Money, ADHD and 2013

Money. 

For some it's as elusive as dark matter - it's out there, we know it's out there, all our instruments and mathematical models tell us it's out there but we just cannot get our hands onto any of it in any meaningful way.  For others it's as plentiful as oxygen.  I recently read that Tom Cruise is worth around a quarter of a billion dollars, pocket change to Bill Gates, Oprah and the Sultan of Brunei.   They couldn't escape extraordinary wealth even if they wanted to. 

I could wax on and on about the varying ways I see money's role in the world.  It's an endlessly fascinating subject.  To my chagrin, I haven't much talent in finance, but I am well versed in discussing the many complex feelings about money. 

Here's a fact in my own teeny tiny life: as an adult I have found earning a solid middle class living to be extremely difficult and astoundingly elusive.  I know, I know....the economy is bad, I come from a comfortable family that sent me to private schools.  Boo hoo for you. 

Well, it's still my life and no one is really going to watch out for it except for me and isn't that true for all of us?  Political correctness has no place when you're being honest about where you come from and the life expectations into which you were born. 

I genuinely don't know what 2013 holds for me.  I am woefully underemployed, without any feasible idea of how to work towards even the seemingly modest (yet, not) goal of financial stability.   I know I have many talents but they are like shards of broken glass that don't ever quite fit together.  That's a terribly tortured metaphor but you get my meaning.  

So I go into 2013 with one promise to you: that I will be open here on my blog with the trial and triumphs in my life.  May we all find moments of peace and vision amongst the choas.   


 

Porchfest - A Lesson in Mental Terror

Last May while visiting a friend in Massachusetts I came upon the Somerville Porchfest,  an event the brings together anywhere from 30 to 100 music acts who perform on front porches over an afternoon.  In less than 10 seconds I thought, "I have to bring this to my neighborhood!"  Or more accurately the front porch saturated, music loving town next door to mine.  In short order, I have gotten many of the residents and powers-that-be very interested in my music festival.  It's most definitely an event whose time has come.  

So here's the unsurprising fact, I am frozen, paralyzed and overwhelmed by what needs to be done.  That said, I know there are many elements in place to help me out, not least of which are two older friends who have become mentors to me.  One runs music events (natch!) and the other is a successful business man, additionally both are musicians.   Even better, they are well aware of my focus and organizational struggles so I am free to talk to them in way to doesn't hide how I need to approach tasks:  very carefully, mindfully, with deep breaths and a blue sense of humor.

I've come close to deciding not to do this but a few thoughts keep me connected to this idea of mine:

1. I am tailor made for the high energy, social nature of this kind of work so it seems a shame to not do it because I'm not naturally organized or focused. 
2. I want to work in the music industry. These folks are my tribe.  
3. I want to know I am capable of putting on something as ambitious as a music festival. 

It's of great comfort to me that I have this blog too.  When the days are hard or overwhelming, I can come to this one place of quiet reflection to make sense of the daily chaos.

I shall most definitely keep you posted.  

Sitting in Silence

It's cliche to complain about family at holiday time so this is my one thought this Christmas Eve: no family is perfect.  I love mine even with all its various imperfections.   

I'm sitting here in the living room of the lovely house in which I grew up.  My 73 year old father because of health problems didn't join my Mom and sister for 9pm service so he and I are here in the house alone.   It's actually quite peaceful.  My brothers are with their families in other locations. 

The tree is so lovely this year that just sitting in front of it on the couch with only the twinkling lights to illuminate the room warms my heart.  My life isn't what I want it to be but in this moment this evening I feel peaceful and gracious for what I have. 

I have a lot of work in the coming year and only a vague notion of how to go about manifesting what I want.  
  
 I wish peace, clarity of vision and courage to all those who read this. 

Impulse Control

One of the characteristics of the ADHD brain is poor impulse control.  

I plead guilty... on so many levels. 

It's such a childish characteristic really: the little one who just HAS to get what they're saying said RIGHT NOW.  The toddler who must have a cookie absolutely NOW or she.will. FREAK. OUT.  In my case when cupcakes such as the one pictures above are in front of me, the sugar addict in me roars to life.  I could eat all those cupcakes and still want more.   A few years ago I finally accepted that being a sugar addict is just part of who I am.  How much of a sugar addict am I?  Two years ago, I did a "sugarless month" to test my resolve of being in the presence of sugar while not partaking.  More deeply I wanted experience a time free from sugar.  With one exception on day 18 I went 30 days with no sugar, no honey, no nothing.  Was it difficult?  At first ABSOLUTELY.  In those first two days, I related to a smoker  craving a cigarette.  There wasn't a moment when my brain wasn't screaming "satisfy me!!!!."  The most interesting observation from this time was that I felt "flat" for most of the month.   Most things tasted rather ordinary to me and my moods felt..hmmm....dull.  The cravings subsided by day four or five and eventually I even managed to turn down sweets offered to me with little to no trouble, which let's face it had never really happened before.  I came away from this experiment with a new appreciation for how much my brain likes sugar and how I will always have to work with these cravings. 

