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The ADHD in Me Cannot Deal with My ADHD Boss's Disorder

posted: Monday February 8th - 6:00pm

An employee living with attention deficit hyperactive disorder (ADHD) explains how she struggles to stay organized at work with an ADHD boss who gives her no direction and presents too many distractions.

Another sleepless night and I'm not what to do about it -- the work worries continue and in the language of open-water swimming, I feel like I am being hit again and again by waves. There is no end in sight to the washing-machine churn, and there is only a faint hope that somewhere out there is a God who is merciful and who will throw a chit to someone who tries very hard. (Me!)

Just when things start going well with The Boyfriend (fodder for the next post to the many loyal readers here), a seemingly more pressing challenge emerges in the form of the ADHD Boss who also suffers from the Bill-Clinton syndrome, a.k.a. he's chatterbox to the tenth degree (not that other Bill Clinton syndrome!). The situation is such that the ADHD Boss and I work as well together as oil and water. I need a boss who can offer direction, clarity and who can help me prioritize, instead of someone who has a whirlwind of ideas, and whose main talent seems to be talk. It is one thing if we were in the game of talk radio, and another if the ADHD Boss, who is new and has a million ideas of his own, spends much of the day talking, forces us to attend a half a dozen meetings, offers minimal direction (except tips on where to get a good bargain for coffee), and then somehow expects that the work will just get done.

The ADHD Boss is no different than me -- an ideas person -- only he's lucky that he has a personal assistant who is the designated donkey keeping his work life in order. How can he manage me if he can't even manage himself? I am left working in all directions -- dozens of projects flying around at once, with no real idea of how the work is supposed to get done -- feeling very alone like things could be so much better if there were some structure and direction. The ADHD Boss and I have gotten into numerous run-ins about "communication style," namely that he doesn't really want, or isn't able, to manage in a way that works well for the both of us. The non-management style kills me.

In the past I've been both blessed and cursed with bosses who were super-organized. One of them seemed like a clone of "Monk," very OCD and always on top of things. To them my disorganization and lack of focus must have felt like torture, but we somehow complimented each other because they offered me specific direction and lit a fire under me and I gave them what I am best at -- loyalty and hard work. At times I felt straightjacketed and claustrophobic under their auspices, and I once told the Father that I wished that I had an ADHD boss because maybe we would understand each other better, and offer each other strategies on how to tackle work's hurdles.

Now that the occasional wish has manifested into reality, I feel doubly frustrated. The saying, "the blind leading the blind" surfaces in my mind as I struggle to figure out what needs to get done, what projects need to be completed, and the ADHD boss himself is struggling to figure these things out for himself since his or "our" boss is chewing his team out. It is a royal mess. On another level I look at the Boss and see this mirror image of me and hate it -- I see how frustrating it can be to try to get someone to follow up (or heck maybe he's a NATO guy. No Action Talk Only).

Everyday I come in feeling like I am being waterboarded, and at the end of the day, despite juggling the dozens of projects, I go home, the last one to leave, utterly frustrated.

I wonder how it is that the ADHD Boss has a wife and two teenage kids, and how he has maintained a marriage and seemingly made a living all of these years. Is the wife, this poor woman, the secret to his success, the one who is keeping him in check?

In the past week after we've butted heads (him saying that I need to be the one pinning him down, me saying I will try but it is against my very nature), we find ourselves at a standstill stewing in our own offices, both of us kind of giving the other the silent treatment -- a sign of frustration and resentment. I told the Boyfriend that unless he leaves or I am placed under someone else, this will not last. So once again I face the fears of being forced back into Layoffland. As with everything two steps forward, three steps back...

ADHD Relationship Communication Fears and Flaws

posted: Wednesday January 27th - 12:09pm

I try hard to communicate my needs in my relationship, but the harder I try the greater of a mess it becomes.

If intuition is such a powerful gift then why do I feel that on one hand my intuition is as sharp as a dog's, and on the other hand it is totally off base. My gut sense about The Boyfriend and the new ADHD boss remain ambiguous. They are as hard to read as Greek.

