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ADHD, Anxiety, and Impending Birthdays

posted: Thursday November 19th - 1:03pm

The fear is bigger than my birthday, the economy, and ADHD. This about reining in my mind so that it doesn't wander, so I can stay focused enough to survive.

The sister came to visit the other day. She sees the apartment that I am subletting and is clearly impressed. On the surface, the place looks great. Hey, it's a high-rise and has a doorman. "How much are you paying for this?" she asks. "Enough," I tell her, but I'm getting a bargain because it's a friend of a friend. The apartment is something from the pages of Architectural Digest, and for years it's been neglected, collecting dust, mold, and the technology is outdated, no place for a DVD plug in the television, which is lost in the VCR days. If you stand far away, you can't see the holes, but when you move closer, you realize that some things are not only dirty, but broken beyond repair.

Lately I have transformed into the Critic -- unconsciously finding holes in myself, in life, in the boyfriend, in the family, in the hustle and bustle and rat race of daily life that defines Gotham. Around the corner, too, is the birthday, a reminder that time only marches forward. It has been almost a year since the layoff, and now there is always the fear that it will happen again. This is bigger than the economy; this is about reining in my mind so that it doesn't wander, so I can stay focused enough to survive. This is an added challenge along with everything else, and to this day, a secret that I carry. So far, the bosses haven't seen the holes. Sure, there was the day I missed a meeting, the day that I totally forgot to follow up on the expenses that are owed to me, but overall distance shields them from the day to day ADHD reality. Why is it that every few days the desk is once again buried in paper? I want to burn it all.

Perhaps the biggest emotional battle lies with The Boyfriend who comes on the weekends. Overall he is wonderful, physically fit, over six feet tall, a professional with a promise of a stable future. We have fun when I am not afraid. Take note of the latter. Despite all of this, unhappiness hangs over like a gray cloud that spells "storm." The root of the problem is an overall restlessness and unhappiness when he comes and goes, and the phrase "plug and play" keeps popping up. I think back to the mother who left me as a teenager; she made many promises, all of which were unfulfilled, and she was never there for me at major milestones, such as graduation. I have said that I could forgive, but maybe I can't. Maybe I hold on to resentment in the same way an alcoholic does alcohol or an overeater does food. It's easier to stick with what we know, sometimes.

My response to uncertainty and fear of abandonment is building a wall and pushing people away. I don't need it or want it. I also can't help it. Every few weeks and increasingly so, I am angry at the boyfriend for leaving me here, leaving me to wait for his return, his text, his phone call. I feel like I am being more of a woman if I wait. I keep reminding myself: patience, patience. I will swallow my emotions and feelings, and then, like a Jack in the Box, it pops out again and I will whine and complain and push him away. "That's okay," "Forget it," "Whatever," "Nevermind." This is the vocabulary of someone who has clearly been rejected and hurt, and does not want to feel the sting of rejection again.

Ultimately, I know that fear will ruin things, but I can't help it and I'm not sure how to solve it so I sit with it on a bench called "fear, anxiety, and resentment," knowing very well that no amount of money, no job title and no home or even, yes, no man will slay this demon. All I can do is wait until it passes.

A Rare Moment: Feeling Non-ADHD, for a Day

posted: Tuesday November 3rd - 10:47am

On days like this, my conversations are more about listening than having the ADHD panic of making sense of the tornado of words and thoughts and tasks and grasping onto whatever I can hold onto.

There was a recent day when I could see things so clearly, it was as if I had a glimpse into the world of a normal, non-ADHD person who can focus on one thing at a time and knock things off the To-Do list like an expert marksman.

