Recession's true victims: ADHDers...

Nod to Jeff for reminding me of this accidentally with his post today...

Please know that the title of this is a joke. But it is true that the recession has changed my life in a way. I have always been a reliable, hard-working employee. However, because of my willingness to be, mmm, shall we shall mobile, I rarely have stayed at a job for more than 2 years. I call it one part young adult self-discovery, two parts ADHD. And maybe another part I'm damned smart and it's hard to find jobs that engage my mind long-term.

But last year, when I found myself in need of a part time job...having left a full time job...thanks to the recession, there were NO jobs available.

In my entire 20 year working life (since age 15) I have never not been able to find employment.

I am actually working part time now, at the full time job I'd left. I still needed work, and they still needed help...it's not an easy position to fill, for various reasons. And so I'm back. But that's not always easy for me. My novelty seeking-mind goes a little stir-crazy sometimes.

And along with the recession, treatment has also caused me nothing but problems. The office is so organized on a regular basis not that it...well, it makes me uncomfortable quite frankly. It stresses me out way more than the chaos did...I think...? I'm forced to deal with things in far more detail and meticulousness than is probably even necessary. We have the closed files catalogued within an inch of their lives. There's no fires to put out. Cases are just ticking along as they shoudl. I'm not wishing for things to be "bad" or to go all nuts. And I don't want to create chaos. In fact I seem to be seeking order...but it doesn't feel natural. I'm good at fixing things in a crisis and um...there's no crisis...and so I'm finding that I'm good at doing stuff when there's no crisis...I just have to work WAY harder to motivate myself.

I'd rather be sticking my face in a box of Twinkie's right now and watching The Girls Next Door, than attending to my itty bitty pile of work.

I'm looking forward to juggling the wee ones with ADHD boy this evening. Children guarantee surprises :) And I baked cookies. With pink and yellow frosting and sprinkles.

So there you have it...the recession has forced me to deal with life the way other people live it. Work seems routine. Kids are fun. And I'm baking cookies.

Wow. Just wow.

Exhibit A: Shoe on Dash Board

Words are not always the best descriptive tool. Most people, and apparently many with ADHD learn best when "shown". And so I give you Exhibit A, above. It's a photo I took this afternoon after a trip to a friends house, when I got into my car, saw the scene on my dashboard and said "this is what people really need to understand about ADHD". It's not about forgetting silly things. It's not about finding things boring. It's not about being lazy.

Let me explain this photo, and perhaps you'll understand what I'm saying. To the right of my steering wheel, there are three items on the dash. A pair of (totally hot, retro, 1940's styled) dancing shoes. A bag of pistachios. And a note to self. The shoes are there to remind me to go to dance class. Exercise is good for the ADHD mind and especially for those of us with a little hyperactivity issue. The pistachios live on my dash because I have to eat frequently, and the only way I will remember, is if I leave food in sight. The note to self says "Jillian!" and "Yankee Cockfight!" I use a lot of exclamation marks because I think in exclamations. I write notes like this so that I don't forget things like "hey, your sister Jillian said she'd cut your hair tonight if you remember to show up!" and "oh hey, Yankee Cockfight, an awesome blues duo is coming through town later!".

To my ex-boyfriend (not to belabor certain points, but he's representative of the class of people we like to call "non-ADHDers!") this was clutter. To me: priceless lifelines to my buried memory. Triggers to connect me to the present...anchors to the day at hand.

Another great example...while driving back to the office I stopped at the gas station.

I took out my credit card, from my wallet...to pay for the gas. When I got back in the car, my first impulse was to throw the credit card in my bag without putting it back in the wallet.

I used to do things like that all the time...which explains a lot about why my life was so difficult. it is simply not natural to me, to put the "thing" back where I found it. It is still to this day, and probably for my whole life, something that irritates and frustrates me. I have to override the impulse and briefly picture the chaos of thinking my card was missing...or of actually losing it. Take a breath...and put it back in the wallet. There is always a conscious effort in this process. It reminds me of a terrific quote that I can't remember the source of, but I read it in the article "Messy Purse Girls" which incidentally is a great article about what it's like to be a girl with ADHD. The quote is something like "most people have no idea how much work it is for some of us to appear normal".