I try hard to communicate to them my needs, but the harder I try the greater of a mess it becomes. What is true is that I continue to believe that writing is the key to getting the message across. I can do in writing what I can't do in person--the message is so simple and straightforward, done without inhibition. Face to face with The Boyfriend or the Boss and I fumble, my voice tightens like a violin string and I look constipated and like a cat thrown into the bath tub. I look and sound pissed, maybe more at myself than anyone else. The relationship with The Boyfriend continues to straddle from good to great to worse. I am not sure if I am facing the dilemma of dating an M.D., someone who is truly not available and who can not change his schedule, or if there is the ADHD part of me that just shrivels up and collapses when things are not said, but inferred.

I deal so much better with clarity. What is clear is that The Boyfriend is clear about what he can and can't do. His schedule is terrible, his vacations are set -- the bottom line is that he just doesn't seem to give me what I need, which is a sense of safety and security in knowing that things are moving forward. What I need is a steady reassurance that I am doing fine, that things are okay, that I am loved and wanted and just fine the way I am. Until then I live with an inner sense of catastrophe that things that are bad will surely get worse.

The Boyfriend and I live three hours apart, across state lines, but I can't be fooled by this veil of geographical distance. My point to him is that physical distance is not a barrier to showing how much one cares--one can send letters, gifts, can listen to the other person after a long day at work, can initiate by sending them a greeting card. Rather the more that I state my needs the more he retreats like a turtle and seems to turn into a sphinx. This only gets me more angry.

"Yes," I tell him, "I realize that nothing can be solved in a day."

All I need to hear is: Jane I love you, you are great and we will find a way to work things out. Instead what I hear is: I'm tired, I've had a long day, I haven't eaten, I have a responsibility to my career now. Yes and I too have a long day, a difficult work situation, and I find a way to go the distance for someone I love and am loyal to.

Excuses excuses I think since his correspondence has included things like, "I see us spending many happy years together," and "I want build a foundation with you." Is it is the ADHD me that takes things literally, or the little girl in me who wants someone who can show me that they will be there for me? I can't stand people who are, as the sister says, NATO (No Action Talk Only). And I feel like I am pulling teeth with The Boyfriend. I'm starting to wonder if he is commitment phobic. If I can't feel safe with him, how will I feel safe telling him about the ADHD and about myself. Mostly I am mad at this disorder. I worry that my ADHD symptoms will just push him away and then I will tell everyone, "See, see another one bites the dust."

Have ADHD communication problems interfered with your relationships? Should Jane tell The Boyfriend about her ADHD? Share your experiences in a comment below. Or connect with other ADHD adults in ADDitude's ADHD forums.

Coping With ADHD and My Personal History

posted: Tuesday January 26th - 12:00pm

My ADHD doesn’t just bring every day challenges, but the challenge of overcoming an already dark past mixed with a lot of anger.

Aside from my ADHD there is a greater demon -- a checkered past.

The history starts with my mother. For whatever reasons she was never there when I was growing up. Maybe it was my sister who was born sick and required two kidney transplants, maybe it was her own disorder. Whatever the reason within the entire tsunami of issues, my problems and issues were overlooked. I did not suffer from abuse but rather neglect.

Maybe no one but me will ever understand, but here are the memories that leave me troubled today.

Postcard from the past: Parents are throwing slippers at each other, the mother slams the bathroom door in the father’s face, the cop car pulls up. I am five. I am crying.

Postcard from the past: My mother is asking me if she should stay with my father, should they get a divorce or not? I am 12.

Postcard from the past: The parents are at it again, the mother screaming at the top of her lungs and the father retreating, as silent as a sphinx. I am 13 and yelling at my mother for being the enemy. "Stop it," I scream, "stop ruining everything."

Postcard from the past: I am 16 and the moving trucks come and take the furniture, and the innards of the house away. My mother promises that she will visit me again, but she doesn’t.

On that day those of us who remained -- my father, my sister and me -- were left to pick up the pieces again and live with the reality that for many years we had a house but not a home, and that is where history starts all over again. In the end my sister and I were blessed with a caring father and a stepmother as solid as they come.

Those are snippets of the darker part of personal history that I haven’t shared with most people because it brings shame, guilt and hurt, and a reminder that some things can’t be changed, and that I can’t just reverse it. I keep telling the Boss and the Father that it’s like a Boeing 747 that has been going at 5,000 miles an hour. A plane just can’t be turned around that quickly, especially if it has been flying like that for years.

