Getting diagnosed with ADHD later in life leaves many women a mix of emotions: relieved, empowered, understood, but also resentful, frustrated and angry.
Living with undiagnosed ADHD often meant that you spent your life holding everything together for everyone else, while chaos constantly brewed on the inside; cycled through anxiety and depression diagnoses with only mild relief; and are burning out from carrying a constant mental load that nobody else seems to struggle with.
It makes sense that you would feel excited to finally have some answers, but also incredibly frustrated at the system for missing it for so long.
Research shows that women are often diagnosed later in life than men. This likely happens because most of what we know about ADHD is based on how boys present with ADHD and girls and women tend to present differently (note, this also impacts adult men being diagnosed). There is a general assumption that everyone who has ADHD struggles to sit still, is disruptive, and their life looks chaotic. That is sometimes true, but not always.
Sometimes the chaos is internal, which is how many women have experienced ADHD. The question needs to shift from: "can you function?" to "how much is it costing you to function?"
If you resonate with this and want to read more check out the full blog post here.