Days Like This

Today was "one of those days" when it comes to my ADD manifesting itself left, right and all over the place. I thought I was off to a good start, getting out the door with my lunch and an important package I had to mail today. Before I could get down the walk and out of the yard, I tripped over a loose brick; one that had apparently been stressed to the breaking point by the freeze/thaw cycle we've been going through of late. Anyway, that was how my day started.

Then I managed to fall UP the escalator as I was exiting the Metro. But I guess the biggest disappointment was that My boss found a bunch of mistakes in my most recent work, so I had to spend some time fixing them today. And I tried to be so careful...

I'm not sure what's going on with me, but I don't feel like myself anymore. And I don't feel like anyone else either. I just feel...well...sorta blank.

It's been a little over two years since I was diagnosed with ADD, and since then I've been through a roller coaster ride of finding the right medication, and assembling the right tools and techniques to help me manage it. And I have to say that I've been fairly succesful. My life is a lot more managable than it was before. I'm juggling a lot of balls and keeping them all in the air (working, parenting, looking for a job, working, keeping my finances in order, taking care of myself, etc.) for the most part. You might even call me a success story. So why don't I feel like one.

Sari Solden, in her book Journeys Through ADDulthood breaks dealing with adult ADD down into four separate "journeys." The chapter that seems to apply most to me right now, "Facing an Identity Crisis," starts with a succinct description of my high school and college years.

While other young adulds were starting out and reshaping, refining, molding, remolding, adjusting their choices, self-images and dreams, you may have reached adulthood with a gap in information about yourself that didn't allow you to do that initial bit of reality testing and adjustment.

Right. I was too busy trying to keep my head above water; trying to get out of college after six years; trying to support myself after college. It was all I could do to manage that much, and it was a struggle. It's not as much of a struggle, now that I have a handle on the problem. I've dealt with anger over what it's cost me to go untreated, mourned over time that was lost. Now I look around and I see myself in a pretty good place, with a pretty good life. I'm only just beginning to stop thinking about what might have been - what I might have been - if the problem had been solved sooner. But I look around and find myself asking "Who am I?"

So much has changed, and I don't have many of the struggles that I had previously, but I find that the past has left a sort of imprint; a familiar pattern that I can at least identify and that I came to rely on for a while; if nothing else, I could always count on things crashing and burning around me. But now it's been a while since the last "crash and burn." And I don't know the rules for this part. As Solden writes,

...adults with AD/HD often build their lives around flawed data and ideas about themselves.

You can say that again. Eventually, you come to see yourself as others seem to see you after enough crashing failures: as one who just doesn't, and just won't "get it." And you come to expect the roof to fall in or the floor to collapse from under your life, because that's just what happens time and time again. It's not fun, it doesn't feel good, but at least it's what you know.

So, even when I've begun to come out the other side, it's difficult to accept success for what it is, because I've had short-lived success before. I could last two years on a job before mistakes start catching up with me and the boss starts losing patience. I could keep my checkbook balanced for a month, or maybe two. I could effectively use a daytimer for a few weeks. And then the pattern starts all over again.

So now, after experiencing some success in managing my ADD, why am I still waiting for the other shoe to drop? Why am I waiting for the moment when I can say "A-ha, now the downhill slide begins"?

Part of it is fear that I won't be able to maintain what success I've managed to achieve, let alone achieve more, and that I'll disappoint myself and others again.

It kind of feels like I'm having to choose between an old friend and a new one. One is me before the diagnosis, treatment and tools. One is me now, after the diagnosis and treatment, and after learning how to manage my ADD. One I know well. The other I've only just met. With one I know what to expect, even if I know I won't enjoy it. With the other, I don't.

The key is to somehow merge the two identities (the "before" me, and the "after" me); not to choose between them, but to introduce them to each other. I just don't know where, or how to begin.

Comments

[sam]

*hugs*

[Tim Who?]

I read of your troubles and I sympathize I really do. As an adult male who has fought most of life’s battles, I understand the frustration of trying to get you s*** together. What I don’t understand is how ADD plays into this. The things I read now and the things I’ve read in the past, I list as normal everyday experiences.

“I tripped over a loose brick.
I managed to fall UP the escalator.
My boss found a bunch of mistakes in my most recent work.”

Ok so you had a bad day. We all do. From the ditch digger down the street, to the Pope. Some days are better than others. Why do you feel that ADD is the root cause, of what I and many others feel is part of everyday life?

“I'm juggling a lot of balls and keeping them all in the air (working, parenting, looking for a job, working, keeping my finances in order, taking care of myself, etc.”

This sentence does a lot more to explain your frustration and struggles. While it is true that some people multitask better than others the fact is for most people it is very difficult to do. Many people feel overwhelmed. The question comes up again. Why do you feel that ADD is the root cause, of what I and many others feel is part of everyday life?

“I was too busy trying to keep my head above water; trying to get out of college after six years; trying to support myself after college. It was all I could do to manage that much, and it was a struggle.”

I graduate from high school with a 4.0 average, I have a high IQ, and I multitask very well. And the struggle of College was too much for me. I couldn’t handle it and dropped out. You made it! Doesn’t that count for something?

“...adults with AD/HD often build their lives around flawed data and ideas about themselves”

Adults with AD/HD and millions of average everyday normal people!

"I just don't know where, or how to begin."

Start with the knowledge that you are a normal adult male and have the normal problems and the normal struggles in this thing we call life.
I make no judgements about ADD or the people that have it or make light of it in any way.

But I ask you to stop and think if only for a minute or two, the next time something goes bad.

Is it really due to ADD?
Or is it just life.

[Mark]

Thanks for sharing you story about it. Glad you did. Might help someone else. *big hug also*

[Terrance]

Why do I attribute it to ADD? Well, I guess it's because I'm looking back over my entire history, and the things that I experienced prior to diagnosis and treatment. Today, I'm a lot closer to whatever might be considered "normal" than I was before medication and coaching.

Prior to that, it was a matter of the frequency and the degree of "screw ups." It was a matter of just "not getting" what other people around me seemed to understand. It was about knowing that I was smart enough to do x, y or z, but still failed at doing it. It was about dismal failure after dismal failure, while I watched other people, who weren't any smarter or more talented than me, move ahead in their careers, education, lives, etc., while I remained stuck in some loop I couldn't escape.

Where I am now is that things are a lot closer to "normal," but the ADD is still there and still manifests. So those "normal" difficulties that other people also experience still happen more frequently for me, and to a greater degree, just based on my observations. I guess it's just difficult to tell where that fine line is drawn unless you're walking around with my brain, etc.

[Tim Who?]

My own opinion is not only are you normal, But not getting closer to it . No…You blew past it a long time ago.
A college degree, a loving relationship, a child, a job, a home.
I know at least 20 guys in their late 20’s to mid 30’s that would give up valuable body parts to have any two of those things.
You’re doing fine. Damm fine.

[Terrance]

Thanks. My coach says I don't give myself enough credit for how well I'm doing.

As for the ADD, I know I have it, thanks to results from pretty extensive medical and pschiatric screening, and because things got a lot better once I found the right medication. Where I am now is that the things that trip me up look pretty normal from the outside. The difference is the frequency and the degree to which it happens.