This is a long way of saying that the ADHD doesn’t just bring every day challenges, but the challenge of overcoming an already dark past mixed with a lot of anger. With the storm of a broken family and my sister’s illness, I needed to take a backseat. All the while it was as if I were invisible, and my own issues were invisible, too.

Then I found that the disorder had a name (ADHD). I wonder if things would have been better if it had been found earlier.

But why dwell? One needs to move on, and perhaps take the plunge. I will find a way to tell the Boyfriend about the ADHD. I was able to tell the Boyfriend about my personal history, but that can not be changed and issues such as divorce, a crazy mother or a sick sister, are more comprehensible to someone than ADHD.

These are challenges that normal (non-ADD) people can more readily relate to -- a broken family, a sibling who suffers from a physical illness, but my few attempts to share my ADHD with others haven't gone well. (Postcard from the past: The good friend who responded to my ADHD confessions with, "Hmmm, interesting I just think people are wired differently.") The Boyfriend is important to me, but our relationship has yet to stabilize...I fear that this revelation would obliterate what is there. Increasingly though, I think to myself, "What is the worst that could happen if I told him?" and I move closer to revealing one of the darkest and most uncertain parts of myself.

I hope to move on, and perhaps take the plunge. Life is meant to be lived.

Fear of Rejection in an ADHD Relationship

posted: Monday January 25th - 11:48am

The truth about my ADHD sits at the tip of my tongue because I am greatly fearful of being abandoned.

Despite all of the self-talk and the one-on-one with the father, I haven’t been able to muster up the courage to tell the Boyfriend about the ADHD. Maybe there is too much anger and pain woven into this four-year battle of trying to solve a disorder that has the frustration of reigning in wild mustangs. By nature a wild mustang needs to be set free and isn’t wired to pull people on a carriage.

The truth sits at the tip of my tongue because I am greatly fearful of being abandoned. I continue to wonder who would want a girlfriend or a spouse who is all over the board, and who has a tendency to start things and not complete them, not out of malice, but because that is how they are wired.

I’ve tried to get together with friends from the ADHD support groups and guinea pig groups that I used to attend, and inevitably those always fall through. Someone forgets about the appointment and doesn’t show up, or keeps changing it. The father tells me that two broken people can make a whole, but sometimes I just see two broken people as just that.

Then there is the fear of being discounted. I fear that the Boyfriend will look at me and laugh and say “Really, that’s all?” when I tell him about the ADHD. The truth is that this thing I consider a beast may sound anticlimactic. This isn’t cancer that we are talking about. Nobody is going to die here. And yet, when the disorder hits at the speed of a freight train, I want to die. No amount of physical pain can compare to the inner turmoil and depression associated with ADD.

Over the past month I’ve had several ADHD meltdowns over the fear of being abandoned. The fights with the Boyfriend have been over this thing that I long for which is clarity and certainty. People with ADHD do poorly without lack of direction, and his is the personality where things are known but not said. This is okay for most normal people, but I am not normal. A normal person would be certain that a boyfriend were really into them if they drove up three hours each way every week to come see them. A normal person would be okay with it, enjoy it and not fret about the greater meaning of it all.

I fully understand the consequence of the fear so I try to do what I can to stop it. At times the only thing I can do with this fear is to sit with it until the storm passes over. I am almost resigned to it and tell myself that all of this baggage is my fate. We all have an albatross in our life and mine is a thing called ADHD mixed with a checkered childhood, a mother who abandoned me and who abandoned my father. Things were far from perfect, but why can’t they just be good, isn’t that enough?

This past weekend I realized that things can indeed be different if I see things from a different perspective. The Boyfriend has seen me at my worst, during my meltdowns, he knows that I am a spaz, that I have a tendency to want to do too much because of an innate curiosity and also perhaps an unconscious desire to push people away. I don’t want to get too close and this I know is not the ADHD. It is my past, a personal history that I carry with me, it is a challenge that I need to tackle.

The ADHD Texting Queen

posted: Friday January 15th - 11:04am

I fire off text messages as fast as my ADHD brain can create them.

