Living with ADHD
By EAP
8/20/20

I would like to apologize in advance for how scattered this essay is.

I am a 14 year old living with ADHD and I’m sure some of you are curious what it’s like. I think it’s essential that I specify I am a 14 year old girl in her Freshmen year of highschool and I’m turing 15 October 20th 2020. Adhd has given me a chance to be different, but with difference comes ignorance. What I mean by that is people don’t understand why I act the way act, or do the things I do, thus the reason I write this.
I am constantly thinking. Thinking about world/political issues, thinking about how I forgot to turn in my English paper, thinking about how I haven’t played animal crossing in 7 months, thinking about how I ruined my social life in 6th grade by liking Hamilton, thinking about the guys that I fall in love with just by saying hello to them. I could go on for pages upon pages just about the things I think about. I’m sure that ‘normal people’ also think about these things but, I do it all within 1 minute. I go down rabbit holes in my brain, and write stories in my mind. There is always a thousand things to do and only 5 minutes to do it. For example this paper is the 5th paper I’ve started writing today. My brain goes 100 miles per hour, and I assume that’s why I talk fast and trip over my words constantly.
I am always thinking about what’s next and how to prevent what happened before. For example, equity for America is next and we need to prevent slavery which happened before. I don’t mean to make this political but it’s the first thing I thought of. This is one of the pluses of ADHD, I have the ability to live in the moment while also anticipating what is going to come next. I’m not sure if that makes sense, most of the time when I explain things it doesn’t make sense because of all the details I add.
Another thing I found to be specific with my ADHD is that I add details to everything. It takes me 10 minutes to tell what should be a 3 minute story. I think this adds to the reasons of why it’s hard for me to manage a social life. My social life has always been a mess, It’s because I have two opposing sides. My ADHD makes me an extrovert while the rest of me wants to be locked away in my room watching Dr. Phil all day. I find it easy to reach out to people, but difficult to carry the conversation. The way I make friends is by making them laugh however, that act ends almost immediately as people often get tired of my jokes.
Comedy is something I am very reliant on when it comes to, well everything. In a bad situation I laugh or make a joke (in my head) to cope. I would like to think that my Adhd has helped my develop comedy skills. With my ADHD I have the power to look at something from a different, often funnier, angle. For example if I was lost in the woods I would probably start singing Lost in the Woods from Frozen 2, not really caring about the issue at hand.
As I mentioned before, I am always at war with myself. Theres always half of me that wants to say ‘cool dog! Where did you get it’ while the other half wants me to awkwardly walk away in a somewhat fast manner. Theres that part of me who wants to keep texting him but I still can’t stop because I need the exhileration of talking to someone I care about. It’s been difficult to manage these sides not only when comes to being social but also academic. I have a fear of teachers. Like a huge fear. I blame this on my 6th grade history teacher when she scared me away from asking for help. I forgot to turn in so many assignments because of how scattered I am, that she basically told me to give up. At least that’s how I read it, now I don’t blame her, she was going through a very difficult time in her life but regardless I cant talk to teachers. Now you’re probably wondering how this connects to ADHD, well let me tell you. I’m awful at organization, absolutely awful as you can probably tell by this essay. So not only do I not ask for help from teachers, but I also can hardly help myself because how disorganized I am.
I have no interest in getting organized ‘the classic way’ with files and binders and such. It doesn’t work for me. It never has, and I honestly don’t want it to. This is negative of having ADHD for sure and im still figuring it out. (I have a pretty good system now if anyone is interested) I don’t pay attention in my classes, especially since we’re online now. I find it difficult to sit down and do homework for a long period of time. The only reason I got this done in about 1 day is because I wanted to do it. I was inspired to do it. I get inspired by everything, and I think that’s a part of the problem.
I cant sit down and do anything because I’m too busy getting inspired. For example, the reason I wrote this is because I was inspired in English, we’re reading American Born Chinese and he’s different, and bullied. I’m different, and I was bullied, obviously to a much lesser extent but it still hurt. This is why I wanted to educate people at least a little bit in how living with ADHD effects people. There was a girl who knew me from age 2-10, she knew I was sensitive, she knew I was scattered, she knew I was different. She rubbed it all in my face completely. I remember one day at lunch she came up to me and said ‘Emily you should be less sensitive and distracted, it’s why people don’t like you’ or something around those lines. It hurt so much to hear that. Then she finessed her way into my friend group, turned them against me and well she made me feel different. Now again, I cant blame her that much because she was 8 and her older sister was the ‘golden child’. I honestly feel bad for that girl.
Those experiences with her helped me grow as a person. They helped me be more tolerant of people. They let me into the world of someone who is just needs a hug. They showed me to not judge someone for who they like, what they wear, their dialect, etc. I’m so happy with who I am today, I’m so confident in myself, you could say just about anything negative about me and I really wouldn’t care. My ADHD indirectly gave me experiences that shaped me into who I am today and for that I will be forever thankful.