I've been having a lot of difficulty with my ADHD lately, and I've been starting to figure out what seem to be my main problems as well as the fact that, unfortunately, I'm not really sure how to solve them/if there even is a way to.
The thing with my ADHD that causes the most severe problems for me is how I interact with time and consequences. For me, on some weird level in my brain, the future's not real. I don't mean this in like a totally delusional way, like I definitely can acknowledge that time passes and eventually the future is going to be the present, but when it comes to things like scheduling and whatnot the future doesn't exist to me, no matter how hard I try to change that. It makes long-term goal-setting in a meaningful way difficult without external factors, but even with external factors I have a really hard time executing on any plan I might make. It's made school really difficult because even when I know when something is due and take steps to spread out the work in a manageable way (for example, a project I'm working on where I broke it down into 6 week-long chunks that felt manageable for me), when wheels hit pavement I absolutely cannot execute on it and leave everything till the last minute like I always do, and end up with what I'm doing right now scrambling to finish and absolutely melting down along the way. It's really frustrating and I've held a lot of long-standing self-hatred for it, feeling like a failure cause no matter how many times people have tried to help me find ways to structure my time in a healthy way, even people with experience working with ADHD, absolutely none of it sticks no matter how hard I try. There's just something in my brain that ignores absolutely anything in time further than 48 hours ahead of me. Sometimes even just more than 24.
I've been going to therapy, seeing a psych and getting medicated, and while I love my therapist for general emotional stuff and she clearly has a lot of experience working with folks with ADHD, for some reason it feels like meds and strategies haven't really been helping in the ways I need; I take Adderall and Guanfacine, but while the Adderall helps me focus in the moment (sometimes), it's often accompanied by a complete inability to really function once it wears off (and my body absolutely eats through it, like with a 30mg XR dose at 10AM and a 10mg IR second dose at 4ish it's completely gone by like 7 or 8PM, which really doesn't work for what I end up having to do in grad school, especially with the issues I'm having), and it just exacerbates my time blindness in the moment, which is actually really harmful when I also can't really control what I'm focusing on. The Guanfacine is supposed to help with that, but ultimately all I've noticed on that is that I have absolute crashes both at the height of my Adderall's effectiveness and as soon as it wears off, making me fall-asleep-in-my-chair exhausted. That and it's made it noticeably harder to get out of bed in the morning (not necessarily in a depressed way, literally in just an activation energy/impulse way). I've tried organizing by making lists, I've tried setting alarms, I've tried a calendar, I've tried daily planners, nothing sticks. Alarms are hard because for some reason seeing the fact that I have alarms set on my phone when I'm not going to bed just fundamentally bothers me to a strange extent for some reason, and while trying to plan my day out in advance helped for a month or so, I found that the second I slip up for even a day any habit I'd built is completely gone and it's even harder (if not impossible) to start again from scratch (believe me, I've tried that strategy again because it was the only one that's really worked, I just can't get it to stick the second time).
I guess this turned into more of a woe-is-me rant, but ultimately what I really want to know is whether anyone else has experienced this, and if they have any advice on how to handle it? It's honestly really starting to get to me and do some serious damage to both my academic career and how I see myself, because it's really feeling like I'm just...not really built to withstand generally operating as a human being, especially when most of the advice I've gotten is just "well you gotta make a plan and then stick to it" when even with external consequences sometimes, I just can't stick to the plan. People haven't really had much advice to give me once I tell them that, and I'm worried I'm just kind of screwed.
