Resolutions. Ha!
I am not a doctor or an actual professional of any sort. I just want to put this out there as a disclosure. This is just my journey.
The brain of a person with ADHD is not like a neurotypical brain. We are called neurodivergent, people whose brain operates differently. Everyone is different, we get that, no one is arguing that fact. It’s just that most brains are able to perform a certain way, ours do not perform that way, for whatever reason. There are various kinds of neurodivergence, we are labeled with disorders as though there is something that needs to be fixed. However, there is no cure for our brains, nor do we want there to be, as an individual, a group nor should the world as a whole.
Now that I know I have ADHD, I accept that I am a procrastinator extraordinaire this is something I might not ever be able to completely overcome. It seems that this is a common theme in most papers and articles that I have read on the topic of ADHD. It should come as no surprise, looking back at my life, that this is a situation for me. It isn’t time management; I know that I have deadlines. I know how to allocate time to projects or tasks that I need to get done. In fact, I do set time aside to do things like cook, homework, project for work, practice, podcast, these are all scheduled. The problem comes when it is time to commit and do the task, I need to be mentally ready to do it.
If you are not familiar with this problem, I will do my very best to explain it for you. However, you might still think it is simply a matter of willpower, and in a way, you are sort of right, but it is much more than this. When I enjoy doing something I can usually get into and devote an entire day without wanting or needing to do anything else. However, if I am not in that mindset, for whatever reason, I cannot make myself do it. I sit there and argue with myself, sometimes out loud, sometimes all in my head. I know, I know, I know, I know that this task, project whatever it may be, needs to get done. I have set aside time to do it. However, I cannot do it. There is some gigantic barrier, hundreds of miles high and wide, an entire mountain range in my way of starting this task.
One might say, get yourself set up on a schedule. Here is a heads up, I hate schedules, I have heard and read that people with ADHD perform better within schedules, but I feel so constrained. My body cringes and my mind cries when I even think of it. Yuck (shudders). It makes me feel like there are things running all over me, creeping me out.
Year after year, I set up resolutions, heck, day after day, I set up resolutions or ideas. My lists of things I need or want to get done. My stacks of notebooks to help me stay organized, my obsession with planners and calendars to get me to remember what I need to. I have apps, lists, notebooks, post-its, whiteboards, calendars, handwritten, on computers, phones, typed out, I cannot organize and plan and stick to it no matter how hard I try.
Go on medication, they say! Here is another piece of information I have picked up from therapists, doctors and ADHDers alike. The medicine will not help you to do the thing. You need to find the intrinsic motivation that helps you with that. The hard part about living in the world we do is that my brain does not have the same schedule that someone else does. Our concept of time warped. My brain doesn’t have the same schedule as the calendar.
I do know people who must stay organized, and their ADHD allows them to do that, but at a price. The amount of anxiety about being organized that comes along with it keeps them awake with thoughts of making sure everything is taken care of.
I am not lazy, I care, an unhealthy amount most times. There are just some who have a certain amount of brain chemicals or brain energy per day. When it is used it all up, it takes a weird amount of time to get it back and until I do, I might not be able to do what the rest of the world needs me to do.
