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I cried in the doctor’s office, but only a little, and it was definitely a load-off-my-mind sort of crying. I’d already had my big cry twice: reading that Delivered from Distraction checklist back when all this began, and then sitting in the auditorium during the ADD road show with Dr. Jain, Rick, and Patrick back in June.
By the time I sat down with the doctor I’d worked myself into a total pretzel – months in the making! with all the DO-I-OR-DON’T-I I’d been carrying around; you folks have been there, I know! Reminds me of the old daisy-petal-pulling cartoons: He loves me, he loves me not, he loves me…
And for every minute of my wondering aloud here, multiply that by ten for all the wondering aloud at home. Poor hubby; here’s a typical opening: “So, here’s another example of the ADD that I don’t have; I left my purse at home again!”
God bless him, though, because he’s the only one in my family who took this seriously, who kept after me to go see somebody. “If you don’t have ADD, you’re no worse off. And if you do have it, you can do something about it.” Contrast that to my mother’s opinion: “You don’t have ADD, you have three kids!”
And then multiply that number of conversations again by a hundred for all the unspoken obsession, the tape looping over and over in my head…..
WHEW.
Yesterday evening, after I’d finally had a chance to tell him the news, my hubby came home from a grocery store errand with a little bouquet of flowers for me.
“Happy flowers” he called them. And, damn, did they make me happy. To show my thanks I completely cleaned off the mess on the kitchen table so they’d look nice sitting there.
They’re daisies.
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There seems to be no middle ground with me and exercise; I totally obsess about my fitness routine for about two or three months, then fall with a mighty (and heavy) THUD off the wagon. Sometimes the two are related, since midlife seems to be rife with overuse injuries.
Right now I’m struggling to get back on track, but finding, as I do every summer, with the kids from school it’s nearly impossible to claim fitness time for myself in any remotely regular way. Right now I’m lucky to sneak into the lap lane at the neighborhood pool and get in a few quick back-and-forths before somebody needs a Band-Aid, or snack money, or help finding lost goggles, etc.
I used to run all the time, but I’ve somehow gotten a pesky iliotibial band irritation that has made running too painful for me. Too bad, because running is heaven for a wandering mind.
I find that I do best with home video workouts. I like the privacy, the convenience, and the fact that I have a slo-mo and a rewind button when I can’t figure out the moves, which happens frequently. Even lifting weights goes so much better with a video, because the last thing I want to do is keep track of how many reps I’ve done! So much nicer to just heft away and let my mind go until the instructor tells me to stop.
I definitely have a fairly big video library, because you just can’t do the same workout over and over again. I like to pick two or three and make those my “go-to” workouts of the month, then the next month, choose two or three different ones. It’s amazing how a routine you were once totally sick of suddenly becomes an old friend when you come back to it months later.
REPORT ABUSESo glad to hear I’m not the only one who falls UPstairs; I frequently get to the top of the stairs, and try to put my foot on a step that isn’t there!
Best-ever incident was when I was in a school play. We had to march and cheerfully sing our way down the auditorium steps and then up the aisle. I can’t honestly blame ADD for this one, because who the heck can march in time AND sing out to the audience AND navigate their way down a flight of stairs? Well, everybody else in the play, I guess.
But as for me, my foot hit the edge of the top step, and then that same foot skidded down the front edges of all the other six or seven wooden steps, and YET…Somehow I managed to get the other foot down on the floor and keep on going, still singing! That came so close to being a literal “break a leg!” moment!
REPORT ABUSEWhile I agree that many folks here and elsewhere blur the lines between ADHD and giftedness, I disagree with the “mild cases view ADHD as a gift” blanket statement.
I’ll admit I can’t weigh in with any real authority since I remain merely questioning-and-undiagnosed at present, but I imagine myself to be at the mild end of inattentive type. I probably belong at a site with a name more like “PartiallyADD.com”
More of a nuisance than a brick wall, perhaps, but still – a *nuisance*. I’d love to experience this rush of creative ideas others have described, but for the most part my wandering thoughts tend to be things like “I can’t wait for the intermission of this concert, because I’m so hungry….maybe I can eat those almonds left over from the dinner I packed – Oh, damn! I left them in the car!” Hardly the makings of The Next Big Thing.I suppose I should clarify further and point out that all this mind-wandering was during a concert I was PERFORMING in…..
So, yes, I agree, we all have gifts, and furthermore, I agree with LibrarianChef’s view that we succeed based on our ability to use any and all gifts we have, and that the challenge is not letting the ADD get in the way of the unwrapping.
That said, I don’t mind if other folks see their ADD as a gift. Frankly, I’m jealous of them! I would never want to discourage someone from looking at something in a positive way.
I’ll allow that the mildness of my own impairment might make me more tolerant of such an outlook.
REPORT ABUSESugargremlin, I loved all the info in your post; like you, I’m fascinated by the connections between this and that, and like you, I love to gather info and ponder it! Your post was very timely for me, because the whole sleep business is a biggie with me right now; I’ve been having a pretty serious bout with insomnia this past month.
RLS – started getting bouts of it during my pregnancies, and it still pops up from time to time. I tend to see it as a signal that I need to go to bed. I’m lucky in that it’s only an occasional thing, and generally doesn’t happen when I’m in bed, but rather when I’m sitting on the couch watching TV at night. So I can get up and march around if I need to.
Off to try that test now…..
REPORT ABUSEThat sounds TOTALLY cool – I’m going to try it at home. Just having things in four boxes would be a big improvement over the mess that’s all over my bathroom vanity!
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Not the funniest, perhaps, but the most recent!
Today I took my daughter to our local outdoor pool for her swim lesson. Since we were a bit late (but only a bit, I swear!
) I had her run in ahead, which left me with the job of carrying most of the many bags of towels, lunch, and whatnot I always seem to be bringing. As I was checking around, I heard myself say out loud, “What am I forgetting?” Suddenly I’m thinking of a song: “Papa, Can You Hear Me?” (from Yentl, I think?) and I’m singing along with my newly inspired lyrics: “What am I forgetting? Do I have my car keys?” and so on. Next thing I know I’m envisioning this whole ADD-themed musical – wow, how cool that would be….A couple of hours later, after the lesson, and more swimming, and lunch, we walk out to the car…to discover one of the doors wide open.
At least I figured out what I forgot!
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