My Blog: ADHD Since 1978-

Halloween schedule

  As my faithful 28 readers know, I like to post schedules once in a while as a demo for my clients. Scheduling is one of the main skills we work on in coaching. After we learn to keep track of our tasks with the To Do List, we work on managing those tasks in time by using a daily schedule.   I’ve written much in the past about how and why I post schedules that an objective observer would deem a staggering success. I’ve also written about why I post schedules that have, to be kind, not at all gone according to plan. But, really, the point is that I view both of those outcomes as a success. Why? The very act of planning, of making a schedule, evaluating tasks, prioritizing, vetting the time something will take – even if I’m wrong- giving one’s self structure, following through on a plan, being forced to adjust and be flexible, dealing with curveballs, and making choices as we move through the plan are all tremendously valuable skills. Skills that you will get better at the more you do them.   AND ANY DAY WITH A PLAN IS GOING TO BE BETTER THAN A DAY WITHOUT A PLAN. Of course I’m speaking of productivity here. A totally unplanned, spontaneous day while you’re on vacation in Costa Rica might be amazing. But your average Sunday, when your list is as long as your arm and you stress level level is threatening to over take the levys, needs a plan.   The brief context here is that my wife was actually not working this weekend, for once. Yay! One kid was at my parents for part of the weekend. The other kid was wildly dysregulated and needed lost of support. And, there were some…

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The Now & Not Now of ADHD

  I’ve been writing a lot about mindfulness lately because I think it is so important for us ADHDers. And, yes, we can talk about meditation, yoga, certain forms of exercise, breathing, and countless other forms of mindfulness. But what do we really mean by mindfulness? To me, what we are talking about is being present in the moment.   This is one of those areas where ADHDers are mystifying to the rest of the world because we are one of two things that happen to be diametrically opposed. Many of us are going a mile a minute and are never really present in the moment. These ADHDers are always on to the next thing. They often forget what they’re doing, lose things, and don’t finish what they start. It is as if they are constantly being thrust ahead by a jet stream current that only they can feel.   But there are also ADHDers who are obsessively in the moment. They are like giant toddlers. The experience time as: yesterday, right now, and… later. And, all that really concerns them is right now. They don’t, won’t, or can’t plan for the future. As a result, they are often late, missing, or unprepared.   And, I don’t know, it may take an ADHDer themselves to realize that these two profiles can even be of the same person. These behaviors can exist simultaneously or at alternating intervals within the same ADHD brain. We are not all the same. And we are not the same all the time. This can be one of the hardest things for the world to understand about us, and a hard thing for us to know about ourselves.   So, am I just pointing this out in the hopes of creating greater self awareness? No. I have…

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Accommodations – extended time on assigments

It is a pretty standard accomodation to allow students with learning, processing, and attention issues extended time on tests and quizzes. But many school systems fight the idea of giving extended time for homework assignments. This has always driven my crazy. When talking with a student client yesterday I was finally able to fully articulate why this stance is insane. Generally, school will give students with accomodations time and a half. Of course that seems pretty arbitrary to me. But let’s assume it takes a kid 1.5 times as long to finish a test. Why wouldn’t you then assume that it would take them AT LEAST 1.5 times as long to finish most of their homework? So imagine a day when that kid has homework in all six classes and they have soccer practice. That kid may have a three hour window of medicated time after school or after practice to do homework. On a normal day that might be enough. But on this day, that kid has three hours of homework (normalized for a neurotypical kid.) So that’s roughly 4.5 hours of homework for that kid. Would it not be a reasonable accommodation to allow that kid to finish some of that work the following day or over the weekend? Don’t we want that kid to go to soccer practice and get fresh air, exercise, and social interaction? Do we want him to live a balanced life. Our society fought very hard for an eight hour working day. But many of our kids are now working a six hour school day plus three to four hours of homework. Why are we asking our kids to work a ten hour day and then punishing them is they can’t do it? I think I’ll pick more up on this next week.…

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Natural Healthy Concepts

It’s been a busy week and I’ve written some epic posts lately. So just a quick tip for this week. I’m not a big supplement guy. The vast majority of supplements just haven’t been proven to be effective. I would strongly encourage you to only take supplements that are doctor recommended and have a robust evidence base behind their use, particularly when it comes to your kids. But, when it comes to younger kids, supplements that are proven to work can be a great way to treat certain issues for a period of time, until the kids get a little older and will tolerate medication a little better. For example, studies done at MGH show that a combination of high EPA fish oil and inositol, which is a B vitamin are an effective non-pharmacological treatment for mania and also offer some relief for depression and anxiety. My oldest used this combo for a year or two until his symptoms progressed to the point where we had to move on to something stronger. But that’s not what I want to share. What I want to share is the company Natural Healthy Concepts. They have a fabulous selection of supplements. There prices are reasonable, considering the very high prices of supplements to begin with. Their customer service is great. And, THE BEST PART FOR ADHDers is that they can set you up with a super-reliable auto refill. I never had to worry about my son’s supplements. The came right on time. Each was set at a different interval. They shipped promptly. The interval was really easy to edit in my account if his dosing changed. Strongly recommended

