Understanding, Accepting and Embracing your ADD

Understanding your ADD

Pretty easy to understand ADHD, just badly behaved kids, no it's hyperactive kids, no it's hyperactive and inattentive boys, no girls too, oh yeah adults as well, they are also impulsive and inattentive and they also have problems with focus, procrastination, emotions, planning, organisation - they also seem more at risk of addiction, depression, anxiety, divorce, being jailed. It's the parents' fault, society's fault, too many video games, just lazy, indulgent. Drug them, don't drug them, they are hunters not farmers, disordered, failures, even indigo coloured!

I have read a lot, talked to many ADHD adults, have it myself and I am still pretty confused. But however you see ADHD, it is certainly complex, involves neuro-chemistry, neurology and genetics. If you wish to gain control of your ADD, you have to first understand it as much as possible. So read books, web sites, magazines; observe yourself and others at support groups, listen to and debate with the professionals - your psychiatrists (be gentle with them they are quite sensitive!) and coaches, figure out how it affects you. Everyone with ADHD has different challenges and strengths, so become an expert in your own ADHD. 

Understanding means mending low self esteem after years of criticism, understanding means gaining new insights into what may finally work for you and most importantly understanding means new hope.

Accepting your ADD

There seem to me are two sensible decisions to make about our ADD/ADHD challenges and issues. We can:

1. Accept that we have a problem and find an ADD-friendly approach or strategy to overcome or manage it
2. Accept we struggle with something and decide to live with it and stop worrying/beating ourselves over it

A third option - of struggling with an issue, doing nothing about it and constantly feeling frustrated and unhappy with yourself - doesn't make much sense to me. This option leads to lower self-esteem, depression and even self-loathing. I know these bed fellows well but now that I know I am ADHD, I am working on acceptance of my challenges. I finally have an explanation for being late, bored and emotional - it's due to a lack of dopamine based stimulation and an impacted future-sense, so I can start to devise strategies to overcome my challenges and accept myself.

The best strategies focus on taking action and maintaining routines. There is far too much ADD advice that fits in the "100 simple steps to tidy your bedroom" category. Most ADHD adults do not lack for knowledge in how to tidy or organise, they don't even always lack the motivation to make changes but they struggle with doing things, or activating themselves to tasks. So focus on how to make things more interesting, how to develop and exploit existing habits, how to avoid overwhelm, how to reward yourself, how to find easier ways to start tasks and activate yourself, and then find the routines and habits  to keep doing them! Grasp the basic rules and then apply then to your unique situation to create your own approach, and avoid those annoying lists!

Embracing your ADD

The business of medicine is to identify and define "illness" and to offer solutions, usually in the form of medications and therapies. ADHD brings many traits, some make living in today's world difficult and bring along co-morbidities such as depression, school/work issues or addictions. Consequently medicine has defined ADD as a disorder and only those with ADHD traits that "severely impact" their day to day life are considered ADHD. All the research is focused on these negative ADD traits.


The science is pretty clear that ADD is a genetic difference, nearly as inherited as height. ADHD minds are at one end of a spectrum of several mental traits, so let's draw a parallel with the end of the spectrum of height. Being very tall can bring some problems:  bad backs and difficulty finding clothes to fit - but some benefits too such as seeing over people's heads and being good at basketball.  If height was invisible (please bear with me on this!) the medical profession would probably focus on the tall people with bad backs and determine that being tall is a disorder, all the science and all the attention would be on the back pain and the comorbidities of not finding shoes that fit and banging your head on doorways, medicine would ignore the advantages of reaching higher shelves and clear views at the cinema. So it is with ADHD.

With the "disorder of ADHD" we have minds that are constantly seeking stimulation, less constrained by other people's rules, often have great energy and enthusiasm and are always seeing the big picture as details are boring. If you imagine millenia ago, tribes folk hanging out in their valley, it looks obvious that is was the bored, rule-breaking, big-picture seeking ADD ones who decided to check out the valley over the hills.  It also appears that in ADD we spend more time in theta waves and that the "right" brain hemisphere, responsible for pattern recognition, intuition and creativity is more dominant.  The overwhelming anecdotal evidence is that ADHD features exceptionally highly in creative, funny, inventive, intuitive and passionate people. The signs are everywhere: in the celebrities we see on films and TV,  in the histories of scientists who made radical inventions, in the profiles of entrepreneurs, carers, explorers and artists too.

