The Mood Strikes - The Beat Continues..

it's the holidays, you know what that means

2: Do you take the shampoos and conditioner bottles from hotel?

3: Do you sleep with your sheets tucked in or out?

4: Have you ever stolen a street sign before?

5: Do you like to use post-it notes?

6: Do you cut out coupons but then never use them?

7: Would you rather be attacked by a big bear or a swarm of a bees?

8: Do you have freckles?

9: Do you always smile for pictures?

10: What is your biggest pet peeve?

11: Do you ever count your steps when you walk?

14: Do you ever dance even if there’s no music playing?

15: Do you chew your pens and pencils?

16: How many people have you slept with this week?

17: What size is your bed?

18: What is your Song of the week?

19: Is it okay for guys to wear pink?

20: Do you still watch cartoons?

21: Whats your least favorite movie?

22: Where would you bury hidden treasure if you had some?

23: What do you drink with dinner?

24: What do you dip a chicken nugget in?

25: What is your favorite food?

26: What movies could you watch over and over and still love?

28: Were you ever a boy/girl scout?

29: Would you ever strip or pose nude in a magazine?

30: When was the last time you wrote a letter to someone on paper?

31: Can you change the oil on a car?

32: Ever gotten a speeding ticket?

33: Ever ran out of gas?

34: Favorite kind of sandwich?

35: Best thing to eat for breakfast?

36: What is your usual bedtime?

37: Are you lazy?

38: When you were a kid, what did you dress up as for Halloween?

39: What is your Chinese astrological sign?

40: How many languages can you speak?

41: Do you have any magazine subscriptions?

42: Which are better legos or lincoln logs?

43: Are you stubborn?

44: Who is better…Leno or Letterman?

45: Ever watch soap operas?

46: Are you afraid of heights?

47: Do you sing in the car?

48: Do you sing in the shower?

49: Do you dance in the car?

50: Ever used a gun?

51: Last time you got a portrait taken by a photographer?

52: Do you think musicals are cheesy?

53: Is Christmas stressful?

54: Ever eat a pierogi?

55: Favorite type of fruit pie?

56: Occupations you wanted to be when you were a kid?

57: Do you believe in ghosts?

58: Ever have a Deja-vu feeling?

59: Take a vitamin daily?

60: Wear slippers?

61: Wear a bath robe?

62: What do you wear to bed?

63: First concert?

64: Wal-Mart, Target or Kmart?

65: Nike or Adidas?

66: Cheetos Or Fritos?

67: Peanuts or Sunflower seeds?

68: Ever hear of the group Tres Bien?

69: Ever take dance lessons?

70: Is there a profession you picture your future spouse doing?

71: Can you curl your tongue?

72: Ever won a spelling bee?

73: Have you ever cried because you were so happy?

74: Own any record albums?

75: Own a record player?

76: Regularly burn incense?

77: Ever been in love?

78: Who would you like to see in concert?

79: What was the last concert you saw?

80: Hot tea or cold tea?

81: Tea or coffee?

82: Sugar or snickerdoodles?

83: Can you swim well?

84: Can you hold your breath without holding your nose?

85: Are you patient?

86: DJ or band, at a wedding?

87: Ever won a contest?

88: Ever have plastic surgery?

89: Which are better black or green olives?

90: Can you knit or crochet?

91: Best room for a fireplace?

92: Do you want to get married?

93: If married, how long have you been married?

95: Do you cry and throw a fit until you get your own way?

96: Do you have kids?

97: Do you want kids?

98: Whats your favorite color?

99: Do you miss anyone right now?

Elmo is proving the meritocracy is a joke and generational/inherited wealth gives too many advantages to immature mediocre losers.

The problem comes in when you start connecting things that you don’t need to connect, like “mild displeasure” with “OH GOD EVERYONE HATES ME” or “I feel a little crummy” with “I AM THE WORST PERSON IN THE WORLD”.

So when we’re talking about Life Skills/ADLs, you gotta use that power to make your life easier, not harder. You gotta connect things when it makes your life better and NOT do it when it makes your life harder. 

Here’s an example of the habits: 

I had a stretch of time where I was too sick to do much of anything. I could barely get out of bed to get to the bathroom. I was walking with a stick and generally just… le dead. And one of the problems I had was that I could almost never remember to take my morning meds. 

I decided that the first time I got up to use the bathroom every day, I’d take my meds. That way I was taking them no matter how crap I felt- I had to get up to pee, like it or not- and it was getting done pretty early in the morning. 

Getting up to pee meant taking my meds; they were the same thing. I didn’t have to remember to take my meds separately, or set an alarm to remind myself, or anything like that. I just did it as part of something I had to do anyway.

As time went on and I started getting better, I realized I could do the same thing with other parts of my routine. If you connect something you need to do with something you have to do, the thing you need to do gets done.

So like… say I’m already in the habit of getting up to take a shower. I’ve lived in crappy apartments my entire life, so the water takes a minute to warm up. Since my countertop dishwasher is right outside my bathroom door, I’ll take a second to empty and load the dishwasher while the water’s still heating up. It just becomes part of the routine of taking a shower. 

You don’t have to think about Doing The Extra Thing. Connecting it to something you’re already doing means that, after a certain point, it just… happens, automatically.

 The problem comes in when you start trying to do this with tasks- things that you only have to get done once, that already have a fair few steps to them. Especially if that task is has a lot of steps, has a time limit, or is otherwise Hard for you. 

Figuring out tasks with dependencies (I have to do this before I can do this!) is already hard for us ADHDers. Sometimes what happens is that you bundle two tasks together- you decide you can’t do something until you’ve done the other thing, even though these tasks are in no way connected. 

Here’s an example: 

I have three packages I need to mail. One of them is a gift for a friend in Australia, which costs a lot of money; one of them is a package for my Etsy store which is Not Finished Yet, and one is a very late Christmas package. 

I might decide, “hey, I need to mail all three of these packages together! I can’t mail any of these packages until I bundle all of them!” But it’s probably smarter to mail them separately! I don’t want to make my friend with the late Christmas package wait any more, so I can mail that first, and then mail the Australia package when I have the money and the Etsy package when it’s finished. 

But if I insist that I have to bundle these tasks… I won’t get any of them done. I’ll be too stressed out about the Etsy package not being done to mail the other two packages, and then I will run out of money for the Australia package, and the Christmas package will not get sent til Labour Day.