I am known as an organized, motivated git-er-done kind of gal. And all of those things are true about me...but I spend just as much effort, if not more, on making sure the little routine things that many others take for granted are done.

So I remind myself to put the card back in the wallet. I set the garbage can in the middle of the doorway to remember to take out the garbage. I put the shoes on the dashboard to remember to go to dance class (and I REALLY LOVE dance class, which makes it even funnier that I need a reminder!). I also input all of these things into my iPhone so it reminds me.

Without these anchors I float. I still exist...but without connection to the framework. "The framework"? The framework that to the ADHDer, it seems everyone else exists within. I mean really...there is no framework. But I have to create it for myself or I can't function. What's really funny is that...I bet people whose brains aren't like this don't even need it! People who are able to ride bikes don't need training wheels after all. The important part for me to remember, I suppose, is that my focus should be on the goal...there is no need to question my need for training wheels. My results speak for themselves.

Today's theme: management

Management of clients. Management of pets. Management of households. Management of medications.

I put off calling my NP about my meds earlier this week a) because I had a good day and just wanted to enjoy it and then b) thought my appt with him was this week anyway...realized I was wrong...called him this morning.

He wants to do a grand experiment called...taking me off of anti-depressants/anti-anxiety meds entirely just to see what happens. Because I've been having really bad anxiety. (Pause) At least I can laugh :) Because that's funny. It actually makes sense because one of the common side effects of most of the medications that treat anxiety, is of course anxiety. That's a pretty mean reality for those of us with anxiety issues. Trying medications then becomes a process of "hmm, I feel anxious...is this the same anxiety I usually feel? Is it different? How is it different? What is it making me feel like I want to do or not do? Did I have this feeling last week before he raised the dosage? Will my ADHD even let me remember back that far, lol? Is it possible that my stimulant medication is making me anxious? Where did I put that bottle of Ativan, and do I really even want to take it?

This anxiety I have been feeling really sucks...and feel more like "the old days" than I have for a while. I don't notice it until it's bad...it's like someone turned on a tv, and there's nothing but white noise, and then they just kept turning up the volume hoping I wouldn't notice, and I don't for a little while, and then I realize I feel compelled to do annoying repetitive little gestures, I am irritable, and feel jumpy...I have a little butterfly in my stomach (but totally different from the freaking jello butterfly of doom in my stomach when I took the generic Celexa many moons ago...see what I mean...it's these subtle differences in types of anxiety that you notice after you've tried several meds...).

I am really coming to understand that it's true: aside from actual serious mental illnesses, of the lesser mental health issues a person could have, it really sucks to treat the combination of ADHD and anxiety. I'm very frustrated...not with my prescriber, but with my brain chemistry. There's just no reason, in my opinion, which is hardly based in medical fact, that I should be having THIS MUCH anxiety, while taking THIS MUCH Remeron...and then having to boost it with Ativan...no thanks. Remeron (Mirtazapine is the generic that I take) was working great for a while. I was loving feeling relaxed.

So he's tapering me off of it, and then wants to see what happens when I just take Concerta, with no anti-anxiety meds. I understand that this will help him figure out another path...but I can't help thinking "um...we already know what happens when I take nothing...I have anxiety!".

I DID start taking dance classes again this week though...so hopefully that will help me burn off a little anxiety while we're undertaking this latest experiment.

I'm just nervous because having seen what it's like to live without anxiety...I'm afraid to go back to my natural state. I really am. It wasn't pleasant, that's why I came to ask for help/diagnosis in the first place!

