I sometimes find myself completely incapable of working - even if it is work I love doing. I tell myself that I am going to sit down and start working and I am going to focus and stay disciplined. unfortunately, I make it about 5 minutes before I am walking around pacing or I get completely defocused. It is like a drug is coursing through my veins and I cant sit or focus at all. (This was the final reason that I went in to get tested and diagnosed.)

Has anyone experienced this and if so how do you cope? Are there methods that I can employ to help me work?

I am sitting at my desk at home, having taken two days off of work to get a consulting project finished that should have been done three months ago. If it isnt finished by tonight, not only dont I get paid but my family will lose what little respect they still have for me...
I have spent so many evenings going to my study with the best intentions of working and getting it finished, only to find that three hours later I have written three lines and surfed the web/porn, rearranged the office, paid bills and generally stuffed around till after midnight.
I am then too tired to walk the dog before work, am less 'in the zone' at work and grumpy when I get home.
I then go to my study that night with the intent coursing through me that this is silly, I just need to get it doen. I am aware that not doing it is making things worse at many many levels.
Yet here I sit, wondering if I will get it done by tomorrow morning...
Dexamphetamine makes my clearer in the head but not necessarily less impulsive.
HELP...

I have many tasks to do at work. If one item won't move forward for me, I just pick up another and make it go.

Me :D

I actually think I am avoiding this task for much deper easons. Just cant get to the root of why.

It's not that I forget to work, I think I am actively, but subconsciously, putting barriers in hte way.
Deep man...

Oh man, I am not diagnosed yet but it is the frusteration of this that is motivating me to go and get it done. It doesn't even matter how little or much I like what I am trying to do, its impossible. I can sit here for 13 hours straight(though of course with constantly getting up and puttering around) attempting to do a simple task and NOTHING, not ONE SENTENCE gets written. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! Its driving me nuts and making my grades multiple letter grades lower than they could be.

I think of all things involved in ADD, this is the worst for me.

I get tired of coping with life in general. Some days I wonder how much more of it I can take. I guess having add and not being diagnoised with it until 45 has helped make my life an uphill battle at times. It's a feeling that my soul is tired does anyone ever get that feeling?

I get tired of coping with life in general. Some days I wonder how much more of it I can take. I guess having add and not being diagnoised with it until 45 has helped make my life an uphill battle at times. It's a feeling that my soul is tired does anyone ever get that feeling?
Yes.

Bone deep tired. Heart tired. Soul tired. Like a dark stillness inside me.

When I feel like this I need to go to a still, wild place with water and just be.

Doesn't always get to happen though.

Where would your rejeuvenating place be Johna?

I'd sure like to get to the root of this problem. It's like a quagmire. The more I need to do it, the harder it gets, until it becomes the one thing that I just can't do. Grapet is right. It's deep. It's like a masochistic avoidance mechanism. Once it's set in motion, it's takes on a life of it's own and it just keeps getting stronger.

It can be the avoidance of something big, like doing my taxes, or it can be small, like paying bills. And the thing is, how many of these things are floating around at any one time? To be honest, I'd rather not look at it all. I'd have no peace. But then again, maybe if I could find a way to stay on top of all that stuff, life would be "peaches and cream"

Instead, it just feels like an endless barage of things that need to be done, and I just can't keep up. It's like I fell behind a long time ago, so I just try to keep my head above water. I'm with you Johna, sometimes my soul feels tired.

As far as work goes, I'm self employed and the worst thing that a customer can say to me is "there's no hurry". That job becomes impossible to do. So I make commitments. I'm more responsible to others than I am to myself. So if I was to try and think of a coping strategy for something, I would try to find a way in through the back door.

I don't know for me it is just my life I get up in the morning stare at the idiot stareing at me from the mirror then go eat brakefast (maybe for the fist time in my life I spell it right) then I listen to teh answering machine say "you have no messages". Then my mind says" you have no messages you are a loner".

Then I have a coffee and the world turns around and I am bright, happy still stuiped but now happy then I head off and face the day as normal only to realise that my pants are on backwards and I forgot all my paperwork oh and that my shirt is insideout.

I get to school with my shirt on the right way same with my pants, cought with my shirt out and end up doing litter duty for 10 minutes, then I say to the teacher, you owe me 10 minute of life then I have to do another 10 minutes.

I go say hi to my friends (by now coffee has left me wide awake and ADD kicks right in) "Hey Mel your brother put your make up on again" :slap: Followed by that alot of talking. I now find my self in a argument and using a very strange comeback that Rob tought me. "Your face comes to a central point."

