Written by: Carole L. Sanek, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
Medically I had been diagnosed with attention deficit disorder probably 10 years ago. I call it my super-power.
I have had it all my life – duh, and because I wasn’t diagnosed until I was an older adult I was left to my own devices and I had to learn coping mechanisms all by myself.
Do you know how grateful I am my parents didn’t take me to the local doctor who would have put me on medications? To the max – that is how grateful I am.
Over 8 million adults live with this every day and we lead great lives, we are successful, some of us are famous. Michael Phelps, Simone Biles, and many more.
We thrive, we have full and happy lives, we rock most of the time, or at least until someone or something piles one more thing on our plates, and then the plates may come crashing down.
Take a look at one good definition of it: ADHD is a developmental disorder characterized by symptoms of inattention (such as distractibility, disorganization, or forgetfulness) or by symptoms of hyperactivity and impulsivity (such as fidgeting, speaking out of turn, or restlessness).
Let’s see I have distractibility but rarely am I disorganized or forgetful. Now I do fidget, and I definitely speak out of turn, but restless? No. It’s like one from column A and 2 from column B is a Chinese restaurant.
When I was diagnosed the doctor told me I was classic ADHD. I thought he said “classy ADHD” and I told him “I’ll run with that” until he asked me if I wanted to be medicated. Of course, I didn’t and my husband jumped in and said “Heck no, it would ruin her charm.” Now I have charming ADHD. I like that even more.
Over this past month, I found myself taking on too many different things, and when I do that I live in the land of confusion. In fact, Genesis has been singing my theme song for years, I am always looking for Superman – like Superman, where are you now?
Taking on too many things can be destructive to anyone with ADHD. You see our brains do not have filters and many times neither do our mouths.
This is the part I like about having ADHD, my prefrontal of my brain doesn’t work like people who do not have it. We cannot consistently filter out background noise. We hyper-focus usually on one thing and our brains run so rapidly so when we are doing something mundane, we pick up on all the external noises going on around us. We see shiny new objects and then throw in our own random thoughts and it is as if we are on a fast-spinning amusement park ride.
After 3 weeks of trying to get my head wrapped around things that were going on around me, it was just easier to crash and burn and pick up the ashes to start over and I prepared to do this.
However, that would be the easy way out, and I am a fighter, I am extremely resilient and I taught myself coping skills in childhood. I called them up – remember ADHD is my super-power. That is when the lightbulb lit up in my brain and I leaned back on remembering I need to trust the timing of my life.
New things were happening at a record pace and I don’t have the capability to wrap my head around every single thing. This is why I was living in the land of confusion.
I remembered I had been at a meeting and the speaker had delivered one sentence that I allowed into my subconscious. It rummaged around in there and grew into an idea. The idea stuck to me like glue.
Wherever I was, whatever I was doing there it was right next to me, or a step behind me and finally it stood right in front of me and waved its arms at me until I let it into the prefrontal cortex of my brain and said, "OK I will pursue this."
This is how I live with confusion, and confusion combined with ADHD can be freakish.
I was lucky as I always am when I use my coping skills and things fell into place immediately. I gratefully gave into trusting the timing of my life.
It will work for you also. Trust in it, believe that within the timing of your life you will find the answers. I did.
Carole Sanek, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Carole L. Sanek is a certified life coach specializing in personal coaching, with her specialty being working in grief. Carole is also an author, and her first book “Fractured” is with a publishing house in Chicago, scheduled to launch by the end of the year. Carole is especially excited that even though she was diagnosed 27 years ago with breast cancer, she wiped that slate clean and thrived on in her life. Reaching Carole is easy as she believes in transparency and authenticity and welcomes people to reach out to her.
