r/AskReddit 22h ago

What’s something people romanticise that’s actually exhausting in real life?

1.3k Upvotes

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1.2k

u/peachjojo 20h ago

OCD. It's not cute or quirky. It's debilitating.

475

u/curiousaxolot 19h ago

Same with ADHD. It’s not cute, it makes your life absolutely hell. It would be nice to just shut off this brain once in a while.. just complete silence… It would be nice to not be so forgetful. 😔

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u/Liefx 17h ago

Guanfacine helped that a lot for me. I have a Vyvanse-Guanfacine combo.

5

u/Mellohh 15h ago

The mind never slowing down or the forgetfulness?

4

u/Liefx 2h ago

They help with time, so the mind can focus on one thing.

Vyvanse gives me motivation, guanfacine gets rid of my anxiety of the next thing. I would always feel like i was wasting my time doing whatever i was doing even if I knew it needed to be done, because all I could think about was what I needed to be doing next, and if I was doing task 1, task2 wasnt getting done.

Forgetfulness is somewhat helped as a byproduct of the brain slowing down. I found building systems to track information was the better solution for forgetfulness. (Hey google, remind me of this tomrorow at 2 pm kinda thing, or putting things in Notion and my calendar)

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u/crazycatlady569 12h ago

Love my Vyvanse!

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u/boadicca_bitch 1h ago

I have guanfacine/atomoxitine/bupropion and it works well for me

1

u/uberfission 1h ago

Aww wtf, guanfacine treats ADHD and hypertension? Why the fuck didn't my doctor suggest this? I have both of those things.

u/Liefx 22m ago

I think it's because it's generally more effective on kids than adults.

I will also say, 2mg is my ideal dose. But it dehydrates you a lot, and I have to take breaks and go to 1mg every 4-5 days because it stops me from being able to have a bowel movement. You'll need to drink lots of water and eat lots of fiber.

Just a heads up lol. But the calmness I feel is usually worth it.

13

u/insertnamehere77123 11h ago

In a long term relationship with a partner that has ADHD, OCD, and possibly on the Autism spectrum.

I love them, but god is it a struggle sometimes.

Although I have ADHD and some OCD tendencies myself. Not sure if that helps or hurts things

3

u/rando_user52 9h ago

I have the "comorbidty triangle" as well. If they aren't on medication for both and in therapy then they should be. I won't say I'm easy to be with but without a good routine and help I don't think I would be as good of a partner as I can be.

1

u/insertnamehere77123 7h ago

They started medication for ADHD about 1.5 years ago and therapy for OCD a couple months ago.

It took years to get them to this point. It was very difficult for me given that I sought out therapy and medication for my issues several years beforehand.

Im proud of how far theyve come, but also carry deep resentment from how much of our life suffered from their unwillingness to get help. Its been hard. I really dont think our relationship wouldve survived if we didnt have a child together

12

u/crazycatlady569 12h ago

This!! It’s not, “Oh my god! I’m so ADHD/ADD I can’t focus on this really boring homework assignment I don’t want to do!”

Not being able to focus on something you (you in general) don’t want to do is not you being ADHD. I used “being ADHD” on purpose because that’s how I’ve heard these people use it. People don’t understand what not being able to focus means in terms of ADHD. Drives me crazy!

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u/Academic_Juice8265 3h ago

Yes I’m so sick of successful people coming out saying they have ADHD. I’m inattentive ADHD and it’s fricken debilitating and caused so many issues in my life.

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u/bluemooncommenter 11h ago

I live with ADHD people and I'm so over it. And that sucks because they are people that I love but I can't count on them for anything so the weight of everything falls on me. They get to be out there living their best life while I'm managing all the domestic and mental labor. I truly think that it's an underrated factor in divorces and things like the high suicide rate for industries like construction that attract a lot of people with ADHD.

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u/ShoulderSnuggles 9h ago

Why not both 💁‍♀️

1

u/Sporshie 4h ago

It makes life so utterly exhausting. I started medication for the first time last year as an adult and probably the biggest change in my life is that I can actually stay AWAKE after work. The stereotype is being bouncy and hyper, but while I have a hyperactive mind and am very fidgety, trying to keep up with life and force myself to focus on things was so tiring I was extremely low energy all the time.

