ADHD: What is it like?

Tuesday I caught NPR's Talk of the Nation and heard a segment about adults with ADHD. Guess what? They're finding what I already found out. The condition, diagnosed in children persists into adulthood. It usually isn't just a stage.

As someone who had symptoms in childhood, with parents who made the decision that the treatment was more harmful than the symptoms, I can say that it's a very real disorder and can have a very negative lifetime effects. Because it wasn't treated, I was forced to deal with it as a moral failing. This lead to overwhelming guilt, demoralization, depression and anxiety disorder. It also generated or aggravated incidents that saddled me with PTSD.




The term "Attention Deficit" does not quite describe what's really happening. On the program, Dr. Russell Barkley gave the best description of it I've ever heard :

. . . What we often find is that the A in ADHD is a gross misnomer and I think oversimplifies the seriousness and pervasiveness of the problem. It's really a disorder in the brain's executive system, which is the system that allows people to regulate their own behavior, stay organized, manage time, show self-restraint, control their emotions to a socially acceptable level and so on.

What's it really like to have this?

What I was most aware of as a child was the lack of any choice in my behavior. It was as though how I behaved and what I did was already decided. In penmanship, I would be told to make a letter a certain way, but it was as though how I'd make it was already decided. In sports, I would be told how to hit and how to field. Not only did I have a problem trying to associate the words adults were saying to my body movements, but more than that, my body still did what it wanted. Remember it now, I do wonder if the problem interpreting the instructions didn't stem from interference between what my body was going to do and what I was being told to do. I don't know.


A consequence of not being able to consciously alter your behavior is that you get punished, when you never made the decision to disobey and couldn't change it. Because of this, you feel a guilt, all the time. Besides guilt, you feel the flip side: resentment. 

Another major thing is isolation. I had trouble understanding people's speech. My hearing was perfect. My brain just wouldn't process the speech if there were any distractions. Sitting in class, my mind would then go on to other things. It also stunted my speech and communication skills.

Disorganization, of course, is well known. Not being able to remember homework assignments, not being able to keep my lunch ticket, having five of them lost in my very disorganized desk. My third grade teacher threw everything out of my desk because it was so messy, and she ordered me to clean out the clutter. I don't remember, but I'm guessing I put it back in just about the same way. I didn't know how to un-clutter something. Organizing was a mystery. I know I did it slowly because I felt so shocked and mortified.

I learned coping strategies, such as defiance and bullshitting. The fifth grade nun wanted us to make a book-cover out of a grocery bag to protect our textbooks. I said, no, I won't do that, it's silly.

The real problem was I couldn't associate the instructions she was giving with the actions my hands were supposed to perform. Every other kid in the class could do it, but I was facing embarrassment and an anxiety attack if I tried. So, I pretended to disobey. I did it a lot and made myself a real brat and pariah doing it.

It meant making an effort alone, like having to teach myself how to dribble a basketball, but being in such isolation that I worked depressed and discouraged. I never got the hang of it, nor did I get any credit for trying to practice alone.

Depression was also a problem with athletics, though. It put an extra second or two on every play I tried to make. Add to that the ADHD, and I was hitting a brick wall and getting all kinds of ridicule due to it. Discouragement grew throughout my childhood.

In adulthood what's it like. I get up and plan to do things, and I might or might not even start them. It's hard to shut down activities that waste your time, or even see them as it's going on. I'll get distracted by a story to post to, and it's like I I drop out of time. Before I know it, twelve hours have passed.

In computer games, I really tried to keep them to a minimum due to losing control of my time. However, I really got into Civilization. For those who don't know, Civ isn't a reflex sort of game. It's a turn based strategy/simulation game. It's also not good as a social kind of game. It's best version is single player.

This game is either the best or the worst thing for someone with my condition. I get on there and one problem after another comes up for me to solve. Since it's turn based, I can take my time with it. If I get on there, again, time, the world, everything, just drops away. It's in a world I can't even remember.

I once played Civilization I for thirty-six hours straight. 

On the good side, it's like that with writing, too. In writing horror and fantasy, if I'm in to creating a scene, I'm really into it, what the characters are experiencing and thinking. Time will drop away, and before I know it, ten or twelve hours pass. Now that I have confidence and I'm in the habit, I don't really need to think of myself as on a schedule. I will write. Just as it was once a foregone conclusion that I will play Civilization.

If I'm waiting for bus, or walking down the street, or really anywhere, I'll begin to think of the novel or characters.

In ADHD, I guess it could be said that there's a disconnect between conscious decision-making and unconscious-driven behavior. It's not totally a bad thing. I've learned to tap the unconscious and use it as my muse, and so it might turn out to be an asset at the end.