“Skeletons Emerge”
I’m the ADHD girl, the one they pat on the back when she’s late or loses track of conversations.
The boss feels bad for me in some ways. I can tell she wants to help; she knows that something isn’t right. She knows that the subject matter is putting me to sleep. She might even be able to see the ADHD, but all she can do is tell me to please think more, do less, read more.
The thing I don’t want to admit to the boss is that my ADHD mind is spinning so rapidly that I can’t get a hold of it. When I start to read something, my thoughts veer like a car spinning out of control. It jumps like oil on a hot pan, splattering all over. This has become a problem when I talk to those finance people who talk in gobbly gook. Not only is the subject a snooze, but also I can’t understand them, because I’m so scared I’m not going to understand them. Does this make sense?
I felt blue today, lethargic, zombie-like. Then, I thought, it could be worse. Thank god I’m not in Eliot Spitzer’s shoes. I don’t understand or comprehend, not out of ill will, but because of my ADHD self – how else do I explain it?
Yesterday at the creative writing group, I came in 15 minutes late but everyone was forgiving, because by now everyone knows me as the ADHD girl. They pat me on the back when I lose track of conversations, or when I don’t follow the meaning of a certain piece of writing. Actually, it’s refreshing to get the pity at times, because that’s what I sometimes feel that I’ve missed all along: a pat on the back, some sympathy for what is a chronic disorder that follows me everywhere.
I thought back to sitting in front of the boss as she rattled off the same stuff that most people tell me – you’re such a hard worker, intelligent, it’s so fixable, why can’t you try harder? At one point in my life, I would have fought back, but not anymore. I sat there, threw my hands up in the air, and said that she was right. I’m frustrated too, and somehow I still feel so unforgiving toward the ADHD me.
