“Suddenly, so much of my life made so much more sense.”
That’s the most common refrain I hear from people like me who were late-diagnosed with ADHD. In my case, it was an ongoing, bitter, semi-serious joke, because while I excelled at tests, writing, and learning of all kinds, I somehow wasn’t ever able to parlay that into a secure career the way my peers seemed to.
I would ask myself, over and over, as I looked at a depleted bank account or sat in traffic on the way to another job that I used to love but now felt like sandpaper in my gut: if I’m so smart, why ain’t I rich?
Almost exactly a year ago from this writing, I got the confirmation of a possible answer to that question: because you’ve had ADHD (combined type) since you were a kid, and nobody knew it.
I can’t blame anyone, not my teachers, not my parents, not my self, not my well-meaning friends and partners who tried a variety of techniques to help me succeed. There wasn’t the science to understand what ADHD was (in truth, there still isn’t, really, but at least it’s getting better).
Now that I know I have ADHD, what does that change about my life?
Being ignorant is not a sin. Remaining ignorant, is. — Robert Heinlein
“What…are you…prepared…to DO?” — Sean Connery to Kevin Costner, The Untouchables
Like many late-diagnosed ADHD folks, I channeled the one double-edged superpower that I understood: hyper-focus. I devoured the books, the podcasts, the papers, the social posts, the videos, and started writing about how I understood what I was learning (and now you’re reading this article! Sing with me: “It’s the CIIIRRRRRCLLLE of WRIIIIIIIIITE…”).
That was the easy part.
The hard part was — still is — that second part of the serenity prayer: accepting the things I cannot change. I have to stop pretending that my brain will work in the same way that most brains in this world work. It explains all the mishaps, mistakes, and poorly thought-out decisions that have made my life more difficult than it needed to be, but it doesn’t fix them.
That’s up to me.
Discipline means limiting my options.
I hate even writing that.
The cold, hard truth is that there are just some things that I see other people take for granted that I cannot do.
I’m going to give you the current version of the running list, but before I do, I want to head off the typical neurotypical response: oh, everybody has that happen sometimes.
Yes. You’re right. They do. The difference of ADHD is not in the symptoms; it is in the frequency and severity of the symptoms. Yes, everyone has diminished mental capacity when they don’t get enough sleep; for someone with ADHD, trouble sleeping is more common, and the diminishment is more severe.
Which is why it’s at the top of the list:
Things I cannot do:
- Skip on sleep. There’s an inverse relationship between how much sleep I get and how much my ADHD manifests during my day — and yes, I’m aware that sleep deprivation affects everyone, please see the above about severity. To add a layer of complication, the quality of the sleep also seems to be a factor.
- Skip on meds. It’s not just taking them — it’s the whole system of checks and reminders I have to have in place, because my brain doesn’t form habits, nor can it just assume I’ll remember to take them. Hence the obnoxious and insistent medical alarm on my Apple Watch, the checkbox in my daily journal for meds, and carrying a spare dose with me everywhere in my ADHD every-day carry.
- Skip on exercise. Again, I know: everybody needs to move. However, for most people, it’s because their body needs it. Mine too, but it’s become more and more clear that it’s really because my brain needs it to function adequately.
- Buy things conveniently. I used to think that contactless payment idea, the PayPal’s and the Venmo’s and tap-cards were wonderful inventions — until I realized, decades too late, that they make it that much easier for my brain to create crises by making impulsive purchases. I have them, but I’ve made them harder to use for myself.
- Use phrases like “in a while”, “soon”, or “later.” Time blindness is a thing. I’ve learned the hard way that I really have no concept of the passage of time, so if I use those very common phrases, they really have no meaning at all.
Things I have to do:
- Interrupt my life to make notes. I have to write things down — names, tasks, ideas, you name it — in my little field notebook, or they get lost. It’s a common joke among ADHDers: The biggest lie we tell ourselves is “Oh, I’ll remember this later.” And sure, there are things on my phone that can let me conveniently take notes — but the phone is no longer a phone, remember? It’s an Infernal Distractibility Sarlacc Pitt of New Shiny Squirrels, and the odds of me getting to write something down without being sidetracked are pretty slim.