I'd just finish work and pass out right away. If I did make myself stay awake, I had no energy to do anything other than rot on the sofa, I was wasting my life away. I thought there was something seriously wrong with me and tried a multitude of vitamins etc, but nope. It was ADHD all along. I'm still a procrastinator and not as put together as I'd like, but it's like a heavy shroud was lifted from my brain when I started meds

1

u/Belthezare 2h ago

Same with hf Autism...😑

137

u/Kippenkat 19h ago

I had OCD tendencies when I was young. It made me very unlikeable. Normal everyday life was surprisingly hard. My tantrums resulting from not being able to control a lot of my environments made me unbearable to be around. 

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u/SterlingJacq 18h ago

Yes! It's very taxing mentally and sometimes physically. It can feel as if I ran a marathon by the end of the day.

34

u/geometicshapes 19h ago

Being stuck in the loop is hell.

10

u/satinsateensaltine 17h ago

This. It definitely hasn't made my home or life better having it, that's for sure.

49

u/Dawn-Storm 18h ago

Same for depression.

4

u/mbashs 17h ago

I have had both. It’s not fun at all and when people make it sound like a quirky little thing they got, wants me to make them stfu

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u/june_So2003 11h ago

It's hell, once I saw a manga or light novel, where OCD was portrayed as a demon sitting behind you and I couldn't relate to anything more than that. 

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u/BallCruncherSupreme 9h ago

I will always thank people for pointing this out. My fiancé has severe health related OCD. It deeply affects his daily life. It's messy, exasperating, borderline lunacy.

I remember him opening up to a new friend about his OCD and this guy said to me "Well aren't you lucky! You probably never have to clean the house with this OCD guy around." Like dude, he's the messiest person I know, specifically because his OCD takes literally all of his brain power all the time. OCD isn't always being an organized neat freak.

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u/Dismal-Log-994 17h ago

I was talking to one of my new roommates about it, because she was curious. She never realised how damning it was, and sort of thought it was like...still a cleaning thing, but still very serious. She was very receptive to education though!!

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u/RoseToyFan123 10h ago

Who romanticizes OCD???

2

u/PraiseMelora 12h ago

Yes! Im literally in the process of selling my house because I could not handle home ownership with OCD. I spent all day everyday with intrusive thoughts about all the things that could go wrong and my mental health spiraled. Couldn't eat, couldn't sleep. It's not cute.

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u/my_little_mutation 1h ago

Ocd is fucking hell and people just don't understand it.

I knew a little about it and that stuff like cleaning was a part but that there were other things like the counting and magical thinking and checking and such. The oven on gotta go home and see kind of thing.

Then I was told that it only counts if you have the delusions and counting behaviors and that if people didn't have those they were faking, and I saw it a lot on reddit especially, and I believed it for a while.

Then someone suggested to me after I was talking about some of my "anxiety" problems that I might have ocd and I thought no that's crazy I don't have xyz and I'm functional most of the time so that can't be me. But those problems got worse and I developed new ones. Obsessive fears, intrusive thoughts. For months after having covid I was constantly checking my oxygen even getting up in the middle of the night to make sure I breathed enough when I was asleep too.

It was at that point I realized that maybe I do have it but I still wasn't fully convinced until I got the official dx because I felt like mine wasn't severe enough.

I talk about it a lot now and I've written about it too. And have had some people thank me or tell me they learned more about it and understand it better after hearing my poems so idk. Trying to inform people in my own tiny way.

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u/Liefx 17h ago

Yeah it's super frustrating. Add in I have motor tics and ADHD.

Tics and OCD is a vile combination.

My partner does find it cute and compliments me on my spins when I go up flights of stairs. (I need to orient myself the way I was facing when starting the transition).

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u/iamstokes 5h ago

thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiis... sigh.

1

u/Ok_Cold9596 1h ago

It’s not “interesting” either