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Monday, February 27, 2012
ADHD in my relationships
I know for me, this ability to compartmentalize issues and pretend they are not there is not something that is not just associated with school. I will avoid people that care about me and want to help me just so I don't have to face a problem or an issue that I have with them or that they have with me. This is probably why I haven't spoken to my mother in 3 weeks.
Maintaining relationships is one of the hardest things for me. I am not talking about relationships with minor aquatints or friends from school, I am specifically talking about family relationships. I originally thought the constant fighting and mistrust that my mother has for me was something that was unique to our relationship and was proven wrong when I went to Landmark College. At Landmark every student has a learning disability (LD) like ADHD, Dyslexia, Language learning disability etc. and I interacted with hundreds of other college students that have ADHD just like me and almost everyone of them had the same kind of relationship with their parents.
I know my mother only wants to help me and that her fighting with me and her pushing me is her way of doing so, however, this only pushed me away from her, made me shut off completely from her and actually distracts me from my school work compounding the problem. I have friends with ADHD that are far more intelligent then me fail out of school due to the parents trying to "help" them by fighting with them. Like I stated above, we compartmentalize our problems and if our parents are fighting with us about school, not only will we avoid our parents, we sometimes avoid school since we view it as the catalyst of the fighting.
I know this makes no sense, even reading it to myself it sounds foolish, but it is one of the issues that is almost impossible to understand. Even my explanation falls completely short of the feelings and reasoning's that we make to not go to class. This was one of the major contributing factors for me failing out of college the first time that I went.
I have had many failed relationships due to impulsive and the fact that ADHDers are knows to fall in love fast and fall out of love fast. Why is this? Well when you "fall in love," hormones and endorphin's are released at a increased rate. Some of these are the hormones that we have less of in our frontal lobe so we crave the "falling in love" feeling since it is able to produce these hormones. This is why many people with ADHD get married on a whim only to have it ending in divorce 3 months later or why we are hot and heavy in a relationship and then become very cold over night. It is difficult create and maintain a serious relationship with someone and having ADHD absolutely adds extra strain on the relationship.
Armed with this information, I made sure I told my girl friend before we started dating that I have ADHD and exactly what it does to me. I told her how it effects me, what I do to cope with it, and made sure she understood that things would probably be more difficult in certain areas then those people dating that didn't have ADHD. She understands this, has supported me wholly, and has actually learned to love some of the minor ADHD problems. Some examples of the issues we have encountered are failure to communicate time schedules, saying I will call but utterly forgetting, not being able to realize when she needs space or attention, and her biggest pet peeve is how I always wait to the last minute to commit to a plan or a date.
I have a lot more to say but don't want to write a book in one night. I hope this is informative and more information along with stories and experiences will be getting posted in the next couple of days.
Thanks for reading.
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Very insightful post. and I cannot wait to read more of your material (keep the posts coming)
ReplyDeleteI wasn't diagnosed With ADHD until I was 21 (currently 24). I spent many years dealing with these frustrating tendencies in my own life, and still do to some degree (some days more than others). Much like yourself I realize that my parents only want to help better me, but the 'pressure' of even a phone call is sometimes too much to bear, which results in weeks, or longer, that i purosefully avoid contact. It's gone to the point where my parents have, in the past, taken it upon themselves to show up at my house to check on me.
I am currently in my third attempt at college, first while being medicated. In the past i would forget to do the assignment, or whatever the case may be, which would make me anxious, even feel physically ill at times, and would cause me to not attend the lecture, which would mean i missed out on the next assignment, and so on and so forth. a vicious cycle that at the end the only option was to either drop the class or receive such a low grade that i might as well not have even taken the class.
While I was unaware that it is common for ADHDers to fall in and out of love easily, my love life definitely reflects this. I thought it was just something with me, one of my weird personality traits. knowing that at least some of it can be attributed to ADHD gives me a little relief.
One thing that I have been, for lack of a better word, struggling with lately is ADHD as an explanation and ADHD as an excuse. While I gladly own up to my mistakes and shortcomings, I can't help but feel somewhat helpless by its ever changing impact on my life... you never know what's going to happen next
I know exactly how you feel. If you continually find yourself struggling in school, I would recomend that you check out landmark college. It is a school dedicated to helping students with adhd and teaches you how to manage it in a college environment. It was a drastic decision and change for me to go there but what I learned about myself after 1 semester there allowed me to actually be productive as a student in a normal college setting, empowered me to control my impulsivity and my own actions in relationships, and it also has taught me the value of support systems. I'll post about some of what I learned later today or tomorrw. If you have any specific questions please feel free to ask me here or email me.
ReplyDeleteThanls for reading
Wow, your inspirational guys. I have been diagnosed since I could remember. I'm 21 now and at a point in my life where I'm having so much trouble with all those small steps to get going. I have high hopes and big dreams but at times these aspirations are more daunting then anything. In my sr year of collage and just lost my job, trying to start up a buisness and maintain grades that have been slipping from the a and b range to c's. I worked soo hard to have good grades because there was a time where I failed multiple times at a young age. ADHD and deslexia are my 2 flaws that I feel bring me down soo much... Im just beging to reach out and have never actually voiced this before. Growing up with a single mom made me always in the decition chair and i feel I have all the answers from everyone's problems but my own. Or i do know but choose to ignore them, "Compatmentalizimg" as you would say. I feel the fear of failing or admitting I'm haddicapped inhibits my true potential. I have the same relationship with my mom as well and in my
ReplyDeleteRelationships, And I also went to a private catholic school. Funny how things happen, keep writing your words bring more comfort then you know. It's great to feel that your
Not alone and it's ok to reach out for help.