Heal & Grow with Nickie
Join your host, Nickie Kromminga Hill, and her guests on a journey of personal stories and insights into healing and growth from past and current trauma. The focus is on fostering true connections through conversations centered around vulnerability and authenticity. The goal is to collectively heal and find opportunities for growth, promoting a sense of togetherness.
Heal & Grow with Nickie
43: ADHD and Me
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Disclaimer: This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be considered legal health or professional advice.
Nickie is not responsible for any losses, damages, or liabilities that may arise from the use of this podcast.
This podcast is not intended to replace professional medical advice.
Hey everyone. I was diagnosed with ADHD just a few days ago. Let's talk about that. Welcome to Heal and Grow with Nikki. I'm your host, nikki Kraminga-Hill. Here we talk about everything Grief, hope, illness, work, family, tragedy, possibilities, fun stuff and not so fun stuff. It's all on the table. Let's take a look at our lives and work to heal and grow together. I'm so glad you're here. Hello, beautiful people, before we get going on today's episode, I just wanted to reintroduce myself in case anyone is new here. If you are new, hi welcome. If you're not new, hi welcome.
Speaker 1:This is episode 43, I think, of the Healing Girl with Nikki podcast, which is absolutely amazing to me. We've been doing this for a little over a year and it's just been a really, really wonderful thing for me and for a lot of other people. So thank you so much for joining on this podcast. We talk about healing and growing. I talk about personal stories or my guests bring their personal stories and we talk about our lives and how we heal and grow from things, or how we sometimes don't heal and grow from things, and it's really just been a remarkable year of podcasting. So thank you so much to those who've been here and thank you. To those of you that are new, a little bit more about me.
Speaker 1:My name is Nikki Kruminga-Hill. I live in Minneapolis. Actually, if you're a Twin Cities person, I live in Richfield, but it's just easier to say Minneapolis. I live in Minneapolis with my husband, paul Hill. We've been married for 11 and a half years. Paul is a percussionist. We met doing a show together. We don't have any human children, but we have snowball pickles, peanuts, almost three. She's an American Staffordshire Terrier and she is deaf, so she has a special need. But that's okay. It's not that challenging to have a deaf dog, actually, but you can. You can hear all about her. I think she was episode number six or seven, if you want to rewind.
Speaker 1:I um, I am a musical theater performer, a musical theater teacher. Right now I work for a senior arts organization. I'm also an author and a speaker and I love to just do a lot, a lot of different things. Podcasting is just one of the things that I love to do. I also talk quite openly about my depression and anxiety, and also I have two diagnosed chronic illnesses fibromyalgia and myalgic encephalomyelitis. You can Google those things or go back in the podcast, because I've talked quite extensively about both.
Speaker 1:And now we're going to talk about ADHD. Earlier this week I received a ADHD-C, which means combined ADHD, combined diagnosis from a gosh neu. And so, yeah, I had mentioned a few weeks ago, oh gosh, I think maybe I have ADHD, and then I kind of didn't say anything anymore. So now I'm going to talk about it and just tell you what my experience has been like so far. Obviously, I'm very, very, very early on this journey and I'm going to learn so much in the next few months, for sure, for sure. But like anything, I will continue learning and growing throughout this process.
Speaker 1:So where to start? Where to start? Adhd is not something I ever thought that I had. It's never been in my brain as a possibility for myself as a teacher. I don't know, knowing a couple people, vaguely, who have it, and then you know what you hear about a little bit in mainstream media. So I wasn't ever really wondering if I had ADHD.
Speaker 1:And then two things in the past let's say year have sort of tipped me off or made me wonder hmm, is this something that I should look into? And the first thing is that I take Adderall for my chronic fatigue syndrome. I really only knew Adderall as something that treated ADHD, but my general practitioner suggested that I try it because Adderall is also used for narcolepsy, to give narcoleptics a little bit of energy. I'm not narcoleptic, but because of the chronic fatigue he thought that maybe adding Adderall to my daily regimen would help and for about a year he suggested that I try it and I said nope, I'm not doing that. All I know about Adderall, really again, is what is in the mainstream media, and I know that people can be addicted to it and I just didn't want to take that risk, especially because I'm newly sober. I just celebrated 500 days sober yesterday, everybody, hooray.
