Suffering in Ignorance

For all of my adult life, I have dealt with the frustrating effects of ADHD. Most depressing of all was that I didn’t KNOW I had ADHD until I was over 40 years old.

I have tried so hard to do my best and failed for as long as I can remember. Disorganization and forgetfulness was frustrating to those around me. They thought I was lazy. I was having a really difficult time trying to decide weather they were right, or if there was a reason that I couldn’t change it, no matter how hard I tried.

Epiphany

A situation that could have easily cause our house to burn down opened my eyes to the realization that this wasn’t just disorganization, forgetfulness, and down-right laziness as I really was beginning to believed. Standing in the kitchen cooking dinner, I heard my toddler in the bathroom calling out to me because he needed my help. I walked into the bathroom/laundry room to help my little guy out and the next thing I knew, I was folding laundry that had just finished drying, dinner long forgotten. The realization of what had happened cause a complete meltdown. I couldn’t take it any more. I was trying so hard and and still, I was failing those I loved the most.

Time for Action

I started doing research, starting with the book Driven to Driven to Distraction (Revised): Recognizing and Coping with Attention Deficit Disorder.

I couldn’t believe what I was reading. Was this guy reading my mind? Almost everything he said described me to a tee.

I visited my doctor and for many years, I was on non-narcotic prescription drugs for ADHD. Organization was still an issue, as did focus. Life became more manageable, however, and my stress level went down significantly.

Sometimes Surviving is Not Enough

Recently, I had a major career change. I loved this new job. However, I quickly discovered that the prescription I was on was not doing enough. The demands of a corporate job required more focus than the medication was providing. I felt like I was drowning. And my new manager (Let’s call her Kathy) was working with the assumption that I had a normal brain. Ha! So was I, for that matter. I began to worried the relationship was going to be difficult and challenging.

New Information

During a conversation with a friend who also suffers with ADHD, she told me that she was taking a time-released prescription amphetamine. I began doing more research. I read some information online, watched some documentaries, and talked it over with my husband.

After much internal turmoil over the issue, and having weighed the pro’s and cons, I went back to my doctor. With her advisement I decided it was time to try this avenue with the hope that it would allow me to be productive to my fullest potential at the new job.

A Coach Makes All the Difference

My doctor started me off with the smallest dose and gradually increased it over the next new months. I decided it was time to sit down and have a discussion with Kathy. I told her everything; about the ADHD, my struggles with keeping my head above water, and the decision my doctor and I had made.

That was all it took. This amazing woman started working with me to find a system that would help me in staying organized and keeping track of things. She has been very instrumental in helping me. I appreciate her immensely.

For the first time, I felt like a fog had lifted; one that I had never know existed! I believe the drug was the second important component in changing my life. The first, and most effective was an incredible person that God brought into my life.

I have seen it stated repeatedly that having a life coach is very important to the success of someone with ADD or ADHD. If you truly love someone with ADHD, there is a way you can help. I am not telling you to enable them. This is not an excuse to justify their issues. They have to genuinely WANT to change. In my case, I did want to change. I just didn’t know where to find a coach.

Natural is Always Better

I want to make it clear; my hope is to stop taking all prescription drugs at some point. If you are just starting your journey (for yourself or with someone you love), I hope you are able to start with a natural course of treatment and find a good coach. I really believe a great coach (Thank you, Kathy. Your an angel!) is the most crucial piece of the puzzle.

Consult your doctor. Make an educated decision that’s best for you. Don’t try to figure this out alone and suffer in silence. I hope you find success. I pray for an end to your frustration. Its time to reach out and let someone help.

Those that were close to me were often unable to help. They were too close to the situation. Frustration, anger, impatience, and resentment will have no place in the coaching process. There are many books and resources out there for coaches. I am sure that Google and Amazon have a lot to offer on the subject. 🙂

Lord,

Please be with your dear child who is reading this blog post. Open the doors and give them the tools that they need to find the peace and support that they need.