But whether you have special ADD traits or simply talents that have been buried under your ADD problems, life is infinitely more enjoyable engaged in our passions and purpose. So stop banging your head against the wall in trying to overcome your neurology but rather figure out what stimulates you, what you enjoy, where you feel rewarded. Shift your life away from the difficulties and towards your unique strengths and talents. Live a life aligned to who you really are. Consider yourself a work in progress that needs constant tweaking, re-aligning, re-examining and re-purposing, and so live a ADHD life of wellbeing, health and happiness:  Understanding, Accepting and Embracing your ADD.

The Many Opposites of ADHD

Confusing Criteria
I believe much of the criteria used to diagnose ADD (like DSM IV) are quite confused and poorly defined. Even the name Attention Deficit is quite bizarre, when for some the problem is often an excess of attention - hyper-focus. I also dislike the disorder label too. Many of the wiser scientists and researchers define ADD as a mis-regulation of attention, which is better but still not on the money for me. I see people with ADD as being neurologically less-controlled, not necessarily a bad thing either. But this lower control of the brain means wider variation in which parts of the bain are dominant, which parts are more active and which parts are under-active. So many people with ADD show behaviours at opposite extremes, some are hyper-active physically, some not at all, some struggle with focus, some not at all. But the tricky thing with ADD is that many people move from one extreme to another, sometimes distracted, sometimes hyper-focused depending on the subject of interest (or boredom).

Wall of Shame

Ignorance is Pain

In the UK the current state of support and information about ADHD is a disgrace. ADD affects around 3 million adults, assuming around 5% of the 60 million poulation of the UK has ADHD. No figures exist but it is likely that fewer than five thousand adults (maybe fewer than two thousand) are currently diagnosed. This different ADD neurology leads in many cases to addiction, depression, anxiety, job loses, marriage breakdown, accidents and even jail. Simply being aware that you have ADHD, goes a long way to helping manage the symptoms and to avoid these troubles and to live a much happier and richer life. Ignorance is pain not bliss.

Admitting ADHD Exists

Acceptance is Painful

Many people (particularly it seems many journalists with ADD themselves!), have a problem admitting that ADHD exists. There is more experimental proof of the existence of ADHD than of any other mental difference, evidence in genetics, brain imaging and response to medications. Yet for many it seems to be almost painful to accept the reality of ADD/ADHD, why is this?

Brave Genes
I think, to accept that ADD exists, is to admit that nature and chemicals play a far more significant part than nurture or "strength of character" in peoples personality and success. That someone who is regarded as brave, was in fact dealt some "brave genes" at birth, that someone who works hard has better connections to their frontal lobes or that someone who is funny maybe lacks those connections contradicts many peoples deep help beliefs. Admitting that ADHD exists, is to admit that much of what people give credit for, admire and value is based more on genetic chance and neuro-chemicals than on effort or determination.

ADD Intuition

Subconcious Thought
Many people with ADD feel that they have deeper intuition than Neuro-Typicals (or Normal Types). I tend to agree, I certainly feel that my intuition is often accurate, insightful, intelligent and sometimes quite surprising. I discover that I feel a particular way, have a new view or reach an understanding only when I talk out loud about it. I may not previously have given the subject a single moment of conscious thought. I have not mulled over the idea - I have neither deliberated, cogitated, nor contemplated it before. But it seems that my non-conscious, un-conscious or sub-conscious (as I will refer to it from now on) brain has given the matter a great deal of thought. The idea or view has certainly not been consciously created or decided upon in the sub-seconds before the words come from my mouth.

