[Blue Yugo]

I’m not going to Niagara Falls.  Not this time anyway.  I’ve needed an honest, true “get away” for a long time, but money or job situations got in the way.  One of my main goals is to a) go to scenic places and bring home some nice photos of nature beyond my own “familiar area”, and b) get away from crowds & noise, and of course c) to go somewhere I’ve never been before as personal empowerment…

I’m staying north of Nanticoke, south of Hamilton itself.  (I’d tell you more if this weren’t such an open forum.)  I’ve got a mind to visit Mr. Used at some point under the assumption they still have the remnants of the RG set there (unless Steve’s taking it on tour with him later in the year.  Gosh, I hope he comes to the US again some time.)

My thinking goes as such:  Make minimal plans.  I can never decide on things ’til last minute and I never adhere to itineraries.  I’ll only frustrate myself and overcomplicate things if I build in too much structure ahead of time.  I suppose part of the joy of taking ADD along on the journey is that it gets to flex its wings by sticking to an “anything goes” paradigm and gets to make decisions on the fly like it wants to.  The place I’m staying has maps and the owners told me they’d be happy to not only help me pick spots along the escarpment and Bruce Trail to visit, but also pick me up if I want to walk one way then call them so they can bring me back to where I leave my car.

This is so empowering in so many ways.  My ADD on one hand can sail on its whims. but at the same time it’ll have a “survival” set of reins that will make me actually focus more because I’m in an unfamiliar place and really “on my own”…with no one to bail me out (aside from in a real pinch, the house owners or my Nanticoke co-worker who said take along his cell #  just in case).  I am a little afraid that I might get the rolled eyes and “Oh great…and American…” but from talking to the plant manager, the house owners, and a few other people, I think the locals will just be friendly and perhaps laid back like I wish the locals around here are.  I hope I meet someone that speaks German since I’m from a very German part of Pennsylvania.

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[Blue Yugo]

My company has a plant in Nanticoke, ON, and I talked to the plant manager yesterday about the whole area from Nanticoke, the lakes, all the way up to Toronto.  I’m going to have to make more than one trip just to do everything I want to!  I’m actually also going to be looking into that general area for far-off future consideration to possibly move.  I may have relatives in BC, but I was born in the States…though it doesn’t mean I have to stay here my whole life.

I’m staying at a B&B with 3 rooms.  I wanted to bring my bicycle so I could bike as well as walk / hike, but it’s a lot to haul and if the weather isn’t right for biking, I may not even get to use it.  I guess not something to bring on the first trip.  I’m going to see the Niagara Escarpment, Bruce Trail, and I’m not entirely committed yet to how far I’m going to wander and what I’m going to do.  I have a few indoor locations I’d like to see, and I’m already playing with street views on Google maps and “driving” a few intersections to my “must-see” destinations.

I would love to get to see downtown Hamilton, but I’m not sure about driving there.  Me and cities don’t mix (because the ones I see are madhouse bustles of traffic and impatient drivers, one-way streets, and gang graffiti).  I’d take the bus, but I’m still not certain of how to convert USD to Canadian.  I assume buses don’t take US.  Or I can save that for another trip and head to points more south and west.  No idea.

I just turned what would have otherwise been an aimless trip to upstate NY into a real challenge for myself crossing borders, changing money, and doing a solo trip where I don’t have a friend or family member waiting for me who will show me around and take the reins for me.  See?  In everything I do, I learn by DOING!  You can tell me….it passes out the other ear.  You can write about it…but I have nothing tangible or a visual reference for it to make sense.  Throw me into it (as long as it’s not a swimming pool), and I learn on the fly and out of necessity (unless it’s swimming…no can do).

I guess it’s now off to install, play with, and get frustrated with my new GPS.  Like all pieces of technology I’ve never seen before, I’m sure I’ll figure it out instantly and without looking at the instructions…at least not for more than 10 seconds within the first 30 days.

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[Blue Yugo]

I have booked my first ever solo vacation.  (I”m 38…that’s a rite of passage I should have accomplished half a lifetime ago.)  I will be staying at a B&B, which is highly rated and highly awarded, and ironically costs the same as the basic rate at the nearest Motel 6.

