That AuDHD life

Nah, I’m AuDHD so my memory retains whatever tf random crap it wants and constantly forgets relevant things like my own address and what I was right in the middle of saying. But even if I could convince somebody, in my experience it still makes them uncomfortable. Or, it did enough times that it’s now lodged in my brain as something to put underneath the mask.

I often play dumb about little details I’ve noticed or remembered. I got in the habit when I was a kid and people would react weirdly like, “why do you know that?” So I’d just pretend I didn’t even when I did, and I never really stopped. I might notice what car somebody drives, for example, but if it comes up I just act like I don’t know unless they’ve specifically told me. I barely realize I’m doing it anymore.

Similar story here. It really sucks to feel like I’m still learning how to be a functional adult. I hope you keep making progress and celebrate all the little victories along the way.

If you like QfG, you might be interested in Heroine’s Quest: The Herald of Ragnarok on Steam. It was released for free and I imagine that hasn’t changed. But I still ended up donating because I enjoyed it so much.

I’m not normally one to point out a spelling mistake, but there is a very important difference between someone with deficits in lots of areas and someone who defecates in lots of areas.

Random thoughts in no particular order:

Circle of the Moon was actually not made by IGA. It was developed simultaneously by Konami Computer Entertainment Kobe while IGA worked on Harmony of Dissonance in Tokyo. However, to me Circle ironically feels closer to an IGAvania of the two while Harmony feels like IGA was trying to make something partway between Symphony and a classicvania.

Aria and Dawn are generally the best liked portable games, but OoE has a loyal following due to its much higher difficulty more reminiscent of the classic games.

Harmony of Despair is surprisingly enjoyable. Even if you missed the boat, it can still be enjoyed on a PS3 emulator with all the DLC and even online multiplayer. It’s honestly a blast.

There’s also a mobile game called Grimoire of Souls and, for the really obscure stuff, some Japan only Castlevania casino games.

Of the PS2 games, I remember quite enjoying Lament of Innocence and keep meaning to give it another play someday. The other one I forgot completely.

I’m looking forward to Bloodstained 2!

Edit to add one more: there’s a Sega Saturn version of Symphony of the Night where you can play as Maria. It’s Japan only, but a translation patch can be found online.

I see white/gold too, and this always fascinated me because I’m wrong. The real dress is black/blue. It’s very hard for me to perceive that way, partly due to the bad quality picture, and particularly the background lighting.

The gold is black and the white is a dark blue irl, but in the bad coloring/lighting of the picture, the deep blue is quite washed out. Know that the colors are very washed out, know that the “gold” is black. Focus on the lower left where the colors are closest to true and block out the rest, especially the bright parts. The thick black stripe in the middle can also be a good spot to start to see it.

Hot take: their older games are better and the newer ones get progressively worse. Demon’s Souls was a solid RPG with rough edges and an interesting, detailed world. Dark Souls improved on the world and exploration, but they also specifically started to cater to all the fans that loved how “difficult” Demon’s Souls was. Ironically, they were praised for making a game to their own vision without compromising just for the sake of popularity. But difficulty alone was never the main draw of Demon’s Souls or the strength of From Software as a developer. They always specialized in immersive, detailed worlds. But ever since Demon’s Souls, they’ve catered increasingly and exclusively to the get gud crowd because it’s obviously successful (and you can hardly blame them tbh). They’re succeeding off the reputation for not doing the thing that they’re doing.

All that said, Demon’s Souls and DS1 & 3 can be enjoyed by most players if you’re willing to play slowly, level build, and use cheese strategies. I can’t speak to 2, I kinda bounced off it (I’m sorry, Zin). The rest are much harder to enjoy solo without literally just getting good at the game, as per the memes. Co-op may be a different story, obviously. If you can get into the really old stuff, King’s Field (series), Eternal Ring, and Shadow Tower Abyss are actually really fun once you get accustomed to the jank. They have a lot of the charm of the souls games without all the annoying git gud crap. RIP, they shall be missed.

I’m in one of those story hyperfixations now and I’m legitimately scared of it ending. Finding it was my solution to a terrible slump I got stuck in. I finished a great game that hit just right, but there was nothing like it to follow up with. Now I’m several months and hundreds of hours into a massive series and I’m going to crash so hard when it’s over. But I don’t want to slow down either, so I’m just enjoying it while I can and barreling towards my own oblivion.

I’m somewhat validated to hear of somebody else having this nickname.

I think most people just truly don’t want to think that something bad is going to happen. So even the ones close to me that know my track record and have used the nickname still seem like they’re making a conscious choice to not deal with that information, even if that means being blindsided later while I sigh hard enough to eject my soul from my body.

Stories like this always make me think: that dude probably rarely thinks about what he did that day, but to the person writing the story it’s a treasured memory. We do countless kindnesses like this, big and small, then never think about them again or know how important they were to the person receiving them. It might be paying for somebody’s groceries, letting them go first when they’re in a hurry, or something you said without realizing the impact your words made.