”Has anyone ever told you that you are amazing? Well you are. You process vast amounts of information. You effortlessly delegate most of your thinking and decision-making to the masses of cognitive workers busily at work in your minds basement. Only the really important mental tasks reach the executive desk, where your conscious mind works. When you ask, “what are you thinking?” your mental CEO answers, speaking of worries, hopes, plans and questions, mindless of all the lower floor laborers."  “Intuition”, David G. Myers

NeuroTypical Blue-Eye Disorder

Introduction
I recently posted this on an ADD forum, I wanted to show the absurdity of the current name and diagnosis of ADD as a disorder. How ridiculous to have ADHD - Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder - but without hyperactivity or any deficit of attention! Doesn't Attention Deficit imply In-Attentive anyway? There are many positive traits with ADD, disregarded to date by medical orthodoxy and I wondered what it would look like if ADD people were minded to diagnose being normal (neuro-typical) as a disorder and listed the limitations of this "disorder":

NT/BED
A very common disorder affecting somewhere between 70-90% of the population. MRI and SPECT brain scans show the frontal-lobes to be over-active. The left-hand side of the brain over-develops during childhood resulting in executive functions asserting too much control over the dynamic and creative functioning of the brain. People suffering from NT/BED tend to be excessively ordered, focused on acquisitions, money and indulge in "dull" activities. There are two subtypes NT Blue-Eye Disorder, one where the disorder has a co-morbidity of blue eyes and the other subtype NT Blue-Eye/Other-Colour, where the co-morbidity is of not having blue eyes.

Reading to the Office

Memories
A memory of a strange behaviour of twenty years ago, hit me a few months after my ADHD diagnosis. I remembered how I used to read on the way to work but not in the usual "glancing at a newspaper on the train" kind of way. I lived in West London in my early twenties and worked as a COBOL programmer in Central London, by the embankment Tube station. I commuted into London every day, by taking a train ride to Waterloo Railway Station, then walked across the Thames to my office near Charing Cross. It took about an hour to get to work, fairly usual for working in London.

Non-stop reading
What was different and strange was what I did on the commute. I found it very boring sitting on the train for 30 minutes each day, but also the 25 minutes of walking bored me too. So I would read a book - all the way. I would start reading the book as soon as I left home, walking along the pavement, dodging lamp posts and post boxes to my local train station. I continued to read as I waited standing on the platform, as I got on and took a seat on the train. I read intently to Waterloo, then as I left the train I read my novel, still completely engaged as I walked up and down various stairs, as I crossed the narrow Hungerford Foot Bridge, passing slower commuters, down through Embankment Tube station, along a couple of roads to my office. I would stop reading for ten seconds to say hello to the security guy and then read again as I took the lift to the fourth floor, to sit at my desk and finally fold corner of the page and put the book away. The return home was the same in reverse, sometimes complicated by having to angle the book to get some light to read by in the evenings.

Under-exploited talent
I still do not know anybody else does this, read as they walk, passing people, negotiating stairs, dodging surprises on the pavement! I guess I was a little weird, another ADD coach told me recently that it's a talent! It certainly illustrates that ADD is not a deficit of attention but a difference in regulation of attention and the lengths we can go to to avoid boredom or low stimulation. Now I just need to think of some way to capitalise on this talent...

Neanderthals (ADHD) Genes

Neanderthals were the peaceful ones

What if our ADHD traits come from Neanderthal genes? Neanderthals were not the brutal violent cavemen depicted erroneously by Victorians. It appears they were red-haired and fair skinned, were quite peaceful, lived in matriarchal small tribes and were artistic and creative (just didn't paint cave walls). They were expert tool makers and the latest evidence is that they "died out" about 28,000 years ago. The evidence is pretty mixed up on inter-breeding with Co-Magnons but knowing how people so enjoy procreation, it is hard to believe there was none going on as the Cro-Magnons were killing out all the Neanderthals. Recent finds in Romania support the inter-breeding theory:

More human-Neanderthal mixing evidence uncovered
A re-examination of ancient human bones from Romania reveals more evidence that humans and Neanderthals interbred. Erik Trinkaus, Ph.D., Washington University Mary Tileston Hemenway Professor in Arts & Sciences, and colleagues radiocarbon-dated and analyzed the shapes of human bones from Romania's Pe'tera Muierii (Cave of the Old Woman). The team found that the fossils were 30,000 years old and principally have the diagnostic skeletal features of modern humans. They also found that the remains had other features known".. "among the preceding Neanderthals, providing more evidence there was mixing of humans and Neanderthals as modern humans dispersed across Europe"..."The team says that the mixture of human and Neanderthal features indicates that there was a complicated reproductive scenario as humans and Neanderthals mixed, and that the hypothesis that the Neanderthals were simply replaced should be abandoned." -Early Modern Humans from the Pe'tera Muierii, Baia de Fier, Romania" by Andrei Soficaru, Adrian Dobo¨, and Erik Trinkaus

Neanderthal Advantages
Suppose the "Neanderthal" traits served a useful purpose when constrained to a small proportion of the population (around 10%) but caused problems when too many in the tribe shared these traits. It seems that people with these character traits were probably attracted to find partners and friends who were similar. These characteristics were of being creative, interested in new things, funny, not keen on rigid tribal organisation or rules, empathetic, energetic mentally or physically and bored easily.

