Facebook and ADHD

I'm sure a lot of my friends have notices, I tend to post often, usually several times a day. I think this is part ADHD and part my psychology. I'll take the last bit first. For a long time, I felt like I have no voice, that no one listens to me. I've always felt a bit invisible, at home or in school. I've been ignored for so many years. So now that I have facebook, I want to be heard. Always when I post, one part of me hopes people will read it and at the same time notice me. I always feel so fantastic, when people like or comment. It means they noticed what I have to say. I really am a somebody.

The ADHD part is pretty simple. Part of having ADHD is poorer control on our emotions. If we have 10 different emotions a day, it's pretty boring day. So that also causes us to easily respond with emotions. And Facebook posts often have some form of emotional influence. I often post something when I'm happy, hyperactive or excited.

I've been in lots of ADHD support groups and I can say, that those are VERY active. I can't keep up with the posts. Even in a group where there are only handful of people, it's pretty common to get five posts per day and the talking in them is very active. And one post can easily have couple hundred comments. They usually start at the topic, go round the world couple of times and sometimes ends in the original topic. Our slogan "ADHD, highway to, hey look a squirrel!" is very accurate! We get distracted on a drop of a hat!

I'm doing bit of a squirrel thing now. I also want to change my facebook picture pretty often. I tend to curb that impulse, but I do update it every couple of months, or if I get a cool new pic. 

Another add. I always try to read the whole newsfeed. It's important to me to know what and how my friends are doing, but I also want them to know, I read them. There was someone who took the time to read your post and noticed it.

Perception vs Reality

I've gotten some comments in the past month. Three of those stuck to my head: I'm strong, calm and I've got stable and healthy mind. I've got to say that I don't own any of those things! But it's how people see me. People see me as strong, because I have to keep going no matter what. They don't see me crying in bed for hours because I just don't want to face the day. It hasn't happened often to me, maybe twice in the past two years. But I do have days like that. People just see me keeping my head high and pushing forward. They don't know that I don't have the option of being weak. I haven't had people to ask for help in my life. I've had to learn how to survive through shit on my own. I've started learning on how to lean on other people now, on how to ask for help. It's still not easy.

I've lived through too much. I haven't had easy childhood. Teenage was pure hell. On top of normal stuff, I was physically very sick and I had ADHD. I guess my tolerance for shit has gotten pretty high after all of that. I've had to survive all of it. Not just learn how to cope with it all, but survive and thrive. I've got a lot of scars. I have lots of problems still, I've got four phobias and several fears, including fear of abandonment. I'm terrified of being forgotten and replaced. It keeps happening in my life over and over again. I'm an awesome person. I'm warm, open hearted and minded, I care fully about others, I don't judge anyone, I'm really good friend, I'm one of the most loyal people in the world, I always look for the good and I'm pretty and intelligent. But I'm not loud and beautiful. I'm not remarkable at anything. I'm average. It's very easy to overlook me.

Few days ago my coworkers told they were surprised to learn I've got ADHD. They said I was too calm for that. They have some experience in ADHD. I think all of my coworkers have basic training on learning disabilities. People who know me a bit see how I'm really not. I tend to jump in my place when I've got to wait for something and should be still. I run around for no reason sometimes. I like walking instead when I could just call. Once at my work place, I ran the stairs up and down three times just because. My coworker was a bit taken aback by that.

Here is a song that's been stuck in my head for a while. It's beautiful, the lyrics, the melody and music video. I just wanted to share, if anyone is reading this. Snow Patrol - In the End

Insights into Life

I've been doing a role as Joy. Her name is Ilona and she represents the childlike happiness, joy and live in the moment spirit everyone has. In the play, different types of personalities are represented as people and how they interact with each other. Joy is the most ignored and everything else tries to push her aside. There is a point to me sharing this. I was once talking with a friend of mine about the role and he noted that my acting in it was natural. It's very easy to overdo it or make it a caricature. This brings to what I've been thinking lately. I'm very upbeat and happy person. I don't get blue easily, that takes a lot of stress! I haven't always been this way. I used to get really upset over mistakes I've made and situations that went horribly for me. I don't know how or when it changed. Nowadays, if I make a mistake, I laugh about it. Like today, I had some lines go really horribly wrong, but I just went backstage and started to laugh about it. There isn't really anything else I can do. I can't change what happened, I could let it bother me, but I choose to learn my lesson and move on. It took me a long time to get here, but I'm glad I've gone through the journey. I choose to believe I'm human and with that I make mistakes. It's unavoidable, but my job is to control how they effect me. I can just do my best, work hard and learn.

