On organization and focus

I have ADHD.  This is not a surprise to anyone who's known me for more than five minutes.  Someone who has ADHD, who wants to do something (like writing for a living) that requires significant focus, self-discipline, organization, consistency, habit, and all the other things that ADHD makes extremely difficult, has to come up with creative, adaptive solutions to get around ADHD's brain chemical problems and attendant cognitive and behavior difficulties. 

I've had mixed success creating and using coping mechanisms throughout my life.  Consistency hasn't been a hallmark of anything I've ever done, and that in itself is a problem with ADHD - even if you create coping mechanisms, you're still struggling against a brain that can't figure out how to stick with the program.  That's the crux, right there - ADHD is a problem that the brain needs to solve, but the tools it needs to use to solve it are the very ones being hampered by the ADHD.  

With writing, my problem is that I'll get an enthusiastic burst of motivation, and then the minute I hit a brick wall, the lights go out, I get distracted, and I just stop.  Even when I'm motivated, it's very easy to go, "Oh, well I'll just check this news site," and then...it's time for bed.  It's a dual problem of focus and consistency.  I have found it close to impossible to stick with a particular coping mechanism, system, or workaround for any length of time, enough to allow me to finish anything.     

Another problem is keeping track of what draft is the most current.  My computer desktop tends to be a confusing morass of disorganized folders copied over from previous computers, multiple copies of the same document, multiple folders called "Documents," and no real system of organization at all.  I've been noodling around with cloud-based storage services to aid me in writing on the go, but I'm always confused about whether they've updated properly, and if not, where my most current draft is.  And it's not like I've stuck with one cloud system - I've got Ubuntu One cloud storage, Asus cloud storage, Google Docs...so I've made my cloud as confusing and disorganized as everything else in my life.  And because I'm confused, that confusion serves as a convenient excuse for my brain to go, "Ah well, look over there at that shiny thing!"  And I don't get any writing done. 

Over the past week and a half, I've hacked my way into an organizational system for writing that seems to be working.  Its beauty lies in its simplicity, but also in the fact that I'm using my own love of gadgets as a motivating factor. 

I recently bought an Asus Transformer tablet running Android.  It's a little 10-inch touchscreen device that comes with a separate keyboard dock that clamps into it and turns it into a little netbook.  I'm using it now to write this post.  A nice thing about the tablet, besides the fact that it's shiny and fun to use, is that it's also very compact and easy to carry with me. 

I also have a big 15-inch laptop that has been my primary writing device for a couple of years now.  It works perfectly for that, but it's extremely heavy and not fun to carry around with me. 

Thus, what I've started doing is this.  I get up every morning about an hour before I have to start getting ready for work.  After a little bit of dithering, I sit down at my laptop and punch out at least some writing.  I don't worry about word count.  I just make sure that I write something. 

When I've hit a wall, or when it's time to get ready for work, I stop, save my progress, and copy the current draft of the document onto a USB thumb drive.  The thumb drive goes directly into a small pocket of a black shoulder bag I carry with me, into which is also placed my Android tablet. 

On my lunch break at work, I pull out the thumb drive and the tablet, and copy the most current draft over to the tablet.  I use the tablet's native (skeletal but useable) word processing program to do some more writing, and then I save my progress and copy the current draft back onto the USB thumb drive.  When I get home, I copy the current draft from the thumb drive to my laptop, on which I have created a folder called "Current Docs," into which the most current draft is copied.  Lather, rinse, repeat.

It sounds like a simple and blindingly obvious system that anyone with half a brain could figure out, and I'm sure millions of people are already using a similar system.  But for someone with ADHD, coming up with a consistent system that a) is simple to keep consistently organized, b) requires the development of a regular routine, and c) is designed to allow a maximum of writing while providing a minimum of valid excuses for not writing - coming up with a system that has all three elements is a revelation.  No clouds, no confusion, and I always have three copies of my most current draft, so it's also a system that backs itself up.

If I want to write for a living, I need to figure out how to streamline all of my routines and habits so that I don't have the excuse of saying, "that's too confusing...ooh shiny."  It may be that I don't stick with this system for as long as I'd like to think I will, but I'm going to give it the old college try. 
    
Note: I'm writing this using Blogger's mobile Android app, so please beware of typos - I can't find the spell check on this. 

An ADHD moment

I wanted to sit down and write a story. But of course, I have ADHD, which makes any task explode into a tangent of other tasks that are only marginally related to the original task of writing.

I started out just fine. I took my medication, which is a long-acting form of Ritalin. The problem with this medication is that because it is long-acting, it also takes a while to start working. So if I start trying to focus on something immediately, it doesn't always work.

I walked the dog, came back, got myself a glass of tea, and sat down with my laptop. When I opened OpenOffice, an information bubble popped up, telling me I needed to update something. I'm so fed up with information bubbles popping up on my computer. I clicked on the stupid thing and it crashed OpenOffice.