People with these Neanderthal traits would gravitate to roles such as explorers, hunters (not farmers), inventors, artists, cooks, story-tellers/jokers and carers. These roles and abilities are critical for the health of a developing tribe (and later a population), for it to survive, develop and flourish. Having some people that want to explore, find new ways to do things, who break the rules, find new solutions and who create the art, literature and music enjoyed by all is great, but only works if limited to a small proportion of the population. The tribe would fail if everyone wanted to explore, sing and break the rules. The bulk of the tribe or population needs to be getting on with farming, teaching, creating rules, running organisations, policing and making things.

Neandethal = ADHD
So here now in 2009, we have a name for these Neanderthals genetic traits, they are called ADHD. They affect around 5-10% of the population. It still seems that many of our greatest artists, film-makers, explorers, inventors, comedians, carers, entrepreneurs and writers are ADHD (even if the don't know it).

The Neanderthal/ADD traits are double-edged however and work better in some environments, they can give strengths and joys in the right areas but also problems and sorrows in the wrong (usually constrained) environments. The ADHD problems come from the need for stimulation, sometimes found in alcohol/drugs or in rule breaking through criminal acts. With a highly empathetic state comes emotional sensitivity and ADDers are more easily prone to depression and anxiety. Boredom causes problems for kids in school and homework, and students at College/University with planning and procrastination and for adults in sticking with jobs and careers. The "InTheMoment"ness of some ADDers helps them to be present and to focus intently and deeply but it also means less focus on the future and planning.

These undesirable problems, that come from these Neanderthal traits, are what the doctors see. Most doctors see people who are "ill" and think about disorders, not about different genetic mental traits. These doctors and psychiatrists are to date the primary documenters of ADHD, they see the "broken" ADDers and they focus on disorders and not strengths. We even sometimes have to exaggerate how broken we are in order to receive medications. Most of their books, such as by Dr Russell Barkley can be so right on the problems but remain oblivious to the ADHD strengths.

Cro-magnons need Neanderthals
These ADD strengths have helped mankind move out of the caves and given us many of our greatest achievements, in literature, arts, music and movies, in great inventions and scientific breakthroughs, in fighting unfairness and tyranny, in exploring and discovering the new and in helping and caring for others. I'm happy to be a Neanderthal!

More reading on the Neanderthal idea at http://www.rdos.net

One Minute Dishwasher Empty

I hate emptying and loading the dishwasher, but far rather use the dishwasher than wash dishes by hand. Emptying the dishwasher falls into the category of mundane home tasks that I hate. Also in this category are brushing my teeth, shaving, hoovering and general household cleaning, tidying and washing clothes - particularly hanging up clothes to dry.

I have always been an efficiency freak. It's as if I was born to be an ergonomics expert. If I can find a faster, shorter and easier way to do something, I will. I'm always studying what I do, to try to find ways to optimise my actions. Now in my forties I am very efficient at many tasks. Obviously I use an electric toothbrush,, though it still bores me to wait two minutes to brush my teeth. When I cook, I immediately review all the cooking tasks and start the longest task first and do as much in parallel as possible. I fill idle moments cleaning up or watching TV. I think I am a pretty good cook but I seldom spent more than 10 to 15 minutes actually cooking despite cooking everything from scratch including several vegetables.

But I believe my dishwasher ergonomic-performance is undisputed. I can empty my dishwasher in less than 60 seconds. I have optimised the storage of plates, pans, cutlery, glasses and cups in the cupboards around my dishwasher in such a way that I can remove each item from the dishwasher and put it away without moving my feet at all. There is no redundant walking around the kitchen to put away a single pan or glass. I moved recently and found that the cutlery tray was missing. At first I felt I had to buy a new one but then realised that I could simply tip the dishwasher cutlery holder straight into the draw with no sorting into knife section, fork section etc. A saving of at least ten seconds, Eureka!