The new ADHD boss, aka Chatterbox Boss, is forcing me to accept this new Palm Pixie thing. At first it sounded like a great idea. What's there not to love about getting that new Palm. Bring it on. I used to equate the complexity of the work gadget to the importance of the person at the company.

So Chatterbox Boss starts telling me about the gadget and how great it is. He finds himself shooting off emails like bullets at 2 a.m. In this age of international business this little thing, no bigger than a matchbox, will allow me to work 24/7. That's when I found myself backing away. Um no, maybe I don't need this seemingly important gadget for V.I.Ps after all. I don't want to be a slave to technology and gadgets, which I already am.

The ADHD mind fires off ideas and thoughts at the speed of light, and I find myself texting people at the speed of light. Perhaps it is the shygirl in me who wants attention and finds that a text, just like email, allows one the freedom to be behind the signs. I've been shooting off texts as a gangster would bullets.

The Sister has pointed out that I'm an addict. The last time we hung out I couldn't take off my eyes off of the little purple cell phone--kept sneaking peaks at the screen as one does to their lover. Finally exploded and grabbed the little thing out of my hands.

"Give me that," she hissed and turned it off.

"Hey give it back," I whined. I don't know how this happened. On one hand the cell phone and texting is the perfect answer to the ADHD brain. Speed, quickness and instant responses and gratification, yet I am pissing people off as I take this 3.0 path.

I gave the Sister a much needed, "I'm sorry." She looked like a cat that had just been forced to take a bath. Too late.

With my new gadget on the job there is that same two-pronged fear. I'm afraid I'll become a slave to it, and burn out from the tsunami of emails from Chatterbox Boss, who himself has said he has ADHD. In the end, I have no choice. Come Monday the gadget will be placed in my hands like a brand new set of car keys to an over-exuberant 16-year-old driver. All I can say is God help me.

There's a New ADHD Boss in Town

posted: Wednesday January 13th - 1:02pm

There's a new boss and he claims he has ADHD.

There is a new boss. He came in from left field several weeks ago, and serves as "the Great White Hope" and a shield to my colleague and I from the top She-boss. He is as middle America as Wonder Bread, and kind of resembles the Pillsbury Doughboy. He's as energetic as an overeager puppy, and from day one he whirlwinded in and amongst the pile of verbage he spit out, said that he had ADHD.

This is the first time a boss has said the words "ADHD", and I wondered, at first, if he was kidding. He's an extroverted ADHD sort. Every morning we sit around and bat about ideas like a cat to a mouse. It's lots of fun shooting the breeze, shooting around ideas. He loves to talk. The 20-minute meetings extend to 2 hours. He's got a small-town friendliness about him, so even when he does the Bill Clinton thing it is forgivable.

But it gets more complicated than that. We are not working in a vacuum. There are another five or six colleagues on the team too -- and now work feels like a game of cat and mouse. The new boss wants to make changes, to exert his power over the ways things used to happen. Sure the corporation has problems and there is disorder. Nothing is perfect; but, he's moving at the speed of light and running a lot of people over -- including my former boss who no longer wants to work with me.

There are common projects, a multitude of them that we all need to get done; but, there is resistance from the ex boss. She and her posse are not answering the phone, not getting back to me, to us.

I feel like a salami stuck between two pieces of bread, what do I do? Why can't we all get along. In the meantime too, there just aren't enough hours in the work day to deal. This politics game is not my forte, and I tell the new boss that. In the end it goes in one ear and out the other. He just doesn't get it, not yet.

Part of the gift of ADHD is an intuition that I have of good and bad things to come and I have a bad feeling of how things are going down here. The bottom line is that nothing good can come out of a war. I just want to be left alone to do the work. I wonder why that just isn't possible in this game that is clearly being drawn out and will continue. Lucky me that I always end up in these sticky situations, thrown into areas that I suck at.

I go home feeling stressed, dream of things like houses burning down, and searching for seemingly insignificant things that are really significant, and not being able to find them. The Adderall is once again running low and the search for the next shrink continues.

I keep telling myself to make the phone call and just do it. I need to do it, to keep help. The boyfriend, shall we say, is on the sidelines. We had a big fight over the weekend. I really wanted to see him; but I sensed resistance. No, he's too busy, his work is crazy, doesn't have the time. I pendulum between wondering if this is my own insecurity or am I dealing with yet another commitment-phobe. I will simply need to take that risk I suppose, as with war between the bosses. I just hope I come out alive.

