The thing with ADHD is that transitioning, that is; switching tasks, locations or topics quickly after hyperfocusing/perseverating is painfully difficult. I'm not even hyperbolizing. My brain feels weird, I feel unsettled and my nerves are jangly. There is a very real physical response to switching gears, and it's icky.
What helps me (when I remember) is writing down my thoughts. Beyond the webz and my innumerable blogs I have a moleskine journal. My diagnosis diary! When I'm unable to use my diary (exams, w/e) I've been known to write down my twisty tangled thoughts on any available scrap of paper because the process of transitioning makes my head a hurricane of half-formed thoughts and to-do lists. Writing down these thoughts, concerns and lists brings order back to my scrambled brain. I also find it to be a type of meditation.
The act of writing, with a pen and piece of paper, is hypnotic. This thread of suspended pigment flows out of this nub in my hand onto this semi-absorbent sheet of cellulose and some how, through the magic of human ingenuity, it represents my thoughts and feelings. The dual act of physically ordering my thoughts and marveling over the process of writing eventually leaves my brain quiet. I can almost hear "Om" at the end of a particularly satisfying scribble session.
Why yes, I have already written in my journal. And then I meta'd the fuck out of it by writing about writing in my journal in another journal.
Also: compartmentalizing. Compartmentalizing helps ADHDers a lot. Even if it doesn't make sense to neurotypicals, if how you personally organize your thoughts and stories makes sense to you, GO FOR IT. It's your damn physical representation of your brainspace. Do what you want with it.
Monday, November 12, 2012
Tuesday, November 6, 2012
Names are Power, and other reasons why words are important.
Back when I started proactively treating my issues AAAALL the way back in July (/sarcasm) I started a journal I called my "Diagnosis Diary" because I like alliteration and I didn't want to call it my "Diagnosis AND TREATMENT Diary" because too many syllables.
One day I was copying the DSM-IV criterion for ADHD, MDD and PTSD and while I was reading PTSD for the first time I was a little confused about its "physical" quantifier for trauma. I started talking about it to the troubled friend I wrote about before and she stopped me after I said "So I was writing in my Diagnosis Diary..." and said that I should focus more on the treatment than the diagnosis since that's what matters.
The thing is, being diagnosed and knowing they're real is a huge part of my treatment. I spent so long worrying and wondering that I was making it all up that having a trained, educated person with doctorates and professional degrees tell me that "No, this is real, you're not making it up, these feelings, thoughts and actions are because of what happened, you have XYZ because of it" is so intensely soothing. I can hold on to it like it's a solid object and focus on it, knowing it's real.
"I'm not a liar. I'm not trying to be a special snowflake. I'm not making mountains out of mole hills. I'm not over-reacting, or being dramatic. This is REAL."
That is the confirmation my Dxs give me. In the way of my metaphysical beliefs go, names are powerful. Having the sets of symptoms and traumatic experiences classified and named gives me power over them. With my education I may resent having the physicality of my synapses pathologized, but that does not eclipse the power having a name, a diagnosis, gives me.
Once I explained this to my friend she got it completely, however I'm left feeling a little distanced from others. I had the name of my DIARY criticized? MY DIARY? It's like someone pissed in the sacristy.
Ah well. I can't win them all.
One day I was copying the DSM-IV criterion for ADHD, MDD and PTSD and while I was reading PTSD for the first time I was a little confused about its "physical" quantifier for trauma. I started talking about it to the troubled friend I wrote about before and she stopped me after I said "So I was writing in my Diagnosis Diary..." and said that I should focus more on the treatment than the diagnosis since that's what matters.
The thing is, being diagnosed and knowing they're real is a huge part of my treatment. I spent so long worrying and wondering that I was making it all up that having a trained, educated person with doctorates and professional degrees tell me that "No, this is real, you're not making it up, these feelings, thoughts and actions are because of what happened, you have XYZ because of it" is so intensely soothing. I can hold on to it like it's a solid object and focus on it, knowing it's real.
"I'm not a liar. I'm not trying to be a special snowflake. I'm not making mountains out of mole hills. I'm not over-reacting, or being dramatic. This is REAL."
That is the confirmation my Dxs give me. In the way of my metaphysical beliefs go, names are powerful. Having the sets of symptoms and traumatic experiences classified and named gives me power over them. With my education I may resent having the physicality of my synapses pathologized, but that does not eclipse the power having a name, a diagnosis, gives me.
Once I explained this to my friend she got it completely, however I'm left feeling a little distanced from others. I had the name of my DIARY criticized? MY DIARY? It's like someone pissed in the sacristy.
Ah well. I can't win them all.
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