I prepare for these episodes months in advance.
I needed a new car, so I set myself up to be fixated on a new Prius when the episode got bad. Nothing less than new would do because I wouldn’t have the presence of mind to vet a used one.
This put a hard limit on the financial damage. The highest trim Prius with all of the options is cheaper that many other cars I could have bought.
The end result was a car $10,000 over my maximum budget. It has far too many buttons, but it didn’t ruin me and I love the car. All in all, a successfully managed episode.
This is one of hundreds of problems I deal with and plan for.
It’s a really bad idea. I’m perfectly willing and highly motivated to destroy relationships to get that money. Think heroin addict.
Instead, I save around 25% of every paycheck on top of retirement plans. This gives me a large buffer against episodes. It’s also split across multiple banks. I only use a single account and the others sit for months without a transaction. I don’t have checks or high limit cards for the others to delay access to their full amount. This is exactly the right amount of friction to keep them safe. It’s there, it’s mine, it can be available if I can wait a day. I can’t wait a day.
The results speak for themselves:
1. My credit score is over 800
2. My only loans are a house and car.
3. I’ve never failed to pay my credit card off in full each month.
As a side note, people see this and think I’m not that bad. They are wrong. Very wrong. I am simply extremely good at masking and compensating.
According to my psychiatrist, I’m a fairly severe case despite being easy to treat.
And, I'm sorry to repeat myself, but isn't it possible that you go to a third party professional (e.g. a lawyer) which you can melt down and it would be fine because it would be legally enforced. Or would the resentment build and you would just buy a second car (or house!) as soon as you are free of their strictures. Sure, you destroy the relationship, but there are more lawyers for the next time.
Once again, congrats on having a solution!
Each step of the process requires significant activation energy and unless I finish every step with no delays, it will not be restarted for months.
My brain is incredibly unreliable. There are very few things I can force myself to do. Unless a routine task is more important than work or my twice a month D&D game, it won’t be done on time, if it gets done at all.
That includes cooking, showering, housework, car maintenance, etc. Reminders for these things will be ignored. Todo lists will be ignored.
If someone has reduced mobility in their arm due to some past injury that might not be considered a disability if its impact on their life is low. If that impairment is so severe that they have functionally lost use of that arm then it could easily be considered such.
I don’t consider my ADHD a disability, but it is an impairment with regards to impulse control. But someone else’s condition could be much more severe. Someone with bipolar disorder or manic depression can easily go through a bout of extreme suggestibility which can wreak absolute havoc on their life.
Categorising many mental disorders as harmless “neurodiversity” feels like a form of forced positivity imposed to alleviate the stigma of some disorders at the cost of dismissing the serious impairments inherent to others.