Comment by 0xC0ncord

> are there any strategies I ought to try to help focus on work without getting sidetracked? And ways to help remember things?

How do you tend to spend your time?

What percentage of your time is spent on activities that benefit from rapid context-switching and short periods of concentration? (Examples might include watching short-form content, browsing/commenting on online forums, most video games, navigating most cities, and working in certain environments).

How much time do you spend on activities that benefit from the opposite? Sustained concentration and attention with minimal interruptions. (Examples might include watching movies, reading novels, some video games, navigating countryside, and working in certain environments).

Our bodies and minds adapt to the demands we place on them. If you're sedentary all day you'll lose muscle mass, cardio endurance, etc.

Late 20s/early 30s is when I started to notice the costs associated with my lifestyle becoming more apparent. The prophylactic effects of youth start to wear off and you realise that you are what you eat, in a multitude of ways.

There are some really good suggestions in this thread: sleep, exercise, medication. Therapy also helps some.

Externalizing my brain helped massively before I was diagnosed. Pages and pages of notes -- both to write an idea down to move away from it and as a way to make sure I do a task. It's way easier for me to accomplish something if I can obsessively plan it out in advance, and it's way easier to stop rolling an idea around in my head if I jot it down (potentially to be never entertained again.)

It's a later step after diagnosis, but my doctor told me I'd be surprised at how effective medication can be. They were 100% right. It's not a cure all and it's not without potential side effects, but it makes me sad that it took me so long to approach my primary doctor about the issues.

But as a side note, the medical info I've read makes a pretty firm statement that there is no late developing ADHD. One if the diagnostic criteria is that the symptoms occurred during childhood. Coping and your environment may affect the disorder's effect on your life, but it's with you for your life. _However_, adult diagnosis is very real. Your environment changes so much as you age, and it may or may not make ADHD worse. I'd talk to your primary doctor with an open mind, both for what may be going on and for how to deal with it.

There are endless systems, tools, and strategies.

Carefully consider your environment. I perform best with very little going on around me. In my physical environment and on my PC. Austere. Minimize things that catch your brain and eye. One or two apps at a time, close everything else. Pick your one more important thing every day and work on that. It needs to be a contract. Usually you have one or two important things to be doing and you can ignore everything else without too much consequence.

To remember things you need an ironclad todo system that lets you very quickly capture anything you need to remember. You need to be able to record, triage, filter, prioritize, and execute on anything you need to remember. If any one of those stages is leaky you won't trust it and it won't last. My entire life is structured around managing it. I have to have very strong discipline. House must be spotless. Desk must be spotless. Try to work in the same place at the same time every day. Environmental and contextual stability is huge. Your brain must associate a particular desk, chair, place with doing the most important things. If you allow yourself to goof off or do other things in that place you are losing the fight.

Working out fixes a lot for me too. I workout or my mood and motivation falls apart. Move or die. Again, consistency is key. Everything I do around environment is to reduce the need to use executive function. It is finite and fickle for people with ADHD. The more you have to think and convince yourself to do things the less likely you are to do them. You need consistent cues. "Sit down here, start timer, means work on main thing and nothing else." If you can have discipline at all of these external things, the work can just happen and there is a kind of freedom in that.

Program outlets. Give yourself set, specific time to explore the sidetracking. Don't tell your brain no. Tell it "later". It helps if you know there is time for the extra thoughts. That there is a relief valve.

Also, drugs. I use prescribed stimulants. There are some unpleasant negative things, but I can function with them and life is better with them. But it isn't some magical cure. You still have to be organized and willing to work on your tasks or you will just be really focused on things you don't really need to be doing.

I could write so much more, but that is some top of mind stuff that I think sits at the top of my hierarchy of being productive. Oh and you may need to have some conversations with future you. How is future you, a week, month, year from now going to feel if you burned a lot of time on side quests?

What is “late developing adhd” bar the obvious?