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Dads parenting and suffering in silence

  Kind of a dramatic title, huh? Well, this is a follow up to my post from July 20th. Apparently I’ve been marinating on that topic and have more to say. Would it be cliche to admit that I figured some stuff out in therapy this week? Maybe less so if it was family therapy? Well, cliche or not, it’s true. And, I’m actually going to quote our family therapist, who is great, but who will remain anonymous. Because she apparently did some marinating on our session and sent me an email afterward that really put into focus what I had some of what I had been trying to articulate.   This might come off as a little bit “complainy.” So bear with me. I do think I’ll end up at a point worth making. As I pointed out in my previous post in July, more and more dads are doing the “primary parent” thing. And, I’m talking about the stay at home dad. That’s a very different dynamic. Yes, it presents its own challenges, much the way it did/does for stay at home mom’s. And, now that I’m writing this, I imagine that those dads suffer from a lot of the same issues that I’m about to enumerate. But, it’s still not quite the same. Plus I don’t presume to have the frame of reference to speak for those dads.   What I’ve come to realize is that I’m doing all the thankless, behind the scenes, bullshit, logistical, day-to-day work of making this family and household run. Traditionally that’s the mom’s role. Traditionally, the parent who works outside of the home and/or works more hours / is the primary breadwinner gets to come home and be Mr. Fun… because it’s usually the dad. But in that traditional dynamic, the…

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Meditation & The To Do List

  There is one important thing about meditation for us ADHDers that I didn’t mention in the last post because I thought it might deserve its own post. I’m not sure how much I’ll need to write on it. But here it is. For those of you who have worked with me you know that pre-pandemic, I was in the process of writing a book about my To Do List system. That project is on hiatus due to the demands of my family life right now. And, I don’t really discuss the To Do List on the blog. That’s the one thing I hold back as “proprietary information” for my clients and people who eventually buy my book.   But whatever your system is for keeping track of your tasks, I suggest that you have that system handy when you meditate. When I was first getting into the practice of meditating, I would find that on my way to clearing my mind (as much as I can) I would often think of things that needed to go on my To Do List. At first I was torn about what to do about that. I didn’t want to break my meditation to log my task, but I couldn’t really relax and get a good zen thing going if I was worried about forgetting the thing I just remembered that I had to do.   My solution is to always have my To Do List with me while I meditate and when something pops into my head while I’m trying to get my zen on, just transition for a moment, document it, and shift right back to my meditation state. I actually find it less disruptive than I thought I would and then I can really let my thoughts go and get…

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Mindfulness

Mindfulness. Being mindful. Being present. Living in the moment. Slowing down. Slowing the ADHD mind. Slowing the ADHD body. Meditation? Breathing? Focus? Stillness? How? How long? Is it even possible? What if I fail? There are many reasons that I always believed that meditation was beyond me as a hyperactive ADHDer. I considered my exercise to be my meditation, as that was the closest I got to clearing my head and “resetting” myself. And, I do still consider my working out to be somewhat mindful and definitely an ADHD management tool. But I have had my relationship with mindfulness change quite a bit in the last few years. Here’s the short version. I started meditating with my oldest son when he did a trail through our doctor at MGH of using the “kids calm” meditation on Head Space. I found out that a five minute meditation designed for kids works great for an ADHD adult. I’ve subsequently moved on to mostly doing semi-guided or unguided meditation. But I still enjoy doing the kids one with my kids when I can get them to sit still. What I learned is that meditation isn’t pass/fail and that you don’t have to do it for a half an hour to get a benefit. Sometimes I can get enough benefit from 7-10 minutes that I can control my anxiety enough that I don’t need an Ativan. That’s pretty powerful. And, no, I don’t think I’ve ever really cleared my mind. But, if I can get down to only thinking about one thing, instead of the 20 things I’m usually batting around between my ears, that seems like a victory. And how I feel afterwards would seem to back that up. So, I say, give it a try. Or do some research on other forms…