Speaker 1:Anyway, after I wasn't getting any more energy with the medication that I was taking, I decided to go for it and I started taking Adderall. I was on the well I think it's the lowest dosage, five milligrams and within about a half hour of taking that first dose I noticed a slight difference in my energy. I guess I just felt a little more perked up, for lack of better words. I suppose I didn't feel jittery, which I kind of thought I would. I didn't feel, I didn't feel weird, I didn't feel odd, I just felt like, huh, this is interesting. I have slightly more energy than I've had in gosh, years, years probably. I still take Adderall.
Speaker 1:I'm on 15 milligrams right now and once I started, once I popped up to about 10 milligrams, I noticed I have slightly more focus than I've ever had before. I've never wondered if I had problems with focus before, but now, all of a sudden, I could focus slightly better and that was just really interesting to me. I just thought, huh, I know this as a ADHD medication, a stimulant to help people focus a little bit better, and I'm focusing a little bit better. I wonder if those two things are correlated better and I'm focusing a little bit better. I wonder if those two things are correlated. The second thing that made me question, you know, if I should be seen for ADHD, was that I, I'm going to be.
Speaker 1:I want to be careful about how I phrase this because, um, I I want to speak very, very lovingly about, about this person and also not give their identity away at all. But I have a really amazing friendship that I just gosh, I just adore this person and we are together a lot. We're together a lot, we're together a lot. And the more time I spent with them, the more frustrated I got with them because they are. They just have some behaviors that are really, really frustrating to me. They're consistently tardy. They consistently don't do the things that they say they want to do or the things that they don't do the things that they say they want to do, or the things that they don't do the things that they want to do for themselves and they don't do the things that they're supposed to do for me.
Speaker 1:And I am certain that this person has undiagnosed ADHD and I mean like the classic maybe I shouldn't use the word classic, but the, the stereotypical symptoms, the ones that you kind of know about from mainstream media. This person fits the bill, and the fact that they are undiagnosed and the fact that they are not getting help for it is really frustrating for many, many people, myself included, and I've continued to get more and more and more frustrated with this person, which I am afraid is going to become detrimental to our relationship. And one day this was sometime last fall I just sat down and thought about, like why am I so upset with this person? Why can't I just like let it go and just say, well, yeah, you know, this is this person's journey and they got to live their life the way that they need to. I instead became increasingly more and more angry with this person and I thought about that saying and this isn't the exact saying I'm paraphrasing, but you'll understand what I'm talking about Some sort of saying like the things you dislike in others are the things that you dislike in yourself. And I thought, okay, you know, comparing this person with me, and I thought, well, dang it. I actually am showing, demonstrating a lot of these same behaviors of my friends. The one that I'm so mad at, just frustrated with I'm doing those same things, frustrated with I'm doing those same things At home, for sure, I'm doing those same things. And I thought, gosh, I got to start, I got to start looking into this for myself.
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Speaker 1:And I did a bunch of research. I mean, I'm continuing to do a bunch of research, realizing that I don't really know what ADHD is and that it's absolutely not named the correct thing. It should be named something else instead of, like, attention deficit, hyperactivity disorder. It shouldn't be named that. I don't know what it should be named, but I've just been wrong about what it is. So I started talking to some friends. I said, hey, I'm thinking I might have ADHD. Have you ever noticed anything in me? And the people I talked to all said no, never. And so I asked Paul hey, paul, have you ever noticed anything in me? And he immediately said yes, I have. I said okay, what are the things that you have seen? He said, okay, what are the things that you have seen? And he said well, you are unable to finish projects.
Speaker 1:When it's time to do something, you do five things before, like, for example, when it's time to sit down and eat. I do five things before that, and by the time I sit down to dinner, my dinner is cold. My meal is cold because I didn't come eat when I was supposed to and he named off a bunch of other stuff too, and that's when I was like, oh crap, whatever this is ADHD or not, I am having an impact, not necessarily negative, but definitely not positive. I'm having an impact on my marriage. My behavior is having an impact on my marriage. And that's when I was like, okay, I am going to get tested, I'm just going to do whatever it is that you have to do to go get tested which is easier said than done, my friends.