Bell rings head off to class and for the first timne you realise it is friday and that you have brought the wrong books. I then walk back to my bag getting book dropped along the way. Following getting my books I arrive late with my books, I had luckly had that lesson on thursday so I still had the books. I am 6 minutes late and blah blah blah. I am now up to 14 minutes when I reach 30 I have to stay in for that amount of time. "Take out your homework" We had homework this is the first I heard of it, I get marked with an "H" for not doing it. 3 "H" and I get I detention. Now for a test on Eygpt. What the :BEEP when did we find out about this. "Andrew don't use such rude language in this class,I told you on Wennesday, you will right your test then stay 10 minutes after class.

So I fail my test then spend my 10 minutes sitting in a desk that I was defacing with my pen. I was allowed to go eat lunch, what do you know I left my lunch at home. I walk up to people and start to beg, there is some compition with the regular beggers. I kick them out and I end up getting $1.90 so I go buy my lunch. The tuckshop is closed because I am so late getting there. I head off for the next two periods: Sport, English.

I walk int sport I have my uniforme because sprot is friday aswell as thursday. I am then down playing sport when I am accidently punched in the nose by the teacher who is very sorry, then hit by the football, then basiclly knocked out by the soccar goal post.

I come out alive but not so well I go into English and take a test on I book I have not finished, oh well I guess it was ok she decided that it wasn't going to be a test so I got off ok. I then go but lunch, I go see a fight that took place right where I was eating, I lost my Tomato sauce to the fight it was used as a wepon against the teacher, damn he was an idiot. I go find my Firends and nothing more dramatic. I head off to maths listen to nothing understand nothing therefor comeing out none the wiser. I head to the bus lines find out that my bus is there run down and get myself cuaght in the door everyone laughs I go sit with friends laughing it off but feeling crap inside I get home.

Then I come home go to the toilet, do what nature requires and then go wash my hands and look in the mirror then there are two different things that happen.

Good day: My mind thinks" my god just look at you how on earth do you remain single.

Bad day: My mind thinks: Who is that F***er looking at.

Then I head to my computer, go to this site then watch some mindless boring T.V then I go eat my cold not very well heated up dinner woundering what happened. Next thing I know somebody calls me and I end up speaking Dutch for the next half hour. I then feel happy. That is when I try and go to bed but I have to clean my teeth spill my water smash a glass and then have to get a hottie then I close my eyes and froget to turn off everything.

In conclusion I think that was one of the worst days of my life. The way I cope is bying looking at others lives, and how mine is usally so much better. Sorry this turned into a bit a rant but it happened to me today. :o :o

P.S I hope I have not used any bad words here I really do I don't mean to.

David,

You described me to a tee. When I am that state (which is often) there is only two possibilities. The first is, if I start the task first thing in the morning, I stand a chance. That sometimes works.

The second is Ritalin. It always works as long as I take the time to write out a todo list first.

Bob

I own a Antigue restorations shop and have plenty of things to do , repair , finish , but I find myself often in the office playing on this dang putter because I'm not into work, maybe that's why I have guys who are good working for me. But they can't do the find art restorations and I have to get my head into it before I can work on a piece.

I own a Antigue restorations shop and have plenty of things to do , repair , finish , but I find myself often in the office playing on this dang putter because I'm not into work, maybe that's why I have guys who are good working for me. But they can't do the find art restorations and I have to get my head into it before I can work on a piece.
DH and Davidked, it sounds like you need to turn off the computer and use time on the computer as a reward for getting certain work done. The best way to make this happen is set REALLY tight deadlines for yourself. ADD'ers either thrive on chaos or feel weird when there isn't any....so we tend to create our own chaos. That may be what you are doing. Things are going well at work and there isn't much chaos so you automatically create it by putting off work because you just "can't get into it." It's a common classic ADD habit.

So use the reward system to help you get past this funk. For example, for each section of a piece that you complete you earn 15 minutes of computer time. Setting SHORT deadlines for each section will create that sense of panic and chaos that we love/hate so much.

Consider it like managing money. If you buy things with cash you have to wait until you make enough cash to buy what you really want. Right now you are buying things on credit and justifying paying the high interest rates.

