I Can't Start From the Beginning

I never would have imagined it was ADD. I always knew I was smart. I always knew I was different. But I also always figured I was lazy, a procrastinator, just slow and a bit thick headed when it came to learning gemarah, math, and science. I've never been a good planner, although email does help get things done. Without email keeping track and the instant back and forth, I don't know if I could ever fully stay on top of a project or plan something.

I've never been particularly fast at anything I wasn't fully enthralled with. There are some things I picked up quickly, mostly writing, public speaking, matters of current events and opinions about social, philosophical, religious, and educational matters. But never fast at most other skills -- I cannot learn another language, though I've tried; I still cannot remember the multiplication tables, though I've tried; I cannot form the words of davening quickly enough to maintain the pace of a minyan. I just always figured there was something wrong with me. There were times I suspected a miniscule stroke in utero. Other times I wondered if I had a long undiagnosed learning disability. But I never thought of ADD.

There are plenty of reasons. One, I never thought of myself as particularly hyperactive; I'm fidgety and gregarious. I can be the most dramatic, arresting personality in the room at times. But I can also sit for hours, and hours, and hours, riveted to a book, the computer, or just hang around reading the paper. Hardly symptomatic of a hyperactivity disorder. So I just thought I was slow.

And lazy. I can procrastinate for days, not hours. Weeks sometimes. If a project is giving me some trouble, it will linger on my desk for an eternity. Then, I'll pick up the folder one day and feel the crush of realization that a month has passed with no activity. Clients feel the delay and some even complain. But I'm successful and talented so many stick around. But eventually, many leave.

Projects can take on lives of their own. Depending on the complexity, or more accurately, the passivity of the person demanding the work, a project can sit unaided, unattended, unfinished. Forever. I have a few of those in my drawer. The client never called back, so the project just died. But the weight of those unfinished projects weighs heavy as I flip past those forgotten project, uncompleted, unpaid. I wish they were finished. In so many cases, there was no reason not to finish. I just didn't.

Those projects that must get done, perhaps they started slow and then the pressure was raised a notch, are killers. They must get done and there's no one but me. Those become larger than life. After days of procrastination, ignoring the vital tasks that lead up to completion, I begin to panic. Late nights turn to overnights. Frantic paper shuffling becomes feverish mental back flips that prevent me from getting a toehold on what needs to be done. The tsunami of other unfinished work occupies my desk, computer screen phone calls, and thought waves. The stuttering, fluttering messes of confusion that I feel paralyzes me and holds me back further. The computer is a steady lure, blogs, news, Google searches, the distractions are abundant and 9 a.m. becomes 3 p.m. before I can even get to open the offending folder. Day turns to night and midnight to mid morning. Minyan is abandoned and in the frenzy of anxiety, often talis and tefillin. Phone calls thrust themselves across my desk further thinning my threadbare attention span. There's too many thoughts, too many distractions, too much anxiety, and too much to do. But too few hours of the day, to few bursts of creative energy, too few hours in my never-ending days in which to actually accomplish what I must do to make a living. And then somehow, the work is done. I smile, feel the relief and in the front of my mind verbally marvel at the fact that the work is complete and the client thrilled. I don't know how, I don't know why, but the clients think I'm a genius. If only they know.

So it couldn't have been a disorder of any sort. The depression, which once ruled my moods, days, and thoughts have subsided this past year. A creaky a.m. schedule preserved by the kindness and understanding of two chavrusas has kept me to a daily seder of some degree Instead of rolling their eyes on the days I don't make it, they accept my mumbled apologies and meager explanations of overnight projects and unforgiving deadlines. They don't even know how they have saved me and kept me from sinking deep down again into the potholes of my insecurity and self-loathing.

But my inconsistency and poor discipline were to blame. There was nothing a little gumption and will power couldn't fix; if only the morning rituals of feigned normalcy and paternal responsibility didn't leave me so drained and distracted when 9 a.m. rolled around. The stress and effort that went to waking on time, showering, getting out of the house and to learning and shul, then to get coffee, eat breakfast, read the papers, drive the kids to school and to be supportive and effective in between my early morning and workday was a day of work in itself. Forget working out. Every ounce of energy went into placing my proverbial left foot in front of my right foot, just to get myself started in a manner that would look and could felt respectable and normal. It's just a shame I was out of gas when it came time to work.

ADD is what I've described above. Every fiber of my life experience has been screaming ADD since the day I entered first grade. My experiences and joys, frustrations and achievements, my coping and my meltdowns. ADD is a real thing I’m being told. It wasn't my fault that the very effort to appear a normal, functioning, at peace with my life were gargantuan and carefully orchestrated; even if unconsciously.

Now that I'm diagnosed, my challenge will be letting go of the blame and self-hatred. To forgive the agony and disappointment. I have to allow myself to be helped and to help myself. I am normal. The fact that my brain has led me to believe otherwise all my life is something that can't be helped. And it will help all the more if I just moved past it.