Years ago I was into drag racing - as a spectator. I was appalled the first time I went to a race. The idling dragster engine is spitting and spurttering and unless the driver gooses the trottle once in a while, it will stall. You'd think no way that car is going to win anything until it's fixed first.

Then...

The light goes green and then that needs-a-tuneup machine looks like it was blown out of a cannon in an explosion of acceleration - a thing of great beauty for an ADHDer to behold. Not a dang thing wrong with the engine. Just can't idle well because its racing cams are holding the valves open to long and the poor machine is choking on the fuel and air being forced down its throat while it is trying to idle.

No one wants to fix it.

I am more and more coming to the awareness that my biggest ADHD problem is trying to behave like nonADHDers. Kind of like the joke: "Doc everytime I do this it hurts. Doc says, well don't do that."

How bout you?

Bob

I am more and more coming to the awareness that my biggest ADHD problem is trying to behave like nonADHDers.

That is *exactly* it; I completely agree :-).

SB.

Maybe we could get "stall converters" for our brains.:D Could stimulants be equal to nitrous oxide? :confused:

Oh how I wish that were my problem. I wouldn't even TRY to behave like a "normal".

My biggest problem is nearly complete cognitive shut-down!

So, I guess I didn't have ADD before, because until this got really bad, it wasn't a problem! (no impairment, no disorder :p)

Tim,

Indeed stimulants are like nitrous oxide. Back in my day and presumably still today, double A fuelers and funny cars burned nitromethane. Crazy thing is nitromethane burns slower than gasoline. Speed (adderall) slows me down. That is, doesn't burn as fast as gasoline (glucose). Good analogy.

Stall converters allow an engine to reach its peak torque power before locking up. I don't know what it is, been out of the game for decades, but lets say it locks at 3000 RPM. So what in our ADHD world is like a stall converter? Hmmmmmmm? I'd say its putting enough distractions in our environment so that we don't become distracted.

Barb,

I've done the "cognitive shut-down" thing a billion times over. In my case, recognizing we are all different, it comes from trying to do things the way we are suppose to.

Examples:

"Got to have a quiet setting to study."

YOU GOT TO BE KIDDING. Quiet is torture for me. I have no peace except in chaos.

"You can only do one thing at a time." My world needs 50 crises threatening my very existance for me to be happy. I'M NOT KIDDING.

Don't have chaos. Don't have 50 crises. Mental shutdown.

So my lastest gestault is: Hell, if I need chaos and crises to be happy, what the hell? :D

I do very much appreciate I'm as freaking crazy as they come. Trouble is, I'm coming to LOVE IT.

Bob

I like the analogy. Capable of incredible performance in short spurts, but very high maintenance, long downtimes, and not exactly suited to running errands around town.

"You can only do one thing at a time." My world needs 50 crises threatening my very existance for me to be happy. I'M NOT KIDDING.
I need this in order to perform, but I don't think it makes me happy. Constantly living on the edge gets tiring -- physically and mentally. But step back from the edge, and everything falls apart.

I like the analogy. Capable of incredible performance in short spurts, but very high maintenance, long downtimes, and not exactly suited to running errands around town.

I need this in order to perform, but I don't think it makes me happy. Constantly living on the edge gets tiring -- physically and mentally. But step back from the edge, and everything falls apart.

Too funny and yet so true
:D

Trouble is, I'm coming to LOVE IT. Imagine yourself jumping out of an aeroplane in a bunny outfit...

Ada, How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. One one-thousand. Two one-thousand. Three one-thousand. Four one-thousand ...

Tail flailing in the air.

Check canopy.

:-)

SB.

Ada's a foxy bunny.

Barb,

I've done the "cognitive shut-down" thing a billion times over. In my case, recognizing we are all different, it comes from trying to do things the way we are suppose to.

.....

I do very much appreciate I'm as freaking crazy as they come. Trouble is, I'm coming to LOVE IT.

Oh, don't misunderstand me. Multitasking, overloading my schedule, keeping 50 balls in the air, accomplishing tasks in an "unconventional" manner (like "reading" material by converting it to audio -- these are probably the things that have kept me from needing, much less seeking, help for 30 of my 39 years.

But, I hit a wall. Before the complete shut-down I really didn't have a problem!

And, by the way, I love it, too. I'm especially thankful that Adderall has corrected my cognitive problems without taking away my "workarounds" and making me "sane". I think I'm much more productive than I would have ever been if I'd been "normal"! :D

Barb,

It is all about acceptance. I can't idle or I'll stall. It's either pedal-to-the-metal or comatose. I'm screaming down the track and loving it. My only regret is it took me 54 years to see ADHD has a magnificent upside. Damn, I beat myself up for nothing. Who said I can't get other people to do what I suck at so I can do what I excel at anyway?

Bob

I could not agree more!

The world by default caters to the greater portion of the population, which is so slow that it's just stuck on the rote, the remedial, and the petty things in life.

These kind of people do not "get" more advanced concepts because they are still too hung up just trying to understand the lower steps that it took to get there.

<O:p
:cool: The world simply does not cater to advanced thinkers
-it instead labels and shuns us so the the primitive majority won't riot !

Their motto is "it's so much easier to exclude a few rare gifted people than have to to compete with them" and that is exactly what the problem is!