The slant of sun was a fluke. I had taken the Adderall like I've been doing on weekdays, but I attribute it to something much greater, like a touch of synpathy from God or a higher up who says, "Hey, we'll cut her some slack today." On that day, I knocked off two major worked-related assignments, and had time to take the stairs instead of the elevator, and eat a leisurely lunch. Most importantly, I was productive, and that is what matters in this BlackBerry, CrackBerry, and 24/7 world. These days feel like bliss compared to all else, and they are rare, kind of like swimming laps and feeling zen. On days like this, I don't get stressed when I talk with the boyfriend, and my conversations are more about listening than having the panic of making sense of the tornado of words and thoughts and tasks and grasping onto whatever I can hold onto. On the rare day of focus, I remind myself that that there is a God.

Lately, the brain and thoughts have gone beserk again, and I am left feeling tired and spinning wheels and shuffling and reshuffling paper like a child who begins building a sandcastle only to have a wave knock it over again. Yes, it is that frustrating. The outsider sees a person who looks pissed and frustrated, and stays far at bay, and I feel totally misunderstood.

The job, while a blessing in a poor economy, remains a struggle. After 14 years in my working life, though, this is no longer a surprise. The He-Boss has a tendency to read e-mails and correspondence at the last minute, and to change his mind at the drop of a hat. He seems prone to swift mood changes based on the level of stress. I can relate in an odd way, only I don't have the luxury of a stable of secretaries and an entourage of staff who are equally as frustrated. The other night, he tapped me at day's end and said that it was time to go over a piece of writing that I'd e-mailed at least two days before. There was a long litany of complaints about the assignment, and I kept thinking, "Why didn't you give this to me earlier? Why is it so last minute?"

I left close to 8 p.m. that night and everything was literally and figuratively dark. I did not even notice the crowds that I was walking into, nor how crowded the bus was. The lump of frustration just seemed to multiply and get bigger and bigger. I called up the boyfriend angry at the world, but really the white hot anger was pointed at myself. I hungered for the day when everything just came together, for a bit of sympathy. By the time I got home into the high-rise apartment, I flopped on the bed and let out an exhale. The bed should have been an oasis from the runaway thoughts, the missed work meeting, and the He-Boss who fired away complaints, but it wasn't. Why hold it in anymore? I let the tears flow like a running faucet, and let it all out.

Can Two ADHD Adults Make a Relationship Work?

posted: Thursday October 29th - 1:59pm

Maybe two people with attention deficit disorder could help each other. There is always hope.

The Boyfriend, aka Mr. Sensitive, thinks that I am hysterical (“You are funny and say the funniest things” he laughs), and that the piles that I acquire are cute. Is it too good to be true? True love, I am told, is when someone loves you exactly the way you are, and tells you to don’t go changing, like the Billy Joel song.

I often think that The Boyfriend is a figment of my imagination, or is an E.T.-like gift that will soon enough return to outer space, so I fear getting too attached. I place my heart in a glass box where it sits soundly so I won’t get hurt. I’ve had my heart and confidence stomped on by enough false starts in jobs and love. At a time when many women my age have walked up the wedding aisle not once, but twice, and are onto their second babies, I feel like a late bloomer, overall. Other days, I fear I will never bloom. Will I ever experience the feeling of having someone get down on one knee and ask me to marry him, and will I ever know what it feels like to be a mother? Is the late bloomer reality an effect of ADHD or is it my fate, and written on my palms?

The Boyfriend elicits these fears and these questions. Is it possible that someone would really like the “spaz” in me? I loathe that side of myself.

I am tempted to tell The Boyfriend about the ADHD medication, about spending much of my teens and 20s struggling to make sense of the disarray and disappointment, which now has a diagnosis.

The ADHD diagnosis came with self consciousness and self doubt. Prior to that, being laid off by an employer, dumped by a boyfriend, abandoned by friends seemed like their fault. Now I find myself repeating “sorry” and “I apologize” as if life were a daily trip to Catholic confessional booth.

This past weekend, The Boyfriend returned again to visit me in Gotham, and then we planned to jet off and take a little weekend escape to a nearby Island. He is so excited when he sees me, there is a spark in his eyes, and he loves to kiss me and have “bed ins” (a tribute to John and Yoko), and time seems suspended and all other worries fizzle.