I found that I’d spent more energy procrastinating about doing my taxes than actually doing them, and behold…I’m getting a refund!  So I’ve already had to blow some of it on a GPS unit as supposedly it’s impossible to travel without one (how ever did my parents get to Washington State and back in 1966 without one, right?)  I’m more afraid of the GPS than I am trusting my instincts and eyes as I cross not a time zone boundary (I have yet to do that some day), but an international border.  I just wonder how many hours it’ll take to get through that fiasco…  400 miles, 6 1/2 hours according to Google, but you know how that goes.  It’s not ’til June, but I’m a little intimidated already…but it’s a trip I have to take because I need to feel what it’s like to be personally empowered…something my parents don’t understand.

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[Blue Yugo]

@Fabulous Glad to hear it’s over…and that you endured.  I had orthodontics as a teen, so I’m a bit resilient as far as dentistry…but when I had my root canal done, it was actually the 2 hours sitting in one place that unnerved me more than the goings on.  (And the dentist constantly coming and going.)  Eventually, the sitting and time consumption got on my nerves, and he gave me a Xanax.  If you ever run across a dental situation that you just can’t take, ask if they have a mild sedative pill like that, and since they should have your other meds on file, they might be able to determine if it’s okay or not given an individual circumstance.

@Larynxa Thanks for the confidence and advice all around.  I guess my mind is leaping at the “A crisis!!  Gotta leap to my own rescue!!”  I hardly ever yank back on my own reins, and I’m not being medicated for ADD at the moment…so any clarity moments have to come from sheer willpower or absorbing the advice or support of others.

I will say to myself that it’s not like NOW is the only opportunity to get the book.  Heck, I still have to finish the Barkley book I have!  There shouldn’t be a rush, and the wishlist (great feature) will help me remember so weeks down the road I won’t forget the title.  In fact, I may even be able to find some of the books at my local B&N and perhaps thumb through a few first and decide what I want.  I did see online that you can have samples sent to your Kindle (which I have as a PC app, not the actual techno-gadget).  Maybe that will help to find a few free samples in order to resist impulse-buying too many books or ones that may not serve my specific needs as much as another.  (I’ve never been a “shop-around” type…always impulse and immediate.)

Somewhere I read about how one of the ADD challenges is to resist the immediate reward and hold off for the better pay-off down the road.  I’m not so good at doing that the right way.  “Small” purchases are a bigger challenge since bigger ones (like renting a cabin in upstate NY for a weekend get-away) are not even possible given there’s so little room on my major credit cards, I couldn’t afford the half-down deposit.  Cost-prohibitive purchases are one thing…it’s those little pesky impulse-buys that add up all the while staying off the radar ’til you get your “nearing credit limit” warnings.

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[Blue Yugo]

So, would Canada now call cheapskates “nickel-pinchers” instead of penny-pinchers?  LOL.

I need to file my 2012 taxes.  I’m terrified that I’ll owe, but I usually get refunds.  That will save me, but I procrastinate something fierce.  (Hmm, weren’t there webinars on procrastination recently, too…?  Will have to check…at some point.)  If I do get a refund, I can float another month or two.

I only got around to the one webinar.  Only hearing 1 to 2 seconds of talk every 5 to 10 seconds would have anyone losing attention span, ADD or not.  I’m going to say something that surprises me, but…I think I need to take a step back!  By that, I mean yes…I know ADD is making my life is a disorganized mess and I’m more like Bill in the “Boring Meeting” skit here compared to my attentive, problem-solving co-workers.  My finances…a disaster.  4 months into diagnosis, and I’m scrambling to make up for past mistakes and lost time.  “Hey, I have ADD!  I gotta FIX this thing!!  …after I check emails…and have dinner………….”

But do we really “fix” it?  Or cope?  Or implement damage-controls?  The thing that stood out to me in the webinar I watched was Stephanie’s book “Adult ADD – A guide for the newly diagnosed.”  My mind is saying, “Start here!”  I’ll have to check its availability and price, or at least pop it onto my Wish List.  Am I jumping too head-on into this?  Maybe I need somewhere to start before I tackle the entirety of how ADD’s messed with my life and focus on one area at a time.  (The videos here helped me more than anything on the concept of “chunking” tasks.)

Well, pending my taxes and a possible refund, I’ll look into premium membership.  For a site I get so much out of, and for Rick and the staff who keep this site running…I need to give back.

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[Blue Yugo]

I had a cluttered apartment because it was small, and when I moved to my townhouse 10 years ago, I swore it wouldn’t become an obstacle course…but it did.  I’d straighten…I’d re-clutter…over and over.  Then I got cats.  Then I lost my job and had a few credit card companies close my accounts.  With less purchase power, I bought less vain, impulsive buys.  With year-old kittens romping, I had to clear stacks of unsorted papers, things in plastic bags that never got put away, and of course heaps of clothing.  Now my house is somewhere I don’t mind having visitors.

