ADD: Greatness in Life

Look, a squirrel.

Long before the world understood anything about the condition ADD and its much more popular twin ADHD, my grandfather was taking apart things in his shed, losing interest in them, and never putting them back together.

A brilliant mind, always absorbing information until his death. He always said,

“I will work until the day I die.”

He took his last oil field consultation call in January 2014 at the ripe old age of 82, and we buried him in March 2014.

He was proud to be able to sit in his recliner at 82 years of age and have people call him for technical knowledge about his profession.

His technical genius, unfortunately, was overshadowed by other mental roadblocks. He was terrible with money, forgetful, and generous to a fault. He made many people millionaires during the big oil booms only to mismanage his own company and scrape by in his later years.

I often wonder if the world knew what adult ADD was when he was struggling with it throughout his life, would his struggle to maintain focus on things have prevented his failures in business?

We will never know.

I, on the other hand, grew up on the cusp of understanding what AD(H)D is and how to treat it. From an early age, my parents and grandparents struggled with me in ways very different from my sister and cousins.

My grandmother loves to remind me that when they took me to evaluate me in the mid-90s, the psychiatrist said I was a textbook case.

From that moment on, I had a conflicted and troubled relationship with my own ADD and the resulting medication I was prescribed.

My first drug

I was in elementary school. I had to leave my class and go to the nurse’s office twice a day to take this little tiny pill called Ritalin. I don’t remember it having much of an effect on me.

Apparently, it helped me maintain focus in class.

I wouldn’t know I wasn’t paying attention

Rage Against the Dopamine

It became a problem in puberty. They switched me to Adderall. That didn’t last long.

My grandmother used to pick us up from school, and I remember sitting in the back seat of her minivan, so overcome with rage I wanted to punch through the window. I can’t remember what I was mad about, but I knew that the Adderall was making everything worse.

I dumped them out into the trash and refused to take any medication again for ADD.

Self Medication

I didn’t stop every medication. I was 17 when I found marijuana, and it was instantly addicting to me.

Every pothead in the world will say,

“Marijuana isn’t addicting, man,”

with a stoned-out Cheech and Chong look on their face while they can’t go a day without getting high.

I smoked my life away for the next 10 years.

I limped through the remaining years of high school and went in and out of college until one day I was waiting tables, and someone “stiffed” me, and I had a realization.

I can’t wait tables forever.

I need to get a meaningful education and make something of myself.

It wasn’t until I moved to Starkville that I took my education seriously. Once I had a “why,” I was able to apply myself. I still struggled with certain areas, but I managed to get through school with 4.0’s and 3.8s all the way through.

ADD distractions Subtract important things

I am scared of my inability to keep up with important things. Yesterday in a meeting, I frantically asked a question about a new report that the company wants me to make, and my boss just pinched the top of his nose in exasperation and said,

“I’ve already answered this question for you twice.”

I have these huge gaps sometimes. Now that I am a father I am terrified I will hurt my son due to an ADD-induced daze-out. So far, so good, but it just hits me in ways that I don’t expect sometimes.

Minimalism for the win

One thing I did for myself that helped with my ADD was to adopt minimalism. I live out of a suitcase and have for the last 6 years.

When I moved to China, I brought a backpack and a suitcase and didn’t look back.

Limiting the things I can lose helps me.

When I lived in my apartment by myself, I would just throw things away all the time. If they are gone, they can’t clutter up the house and make it impossible for me to find things.

Get in the Mind of Future Me

Another way I combat my ADD is to do things now that I know will make it easier on my future self. I recently wrote an article,

In it, I talked about the importance of using the “Is this a gift to my future self?” heuristic when making decisions.

For example, I just got out the Christmas Tree; I know it’s late but better late than never, and when I did, I couldn’t find the lights.

I didn’t put up the lights. If I did, I would have put them directly in the box with the tree or the ornaments. I know that there is no way I would be able to keep up with them for a year and have them next year when I need them. I looked everywhere for them, and I finally found them, but they were nowhere near the other Christmas decorations.

Little things like taping the dongle to the wireless keyboard when storing it so that I do not lose it and then the keyboard is useless, or putting my winter gloves in my winter coat before storing because I will lose them separately.

Split my Brain in Two

The prefrontal cortex is a complex higher-order thought computer. Mine is always going into overdrive. At any given time, I am simultaneously immersed in a Warhammer 40K book, doing end-of-the-year reports for my students, preparing lessons for the next week, writing on Medium, and keeping up with my favorite podcast.

As I am writing this with my soundproof headphones on, listening to a Dance Gavin Dance instrumental album, I realize it’s the inverse of what I am trying to write about.

The idea behind this section is I listen to podcasts, or audiobooks while I clean the house, fold clothes, decorate the Christmas tree, work out, or do any other task that doesn’t require much thought.

Interestingly, when I need to focus, I do the opposite. I engage my mind with voiceless music and can focus clearly.

I laser-focus on audiobooks or podcasts if I am doing something with my hands. If my parents knew this, they could have put audiobooks in my ear and let me play with Legos, and I would have read any book they wanted with joy and absorbed it.

It’s somewhat embarrassing, but I struggle to read without getting distracted or losing focus. It’s too active, and my brain needs more stimulus to remain engaged.

ADD’s about enough

This is a small glimpse into the mind of someone who has suffered and embraced their ADD their entire life and has lived to tell the story. What I have learned is that ADD is both my biggest strength and my most glaring blind spot. If you are someone that is suffering from it please recognize that it can be a strength as much as a weakness.

More on the subject of ADD

If you would like to read another good story about AD(H)D check out Aurõra’s Story titled,

I’ve added it to a list of my own as a reminder to go back and reference occasionally.