ADHD, Tongue Tied and in Love

posted: Tuesday January 5th - 2:35pm

I still can't bring myself to fess-up to the boyfriend about my ADHD.

Spent New Year's with the boyfriend. We braved the winter chill by holing up in the apartment with DVDs, popcorn and the promise of a new year. For the first time in a while I didn't think about resolutions. In the adult ADHD world, every day has the feel of New Year's--promises made and promises broken. Despite all of the holiday cheer and festivities, inside a storm brewed--the fear, anxiety and doubts resurfaced. Even though he had come to visit me and his mere presence should have been a sign of his interest, I could not trust even that. Where was faith when I most needed it? Somewhere between his coming and his arrival, the tsunami of emotions escalated and exploded.

Why hadn't he called me as often as he used to? Why had the frequency of his visits gone down? Why didn't I meet his friends and his parents yet? Why was I seemingly begging for it? The thoughts were now spinning out of control. I could not catch my breath. The beast had resurfaced. I thought back to one of several run-ins we've now had, mostly over my need for affirmation. There I stood amongst the hustle and bustle of holiday cheer, but inside the storm of anxiety was now escalating before the boyfriend.

I started to pout. The boyfriend wanted to shop and asked if I wanted to come with him. "No," I snapped. "Why don't I just meet you later?"

He seemed confused and said, "Okay."

Then he seemed frustrated when I said, "So you don't want me to come with you?"

The face-off seemed foolish even as it was happening. What was I waiting for? An engraved invitation? What was going on? Why was I doing this push/pull thing? Why did I have such a hard time communicating? This is odd for a writer. I thought back to the book that I'd bought a while back and keep hidden on the bookshelf, "ADHD and Romance." When I read the list of challenges and benefits for those of us in ADHDland, and kept thinking, that's me, that's me.

The problem was not finding romance, but sustaining it. I thought back to all of my past loves, a long litany of mostly short-lived dates, none really leading into relationships. There is always a tipping point, which sometimes comes sooner than later when it comes to people. Sometimes friendships start out like a meteor and fall to Earth with a splat. That translated to lovers too.

I told the boyfriend that I was screwed. Whenn solving the challenges of ADHD love with medication, there seem to be side effects such as irritability, anger and impatience. After the storms clear, the boyfriend wants to know what is specifically wrong. Each time the answer sits on the tip of my tongue like a rock unwilling to budge. I've mentioned the family problems, the sick sister, the non-existent mother, being depressed and sad, feeling like a failure, and yet I could not bring myself to say, "It's the ADHD."

Tongue tied and stuck in the same place in a new year.

ADHD Dating Strategies and Solutions

posted: Monday December 21st - 3:22pm

I told the boyfriend that I’d like to take him up on his offer of accompanying me to see a therapist. But I still fear telling him about my ADHD.

The snowstorm hit like an child’s tantrum, sudden and explosive, and dumped close to two feet of snow over the weekend. The boyfriend and I accomplished our long-planned trip up north to a small town where he had once worked, a “chapter” in the ongoing book of his life. Funny how I, too, connect places, addresses and homes to chapters in my life. I can’t even count how many times I’ve moved since turning 21. The trip showed me that the boyfriend can plan and execute the things that he wants and is focused on.

Before heading to “north country,” I had had what is increasingly a series of meltdowns. In desperation, I invited the ex-boyfriend out for drinks. Despite being bitter and hurt about what he clearly viewed as rejection from us, he wanted to help. He said that there were three problems that he could see.

“Most people suffer from either fear of commitment or abandonment, and you suffer from both,” he said. “Jane, I think you try to do the right thing. You don’t mean to be mean or nasty or send mixed messages, but that’s how it comes out, at times. It comes out like you are playing games. People, especially those dating you, are equally as frustrated and at a loss. On the positive side, you acknowledge that you have a problem.”