My mind is no different than my house.  It’s harder to clean, and more painful when you have to start lopping off hobbies, collectibles, and so-called friends who were really just users.  I’ve grown less materialistic thanks to credit card companies shutting down my accounts, and now I wish I could sell off stuff.  So-called friends are, in theory, easy to get rid of, but you still mourn for the times that you did enjoy with them…even though they only did things like took you to a Chinese buffet after you burned off 3 tanks of petrol driving them to the mall, bank, or their boy friend’s house…all of which is 20 miles away.

I wish my brain really were the well-0iled machine that my reminiscence makes it sound.  It gets there…eventually…and with much procrastination and diversions along the way.

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[Blue Yugo]

Hmm, I wonder how much Canadian currency I got laying around.  A lot, actually.  Do they want their pennies back, haha 😉  I got …well, probably a dollar or two of them.  Plus I have a bunch of other cash my parents brought back from numerous trips to Toronto and Niagara.  I’m the only one in my immediate family who has never been to Canada, overseas, or even out of the timezone.  I just got my passport a few weeks ago, though, and trust me…I want SO BAD to take my first real trip / vacation since I was a kid…even if I have to sleep in my car.

Where I live, a car is 100% required.  I my daily commute alone is 60 miles (thus all the petrol I burn through) and I simply do not know how to function without the freedom of one.  It’s used…only $122 per month.  Sad that 3 banks turned me down on such a relatively simple, low amount loan.  But I guess that goes to show my difficulty with money, spending, saving (the lack thereof), and of course remembering to pay my “paper-free” bills.  A car is the least of my expenses.  I have credit card debt around $30,000 and am 10 years into a 30 year mortgage which is $700 a month.

I haven’t really taken to E-Books as much.  Figures…they’re cheaper.  I don’t know if it’s just a “me” thing or if a higher percentage of ADD’ers just don’t dig the E-Book format compared to a tangible paper book that you can thumb through and jump to pages instantly.  What I need is to find me ONE really good one, preferably in dead-tree format.  Recommendations?  Given the problems mentioned here, what’s a good book that actually gives advice on how to better manage one’s money (versus books that simply state why ADD’ers aren’t as good with money…strategies over clinical mumbo-jumbo!)

I’m sinking, and I’m sinking fast.  I am currently looking into my Employee Assistance Program through my employer.  Such services are common and I used it once before, many years ago.  They’re going to call me back, and I might be able to get some free counselling through my employer to help me address how ADD is disrupting my life.  It would be a limited number of sessions, but it’s a literal free service to me, and I’d be a fool to turn it down.  (I’m just VERY afraid my employer will find out I have ADD, but they gave a whole confidential statement when I talked to them initially, so I guess it won’t harm me.)

Sorry for a million disjointed topics in my posts…my mind thinks faster than I can type and likes to be thorough.  I try to tame it, but you know the drill……

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[Blue Yugo]

The link works.  Will be a good while for it to buffer, I guess.  Meanwhile, I can run my…errr…typing I guess.  I had no idea the story behind this site or what it does.  I guess it’s just easy to assume people with success in television and media automatically live the good life.

I also don’t know if the pages are automatically converting to US dollars or if there’s a benefit (or detriment) to the price if adjusted for exchange rates.  I grew up with no concept of money until I was thrust into the working world at age 17, mainly because my parents always told me that the family finances were none of my business and children should never ask about it.  Money, especially the lack thereof, creates a huge amount of anxiety in my life.  I saved when I still lived at home, but my sister always said since you can’t take it with you, spend spend spend!  I bought a townhouse 10 years ago…and now it’s just a matter of time before my cats and I are ousted.

I made room on my credit cards (thanks to gift money over the holidays) and bought a few things from this site.  I’m now over my credit limits on a few cards, and late on paying one other.  The only one I keep liquid is the one I use to  purchase petrol…and with prices rising and having to replace a car that got totaled on 26 Dec. and taking on a car payment (after being turned down by 3 banks)….well, you get the idea.

Maybe it’s my browser or something, but when I click the link to the webinar archives, I get a screen asking me if I want a Free or Premium account.  (And I’m logged in already, yet I still get the screen.)  If I click Free (still logged in), I get the screen to set up my account.  Uh, hello…I already have an account and am currently logged in…!  I don’t know why it does that.  That’s one part of web programming I never got into, so I can’t say.

