All Signs Point to ADHD

There has been a major shift in the way I see things within the last month or so. Throughout my life, I have been always over analyzed inside of my head. Am I talking too loudly? Was that funny what I just said? Are they laughing at me or with me? And I guess I thought everyone else thought this, too. I mean, everyone has their own biggest critic anyway, so in those situations are we all kind of in our own head? APPARENTLY NOT????

To me, all feelings have needed a beginning middle and end story as a reason to why I would feel the feeling. I hyper-fixate on the feeling. For example, when I’m sad, I make myself sadder by obsessing over WHY I am sad or where the root of the sadness is coming from. Sometimes it takes me 20 minutes to figure it out, sometimes it takes me two weeks. But for however long I need to figure out the feeling, I will feel that feeling wholly. It’s exhausting.

My psychiatrist recently rediagnosed me with ADHD. I was diagnosed first in high school and given the classic 504 plan – extra time on tests and quizzes and a closet by yourself to take them in so no distractions – and, of course, Adderall. (I am not knocking the drug itself or the class of drugs similar in any way. I know for a fact if taken correctly by the people who truly need it can have tremendous benefits. This is my own god damn blog I don’t need to explain myself but whatever). Adderall was not for me. I wasn’t socializing or as fun as normal in school when I’d take it, and don’t even get me started on how much of a bitch I was coming off the Adderall. I actually had to take a second dose after school so I would be less of a bitch coming off of it for the night. My poor parents, LOL.

I stopped taking Adderall before college, and basically my ADHD was never spoken of again, until I met my psychiatrist in March of THIS. YEAR. (I know.)

I literally filled (and continue to fill) our hour-long appointments to the brim about why I feel this way, what this emotion does to me, how riddled with anxiety I am, and after she helped me calm down through my anxiety and PTSD, she targeted my ADHD. She saw it so apparent. My ADHD presents itself like ADHF- Attention Deficit Hyper Fixation (not real, just something that makes sense to me). I fixate on things: my lungs if they hurt and what that means for me: Am I clotting? Am I dying? Alright, calm down… but what if? And I fixate on my feelings. Where is this anxiety coming from? Did I say something I shouldn’t have? Did I do something weird? Was I wrong? It doesn’t stop.

ADHD makes me accommodate. I accommodate my feelings to fit situations, and I accommodate living with agonizing anxiety. I stopped accommodating recently. My psych said this analogy and I hope you like it as much as I do:

“If you fill a pot of water, bring it to a boil, and throw a frog in, the frog will jump out to save itself. If you put a frog in a lukewarm pot of water, and gradually throughout the day raise the temp of that water to eventually boiling, the frog will die. The frog is accommodating.”

I’ve been on meds to help for a month now – and I feel more like myself. I feel like a relaxed version of myself. I feel like a balloon that was blown up way too much finally being able to let some air out. My best friend (shoutout Britty P) told me she thinks the old me is back. I’m definitely a new version of the old me: not as scared to be social or put myself out there, doing things with people I normally wouldn’t, not letting the best of my anxiety get the best of me.

That is what accommodation does to me. I was suffocating and burning from the inside out. I finally feel like I’m allowing myself to have thoughts and feelings without being so damn critical. I have the room for positive experiences and emotions. I am no longer held back by the amount of air in my balloon or the weight of my baggage.

I am Brianne Torre.

I have PTSD and ADHD.

And both of those things give me heavy anxiety.

But they also both give me hope.

I’m coming out of the weeds, I’m trekking through the mud, I’m getting my feet back on solid ground. I’m proud to keep growing, and I hope you guys will stick along for the journey. I feel like when I have more to write about than my fucking feelings, it’s going to get a lot more interesting. Or maybe it won’t. But it’ll help me. And that’s the reason why I’m doing this anyway. I am my biggest critic. But it’s because I’m also my biggest fan. I want to see myself succeed – and day by day, I continue to get out of survival mode and into “thrival” mode.

Amen, dude.