A Good Reason to Get Diagnosed....

I've heard several people say that they believe they have ADD but do not plan on seeking a diagnosis. There are many good reasons to get a doctor's say, but one you may not have considered is - FREE MONEY!

After my ADD/ADHD killed my law practice and cost me my license, I had to look for another line of work. The problem is that I had no money to pay for new training. Fortunately, I visited with Nebraska Vocational Rehabilitation. Turns out that I qualified as disabled for purposes of receiving funding for career training. Qualifying wasn't that hard, either. They went off of my therapist's and physician's opinions. Now, granted, my ADHD is pretty severe, if I do say so myself, but the point is that I didn't have to jump through a bunch of hoops like I would with, say, Social Security Disability. Instead, once they had confirmation of my diagnosis, they put me on the planning track. I chose computer training and received over $4,000 toward obtaining my Microsoft Certified Systems Administrator certification (the school scholarshiped the remaining funds). The lesson is that a diagnosis can serve many useful purposes and open doors you hadn't considered. So get to your doctor pronto!

Symptoms of adult ADHD, part II

From The Disorganized Mind, Dr. John J. Ratey lists the following as common symptoms of adult ADHD (must be persistent):

Trouble starting and finishing projects
Trouble organizing steps in a project, paper, letter, home, office
Trouble with memory - worry about Alzheimer's since the teen years; misplacing things, pirouette sign (coming back again and again for something you forgot)
World-class procrastination
Internal feeling of being antsy, squirming, restless legs syndrome all throughout body
Difficulty focusing, paying attention during a conversation, attending lecture, watching movie or reading a book
Impatient to a fault; finishing other people's sentences for them, drawing rapid conclusions, or breaking into conversations; episodes of road rage or extreme temper
Distractibility; spacing out

Symptoms of ADHD

Someone asked me what are the symptoms of ADHD. There are so many it is hard to list them all. Instead, I quoted him the list given in 10 Simple Solutions to Adult ADD. Symptoms include:

having mood swings
abusing substances
putting too many activities on your schedule
making a lot of to-do lists and never using them
getting lots of speeding tickets
having feelings of not living up to your potential
chronically procrastinating
impulsively taking risks
having difficulties finishing projects
frequently losing items
having a quick temper
having problems with organization
having a series of marriages
impulsively quitting jobs
changing jobs frequently
lacking friends
having difficulties managing money
having low self-esteem
being underemployed (working below your ability)
disliking traffic so much that you will drive out of your way to avoid it
interrupting people

ADHD is not a lack of attention. Rather it is trying to pay attention to too many things at once and thus failing at all of them.

Militant Vigilance

In his forward for The Disorganized Mind, John J. Ratey, M.D. mentions that "militant vigilance" is necessary for ADHD sufferers to deal with their deficits. I can definitely attest to this, as it is the one area in which I am sorely lacking. The simplest tasks seem impossible because of my inability to maintain this vigilance.

For example, the other day I was involved in a discussion with other attorneys about ADHD. A very well-meaning person suggested that problems with missing court hearings and deadlines could be solved by using a PDA to record dates. Unfortunately, I knew from personal experience that having a PDA and calendaring software did not help me, because often I never made the proper entries in my calendar. I would be on the phone or opening mail, but I would be distracted and would not record the pertinent information at that moment. Yet if I did not write it down right away, the information would be lost and I would get a call from a judge a few weeks or months later asking where I was.

Something is missing, and it's not the tools. It's an awareness issue. Yet even that is insufficient to describe it, because sometimes I'm aware that I should write something down and yet I can't get myself to do it. This ties into something Nancy Ratey, the author, discusses in Chapter 7 on Impulsivity. People with ADHD often have an inability to learn from past mistakes. They lack a "working memory or judgment or a way to evaluate consequences...." Nancy mentions this in the context of ADHDers speaking without thinking, but I think it fits with my issues also. Of course, it seems counterintuitive to think of sitting and not doing something (like recording a phone call) as impulsivity, but the working definition by Ratey seems to fit.

Anyway, all thoughts on this subject are welcome.

Books I am Currently Reading

The Disorganized Mind, by Nancy A. Ratey, Ed.M., M.C.C., S.C.A.C.
10 Simple Solutions to Adult ADD, by Stephanie Moulton Sarkis, Ph.D.
Living with ADD: A Workbook for Adults with Attention Deficit Disorder, by M. Susan Roberts, Ph.D. and Gerard J. Jansen, Ph.D.
Organizing Solutions for People with Attention Deficit Disorder, by Susan C. Pinsky

My Attention Deficit Disorder

I decided to create a blog to discuss adult attention deficit disorder from the point of view of someone who suffers from it. I call it "100 Televisions" because talk show host Tammy Bruce once said that ADD was like "having 100 televisions playing in your head all at once." ADD ruined my career as an attorney. I hope that this blog will help others as well as myself cope with our ADD.