Starting to post about what’s different now that I spend most of my time on ‘the other side’ of ADHD. Based on comments I’ve received on my blog, there are people that can benefit from a first hand prospective of how the diagnosis changed my life.

For starters, you don’t know there is another side until you get there. Women with untreated ADHD spend most of their time trying not to go down a ‘rabbit hole’ with their ADHD symptoms. You consider the symptoms weaknesses that you should be able to overcome and feel a lot of guilt that you aren’t able to.

Let me give you a few examples:

–Time Blindness– We may go to bed at night with a list rolling thru our heads of things we want to accomplish the next day. The list is always too long and we always forget most of it by the time we get ourself awake to start the day. Once we think of a few of those items, we may spend untold amounts of time marinating on how to get started, how we can accomplish what we want, and if we can stay focused enough to complete the top task. By the time we get around to starting we become anxious about how much time we have wasted and if we do start we become too overwhelmed and can’t complete enough of the task to feel satisfied with an accomplishment. When we do get in bed that night we punish ourselves for forgetting half of the list and only completing a few of the things you intended to.

–Trouble Staying Focused – When you start on a project you can be hyper focused. To the point of not remembering your other responsibilities. You work hard, accomplish a lot, then before you seem to conclude the task 1 of 2 things happens……you get distracted or you get tired & overwhelmed. ADHD can feel like 1000 thoughts cycling through your mind at once. Each thought leads to another. This coupled with time blindness can send you down a rabbit hole that wears you out and depresses you. There is just too much noise in the brain distracting you that it can be exhausting to stay on task. Even something you deeply enjoy and are good at. Every sound, sight, smell can immediately send your thoughts in a different direction than you want them to be. So much so you may spend a lot of time in behaviors that seem self soothing but are actually unhealthy distractions that lead, again, to anxiety and then depression because these unhealthy, self soothing, distractions & behaviors create a whole different list of issues for you to manage. The ‘Simplify Your Life’ stories the rest of the world raves about can feel like Mt. Everest to a woman with ADHD. Social Median & Television is a WHOLE issue I will address in its own blog post. One thing I can tell you is having spent several months ‘out of the rain’, ‘on the other side’ I have found ways to deal with distractions that lead to unhealthy behavior.

–Lack of Energy – Thinking about what we need/want to do and trying to organize a plan in our brain literally exhaust a person with ADHD. So much so that we may choose to take a day sitting in solitude instead of dealing with life. Actually most people with the brain disorder of ADHD are fairly intelligent, so remaining idle and accomplishing nothing can really make you feel less than worthy of all of the good things in your life. My biggest obstacle with trying any type of medication for my brain disorder was the fact that I read it can make you anxious and I already had bad anxiety. The amazing thing about having ADHD and taking norepinephrine (which is a stimulant) is it calms your mind down so that you can focus so I actually feel a lot less anxious when I take it. If I skip a day the rain comes back, I slip to the other side and my anxiety gets paralyzing again. When I sleep, I sleep much better because my brain is not full of noise and I am more organized and successful accomplishing my goals and dreams. When I was less productive in my life, nocturnal anxiety was a serious problem for me…. waking up at 2 am realizing all of the things that I needed to do and kept forgetting.

–Impulsivity -When there is an absence of norepinephrine in the brain, your body is always searching for a dopamine fix. Dopamine is the brains reward hormone. Norepinephrine leads to the production of dopamine in the brain. Lots of things can stimulate dopamine like sex, exercise, the nicotine in cigarettes, and recreational drugs like heroine or cocaine. (not all are healthy). ADHD sufferers may act impulsively in an attempt to provide the dopamine they crave. Some passively destructive ways someone with ADHD may delve into in an attempt to create dopamine are overeating, overspending, overtalking, oversleeping, etc. People struggling with untreated ADHD can be hyper focused on any of those behaviors in their hunger for the reward hormone without ever thinking about the consequences of their actions. They are much like diabetics searching for sugar if their insulin isn’t regulated, or an alcoholic thinking about how to get the next drink, a drug addict searching for another fix. Just like a diabetic feels better when their sugar is regulated and inflammation is low, and an alcoholic feels when they deal with the underlying reasons why they drink too much, or a drug addict sees the life they have been missing when they are no longer focused on the next fix………… an ADHD sufferer that finds the right medication to replace norepinephrine is able to implement cognitive therapy practices to quit living a self-destructive life and actually ‘live’ each day focused on their hopes and dreams.

In conclusion, the background noise in our brain is gone. We are no longer distracted from living life because of the noise. We are no longer searching for a quick ‘feel good’ fix to replace the success they are missing that living a productive life brings. We understand time, organization, and focus. We get our dopamine from positive behavior like accomplishing goals rather than the quick fix-destructive behavior. Instead of fast food, red wine, needlessly shopping, oversleeping………I find satisfaction in positive behaviors that combat anything that causes anxiety, depression, or threatens my peace. I can think and reason clearly enough to live past today and understand the consequences of being successful, organized, and healthy.

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the part that my Higher Power has played in this journey. For me, someone who has always been a ‘people pleaser’, it would be impossible for me to acknowledge my shortcomings, seek help, and put the work in to successfully treat something like Adult ADHD. It has been possibly one of my top 5 rewarding accomplishments in this life so far 🙂