(Do the webinars usually only play 2 seconds at a time then freeze for about 5 to 10 more?  As an ADDer, well, you know……)

If all else fails, my About Me here has my email and I’m on Facebook.

For now, I gotta go tend to my virtual trains online, chase kids out of my backyard, and pick one of the many “I should do…”‘ thoughts running through my head.  13 minutes into the webinar, and not much has been said and I only get 1 or 2 seconds of audio between 10-second gaps of nothing.  (Lost interest….)

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[Blue Yugo]

@Larynxa Sorry, I can’t view them because I am not a Premium member.  I don’t have $100 free on any credit card this month (unless I don’t want to put petrol in the car and be unable to get to work).  Sadly, Premium membership is going up at the end of this month which depresses me even more because, for a site trying to HELP us get out our financial misery (among other things), raising prices only hurts us worse and blocks those like me who already can’t afford.  With the automatic US tax breaks ending, I already bring home less every week as it is.

Email’s free…Facebook’s free…and even though I don’t talk to anyone in those venues about this stuff, I am at least available there.

And, BTW, has anyone seen any of these supposed Newsletters that they’re supposed to email to us?  I’ve been here since December, and…nothing.

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[Blue Yugo]

The most painful part of going to the dentist is paying the bill.  It took me 18 months to pay off my root canal.  Now I have 4 unfilled cavities because I just can’t afford more dental work without insurance.

I’m ashamed to admit that I have an Accounting degree and absolutely NO sense of a personal budget.  I’m so in the hole right now, I barely get petrol in the car every week for work.  My counselor won’t see me until I catch up on my bills, so the big question is how does one (without insurance like me) pay for help with ADD when I can’t afford it?  I don’t quality for assistance in the my state because I have a job with above-poverty income even though I spend 110% of what I make each month.  I can’t see webinars here, but I’m desperate to get grips on my finances and to be smarter with spending.  Got passport, will travel if I have to!  Any “heads up” on perhaps where I can find some distilled knowledge that gets presented in those webinars?

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[Blue Yugo]

I haven’t even tried Scrivener yet, but my non-ADD sister is running the trial.  I haven’t seen it yet, but it might work for me.  She uses it for her research papers in college, so it’s all a lot based on research and factual essay style.  I write fiction stories…the polar opposite of academic blatherskite.  Right now I just use a combination of Word and Open Office for writing.  My first novel for publication is 75% done, and I will eventually need to read up on self-publishing e-books!

I tried posting to this group before, but after all the effort I made making my post, it didn’t have any way to submit.  But my favorite piece of advice in general to writers (particularly of fiction) is “Give yourself permission to make mistakes.”  Afterwards, “Edit, edit, edit!”

An internet resource I love sharing is http://www.nighttimenovelist.com because I have the book, “The Nighttime Novelist” by Joseph Bates.  The website includes free downloads of forms with pre-made outlines for character and plot creation, great for those like me who are otherwise inconsistent and forgetful every time I make a go at it.  The book has the full set of forms and is my recommendation of “If you only buy ONE book to help you write better…….”  It’s got short chapters with consistent pace and formatting with pop-culture references to works of which many other fiction writers are familiar.

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[Blue Yugo]

I don’t have the “H” in my diagnosis, but one of the 2 hyperactivity traits I do have is the foot tapping and/or leg shaking thing when I’m seated.  I noticed it in first grade and remember thinking “Gee, I hope this doesn’t carry through my whole life.  I guess I can stop when I want.”  (Yes, in Mrs. Harrison’s first grade class I thought such a thing.)  I never outgrew it, and I can’t stop.  Having 2 of the 9 markers for hyperactivity doesn’t put me into the combined subset.  Then again, maybe I’m one of the % for whom the hyperactivity symptoms didn’t carrying over into adulthood…not enough of it anyway.

A few holiday seasons ago, I took a temporary position working six 11-hour days at an Amazon warehouse (lost 15 lbs in that time, I may add).  My feet hurt so bad, I’d cry when I got home…but the constant activity of loading trucks and sorting boxes manually kept me going.  Now I’m back to being a programmer at a mostly-desk job.  I like the work, but I bore easily.  I day dream.  I multi-task.  I find myself checking emails in the middle of assembling a web-based training course.  One of my legs is always idling like some sort of rogue piston out of an engine.

