A little more detail

I decided today would be a great time to go more in-depth about what it’s like to suffer from ADD. First of all, there are people who believe this disorder isn’t real and is being made up to sell drugs. I’ll tell you that it’s not and that anyone who says that doesn’t understand how it works. I’m not some stupid, hyperactive kid that’s too dumb to pay attention, no, I’m just a guy who has trouble filtering out all that juicy data my senses take in. You don’t even notice it, but you’re ignoring millions of little things right now. You’re ignoring them because your brain is going “hmm, maybe I should ignore that because it probably isn’t going to kill me, eat me, or be on the test.” My brain doesn’t work like that when I’m off the drugs. My brain takes in everything it can. As a result, it’s hard to concentrate because only some of what I’m focusing on is making it through (because the brain is not designed to take in so much at once) which often times causes me to space out and forget what I’m doing.

 

So for those of you who don’t have real ADD, I’m going to try to explain what it’s like. I want you to imagine that someone assassinated all the periods.

 

So everything is sort of like this where it all runs together with nothing stopping it or separating it and it’s impossible to tell where to stop going on running forward without commas or exclamation marks question marks or even a single colon it’s maddening and frustrating and you can’t tell where one sentence ends and another begins and you can’t remember the beginning of the sentence at all and thus this no longer makes sense and you’re confused and why can’t I see the puppy mommy and then there’s just all kinds of

Stop, hammer time

Yeah so, ADD. I guess you probably need me to explain a bit more. Well, ADD is kind of like a sketch comedy show. You see one thing and it’s like the funniest thing in the world and then maybe you see the next thing and it’s not so good, but then you forget the funniest thing but it doesn’t matter because you see something new and… this metaphor is actually making me dizzy enough to vomit, so I’m going to move on. Basically, ADD is just mentally hopping from one thing to the next at random and hoping one of these things is what you’re supposed to be paying attention to. Unfortunately, you’re brain—being the fucking genius it is—makes up shit based on what you see between these little jumps.

For example, you hear this: “George Washington Carver… French Revolution” and your brain does this “George Washington Carver was the French Revolution.”

George Washington Carver is, the French Revolution

Surely you’d remember coming to a conclusion this ridiculous right? Well, no. No you don’t. Because by the time you take the test, you’re not thinking “that’s incredibly silly.” It’s been far too long since you heard that mixed information and you don’t remember that it’s miss-matched. No, all you remember is “George Washington Carver and the French Revolution” and this isn’t something at the forefront of your mind or something you could even think more in depth about, no this is something that pops into your head the second you see the two together. You make the connection even though at one point you knew it was wrong and you get a bad mark on the test and everyone hates you and… and…

Technical Difficulties, please stand by

 

Oh, where was I? Right. So you fuck up and think you’re dumb. That’s about it I guess. ADD is a long string of goofs related to tests, quizzes, people’s names, and life in general.

So I’m sure your last question is “how do you live with it?” and the answer is, patience, understanding, good role models/parents/legal guardians, and the willingness to overcome the odds.

Just kidding, it’s actually just lots of drugs. Lots and lots of drugs.

Psychiatry at it's finest