As recently as two years ago, I would have looked him in the eye and told him he’s wrong, that I was misunderstood. I still feel misunderstood, but have come to the conclusion that a person with an illness can’t get well if she doesn’t acknowledge it. I told the father the other day that I know that I want: I want to be reassured that I am loved, appreciated, understood, that I don’t mean to seem flaky or mean. If others could enter Jane’s universe, they would see that I have a passion for helping others, a sharp intuition, that I work hard and only want to produce the best for the things and people I am passionate about, that I am extremely loyal and committed to those passions.

My thoughts and ideas tend to pendulum back and forth, sometimes wildly. In the course of a month, I’ve considered a myriad of travels and professions, and it is rare that I will look an opportunity or event in the eye and say, “Sorry I can’t attend.”

I am like a child in some ways, drawn to color, laughter, simplicity, and yet in the darkest of moments when I am overcome by fear of rejection, of self, filled with self-doubt and don’t trust a soul, I either collapse within myself and apologize for being me, or I lash out at those around me and find some reason to reject them.

I have already told the boyfriend that I need help, need his help, that I’d like to take him up on his offer of accompanying me to see a therapist. He nods yes, texts back that he will help, but at the end of the day, there is little to no follow up, and I am unsure as to why. In the heat of the argument, he said that I should either come out and tell him what the problem is, or drop it. There is no way he can help if I don’t tell him. The reason I fear telling him about my ADHD is that based on so many things that I’ve seen about him -- he will forget. He may say, “I’m sorry Jane, that is terrible, I want to help you as much as I can.”

And then the entire issue is dropped until there is another meltdown or breakdown. I have communicated my fears and desire to make this relationship work in e-mails and in person, and often the e-mails go unanswered. Does this mean he doesn’t care, hasn’t heard me, that because of these problems he’s lost interest? I am tired of assuming, tired of sending emails and texts about the same issue -- the issue that when I express what I would like and what means a lot to me, there is a silence and often not even an acknowledgement. In the beginning, the boyfriend sent many hand-written letters, texted sweet sayings, asked me what time he could call me, and now I fear that I’ve showed and shared too much, and that he’s either taking advantage of the fact that I’m really into him or he’s not really into me. Somehow love loses its flair when one needs to state and remind the other to do something.

I carry these questions and concerns and fears with me like the many piles that I still carry with me. In the dead of winter a security person at a building asks me, “Are you moving house?” with a laugh. This is a question that I haven’t been asked in a while. Sounds funny, but at the end of the day, it is a question that reminds me that there may be a relapse.

ADHD, Relationship Insecurity, and Winter Blues

posted: Thursday December 17th - 11:28am

I am very close to telling the boyfriend about my attention deficit disorder with the hope that it may buy some sympathy.

Could it be that at age 34, with a new crop of white hairs, the reality that my mother did not acknowledge my birthday, and the other reality that with all I’ve accomplished I still feel inadequate, the little girl of 10 years old emerges begging and screaming for attention? My sister was born with kidney failure and has been through a dozen plus surgeries since she was born. The devil in me wishes, at times, that I were as sick as she. I wish everyone gave me gifts and surrounded me with sympathy -- I wish I were little and cute, because, of course, I am none of these things.

In the blink of an eye, the woman is transformed into a girl -- helpless, awkward, fearful, and always wondering if she deserves normalcy and happiness. Where is this rant headed? Well, for the past few weeks and especially today, I’ve struggled with twists and turns and inner turmoil with the boyfriend. He lives in another state, about three hours away, and he is struggling with a new job with insane hours.

I am struggling with a new job, too, and dealing with the He-Boss and She-Boss, and a place packed with politics. Long hours -- leave home at 8 a.m. and return at 10 p.m. In between, I catch a swim, but even then the swimming has lost its spunk and pizazz. I swim with the anger and fury of an angry drunk, the swim completely stripped of the joy of just doing it. I pound the water with fists and huff and puff at people who swim in between both lanes. A mysterious thing occurs when I go from being a normal, creative, and witty person to someone who is anxious and totally paralyzed by fear. I can see it coming like a runaway train on the wrong side of the track, and yet I can’t stop it. I wonder if it is the same with an anorexic who logically knows that one needs to eat to be healthy, and yet distains food.

On a logical level, I know that by acting like a child -- by making demands, by spazing out -- I will repel instead of attract people. And yet, these spells of being nasty and pushing people away continues.

