ADHD: Things I Figured Out

My official diagnosis of ADHD came at age 36, but my Mom and I had suspected that I have had ADHD for years. I have a younger Brother and Sister each with ADHD so I guess genetically the odds were increased that I would be diagnosed as well. I somehow made it through school as a kid managing to reach senior high but ending up having to drop out because age wise I was a senior, but my credits said I was a sophomore there were a lot of extenuating circumstances that prevented me from graduating with my class but I'll write about them at another time. All through school I was told I needed to try harder, or that I wasn't working up to my potential, some said I was lazy, while others said I needed to apply myself more. To be honest I never really understood what these people were telling me I was doing wrong. From my perspective, I was in school, attending classes, and somehow missed a lot of what was going on. It wasn't that I didn't want to pay attention I would just notice things like leaves blowing around outside the windows they seemed to dance as they whirled around flying past the windows of the classroom. I would get lost in watching the leaves and become oblivious to what was going on in front of the classroom. I was the kid that would get called on because the teacher knew I wasn't paying attention and wanted to prove a point, but I didn't realize I wasn't paying attention to the right thing until it was too late and I would hear the teacher call on me to answer a question I knew nothing about. That was in the days when ADHD was barely known about and those who did know about it thought it was a primarily male disorder that involved excessive amounts of visible energy that caused those with ADHD to squirm and make excess noises and occasionally get ideas like suddenly getting up and running around the room because they couldn't sit quietly like most other kids. In those days they hadn't realized that girls could have ADHD only it would show up as though the girl was daydreaming when in reality the lack of external activity was caused by having more thoughts and ideas running amuck in their minds then they could figure out what to do with. Things would catch their attention and their mind would run wild with a collage of ideas and concepts about what they imagined would happen if any hundred or so things were to occur at that moment. I was one of those girls. I fell through the cracks in the beginning due to a lack of knowledge about ADHD. My desk was frequently placed facing a wall or inside the coat closet or even in the hall in an attempt to motivate me into doing what I was expected to do. Many times I had every intention of doing the task I just got sidetracked without realizing it was happening until it was too late and then not knowing how to explain why I didn't get the given task completed because I didn't have a clue which thought or idea was the real reason why I didn't finish my assignment.

What did I learn from these experiences of being oblivious to the task at hand? Well, I learned that a quiet classroom was harder for me to stay on task in then a noisy one was somehow more conducive for me to somehow concentrate. This with the idea that compared to other students I was relatively quiet and kept to myself most of the time the noise somehow helped me get my assignments done. I missed recess a lot and had to stay after school a lot because of my "daydreaming" and not getting assignments done. Later, I found out from my Mom that nobody really knew what to do with me because I was a bright kid I just didn't finish things or pay attention to what I needed to.

Looking back and keeping in mind how I seem to be with regards to what I focus on, I almost think that in some ways it wasn't so much that I was paying attention to the wrong thing it seems to me that I was focused on everything and in some ways on a mental overload. The only thing that people could see from the outside was that I appeared to be daydreaming ... what they didn't realize was that I was busy processing all the information my senses were obtaining from the world around me ... I just couldn't explain what I was doing internally which I'm pretty sure that lack of ability to explain what was going on inside my head was part of what frustrated the adults in my life at that time.

I've been doing some self-assessment, trying to figure out what I do to help me selectively process everything from the world around me. Over the years, I've found that things that work for me are often things that have potential for being disruptive to others, but they work for me. I don't know if they are things that will work for others, but as with anything I've written folks are welcome to either try or not try things I come up with.

For tasks that require me to be careful with details such as income taxes, or other important paperwork, I find that having the TV or radio on in the background seems to help. Something I recently started trying when I feel like my focus isn't where I need it to be is to dig out my trampoline and bounce on it for 5 or 10 minutes, and then continue what I was working on.

