For you ADHD mamas! A glimpse into my world.

Flash back to grade school:   You are in a classroom with a disruptive child.   He can't control his actions, frequently shouting out random words or asking irrelevant questions without raising his hand.   He can't keep his hands to himself, or he stares out the window all day. You can't understand why it's so hard for me to conform to the rules set by the teacher and you grow more annoyed as the year goes on because it's always something with him.   I remember those children well.    Now, I am married to one and raising another (possibly more than one). 

It makes my heart ache to now understand what those children in class were going through when the rest of us sat and tried not to judge them.    In those years, ADHD was not something you talked openly about.  (This is the part that angers me....)  Parents were in denial that their children suffered from the disorder and refused to accept that something was "wrong" with their kids.   They frequently argued with teachers, social workers, psychologists, and general practitioners.   They came up with excuse after excuse why ADHD wasn't what their child had.   There was no way!  Not their child! 

I live with a husband diagnosed with ADHD.    Statistics show that marriage with 1 or 2 partners dealing with the disorder have a much higher rate of divorce.   If I remember correctly it's 70% higher than those not dealing with it.   Marriage is HARDER.  Everything in our house is HARDER.    Miscommunication, lack of short term memory, hyperfocus (which is never cleaning the house), fatigue and irritability from trying to focus, anxiety/depression due to low self esteem from not being able to focus and being upset with themselves that they can't.    He cannot be on time---it is not possible.  If there isn't an alarm set for an alarm, set for an alarm, then it isn't going to happen.   Some days it feels like all responsibility is left for me.   You can see where this can become exhausting.    We have gotten to a point in our relationship where we can laugh about it most days, but it took a looooong time to get there. 

When Mason was born, I knew something wasn't typical about him.   He was bored with toys early.   He was having tantrums due to overstimulation when he was very young.   His hands couldn't be dirty.   He could only use certain sippy cups.    He cried in the car no matter how long we were in it.   (Try a 14 hour trip to visit family with that going on....)  To this day, if you change his routine and don't tell him several times ahead of time he has a meltdown.    There were so many days in my life I worried:  Is he on the autism spectrum?  Does he have OCD?  WHAT IS GOING ON WITH MY BABY BOY???   After my husband was diagnosed and I saw a change in him on meds,  I could rationalize Mason's behaviors better.   He has sensory issues because he is overstimulated because his brain is going faster than his body can handle.    His brain is going 100 different directions and there are only a few outlets for that information and as a 5 year old he just doesn't know what to do about it.    On the plus side, he knew his colors at 10 months and he could write his alphabet at 18 months.  He would sing full songs in the car by 2.5 and he has always been one step ahead of most adults for the majority of his life.   To compensate for all of this I have no choice but to plan steps ahead.   Not 2-3 steps but more like 10.   I have learned in this house that I have to be prepared for any situation/reaction because I don't know what will happen and I want to help him get ahold of his reactions and learn how to deal.

Today was the first day we tried Ritalin with Mason.   Two weeks of being exhausted after school with massive, immature temper tantrums and I knew something was wrong.   He cried Saturday and told me that he can't focus at school because it's too loud.    He's always been his own worst critic.   If something might be wrong then he won't even try to answer it.   He came up to me yesterday and asked me what "1+1+1+10+5" was, but 2+4 at school overwhelms him.   It was today that all of this hit me.   5.5 years later and today was the day I finally accepted that he does, without a doubt, have ADHD.   I keep throwing around the question, "why is it so hard for me to accept?" because I knew that the chances of having a child with the disorder were higher.    I didn't want to admit it because I now have to face it head-on.   I don't get to hide under my covers and wish it away.   I don't get to send him to school and brush off the social issues that come with the disorder.   I don't get to do that because I WON'T do that.    I won't be the mom who refuses to help her son because of what others may think of it. 

There are days that I see the look on other parent's faces and I want to slap them into reality.   My son cannot control his impulses.   If we are at the park and he is excited, he will probably cut in line on the playground equipment and I will be there hovering like a hawk to remind him over and over and over and over and over and over and over not to do it, but he will do it anyway.   When he gets done cutting and finishes playing, he will be upset with himself.   He will know that he cut and he shouldn't have, and he will be so frustrated that he couldn't stop himself that he will have a meltdown over the way his zipper is sitting on his coat on the way home.    So, what do these parents want me to do?   I won't avoid public places because they lack such compassion and understanding of the disorder.  I won't yell at him and degrade him in public because they think I'm a bad mother so I need to make sure they know that I know how to discipline.   I will remind him, probably sometimes in a tone that is too harsh, that cutting in line isn't socially acceptable and he needs to learn how to handle him impulses no matter how hard----even though I know it really isn't possible.    I want to carry fliers to pass out everywhere I go to raise awareness.   ADHD isn't just hyperactivity.  It is a LOT  more.   It affects every person differently, which is why it can be hard to diagnose.  There are actually 6 different types of ADHD.    Each type responds differently to medications, therapy, etc. 

