SQUIRREL! How ADHD Makes Me Better

Note: I first wrote this 2.5 years ago, which was about 6 months after I was first diagnosed. I wanted to update it with the things I’ve learned since. October is ADHD Awareness Month, and the original plan was to publish this then – but… SUPER META, I didn’t quite make it.

When I was 10, my brain kind of…imploded. I’d always been high-strung, but it suddenly got much much worse. It began as OCD-type impulses, and plagued me through my teens and 20’s as depression and anxiety at varying levels of noise in my head.

And then…at the age of 32, I found myself in a psychiatrist’s office, being handed an official diagnosis of ADHD – Inattentive Type. I had Googled enough before going that I agreed with the diagnosis, but I was still sort of…in shock. I was high-achieving all throughout school, never had any behavior issues, and was pretty sure that ADHD equaled the nutso spazzy kid in the corner of the class who was always distracting everyone. I began medication at that time and started to re-learn how to…well, how to brain. I started to understand why I do some of the things I do, and to make some kind of peace with the things that I just thought made me…weird. I go back and forth between wishing I could just be “normal” for a while and deeply appreciating that I’m not – because, the simple fact is, my ADHD makes me significantly better at most of the things I love (it’s a little chicken and egg…).

There’s one primary reason that ADHD makes me better – and that’s focus.

Why focus?

There are two sides of the focus coin for ADHD, especially for inattentive type: 1) the complete inability to focus, and 2) hyperfocus.

The complete inability to focus…let’s be honest here, it isn’t really an asset. I have to be careful about my mental and soul resources, and sometimes I have to go through the very painful process of wrenching my attention to where it must be, and keeping it there until a task is complete. Sometimes that feels like I’m crawling in my skin, or like something internal that’s probably important will go snap! unless I can think about or do something else for a minute. Medication helps, as does getting enough sleep. Also ride or dies, and internal soul consistency. And Trello.

Hyperfocus, however, is when my brain decides that a thing is particularly interesting and it will happily think about that thing until it is no longer interesting. Hyperfocus is how I got through school labeled “high-achieving” when that’s often hard (if not impossible) for someone with ADHD – because I was hyperfocused on achievement. Hyperfocus also allows me to learn at lightning-fast speeds if I’m interested in what I’m learning, and it lets me get an enormous amount of stuff done – and done well – in comparatively short amounts of time.

Hyperfocus also is what allows me to see and understand people. People are fascinating, endlessly so, and I’ve thought that since I was a child and I would avoid being bored by people-watching – or organizing JCPenney catalogs… My part of this blog is a result of that fascination. My ability to understand people, and to love them because of the things that make them even more fascinating, are also a result of that fascination.

…most people with an ADHD nervous system have significantly higher-than-average IQs. They also use that higher IQ in different ways than neurotypical people. By the time most people with the condition reach high school, they are able to tackle problems that stump everyone else, and can jump to solutions that no one else saw.
– ADDitude Magazine, Secrets of Your ADHD Brain

My career is also a gift of the hyperfocus side of my ADHD. I’ve been able to hyperfocus on programming since I first found it as a teenager. Some element of my brain also lets me make connections that most other people don’t make, which makes me good at IT architecture, and at recognizing and knowing solutions to customer pains.

See also: Coping Mechanisms

So…the focus is pretty sweet. There’s another piece of having ADHD that affects me pretty regularly. Because I was definitely an adult you guys (…by age, anyway…) when I was diagnosed, I had spent a lot of time developing coping mechanisms designed to balance the frustrating pieces of having an ADHD brain. For example, I take really good meeting notes – because I write things down so that I remember what happened and what I need to do.

Execution is maybe the most valuable business skill ever.
– me

I had to learn how to execute, how to get things done, even when I didn’t want to, and even when I was completely overwhelmed by the world around me – because…I’m kind of always overwhelmed by the world around me.

Random Me ADHD Things to Know and Tell

• ADHD is very often misdiagnosed in women, usually as depression or anxiety.
• I have a lot of sensory issues associated with my ADHD – like I hate the metallic smell of necklaces, and I can’t do layers of clothing very easily, and sometimes all of the lights are too bright and every sound hurts.
• People have three potential effects on my brain and mental resources – 1) hurt my brain (it takes resources, just to be around them), 2) neutral to my brain, and 3) beneficial to my brain (they give me resources). Those are in order of decreasing likelihood, by the way.
• For many years, I could name every X-Files episode of the first 3 seasons, in order, and give a synopsis of each. This was before the internet was really a thing.
• I can recognize and duplicate (sing) melodies extremely fast.
• The company I work for has a Neurodiversity community, and there was the first place I learned that I wasn’t the only one who has to find a quiet corner and hide at conferences.
• I physically shake if my brain gets too overwhelmed without a break. Also sometimes I can tell my brain is tired because I leave out words when I type, even when I otherwise feel fine.
• When trying to describe how I make connections between ideas, the closest models are “everything gets a tag” and “Nightcrawler from the X-Men movies.” Bamf bamf bamf!

Ultimately…

Having ADHD/not being neurotypical is hard. Surrounding myself with people who love me because of it has been…vital. Understanding that God made me this way because it would help me do what he wanted me to do has also been vital. But making peace with a noisy brain isn’t necessarily a given – but it has forced me to be stronger, and more capable, and…definitely more interesting.