It’s been about eighteen months since I first spoke to a doctor about getting referred for an adult ADHD diagnosis. The doc said basically “I’ll refer you but don’t expect anything because you’re holding down a job and a family so you must be doing alright”. I had my screening interview back in June, and that was followed up by two web-based questionnaires, one for me, and one for an adult who was about when I was young. My mum filled this role. And it’s off the back of this questionnaire that the NHS has discharged me, stating “ADHD is a life-long condition and we would expect differences to have been evident from an early age” and “[my] difficulties are not best explained by a diagnosis such as ADHD”.

Unqualified as I am, I do still feel like based on my own research, ADHD is probably the best explanation for a bunch of stuff in my life. A guy I’ve spoken to a lot who has some experience says my lived experience sounds fairly textbook ADHD/autism as taking effect from my mid to late teens (when my mum wasn’t about so much), but the NHS seem to have focused in on my early childhood in discharging me.

Has anyone here been discharged by the NHS before a diagnosis, and what did you do afterwards? Did you carry on and get diagnosed elsewhere? If that happens, do you have to cover the entire cost of prescriptions forever? Did you get diagnosed with something else? ngl this feels like a real blow and I don’t really know what to do next.