baddie bad

Short term memory loss. Seriously, I forget things that are said to me 5 minutes ago or will forget I opened a soda and will have 3 open cans by the end of the day with none of them finished. A lot of people don’t know about this, and so they think that I don’t care enough to listen to what their saying (which I do!!! I just can’t remember it) or that I’m lazy because of all the things I don’t end up doing because I forgot I had to do them.

Lack of motivation. Listen, I honestly can’t do anything on my own for the most part. I have to have someone else tell me to do something or have them set goals for me because it’s so damn difficult for me to do it myself. Again, I’m not lazy, I just have trouble doing things on my own

Language processing difficulties. Sometimes, English and words in general don’t work out in my head. Reading or even listening to someone talk can be extremely difficult for me to understand because my brain just won’t work. Why? Can’t tell you 99% of the time! It’s not that I need to focus, it’s that my brain is just buffering.

Needing multiple forms of stimulation at all times. I have a tin of putty that I keep in my book bag and a smaller one I keep in my purse at all times because of this reason. If I want to learn anything at school, I have to be able to look at something, hear something, and have something to do with my hands. Otherwise, it’s probably a big nope for me. What’s frustrating is that since this isn’t talked about enough, I often get called childish or get looked down upon because I have to play with silly putty in a highschool class.

Hyperfixation. Adhd can mean not being able to focus, but it’s also focusing too much on something! This can mean anything from a certain interest someone is in to at that moment, to something like a song that has been stuck in your head for a week. People seem to not understand this and think that we’re boring and have nothing else to talk about or that we’re annoying because we keep bringing the same things up over and over again but that’s not the case. Trust me, I’m annoyed with the hit or miss song too, but at least it’s not playing in your head constantly like it is for me

These are all the ones I can think of right now, but it’s really important we talk about this stuff more. All of these things that come with adhd can be very frustrating for those around us because they don’t understand that we can’t help it. To an outsider, it may just look like a person with adhd is just lazy and doesn’t care, when it’s actually just how our brains are wired. None of us want to be frustrating to others!! In fact, all of this frustrates us too!! But since adhd is just known as “not being able to focus”, people don’t realize what all comes with it and how it can really fuck everyone over.

But for some reason ADHD is like… Trivialized? Like it is a mild inconvenience that only has a real effect in school. Maybe it’s because it’s not usually life threatening, or because it’s not visible, but I have known that I have had ADHD for 12 years. I am only now understanding the impact it has on my life. My ADHD effects every aspect of my life. I think it’s more impactful than my anxiety disorder. (It may be the cause of my anxiety disorder but we will not even think about that aspect rn).

My ADHD is not a quirk, it’s not just a school problem, it’s not a kid problem, it doesn’t mean I’m hyper and spacey all the time, it’s not any of that.

My brain functions in a fundamentally different way from a NT brain. My social life, academics, memory, interests, confidence, and so much more are directly affected by this. And I never even knew.