[sdwa]

My mind never shuts up. As I was reading your post, I thought – no matter what I’m doing, I’m thinking about something else, all the time. All day, every day. Even in my sleep. My mind is like Grand Central Station at rush hour with an orchestra playing in the background and newspaper vendors shouting. I’m a terrible cook, too. Connection?

I had to laugh when I read Bill’s comment about writing down thoughts in a notebook. I have a house load of thought-filled notebooks. Great ideas that may never be used.

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[sdwa]

I fall upstairs a lot. I fall off the sidewalk, or just plain fall down while I’m walking. I walk into door frames and protruding corners of furniture. I drop and spill things. If I have to carry multiple objects, I do it awkwardly. My sense of the space around me or of how objects move and interact is not that great. No problem at all with fine motor skills, like writing or drawing – but clumsy when it comes to running, throwing, riding a bike. Poor sense of balance. I can accurately guess the size of a fixed space by looking at it, such as part of a room, which I’ve confirmed by measuring – but I can’t parallel park. When I’ve tried exercise classes in which the instructor faced the room, I couldn’t watch them and move the same arm or leg – can’t reverse my position in my mind. I’d have to be standing behind someone to copy their movements. I can’t follow the directions to fold anything in a complicated way unless I see it dozens of times – as in doing origami or making clothes look nice on a shelf. I can’t wrap a gift without it looking like a kid did it. Weird, huh? The problem seems mostly to be in navigating through space. If I can rely on visual cues, I do a lot better.

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[sdwa]

To answer the question in the original post –

I’m great at creating, but lousy at initiating.

How do you all get over the resistance and inertia around starting something?

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[sdwa]

Hi DaniV. Glad you’re here. I found out when I was 45. It made sense in light of a lifetime of struggles. My son has it, too – he’s 12, was diagnosed at age 5. I still haven’t figured out how to handle my own problems, so I don’t feel I’m that much of a help to him, but I’m glad we know what we’re dealing with. Understanding the challenges has helped me realize I’m not alone, ADHD is real, and there are ways to manage it. Still working on the management part. I think it’s worth taking the time to learn as much as possible about it. It’s also good to listen to the stories of other people.

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[sdwa]

Alcohol:

I don’t drink very often. I’m not supposed to drink with the medication I’m on, anyway.

But in general, after one or two glasses of wine, I’d feel less shy, less inhibited – but also far away, removed, too unplugged from what was going on. It will put me to sleep in the short term, but lead to insomnia later. In the week afterwards I would usually notice more mood swings, depression, and irritability.

I don’t like alcohol – I was always more into “uppers” like mega-dosing with caffeine, or going for the sugar rush. Now I’m experimenting with a lower carb, higher protein diet to see if it helps me even out my energy levels.

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[sdwa]

Nellie – I felt relieved that I got it done, despite not enjoying it at all. There is still more of the same ahead, but this was the larger piece of it. And for a few minutes, I remembered what I already knew – that it’s easier to do things than it is to endure the pain of knowing I need to do them and procrastinating. But knowing that doesn’t reduce the pain of starting.

Re: what No Dopamine & Zaidyma are saying about over-committing….One of my problems is that there are so many things I want and need to do, that I can’t decide what to do first,. This tends to paralyze me, especially for projects where I’m not accountable to anyone else, where it’s just for myself that I’m doing it. I have guide-books for doing just about everything I want to do, but I can’t do everything from five different programs.

One thing that helped was a series of visualization exercises – imagining in vivid detail 3-5 things that I needed to do, as if I were actually doing them – then doing them. That was from a program laid out in a book, which started well but got too complicated – then I gave up. Better to stick with the first week.

I could spend all day (and often do) staring into space. What I’d like to find is a consistent method for triggering the “on” switch. Emotionally intense experiences can help, but also lead to situations with their own problems. The medication I’m on helps but is no magic pill when it comes to getting in gear. Overcoming inertia is a huge problem for me.

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[sdwa]

I looked at it in the book store but I couldn’t really get into it – maybe I’ll take another look, as I know a lot of people like that one..

I like Gabor Mate’s book “Scattered” because it addresses many of the emotional issues (fallout from ADHD rather than ADHD itself) in an insightful way.

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[sdwa]

Nellie – Good for you. Boredom didn’t kill you? After I read your post I forced myself to go through my class. After an hour it became intolerable, and I needed to break it up, get up, walk around, do other things, and come back to it in smaller chunks, I really felt disgusted, frustrated, insanely bored – but I finally finished it (except for the test). What kills me is that it takes 15 hours to do what is supposed to be a three-hour class.

