First off: I am still undiagnosed. I’ve followed the ADHD topic for more than a year now since I seem to match a whole lot of symptoms and behavior patterns. An official diagnosis will most probably still take another year. I live in Germany.
One thing that got me wondering was caffeine. As I’ve heard, drinking coffee will make ADHD folks not feel any more awake, maybe even a little tired.
While it doesn’t make me feel awake as well, I very vividly remember my first coffee a long time ago that caused a massive outburst of productivity when all of the time I was known for being ‘lazy’ and distracted. However the effect quickly diminished with each subsequent coffee over the next year.
Isn’t this a contradiction though? If I actually had ADHD, why did coffee have this awakening effect on me back then?
It’s not a universal rule at all. I know people who are very ADHD who if they drink coffee they have a panic attack. I know people who it makes tired, and I know people who it makes productive. Personally it makes me more talkative.
Basically, it’s not a criteria for diagnosis at all. Everyone’s brain chemistry is different. There might be a higher percentage of people with ADHD whom caffeine does not affect compared to the general population, but that does not at all mean that to be ADHD you have to have that same thing.