The Buddhaman was right. I try to push people away by taking on too much. Insecurity and fear and an innate curiosity in things drives a desire to do more, and then starts a vicious cycle of feeling totally overwhelmed and overstressed, which leads to temper tantrums, which drive men and people away. I want to end the cycle with the snap of my fingers, only it lingers like a cancer that spreads.

Outside, old man winter is not afraid to share a glimpse of the long and brutal season to come. The temperature has plummeted to the teens. Inside, the office and even the Penthouse are nice and toasty, but mostly I fear what will become of me if I don’t get help soon. I’ve already reached out to an ex-boyfriend who was the first I’ve ever told about the ADHD. Despite my quirks and our break up, he is gracious enough to listen and to help. He e-mails the names of herbs and natural supplements that supposedly sharpen memory. I thank him, we sit at a restaurant and share a post-birthday brunch, and he shows me my astrology charts. The boxes that show friends and “service” are empty, and there are other boxes that show a life of sorrow and turmoil with dating, stability, and all the things that most people take for granted, damn it. The ex says that since most of the planets are to one side, this means that this is my destiny, like it can’t be changed. I nodded and thanked him for the free reading, drank the wine, seemed okay with my fate until later that day. What if the reading is correct, and there isn’t a single thing I can do about my predicament? I feel resigned to my sorry fate now.

There are signs that the beast has returned -- there is a constant “push and pull” with people, the "I love you, I hate you" syndrome. Why in the world would a smart woman text sarcastic things to her already busy boyfriend? Why would she constantly doubt whether he will call her? Why would she doubt to the point where she pushes him away with the ferocity of someone nasty and unrecognizable?

I am mostly afraid of myself, and I am unsure of what to do. What I have done is gone down the list of psychiatrists in the neighborhood who take evening and weekend hours and that of psychologists too. Once again, I will call down the list and try out a new shrink. It has been nearly a year since I’ve been to a shrink in part because I was busy being miserable in Layoffland. Maybe I just want to be miserable. Odd, isn’t it? I am also very close to telling the boyfriend about my attention deficit disorder with the hope that it may buy some sympathy, even though I swear he is ADHD too, but maybe has yet to acknowledge it.

In desperation, I’ve turned to the solitude of the church again. There is one not too far from where I work. One afternoon, I walked past the hustle and bustle of the holiday crowds and into the sacred space. There is a little bookstore inside the church and I caught a glimpse of a charm reading, “With God all things are possible.” I bought it for a sense of hope, and for now that is the best that I can ask for.

ADHD Relationship Confusion

posted: Monday December 14th - 4:48pm

The attention deficit part of me wonders if the boyfriend has simply gotten bored and moved onto the next flavor of the season.

The birthday comes and goes, and all was blissful. I looked in the mirror and found a few new, white hairs, and a feeling that time has lost its meaning.

Every year flashes by with greater speed.

Things are going okay with the boyfriend, although there is increasingly a sense of dissatisfaction and discontent with him. It's been a while since I've been with someone who seemingly forgets things that matter to me -- like a simple text message to let me know that it's getting late, so sweet dreams.

I miss the first three months of dating, when he'd send me love letters and cards. I miss a feeling and sense that I am loved. I fear his anger at authority, which perhaps leads people at work to misunderstand him completely. The talk of having children and even adopting, and visiting his friends and family seems to have faded, and the ADHD part of me wonders if he's simply gotten bored and moved onto the next flavor of the season.

The behavior from the beginning to now seems to have shifted into a new territory, and into an area that I don't understand. Suddenly, within a week, I see that the person truly dislikes his job, albeit the job is a new one, and with every new job comes some shit that we all have to deal with. I see myself in him: the frustration, the mistakes. But I also know that as an ADHDer, if I love someone, I am extremely loyal and I'll go out of my way to placate him. I've done house chores and cooked for the boyfriend, and suddenly I wonder if I've become too much of a doormat. I end up feeling resentful.

I realize that one should try to count one's blessings and thank the other person, but at the end of the day, I feel like something is sorely missing in the person -- only, I can't understand it. I've told the boyfriend hundreds of times to please send a quick text if he knows that he won't be able to talk, or if he knows that work is crazy. And, once again, he's forgotten and I am left wondering if I really don't matter.

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