I think about this because I’m one of many people that will scroll past a meme saying “you matter” and instantly know that it’s wrong. But this idea is the closest I get to seeing the truth in it. We’ll never know how many people are out there telling a story like this about us without even knowing our name. But they are out there - and that feels pretty nice to think about.

It’s internalized ableism related to being told their whole lives they’re so smart and talented if only they weren’t so lazy. We’re extremely capable - sometimes. The rest of the time we struggle at the most basic of everyday tasks that normal people find trivial. Now combine that with late diagnosis. That’s a lot of years being told you should be better and wondering why you’re not. At the very least, it’s an extremely specific kind of low self esteem.

It may not be solely caused by dopamine levels, but the experience is common among many ADHD sufferers and our brain chemistry does predispose us to responding to that in certain ways (which is why we can break out of that pattern more easily when medicated).

For me, it was studying more effectively. Whether it’s studying, cleaning, or even enjoying a hobby, I just cannot buckle down and grind through the hard part. My brain needs some minimum level of efficiency to be satisfied. If it feels like I’m working too hard without enough of a result, it’s an impossible battle.

So I figure out how to do things better. Someone already mentioned Anki flash cards, and those were great for pure memorization. But every subject - and person - is different. The key was always going off the beaten path to look for other ways and other resources rather than just trying to grind it out. If I were in school now, I’d probably ask ChatGPT a lot of questions to help me learn. But I want to stress that I’d do so very carefully.

Maybe it’s because I’m AuDHD, but I tend to have to figure out my own way of doing things anyway. I rarely expect that the way other people do it is going to work for me. So I research and experiment until I find my own unique path. That feels less awful and it’s much easier to stick with.

Just about every aspect of linguistics has always fascinated me, even basic phonetics. I didn’t have much opportunity to study foreign language until I was older though, which I still regret. If I started earlier I probably would have gone a lot farther. Despite several years of intense Japanese study, my ability at using it is still poor. I keep practicing what I have even now though.

I was mostly avoiding writing a 12 paragraph comment. Any diet or self image issue taken to the extreme is an eating disorder. The most important lesson there is don’t take it to extremes. For people who struggle to diet in the first place, it’s not impossible but also not likely for the pendulum to swing that far in the opposite direction.

But if It ever did get to that point, no matter how or why, it’s not shameful or embarrassing and you can ask for help. Everybody just wants to see you healthy.

I’m only a sample size of one, but I lost half my weight and have kept it off for over a decade. I’m still borderline overweight, but healthy. There was no single trick, but the biggest thing was just sticking to it long enough. Once my body got used to being a lower weight, I was way less tempted to eat such large portions. The reframing I posted was taught to me by my therapist and helped me get to that point.

You gotta be in it for the long haul, but it’s long and difficult so take anything you can get to ease the journey. The easier it is, the more likely you will make it to the end.

It always helped me to think of hunger as winning. Hunger is the goal. Hunger is weight loss. If I’m hungry, it’s not a thing to be fixed. It’s what I want! I win! I’m hungry? Hell yeah.

Get your dopamine from hunger instead.

I’ve always had something wrong with me. The various diagnoses never fit and treatments didn’t do much. After making progress with my depression, I reaffirmed that it’s a result of my struggles, not the cause of them. So I stopped taking my meds, which never helped anyway.

At least, not how I expected. All my life, the mental fog and feeling scatterbrained was just normal. Even when starting Wellbutrin, it was mixed with other medications and ramped up so slowly that I never noticed the difference it made. But suddenly going without, I realized … oh, this has gotta be ADHD. So I got diagnosed and I’m seeing where that leads me.

It’s been a long road, and more difficult than most. But maybe soon it’ll finally get a little easier.

I only mentioned it because it took me a long time to realize, and if you ever try again I hope it helps.

Even after getting a diagnosis my brain keeps moving the goalposts, so I get it. Now I keep thinking things like: “it’s just one opinion”, “maybe they were being generous”, etc. I don’t know if I’ll ever give myself a damn break. But I can easily say the words to other people.

The fact is, getting ADHD properly diagnosed is extremely variable. Some people are much easier to diagnose, and some doctors are much better. Those of us still figuring this out later in life aren’t the easy cases, and a lot of doctors won’t look too hard. It doesn’t make your case any less valid. It just means you have to work that much harder to get the right diagnosis - while struggling with a condition that literally makes it harder.

I pointed out to the doctor that tested me how I could answer many questions as a 1 or a 5 depending on how I interpreted it. For example, “have problems with being on time.” I could say never or almost never, or I could say the overwhelming fear of losing track of time and being late ensures I’ll do nothing beforehand and leave way too early out of boredom/anxiety.

In the end I put 5 because what they’re looking for is if you’ve struggled with these problems for your whole life. Learning and implementing coping mechanisms isn’t an argument against that struggle, it’s evidence for it.

But for what it’s worth, I answered 1 the first time I took one of those and went 12 more years without getting diagnosed. I think about that a lot.