Since sweets are my drug of choice,  I don't keep them in my home except for rare times such as holidays and celebrations.  

The above story is about one aspect of impulse control that's relatively easy to elucidate upon.  More difficult are putting blinders on to the myriad distractions that cross my path every moment of every day.  Writing these essays is one of the few things that I can do with consistent focus.  I put on quiet music and I type away.  It find it incredibly satisfying and peaceful.  

How Do I Look to the Future and Make Peace with My Past?

I am prone to rumination, a hallmark of the depressive personality.  I hesitate to even say that I'm a depressive because to meet me you most likely wouldn't think that.  I am extroverted, pretty  quick-witted and somehow manage to at least externally maintain my sense of humor even when down.  Oh, but to those who've known me for years, they have seen the darker me.   The one who goes inside emotionally, can't talk with people, is hypersensitive to criticism and paranoid that everyone hates even the thought of me.  Almost needless to say that another hallmark of being a depressive is, when actively depressed,  being profoundly self-centered. 

So here I sit at my computer trying to do what others with a different temperament than mine do: feel the pain, learn from it and move on to a life spent moving forward and not so much looking back.  

If left unchecked I wallow in the past (see above paragraph) but I've noticed that the sturdier amongst us have the ability to let things slide off their backs.  I've also seen folks be in total denial of their pain so the middle ground is where I aspire to be. 

My entry today is my attempt to make peace with my "should haves" in life and then move on to a different yet still meaningful relationship with my youthful dreams.  

So what "should" I have done with my life when I was younger?

1. Moved to Chicago after college to pursue a sketch comedy career and/or
2. Studied voice at a conservatory.

Um, that's really it.   

I sit here in the land where some may say, "I regret that I never did that."  What a terrible, honest yet necessary thing to admit.  I can certainly say these words but when I think back on WHEN I should have done those things, when youth alone makes things easier and freer to pursue dreams, I also remind myself that I was truly, actively, miserably, suicidally depressed....for years.  Even if I had thought to myself, "now I need to move to Chicago," it really couldn't have happened, in fact it's probably good that it didn't happen. 

So yes, I do feel sad that I didn't do those two things but here's the twist in all this that I am going for.  Are you still with me? I still want a comedy and/or music career or at least the knowledge that I tried my best to do either.  That fire in me has never, ever dimmed, in fact it gets more pronounced.  

Yes, I know, there are no guarantees of success.  For every Tina Fey and Conan O'Brian there are thousands of people whose names we don't know.  

Comedy sketches, screenplays, song lyrics now more actively then ever bounce around in my brain and finally, luckily, happily I am starting to listen to those ideas and put them down on paper.  

It's a start. 

Training for a 10K - Planning and Running

Long story short, like many I've struggled with my weight.  By struggle I mean I weighed 240 at age 14.   That's me up there at 14 and 16.  I lost 70 pounds in high school, looked pretty good for years, gained much of it back in my depressive late 20's but settled into a somewhat peaceful middle ground of weighing on average about 205 and hovering around that number  for more than 10 years. Additionally I do yoga and powerwalk. 

Now don't be shocked folks.  Let go of those Hollywood expectations. My comfortable weight and one where I look and feel rather good is around 180.  I'm 5'8 and large framed.  A size 12 suits me just fine. 


I've exercised since I was 15 (I'm 41).  Never obsessed.  Neither lazy nor single minded in my goals.  I would say on average, I have a lot to be proud of.  

Now I DO want to be more single-minded in my goals.  I've signed up for a 10k (6.2 miles) that will happen mid February.  That's 12 weeks of training.  

Here are my fears:

1. Boredom
2. Lack of planning
3. General distraction
4. Lack of focus. 
5. Did I mention boredom?

So here is at least part of my plan:  I've printed off a 12 week training program and taped it to a wall in my kitchen where I can cross off the days and make notes as needed.  I've said to myself that the ONLY think I need to worry about is the day ahead of me.  I'm perpetually overwhelmed by the amount of info on the web.  Mental paralysis takes over and I shut down.  I think part of finding the middle ground will be writing about my progress here. 

So here goes:  Today I chose the website www.amatuerendurance.com as my guiding source of advice and information in this 12 week journey.   No more and no less than this site.  