Hey man, this post is not a judgment on you. It's just a suggestion based on personal experience and observations of others with ADD. (I have 6 brothers and 3 sisters. 5 of us have ADD....plus the old man :eyebrow: )

Fighting, I understand what your saying and I try to do that. I am a dealine sore of finisher. When the guys are behind I jump in other than that I tend to leave them alone. But I find myself getting bored allot lately. Even with alot of work comeing in. My mind is always thinking of ways to bring more in. When I get to bored I go out and help but this is good and bad. I tend to get my hands into what the guys are doing and that's not good. SO I find the things they can't do and do it, but it seems the phone will ring and I get off task. Usualy I need to find blocks of time when no one is around to do the conservation things so I don't get distracted. Distractions are my down fall at work. But I have gotten better at recanizing them. But it's still hard to get back on task.

Fighting, I understand what your saying and I try to do that. I am a dealine sore of finisher. When the guys are behind I jump in other than that I tend to leave them alone. But I find myself getting bored allot lately. Even with alot of work comeing in. My mind is always thinking of ways to bring more in. When I get to bored I go out and help but this is good and bad. I tend to get my hands into what the guys are doing and that's not good. SO I find the things they can't do and do it, but it seems the phone will ring and I get off task. Usualy I need to find blocks of time when no one is around to do the conservation things so I don't get distracted. Distractions are my down fall at work. But I have gotten better at recanizing them. But it's still hard to get back on task.
DH, have you thought of hiring someone to handle the "distracting" tasks like answering the phones?
If you had someone who could intercept distractions for you and organize and prioritize them you will likely get more done.
Oh, and I know what you mean about boredom with what you are doing....
One weird thing that I've found helps me get out of that funk is going to a public place and watching out for pretty women until I get bored with that. Hey, some people like to walk through art museum's, flower gardens and forests to meditate....I just go to the mall! :D
For me it's like rinsing my mind out of all of the work and stress...you need to find something like that.

Also, I just thought....playing loud music when I'm working (depending on the work) really helps me stay focused and working.

Done them all, LOL But what realy settles me down is going hunting, I sit and watch the deer more then I hunt.

Done them all, LOL But what realy settles me down is going hunting, I sit and watch the deer more then I hunt.

Yeah, that's what I meant....go hunting....the kind of animal doesn't really matter....or even if you ever get to use your gun, eh? :D

As my boys were growing over the years and I would come in after a hunt late evenings they would always ask me if I killed anything. The majority of the time I would tell them "it's not the killing that interist me but the hunt it's self. Killing is the smallest part of the hunt, getting your mind into the hunt is the chanalage."
>I'm a bow hunter and like to get close . Some time I can reach out and touch deer or have a Red tail hawk land a few feet away on a branch and have a stair down or maybe a squarrlle will run up the tree and I would freek it out with a little movement, rabbits running over my legs trying to get away from a fox in persuit or watching a fox playing with a field mouse it just cought. The list could go on and on. I found that having ADHD in the field has been a great help, by hyper focusing on sounds and movement it keeps my interist at a very high level.

DaveHawk my Dad is AD/HD and a hunter.
He would really relate to your post.:)

For me coping at work isnt hard. I sit there in front of 4 terminals. 2 Sunblades and 2 Linux boxes. The moument I lose focus with one, I switch to another. Some of my code might need to be debugged a little more , mainly because of the disjointed nature of the code, but I get my job done.

Its my daily life at home that i have issues with. The normal mundane tasks I have problems focusing on.

Task completion. I struggle too! I think if I fill up my day with busy work and not think about not doing the task at hand then I'll get more done. But then there's the exception of things that need to be done like cleaning out a room or a closet etc. That take alot of focus because of all the surrounding distractions. Why is cleaning the house so hard? I think it's because I don't have an exact spot for all my stuff then it's like where does it go? It's still out of place no matter where I put it. I need to be more comfortable throwing things away.

Hi Everyone,

Thanks for the responses. I have tried rewards (and punishments) like Fighting suggested but with zero success :(

A few days ago I started Concerta. I expected it to take at least a few weeks before it started to work and to be honest I gave it very little chance of working at all given how hopeless I was. Oddly, the drug started to work almost immediately. In the last 2 days I have been able to do things I have NEVER been able to do before even with the best determination on my part. It sounds silly, but one of my goals in life was to simply be able to concentrate or study for just one hour. I tried a million times to do it and never succeeded once. Well, today I did it effortlessly. I sat in meetings without bouncing off the walls. I completed my entire task list for the day. The best part is that I didnt feel that dread every time I needed to complete a task. It has been simply amazing.

The last two days have been two of the best days of my life. I dont know if this is some short term effect or if it will last. However, I would have paid a year's salary for the last two days. I had no idea that drugs could have that kind of effect. The only bad thing so far is that I feel funny at the end of the day.