🎓 Getting Through College with ADHD and Autism
📆 After struggling through high school with mental health issues and undiagnosed neurodivergence, I started college at VCUarts in Fall 2019. I was excited to be living on my own for the first time, and to be studying something I was passionate about. The first semester went pretty well, and then the next semester in Spring 2020, COVID hit. I had to go home after spring break, and didn’t ever return to my dorm. Classes continued online, and I began to fall behind. I got a few bad grades that semester. I moved into my first apartment that Fall and continued with online classes.
💭 As I continued classes online, and eventually hybrid in person, I realized I needed more support for my ADHD and (then undiagnosed) Autism. My mental health was struggling, I wasn’t turning in work on time or sometimes just not turning it in at all, I felt distracted during classes due to my sensory issues, and was unable to focus enough on my professors to take quality notes on their lectures. I was identified as gifted in elementary school, and I never learned proper studying skills because for a long time, I never needed to study! I looked into getting accommodations for these challenges, but I didn’t have the documentation I needed to receive them. I continued struggling through my classes, barely maintaining the 2.5 GPA required to remain in my major.
🎨 As I continued in my Art Education major, teaching units during practicing courses to classes in elementary, middle, and high schools, I realized that public school education was not where I wanted to be. The rigid structure required in lesson plans was not the way I thought, nor the way I wanted to teach. I struggled to work with disinterested students, and felt a lot of anxiety standing at the front of the classroom. I was way too far in to switch majors, unless I wanted to delay my graduation even further.
📚 So this left me stuck in a major I was no longer happy with, with no accommodations for my ADHD or Autism, not on track to graduate on time, and generally feeling pretty hopeless. I decided to take the Spring 2023 semester off and focus on working and earning money while trying to improve my mental health. I missed the application to student teach in Spring 2024, and my graduation was delayed by yet another semester.
📝 I returned to school in Fall 2023, and I tried again to get accommodations. Their required documentation had changed and I qualified! If people are interested I can share more about my specific academic accommodations in another post. Unfortunately, I didn’t end up using my accommodations much, and I wound up failing two of my classes. Which leads me to this semester - I’m taking one class currently to finish my required courses before I spend my final semester (this fall) student teaching, then graduate in December!
✏️ Overall, I’ve had a really hard time in college. It took me forever to get support for my neurodiversity, I haven’t made any friends through college that I’m in regular contact with, I’m constantly stressed and frequently struggle with my mental health, and I’m a year and a half behind many of my peers. If I could go back in time, I would’ve chosen a different major to begin with, and I might have even delayed starting college too. I don’t share this to discourage anyone from going to college, but hopefully to let others with similar stories know that they are not alone.
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Navigating college with AuDHD has been an incredibly challenging yet ultimately transformative journey for me. Like many, I entered college excited but quickly found myself overwhelmed by the demands, especially with undiagnosed neurodivergence. I wanted to share some of the things I've learned that have genuinely helped me develop new skills and maintain a growth mindset, even when things felt impossible. One game-changer for my learning process has been embracing digital flashcards and active recall methods. Traditional rote memorization often left me feeling disengaged, but apps like Anki or Quizlet (or even just making my own digital ones) transformed how I study. For brains like mine, which can struggle with sustained focus, the quick, interactive nature of flashcards helps in forming those new connections essential for learning. I found that breaking down complex topics into bite-sized questions and then actively retrieving the answers, rather than just rereading notes, significantly improved my retention. It's about making learning an active process, not a passive one, which is crucial when sensory issues or difficulty taking quality notes can make traditional lectures a blur. Another huge shift for me was cultivating a growth mindset. There were so many moments where I felt like I was failing – struggling with time management, missing assignments, feeling overwhelmed by sensory input in classrooms. It was easy to fall into the trap of thinking, "I'm just not cut out for this." But I slowly learned to reframe these setbacks not as failures, but as opportunities to adapt and find new strategies. For example, when I struggled with time management, instead of beating myself up, I started experimenting with different planning methods, like using visual timers or breaking tasks into 15-minute chunks. It wasn't about magically becoming organized overnight, but about consistently trying new things until I found what clicked for my brain. Receiving accommodations was also a huge part of this adaptability. It wasn't a magic fix, as I mentioned in my original post, but having that official support provided a safety net and encouraged me to advocate for my unique learning needs. It also helped me realize that it’s okay to learn differently. This permission to be myself allowed me to focus on developing skills that genuinely supported me, rather than trying to fit into a mold that caused me constant stress. I learned to identify my sensory triggers and proactively create environments where I could focus better, whether that meant wearing noise-canceling headphones during study sessions or finding quiet corners of the library. Truly, college has been a brutal lesson in mental adaptability and skill development. It's taught me that learning isn't just about academics; it's about understanding how *I* learn best, managing my environment, and having the resilience to keep going even when the path is winding. If you're a neurodivergent student feeling lost, know that you're not alone, and there are always new skills to learn and mindsets to embrace that can make a world of difference.
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