I take joy out of small pleasures. I live in the moment, so it's easy to stop and smell the roses. Or in my case, smell the lilacs. I always stop to smell them. I love eating. I love cooking food that's good and surprisingly healthy. I love exercising as well, dancing to music. I fill my days with these. I admit that being happy person, it's easy to find stuff to be happy about. And I never tell anyone how to live their life. I will never tell depressed person to smell the roses. In my experience, they do, but it doesn't give the same pleasure as it does for me. Their brain chemistry works differently, so things that work for me doesn't work for them. But I do want to remind people to be more in the moment. Often things that create most stress are in the future. Part of the problem is waiting until you can do something about it. Only thing that helps is to stop and look around. What kind of weather is it? What does outside look like? Is there anything beautiful out there? What about inviting a friend over for a coffee? The moment is often good. People just forget to stop for a second.

Some Observations

I've been taking bigger dose of Concerta again and boy am I feeling it! I've got opening night coming up next week and I am super nervous. I'm normally not this nervous, not even last year. It's normally this excited nerves, now it's just really anxious nerves. I am thinking Concerta and stress don't mix so well with me. I know for some (a lot?) people it helps with stress control, but apparently I'm not one of them. I don't know if this would settle, since it takes about two weeks for the body to get used to new doses and drugs, but I don't think I can take the risk. With lower dose, I don't function as well as I would with this, but this nervousness is killing me. I have to regulate my breathing everyday so I don't have a panic attack and concentrate of doing relaxing stuff like singing. Well not concentrate but do more of them and just them. And I eat more chocolate! I usually consume lots of chocolate, but with Concerta I don't crave it anymore. Well except now.

I've got to say I'm really excited about the play. It's not "normal" play, it's 7 small plays in one. Each one has different actors, directors and writers. They usually have some form of theme, like this year it's the mind. Each writer has done their own interpretation on the word and gone with it. Well, this year we had bit of an actor shortage. We had more plays and parts than usually, and we didn't have that many new people coming so one actor is in more than one role. I've got two. I'm lead in first play. Then I'm in another play as supporting role sort of. I find it bit funny that in this second role I've got more lines than in the one I'm lead role. I've got just couple of lines in that one, but I'm on stage almost every minute of it. Yesterday we had practise with all the plays and it was the first time I felt like I'm acting since starting rehearsals. We finally had some audience and it felt more real. Some might find this a bit weird, but I felt less anxious on stage. I actually felt really calm. This is what I'm supposed to do! Rehearsals have completely different energy. It's more fun in a way but there is something missing. But when you have an audience, it's home! I hope everyone will experience this once in their lives. It doesn't have to be acting, but that something which is their thing. It resonates in your soul.

State of Being

There is one state of being I really hate and that's being tired and bored! Being bored with ADHD is both really easy and difficult. We can come up with lots of stuff to do really quickly but sometimes it's a killer. Like right now. Bored is better to handle when you're not tired, because you can just think of something to do. But when tired, I can't do anything. Being tired makes ADHD bit worse. I loose the little concentration ability I normally have. So that means if I start watching it, I'm going to get very distracted in about 5 minutes. I'm bored again. Being bored would be OK if I had the energy to stay focused for a while. Now I'd sort of like to go out, but my body doesn't want to move from a very comfortable position in my computer chair (yes it's possible to be in a very comfortable position in these). And my body hurts from yesterday's practise. We had some on stage fight lessons. It was lots of fun but my back really hates me right now. It's screaming for a massage.

Being tired of stimulants isn't fun either. I can't take naps with them. My body just doesn't slow down. Although I've learnt a lesson here, don't take stimulants day after a new workout  routine.

This will be a short post because I can't concentrate on writing. I just want to sleep. But I can't..

