Research with Claude pointed to an AuDHD diagnosis experts confirmed

Ari Paul@AriDavidPaul

Following up on this. Turns out I have light AuDHD, which was incredibly helpful to learn. That came after testing clearly negative for everything and seeing multiple psychiatrists. That diagnosis came from a mix of my own research + Claude and has since been confirmed by a neuroscientists and psychiatrist. It gave me a new lens on challenges I was facing. For example, it reframed “depression” as mostly “autistic burnout” for me, which requires a different remedy; (activity for depression, genuine rest for burnout). That diagnosis also led me to other things, like a diagnosis of light hypermobility. Neurodivergence is still poorly understood, but it’s foundationally connected with overactive immune system (specifically MAST cells, histamine sensitivity), and stomach issues in many. For myself, I just have light seasonal allergies, a slight histamine sensitivity, and light hypermobility (double jointed elbows, hypermobile spine in spots.) Main take away from this journey is to keep digging and use LLMs for self-diagnosis (and then verify with the right experts.)

The diagnosis was helpful to me, because I’ve long experienced the inherent contradictions and “back and forth” between the adhd and autism pulls. I didn’t know how to describe or model it, and so just thought of myself as someone with inconsistent energy and a weakness for procrastination at times. The diagnosis let me reframe that as different nervous system states, and quickly yielded specific “hacks.” For example, if I’m procrastinating on something now, I’ll often “speed task” it, or in some other way gamify it to “trick” my adhd brain into tackling it immediately.

It also helped me understand why some activities were surprisingly draining for me. “Masking” is exhausting.

I think I’m 90% recovered from burnout after about 21 months into “retirement.” That was a combination of:

“Touching grass” - lots of time in nature and ideally in flow state via hiking or climbing or meditating.

Connecting with friends and family - spent a lot of time with family and my ~10 closest friends, quality time on what matters. Love and friendship. Looked for ways to help others.

Transcranial magnetic stimulation: did 2 rounds of this, each time it cut my anxiety by 35% (sustained), and cut 5 years of brain fog each time.

Supplements and peptides: taking “Wolverine stack” and a bunch of supplements now, but noticed very little from any of it. With wolverine stack i recover from workouts a little faster. No affect on mood or burnout from any of it. But my blood test results were solid at the start; worth getting a blood test, if you’re low on something, could be an easy fix.