In the middle of this, of course, life goes on. And I was up until 2AM cleaning because my misbehaving dog and cats had an all-out territory marking war, which ruined one whole couch, peppered the rest of the house with puddles of piss, my female cat got all annoyed that her litterbox had been elevated (to keep the puppy out of it) and decided to stop using it, which resulted in PILES of cat poop...I declared a Holy War in the name of any god that would steop up the the task, quarantined all the animals separately, and cleaned the whole house from top to bottom. I had no choice...not only was it disgusting, but it stank, and my poor roommate shouldn't have to deal with it. Household management is key to domestic tranquility.

This is after they pissed all over my notebook I had put together to keep me organized last week...which I had to start all over again...and my paychecks...and my little notekeeping notebooks that I carry...and my bag that has just the right compartments in it to keep me knowing where my stuff is.

And there's a few clients at the office that...honestly, I wish I could just "disappear" with a magic wand. Why? Because they're totally anxiety cases and they're stressing me out. Sometimes client management really sucks.

So...at least managing the dog and cats seems to be working. And as always, I have to remind myself...I get more done dealing with this circus than most people do without...

The ADHD I can stand...

...it's the anxiety that kills me.

ADHD makes me have a good time. It makes me energetic, it makes me have fun ideas, it makes me bounce around. Granted this is not always to my advantage, but it doesn't make me feel trapped, sick, mentally unwell, unable to make decisions, and unable to cope with anything.

Anxiety does.

And I shit you not when I say that the fact that my dog and two cats are having a pissing war that has destroyed my entire home this week has not helped. Or that certain people in my life who qualify as "high maintenance" have also not helped (hence I have hit the "ignore" button on their bullshit).

Oh, and the fact that my Remeron/Mirtazapine, isn't doing shit? Yeah that's not helping either.

We've tried two dosage bumps now, so I feel sufficiently convinced that no, this shit is just not going to work anymore. That's not unheard of in the world of Remeron. Sometimes, for some people, for no particular reason, it just stops working. And when that happens, and you start to think of Ativan as something you really want to take on a regular basis, you know it's time to ask for something new. The other night it was a tiny tab of Ativan and "oh look, a wine tasting, I think I'll pop in!".

Of course, here I am trying to finish up the dregs of school so that I can graduate...after having to ask for more time to finish my homework from last semester, because medication changes were making it impossible for me to think straight.

A lot of ADHDers talk about ADHD and how it kicks their ass and makes school harder...and it does for me too...but it's not even half as bad as dealing with unchecked anxiety. And meds changes in the middle of a semester. This is my last shot...I HAVE to finish this work this semester...and I am extremely sensitive to meds as anyone who's read this blog with any regularity knows. This is not anxiety talking--it is a fact that every time I switch anxiety medications, my thinking ability falls to shit for several weeks. But is that worse than literally hating life for those same several weeks because anxiety is running the show? Running my life? Either way the choice is heartbreaking.

At 7.5 mg of Remeron, I remember how it melted the anxiety away...and then we went up to 15 and all was still well...except that it made me so sleepy I couldn't function unless I piled my ADHD stimulants on top of it (which I honestly don't need every day). So we went up to 30 mg...but it felt like, even though the sleepiness pretty much went away...the anxiety was creeping back in. And so we went to 45mg...and gradually I have felt nothing but worse.

I've written about the anxiety before, and described it as a white noise, polluting the backdrop of every minute of my waking life, for as long as I can remember. It's back in full force. If white noise isn't an potent enough descriptor for you to grasp what I'm saying, perhaps this is: imagine fingernails on a chalkboard every time you're trying to have a conversation, make a decision, or get work done...and there's no off switch. Or someone beating a drum right next to your ear, that unfortunately nobody else can hear, so that when you react to it, people think you're being really unreasonable.

Oh I have a bottle of Ativan, the chemical equivalent of an off-switch. But I simply don't see drug addiction as a healthy alternative to chronic anxiety. Ativan has the potential to make very good friends with your body chemicals in as little as 7 days. The way I'm feeling, I don't doubt the potential for addiction could be very real.