So, here I am.   Today went okay.  Mason did well on his med and I can only hope it wasn't a fluke.  I want nothing more than to see his self esteem flourish and see him reach his potential in all areas of life without having to be so frustrated.   I want to see him outgrow his anxiety when he learns how to better handle the stress of not being able to focus.   I want him to graduate high school, go to college,  have a marriage with a woman who researchs and understands the ins and outs of committing to a person with ADHD, and be there to guide his children if they end up inheriting it from him.   But above all, I want him to know and recognize that the anxiety and worry I went through while he was growing up was because I wanted nothing more than for him to be the best that he could be and I did whatever it took to be his main supporter.   Children with ADHD need support.  They don't need to be degraded and given dirty looks by adults.   They aren't stupid.  They know 100% that they are "different" and they dont need an adult to make them feel worthless about it.    Think twice before you judge a child who you think has parents who "obviously don't discipline or care about their child's behavior" because you never, NEVER know what goes on behind closed doors. 

A Fresh Start

It's that time of the year again.   In just a few weeks October 16th will be here and I will be another year older.   In the past few years I have been focusing on either teaching myself something new or refreshing my life in one way or another.   Let's be honest--birthday #25 is about the last birthday you have marked by some type of milestone before you hit senior citizen status.   Lower car insurance may not be impressive, but it was at least a milestone!   Three years ago I went back to school to finish my Bachelors in Nutrition Science, two years ago I taught myself to crochet, and last year I honestly can't remember what I worked on.   My best guess would be focusing on making it through the day without my head in a toilet while my two children pretended to lose their lunch as I was.  (Pregnancy #3 was ROUGH, to say the least).   This year my family is complete, we have transitioned out of the Navy and it's been 2 years since my husband's last active duty day, he is finishing his degree and the kids are flourishing.   It's time to set some time aside to focus on myself.


I have been writing this post in my head for the last few weeks, and I will be the first to admit it was much more witty and focused when I didn't have to "say it out loud".   I still can't decide where to start so I will preface by explaining a little about the way my mind works.   For as far back as my memory goes,  I have been extremely empathetic.   Yeah yeah, I know what you're thinking.  "Well, so am I".    No.  This goes beyond normal empathy and makes my life extremely challenging some days.   If I see a boy on the playground get his feelings hurt, I CAN'T quit thinking about him.  I worry about him, worry about what he thinks people think of him, about how he is handling these new emotions that are hard to deal with as a child,  worry about whether he will stop trying to make friends because he now has a slash in his self esteem, etc, etc.   The list goes on.    Every memory I have is tied to an emotion and when I replay the memory I feel the emotion all over again.    Along with this extreme empathy, I also have some unmistakable intuition.  (this is the important part!)  I can tell when a person has a front up and why they do.   Sometimes I know how they truly feel before THEY even do.   It's impossible to lie to me.    I mean, you can lie to me and I most likely won't tell you that I know you are lying, but I know.   Every. Single. Time.    Most of the time I try to ignore these things because 1) I sound like I missed my ticket to the crazy house to most of you, 2) Almost nobody can really relate to me past the surface, and 3) I don't like being this way.    I want to be able to stand up for myself instead of worrying about hurting someone's feelings because before I have even hurt their feelings,  I am feeling how sad they will be when I do!   You can see by this mess that it's very conflicting and I essentially keep my thoughts to myself 90% of the time and avoid a lot of situations because of it.    So, since I don't like to hurt people's feelings and I feel empathy for people even when they have done wrong, this has made a key point in my childhood extremely hard to process and accept.   I have been dealing with anxiety since I became a mom, and I believe it's because the following situation took on a completely different light once I was a mama myself.