I sometimes think of falling in love like being drawn to a painting. From afar, the painting -- which could be “The Milk Maid” -- seems perfect, and then you walk closer and see the fissures and the cracks within the paint, and start to wonder, "Could I really hang this up?"

I’ve noticed that The Boyfriend is almost as forgetful as I am. There was the jacket left behind, and then the litany of hats, cell phones, and umbrellas, which translate to grand plans of weekend getaways or promises to visit friends and family, or attend certain events, which never seem to materialize. The Boyfriend has similar tendencies towards half-drunk cans of soda, which create a landmine of cans in the apartment, and he, too, loses track of time.

There was a time when we talked on the phone for hours until close to the wee hours of dawn. I love talking to him, but wondered if he’d forgotten that these were official “school nights.” His apartment looks like a tornado from The Wizard of Oz blew over leaving behind a mess of papers, clothes and “stuff.” I called up my girlfriends in panic, but the girlfriends tsk tsk me and say, “Jane, most guys are messier than women, and their places just aren’t that clean.” I’ve spent most of my life being yelled at for having too many piles, so I am sensitive to this like a canine that sniffs out cocaine.

I asked the Father the other day if he thought two people with ADHD could have a relationship and make it work. “Yes, I think so, and money can solve a lot of problems,” the Father said. “You can always outsource things, including getting someone to come clean the house.” Briefly, just briefly, what the Father said seemed to offer a glimmer of hope. Maybe two people with a disorder could help each other. Two wrongs don’t make a right, but there are always exceptions to the rule. There is always hope.

ADHD Medication Holidays

posted: Monday October 26th - 3:49pm

The effects of going off my ADHD medication are noticeable, but the sunny side outweighs the negatives.

On weekends, I put the Adderall on hiatus, out of a hunger to feel a bit of normalcy again. I call them "Adderall Retreats" or "double 'S' days" (Saturdays and Sundays). Either way, these medication holidays are respites from what I consider the effects of the drugs on me, an edginess and anxiety followed by a brief oasis of focus.

The effects of the Adderall Retreats are noticeable, but the sunny side outweighs the negatives -- I gain a few pounds (the underwear elastic groans), I sleep like a baby, and I am more forgetful and struggle between To Do lists, a handful of organizers, and full-sized monthly wall calendars. Once again, I’d like to nominate myself as Poster Girl for Staples. Thank you very much.

Procrastination takes hold and once again I am thrown back into a world of missed deadlines, but I feel less fear. The worst thing is fear -- fear of people, fear of failure, fear of collapsing in a vortex of anxiety and self-doubt. I walk around constantly thinking there is something wrong with me, that I am a defective iPod -- nice to look at, colorful and bright, but inside the wiring is wacky.

The Adderall Retreats return a dose of confidence back into me; I am a wild mustang that has been quarantined and set free. I can go with the ideas, which hit me like meteors. The string of thoughts make me laugh -- one second, I consider being a doorman, I surf the Internet and look for shooting galleries, I consider taking an interior decorating class or a sushi class, I wish to get a replacement Beta fish for the one that died two years ago. I am like a child at play: happy, content, and totally me. I wish that the world functioned this way, too.

The humor and flair for words once again surface. I have come to take these things for granted, and have started to realize that the color and spark are a gift that I too often overlook. I think back to my good friend Kate who once told me that she didn’t believe that ADHD is a disorder.

“People are wired to learn differently, Jane,” she said. Kate is great and maybe that is the thinking that will allow me to overcome fear and anxiety and move on through everyday life with a sense of normalcy. I miss a sense of normalcy and feeling that I am normal, which is why I take these Adderall Retreats, and yes they are bliss.

ADHD in the Rat Race for Organization

posted: Wednesday October 7th - 9:47am

Organize, organize. How does an adult with ADHD make sense of everyday life in times of uncertainty (and stress, and inattention)?

