I'm watching these videos on ADHD, because they explain a lot about what is going on in the brain and he has apparently devoted much of his life to the study of it as a neuropsychiatrist. He seems to really get it and explain it well and I so much appreciate that understanding. I will have to watch 3 times or more to fully grasp it and unfortunately I probably wont be able to walk away with an ability to convey very much of it due to my adhd unless I were to sit down and study it. He's a strong believer in the medication, which is what I would expect from a psychiatrist. ( I just know personally, it's not for me.) The only other thing I'm not able to wrap my head around is his comments about it being a motivation deficit. I'm not sure what I think about that. I will have to listen again.
Have you watched how to ADHD or this other guy I forget his name. I really like podcasts there is one I really enjoy that’s from Chadd. So many speakers and I listened to great stuff that is helpful for me check it out let me know what you think of it and what you found
I’ve seen Dr. Hallowell at his clinic in Sudbury and I’ve listened to him speak on multiple topics. He’s really good at giving people hope but Dr. Barkley is in a league of his own when it comes to his knowledge and the brilliant way he is able to convey what he’s talking about to people like me with no medical background. His analogies are the best. I literally think I’m his biggest fan and I’d love to meet him. Patricia Quinn is another good person to listen to if you’re interested in hearing specifically how the disorder effects females over the lifespan. She and Dr. Kathleen Nadau and one other person wrote a really informative book about girls and women with adhd. They talk about things I’ve never heard from the male experts in the field....mother/daughter relationship difficulties, self hate is also common with a late diagnosis or untreated adhd in females, societal gender roles placed on women that are difficult for adhd women to keep up with, cyclical hormonal effects we have to go through, etc.
I transcribed most of the third video, if anybody prefers a reading format. There's a lot of interesting things for me but one of the things he talks about is the sequencing and disfluency, which I have a lot of problems with, more so in speaking then in writing, where I can labor over it if I have enough time and sort of guess at the right sequencing, but sometimes I just can't figure it out. This is extremely frustrating, painful reality for me and has been my whole life. I remember crying over essay writing, being forced to participate in contests that my siblings accomplished with ease and aced everytime. Sometimes, I even wonder if I know answers subconsciously because I have this uncanny ability to answer every other possible answer but the one that applies, with consistency, it's like I have to rule out every other possibility first. Barkley doesn't mention that but I wonder if it fits in somehow. And as far as speaking, I usually am so painful to listen to disjointed are my sentences that I can make everyone in the room embarrassed for me, lol. Painful! Recently someone called on me to say something in a group, I got out one sentence, and about 20 seconds of silence, internal blankness, few more words and a close. Embarrassing! Frustrating. Part of this is a sensation of trauma happening too.
And it's funny, he references diabetes and before I discovered his videos I had been thinking how adhd is sort of like diabetes, which my mother had. A disease that isn't visible, that noone really wants to learn about or help with and needs to be managed and unless you're a child, you're managing it alone.
I definitely have problems with time, I don't know that they are exactly like he's talking about but I can't really refer to a time in the past, Pretty much it's complete guesswork, usually, my time frame is now, and before now...which is a pretty wide open window for the past. I guess it's working memory stuff. It's all pretty frustrating because I understand a lot but then my comprehension definitely runs into walls around organization, time, working memory.
Impulsivity isn't a huge problem with me, although, it might keep me interested and therefore asset, if that makes sense. Trauma from my past shut down a lot of my instincts to react, and I'm currently exploring reviving these aspects to feel whole again.
I feel like I understand some of issues but still there's a lot of mystery to me of what's happening that I'd really like to understand, even if I forget it right after, lol.
Are you in good shape physically? As a teenager, before i was ever diagnosed having adhd, i jogged, rode my horse, did yoga, went hiking, i took classes at the gym and smoked a ton of weed everyday. I was fit and it felt good and i think it helped me. Now I’m over weight 40lbs i let go of all the things i was good at doing and enjoyed after high school because i believed i had to be an adult and be independent afford my own place and living and to do that took everything in me trying to accomplish it. I was so overly focused on everything i was bad at ( i grew up with not the most emotionally supportive parents)wishing I wasn’t and i never complimented myself of the things i was good at. That’s one of my big my regrets in life.
At about 1:17 in the above video, he says something that I don't understand. "Doesn't matter what you know--you won't use it. You have what psychology calls a performance disorder. Performance disorders have nothing to do with skill. You have all the skills other people, your age possess but you can't use them because you see, it's the executive system, where the rubber meets the road, where what you know gets applied every day in what you do. And ADHD is a disorder of doing what you know. It is not a disorder of knowing what to do. And that is a very important thing I want families to understand. Your child, unless he was raised in a zoo or a very impoverished area, or adopted out of some very far-fetched, wartorn, underdeveloped country, has all the information and knowledge that the other kids their age have, what they can't do, is use it.
Your first answer was correct. It's working memory, being "near-sighted" to time, the impulsiveness and lack of follow through.
If someone had asked you what you needed to do and how you needed to arrange a task to complete a particular goal, you would likely be able to do it quite well. But when it comes to the daily actions of performing what you laid out in the plan, most of the time, it won't pan out.. likely due to a poor management of time, poor prioritization (distraction).. basically, it all boils down to poor Executive Regulation.
He used very clinical language. I wasn’t able to access links above but found some info on YouTube. What he’s saysinv about not being able to use info is: many of us are very intelligent, but we struggle to use that intelligence in day to day life for success. For example, you can know that you need to wear glasses to see clearly. But taking the time to see the doctor, get the Rx filled, carry the glasses with you and use them whenever you need to read is a lot of steps. You may or may not be able to follow through on all the steps to put your knowledge into action depending on MANY factors. He’s says many of us need structures in place for us to put our knowledge into action.
Thank you so much for taking the time to help me understand...said in way I totally understand and with the perfect summary sentence. I definitely would benefit from some structure in place. I just read your idea of a working buddy, too, love it, that's a really creative way to work around obstacles.
It can take effort to find the right buddy and regularly schedule things but hey...we all benefit from exercising our ask for help muscle. My buddy happens to also have ADD and greatly benefit. I’m thinking of starting a meetup for this!
yes, I can see how you'd want to understand that it may not be the first person you meet and sort of willingness to keep trying. I think it's a great idea to start a meetup. For where I am, finding a coach is difficult and then to afford one is a whole other obstacle, so finding a buddy could really be a great way to resolve those things.
Dr. Barkley books are quite dry, so it's understandable that it was difficult to get through, especially for someone with ADHD. I like his seminars, but could not get through the books. I even bought the audiobooks because the content was good. The audiobooks were easier to digest.
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