Reviewing this behaviour after my ADD diagnosis, I realised what this was all about, why I was so efficiency minded. My ergonomic drive was based on several factors: (1) I suffer from low-activation, finding it very hard to initiate new tasks particularly those proving little stimulation to my stimulation-starved brain (2) Mundane activities bore me even more than they do others people, to the point of being painful, (3) Long boring tasks are a nightmare, it is far easier to tackle a low stimulation task if I can complete it quickly. So by optimising my cupboards to make emptying the dishwasher easier, I am far more likely to bother to empty the dishwasher at all.

ADHD Gift or Curse: the Debate

Currently there seem to be two philosophical (rather than medical) camps on this:

1. The “disorder” view - held by most in the medical establishment and many ADDers is that people with ADD have a disorder that causes many problems from under-performance in education and work, broken relationships to co-morbidities such as addiction, depression and anxiety. Doctors and ADDers here wish to externalise their ADD as a “disease” that they suffer from, an illness to be cured. ADD medications offer a partial, if temporary cure. The view is perhaps the simpler and less controversial view, it makes it easier to argue for help, aid and medical support for people with ADD.


2. The “disorder/gift” view - held by a number of authors, many ADD coaches and ADDers is that ADD is a neurological difference, not a disorder. The difference does bring with it the problems defined by the “disorder view” that may need medication and/or support but the ADD difference can also bring “special” traits, perhaps even advantages over neuro-typical minds. These traits include ability to hyper-focus, intuition, creative thinking (out-of-the-box, big picture, inventive), energy, humour, greater empathy and high-intelligence
   

I have wavered between the these two philosophical camps since my diagnosis a few years ago. But I do not see how anyone can be certain that either view is “correct”. There has been virtually no research as to whether there are advantages to ADD, the medical establishment is just not that interested in this area. For many doctors arguing the “disorder” model is understandably a much easier way to gain funding and support for patients than a more complicated “neurological difference than can cause problems” model would be! There is not much more that anecdotal evidence to support the “gift” view either. But even the statistics and evidence of the disorder of ADD are problematic. Without a specific genetic test, brain scan or blood test for ADD, no one has really pinned down what ADD is yet and who really has it, whether ADD is one disorder/difference or many.

I am not debating the existence of a set of characteristics found in a proportion of the population that we call ADHD (incidentally I hate the H in ADHD as I how can I have a hyper-activity disorder when I am quite usually lethargic and not remotely Inattentive!) but we do use a fairly simplistic subjective list of symptoms and characteristics that, for medical convenience, excludes people who have ADD characteristics but don’t have serious problems? Research indicates that 40% of people with ADD have had problems with depression, is that because the DSM criteria specifically rules out well functioning people with ADD? ADD shows some widely differing traits under/hyper-focused, hyper-active/slothful and some ADDers respond to dopamine, some nor-epinephrine and some to neither - I think diagnosis still remains more an art than a science.

I favour the “gift view”, as in my lifetime I have experienced my differences from other people, with not only negative but positive traits. Some close friends, also ADD, have very different kinds of ADD from mine. Some of thier challenges are different but some are the same. Some of their “gifts” are different but some are the same. I don’t tend to see these challenges or gifts to be as pronounced in non-ADD people. Some of our strengths seem to logically follow from having less executive control and perhaps more dominant right brains, though perhaps they are just our normal underlying characters? But if our neurology if different, would it not make sense that it would bring both bad and good attributes? It is not that our brains are smaller or don’t function, it is just that they are connected and wired slightly differently.

I coach ADD adults. I want to help them Understand what ADD is, to Accept the challenges it brings but also to Embrace their positive traits too. I do not want to deny or avoid the negative traits but to use experience, support, work-arounds, medication, supplements, sleep etc to help with them, but I also want to help clients (and me) to focus on what we do well, our strengths whether we call them “ADD gifts” or just part our innate character, I suppose it doesn’t really matter. I do want to encourage them to take the positive view: that ADD is a difference and not a disorder.

Book Stacks

No alternative
I started to read in earnest about the age of nine, kick-started by a three-year family move to France. TV was transformed from the exciting varied programs of English speaking channels, BBC and ITV to the excruciatingly dull studio discussion programs of French speaking RTF and Antenne 2 - my under-stimulated mind sought refuge. I discovered my Dad's extensive Science-Fiction collection, hundreds of books available for me to read and browse.

