ADD

When I was 22, I found out I had Attention Deficit Disorder.

Well, that's not exactly true. I'd known for quite a long time, in the sense that I knew my brain worked differently from most other people's. That statement would be true even if there was no such thing as ADD, but that's beside the point. Anyhow, I knew that at the very core of how I think and how I divide my concentration, I tended to be different. It wasn't until I learned what ADD really was that I realized it applied to me. I always thought that ADD meant you couldn't concentrate at all, and the truth is, I have an amazing ability to concentrate, better than nearly every person I've ever met. That's not bragging, that's just how it is. But the problem is I can't choose what to concentrate on. Either something catches my interest, in which case it envelops me completely, or it doesn't catch my interest, in which case paying any attention to it is a massive chore that I usually tend to abandon until it becomes impossible to ignore (and often, even then). There is virtually no middle ground. Anything that looks normal concentration is just me pretending to care.

When I first found out, I was a little angry that I hadn't been diagnosed before. In many ways, aside from hyperactivity which doesn't tend to manifest itself in me except for hands that have to be constantly in motion, I've got all the classic symptoms. I'm messy, I can be impulsive, I like gambling, deadlines don't mean shit to me, never did my homework but did well on tests, seem to need constant stimulation and sensory input. But then I realized that if I had been given this label before I was ready to really understand what it meant, I'd have accepted it as a core deficiency and I think I would have failed to realize that there's benefits to it as well.

ADD is very misunderstood. It's both over diagnosed and under diagnosed. It really comes down to who is doing the diagnosing, and it's usually not someone with the knowledge or training to accurately diagnose it. For some, every single behavioral problem is childhood ADD. For others, they don't believe ADD exists and see any form of medication as mind control.

I'm bringing this up now because it's been on my mind lately. For several years after being diagnosed I was on Ritalin and Desoxyn. At the moment, I'm not, but not because I shouldn't be. I should. But a confluence of factors (ironically related to having ADD) I sort of went off it. I'm increasingly realizing this is a poor decision. I don't work as hard (the last couple months aside), my apartment is a huge fucking mess, I'm tired all the time. It'd be ridiculous to pretend Ritalin or any other med would magically fix that, but certain things are just easier when I'm on it, and I really should go back to it.

But the problem is having ADD makes it very difficult to get treatment for ADD. I have to find a new, more local doctor, but that involves things like paperwork and dealing with insurance and blah blah blah. I swear, I have an honest to god fear of forms. I can't stand them. Though in my previous job, I often had to design forms, and that was very pleasurable work, because I could make the form that I wanted to fill out. The non-scary form. The form that didn't ask ambiguous, unanswerable questions. The form that didn't make you feel like an asshole for not being able to fit your social security number in the half inch space provided. Medical forms are generally not like that at all. Medical forms are designed to make you feel retarded. I'm in awe of people that seem to effortlessly navigate through reams of paperwork, whether for loans, healthcare, fishing permits or whatever. To me, it's like being able to bench press a car.

None of this has anything to do with what I generally post about (sex and more sex). But it's been on my mind lately. I guess if I have a point (and it's really not safe to assume that I do), it's that I miss Ritalin. It's not a wonder drug, it didn't "cure" anything, didn't turn me into Superman nor turn me into a zombie. But things were just a little easier, and I miss that.