In Jesus Name,
Amen

Communication: Bridging the Gap — Communication Gap

The Problem with Communication

Communication word picture: You are standing on a bridge that spans a great chasm. Your spouse is standing in front of you, facing you. A hundred or so feet separate the two of you and the bridge is completely missing in between. No matter how loudly you try to talk, your spouse cannot hear you. You get so frustrated because you can hear them just fine.

This “word picture” reminds me of the communication gap that a lot of us find ourselves in these days in our marriages. The reason for divorce is often rooted in this issue. The problem isn’t that our spouse doesn’t hear us. It’s that neither one of us are truly listening.

The Reason

Why do we do this? It’s because we are so scared that our own needs won’t be heard and met that our whole focus is consumed with getting our message out instead of giving at least equal attention to the message our spouse needs us to receive. We have been hurt and/or offended, and it makes us feel insignificant; like we don’t matter.

No matter how much we have been hurt by our spouse, they have also been hurt by us. It is so hard to see this through our own pain and frustration.

We live in a world that is filled with narcissism. A large portion of our young adults seem to have this sense of entitlement. Book shelves are filled with SELF help books. Our entire social media world is founded on SELFies. In this world, it is pretty easy to think of ourselves as less self-centered than society as a whole, but are we really?

SELF assessment is not the easiest thing to accomplish. Putting ourselves in someone else’s shoes takes objectivity when the situation involves us. This is hard to do. But it is completely necessary to remedy this problem.

Perfect Example

My husband and I will be celebrating our 19th wedding anniversary this November, and we have been together for 25 years. In the midst of five children, we are just now really starting to grasp the communication thing.

A couple of days ago I was having an unusually stressful day: A very close friend of mine was at the hospital with her son who was admitted for some very serious symptoms, one of my children had accidentally charged an item to a wrong account and caused an overdraft, I was in the midst of preparing for a rather large event our family has coming up, and it is officially August, so as a school teacher my mind starts racing about the upcoming school year.

My husband and I were texting and I was telling him all of my woes. His response was “Welcome to my world. We need to stop worrying somehow.” Although I have always felt like I was a pretty empathetic person, this really gave me new insight into what life was like from his perspective. He has always been a worrier by nature. I am not, so this was a relatively unfamiliar experience to me. The knot in my stomach, the restlessness, the muscle tension.

I told him that for me, having a few minutes each day to talk to him about it would be really helpful. His reply was “K. I have so many chores to do when I get home. Then I am exhausted and just want to veg.”

The Solution

Shortly after this exchange, I was out running some errands and listening to my favorite Christian radio station (Family Life Network) in the car. The daily broadcast of Focus on the Family was on and it was uncanny how applicable it was to our situation. Going from ME focus to WE focus. I STRONGLY encourage you to listen to this broadcast:

Working Together as a Team in Your Marriage

Moving away from the ME mentality toward the WE mentality makes all the difference in the world. Bridging the gap takes working together and actively listening; not just hearing.

The broadcast linked above talks about taking 10 or 15 minutes a day just to connect with each other. Like many other things in our lives, motivation is the biggest problem. It’s not that we don’t want to spend time talking to each other. Frankly it is that there is no energy left at the end of the day. All we want to do is vegetate, right? But taking that 10 to 15 minutes a day to really connect can make all the difference in the world.

The couple being interviewed, Dr. Greg and Erin Smalley, have what they call an E-nuptual agreement. It is a mutual understanding that they will not let electronics interfere with their WE time. This goes beyond just the 15 minutes that they are talking each day. It extends to the time they are watching their favorite program together. I would venture to guess it includes date nights and any other time they have set aside to connect with each other. Technology is a wonderful tool, but just like any other tool, it can be grossly misused and cause tumultuous impact on our relationships.

Most of what has been said in this blog entry and in the broadcast linked above is probably not anything new to most of us. But it is always a good reminder and something we need to focus on more deliberately in our day-to-day relationships, especially our marriages.

Amy L Sutton

Category Archives: Marriage

Controversy Within