Frazzled, burnt out, the battle is back. Once again I am on the forefront of what some might call the rat race cranked up a few notches. The Boyfriend doesn’t know about my attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), but I have a feeling that he suspects it. I have a sixth-sense, which is one of the positive traits of this disorder. He knows that the new job is driving me batty, and that I am spinning wheels behind closed doors.

The fortunate part is that I spend much of the work week at a satellite site away from the Mothership, a blessing in disguise since the boss and colleagues are shielded from the stress, the fear, and the Everest-sized pile of papers. How to organize and make sense of things in times of uncertainty?

Once again the search for the Holy Grail of organizers continues. I am caught between the “to do” list on paper, Excel, and Outlook, along with the monthly and weekly Day Runners. I’ve already accumulated a pile of notebooks and random notes on napkins and Post-it's. The tech-addict friends keep trying to hammer the idea of the iPhone or iTouch in me, but given that I have an aversion to instructional manuals, I fear that I will acquire the gadget and it will end up a paperweight.

The Boyfriend and the myriad of friends think that the He-Boss is the root of the stress. Little do they know that he is only a part of the equation, that there is the constant struggle to stay with the pack. Not a day goes by when I do not blame the hiccups and kinks on the ADHD.

The Boyfriend came to visit last weekend. As a doctor, his life is one of a rat race, too. On call, off call, rounds: It is a new language to me, but what else can I do but suck it up. I find daily life hard enough to deal with, much less the reality that I have seemingly once again fallen for a great guy who doesn’t live in the same city as me. At the most, we see each other once a week. All of the daily trials and tribulations and joys are shared by text and, sometimes, by phone. I find it hard to deal with the reality that, at the end of a long day, I return to an empty apartment overlooking this great city, and am comforted by a half-empty bottle of wine.

The distance and uncertainty of the relationship leaves me holding onto the steel wall, which I cling onto. I stubbornly refuse to give too much of myself. There are secrets that will remain just that. I sweep the small collection of vitamin and pill bottles into a drawer when friends come into the apartment. I’ll admit that the real reason I do it is because I am ashamed of the Adderall, which I feel has run its course. Not only have I once again started to daydream, but I question whether this ADHD medication is the root of the moodiness and restlessness. The one lifeline that I’ve had is pen and paper. I’ve returned to jotting down parts of conversation in a notebook, referring back to names and dates so that I can’t be faulted for not listening. And given the demands of the new job, the everyday living has fallen by the wayside, and I’ve again turned to outsourcing. The entourage includes the maid, $65, the laundry, $8, and the food service that offers door-to-door delivery, $56.

There is also the cost of replacing lost items like the lipstick, umbrella, or pens. I sit, stew, and end up beating myself up over what I consider silly mistakes. These mistakes are reversible or replaceable, but what about losing track of the string of e-mails at work, or forgetting about one of the many impending deadlines. I fear that the day will come when the boss and the rest of the colleagues see the piles and the mess, and they will wonder what happened—and the same of The Boyfriend.

For now I feel safe on the island of pseudo-anonymity, a place where I can wrestle with the notebooks and organizers, and the guilt and blame on my own. A lonely battle indeed.

Love—and Adderall—Rediscovered

posted: Friday October 2nd - 2:17pm

While the boyfriend expounded the use of ADHD drugs as a weight loss fix for his patients, I hid my refill of Adderall, and kept my mouth shut. Breaking the news about the diagnosis would have to wait.

This is bliss. I am in love, and it has been ages since I had someone I actually looked forward to being with. Cupid is kind.

We are at the end of month three with Mr. Sensitive, and it’s great. For the first time in my life I can’t complain. (OK, he’s obsessed with baseball, and he wants to take things slow. It took him two months to mention my name to his mother, and to the rest of his family I am non-existent. But, as the father says, as long as I am having fun, that’s all that matters. I mean at the end of the day you can’t care too much, right?)

