do aspies have adhd

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I do have a lot of trouble staying focused, though I'm not sure if it's due to AS or something else.

I do have a lot of trouble staying focused, though I'm not sure if it's due to AS or something else.

In 1979 I was diagnosed with Hyperactive ADD which is now called ADHD Combined Type. My Axis I disability diagnosis is Severe ADHD Combined Type. I was given 100% disability for my level & I was going through testing at the same time & 6 mos later I got a diagnosis of Asperger Syndrome & when I asked Social Security about adding it to my Axis I diagnosis record they said they can't because I'm already 100% disabled with a mental disorder and they don't usually list two disorders in one Axis number, my Axis II is Generalized Anxiety Disorder & Axis III is Permanent PTSD & Axis IV is fibromyalgia....from the government's doctors not mine.

That is not true at all. People with ADHD can experience hyperfocus. I do, and so does my son. In fact, now that I am thinking it through, every single person I know with ADHD has periods of hyperfocus. I'm not saying all do. But everyone that I am thinking of now does.

One of the main reasons I didn't realize I had ADHD for so many years was because I viewed myself as being able to pay attention because I could think of plenty of hyper-focus type moments. I can become so absorbed in a book, for example, that I don't even realize I am reading and it can be hard for someone to get my attention. At work, I have to set a timer to go off, or I will invariably forget to leave to go home. Yet my head is like a tv with all channels simultaneously blaring, I cannot sit still for longer than maybe 3 minutes (something has to move, even if it's just wiggling my toes in my shoes), I have dozens of started projects that will never be finished, I can get distracted by the whir of the computer fan, I sometimes have to read the same passage 4-5 times before I understand it if it is not of interest to me, my mind can go off on a tangent and never get back to where it was meant to be, I spend half of my life--it seems--trying to find something or trying to remember why I got up and walked into another room, and I have issues with organization that sometimes nearly disable me.

I do agree with those who say that it is hard to tell where one starts and the other stops. My son has NLD which presents a lot like mild AS, and sometimes it is really a toss up whether something is due to that or his ADHD.

I, myself, am not sure I am convinced that ASD and ADHD do not belong in the same bucket. Yes, they are different, but I think they are more similar to each other than either is to NT wiring. I suspect that someday we will understand how they are linked, and they will be considered different variants of some larger condition.

I've never been diagnosed with ADHD.

Same for me. I can get so intensely focused on something that I become totally absorbed in it.

The problem with ADHD is not that we can't focus on anything, ever, it's that we have trouble choosing WHAT we focus on. So you can get stuck on one thing and perseverate, or be constantly getting distracted by one thing after another.



I suspect the same thing and I have been thinking about that a lot. Also I am wondering if Aspergers is more closely related to ADHD than it is to other forms of autism.

I've never been diagnosed, but I suspect I just have ADHD. The criteria for ADHD fits me better than the ASD criteria does. I've heard that in children ASD and ADHD can look similar. If ASD kids can be misdiagnosed with ADHD, why can't ADHD kids be misdiagnosed with ASD?
It seems like most of my social problems are caused by attention and impulse control problems. When I was a kid I didn't pay attention to social cues, but when I started to pay attention to them I could naturally read them. I often did socially inappropriate things because I of my impulse control problems.

People with ADHD actually do not always have trouble focusing on things they are interested in. They tend to have intense interests, although less intense and more varied than autistic people.

I am diagnosed with ADHD, and while the diagnosis is for inattentive type, I suspect that was more the clinician's bias than the reality (that I meet the criteria for combined type).

The only cognitive test I know of that I was given that is indicative of anything was the trail making test, in which I scored 20th percentile on test A, and 10th percentile on test B, but such tests are at best indicative and are not reliable for diagnosis.

A large percentage of autistic people meet the criteria for ADHD. I've seen studies with numbers from 30% to 70% and probably higher, but I do not recall at the moment. I think Ettina's 50% figure is probably close to accurate.

I was diagnosed with ADD once by a mental health therapist, back when I was 15. I sort of thought it was a load of crap at first, as seemingly everyone was getting diagnosed with it back then, but when I was reading about inattentive ADD one day, it suddenly hit me that this therapist may have been correct. I don't know whether or not I truly have it, but there's no doubt that I at least have some traits of it. I think a lot of it just comes with being an aspie though, much like my OCD tendencies.

Once you have ADHD it's with you for life, unless you outgrow hyperactivity and your symptoms aren't severe enough for an adult diagnosis.

I was diagnosed with ADHD - Primarily Inattentive but I'm combined. I get hyper and impulsive though I'm unsure if this is due to bipolar. I'm considered rapid cycling.

Anyway, yes, ASD + ADHD. Oh my!