Next to my bed was a wide-shelf with a convenient switch for a side back-lit opaque glass panel. I would keep the books I was currently reading on this shelf. I usually read until tired, often way past my "official bed time", switching my light off when repeatedly told to my Mum or Dad, switching it back on again once they were safely out of sight. When sleepiness finally arrived, I would fold the corner of the page I was reading, so that I would remember my page the next day.

Sustaining Interest
I loved those Science-Fiction books by writers whose middle names were given only as initials, such as Arthur C. Clarke or Philip K. Dick - exciting ideas, amazing science, fast paced plots and complex stories. Despite this I could not always keep my interest active for long, normally somewhere around page 100 my interest would wane and I would become distracted by the other books in the bookcase. I would pick up and start to read another book, which then became my current book, relegating the previous book to my book stack. Yet again, my interest would wane and I would pick up another book.

The stack of books on my shelf would grow and grow and became more and more daunting as it grew to several feet in height – so many books to finish in a pile, threatening serious injury if toppled over! So I had a rule, when the stack reached twenty books, that was it - no more new books. I forbade myself from returning to the Sci-Fi bookcases. I had to clear down every one of my active twenty books before I allowed myself to even pick up another. Once the backlog of twenty books was cleared I could start again, which I of course I did, over and over again.

Book Rules
My rule on stack size did vary, over the years I reduced it to around five books. As an adult I continue to have this behaviour. In some ways it has become less manageable as I have never managed this level of control with non-fiction books. The non-fiction stack grows so large that books are returned half-read to my book cases with no completion date in site. Sometimes I pick them up again and finish them weeks, months or even years later, sadly some remain half-read to this day. Not because the book is uninteresting but simply because a brighter shinier one has caught my eye! When I was young it never seemed that odd to be reading multiple books at a time, picking up new books that caught my interest and having rules about stack sizes. But I didn't know anybody else who did this, occasionally a friend might remark on my stack, but it was just what I did.

ADD Systems
Now in my forties, with the knowledge of my ADD, it all makes sense. Having ADD means it is harder to sustain interest, I get bored quickly, usually much more more quickly than other people seem to. So I look for new stimulation and like to multi-task. I seldom get tired at night at a regular time, as my executive functions don't regulate my sleep hormones very well so sleepiness arrives between midnight and 3pm, regardless of how early I woke up. Once I reach a certain point in a new book, where I can see how it will probably develop, my interest diminishes and other book become more attractive. As a child, ignorant of my ADD, I invented a system to manage my ADD symptoms, the “twenty in a stack” rule, I think it worked pretty well. It is pretty common for people with undiagnosed ADD to unconsciously build work-arounds to their ADD challenges, sometimes pretty creative and innovative solutions too. I just wish I could apply it to my non-fiction books now.

Gift of ADD

ADD has caused me problems with work and relationships, brought me addictions and depression and prevented me from achieving goals - not that I have many goals as I find it hard to even contemplate the future. But if I had a button to press to remove my ADD, I would not press it.

I like my constant craving for new interesting things, my perfectionism, humour, out-of-the-box thinking, creativity and rule breaking. If my neuro-chemistry were returned to “normal” then I would lose these attributes too. Some might argue that these positive attributes are not part of ADD but they certainly are part of the “differences” package that has set me apart for nearly fifty years.

Even though there are no double-blind studies proving the benefits of ADD, lack of proof does not equate to non-existence. Dr. Barkley has not been looking for positives, nor have any other scientists - positives are pretty hard to test for.

I do however find that the usual lists of benefits for ADD seem to fit with the ADD people I know, much more so than for people without ADD. Maybe its a little like horoscopes - if you list flattering attributes then everyone will agree they have them? I also find it easy to “diagnose” people around me with “undiagnosed” ADD, as well as people in the media, authors, TV presenters, comics and actors in movies? It seems that their ADD got them those jobs in the first place, the ADD that makes them funny, engaging and interesting. I have found that I have unconsciously sought people with ADD as friends, colleagues and partners over the years. It seems it is common for ADDers to connect with other people with ADD, people who maybe talk quickly, humorously, alight on different topics and keep their boredom away?