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Decision Making & ADHD

Decision making is not an executive function. Difficulty with decision making is not a symptom of ADHD. So why do so many ADHDers have difficulty making decisions? I think there are a few reasons. But the primary reason is that the actual process of making a decision is the perfect storm of Attention, Working Memory (Executive Function,) Managing Impulsivity, and Managing Anxiety. In short, to make a difficult or complex decision, we need to do all of the things that we stink at. So, what’s the solution? I have a few tips. Make the commitment to actually make decisions. Decide to decide. Don’t let yourself kick the can down the road. If I’ve learned anything from doing this for over a decade it is that NOTHING GETS BETTER BY PUTTING IT OFF. Occasionally things go away, but even that usually has negative consequences. Be intentional about making your decision. Separate the decision from any other related tasks that you have to do and isolate that as its own task. Give yourself time and space to make that decision. Do research if you need to, but limit yourself to a specific amount of research so it doesn’t drag on indefinitely. Recognize that there is often no perfect solution and no amount of research or thinking can come up with all the answers. Rarely are things 100%. Sometimes 51% has to do. Recognize that in many cases, there are more than one right decisions and/or the decision isn’t final or can be changed/fixed at some point down the road. Manage any anxiety you may feel with exercise, meditation, and/or self talk, especially if it is a big decision. Lastly, make sure you are optimal when you set aside time to make your decision and/or do your research. Be medicated, well slept, not…

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The Depression Entry I Meant to Write Last Time

So… It has been a while since I posted. My bad. But in my defense, my last post was epic. I hope nobody was thrown for a loop. It ended up getting kind of personal. This is the quick post I intended to write that day. (And I’m going to back date it and hopefully post again tomorrow!) For those of you who know me, you know know that I live by my To Do List. So much so that I’m writing a book about my To Do List strategy and I teach it to all my clients. Generally I don’t include the normal day to day stuff that I do every morning like showering, cooking everyone’s breakfast, doing the dishes, icing after my workout, etc. But I was finding that since just doing those things were my victories for the day, I “wanted credit” for them. So putting them on the list and crossing them off was important, even if that meant just uncrossing them at the end of the day so I could cross them off tomorrow. It gave me a real sense of progress and success, something I very much needed. Now, as my depression seems to be abating and my productivity is returning, those things just clutter up my To Do List and I’m starting to take them off. But they really helped get me through.

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Managing Depression on a Daily Basis

So, not strictly an #ADHD topic today. But #Depression is pretty ADHD adjacent. Some studies have shown that up to 65% of ADHDers have some form of comorbid depression and/or anxiety. I certainly do. And, if you’ve been reading me for any length of time, you know that I love to share my tips, tricks, and triumphs. As my mentor coach one said, (paraphrasing) one of the things that we are selling is that we are pretty good at life. As haughty as that sounds. I don’t think it is untrue. I have two great role models in my parents. I have had many other great influences in my life, from coaches to teachers to friends. And, I’ve had the wherewithal to do a lot of work on myself along the way that has paid off. Having said that, I think I’d be both disingenuous and a pretty big asshole if I did admit my own vulnerabilities. I’m an ADHD coach and a life coach because I happen to think I get “it” right far more often than not. But I very much have struggles. And, I think it is important for those of us who put ourselves up on any kind of pedestal, proclaiming to be an expert, to also proclaim that we are human. We have weaknesses, we make mistakes, and we have struggles. I know that I’ve mentioned this in the context of the daily schedules that I post regularly. I used to only post those that went swimmingly. But I’ve come to realize that people get as much or more out of seeing how I handle a day that doesn’t go according to plan than they do seeing how I plan things perfectly. So, I’m making it a point, as I experience the vicissitudes of modern…

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Smartwatch as ADHD helper?

I will be the first to admit that I have poo-pooed the smart watch since day one. My general feeling is that they are so much unnecessary digital flotsam to distract ourselves from reality. But…   I have a relatively new client who has made me open my mind to the idea of a smartwatch being a useful tool for the right type of ADHDer. Like myself, he uses his phone for many useful things, as a tool. But he has a tendency to get distracted by its many features and to go down lengthy rabbit holes. I know that will ring true with many of you.   So for him, the beauty of the watch, at least so far, is that it does the bare necessities without being the opportunity for too much more. He uses it as an interval timer, a useful thing that we’ve worked on. He gets reminders and alarms on it. He can get texts and emails on it but really only to the point of knowing if they are really important or time sensitive. Since most aren’t, there’s no need to then take a deep dive into the email or text-verse and get lost. And he uses it to wirelessly stream music to his earbuds without having his phone out as a distraction. So, I’m pretty sold on his use of the watch. It seems to really be working for him. I would put the caveat that I don’t think this would work for all ADHDers. Some folks would take our their phone’s anyway and can’t resist it’s magnetic like pull. But if you are the type of person who is close to being able to use your phone as a tool, not as a toy but get sucked in in that moment of…

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ADHD & Girls and Women

Now that I’ve hipped you to the ADDitude podcast feed, if you are a girl or a woman with ADHD you need to check out #337. Everyone knows that I like generate my own content on this blog. But sometimes I just need to refer to someone more expert than myself. Underdiagnosis and undertreatment in girls and women has been a problem for decades. Now that ADHD in Women is finally being addressed and studied, there is really important science that all ADHD women should know about. If you are a women, there are ways that your ADHD may really be different from your brother’s, husband’s, or father’s ADHD.

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