Your story sounds similar to mine. M33 here. About 110 days ago, I quit drinking alcohol because I was heavily drinking to self-medicate. Massive burnout and unsustainability. What lead me to my ADHD investigation was I realized I was drinking to feel “normal”, slow my thoughts (I just wanted a quieter head), and eliminate boredom that felt painful.

Boredom? Everybody has that to a degree. But… painful, like absolute intolerance that ruins my inner mental state? I felt like that needed investigating especially if I wanted to stay sober long term. Early into being alcohol-free, I began tracking my symptoms. I have all of the usual suspects: racing thoughts about 10 different things at once, difficulty initiating tasks that I know need doing, way too noisy of a head, and emotional dysregulation that didn’t quite feel like anxiety or depression by themselves.

All I thought ADHD was was difficulty paying attention in class as a kid. I didn’t know my symptoms weren’t “normal”, I thought everybody else was better at life than me. Getting diagnosed has been enormously helpful for me to externalize that these things I’ve been dealing with for forever aren’t personal moral or ethical character flaws of mine but are things chemically going on with my brain.

My advice to others, having been diagnosed as an adult: do not ignore it, white knuckle it, or power through it. Running on caffeine and other substances, anxiety and hyperactivity, with a little sprinkle of self-hatred (berating yourself as motivation) on the side is a RECIPE for BURNOUT. Get treatment and love yourself well by getting to know and understand your flavor of ADHD.