◯ TREE 680: The universalising mistake
Several weeks ago Christine and I were watching this lecture to parents of ADHD kids because one of our kids has ADHD, plus it’s interesting. We’re sitting there watching, learning, appreciating the respect he shows to parents and it starts to dawn on me that he’s not just talking about my kid’s brain, he’s talking about my brain.
(!!!)
I’m like, how can this be? I can focus. I show up on time. But these things he’s saying… So I do a couple reputable ADHD evaluations online and the results are: dude, go see your doctor about your almost certain ADHD. I immediately wait for about a month (because ADHD?) and then I go see my doctor.
My doctor, who I hadn’t met before because I only moved here a year ago and I’m healthy, tells me two important things:
The NHS is useless for adult ADHD. The waiting time to get a diagnosis is eight years (!!!)
If I do the self-evaluation he gave me and score high on it, I can safely assume I have ADHD.
I took the self-evaluation home and put it straight on my desk where I could see it and remember to put it off every day for a couple weeks.
I finally did it over the weekend. (It took 10 whole minutes.) You’ve guessed by now: I totally do have ADHD.
My point is that I’ve written things, especially about willpower, that may not apply to you because your brain is wired differently to mine. Likewise:
Not everyone can be a vegan.
The thing that levered you out of your depression may not work at all for your friend.
That guy who figured out a thing and turned it into a course about What Everyone Must Do If They Want to Be Successful isn’t correct about what everyone must do.
We like to extrapolate universal principles from single data points. We want a single theory of everything. We wish for one size fits all.
But that’s not the world we live in. We live in the kind of world where there are over 4,000 religions, 160,000 species of moth and articles titled ’18 Types of Lettuce and the Best Ways to Eat Each One’.
Be slow to universalise your experience.
I saw this over the weekend. It is delightful.
Grow slowly
Jeff
P.S. Secret Santa time is just around the corner. Give your lucky person my book.
You know on Christmas day when the presents are opened but Christmas dinner isn’t ready and and there are a couple people who don’t know what to do? If a copy of my book of short stories goes in at least one stocking in your house this year, Christmas day ennui will be banished.
I had depression before I knew what it was. I had dyslexia before...... I have put words to my behaviors and it deciphers a place to make a change or two. It’s always an adjustment to improve here and there. That’s life.🦥
Adult ADHD has been a hot topic over in my little social bubble. Yes, it feels as if it's next-to-impossible to get an official diagnosis (and in my research, medication is at a shortage to boot). But the first step you describe here (and one of the more important in my opinion) is recognition. Once you see, you can't unsee, and so life feels less like a mysterious incomplete puzzle. So many behaviors and incidents and idiosyncrasies are finally better understood. Daily tasks becomes more approachable and manageable as one a. accepts the circumstances are different than average and b. gathers helpful tools for support. Finding the positives in neurodivergence is super helpful too. (The creativity and ingenuity alone are pretty incredible characteristics!) But to put it in your own words, what helps one person might not help someone else. Not being "typical" can feel pretty scary and lonely. A little self-compassion can go a long way!