ADD research
So A month or so (?) back I was digging through the free bin at McKay's and came across a book called:
"Driven To Distraction : Recognizing and Coping with Attention Deficit Disorder from Childhood Through Adulthood"
http://www.amazon.com/Driven-Distraction-Recognizing-Attention-Childhood/dp/0684801280
along with several other nifty books - sometimes I wonder about McKay's logic... I found some really good books there. Maybe they do it on purpose as a public service to those who cannot afford more.
ANYHOO... this book basically describes all of the women on my mom's side of the family... Now this book does say that many women do not exhibit the hyperactivity in ADHD, but the women in my family are plenty hyper.
I'm pretty sure I'm ADHD too, even if I am higher functioning in some areas, but mine manifests in some pretty interesting ways:
1. Creatively speaking - I really hate doing custom work (as in sewing) unless I have complete autonomy over the design and execution. If I am not excited about the design or learning the skill, and I cannot change around the details as I am inspired, then I might as well be working on an assembly line.
That may be why working in the Secretarial field has kept me well.. content enough, because you have a certain amount of autonomy, and you are never bored, because every day is different. I suck at filing and have to make a game of it to get it done... I sort the stack by what drawer it goes in then I randomly pick a drawer to work on.
2. Getting started on something or getting out the door to an appointment. Every time I get ready to leave the house to go to work, go shopping, pay a bill, meet someone, I go through this agonizing process of suddenly seeing every single thing that needs to be done in the house, and wanting to stop and knock a few items out before I head out the door. This makes me either horribly late or on the cusp of late. Both of which add even more stress.
I have had to start doing the flylady thing and getting everything lined up the night before: lay out my clothes for tomorrow, Have some of my lunch items ready to grab, (I fill up pint mason jars with milk and one goes out the door with me every morning, and I make homemade granola over the weekend). My shopping for groceries has become very regimented so I have the first priority to have the items I need to keep me from going out to eat at Lunch.
3. Dealing with clutter: With all of these things I want to study or make comes with all the educational materials and tools and equipment you need to make it. Some hobbies, like embroidery, don't take up as much space as tubs of yarn for knitting, wool fiber for spinning into yarn, or tubs and tubs and tubs of fabric for sewing into a costume or for around the home.
4. Dislike of crowded places and meetings, where I have to sit still and be quiet or I may not be able to get around without feeling hemmed in. Sometimes this makes me downright reclusive, and I am supposed to be an extrovert. But the more people I hang around with, the more distractions I am exposed to, the more obligations I get talked into, the more behind I get.
So sometimes staying at home and working on my own backlog is something I do in self defense. I keep wanting to have this house where there is a place for everything and everything has it's place and everything is perfectly maintained. But everything needs an organizational overhaul because I am living on my own now for the first time since I was 29 so it's all on me both time and money wise... and it takes every penny and second if I let it.
5. Impulsiveness - Sometimes I go where angels fear to tread, speaking my mind-wise. Especially if I think something is unjust. Less so at work, because I am on someone else's dime, but definitely yes in my personal life. Fortunately I try not to associate with people who are ungenerous or unfair. I tend to be more selective in picking my battles now, but I still sometimes surprise myself.
So yes, I always used to make jokes about being manic, or OCD, but I think after reading this if I had to self-diagnose I'd say I was probably a high functioning person with ADHD. I try to look at the challenges that I have as being like a gardener who is behind on their pruning. They have a bunch of plants putting out a lot of branches, which takes away from bearing as much fruit as it might if some excess branches were trimmed off earlier in the year.
I keep hoping that as I develop structures that work for me, and winnow out the distractions and less important (to me) projects, that some sort of spontaneous healing will occur with my schedule wise and clutter wise in my life.