptical of MH info on social media. In this case, the hyper interests are the kind of thing that once you’ve been on the receiving end of it, you know what it is.
It’s definitely a thing.
