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Adult ADHD Blog

ADHD and the City

Archives: September 2008

Temper Tantrum

I sulked, pouted, and felt like bursting into tears at work—like this part of me would always be there: the impatient, impulsive, jealous self.

I've crumbled under the stress of city living and a crazy job made crazier by the downspiraling financial markets. This morning, I snapped at the boss and colleagues at our weekly powwow. The boss was giving me a hard time about one of my ideas that I'd worked long and hard on, and I took the whole thing very personally.

Her rejection was so familiar to me, like all of those men, all of those undependable guys, like the non-existent mother, so familiar that I lashed out at her. Forget about the acting tips that I'd worked so hard to perfect. My face at the meeting showed anger, disappointment, hurt, and, as the sister often says, "Even Ray Charles could read me."

The meeting went silent. The colleagues include a quirky guy who doesn't wear shoes, but his sense of humor is infectious. He can make the world's biggest stick-in-the-mud smile. Then there is the other colleague, a woman who is chatty and outshines me with her Katie Couric perkiness. And within minutes, I had reverted to my 10-year-old self, defensive, envious, and pining for attention.

I wondered if it was the Meds talking. Maybe it was making me more depressed and angry. I sulked, pouted, and felt like bursting into tears at the meeting. I feel like this part of me will always be there, the impatient, impulsive, and jealous self.

I talked to the father about the episode, and he said it was immaturity. I needed to grow up, he said. I know, I know, my Ph.D. scientist-swimming friend would chalk it up to potential hyper-glycemia and tell me to get a blood test. Or is it too much Diet Coke? I wish it were that simple because I am trying so hard that it hurts. I hope the boss and colleagues forgive me in the end, but I'm also sick of apologizing.

Man Strike

Will any relationship be long-lasting and ADD-friendly? It seems I get so bored so easily.

A season of serial dating and I am officially burnt out. I am not sure if it is the ADD chick in me—the impulsive, spicy, razor-tongued girl in me who lashes out at the men who have been attempting to continue to date me—or that simply I am settling for men who are offering me scraps.

There are two kinds of men on the horizon: the uber-control freak (who controls everything from phone conversations to what I order at the dinner table) and the boring-bland man, plain as flavorless yogurt. The 34-year-old teacher continues to be interested in me, but I have one thing to say, "Bad kisser, body odor (he smells like old detergent, even his breath), and boring, boring boring." His kissing and touching give me the willies. I can barely feel his kissing; they are like little baby pecks. I know this is perhaps too much dish for an ADD-related site, but the point is I wonder if I am bored because of my ADD or if I've yet to meet Mr. Right.

At the same time, I feel like I need to hold onto to the bad kisser because he might accept my ADD self. So far he's the only man who has offered condolences to the betta fish who died last week. I was in such a funk that I decided to skip the Adderall and Lexapro for the weekend, and be my wacky self. I feel like when I take it, I am nervous, jittery, anxious, and without it, I am ditzy, loopy, and more free. The meds feel like a corset—while a day without pills makes me feel as free as wearing a dress bra-less, if that makes any sense.

The whole serial dating thing bothered me because I started to wonder if any relationship will be long lasting. It seems like I get bored so easily with jobs, tasks, people, and men. Or maybe it's this crazy city.

On a positive I completed the task yesterday of opening the stove for the first time and attempting to tackle a recipe: artichoke pasta. I proved that I can boil water properly :) The next step will be to open the door of that square white box, otherwise known as the oven. I feel like when I have a great expanse of time, and when I shut out the world (no roommate, no family, no stupid men), I can accomplish things.

On the other hand, it feels awfully lonely at the end of the day since I have a hard time multitasking. The sunny splash of the day was walking over to the church, attending evening mass, and secretly praying for what I always pray for: inner peace, happiness, and a really cool ADD-friendly guy, who will hopefully appear before I enter my Botox phase.

Dating with ADD: Mr. Cheapo vs. Shy Boy

What would happen if I told a date that I have ADD?

I officially buried the betta fish last night. Over the past few days, it had been acting funky, sinking to the bottom of the tank like a submarine, refusing to be enticed by blood worms. Then last night I found it on its side, no longer breathing. Even though the fish never said a word to me, I found myself increasingly attached to it, talking to it as if it were human.

A friend joked that any time you name something you get attached, whether it be a plant, a chair, or even a pair of chopsticks. It humanizes an object or thing. So I stared at the dead fish and started crying as I flushed it down the toilet. The sadness was a small price to pay for loving something.

The dating game continues as I've whittled the laundry list of a dozen candidates to two. There is Mr. Cheapo. I call him that because after a month of dating him I realize that he will literally spend a half an hour or more winding around the streets seeking free parking rather than settling for a coined meter or a parking lot. And he packs breakfast and lunch to work, including milk in a jar for the cereal. Stick in the mud comes to mind. I have images of an unhappy marriage where he'd be calculating the number of toilet paper sheets on X and Y rolls to see what would be a bargain. Then there is the part of me that is very impatient—maybe ADD, maybe I'm hypoglycemic as my Ph.D scientist friend thinks. I did everything I could to stop myself from screaming, "Stop winding around, I will pay for the parking for god's sake!"

I also continue dating the quiet and timid and somewhat geeky grade school teacher. Despite his awkwardness and "shy boy" persona, he feels safe, predictable, and is able to tolerate my tsunami-like mood swings. The father, who is now desperate to get me down the aisle, says that both are great candidates. He's sent a collage of these guys’ photos to the grandmother who is getting very worried that I will never make it down any aisle but the supermarket's. I wish these people would chill.