Just because the ADD brain is different, it is not necessarily inferior. ADD brains are not broken, some parts are a little smaller, some parts a little bigger, some parts operate more quickly, some more slowly. Would it not be logical to conclude that this means people with ADD can do some things better and some things worse? The major difference in ADD is with our “weaker” frontal lobes, these lobes came late in evolution to help people operate in a tribe - to obey the rules, to be patient, to keep our emotions in check, to plan for the future. If our frontal lobes are less in charge it is inevitable that we will break rules, get bored and be more emotional. But then with weaker control it also seems inevitable that more people with ADD rule-breaking-boredom would become explorers, inventors, artists and comics? For mankind as a whole it is probably beneficial that 95% follow convention and the rules but that 5% break rules, connect new ideas, create and don’t conform. These people bring change.

The problem lies in part with medicine taking responsibility for defining ADD. Medicine defines everything as disorder or illness, that is the business of doctors, psychiatrists, pharmaceuticals and therapists. There is no scope (nor ever has been) for medicine to define strengths, abilities or attributes. If you review the DSM IV diagnostic criteria for ADHD, they mandate significant problems or disorders before you can even get a diagnosis. If ADD is a genetically inherited, neurological difference that brings both good and bad, then the doctors have immediately excluded all the functioning ADDers by their definition. This is deliberate selection of “disordered ADD” only. The well ADDers are excluded, they may have challenges but their strengths help them overcome them and survive in society. The doctors, including Barkley, have really not done any research on this, maybe one day they will but it seems likely that neuro-typical people would be reluctant to define experiments to prove that they do not measure up to people they classify as disordered? Some of Barkley’s statements have the feel of prejudice, it appears it would take an overwhelming amount of evidence to change his opinions.

Not every inventor or entrepreneur has ADD, nor is everyone with ADD an entrepreneur. It is fair to say that ADD people have different traits from normal (neuro-typical) people. Many of these traits cause problems but some can bring unique strengths especially if recognised and embraced. I like to think of my ADD as some kind of warped gift, one I do want but not exactly what I would have bought for myself if I had been given gift token and the full choice of brains available instead!

ADD Cooking with rules, connections and intuition

Recipes
I seldom, ever cook from a cookbook. But I am a pretty good cook, friends and family would probably say I am a very good cook. I do occasionally browse read cook books and watch cookery programmes on TV. My mother is a pretty good cook too. But when I cook, I look at what ingredients I have and work from them.

My cooking is often the better, the more challenged I am by my ingredients. I did a creative writing course recently where I was surprised how restricted we were in what we were allowed to write. I had been nervous that we would be given a blank sheet of paper and then told to fill it up. In fact the directions were quite the opposite. We were given strict parameters of place, characters, events and their sequence, yet I felt our ideas and imaginations improved if anything? I realised that creativity comes more easily from working within constraints than being given a totally open field to work in. The constraints are a "box" that lead to "out-of-the-box" thinking, something people with ADD excel at.

I hate lists
Other aspects of my ADD come into play in my cooking too. My short-term memory is poor and I hate lists, so the idea of memorising or writing down a list of ingredients for a recipe is neither practical nor appealing. Working from a recipe also runs counter to my rebellious, anti-authority disposition! I do not like to be told what to do, and tend to believe that I can do better than others. so I won't follow anyone's recipe too slavishly. I'm very happy to read their recipe, to learn techniques from their recipe, to take ideas from their recipe but never to completely it - I'll always add or change something. So I shop by buying what appeals to me, what stimulates me and what makes sense to me. Over the years I have got much much better at ensuring I purchase all the necessary ingredients for the next few days cooking.

Cooking Rules
When I plan a dish, and by plan I mean think about it for one minute before starting to cook it, I engage another ADD facility, "big-picture, non-linear" thinking. Over the years as I have cooked, I have assembled in my mind not the details of individual recipes, but the rules and the logic of tasty cooking. As with anything I learn, I struggle to remember the details. I cannot remember recipes or jokes, names and dates either, but I can remember the underlying logic, the structure, meaning and connections between and around things. Everything is connected in my mind, so it is with cooking, so I have learnt from my mistakes and successes, from recipes, from restaurants and from other people's cooking. I know what works, what ingredients go together, how best to cook vegetables to be healthy and taste good, what sauce best accompanies which meat, which spices work in combination, the typical ingredients are found in Italian, Chinese, French, Thai (etc) recipes. These rules are wired in my brain, refined and improved for over 30 years, cooking disasters are now rare, and my cooking gets better and better.