I've just enjoyed a Sunday espresso and holiday chocolate truffle. 

Tomorrow I run...

Employment vs Passion at Age 41

I've taken an antidepressant medication for 12 years, one little pill just about every day.  It's been life altering.  I've attempted approximately five times to get off of it and like clockwork my mood dips precipitously and dangerously low.  Other than feeling mild annoyance at paying out of pocket for these pills, I have no daily side effects.  Long term?  Don't know that yet.  

To get this medication I visit a psychiatrist, Dr. W, four times a year.  I hesitate to say, "my psychiatrist," though she most certainly is, because my true therapeutic relationship is with my therapist who is an LCSW.  

Today Dr. W and I had our most frank and satisfying talk yet.  

I am toying with, as I have on and off for years with returning to school, for a music degree.  Dr. W asked me if she could speak frankly. Yes. To paraphrase, she said, "Go get yourself trained in a health care profession, get a two year degree at a CC or state school - radiologist, phlebotomist, anything.  Go make money.  I think this country is sold a bill of goods when it comes to "following your passion" and "getting into the best school.  You will always struggle if you go get a music degree."  She expressed her frustration at how much school debt Americans take on.  "Where you get a degree doesn't matter, what you do with your degree matters! Go get a solid health care job, which earns you money that you then use follow your passion.  Healthcare is where you can earn good money. Though I like psychiatry, it isn't my passion.  My family is my passion."

What she's said strikes a chord with me.   Though I have some CC debt I have no school debt.  I've seen my contemporaries and particularly my 80's born friends struggle under their debt load.  

I feel that to earn a solid middle class living, I have to go back to school and in something that isn't my passion, something that is really difficult for ADHD folks.  

Any thoughts or experiences folks would like to share?  






   

Help! My Eyes are Bleeding!! Navigating Google +

Agh, the nightmare of navigating google+... or any social media settings.

All I want is a private blog that notifies my readers when I publish an essay, which at a minimum, is every Tuesday, by the way.  When I finally sat to read about creating a blog, I started with Wordpress.   What a fucking labyrinthine, rabbit warren of a corn maze of neverending alleys, byways and wormholes of information.  There are people out there for whom navigating these sites is intuitive, even dare I say, pleasurable. I would rather find something that makes my eyes bleed. 


An hour and desperate phone call later to my computer savvy BFF, I'd found Google's Blogger.  Simpler? For sure.  Yet, still a struggle for me.  

So I start my blog but soon figure out that Google really doesn't want me there on Blogger.  So passe'.  No it's all about Google +.  OK, I'm game.  I want my blog and won't be cowed by technology.   They want you on Google+ sharing, sharing, sharing!!

I soon find myself in a mess of "circles" and "sharing" and the worst, "default public settings."  NO, I don't want this!!  Writing about my ADHD is difficult and vulnerable and I don't want anyone but of my choosing to be able to access it.  I love my family and friends but I'm not ready to share this.  

I'm proud to say that I did manage to create an "ADHD Essays" blog circle and have made it private.  Not only that, I've hidden who is on that list from public viewing.  

If you see otherwise, let me know.

Oy.  

The Dreaded Employment Search also known as, "I just wanna be me!!!"

I mentioned in my first posting that I've been fired from some jobs. The following job wasn't one of those but came pretty close.  I quit before that happened.  Years ago I worked at an arts organization where I was in charge of a huge database of arts and music presenters that had to be organized in Excel, at least I think it was Excel... it was something with boxes and grids that represented time and space.   I'll leave the description to that.

This was the job, in Spring of 2000, where I said to my therapist, to paraphrase, "my depression is well taken care of but there is something else going on."  I COULD NOT get myself to make heads or tales of that database, nor could I stay awake to get close focusing on the task.  It was excruciating.   Not only could I not get my brain to organize to do the required work, I didn't really want to.  I found sitting at that desk intensely...actively... boring. Even with that said, I've too often felt the compulsion to GET BETTER AT THINGS I SUCK AT!!

Every day I see people who kinda, sorta hate their jobs but manage to do ok or even well at them.  They earn money this way, they vacation, they go out to restaurants where they bitch about their jobs.  THEY HAVE MONEY.  Thus my dilemma. They may hate their jobs but they can pay at least some of their bills and enjoy of modicum of respect in society.  I wish I could fake better than I do.  I really, really do.  Rant done.

