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Inability to switch between interests and profound guilt

Talli

Hello everyone this is my first post so I am sorry if I do anything wrong.

I am not yet diagnosed. I am currently on the waiting list (for two years so far) for a full diagnostic assessment having done the paperwork and attended the triage app. I am also on the waiting list for a ADHD assessment.

Both these diagnosis were suggested to me by three different NHS counsellors who strongly believed me to be AuDHD. But of course we will see what the assements say.

I am wondering if this behaviour sounds anything like AuDHD to any of you:

I have extremely intense special interests which usually last a long time (months to years) where I become fixated on one subject and it’s everything to me. But then it’ll start to wane and I’ll go back to a previous special interest. The guilt I feel is extreme like I am abandoning a family member and its ruins my life when this transition is happening. 
Sometimes the special interest will only last a month or a week and then the same profound deep guilt will kick in to the point all be almost paralysed and can’t do anything or it will lead to severely distressing behaviour which I will not go into on here.

I cannot seem to control how I feel about changing and the guilt it brings on.

Can anyone relate? 

Parents

  • Hello and welcome,

    I am diagnosed ASD.

    I can totally relate to your fixation. Some autistic people become fixated upon subjects such as astronomy, maths, Sci-fi, etc. Me, I have always been fixated upon using my hands to make things ever since I could pick things up. I too, cycle through, what I will call hobbies, many I return to some I do not. I can, within days, drop one hobby to take up a new or and old one. I certainly get very restless mentally, and possibly emotionally itchy between hobbies but know it will pass.  I do not feel as strongly as you when changing hobbies but certainly can understand how you could feel like that. However, I know my partner, diagnosed ADHD, can become extremely emotional when they have to break away from something they are very absorbed by just to eat a meal. 

    The hobbies for me are not just passing time, far from it. The most important part of my world is actually that within my head.  Hobbies have always provided time and space to do two things at once; time to listen to music and time to visit my internal world and process thoughts and feelings. It is always a voyage of discovery. I seem to need a lot of this downtime.  For me I value the sameness, predictability and the isolation of these so called hobbies. 

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  • Hello and welcome,

    I am diagnosed ASD.

    I can totally relate to your fixation. Some autistic people become fixated upon subjects such as astronomy, maths, Sci-fi, etc. Me, I have always been fixated upon using my hands to make things ever since I could pick things up. I too, cycle through, what I will call hobbies, many I return to some I do not. I can, within days, drop one hobby to take up a new or and old one. I certainly get very restless mentally, and possibly emotionally itchy between hobbies but know it will pass.  I do not feel as strongly as you when changing hobbies but certainly can understand how you could feel like that. However, I know my partner, diagnosed ADHD, can become extremely emotional when they have to break away from something they are very absorbed by just to eat a meal. 

    The hobbies for me are not just passing time, far from it. The most important part of my world is actually that within my head.  Hobbies have always provided time and space to do two things at once; time to listen to music and time to visit my internal world and process thoughts and feelings. It is always a voyage of discovery. I seem to need a lot of this downtime.  For me I value the sameness, predictability and the isolation of these so called hobbies. 

Children
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