ADHD Breakthrough
Monkey is an ever-evolving wonder to me. My gratitude for her ability to translate the way her brain works into words to help me understand is a gift that gets us through so many otherwise difficult situations.
She had spoken with her doctor several months ago about trying an ADHD med to see if it could help her with focus and as another piece of the puzzle with lethargy and anxiety. Due to life and timing, she had tried low doses a couple times randomly, but last week, before her first 8-hour shift at work, she took a full dose to see if it might help.
We picked her up after her shift at 8 p.m. and she was in great spirits and did not seem as tired as we had expected. She had enjoyed work and her co-workers and all had gone well.
An hour later, I had just turned off my light after reading in bed when she came running up the stairs to chat. She perched on my side of the bed and began a brain dump filled with joy and insight and awe. Her first question to me was, "When you have something to do, do you store that in the back of your brain to do later when you have time?"
Seems obvious, right? Of course I have slots in my brain where I store need-to-do's" for later. And yet, it is only obvious if that is the way that your brain works, and my sweet, brilliant, insightful child has a brain that does not work that way, so she had to intuit that knowledge because I had never verbalized it.
After I answered in the affirmative, she launched into a tremendous information download that helped me understand better than ever the disconnect between my expectations over the years, and what this lovely human had been trying to deal with.
"I have 1 and a 1/2 slots in my brain," she explained. "I have to have music or a video playing to take up that 1/2 slot because if it isn't filled it has to go searching to find something to fill it, which takes me away from the full slot item which is at the front of my brain."
She explained it more clearly than that, but hopefully you get the idea.
After taking the full dose of the ADHD med, it was an epiphany for her.
"Suddenly, I could have a full queue of items to work on. I wasn't forgetting things and I could move from one task to the next. It was AMAZING!"
"In the past, when you would tell me to start the dishwasher, or unload the dishwasher, I wanted to do those things. I want to help, but once I put it into the back of my brain, there was no slot for it, so it was just gone. That's why it works so well for me to have my own bathroom downstairs now. I can leave out my toothbrush and tooth paste because if I see them, I will remember to brush my teeth. If they are in a drawer, they never take up a slot."
Then she went on, "I can tell you are getting tired, so just one more thing. I'm going to take the next dose of med, then go down, do my quiz and write my paper for class, and for the first time, I feel sure I can get those things done. And I can imagine a time, once I'm used to take the medicine, where I would have space in my brain to begin writing again. I haven't had any interest in doing that for so long."
That was one part of the conversation that brought me the most joy; the idea of her finding pleasure in writing again. She's not been able to muster energy nor enthusiasm for doing any of the projects and hobbies that used to bring her so much joy, and this is one possible way to create space in her brain and life to reignite those passions.
She was never lazy, and we never wanted her to feel guilty, but there were certainly times we were all frustrated at things that didn't get done. This isn't a magic pill, but to hear her talk about being able to have her brain work in a way that serves her better is a gift. No matter what happens, I'm glad she had these moments.
The only drawback is the next morning she came upstairs around 8:30 a.m. to let us know she had not slept all night. What she said was, "Taking adderall at 9 p.m. is not the best choice."
Live, learn, understand. She'll crack the code eventually.
