Month: March 2015

Ways My ADHD Brain Functions (or stops functioning !)

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I was with a group of friends earlier this week and one asked me how I was doing with my meds. This led to a conversation about ADHD, and another friend rolled her eyes and said – “I don’t even think ADHD is a real thing. I procrastinate as well, but doesn’t mean I need to go to a doctor and start popping pills.”

Her statements made me realize why I started this blog in the first place. Aside from sharing my depressed feelings in metaphors, I wanted to use this blog to start a platform where I could tell people that ADHD is more than just “procrastinating”.

It is procrastinating severely. Ha ha.

Jokes aside, I am going to try my best to explain some of the things I go through-

Things people (mostly me !) with ADHD go through-

  1. We cannot concentrate. Most people mistake it as not being able to concentrate ONLY on school work. Any one can do that. But it takes special ability to lose focus while talking to people, listening, doing basic chores like cleaning or laundry, working in customer service (where you have a memory span of a goldfish and forget what your client just asked of you), missing appointments every single goddamn time, forgetting to go to work, classes, or other commitments. My house caught on fire a few years ago because I forgot to turn the electric heater off (True story !). You get the point.
  2. We fidget. A LOT. My lack of ability to sit still or fall asleep if I sit still too much has caused me a lot of trouble. I’ve been called impolite and uncourteous, customers at work always ask me if I’m cold or if my hands are dirty because I keep on rubbing them together like a mad scientist plotting my next evil invention.
  3. Our minds work at the speed of light. Between writing point number 1 and this sentence, I chatted with two of my friends, played a level of Frozen Free Fall (don’t judge !), talked to my sister, checked in with my dad about dinner, googled life goals and wasted about 45 minutes of my time. Just magnify this scenario by several hours and you will watch your entire life pass by.
  4. We are very impulsive. Impulsivity comes in different forms. For me, it is excessive talking, interrupting people ALL the time, answering questions not directed to me, hyper social behaviour (jumping up and down like I won a medal when I beat my 5 year old cousin’s score in Candy Crush), embarrassing parents by blurting out family secrets at dinner parties, LOL.
  5. People with ADHD usually have accompanying depression, anxiety or other disorders that affect every single aspect of their lives including friendships and relationships. I will not go into much detail about that here, my entire blog is the proof how sad I am.
  6. One question I’ve received from quite some people is – “But how do you have a disorder when you are so smart and confident ?” It saddens me that people are very quick to assume anyone with a mental illness or disorder is embedded with stupidity, clumsiness, shyness, ineptness  in their genes. This stereotyping is the reason why I feel it is important to talk about mental health and educate people that any person is susceptible to problems at any point of their lives. Having ADHD is not being stupid or failing school all the time. On the contrary, people with ADHD are quite smart and creative, and there are some bloggers I follow who prove that. It is our cognitive difference (caused by pure chemistry in our brain tissue and not the lack of will/determination to do something) that makes our learning and behavioural abilities different from the ones structured by the society. This results in most people with ADHD struggling in various aspects of life, leaving them feeling different, frustrated and anxious.

But guess what ? Different is good. Though I’m struggling with lots of things because of my ADHD, anxiety and depression, I am also happy that I am creative, confident, have my unique strengths and talents that make me who I am. Taking medication has helped me immensely in all aspects of my life. I have become a (bit) more organized, can sit in a place for hours without fidgeting, can listen to people without interrupting, prioritize my to-do-list and actually do chores at home! But I’ve also realized that medications don’t solve everything. I am equally or less lazy and still procrastinate for hours if I don’t set my mind on something. Nonetheless, life is getting better, and I better stop writing now because I need to go thank the people in my life personally, and not through this blog, for always  being there.

Adult ADHD is a neurobiological disorder that can also be categorized as a mental health condition. Symptoms include difficulty with regulating attention (being unable to focus for any length of time, hyper-focusing with the inability to break focus, and difficulty with prioritizing focus) to a level of impairment and possibly, but not necessarily, hyperactivity and impulsivity. ADHD Researchers have studied impairments in the brain chemical neurotransmitters, dopamine, norepinephrine and epinephrine, as being a contributing cause of the disorder.

(For more information on ADHD: http://caddac.ca/cms/page.php?2 )

The Fish that Flew Out of The Tank

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Have you ever felt like a lone fish in a huge fish tank, where all your little fish friends have died and their skeletons float slightly above the rocks every time you try to bring them back to life?

You watch the world outside, the light patterns refracting in every surface that is between you and the infinite space of air. You are just a fish, but you know all too well that lights cause illusions and the world is never as it seems.

Sometimes you want to break out of the tank, but the thick glasses separating you from your freedom seem to stretch for miles, that one tiny crack you made months ago by hitting your head first into the glass seems to dissolve if you glance at it from a side angle.

You are alone. You and your dead fish bones. There used to be dreams too. But dreams come from your imaginations, and your imaginations are choosing to float away, one air bubble at a time.

Life outside the fish tank looks beautiful. You can see rainbows and unicorns, and oh look there’s the green field and the sun shining on those pretty pink pansies. You cannot wait to get out. The tiny crack you made months ago now suddenly seems larger. I have to get out. I have to touch the rainbow. One push, two push, a thousand pushes. I shall not give up until I smell those pansies. The crack finally gives in.

You flow outside the fish tank, the amount of water that falls on top of you is enough to make your own little pool, until it starts seeping and soaking down the thick carpet below and you look around to see little wet rainbow pieces and torn pansy pieces making paper islands in the vanishing pool. The air doesn’t seem so fresh anymore, and you flop around hoping that someone will pick you up and lay you down among your fish bones, for you realize that in pursuit of something wild and beautiful, you forgot that you were just a tiny little fish who didn’t know how to breathe out of water.

I’ve Been Thinking

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I’ve been thinking. My school is on strike since yesterday, and I have nothing to do. So I’ve been thinking.

I finished reading The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath yesterday, and I couldn’t help but resonate myself to the character Esther who is depressed and cannot write. I am depressed, but I can write. The only time I cannot write is when I am not depressed, and that makes me question my own creativity.

I would like to think that my ADHD medication is not putting a stop to my creativity. I feel good. I feel organized. My thoughts are still a chaos, but I find myself deflecting them often. I do not have the time to be sad and I do not have time to write.

I like the way that I can collect myself, rationalize my priorities, even make my bed every morning (which I never did before !), but I feel like I’m fighting to write, fighting to let my words flow freely, fighting to compose poetry, fighting to retain the things about me I love the most.

I started to type this up an hour ago, and I’ve barely written 200 words. Two hundred words feel like an infinite stretch to my infinite feelings. I squeeze my thoughts in, between each space of every word I write, but they are just tiny scrawls in invisible ink.

I have so much to say, countless things to express and so many questions. I am watching the light snow fall outside. I can see every single snow flake that melts as soon as it touches the ground because the sun is shining. My thoughts are no different. They are beautiful and sad and cold and blue, and slowly fading away.

For the first time, the sun is shining in my life and I am not sure I like the warmth.