Healthy Eating
Recently as I have understood more of the science of healthy eating, my rules have broadened to ensure my cooking is healthier and healthier. Vegetables take a larger share of the plate and are more often steamed or cooked quickly, carbohydrates reduced and replaced by more beneficial proteins (for my ADD) such as oily fish. Organic vegetables are delivered weekly and provide more "unexpected" ingredients challenges such as what to do with so much beetroot! Juicing, organic foods, sprouted seeds, pulses, low-wheat and varied carbohydrates like brown rice and quinoa have crept in and then become a normal part of my staples. I am now stimulated to not just cook good tasting food but healthy meals with essential vitamins, minerals, oils and organic foods. My always experimental cookery has progressed to be very healthy as well as interesting, varied and hopefully delicious.

ADD Chef
My ADD brain desires new stimulating dishes and my ADD attributes of poor memory, inability to follow rules, creativity and efficiency have resulted finally in my becoming a pretty fair cook - who never cooks from a recipe.

ADD/ADHD Diagnosis

A Long Journey
I figured out that I had this weird neurological difference, called ADD/ADHD in my mid-forties, thanks to Wikipedia! It is not surprising that it took me a while to figure out that I am ADD, as I had to diagnose myself with no help whatsoever from any of the doctors, therapists or psychiatrists that I had seen over the previous few years. I had explained to them that I was sad for no particular reason and that I was deeply bored of life, work, home and myself. The doctors decided that I was depressed, despite my having few of the standard symptoms. But I wasn't classically clinically depressed. I was quite unhappy, disappointed with my life, my marriage, my work and myself. I had had addictions, felt stuck, drove everywhere too fast and hated rules and regulations. I was angry at the World for its stupidities, at politicians, institutions, the media and general selfishness. I was often very bored and found respite from tedium in computer and video games, on TV, the Internet and reading.

I was different
Living in the UK, ADD only ever featured in brief news stories about badly behaved boys with food allergies, so the doctors hadn't a clue, nor did I. But the difference was that I knew I had something different, it wasn't normal depression, there was so much more. I was different and always had been. Whether it was my easy boredom, bouts of intense work and concentration, my laziness, my focus when reading books, watching TV or playing computer games, my excessive talkativeness, my shaky hands, my poor memory, my constant drive to do things efficiently and quickly, my impatience, my constant craving for information and ability to learn rapidly, my inability to stick with anything long enough to become expert but the ease with which I took up different roles, my inability to plan or even consider my future - I just wasn't like other people.

I did what I do best, I read and researched. I studied psychology and particularly positive psychology, I trained in NLP, I had therapy and learnt therapy, I read neuro-science and finally I cracked it. Late one evening on Wikipedia I came across Sluggish Cognitive Tempo, then ADD, my whole World began to change. I was an adult with ADD. It then took me nine months, thousands of pounds and much frustration before I had my self-diagnosis confirmed by a Psychiatrist. I had a frustrating medications journey, culminating in tachycardia and haviing to stop taking stimulants. I then had multiple tests to find and then avoid allergens (wheat, dairy etc), to supplement for deficiencies (Zinc, Magnesium, Folic Acid, Vitamin D etc) and to take amino acids to help build my neuro-chemicals. Overall not as effective as Adderall but pretty close. I slowly realised over this period that there is no fix for ADD: medications and supplements can help, behaviour modification is worthwhile but I had a different neurology and I needed to Understand, Accept and Embrace my ADD, as I was going to have to live with it for many more years...

Tragedy of Undiagnosed ADD
I am now an ADD Coach, see my business site at www.simplywellbeing.com. I want to help other adults who are diagnosed ADD after many year of struggling with challenges that they and no one else appreciate. People who find the World around them to be so critical, that eventually they criticise themselves more than anyone else. ADD Diagnosis is a turning point for many, when they can start to re=evaluate themselves, their dreams, their place in the World and to appreciate their special strengths and to consider what it really takes to make them happy.