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JamieJJL
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When making plans, I find that sometimes we might make a huge to do list because we tend to be overtly optimistic that we can finish or do everything within that time frame and when we fail to finish even just short of one task, we tend to beat ourselves hard. So I find now it's best to simplify what tasks I want to do, prioritize them, and then be OK in saying hey I tried my best within today so can tackle the remains tasks the next day, etc. I'm just saying we tend to be too hard on ourselves especially compared to neaurotypicals. You can try breaking down a big task into smaller steps/goals and you'll feel better as you scratch off each one. 😀
I feel your pain. This is one of the major symptoms of my adhd too. People say just leave earlier or just get up earlier, just do this or that......don't you think if I could just do something I would haha! My work had sent on on time management courses, I've tried the alarms, notes, plans. I'm on stim meds, just started on elvanse 30mg today, prior to that was concerta. Anyway once I wake up it still takes me various times before I take the meds or I wake and just lie there. Once I take them I'm not quite as bad as I would be without them. So now I set my alarm an hour early and take them and go back to sleep for an hour. The only other thing that sometimes helps me is if I put things half an hour earlier in my diary. This only is really effective if I forget I've put it an hour early but it does work for me. I turned up to a meeting last week and thought I was 5 mins late, I was in fact 25 mins early haha. Other than that I've nothing haha
Also when I was at uni, I was terrible, I procrastinated so bad. But I found that was a bit of a super power at times. I would do essays the night before they were due, and produced better work than if I'd spent weeks on them. I also crammed for exams the day before and morning of the exam and my brain has a weird way of retaining all the information, I put things into words or phrases I remember and can remember all the other stuff from these phrases 🤷♀️ I've carried this on in work but unfortunately doesn't always apply quite the same and deadlines etc can give me anxiety. Bearing in mind when I was at uni I was also undiagnosed so I just thought that's how i worked. I have support in my work which is a godsend.
Yeah I definitely used to feel the superpower-ish effects, it was pretty common for me to do things the night before they were due, and even in one case in my first semester of grad school I turned in an analysis to my advisor and he told me it was the best piece of work he'd ever given me. But a friend of mine accidentally spilled the beans that I did everything the night before, and my advisor sat me down and tried to help me set up schedules to get things done in a healthier way. Unfortunately it didn't take, but I also found that I couldn't go back to doing everything the night before anymore, and so since then I've just been kind of floundering trying to figure out a new strategy since neither worked anymore.
Hi Jamie, thank you for sharing. I hear you and empathize with what you are saying. You have obviously done something right to get to the point you are at, grad school. Good job!
I too struggle with the “reward” system and procrastinate to feel that excitement/rush to get a task completed. My bio goes into a little more detail.
ADHD causes time blindness for alot of us. And im like you- life hacks that work for non adhd people simply do not work for me. life hacks that try to force my brain into a non adhd mindset box are also not helpful and create very negative emotions for me.
my adhd brain works great under pressure- which is how i handle grad school, FT job, n single parenthood… until i have TOO MANY deadlines simultaneously. then i get into crisis mode.
since our adhd brains are interest based, and our adhd brains do not structure our life decisions using the concept of taking any n all actions to avoid negative consequences ( what a fantastic built in feature non adhd brains have!!😂) my personal life hack is put my heart n soul into the things that personally interest me n that i value- n allow myself to be “ meh” on the stuff that i dont personally find enjoyable or impt.
for example- i dont looooove sitting in meetings, nor ceremonies… so im usually not putting pressure on myself to be on time AND engaged. i can do one or the other but not both. we all know those neurotypical type A folks who are ALWAYS on time and ready.,, but sit there vapid with no independent thought of their own. 🤮 do we really wanna be that? it screams middle management vibes. lol
if i care deeply about something- i “ show up” in life then i put my 100 % into it. therefore, i can fact check and know im not lazy nor irresponsible. i simple dont value the activity, person, class, assignment, task, etc. and im okay with that.
try to give yourself positive, realistic self talk. example” oh shit i dont actually find this class important to getting the career i want when i graduate n so my adhd mind didnt naturally propel me to prioritize it, so i guess i will just do the minimum to get the minimum grade i actually need to pass”. even non adhd people do this!
when i learned to embrace my adhd- vs run my life taking addy n engaing in life hacks to pretend i hadca non adhd brain. my life satisfaction increased immensely n its strange, but i naturally started being more calm n productive doing Less🤷🏻♀️🤔
I'm hoping I can start to engage in thinking like that more now that I'm done with coursework and just have to focus on my dissertation, since it means my deadlines are now all a lot more related and all connected to something that I've self-determined because I'm interested in it.
Hi Jamie 😁 thanks for sharing because you just described exactly what my 16 year-old daughter is feeling everyday and you’ve reminded me to back up. To be encouraging where I can 🙏🏼 wow how overwhelming all of that is and I’m praying for you and my daughter to have the mental peace it takes, the mental support, encouragement everywhere and the patience from the people around you 🙏🏼 you are doing a great job for what you’ve faced and are facing trying to navigate life!!! Do your best to pick and choose when you have to do something well, don’t dwell too long and let go of the others. 🤩❤️
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