Mr. Sensitive is an M.D. and knows all about drugs. He’s an anesthesiologist, and, he adds with a laugh, a “drug pusher.” He sometimes talks about his patients in a very generic way, and he has a particular gripe about the “spazes,” the people who can only function pseudo-normally with doses of Clonazepam.

We were flipping through a celeb glossy the other day as we waited for a takeout order, and there was a short piece about Lindsay Lohan. Is she anorexic or is it the attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) drug Adderall? Adderall, the weight loss secret to the stars. Mr. Sensitive started going into the details of Adderall—how it’s a stimulant, how it suppresses appetite, how it is abused by people, even if they have not been diagnosed with ADHD, who want to shed weight quickly. “It’s basically speed,” he said to me.

I feel like someone who is now keeping a dark secret. The other day I got a refill of the Adderall, and I’m once again on the medication and feeling oddly productive. Sure I am spending all of my time with Mr. Sensitive, lying in bed, laughing and enjoying the grand view of one of the ritziest neighborhoods in Gotham from the “penthouse.” I feel lucky; everything is going smoothly.

As I write, Mr. Sensitive is sleeping, but I wish I could be myself fully and tell him about “my drugs,” the Adderall, and the long and painful search for answers to my disorganized angst, to the checkerboard resume: 12 jobs in just as many years. Last night he mentioned a few of the things he liked about me. “You’re not crazy and you’re different, I’ve never met anyone like you before,” he says.

“How?” I asked.

“You have this way with words, you say these things and it makes me laugh,” he says.

He says I am sweet, too, and kind. I want to tell him that these are common traits among adults with ADHD, but I stop there. I lie in the darkness and in the silence, and keep my mouth shut.

“Thank you,” is all I say, and it is all that I can reveal for now.

ADHD Skeletons in the Closet

posted: Monday September 28th - 9:57am

What's life with adult ADHD like? Well for starters, my mind is like a 250-pound woman who is sluggish and needs to shed the weight.

The apartment is suspended in the air on the 16th floor of one of the ritziest zip codes in Gotham. The one bedroom feels like a palace compared to the trailer park in the 'hood, spacious, with a grand view of expensive high rises. The doormen know my name and ask me if I need any help with the groceries. I shake my head "no" and wonder why they ask. What do they want from me? It is a sublet and temporary, and I fear that I will be spoiled. How does a cat go from Sheeba cat food to the generic dried sort? I don't know.

The Sensitive Guy and I spent the entire weekend together, and he observes that I am different and says it in sort of a complimentary way. He says I am funny and I make him laugh. The things that come out of my mouth--the impulsivity that is a trademark of ADHD--make him smile and I feel, for the first time, appreciated. He is referring to my thoughts and vocabulary, which run freely like wild mustangs. Within the words and thoughts there is always a spark of color. He says that I am a natural writer, talented, gifted, and that I am creative, something that he isn't. I wonder if it is possible that I've hit the love jackpot, but it seems too good to be true.

I hid the last few Adderall pills in the drawer when he arrived, and made sure that the books and magazines related to ADHD were tucked away in the closet.

The sensitive guy is a machine when it comes to rattling off numbers and dates and factoids, and I am completely lost. I hide my boredom and the seeming inability to listen. He is well read and turns to books as solace or escape, and in the meantime I struggle to read a passage in an article and understand the meaning. I do feel retarded at times, as if my mind is like a 250-pound woman who is sluggish and needs to shed the weight.

The Sensitive Guy and I did very little this weekend, and time seemed to have retreated into the sidelines. We basically nestled in the penthouse, holed in and glued to the couch. We did not leave to eat and noshed on snacks. I've noticed that he seems to lose track of time, and that he's noted several times that he feels like he's always in a rush. Could it be that he suffers the same fate as me? The truth is that I am scared shitless about someone seeing through the shield. What if they see my warts, and realize that I am really a disorganized person who is half genius and half mess?