Speaker 1:I talked to my psychiatrist. I said, hey, I want to get tested. She said why? What are your symptoms? I told her. She said, yeah, you should get tested. Go talk to these people. So I called the clinic that she recommends and and they say we have no openings. I said you have no openings, like ever. She's like, yep, you're just going to need to keep calling back. Well, if you've listened to my episode on telephone phobia, you know that I will not be doing that. I will not be. Yeah, you tell them, snowball, I will not be calling this place to see if they have appointments. Sidebar difficulties talking on the telephone can be a sign of ADHD. Okay, so that's not working out. I call, I talk to my general practitioner. Hey, I'd like to be screened for ADHD. Okay, what are some of your symptoms? I tell him my symptoms. All right, I got a guy, call this guy. So I call that guy yes, we can get you in on August 27th. Keep in mind this was back in February. So I took the appointment. I said great, I'll see you on August 27th, no-transcript. Okay, so the appointments are set and in the meantime I start sort of spiraling.
Speaker 1:Actually, I would say March and April were pretty dark months for me this year, for multiple reasons, I suppose. But because I was learning about ADHD and the more I learned, the more I understood myself, which is good, right. But it also was oh my God, are you kidding me Really? Like, like all the signs were there. I missed them, my parents missed them, doctors missed them, and and now I, oh God, I got to do the fibro thing, I got to do the chronic fatigue thing, I've got to do the depression thing and the anxiety thing and all the other things, and now I got to manage this ADHD and I I went through a grieving process, a process that probably isn't done yet, just because I have a diagnosis, because I thought you know what I don't want to like, I don't want to deal with this, I'm not going to, I'm not going to deal with it Like, oh my gosh, I didn't understand that these things that I do aren't neurotypical, and I'm not trying to be neurotypical, but I am trying to lead a better life for myself and an easier life for myself, and learning how to cope with some of these symptoms is a way for me to live better.
Speaker 1:A few weeks ago, I reached out to a friend who has been diagnosed within the past year or so and I just said, hey, how did you get diagnosed? Because I am having a very difficult time waiting for August. And I'd like hey, how did you get diagnosed? Because I am having a very difficult time waiting for August and I'd like to start getting some help now. How? How did you get diagnosed? And she said my doctor my doctor, excuse me recommended a online test to me it's called ADHD online, which I had already. I knew about it because I already researched it. She said I took this test and I gave the results to my general practitioner and that's how I started on my meds.
Speaker 1:And I was like okay, okay, and and I had opted out of not taking the ADHD online test prior to this because it's it was expensive, it's like $'s like 170 plus. I didn't know if I should trust an online test and I didn't want to spend that much money and I wasn't sure how accurate it was, and so I decided to not take it. And then this friend had mentioned it and I thought, okay, maybe, maybe. And then I went to my next therapy session and she said you know, while you're waiting for this full assessment in August, what do you think about taking the ADHD online test? I was like you know, I told her the reasons why not, like why I wasn't going to, and she said okay, I, you know, I understand that, I respect it, I value your opinion and it could be helpful to you for this interim time, before you get your other diagnosis or don't get your other diagnosis, you could take this test, give the results to your psychiatrist, give the results to your general practitioner and say is there anything we can do with this information or what if it says that I don't have ADHD? Then I could stop thinking about it. So I decided to take the test that night. Um, and I took it that night.
Speaker 1:I got the results the next day. It said that I have major depressive disorder which I'm already being treated for General anxiety. Already being treated for ADHD-C. Adhd-c means that you have both attention deficit and hyperactivity. There's two other kinds of ADHD, just the attention deficit or just the hyperactivity attention deficit or just the hyperactivity, but they just call it all ADHD. So it said yeah. So it said I had ADHD. It also said that I had sensory processing disorder, which I'm not going to go into today other than by saying this makes sense to me and I'm going to see if I can specifically get tested for it. And then I also have auditory processing disorder, and all I'm going to say about that today is I'm going to look into that as well. So it said that I had ADHD, sent the results to my psychiatrist, sent the results to my general practitioner and I'm waiting to meet with them and I'm just going to leave it at that. I meet with one next week and I meet with the other the week after. So I was like, okay, I took these tests, I realized that there might be, you know, some questions about the validity of this test, but for right now I'm just going to live as if and keep researching and keep doing what I can do on my end to learn about myself.