And meetings…I HATE meetings!  Especially if I have little to contribute or listen to.  I don’t make binder-clip dinosaurs or paperclip bi-planes, but I would if I could and still keep my job (and the respect of my serious, non-ADD co-workers…fat chance).  I fiddle with things.  I put 2 or 3 pens between my fingers so I have “claws” like Wolverine or something.  I doodle…or pretend to take notes when in fact I’m making a to-do list or (shhhh…) scribbling an idea for my currently in progress novel…  Inside, I’m rumbling with impatience.  I “want out” and feel a part of me is clawing the walls.  Heck, you KNOW I stop paying attention once they hit on parts that don’t involve me or I just don’t care.

But you see…this is why I don’t let anyone at work know I have it.  I’m afraid I’ll be booted to some reject pile and relegated to the ranks of the unemployed.  It’s bad enough I can’t hide my restless foot and leg.  Still, I’ve got ADD…not ADHD.  Or, is the “H” just hidden a bit with the advancement into what’s supposed to be adulthood?  Something to discuss perhaps when I see my overpriced doctor on Friday.  After all, since I can’t afford it, it might be the last visit I go for (for a while).

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[Blue Yugo]

@Larynxa

I always wondered if there were places who might want to look at Reye’s survivors’ brains and stuff, whether or not they pay any sort of compensation for volunteers.  There are so few of us, and Reye’s is on the decline because people are now more aware of the dangers of aspirin combined with the flu and chicken pox (and vaccines are making c.p. on the decline, too).  I am an “intact” survivor because unlike the vast majority of survivors, I do not have any physical impairments (aside from a slight speech slur which I find singing actually helps diminish).

Anyway, yes, I’d be very interested.  My father co-founded a chapter of the National Reye’s Syndrome Foundation in the early 80’s, and they still make donations to the NRSF every year (and my name’s published in the newsletters, yaddayadda…).  They’d drug-induced a coma so my brain and body could overcome it, and I had the whole “light at the end of the tunnel” vision, remember waking up, and even somehow retain memories of being a baby, which is highly unusual, but I remember way more than most.  Must have been something going on in the brain.

I did look it up…a side-effect of Reye’s does include ADD / ADHD, but I guess it’s harder to study because of how few survivors there are and that most are impaired physically or cognitively.

I gotta log off and go somewhere, but I’ll have to return to this later and look those things up.  “Add to To-Do List!!” I scream at myself.

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[Blue Yugo]

CFCK – Can’t find car keys
CFW – Can’t find wallet
(Two of the leading reasons I get a late start to going places)

GDA – Got distracted again
STMT – Spent too much time…  (doing something)
TWWIM – That wasn’t what I meant

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[Blue Yugo]

I used to (and still occasionally) do bicycle rides with small groups of people.  But the rides I mostly do are not just mid-morning Saturday jobs…I ride after work, on a wooded path, in the dark.  I bring this up on an ADD forum for this reason:

There’s nothing that causes me to be more focused on ONE thing for an hour than riding a bike through the dark woods at 18 mph with nothing but LED headlights lighting the way.  I think what’s happening is I feel a few senses of “survival”.  1.  Keep up with the other riders or get left behind.  2.  Keep moving this way the black bears, wolves, and geese (yes, seriously) don’t get you.  3.  All you can see is what your LED beam illuminates, and ignorance to the dangers of the woods around you is bliss.

Focusing without the mind-wandering actually happens automatically for me because I know I have to watch the shadows for ruts, signals of downed tree branches from riders ahead of me, and just plain going like hell back to the car-park.  Once the sun goes down, my mind doesn’t wander and my eyes can’t sight-see.  Riding in darkness on road or in the woods involves a minor investment, and sadly without health insurance, I don’t do much of it any more lest my luck run out while I got no coverage.  But it is one of my rare escapes into a world where my mind won’t wander because something clicks on that prevents it.  Sadly, I can’t be in that state all the time or by choice, and hyper-focusing in other scenarios is hit or miss and practically up to chance and luck.

Either way, day or night, group riding is fun because I feel like riders all feed off of each other’s energy, drive, and motivation.  Maybe ADD’ers more than others, but the dedicated riders I tag along with have more than enough energy to spare.  (I don’t envy them, though.  I may have a million hobbies, but some of these riders have precisely one hobby they revolve their lives around: bicycling.  I’d rather shift my attetion 250 times a day than to be stuck devoting all my mental energy to being an expert in one thing.  Ugh.)

– Viv

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