The friend tells me that I should continue to see where things go with the suitor. There is no commitment with the Sensitive Guy, and in many ways I find myself unconsciously pushing him away because I feel I'm not worth it, I'm not good enough--that at the end of the day, no one would want a woman whose thoughts and interests drift, and who carries around a lot of piles.

Dodge Ball in Cubicleland: The Struggle to Organize with ADHD

posted: Saturday September 26th - 2:33pm

An adult with untreated ADHD lands a position that demands of her multitasking and prioritizing. The whole thing is laughable, and I wonder how I will survive this job.

I feel like a fourth grader in gym class all over again. I can see it so clearly in my mind when I close my eyes. I am standing against the wall clinging on to dear life as an entourage of classmates throw rubber balls at me. I try to dodge, duck, and avoid a travesty, and it is exhausting. I run around in a circle and wish I were an iguana, so I could shed my tail and run away from my predators—in this case, a new job.

The new job feels like a constant series of fires that await putting out. The He-Boss barks commands to my bosses non-stop. Although a hierarchy exists, in the end there are only two tiers, the He-Boss and us serfs. We all suffer under his wrath and what is clearly the signs of someone very unbalanced. Like I said, maybe he suffers from attention deficit disorder (ADHD).

He works 24/7 and the messages fly from his BlackBerry way past midnight. Does this guy sleep? When I come into work there is never a dull moment. I brace myself for multiple projects, a barrage of emails and phone calls, and I feel like an Octopus on roller skates—totally out of control.

I have relapsed back to bad habits including acquiring more notebooks and organizers. I will walk into a pharmacy, a bookstore, a stationary store, and reach for a legal pad, a Mead notebook or the Mercedes Benz of notebooks, aka the Moleskin. I will start a To Do list on the pad, the notebook, in Google calendar and in Microsoft Outlook, and before I know it, I've missed an appointment with a colleague, a source, a professor. I sigh and pinch myself and tell myself I'm a Fuck Up. The trouble of keeping a balanced schedule. Therein lies the vicious cycle of being a high-functioning ADHDer. I am my own worst critic and for the rest of the day I end up looking like Eeeyore the depressed donkey from Winnie the Pooh.

The good news is that the boss recently told me that my counterpart—the woman around my age who seemed to hate the job from day one—quit and is moving to another city with her boyfriend. Although this might mean more work for me, I relish feeling needed. When the workplace is chaos and someone quits, and someone else gets laid off my own flaws are less visible. By the basic economic rules of supply and demand, I can survive on the job for now even though, without proper management of the ADHD symptoms, I continue to feel like I'm being pounded. Everyone is too busy trying in this all-hands-on the-deck mode, and it gives me time to seek help. From the verbage of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire," lifeline please.

I turned to an ex-boyfriend yesterday, who discovered my disorder by stumbling onto this blog. He's a Silicon Valley-entrepreneurial-type, an Ivy Leaguer, who operates much like a Richard Branson in his own right. He was the one who went through the clutter in my life and organized them into potential piles, and suggested that I get a manila folder for each.

After being thrown another pile of tasks, I texted the ex and asked him if he had time to chat. He texted back and said I sounded kind of frazzled, and he hoped that wasn't the case. I needed his advice on how to handle super-multitasking. "I hope that I stay afloat," I wrote. "You have the wind at your back now, Jane," he texted back. "All you need to do is chart your course." It gave me a brief and perhaps false sense of hope that I'd be fine in a job that is clearly all about prioritizing and multitasking. They might as well have asked me to balance their books. The whole thing is laughable. I am always forced to face my greatest fears.

ADHD Commitment Phobics: When to Press the Panic Button

posted: Monday September 21st - 4:11pm

Like countless other adults with ADHD, I’m drawn to the chase—and quick to misread signals in a relationship.

Once again I feel like I am spinning wheels when it comes to love. The new suitor, Sensitive Guy, is a tough read, although he says things that are obvious. The words aren't matching the actions.