No Dopamine – Yup, I hear that. Not knowing how long things will take, wanting an intellectual challenge, diving in without thinking through the long-term results. Le sigh. And, like you, don’t want to commit to projects that are not in my area – EVER AGAIN. It’s bad enough trying to get myself into the mindset to do things I’m good at and actually like.

Zaidyma – There are days when every step goes on a list and is checked off as it’s completed – even if my brain is so gone that I have to remind myself in writing to photocopy a single document. What got hard for me was jumping back and forth between two screens, trying to remember what was on one page while making notes on another. I can remember about three words at a time. But similar to what you describe – once I get started, even if it’s on something I hate, it’s still hard to stop. Which can be good when something obnoxious needs to be finished right away. Without a looming deadline, I tend to space out.

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[sdwa]

I’ve had similar reactions – my mother’s second husband, who has a PhD in molecular biology, is one of those people who doesn’t believe ADHD exists and was just invented by the drug companies to trick parents into buying expensive prescriptions. I read an entire book by a psychologist who dismisses problems like ADHD and clinical depression as symptomatic of political problems – while I see his point about living in an isolating and frenetic culture, that is not the entire picture.

What I’ve done is tried to inform myself as much as possible. Talking to other people who face the same issues helps even more than learning about the brain stuff. Hearing a room full of people with the same “symptoms,” similar experiences, similar challenges and preferred ways of doing things, I know ADHD is a real condition. And because I know it, I can deal with it for myself, without having to convince anyone else.

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[sdwa]

Tea – what, they’re like The ADHD Guide to Amnesia?

Unfortunately, the only jokes I know are dirty, religious, or both.

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[sdwa]

I’m amazed that you studied accounting if you’re not a math person. That’s one of the things I told myself I should study for “job security” but I’d probably die trying. Same thing with writing computer code – I could learn it, but it would take me a hundred times longer than anyone else and I’d probably still be bad at it. In my youth I thought about doing crazy things like going to law school – ha ha – I could never memorize that much stuff, I couldn’t do the logic problems in the LSAT. It’s only taken me thirty years to figure out that I don’t have to pursue a degree in every subject that interests me. This has gotten easier as more colleges post their lectures online.

There are many warm bodies in boring rooms for CE credits, but in this case I have to take an open-book test on the content in order to receive credit…and even with the information right in front of me, I know the math questions will throw me. Even in the questions where they provide the formulas, because I struggle to see how the information should be plugged into the formula.

My boss has always taken a non-management approach to management. He just assumes employees are at their desks doing their work, which for the most part, we are. I have, over the years, repeatedly asked for projects, guidelines, and feedback – but to little avail. If I miraculously stumble upon an activity my boss likes, he lights up like a casino, yet continues to expect me to read his mind…so, whatever. On the bright side, he isn’t a control freak.

In an ideal situation, I’d be doing what I’m actually good at for someone who’d leave me alone to work, but who I’d report to at the end of the day and/or week.

There are reasons why I’ve never had much of a career.

I’d like to be self-employed, but I’d still have to deal with finding a trigger to initiate action. Once I get started, I’m usually OK…unless I forget to stop.

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[sdwa]

Definitely not just you. I’ve felt like an outsider & freak all of my life. It’s difficult to relate to people or the things that seem to interest them, particularly in group situations, such as at social functions where the goal is to make nice and meaningless conversation. If I don’t hear something that evokes an emotional response, I am generally not invested in what’s happening. That’s a real brain-functioning thing, encountering stimulation powerful enough that to wake me up. I don’t like noise, commotion, crowds, activity – it’s just too much for me. I’ve also developed the skill of looking like I’m following what people say even though I am often tuned out. And I hate running into people I don’t remember but who seem to remember me.

As for what TooFat says, I think a lot of ADHD-related problems may not be about ADHD, but still originate with ADHD, and can build up in layer after convoluted layer of hang-ups, anxieties, defenses, etc. And that addressing the underlying ADHD stuff and how it manifests can help with the other stuff.

Suggestions?

It’s probably a good idea to listen to what someone has said and mirror your understanding of what they said back to them.

Even if you hate it, it’s probably worth memorizing the Miss Manners list of standard acceptable responses to social situations, so you don’t have to think about it. Even if the response is somewhat colorless, no one can say it’s wrong.