From the time I was a young girl I knew I was adopted.   My parents lost a baby born prematurely and were not able to have children so their doctor knew they were looking at adoption.    On October 16th, at 1:29 pm,  I was born at Asbury Hospital in Salina, KS.   20 minutes after my first breath,  my parents were called and told there was a baby available for adoption and they were first on the list.   Sometimes I laugh thinking about the shock on my dad's face at that moment. :)   They accepted, brought me home when I was released from the hospital, and my mom cloth diapered for a week before they both gave up smoking to be able to afford disposables.   You're welcome,  mom and dad.  Haha!   I don't remember asking many questions about my biological parents when I was growing up.   You see adoptive children searching endlessly and tirelessly for their birth parents, but I just didn't have that calling.   I knew my birth mother's name, that she was 16 when she had me, and that she couldn't take care of me so she gave me up for adoption.    I always believed everything happens for a reason and remember thinking that if I needed to go then God would find a way to tell me. 

God knows I am indecisive and read into everything from 6 different angles.   He has never failed to give me a very clear, unmistakable answer to my prayers or situations I have worry over.   That's what I love about Him.   He has always known exactly how I need to be shown something.   People asked me normal questions about being adopted my entire life, but shortly after I started 5th grade people began to ask me if I wanted to know who my birth mother was.   My response was the same every time: " If I need to know, God will find a way to tell me."   Some friends even went as far as telling me that their mom knew "my mom" and she worked somewhere in town.   I still denied this and asked them to please not tell me any more.   Middle school and most of High school was your typical time for a girl.    Volleyball, choir, church, softball, student council, summer classes for college credit.     In High School, in the matter of one year, 7 people I knew died the end of my Junior year to the beginning of my Senior year and most died of cancer.   One was a young boy I had worked with at vacation bible school, one was one of my great friends living in another town over, and one was my seminar teacher.   I'd been on a missions trip with my church when he started having the leg pain that eventually led to his diagnosis.   All of these people inspired me to take on the roll of Chairman of the Youth Relay For Life in my hometown and use it as my Senior Project.   The mother of the young boy from VBS was the city member on the committee and she also happened to be the neighbor of my best friend.    Life was going relatively smooth, until shortly after my 18th birthday......

I'd dug a book out of my back pack and sat down in Seminar for the required 20 minutes of reading time.    At this point in my life I was still early the majority of the time so my desk partner hadn't walked in.  He was 2 or 3 years younger than me and we were very different people.  We were assigned seats by the long-term sub we had, being as how a new teacher hadn't been hired to fill the spot of our recently passed teacher.     As the bell is about to ring, my desk partner walks briskly into class, looks at me and loudly expresses his shock that he knows who my birth mom is.   For the next 5 minutes I am in shock.   He tells me her name, that I'm so-and-so's sister, that he overheard this kid telling his best friend at the basketball game the night before.    I can hear my heart beating in my chest, but the rest of the class is a solid deafening sound of the air conditioner and pens tapping on people's teeth.   Slow motion but fast at the same time.   Stomach rolling, sweat beading on my eyelids, and no breath in my chest.       After 18 years, there it was.    

The next 18 minutes were the slowest of my life.   As the bell rang to signal the end of reading time, I hastily filled out my planner and signed out to go see my best friend.   She was still in seminar so I motioned for her to come out into the hallway NOW.   She knew something was wrong, but when I asked her bluntly if she'd known she spoke quietly.    She had known, but she didn't tell me because I always said I didn't want to know.     I remember signing into the seminars of other friends and meeting them in classrooms for the next hour, asking the same question to all of them, "did you know?" and almost all of them had.    Words can't explain what it's like to be in this type of position.   All my life I had been happy being adopted, and all of my life I knew in my heart my birth mom had done what she thought was best for me.    Now, at the age of 18, the fury inside my heart for someone who chose to expose my life when it wasn't her right was building.    You see, my birth mom is the woman who lived across the street from my best friend.   The woman who lost her son to cancer.  The woman who joined the committee of my senior project.   That same woman who showed up at softball games, volleyball games, and told most of the people she knew who she was in relation to my existence.   The woman who told her son this life-changing secret so he would bring his brother over to my best friends because she wanted me to know him before he passed away.    I often think about the weight that he carried on his shoulders when he was given this secret to hold.    There is always a way to forgive a young girl and understand her decisions regarding giving her baby up for adoption, but it's far more difficult to understand how an adult who "only wants what is best for you" can blow your life apart in a matter of minutes. 

It's been 11 years this year and I am farther from understanding today than I was then.   I thank God often that I am adopted but I cannot wrap my brain around the mother of a child exposing such a secret and leaving said child reeling with uncertainty, making her so vulnerable.   It's what I imagine being thrown to the wolves is like. 

(more on this part of my life and what followed this day next blog.)