As for ADD, once in a blue moon I will wonder what would happen if I told a date that I have ADD. Would he run away, would it be a litmus test to see how much he loves me? Just wondering, though I'm too much of a wimp to do so.

Amidst Uncertainty

Getting through an ADD day is like walking a tightrope. Wound up, tense, fearful.

How much of the darkness is imagined, and how much is real? I met the new shrink, the Buddhaman’s replacement. Thank heavens she is a woman, because, lately, the dating escapades have turned south, and I've lost hope (or amusement) with the litany of "Y chromosomers."

Looking back at the past year, I can see that the two men I gave my heart to clearly weren't emotionally available. A friend kindly calls them "social retards," and I think it is much simpler than that: It takes two to tango. If an ADDer meets a social retard who just isn't all that into you and the two date, what do you get? A World War III of broken hearts.

I am perennially late, and the socially retarded guys are uncommunicative and rigid. My impulsiveness, impatience, or overexuberance must drive these super-planners insane. I try to see it from their shoes, but somehow it doesn't work. Both of these men, as of this week, have fizzled from my life.

On the bright and sunny side, I found a new shrink. To be honest, the Buddhaman left me thinking that all shrinks chat on cell phones or nod off while you spill your guts out to them. Needless to say, I was weary going into the next patient-shrink relationship.

The replacement shrink, Dr. M, is cool, her voice steady, and without a sign of insanity in her. I was surprised at the silence in her office, no buzzing fax machines or ringing phones. She held a clipboard and jotted notes, her expression attentive. I felt like I could trust her; she would not nod off and I would not feel pressure to entertain and embellish.

I told her about the frequent moves, the boredom, and the inner turmoil eating away at me. Getting through a day was like walking a tightrope. I was wound up, tense, fearful of always making a mistake of tripping. I said that, after more than a year of working with the Buddhaman, I lived an existence of apologies and guilt. It was overcommitments and a litany of “I am sorrys.”

I can forgive again and again, but most people who don't understand the mishaps of ADDers can't. I waited for her to say something, to indicate, "It's OK, I'll help you." But she only jotted and sat as still as a sphinx. As I wrote out the co-pay, I couldn't take it anymore.

I asked, "Dr. M, so do you think there is hope for me, because I've talked with friends and they think it's hopeless." The mysterious friends are the voices inside me. I need reassurance; I need someone to tell me, “Hey things will be OK.” Right now, it means frequent calls to the stepmother, the sister, the friends who are just as confused as me—but hopefully one day I think I will be able to fly on my own.

Outside, the weather is a dreary gray, the sky heavy with what looks like rain. Tomorrow, I'm set to once again swim in the open water, most likely the last race of the season.

Avalanche of Worry

Fretting about the present, the future, the job, the meaning of life overall.

Maybe it is the switch in seasons, but I've been in a funk over the past several weeks. I wonder if I should blame it on the litany of men who have come and gone into my life like shooting stars. Easy come, easy go.

I also wonder if it is the meds, throwing me into an unexplained tizzy in the middle of the day. I start fretting, worrying about present, future, the next birthday, the meaning of life overall.

I become buried under an avalanche of worry and walk around the streets looking like someone has died. Or maybe it is that I didn't take vacation at all this summer. In fact, the other day I emerged from the cubicle and looked at a colleague, and said, "vacation, a foreign concept." It cracked him up.

The father doesn't understand the fretting over turning 33, over the job, the economy, the directionless betta man. "You're not married to him; just go out if he asks you and you feel like it," he says. "He's like a reserve in the Army." That made me laugh.

My only escape is swimming. Water is an escape and follows the lead of my strokes. When I dive into its coolness, I am enveloped in sweet silence away from the static of daily life and my own thoughts.

Escape

The summer is ending, and my latest romance with a fellow ADDer is cooling off.

The summer is coming to an end, the sunsets arriving sooner, and the darkness enveloping me when I awake. I had wanted it to last longer. I always want to capture something as it flees.

The one guy who pegged me as his girlfriend, four dates into the game, seems to have cooled off, not because of his lack of interest, but mine.

In the beginning, when I did not see his warts, I dated him with the enthusiasm of a child at a candy store. I jotted down notes about our dates, chronicling each encounter. Now, not only is he feeling like yesterday's leftover meal, but I look at him and see in him many things I hate about myself.

He is another member of the "perennially tardy" club, or maybe it is because he has the directional sense of a blind ferret (like the one in "Along Came Polly").

The first three times he called, asking for the street address yet again, walking north when it was supposed to be south, going to the west side, rather than the east. I chalked it to the fact that he's not from my neck of the woods.

I answered him first patiently and then slowly biting my tongue harder and harder. The other day I could no longer contain the angst.

He was completely inaccurate about whether a movie was playing, what time it would start—and then he got off the wrong train stop and left me waiting at the theater for a good 20 minutes. I thought I was late. I kept texting him with my "ETA, estimated time of arrival."

I was steaming, thinking now of a friend—that type-A Ph.D. man—who, to this day, reminds me that I never showed up to swimming on time. He was annoyed; now I was getting a taste of my own medicine. "I think we suffer from the same problem," I said, bluntly, when he finally appeared.

There are signs that he might be worse off than me. He only recently opened a bank account; he's poor with money, he takes on too many activities, he lives in a rented basement in one of the boroughs, and his mother is harping on him to organize life, money, work, food, etc.

When we go out, I am not proud of him. I find myself snapping at what I regard as laziness, when maybe, who knows, he could be tres type-B—or maybe he has ADD. I had to catch my tongue at times when I felt like lashing out at him. "Are you stupid or something?" I want to ask.

When I told the story of his mishaps to my sister, she said I was unforgiving and mean. But that is how I am treating myself half the time. The inner voice is harsh.