#Adhdax

[stardustedknuckles]

I don't really know if it's an adhd thing or just the condition that is being me, but I think one of the things I hate most about my brain worms is how they've convinced me I have less energy than I do.

To be clear: I do in fact have a very low amount of energy. But what I mean specifically is that sometimes I'll think ahead to the idea that I might take a class, learn a skill, do something where I make the effort to go once a week and get something out of it. And I'll even imagine that at this point in time, I only have one job! Extra time!

And it'll settle over my thoughts like a cobweb: oh right, that sounds like a lot of energy and I'm preemptively tired and discouraged thinking about it.

Except. I have this test, where if I don't want to go somewhere or do something, I'll ask myself "would I go if I could instantly teleport there?" because often it's not a matter of not wanting to do the thing, it's the transitional states in between. It's getting up, it's getting dressed, it's waiting for the train, it's walking - because those are all individual tasks for me, where for people without chronic fatigue, Adhd, or what have you, it is just all part of the same action. Executive function, you could even say.

And it's easy to tell myself I don't want to do that when I don't have to, but the fact is that it doesn't bother me except for some specifically awful days to do all of that. It's literally fine.

So why does my brain offer up so much dread and exhaustion at the prospect of doing the same boring shit I do every day in preparation for something that is ultimately way more rewarding than staring at dogs and cleaning up after them every day? Why does a sewing or a singing lesson feel so much more weighty?

You wouldn't believe the things I've talked myself out of because of this alone. Making friends who will go with me to these things is pretty helpful, but it also... Requires that you go where the people who have those interests are first. Drives me nuts.

[stardustedknuckles]

A great thing about having a busted dopamine tank is that I can't be bribed into doing shit. No amount of offered reward could motivate me to do something I don't want to.

A deeply detrimental thing about having a busted dopamine tank is that I can't be bribed into doing shit. No amount of offered reward could motivate me to do something I don't want to.

[stardustedknuckles]

*day 3 of remembering to take my emotional regulation meds* wow I haven't wanted to explode the room full of barking dogs and everyone in it in a few days.

[stardustedknuckles]

A year without meds has me sitting on my bed going yeah I could take my evening dose but what will I DO while I'm on it? I can't just waste it. So like. It's not quite sunk in yet that I can just take them and I will have more. I can take them and do whatever I want, and whatever it is I do will be done better than I've managed in a year. It's okay if that's video games. I've told way too many folks in the Adhd alien server that meds don't have to only be for work for me to start falling into that trap myself.

[stardustedknuckles]

My Adhd ass, not having taken my meds in two weeks: aw yiss, gonna take em and get the energy to get stuff done

My Adhd ass, exhausted from the extra brainpower it's taken to muscle through the last two weeks: oh a stimulant, finally? Excellent. Nap time.

[stardustedknuckles]

"I feel like the thoughts have always been there, but they're just so easy to recall now."

Beau getting that headband of intellect really was just "woe, arcane Ritalin be upon you" huh.

[stardustedknuckles]

It kills me that the only way I can think clearly enough to actually plan a meal and execute it instead of slapping macaroni into a pot for the sixth time in a week is to take my meds.

The meds that tank appetite and can't be taken on an empty stomach.