I think in some ways the thing that is the most difficult for me isn't always the act of staying on task, but getting started on whatever needs to be done. Over the years I've had people tell me to "just do it and get it over with". I hate that statement, not because I don't want to "just do" whatever "it" is, but rather because I struggle immensely with trying to figure out where to start. I know that the kitchen needs cleaned, but trying to get beyond figuring out in my head as to what I want to begin with in regards to cleaning up the kitchen can be next to impossible. To help myself overcome this problem of being stuck in my head trying to figure things out, I found that using my computer and PDA are beneficial. I use planner software that allows me to setup reminders in advance. I have reminders that tie in with my cleaning schedule, I also have reminders for things like appointments, bills, medication refills, vet care for my dog, phone calls I need to make... just about anything that is important that I remember to take care of it and may need to have a hint as to where to start with the task. I'm able to sync the planner between both my PC and my PDA so I'm able to carry my schedule and reminders with me if I'm out of the house and away from my PC. With my reminders, I not only include what I need to be reminded to do, but also a short note including some of the specifics of what I want to accomplish, kind of like a to-do list on steroids.

Another thing I have troubles with is remembering to use fresh produce before it spoils. What I found that seems to work for me, is that if I want salad for example, I'll buy one of those bags of salad, and then if I want anything with it, I'll buy one of each item I want to add to my salad. In essence, rather then buying in bulk, I buy what I know I will use for one or two salads. This saves me from having to worry about whether or not I used an item of produce before it spoiled. Not to mention I can buy bulk produce with the intention of taking it home and freezing it, but somehow the items never get frozen, so it's just cheaper and easier if I buy what I need instead of buying bulk.

I figured out also that for me, my computer and related gadgets can help me in a huge way when it comes to organizing tasks and such. I've tried paper type planners for this, but found it was too much of a pain to have to write the same thing over and over again through out a planner ... not to mention paper type planners are easily overlooked or lost by me which defeats the purpose of using it. Using my computer, I can tell it that on the first Wednesday of the month I need to do such and such and it will allow me to not only enter the info for that Wednesday, but will allow me to create a reoccurring event/appointment with a simple click of the mouse that item is scheduled for as long as I need it to be scheduled for and I only need to enter the info once. I go more in depth into how I schedule things in my other article entitled, "How to make a cleaning schedule" (also available through my profile on Associated Content) it is something that while it is about cleaning specifically, it can be easily transferred to other tasks for implementation.

When I was taking some college courses, that as long as I was taking notes, I was able to pay attention to what was being discussed or lectured in class. I'm not clear as to why keeping my hand going in writing notes about what was being said was able to help me pay attention. I do know that there were times when I really didn't have anything I needed to write down in terms of notes, and during these lapses in note taking, my attention would wander. The way I dealt with this once I realized what was helping to keep me focused, was to experiment with different ways to help keep my hands busy while focusing my thoughts. I discovered that having a separate sheet of paper that I would place under my notebook or off to the side depending on what type of seat I was in and how much room I had to sprawl. This loose sheet of paper was where I would doodle or jot down thoughts that seemed to be off topic, but important for other reasons. This enabled me to acknowledge the rogue thoughts when they came up without letting my mind run amuck with them. The doodling helped to keep my hands busy and was something I was able to do that didn't interfere with anyone else. Tapping my pen/pencil or rolling it around for example would have potentially taken away from the ability of others around me to pay attention to what was happening in class and that just didn't seem like something I wanted to do, but doodling and jotting rogue thoughts down was something that unless someone looked over my shoulder, and saw what I was doing, it could easily be interpreted as simply note taking. Before I got dentures, chewing gum seemed to help me stay focused, but since most gums I've tried chewing end up getting stuck on my dentures long before class is over gum turns into more of a distraction then it is a way to focus. I do suck on hard candy like hard mints, or anything that will last for an extended amount of time and not stick to my dentures. I find that hard candy isn't as effective as chewing gum, but it can be helpful for those times when I don't have anything to write on or with and need to pay attention to what I'm doing or what is going on around me.

I'm sure there are other things I either do or have done to help me pay attention, but because I've been doing so many of these for so long even before I was diagnosed, it's tough for me to really know what things that I do are different from what folks who don't have ADHD do or if the amount of useage of any given technique is an indication of compensating. To me these things are normal parts of day to day life. I'm always looking for new ideas for how to do things more efficiently though, so over time I hope to be able to offer more thoughts on things I do to compensate for the symptoms of not only my ADHD but also of other mental health diagnosis that I have. There is a sort of overlap in what works for ADHD symptoms and what seems to help with some of the other symptoms I have so it's an ongoing process I hope to not only learn more to help myself with but to be able to share with others so maybe they can get some ideas to help decrease their struggle as well.