Side Note about my Language

I would like to remind that English isn't my native language. It's second or foreign language depending how the way it's counted. I have very high proficiency level in English and I studied English language in university but I only started learning it when I was 9. I sometimes use more English than my native Finnish and I've got lots of friends who I speak in English and some native English speakers as well. But I do get confused with idioms sometimes and correct prepositions. But to be fair I get them confused in Finnish as much as I do in English. I can never remember which idioms are in which language! Some are very similar and sometimes I translate one into the other and I get really confused because it sort of sounds right but not quite. And my pronunciation is pretty good as well! People often have hard time believing I'm Finnish because I don't have the normal signs to say so. People often expect us to sound like Kimi Räikkönen or Mika Häkkinen. Not all of us do! And I have gotten quite a few questions on how long have I been in Britain. I apparently have at least slightly British way of pronunciating words.

Me and Weird Experiences with ADHD

I had to take off a week from ADHD meds. I was feeling a bit weird. I get like this when I have an infection and I thought I had something, but my blood test came normal. I did have slight cold but not bad enough for this kind of reaction. But it was an experience! I definitely noticed the difference. Doing normal stuff took so much more time than with meds. Preparing dinner was a nightmare! I would constantly forget things, go back and forth between kitchen, computer and forgetting the timer. Forgetting to put right things in right places at the right times. I don't think I used ANY seasoning on my food! I forgot half the ingredients in the store. Using lists never helped me since I kept forgetting to do the list, take the list with me or check it. The chaos in my life and head was a lot worse. I like a bit of chaos, but now with the meds I've grown used to less of it.

Another thing: I don't count any of my health issues as bad things or curses. I know many people feel even having one of these is horrible. Especially with ADHD. So many feel that it's a curse. I don't know if it's how I was raised or my own personality, but I don't think it as a bad thing, nor a good thing. It just is. It gives and takes like anything in life. Nothing is perfect but the attitude towards everything and anything is the thing that matters the most. There are days when I curse having diabetes or hypothyroidism or ADHD, but those are just bad days and they go away on their own. Then there will be a good days! I've had diabetes so long that I don't really actively think about it anymore. Most of the processes are automatic, like counting carbs and correcting for them, taking insulin, and staying consious on how I feel. I've had it so long I can recognise signs, ok now I*ve got high or low blood sugar. And I can have some fun with it. One of the funniest things for me is BS. It's short for blood sugar. I think getting diabetes at such young age really affected how I think about health malfunctions. My body hasn't worked like most people's since I was 8. So getting different diagnoses isn't too shocking for me. I get the initial shock yes, but after that it's just, ok I've got this, lets go back to normal life! I'm glad I'm like this. It makes my life so much easier! I do worry about some normal stuff, but I rarely get hang up on them. I refuse to let myself get that way. Life is very stressfull as it is, I don't need to create more stress. So much of that stress is created by the person. I can choose to let it go on, or think and worry about it. I'm not perfect in that aspect. There are certain things that I can't get over just like that, especially things that involve other people or waiting. I'm hopeless at waiting! And I always listen to people who have problems, but my patience runs out when they come to me about the same problem several times a week expecting me to fix it, when it's their thing. I'm their friend, I offer advice and any help I can give, but fixing big issues is their responsibility. Unfortunately there are people like this..

I got bit off track again! What attention problem?

Environment

This time this is gonna be bit different. Well I'm always writing what's on my mind and I've been thinking about this a while. Especially since I hang out with international students quite a bit and sometimes they aske me things because I'm Finnish. This has come up few times.

Sometimes people get amazed about my environmental consciousness. I recycle. I don't use one particular shop because they move some of their merchandise across the world. If I can, I buy Finnish foods. It's not possible with a lot of fruits and I love fruits but vegetables are always Finnish. I sometimes buy slightly more expensive Finnish items, rather than Swedish one. I love food market in the summer! I have my own bags for carrying groceries. We Finnish tend to know a bit more about recycling, but most don't bother too much with it. If the recycling place is close then yeah. But my apartment building only recycles cardboard, mail type papers, bio, and regular garbage. For glass, clothes, dangerous material and metal, we have special places but they are a bit far off, and some items weight a lot!