For me, the big hurdle has been in coming to a place of self-acceptance, so that even if others think I’m weird, I don’t experience it as so much of problem that I’m devastated, because I have a solid place to retreat to where I do what I love and get into a state of flow. A lot of the ideas that work for non-ADHD people have the opposite effect on me. Like trying to build on areas of weakness, trying to correct mistakes, trying to push beyond the comfort zone – instead of focusing on strengths, successes, and learning how to sustain the comfort zone. Being with and inside of my areas of strength makes me feel more real to myself, and when I feel like I’m more in touch with who I am, more comfortable with who I am, what other people think doesn’t matter as much.

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[sdwa]

Um, yeah….No. I don’t like The Holidays. At all. Ever.

Confusing – socially.

Overwhelming – too much activity.

Demoralizing – I have no idea what’s going on.

Exhausting – physically and emotionally.

Boring – I have nothing to say, and neither does anyone else.

Lonely – feel alienated.

Unrelatable – No sense of meaning or purpose

Empty – would rather be home by myself doing something else

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[sdwa]

Tentatively…yes.

What do you mean by being “snowed”? Do you mean tricked, or do you mean flattered and manipulated?

Often people says things to me in jest, but I take their comments literally and believe them.

I am very visual – so much so, that if I want to watch a movie, I know I will have a better chance of understanding it if in addition to being in English it also has English subtitles that I can read.

Often, what people say to me doesn’t register in the same way, or is not as memorable as, words I can read on a page.

As I tend not to remember what I read, either, I share information I’ve read with others often by reading it again while writing about it. Thus, when I read my own blog essays, I am always surprised that I knew so much about topics I’ve since completely forgotten.

When I see or hear things I used to know, I remember that I knew them, but in the normal course of the day, I would not remember those things at all.

Often, when people talk to me I see facial expressions, body language, and hear tone of voice, and respond according to their emotions and not the intellectual content of what they are saying.

In conversations, I fade in and out, sometimes understanding, and at other times hearing the words as abstract noises.

I am extremely noise-sensitive, don’t like to listen to music, don’t like the television on in the house, don’t like the radio, and get very tired when there is lots of commotion around me. Visual clutter – like having a lot of junk lying around on tables, counters, etc – feels like mental noise.

Does that answer your question?

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[sdwa]

Well, I don’t know. For me, talk therapy tended to magnify rather than alleviate my problems…because what I put my attention on grows larger. I’d often leave feeling terrible because of the feelings brought up by the session, and it would take hours for me to return to Earth and normal functioning.

I struggle with intense moods and not being able to shift out of them. If I get upset, it can ruin a day, a week – however long it takes for me to get into a different frame of mind. I used to take long walks to burn off some of the tension. Sometimes it helps to go to an art gallery and feed my mind with images that get me thinking, or to a park where I can look at trees, flowers, water, the sky, etc and get away from urban energies. It can also help to watch a movie, preferably a comedy. I am extremely visual, so looking at pretty things helps, doing visualization exercises, carrying a picture of something that comforts me and serves as an emotional anchor. Sometimes I also pray, and I think prayer can work even if you don’t believe in God – the point is to access a sense of what is timeless or eternal, “the numinous,” or that quiet inner core we all have when we feel peaceful and clear, and listen to that voice. My problems are too big for me, so I appeal to a power greater than myself, the life force, the universe, the Great Spirit, whatever you want to call it. Sometimes it helps to draw pictures.

One-on-one therapy didn’t help me that much – I learned some things (one of which is unfortunately that a lot of therapists are bad at their jobs), but have found it more helpful, more “normalizing” and balancing, to participate in support groups with others who have similar experiences and challenges, and I like seeing the same group of people for a period of weeks, it kind of sets up a rhythm and continuity for me, which is nice because I tend not to be very socially active in my daily life.

It’s good if you can find someone to work with who knows about ADD/ADHD and has studied it, perhaps specializes in working with us. With my HMO insurance program, I didn’t feel like the counselors they employed were exactly Top Drawer, whether due to lack of training or to general burn-out or simply having been folks who should have gone into another line of work. And I couldn’t pay a therapist $300 an hour to go outside of that system. For me, learning more about ADHD helped me appreciate what it is exactly that I am dealing with, so I recommend reading about it, if you are a reader, and if not, a former coach of mine, Jeff Copper of DIG Coaching, has a weekly radio program on BlogTalk Radio, I think called Attention Talk Radio. You can probably Google him.

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