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Day Four on Methylin (Ritalin) is pretty much the same as Day 1….uneventful. The difference is, I am at the full dosage prescribed me – 20mg daily.
Yeah, I wake up faster, but takes a little longer to go to sleep (even though I take the last dose about 9 hours before bedtime). I feel tired, but my thoughts are still going strong. Saw a slogan yesterday that captures this: “My mind is like a banana tree full of monkeys chattering for attention.”
I have a bit more energy. Enough to get me up and at ‘em. I haven’t had many negative self-talks. Not much depression going on. But certainly there’s not much motivation either. Did the dishes today, but I really thought I would see a bit more in terms of clarity, concentration and motivation.
Maybe it’s time for a check-in with my doctor . . .
In the movie Lost Horizon, Olivia Hussey and Sally Kellerman sing about swapping cultures. One has lived a quiet sedate life, the other a very busy life. They each list things they will not miss about the life they are leaving behind, as they embrace a new life, in a new culture.
This song, Things I Will Not Miss, has been stuck in my head for the last couple of days and has become a metaphor for the change I feel is to take place.
After a conversation yesterday, my doctor and I decided to try a course of Ritalin to see how I respond. Though I have tried many different medications for the depression that is often “co-morbid” with ADD, I’ve never taken anything for the ADD. In fact, the doctor who diagnosed me 11 years ago, after the birth of my first child, said I was a “high functioning” ADDer. Riiiiight.
Maybe as a female, I “mask” it better, because “we women multi-task” but, just as I am exceptionally creative, I’m also woefully ADDlicious.
So, this thought – this hope – that maybe, finally, I will see what life is like through a “normal brain” is making me create my own list of the Things I Will Not Miss About ADD:
- DWA (Driving While ADD!): I will not miss the accidents, or the night driving with the shiny lights from oncoming traffic distracting and actually hurting my eyes.
- Tuning out my children when they are talking about things that are not interesting to me. Yeah, a lot of parents do that, and some might argue it’s a useful thing to be able to tune that out, but as an ADDer, I feel as though I’ve tuned out a little more than is healthy for building relationships, at times.
- Interrupting: I’m a constant interrupter. I just can’t wait for you to finish. In fact, sometimes you are just not interesting, and I’d really like to get to my point, which is infinitely more interesting! Ugh! I’ve always had such poor social skills. They’ve definitely improved over the Childhood Version of My ADD (ADD 1.0), but still, I list it as something I will not miss.
- Losing track of time: Thinking that and hour is “only a few minutes.” As in, “I’m just going to pop into this bookstore for “a few minutes” and coming out to find I’ve been gone for ages.
- Not waiting until the absolute last second for everything: Dashing out trying to hurry to be on time when you know it’s an impossibility; doing something at the last minute because it was boring and now you’re back is against a wall and you have to (and it’s still boring!!)
There are probably a ton of other things, but those are the main ones on my list of Things I Will Not Miss. I don’t know if I am setting myself up for failure or not. Maybe “normacly” is overrated. Maybe Ritalin won’t work for me. Maybe lots of things….but I’m still excited to try.
I’ll see you on the other side!
