Just wrote this on a facebook group so thought I’d share...
In dyslexia, there's a school of thought about trade-offs. In ADHD people often don’t see their disorder with such a positive light. But I still do.Â
With ADHD I find it hard to concentrate, but when I do I retain knowledge better than any average concentrator that I know! Seriously, everyone at school has to go over information 3, 4, 5 times before they retain it. I have less opportunity to go over it from being constantly distracted, but when I finally do, once or twice is more than enough.Â
Being distracted by 100s of thoughts is shitty, but cycling through thoughts and ideas and finding solutions to unrelated problems because your brain is somehow wandering all the time is something lots of people can’t do (they have to be actively or semi-actively thinking about a problem to solve it).Â
Organising or finishing projects can be tough, but I have the vision to think of them to begin with! and passion and drive (and lots of thoughts) to invest time into figuring out ways to achieve things. Even if not all ideas come to fruition I'd rather have the ideas and the 'driven by a motor' attitude to begin with...Â
With meds I find all these things that play to the strengths are much easier - I can finish the last 5% of the exciting project that makes it past the planning stage. It's only the really tough boring boring hard stuff (cooking, cleaning, being on time) that stays tough and I find the creative and me-defining stuff a lot easier (though not without frustration). *NOTE: not all these things are fully ADHD specific or diagnostic, I’m talking specifically my traits that apply to my brain and my response to meds. It may differ for you.Â
