Neurodiversity Celebration Week - life living with ADHD
For Neurodiversity Celebration Week (17-23 March), Anna, Trainee Advanced Clinical Practitioner at the Trust shares a blog about her life living with ADHD and how this has affected her and her journey to becoming a mental health nurse. She also shares details on the support she has from colleagues and the Trust to ensure she feels included and valued.
Anna said: Neurodiversity has shaped my life for many years, initially through supporting my diagnosed loved ones, and more recently, through my own diagnosis of ADHD in 2023, after years of wondering, maybe...?
Life in the pandemic lockdowns highlighted so many key things that were crucial to my ability to function, by ripping them away overnight. These included routine and structure, as well as novelty, personal space, and physical activity. When those things disappeared, I was left with increased anxiety and agitation, loss of identity, and significantly more house plants and abandoned hobbies than I knew what to do with.
Finding out I had ADHD was eye opening and validating. It explained why I struggled to focus on tasks so much, why my mind constantly felt like it was racing at 300 mph, and why I struggled with how others perceived me. It also gave me the breathing space I needed to consider how much it had impacted my journey to becoming a mental health nurse - spoiler alert, a lot! - as well as the elaborate and often ridiculous methods for coping I had developed since qualifying.
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