Speaker 1:And then, like four days ago, I got a call at nine 30 in the morning. I don't ever answer my phone, but I saw that it was the doctor's office for my August appointment and I thought, oh, maybe they can get me in a little bit earlier. I should answer this call. So I did and they said can you come here in two and a half hours? We've had a cancellation. And I said yep. So I went Um three and a half hours, four hours. Maybe I might do a whole nother podcast on what the testing was like. Um, cause, it's, it's very interesting and and it was sort of fun I'm someone who likes, you know, psychological exams. It was, it was very interesting. But, um, he said, if you can wait about 20 minutes, I will look at all of this data and let you know what I think. I will look at all this data and let you know what I think. I said okay.
Speaker 1:So I waited and he brought me back into his office and he said yes, it is, it's my. He didn't say it's my understanding of something. It was nothing generic like that. Like he gave me a positive ADHDC diagnoses, the diagnosis, and said that he is going to do a big old like workup of all the information and he's going to send it to my general practitioner. I also asked him to send it to me because this particular doctor that I saw only does the testing and the diagnosing. He doesn't do any of the management. He suggested that I start seeing an ADHD coach, which is something I would really enjoy doing. It also is not covered by health insurance, so I'm going to have to look into that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so you know, I got in three and a half months early, which is absolutely incredible. So, dear person who canceled their appointment last week, thank you. You have changed my life for the better, I think, and got me into this doctor appointment. So there you have it. So there you have it. I feel okay about it right now to do with that information, and what I want to do with that information is learn about myself and and keep going and maybe maybe live differently in in really, really great ways.
Speaker 1:Like I'm, I'm excited. I'm excited for what's to come. I'm pre-exhausted for what's to come, just because I'm exhausted all the time anyway. But you know, it's work. Bettering your life is work and I want to better my life and I'm willing to put the work in, and I know that there's so many people out there that also have ADHD and are living really, really well and are living amazing, fulfilling lives and I'm already living an amazing, mostly fulfilling life. So managing this is only going to make my life better it's. You know.
Speaker 1:I know that there's a long road ahead. I know that this isn't a recovery type of situation, but that you know that's already happened with my fibromyalgia and my myalgic encephalomyelitis, like. Those aren't things that I recover from ever. I will never not have fibro. I will never not have ME CFS. I will never not have ADHD, um, those that those are just there are labels that I have and and that's fine. So I will always be managing this Um, but it looks like I've been managing it for at least 20 years somehow and, wow, I'm about to get some coping skills. That sounds freaking fantastic for me. So that is a story of me being diagnosed and how I got to this exact moment.
Speaker 1:I'm sure I'll have plenty to share with you in the future. For those of you that have already been diagnosed, please feel free to send your advice. Please don't give advice unless you're already diagnosed or if you have a child who is diagnosed. I'd love to hear from those who are on the same path. You can send me an email at healandgrowwithnikipodcast at gmailcom. Nikki is spelled N-I-C-K-I-E, and yeah, I look forward to sharing more with you in the future as I learn and as I heal and as I grow. As always, thanks for healing and growing with me today. Bye-bye, hey, everyone.
Speaker 1:If you enjoy my work and you would like to support me, there are so many ways in which to do so. You could purchase my book things I'm'm Thinking About A Daughter's Thoughts on the Loss of Her Mom. It's on Amazon and also linked in the show notes here. You could buy me a coffee Mmm coffee that's also linked in the show notes. Or spending money right now is not something that you're able to do. You could always share your favorite podcast. You could tag me in a post. You could follow me on Instagram or Facebook or LinkedIn. Any of those things help me out quite a bit. Thank you so much for supporting me. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be considered legal, health or professional advice. I am not responsible for any losses, damages or liabilities that may arise from the use of this podcast. This podcast is not intended to replace professional medical advice. Thank you.