Now I want to focus on the positive:  Here are some of my strengths:

1. Fantastic public speaker
2. Natural teacher
3. Engaging performer
4. Good writer
5. Work as a team member
6. Strong voice with great variety
7. Outspoken when necessary 

In looking to the future and trying-oh-so-hard to not be burdened by the past I focus on what I do well, which is what the above list is about.  The more natural fit for me is a performer-teacher- nurturer- speaker and-collaborator.  NOT a desk jockey.

Music Study and Me

Here is a list of instruments I've started and been unable stick to in order of attempt:

1. Drums
2. Clarinet
3. Violin
4. Piano
5. Ukulele

Voice is the one instrument in which I've had some success in sticking to and of moving beyond a beginner's knowledge, but truthfully, even this has been a huge struggle.  Working on any instrument on my own becomes a fight against sleepiness. In turn that sleepiness leads to an inability to notice patterns, which to my mind, is a hallmark of attaining any kind of proficiency in, well, anything.  

The trouble is I am most definitely a musician by nature.  For example, my heart warmed and broke a bit when one day looking through old report cards, I noticed that my kindergarten teacher wrote that my five year old self came alive when the piano teacher came to perform in class.  Oh, to see that little self!!  She still exists.  My deepest connections are with other musicians. I am most alive when on stage or rehearsing.  Yet, I am left unfulfilled.  Many of my friends have MA's and DMA's in music and play at levels I only dream about.  I crave proficiency in a melodic instrument.  My job struggles are such that I can't afford lessons but even when I could my lessons would occasionally (often) end in tears of frustration regarding my sleepiness.  My very understanding teacher would be a wonderful listener but neither of us knew or knows the answer to overcoming this lack of attention or of maintaining flow in practice. Additionally, until I have health insurance again, ADHD medication is not an option.

Are any of my readers musicians?  If so, what has worked for you to attain knowledge and build upon it?

Discipline

I've been thinking a lot about the word "discipline" lately.  It can be a cruel word in the context of ADHD.  Searching for internally-generated discipline can feel like walking around in a black room that changes shape.  Not only that, in my experience, I can manage to find some measure of discipline or linear thinking and still manage to make a whopper of a mistake.  A few years ago I did nearly everything beautifully right to get myself to my flight on time but still managed to miss the plane because I was waiting at the wrong gate.  The airlines' name were similar and I just didn't pick up on it until it was too late.  Not only that I lost track of time while waiting for the plane so when I finally realized my error the plane had already been gone for only five minutes.  Five minutes!  Commence tears and shame. 

So back to discipline.  See this definition.  I'm struck by discipline meaning bringing order and control to a situation.  There's so much between that state and my brain I practically get dizzy thinking about it.  Actually what it really makes me feel is demoralized. 

For many, focus means cutting a clear path:  I set my sights on that goal, lay out the plan and over a span of time to varying degrees of success, internal and external, I complete that goal.  Except for very rare times, accomplishing goals eludes my grasp.

I equate my relationship to focus as it is to fog.  I see it in the distance, it mostly disappears up close but, occasionally, I look down and droplets of it will appear on me but soon enough it evaporates. 

I write this moderately meandering essay in the context of my awareness that I still want a voice over business.  I'm not sure owning my own business is right or possible for me but many aspect of this work appeal to me.  I'm still trying to answer this question before I dive in again. 

What do you think, dear readers, of discipline?   

Let Me Introduce Myself…

I am a 41 year old single woman who was diagnosed as ADHD in my early thirties. That and depression have been the primary struggles in my life and I am tired of it.

Thus this blog.

I’ve held tons of jobs since college: counselor to the developmentally disabled, waitress, bartender, B&B receptionist, music school receptionist and briefly, psychiatric counselor. Been fired from some jobs, got bored of others. I graduated from college with degrees in English and French. Hell, I even lived in France for my junior year of college but career success has eluded me. I get overwhelmed by paperwork, suffer anxiety, boredom and/or sleepiness when I attempt to focus. 
 
This struggle has gone on my entire life. It’s brutal on my self esteem and my hopes for the future. Setting long terms goals feels like an impossibility. For example…

I worked with an extraordinary voice coach/accompanist for four years in the hopes of recording an album together and it came to nothing. Outside of becoming an infinitely better singer, the project faded away. 

Next I worked in fits and starts to create my own voice over business, but this went nowhere too. This one hurts more as my parents generously helped fund this dream.  I felt total and complete overwhelm. I could not get myself to sit at my computer to work on it. My will and my brain could not get in sync.

So this is where I am. 

I am very nervous putting my struggles out there but I feel compelled to do so to get them out of my head and onto paper, so to speak.   My other motivation is this: I am perpetually inspired by people who put their vulnerability on the table.  They face their fears and see what lies past them. I want to be one of those people.