Feelings are hard, I feel everything all at the same time in great abundance, when things are good they are REALLY good and when they are bad they are REALLY bad – there isn’t really an in-between.
This has happened to me recently, feelings of almost complete euphoria which in itself would sound so unusual to anyone outside if I tried to explain because nobody feels like that over anything but then on the other side of the coin the pain that I feel when things are not going great really hurts, it feels like I am wrapped in a dark blanket with heavy bricks upon my chest and my brain is going like a formula one car, analysing every conversation, every message, every single interaction and replaying it over and over again.
During my un-masking journey, I have discovered that the negative feeling is actually RSD or Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria which means when I feel rejected or criticized it causes me an extreme amount of pain and can trigger a cycle of anxiety, this is linked to what we now know is ADHD.
The euphoric feeling I am yet to figure out fully what that is, ChatGPT coins this as the “ADHD love cannon” everything loaded into a massive cannon and fired directly at my brain all at the same time…..until the Dopamine runs out of course.
The final thing that plays nicely into this blender of emotional turmoil is the all-or-nothing thinking, because my brain doesn’t moderate very well it is either “this is the best thing ever” or “this is hell, I am out of here” which naturally neurotypicals can’t make head nore tail of.
If you stayed to read all of this, thanks, I am just rambling at this point but this is how I feel, this is how ADHD and my neurodivergent brain works and makes me feel and I wanted to share it.