Almost completely incapacitating executive dysfunctioning

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My executive dysfunctioning has always been really bad, but since I moved away from home to start college in my country's capital city (Madrid, Spain) a year and a half ago it's been wild. I've only managed to pass one subject in all this time, haven't gone even to a third of my classes, delay buying the things I need all the time to the point I usually have very little food and starve myself, and even when I have food I still starve myself because even cooking is too much activity already, don't do any cleansing whatsoever so the piles of trash keeps acummulating all over my room and the flat in general is as dirty as it can get, almost don't leave my bed and spend most of my time laying on her in a quasi-lethargic state, haven't made a single friend in all this time because as I' ve said I spend most of my time laying in bed, struggle to keep personal hygiene at a decent level, don't even have the ability to keep contact by text message with my family and friends back home... I know this sounds like I'm either so seriously depressed I'm almost catatonic or the laziest person ever, but I'm really neither of those things, I just lack any executive functioning skills whatsoever.

The thing is that over the years I've tried all the tips that I've seen online about how to manage executive dysfunctioning again and again and none of them seem to work, I always end up again falling back into the executive dysfunctioning spiral very shortly after trying, and I don't know what to do anymore. The other day I was watching a video of a youtuber who has autism and ADHD about executive dysfunctioning and at one point he said that if you find impossible to do even the simplest tasks in your everyday life and nothing you do seems to help it you might need medication to regulate your executive functioning, and that in his particular case that was undoubtly what helped him the most to get it under control. I fear this might be the case for me too.

However, although I firmly believe I also have ADHD and not just autism (which anyway I only got diagnosed last October), I still don't have a formal ADHD diagnosis, and I doubt a doctor would prescribe executive functioning medication (which as far as I know is the same as ADHD medication in general) to me without an ADHD diagnosis, but I don't know if I have time to get a diagnosis (my parents will make me drop out of college and move back home if I fail every subject again this year, so I need to be in conditions of passing my final tests in May or else I'm f****d). I have an appointment with a new psychiatrist next week, but if medication is as I've said what I actually need I don't see how I'll be able to get it soon enough to be functional enough by at least April.

I'm just so sick of being unable to do anything at all and finding almost impossible to carry out almost any task. Can anyone relate?

Yes, my executive functioning issues became dramatically worse when I went away to college too. I think it is probably because of all of the additional responsibilities all at once. Luckily, I had an older brother and twin sister who also went to the same college and my parents lived only a half hour away. They managed to help me enough to get through college. What was worse was when I went away to work... by myself... in another state.

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31st of July, 2013
Diagnosed: Autism Spectrum Disorder, Auditory-Verbal Processing Speed Disorder, and Visual-Motor Processing Speed Disorder.

Weak Emerging Social Communicator (The Social Thinking-­Social Communication Profile by Michelle Garcia Winner, Pamela Crooke and Stephanie Madrigal)

"I am silently correcting your grammar."

The challenge of combining two major transitions - moving away from the family home, plus succeeding in college or a job - is often too much to do at once.

MM, good luck with your psychiatry and meds, but my prediction is you have too steep a hill to climb to get to full functioning by May. If you do need to return to your parents' home, make your personal goal to learn independent living skills. An occupational therapist or case manager can sometimes help with this, but I don't know what's available in your country. There are tricks or workarounds to help with executive functioning, such as building routines that you can execute without much conscious attention, or religiously relying on a day planning tool. But it takes time and practice to develop these things.

If you do succeed at remaining in college, you still need to improve your executive function and learn better independent living skills. There are some approaches that may help. Often buying a student meal plan is a good idea for autistic students, because there's a lot that goes into menu planning, purchasing, budgeting, cooking, cleaning up, and food safety that you can just ignore if you get everything from the cafeteria. You may also get better at things like talking to the professor if you are having a problem or will need to miss a class. I bet that it's really hard for you to do this right now

Good luck. Remember, and remind yourself, that you're a good person even if you don't meet every challenge successfully. Adulting is hard!

As for as the meds go... My girlfriend has executive dysfunction along with sever depression & had a stimulant ADHD med prescribed to her after trying lots of antidepressants. It might help her with her executive dysfunction a little but it's hard to say cuz she also has depression, bad anxiety issues, & a stress illness & it does help with those issues some. I'm on the antidepressant Wellbutrin/Bupropion which also helps with ADHD a little. I do have ADD & my executive function may be tad better on it. You could ask the psych about trying it cuz it may be a little safer than trying a stimulant med & some of your symptoms sound like they could be depression related even if you don't have depression persay it might be easy to get that med due to having those symptoms. You might could also fairly easily get Strattera/Atomoxetine prescribed cuz it's a nonstimulant med for ADHD & there has been some studies on it helping executive function.

The first step is recognising you have a problem, and seeking help. Now you've got to that point, I'm confident you can find a way.

My suggestion:
Take an hour or two just to list out all the things you need to do.
Then see how many items you can put off a day or two. Use the maxim "never do today what you can put off until tomorrow".
After that you'll have a short list for the day, which is not so overwhelming. Tackle those jobs one at a time, and make sure you finish each job once it's started.

Don't beat yourself up about not finishing your list - every job completed is a cause for celebration!
At the end of the day, just make a new list for the next day, and repeat for a few days.

What you'll find is there are some activities that are coming up every day, such as attending classes, eating, and personal hygiene.
After a week or two, you will be developing a routine for these daily activities and they'll be easier through practice. You won't need a list for them anymore.

Now you've got the urgent daily jobs under control, you can start adding into your lists one or two of the things you have been putting off. You can spend a day on a cleaning/tidying blitz of your room, you can wash your clothes, schedule a time for shopping, and so on.

If nothing is working for you, it's possible medication might help. I'm on a low dose antidepressant which helps a lot with motivating myself to do the things I need to do and I think its because it increases noradrenaline (norepinephrine) as well as serotonin. So possibly an SNRI might help? But speak to a doctor about it.

Wishing you luck!

i think adhd shows up at an very early age .. i dont know the case with your childhood ..