Welcome (Who am I?)
Updated: Feb 6, 2022
I would love to introduce myself in a way that isn't totally boring and long winded. But.......
let's be real. I have ADHD too and I will most likely get distracted and start rambling off topic (and then I'll come back and edit it and you'll hopefully never know).
My name is Michelle Rolls. Yuppers I have ADHD, and so do many other of my family members.
I was that young girl in school that tried my hardest to be the absolute best student I could. I loved being with my friends, going to dance classes, and being on stage (I loved dance competitions). In elementary school I worked hard but never succeeded to get great grades. haha I even got a hearing test done, but guess what? (this is probably my favorite part of the story) I could hear totally fine, I "just wasn't listening" (turns out my ADHD diagnosis made sense of this. I was just distracted by all sorts of internal and external things). Fast forward to adult hood. I was diagnosed with ADHD. The hard part was, I didn't get any "next steps" and didn't think there was a "next step" except from pharmaceutical meds. I know I don't have to tell you how, meds and the diagnosis of ADHD holds so much stigma (even still these days). Because of all the stigma I have internalized over the years, I had a hard time excepting the diagnosis...and meds were completely out of the question. I for sure didn't think there were more options for managing or treating ADHD than meds. There are many ways to treat and mange ADHD: Medications, Natural/alternative solutions, Therapy, Coaching, etc. And then best part is that you don't have to choose one or the other treatment option. Research shows that a "multimodal" approach (using more than one mode of treatment) works better for most ADHD individuals.
SOoo.....When someone asks "do you have any questions?" I often reply, "I don't know, what I don't know, so how would I know what questions to ask!" Because of this, (the unknown after diagnosis and when the doctor asks if you have any other questions....well, "I don't know what I don't know"...) I feel it's part of my moral duty to share and help others in their ADHD journey.
I have traveled through life,...I have been diagnosed with ADHD, chronic illness, l have a fantastic kiddo, been divorced, got re-married (to the most amazing man EVER), finished University, and now starting a business helping fellow ADHDers, and (of course) just keepin on keeping on.
I'm glad you're here with me. This journey is more fun with more people.
(keep scrolling to read why I working with ADHD and Deficient Emotional Self- Regulation DESR)
The longer ADHD goes untreated and emotions remain dysregulated, the greater the odds that comorbid conditions develop!
DESR = Deficient Emotional Self- Regulation
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DESR interesting facts
Not a diagnostic criteria for ADHD (but many think this should be in the diagnostic criteria)
Not can have a prominent role in ADHD
DESR is a relatively new term to describe impulsive emotion coupled with emotional self-regulation difficulties
(I argue that it hasn't been put into the diagnostic criteria because this concept is so abstract AND the ADHDer ability to mask can be quite amazing)
Is associated with low frustration tolerance, impatience, being quick to anger, aggression, greater emotional excitability etc
Decreased ability to self-sooth and down-regulate a strong emotion to reduce its severity
The ability to refocus attention from emotionally provocative events (this is similar in our ability to shift focus…. Transition focus)
Emotion has a substantial influence on the cognitive processes in humans, including perception, attention, learning, memory, reasoning, and problem solving. Emotions are the psychological state of feelings. Other aspects of "feeling" are somatic (relating to the body). Both psychological and somatic feeling dysregulation have HUGE psychosocial impacts for an ADHDer. (I will be going into this a LOT more in another post soon to be linked here....stay tuned)