Hello fellow cadets! I am not dead, nor have I quit blogging. I just had to take a hiatus from blogging and anything else. The last two months have not been very easy on me.
I have been dealing with depression, trauma from being physically assaulted while on a trip, the loss of a close person in my life, and some other tumultuous events in my life. I have been mostly doing my freelance assignments and trying to do my best to take my daily walk and drink water.
I’ve also had some trips not work out this year: Iraqi Kurdistan, Egypt, Costa Rica, revisiting the US and a few others. My main trips have been to Northern Greece and Croatian Istria this summer. This is fine, but I would prefer something more unusual. However, I have learned over the years to get over this fear of missing out. These other destinations will be there later. It’s not a race to collect stamps. I realize this sounds like a first-world problem post. So, I’ll stop.
The main thing I want to elaborate on today is ADHD awareness. October is ADHD awareness month. As you can read in my “About me” section, I came up with the name space cadet because I suffer from Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. I was diagnosed when I was 13 years old. I was a bit lucky, as this was a time when girls were seldomly diagnosed with this.
Here are some of the top questions and comments that I have received over the years when I come out with my ADHD diagnosis.
How did you get diagnosed?
I was not a very hyperactive kid. Like many children, I had quite a bit of energy and sometimes didn’t have the correct concept of boundaries, well to be fair, I still kind of don’t. I was an intelligent kid. For example, I could find countries like Zambia and Myanmar on the map when I was 3. I read National Geographic and Belgian comics in French and Dutch when I visited my grandmother, an achievement for a Southern Usian kid.
However, when I got older, things became different. I failed math tests because I forgot to write out the whole math problem. I often wrote some of the best essays in my classes but did a terrible job editing. To this day, I still have to be careful with editing, despite writing professionally as one of my jobs. I am excellent at editing other people’s work. Still, when it comes to my work, good god, I need to check a hundred times, and sometimes after that, some smart ass manages to point out a spacing issue or comma splice.
I forgot to bring permission slips and lunch money to school. I had to hide a lot at school in shame. My handwriting was and still is atrocious. My father screamed at me repeatedly because I did not inherit his calligraphy script. The list goes on and on. I had occasional outbursts when I felt attacked. I constantly was told things like. ” You are a slacker” ” Why are you so smart but act so stupid” Eventually, my parents took me to a psychologist for some behavioural issues. I took some tests and was diagnosed almost immediately. It has been a big zigzag from here.
What do you mean by awareness? Everyone knows all about ADHD! It’s overdiagnosed! They give every 8-year-old kid speed now! You didn’t know!
That isn’t so. It is significantly underdiagnosed in adults. ADHD goes even more silent in young girls. People believe that it is only prevalent in young boys, which is far from the truth. ADHD shows itself in many different forms. A lot of people, especially women, have more inattentive elements than hyperactive elements. This is one of the reasons it goes silent and undiagnosed with women.
A lot of ADHD is going from being overstimulated to understimulated. There are days you can write a book on a topic. There are days you have to muster up so much strength to write an email. I like to joke and call it selective attention disorder. ADHD has many overlaps with other mental conditions such as Bipolar and Autism; however, it remains pretty different in many aspects. People with ADHD tend to be more adaptive and usually have a stable mood. Although depression and anxiety can come with ADHD, often it is more about the stigma attached to having ADHD and being treated less because of it and having your spirits broken. But not everyone with ADHD is the same. Some people with ADHD have Bipolar disorder and Autism as well.
Not everyone who has ADHD gets “speed”. Some people are prescribed stimulants and function well. They don’t enjoy the feeling that others who take speed recreationally get. Other people take antidepressants which work for them. There is not a miracle drug for ADHD. Some medications work differently for other people. Some people find meditation and bullet journaling works. I’ve gone back and forth with all of these methods at different times.
But ADHD is a US AMERICAN thing, We don’t have ADHD in my country!
Yes, you do. Just because some jackass wrote an article that French kids didn’t have ADHD a decade ago does not mean it is true. Many physicians and psychologists have debunked this claim. The author claimed that French children have better self-control than US children, which must mean there is NO ADHD in France. I’m not sure how true this is either.
ADHD does not come from computer screens and processed food. It’s not because someone’s parents didn’t discipline them right. It is not from vaccinations. I ate good food. I was more of an outdoors kid anyway and hated video games.
This woman does an excellent job explaining ADHD in this Ted Talk.
Does ADHD contribute to your wanderlust?
Probably! I believe it is more correlation rather than causation. I have always been interested in seeing the world. Holding a traditional 9-5 job does not usually suit me. I get frustrated when I feel like I am being micromanaged. This is why I have several part-time gigs instead of one gig. Being in the same place for a while is boring. I usually need to go somewhere once a month. On the other hand, I can get quite bored quickly with material items, and minimalism helps me cope with my ADHD, so it is one thing that works in my favour. Coincidentally, I have met quite a few fellow travellers and friends within these travel communities who are also diagnosed with ADHD or highly suspect they have it.
Is there anything positive about having ADHD?
Quite a lot! Many people with ADHD can connect dots that neurotypicals cannot. They tend to see the nuance in a lot of issues that are overlooked. For example, they can find offbeat travel destinations and end up with experiences they wouldn’t have found if they stayed inside the lines. I can go on to list many other examples.
When I was young, there was no such thing as ADHD? We just disciplined children better.
Ooof. Boomers really do like to mistake childhood trauma for precious memories. Get off my lawn with this.