I've been raised in a school that was part of something called Globe. It later become ENO, Environment Online. There is a bit of a joke in there, because it was created in a small town called Eno. Anyway. It's about taking environment. We took readings, like lake temperature, how much rains in a day, the air temperature, this sort of thing. Well at least back in my day we did those. It was part of my summer homework! I think it's changed a bit in the last 15 years. We were also taught how to make our carbon footprint as small as possible. I liked all those classes and that it stuck with me. A lot of us haven't been keeping up with this. I like knowing I'm doing my part in this world.

Carbon footprint is about small choices. Walking or biking small distances rather than going by bike. Taking public transportation. Buying local foods. Even growing some yourself. Lowering the room temperature by couple of degrees. Donating or selling old stuff. Recycling, especially bio material.

The Doctor

Alright so my conclusion is that the eleventh Doctor has ADHD. And why do I think this? This might contain some spoilers for season 5. I'm writing either very specific, quotes, or very general, in a way it can be almost any episode. Well, does happen in almost every episode.

Reason one impulse control, or lack of it. I'm watching the Christmas Carol and seriously, a chimney! "Sorry, Christmas eve on a rooftop, saw a chimney and my whole brain went what the hell!" He always seem to be gathering stuff from around him as well. Remember the fez? Yeah he picked that up from a museum exhibit. There is a dalek on the loose trying to kill them and world is ending. He still has time to pick up a fez! And he's usually all 'do now, think later'. He comes with great plans and gets everyone out of trouble but with few hick ups along the way.

Concentration. He seems to loose the though sometimes, he does get it back but there is alot of wandering in the between. Off track comments "Now, this console is the key to saving that ship, or I'll eat my hat. If I had a hat. I'll eat someone's hat. Not someone who's using their hat. I don't want to shock a nun, or something. Sorry, rambling, because, because this isn't working!" or "Give me time and a crayon" No idea why a crayon.. Anyway. So what was I saying? Oh yeah he keeps jump around a bit in a room, can't stay still. He always sees something and goes over to it and plays a round a bit, in a sense oh what does this do. He has said he's easily bored. And he often gets stuck on new weird things when the world is ending around him. I sometimes wonder what would happen to him if he didn't have a companion shouting into his ear some sense.

Hyperactive. Yeah he can't sit still for a moment. Need I say more?

He sees things that other people sometimes miss and he looks at the world differently than others. This is something that happens often to people with ADHD. We can often look at simple, everyday things in new light because our perception works differently.

So my conclution is that ADHD people are pretty close to being Time Lord!
But seriously. Part of this can be explained by him being Time Lord. He literally sees the world differently. He can see time. He's lived about thousand years. He's got alot of stuff in his brain.

ADHD and seeing the world, or hearing it

I was told few weeks ago that I'm different person in a group situation than I am with three or less people. I hadn't thought about it before but I realised it's true. When I'm in a big group especially in a pub or other public venue, I am really quiet. I usually end up listening more than talking and I leave early. Here is part of the reason; when there are lots of people there is lots of stimuli. Several conversations, music on the background, other people walking about, noises of life. For someone who has ADHD it can be really difficult. It's like being in a dance club with everyone shoving you, loud music, flashing lights. Or in a room with dozens of tvs with sounds really loud. Or in a room full of people where people around you shout your name.
It's really difficult to focus on one conversation when words and topics from others are taking away my focus. I actually love dance clubs because I can focus better there. I can just let go and go with the music.
Anyway. Big social situations. Yeah I usually end up leaving early, because trying to focus on one thing and not everything can give a wicked headache. And even if I don't have a headache, I feel like my brain is malfunctioning. Well it is, but I can't really think anymore and it's overloading. It's bit better with medication though. But even those can't work miracles..

There is another reason why I don't talk in big situations. I have hard time getting word in. I can't talk on top of someone else, I just can't. I respect people too much to talk over them, especially when I can't get a word in. I don't want others to feel the same way. What they say matters! Smaller groups I can talk people's ear off. I can talk bit about everything. I still wish I could talk in a big group but I don't know if it's ever possible.