Procrastination and Time Blindness by Bonnie Le Hamilton

This has been quite a week, starting with Konnie’s youngest son calling me around 9 PM last Tuesday night to inform me their house was experiencing internet issues which had yet to be resolved. That is basically all he said. I groaned but let him know I got the message and I would see what I could do.

I was tired, I wanted to get some sleep. I did actually try to get some sleep at first, then I finally gave up and opened my laptop, still thinking about Royce’s call.

His rapid fire statement still ricocheting in my head. Why me?

The answer was of course, our blog is just the two of us, it is after all about life as mirror twins, which we are. But dang, last-minute warnings are no fun.

Honestly I figured I deserved that for spacing what day of the week it was the week before. I told myself at least I got a warning, unlike Konnie the week before, and tried to get my mind to concentrate on something to write.

It was getting late, and I didn’t have enough, but it was better than nothing when last Wednesday morning less than a half hour before the post was supposed to go up Konnie called.

I answered telling her I was still working on it.

She called to inform me her internet was back up, and she had managed to get to a post up.

All that panic for nothing!

Konnie told me to look on the bright side, at least I had a post started and I had a whole week to finish it.

I think she’s forgotten that I am diagnosed with both ADHD and Autism. In other words, I tend to be time blind. Everything is either now or not now. I have a hard time seeing things any other way.

One week to tweak and edit a post? Plenty of time.

Five days to work on my post? Other things need done first.

Two days away? I’ve still got plenty of time.

You get the picture.

I’m now sitting here in the middle of the night typing away because I didn’t bother working on it during the day. After all, noon on Tuesday is a long way before 9 AM on Wednesday.

It’s Wednesday, and I should be asleep.

Yes, I’m a bit of nigh owl. Not this bad though. At least not every day. And I am trying to get to bed earlier. The problem would be that I didn’t sleep much on Monday night, so I slept off and on Tuesday instead.

I’m awake right now. This is going to throw my sleep schedule so out of wack it may be weeks before I am back on the schedule I was trying to establish.

Then again, I was only trying to establish a better routine. Habits take four weeks to become routine. I may never reach that mark.

This is the problem with being both ADHD and Autistic. In the ADHD mind routine is bad and to be avoided, in the Autistic mind routine is necessary. The battle is to establish routine that works without annoying the ADHD side of me.

Anyone who is both knows how hard this is.

I also suffer from executive function paralysis. Meaning, I know what I need to do, but I can’t seem to get my body to start on it.

Let’s face it, I finally got my shopping done this month because my neighbor needed to go shopping too, and her car isn’t working. I literally finally made it to the store because my friend needed to go too. I’d been telling myself to get up and go to the store for three weeks at that point.

I mean I’d been out of bread for two weeks by that time, and I still hadn’t made it to the store, even though I could have, if I’d gotten off my duff and left my house.

This is the problem with having my issues, and I’m not alone with this. Anyone with my diagnosed sensory issues will have the same kind of issues.

Okay, Konnie’s oldest admits to having these kinds of issues, and she’s got two little girls depending on her!

I honestly thought getting a diagnosis would make life easier for me, but all it has done is give me insight into why I do (or don’t do) the things I do.

The biggest one is it explained why I like my collections.

I’ve had people see me bring more books, or Nativities into the house, and ask, “Don’t you have enough already?”

Uh, maybe? I’m working on it. I have actually stopped buying more Nativities, but am still acquiring more books, and Barbies.

Anyway, happy writing, everyone!

ADHD and Follow Through by C.E. Plagmann

C.E. Plagman is a neurodivergent writer, wife, mother, and lover of reading, singing, and all things home. She's on a journey of self-discovery, and discovering her writing. You can find her at The Neurodivergent Homemaker. She is also Konnie's oldest daughter.

One thing I’ve always struggled with is following through on my goals, dreams, promises, chores and anything else you could think of that I could fail at following through on.

Society would call this irresponsible or flakey. Someone who can’t follow through is someone you can’t trust. But here’s the thing: I’ve always wanted to follow through. If I don’t follow through it’s not because I’m lazy or just don’t care. In fact, I probably beat myself up worse than anyone else could. And yet, growing up I heard all the time that I was lazy, irresponsible, and untrustworthy.

I learned to internalize all these words people used to describe me and believed I was all these things, but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t change. So, I believed there was nothing I could do. I would just always be lazy and irresponsible.

And then I was diagnosed with ADD at the age of 20, while in college. At the time I didn’t bother researching ADD, but in the last year or two I’ve really begun to follow ADHD YouTubers and instagrammers and I’ve connected with other moms who also have ADHD. I learned that ADD is no longer the correct term and that we’re all just ADHD, but there are three types of ADHD. I’ve learned that I’m probably ADHD combined type (the other two types being ADHD inattentive type and ADHD hyperactive type.

As I’ve been learning more about my brain, I’ve learned ways of combatting the way my brain works so that I can function in our society. I’ve learned about setting up my environment to help rather than hinder me. I’ve learned that I do best with open storage that allows me to see everything (because my mind is very much an out of sight out of mind type of mind).

And most importantly I’ve learned that my inability to follow through is likely because my brain craves dopamine and new experiences and ideas. If something bores me, I won’t do it, and it’s very hard to force myself to do it. None of this makes me lazy or irresponsible. It just means that my brain thinks differently so I have to do things differently than most people.

These days, now that I’m medicated, and learning about myself, and learning strategies I’m doing much better, but there are still days where I’m lucky if the kids are fed on time and I’ve brushed my teeth once that day. You win some, you lose some. But each day, week, month, and year at least I can say I’m getting better, slowly but surely. And I can remind myself that I’m not lazy, irresponsible, or untrustworthy… my brain just thinks differently.

http://theneurodivergenthomemaker.design.blog/2022/07/18/adhd-and-follow-through/