This is why, and I have to remind myself of this, it is a fucking miracle that I made it in life as far as I have without a serious drug addiction problem. This is why everything about the general functionality of my life is freaking commendable. But knowing that doesn't make the anxiety go away, and this morning I kind of lost the battle I've been quietly waging for several weeks now. Poor ADHD boy, even though he suffers from anxiety himself, has never seen me this way, and was honestly, and understandably a little overwhelmed. Because you see, I'm able to be articulate sitting here several hours later, tying onto a page, but this morning when I began to unravel, I wasn't able to articulate the problem...so he was a little at a loss to know what to do about it, if anything. He politely speculated that perhaps PMS could be the issue...but the first clue that PMS wasn't the problem, was the fact that I had no inclination to argue that point :)

Knowing that I've defied some odds doesn't make me want to cry less. Knowing that doesn't make it easier to explain to people around me. All they see is irritable...cranky...illogical inability to make decisions...sharp and sudden reactions...what they don't see is that the inside of my head looks like armageddon, and I'm just trying to crawl through the day with the stumps of my sanity held to my chest in desperation. Regardless of my actual surroundings, my mind and body are engaged in fight or flight.

I'll call my prescriber on Monday, but right now, Monday feels like a long, long way away.

Because shit ain't all dipped in gold...

...my roommate Ariel is the best.

When I'm having a "moment" she's always got the answer. And often the answer is "well shit ain't all dipped in gold Miss K".

I think every ADHDer needs to keep this mantra in mind. It's perfect for those days where life feels like one frustration after another.

Life isn't perfect and that's okay.

Shit ain't all dipped in gold.

Ugggghhhhh, one of THOSE mornings...

...where I drop things, and bump into things and my brain feels like pea soup, and the dog is running around the house like a maniac just out of my reach every time I try to catch him to put him in his room before I leave the house, and I stepped in a puddle of water with socks on because my eyes were hardly open, and the cats wouldn't STFU, and I got 8 hours of sleep but feel like I got none, and I keep hurting myself accidentally, and I'm pissed because the cat litter got stuck to my feet, and look, I'm dropping things again, and I can't get the gas cap open on the car and...

You get the idea.

I used to have mornings like this all the time.

I was also 20 minutes late to therapy. WHICH SUCKED. Even though the session was good.

Gah...but here's what I realized, and said to my therapist when she asked why I was so damned late...I used to have mornings like this all this time. ALL the time.

And I don't anymore.

:) Let's hear it for self-awareness and treatment. In light of this realization, I guess I'm just thankful that I don't have lame mornings like this every day anymore. Even though I hate this morning, looking at the stuff that "wrong", there's some that I just plain don't have control over. And I know what to do about the things I do have control over.

I just wish I would stop dropping shit. That's got me on my last nerve.

xxxxxxx <-----------See, there it is...my last nerve. Figured I'd type it out so I can keep track of it...

ADHDers can even be found on status lists...

...and today I was honored to be published in just such a local affair in a major newspaper.

For my community event organizing work.

Wheeee!

See...don't ever let anyone tell you that ALL of your ADHD "big ideas" are bad ones. Some of them are good. Some of them are BRILLIANT! Some of them are at least partially good and even better after you step away from them to analyze them a little more closely.

This particular idea has blossomed into an endeavor that feeds my soul...that makes me feel good about myself...and helps other people at the same time, and adds something really unique and special to my community.

Proof that there's no reason that we ADHDers should apologize for our "random" ideas...that there's value in learning to focus and asses and develop them...and really, you know what? People with perfectly normal brains have crappy ideas every day! People with normal brains also sometimes miss the value in idea that an ADHDer will find novel, intriguing and worth investing time in.

ADHD may not be a gift, but it does have plusses sometimes as well as minuses. I'm working to maximize the benefits of the plusses :) And today, my state community recognized me for doing just that...wicked bonus...!