Well, at that point I decided I'd had enough of OpenOffice, and got on the web to find another kind of freeware word processing software. As I was scrolling through the list of programs available, I remembered that Matthew had a copy of Word 2007 on the main desktop. I don't want to use the main desktop for writing, because we don't have a good computer desk, and the chair is way too low, so it's uncomfortable.

Anyway, I got the idea that maybe I could turn on network sharing so that I could share the copy of Word that was on the desktop computer and use it on my laptop. I know now that such things are not possible, but at the time it seemed like a likely possibility. So I took my laptop over to the desktop and connected the homegroups using the password, making sure everything was shared properly. In the process, I noticed that while the laptop could see the desktop, the reverse was not true, so I spent some time trying to fix that problem. While I was doing that, I decided to set up all of the homegroup settings, making sure that I could use the network printer, and that my iTunes library on the desktop was shared with my laptop.

That accomplished, I went about trying to open the desktop copy of Word on my laptop. Unfortunately, my laptop showed that copy only as a shortcut, and since Word wasn't installed on my laptop, I realized that my genius idea just wasn't going to work, and I was going to have to either stick with using OpenOffice or find another program.

I took my laptop back over to my comfy writing nook and checked to make sure the network settings were all working, and then, since I was doing that anyway, opened iTunes on my laptop and synced it with my desktop library. Then I went back to the website and tried to find a freeware word processing software. I found one called AbiWord, and downloaded it. While it was installing, I checked to see how much Word actually costs, but for some reason, the website I was looking at didn't list the price.

AbiWord installed itself and I started trying to use it, only to discover that its dictionary didn't recognize contractions. Well that was no good at all. Finally, I gave up and opened OpenOffice, wrote a few sentences, and then got up to get myself a glass of tea. I got a glass out of the cabinet, got the tea out of the fridge, and then realized I had a glass of tea already, put the tea back in the fridge, leaving the glass on the counter, and went back and sat down at my laptop.

I wrote a few more sentences of what I was originally writing, and then realized how funny the whole previous sequence of events had to be if seen from the perspective of someone who doesn't have ADHD, so I switched to a new document and started writing this.

Now you listen here, MSNBC.

I have ADHD. I was diagnosed at three years old, long before anyone in the media had ever heard of it. I know several things for a fact:

1) ADHD is a real disease that affects about 2% of the population. We've gone absolutely crazy in the last ten to fifteen years diagnosing kids inappropriately with it left and right, which has left those of us who actually do have ADHD in a rather difficult position - defending ourselves from those who say it's not a real disease while fighting the tide of inappropriate and reckless diagnoses.

2) ADHD causes inattention, disorganization, impulsivity, recklessness, procrastination, distraction, hyperactivity, forgetfulness, and...oh look, a chicken. These are real symptoms that cause real problems in daily life. For kids, it can make sitting in a classroom an exercise in torture, and make learning really difficult, even if the kid is really intelligent. For an adult, like me, it can make for an extremely difficult workday - especially in a job like mine that requires the ability to organize tasks, manage large amounts of paperwork, complete complex tasks, and stay focused for hours at a time.

3) These symptoms do not go away. They do not fade, you do not grow out of them. They change in character as one's personality develops. Hyperactivity that may cause a child to run around screaming and being disruptive can evolve into fidgeting and social awkwardness as an adult. Still, the symptoms are there, they're real, and they are caused by chemical deficiencies in the brain.

4) ADHD medications, like Ritalin, can mitigate the symptoms of ADHD. The stimulant effect of Ritalin and the other ADHD medications help to kind of kick start the brain and focus it, reducing distraction, impulsivity, and the other symptoms that can make life with ADHD so difficult. These medications work for more than two years. I've taken ADHD medications my entire life, and they have always helped me. Right now, I take Concerta. Without it, I would not be able to function at work. Period. With it, I can focus, I can organize, I can do what needs to be done. That's real. That's measurable. And that's been the case all of my life.

5) ADHD medications do not necessarily stunt growth. I'm nearly six feet tall, and I've been taking ADHD medications my entire life. Do I know whether I would have been taller had I not taken Ritalin as a child? No. Do I feel like my growth was stunted? I don't know, but I'm not worried about it.

This study stinks. It stinks of the kind of anti-psychiatry propaganda spewed forth by the Scientologists and their ilk. Psychiatric medications work, for lots and lots of people with lots and lots of different conditions. They work because they fix, or mitigate, or otherwise deal with, the chemical imbalances in the brain caused by whatever psychiatric disorder someone might have. They work for people with ADHD. They work for people with bipolar disorder. They work for people with depression. They work for people with schizophrenia. They work.

So, MSNBC, and whoever published this "study," go do some more homework. You'll find that there are lots and lots of people out there with ADHD, like myself, who have found great benefit from medications, and who continue to find great benefit from medications, and who have taken them for much, much longer than two years. Meanwhile, ...oh look, a chicken!