- Put things where I can see them. I love minimalism. I love the aesthetic, I love the idea, I love even the process of cleaning and declutterring etc. But if there’s something I need to remember to do — from yoga in the morning to remembering my keys to taking important papers to work — I need to have it in front of me, in my vision. This means that I need to have a certain other kind of minimalism: if you need to remember it, leave it out. Put everything else away, because it will distract you from remembering.
- Have reminders of time everywhere. As I write this, I’m wearing my Apple Watch, I have a small hand-carved clock on my shelf in my peripheral vision, a two-foot-diameter wall clock on my wall, and I set a timer via my HomePod so that I will stop writing in time to get ready to go out to dinner. And I’m still half-worried that I’ll be late. I’m lucky; most of the time I don’t have that ADHD trait of “I have an appointment later, I can’t do anything until then!” but I do have the reverse: I’ll just write for a bit and then get ready. Nope. I’ll get drawn into the writing (or whatever) in a lovely combination of hyper-focus and flow and keep telling myself “just one more thing” and be late — as I often have been, throughout my life.
Or worse, I’ll work right up until the absolute last minute, where if everything goes right I might be able to be on time…and when I’m playing those odds, the house almost always wins. The House of ADHD, that is.
Which brings me to the biggest discipline change of all since I got my diagnosis, the thing that, with the help of my partner I’ve identified as the one factor that contributes the most to any problems I have during the day:
I can’t rush out of the house.
I have to — have to — give myself time to prepare for wherever I’m going, or I will almost always forget something.
Actually, I’ll adjust that to always, because the times that I don’t forget some important aspect of where I’m going are simply because that particular excursion didn’t require as much. I wasn’t prepared; I was lucky.
A short but not complete list of things I have forgotten:
- My power adapter (for whatever device I might be bringing along).
- My meds.
- My wallet.
- My phone.
- My watch.
- My headphones.
- My keys.
- My teeth (yes, I have dentures).
- Important papers needed for whatever appointment I’m heading for.
- My destination (yes, I’ve driven entirely across town to the wrong place before remembering where I was supposed to be going).
- Whichever of three engraved nametags for the board or organization I’m supposed to be representing at the event I’m going to.
- My car (literally. I have jumped on my bike and headed out before realizing this was a time I was supposed to take my car).
Any of those items might also have been something that I forget when leaving an event if I’m not careful.
I’ve been lucky to have an extended support network locally of friends and family who have helped me numerous times to replace or bring the truly necessary items to me. Other times I just show up at the place and look less professional — if they know me, they might think it’s a one-time thing, but if they know me, it’s well, Gray’s just like that. Since my profession (nonprofit fundraiser) requires making a good impression on people, that’s not an ideal situation.
But what we’ve noticed is that if I am rushing out of the house to try to be on time, I’m unprepared. My amygdala will merrily ride a white-rabbit thrill of I’m late! I’m late! and put all the focus on where I’m going, often jumping ahead often to what I’m going to be doing, and entirely ignore the getting ready side of things.
Scaffolding helps. Routines help. But ADHD is still there.
So there is a checklist by the door. There’s a nice little “ADHD EDC” kit I keep stocked with the things I usually need, and if I remember it, then I remember most everything else. If my partner and I are leaving at the same time, we have a verbal ritual of stating and acknowledging that the door is locked.
Just last week my partner had to drop off my computer power adapter at the coffee shop where I was working prior to a meeting with the owner about a fundraiser. Luckily it’s only a little out of her way to work, so I only felt mildly bad about having to ask her to do it — but if I think back to all the times I’ve felt shame or remorse about being an extra burden or letting people down by not being prepared, it’s a whole lot of memories.
That’s why I call this a discipline. I suspect it’s why I have always loved coats with many pockets and backpacks and such that advertise how wonderfully organized everything can be — because that’s a fantasy I have, of having everything I need exactly when I need it.
Buying another backpack isn’t going to fix my brain, though. I have exactly two options:
- Take the time to have all the stuff I need planned out in advance, or
- Need less stuff.
I’m still working on both. And in the meantime, I have a new game. Instead of try to get as much done in the time I have left, I try to get something completely done before the alarm goes off so I can actually have more time than I need to get ready.
I don’t want to be that person anymore who shows up “just a little late, and barely prepared.” I want to become the person who always is earlier than expected, with exactly what is needed (and maybe a little more). It’s a work in progress.
Discipline and grace. They’re both the biggest changes since I got diagnosed — and thankfully they can feed off of and reinforce each other. It’s about the practice, not the destination.