On one hand, he has proclaimed his love for me. He burst into tears after we watched "The Time Traveler's Wife" together, and then again during his latest visit, when he said that, when he sees me, he sees a future that he's always wanted. It is the dialogue of Nicholas Sparks novels. He assured me that these were tears of happiness, yet the voice of reason chimes in, "When it's too good to be true, it is just that."

His gifts to me are as practical as they come. They've included a bottle of Tums (for those late-night dinners), a box of roach bait for the former apartment, and a bottle of hand sanitizer.

He's brought me to baseball games—which he loves—but he has yet to see the pool where I swim. There are hints of promises—meeting a friend, showing me the kind of homes that he loves, bringing me to see his workplace—and yet he really hasn't followed up with action. The sister says that such friends and lovers are NATO (No Action, Talk Only).

And yet I am drawn to the mystery of the unspoken, of everything unsaid. I am still drawn to the chase. How can one proclaim love for someone, and not follow this up with something certain? Why is he not asking me if I am dating other people, why doesn't he seem jealous when I mention other men who I am meeting up with, why isn't there a sense of possessiveness? I know I should focus on the new gig, but my mind inevitably shifts to pipe dreams, and wondering where I stand with the Sensitive Man. Am I being played?

It bothers me a bit that he so easily loses track of time or seems to disregard it when we talk. "Wow it's almost 2 a.m.," I'll say, though he seems to not understand the meaning of this. We end up chatting three or four hours into the wee hours of the morning, and I feel like a dead bagel when I wake up.

A bad sign was when he wanted to keep the souvenir cup from the wedding that I attended with him that had a lipstick smear on it. I am not a cup, I thought. I told him he could have it, so that I would once again be the placater, and to stop his tears.

The friend, Danielle, says I should hold onto him, but date others, too. It seems like good advice when love seems so tentative.

ADHD Relationships and Reading Cues

posted: Thursday September 17th - 10:57am

The psychotherapy and medication for adult attention deficit disorder take a back seat, while the personal life reaches new heights.

The Sensitive Guy is a chatterbox. Every other night he calls and we are on the phone three, four, sometimes five hours (and I am the adult with ADHD). Time flies, and he laughs and listens to everything I say. I wonder if it is because he's lonely, I mean he just moved to a new city, new job, and there's the pressure of studying for the boards. I feel like I am clothed in a veil of uncertainty with him. The overall feeling is that he's interested and yet is moving at a snail-like pace when it comes to commitment.

The bottom line though is that I am terrible at reading social cues. I wonder if it is the adult ADHD that is the cause of this, and the real reason why I feel the urge to turn to the stepmother or a friend for a second opinion. The ADHD treatment has taken a back seat since I started the job. The bottle of Adderall is empty and I've skipped on several ADHD group meetings.

I've been on cloud nine—on a bit of a honeymoon—and it seems like luck has turned around. The father returned from a trip to Asia a couple of weeks ago, and said he visited the big Buddha in Hong Kong. He kowtowed to the Buddha, and shook out a fortune from the incense can and it said, "Good luck for the rest of the year." I told him that half of the fortune was his since he did the shaking, but he said it was completely mine.

Looking back, it seems amazing that I've escaped the trailer park in the 'hood, and now have an apartment in one of the best neighborhoods in Manhattan. The 10021 zip code sits pretty, even if it is a temporary sublet. The apartment materialized through a friend, who pointed me to a middle-aged woman who spends most of her time in another state. The apartment is suspended high on the upper floors—the view at night is breathtaking and brings a single word to mind: Gotham. I've never had my own place in a two-doorman building, and the idea of an elevator vs. a walk-up still doesn't seem real.

But for the first time I am sleeping in my own apartment in one of the ritziest neighborhoods in Gotham. I fret and fear that the other shoe will drop, but then I stop myself. Sometimes you just have to take a step back and enjoy it. 10021 here I come.

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