25| Sza,ptsd,adhd,DID

I was trying to explain to someone how busy, fast, and random my thoughts are, and the closest example I could think of was comparing it to the DVD logo screensaver that bounces around the screen and whenever it hits an edge, it changes colour. My thoughts are like that, but a lot more and a lot faster. They said "I kinda get it, but it's hard to visualize" so I decided to animate it.

This is what I imagine a neurotypical brain to be like. Thoughts move around in a box (brain). They are squishy and morphy and gradually change from thought to thought, all kind of related (all blue) but slightly different shades. As the thought hits the side of the box it morphs into a new shade, sort of related to the previous thought. It's easy to follow the path (train of thought), but gets a little distracting when they cross paths. They also change in size depending on which thought is the most prevalent at the time, sometimes there's less thoughts, and even sometimes even none.

This is my ADHD brain. There are a lot more thoughts at once, they move very very fast (although some at different speeds at different times), they are very colourful and unrelated to each other. Very bouncy and not squishy. When they hit the side of the box, they bounce off as a totally new colour (thought) unrelated to the previous one. It's harder to follow a particular path, very distracting, and super exhausting by the end of the day. They also change in size depending on which thoughts are more prevalent, and there's always a fair number of them at once.

In order to understand my own thoughts better, I like to vocalize some of them. Hence the talking a lot (I also get bored of silence and I feel this compulsive need to get my thought across 100% as I imagine it, including every detail possible because I like being communicated with in that way and it might help prevent miscommunication).

This is my brain when concentrating on something. Super busy still, very bouncy and fast, but there's more related shades of the same colour. There's still some unrelated ones in the background though.

This is my ADHD brain hyperfocusing. All the crazy thoughts join together in the middle and stop moving to focus on one thing. I don't get a choice on what this thing is or how long it lasts for. When I stop doing the thing I'm focused on, I'm very unlikely to want to come back to it. Which is why I don't like stopping tasks or being interrupted when doing something because I know that when I stop, my interest in it will not come back. Unlike the neurotypical brain that has larger thoughts with some smaller ones still running in the background, mine doesn't. So while I hyperfocus, my brain ignores all other signals from other people talking to me, to my own body telling me I need to eat or pee or my position hurts. Which is why after focusing for hours, I'm not aware I was ever talked to, touched, and I'm usually in a lot of pain from something (stomach, bladder, joints, etc. I've caused UTIs by hyperfocusing for too long).

I'd love to create an animation on executive dysfunction sometime, but I need to visualize that first.