I also always, always find a way to [...]]]> I’m someone who really enjoys puttering around with home improvement.  I have a powerful drill and I enjoy using it to put holes in things.  I feel a sense of competence when I hang a shelf or a towel bar, or build something useful out of scrap materials.

I also always, always find a way to screw up my project at some point.

The fact is that having ADHD and dysclaculia is not a recipe for smooth sailing in this department.  ”Measure once, cut twice” is not something that works when you measure twice, get two measurements, so you measure again, and get a third measurement that’s completely different than the first two, so you measure again … and you wind up splitting the difference between the two measurements where there were the largest cluster of results, and it turns out to be wrong.

Last week I had an adventure where measuring didn’t even enter into it.

I was building a folding screen to hide the cat box.  To make a long story short, my house is rather odd, and the only decent place to put the litter box is right by the front door.  I feel it’s slightly tacky for the cat box to be the first thing guests see when they arrive.  So I got a few window shutters and made a screen.  But my ADD, as always, caused an amusing screw up.

A folding screen, of course, requires sets of hinges in between each panel.  By swinging the panels on their hinges, you can arrange the screen to fold folike an accordion.  You can make it longer or shorter, or even fold it around whatever you want it to.  Clever arrangement, don’t you think?

I was on the home stretch of this project last week.  I’d painted all the shutters pretty colors.  The only thing left was to attach them.  I had an hour before I was supposed to meet a friend, and I wanted to get as much work done as I could in that hour.  I happily made little marks through the holes of the hinges where I’d need to put in the screws.  I happily drilled little holes in the sides of my panels, and attaching hinges with finishing screws (have I mentioned that I enjoy playing with power tools?).   I happily attached the hinges onto two panels, and was quite proud of myself when the panels obediently folded as they should, and stood up when I unfolded them.  Yay!

Then I went about the second set of hinges.  As I finished up, I reflected that I’d gotten two thirds of the way through my project without screwing up.  Only one more set of hinges to go!  I told myself it was because the project didn’t involve a lot of measuring.

I set my folding screen on the ground, expecting my three panels to unfold and stand proud.  But no.  They weren’t unfolding at all! What could be wrong?  Were the hinges on too tight somehow?  I loosened the screws.  No result.  The shutters were still stuck fast.  I loosened the screws some more.  Then some more.  A little bit of movement, but still no unfolding.

After several minutes of this, I finally noticed that I was not working with a third panel. I only had two.  That’s right, I attached the second set of hinges on the other side of the two panels I had just hinged.  I had fastened my screen shut.

Before I met my friend, I had just enough time to remove the hinges and put my tools away.

The moral of the story is, when you have ADD, don’t rush yourself.  I had plenty of time to finish my screen.  I didn’t need to get it done in that hour before I met my friend (thank the gods!).  But I rushed myself, making it more likely that I’d overlook something important —  such as the number of panels that I was working with.

Well, in another installment of “I wish they’d told me that a long time ago”, it turns out that SSRI’s can contribute to hyponatremia, a potentially dangerous condition in which your body doesn’t have enough sodium to regulate the water in your cells.

It is believed that SSRI’s might contribute to at least mild hyponatremia in [...]]]>

Well, in another installment of “I wish they’d told me that a long time ago”, it turns out that SSRI’s can contribute to hyponatremia, a potentially dangerous condition in which your body doesn’t have enough sodium to regulate the water in your cells.

It is believed that SSRI’s might contribute to at least mild hyponatremia in up to 30% of patients taking these medications.   Symptoms of hyponatremia are nausea and vomiting, headache, confusion, lethargy, fatigue, appetite loss, restlessness and irritability, muscle weakness, spasms or cramps, seizures, and decreased consciousness or coma.  SSRI-related hyponatremia is more common in women and the elderly than in the general population.

Now I’m not unconscious or throwing up, but I have been having some unusual issues with my muscles lately.  I’ve been incredibly tight, and no amount of stretching seems to help.  In fact, I pulled my hamstring last weekend while gently easing into a yoga pose that is usually pretty easy for me.  Coincidentally, just last week, my doctor doubled the dosage on the SSRIs that I take.

To make a long story short, other than serious organic illness, my “lifestyle” embodies many potential causes of hyponatremia:

• I take SSRI’s, which in addition to being potentially diuretic, also make me thirsty, so I drink a lot of water.
• I’m on ADHD meds, which also cause dehydration.
• I’ve been taking a lot of asthma and decongestant medication to deal with a bad allergy season
• My diet low in sodium, because I’m a vegetarian who eats no processed foods.
• Since I’m thirsty, I consume a lot of water while exercising.
• I drink alcohol.

As for that last one, you’re supposed to be careful with booze when you’re on the meds I’m on.  I know that.  I’ve known it for years.  I’ve been naughty.  But it’s been a rough summer, and I’ve been self-medicating.  I clearly need to stop doing that.

Since hyponatremia (if that is what I have) can indicate a serious organic illness, I’m going to the doctor on Monday to make sure it all checks out.  In the meantime, I’ve spent the last couple hours drinking miso soup and coconut juice to try and restore my electrolytes.  I already feel better.  And if you’re on SSRI’s, be aware that hyponatremia is a possibility, and discuss any symptoms with your doctor.

Partly, it’s because I’ve just been too depressed.  I feel like if I write about [...]]]> I haven’t been posting a lot lately.  Partly this is because of the amount of time I’ve had to spend reading job listings, filling out applications, tweaking resumes, and trying to write cover letters that aren’t don’t sound like total BS.

Partly, it’s because I’ve just been too depressed.  I feel like if I write about what my life has bee like lately, I’d just be whining, and I should be trying to be chipper and cheerful and all that crap.

But then I realized, this is a blog about adult learning disabilities.  Life with adult LD sucks sometimes.  And seldom does it suck more than in the area of employment.

So here goes.

Back in March, when my husband was offered his exciting start-up opportunity that involves a significant pay cut, my plan was simple: I’d go back to my previous job, which wasn’t that exciting, but was a decent place to work, and I’d put in a bunch of hours there while looking for something that paid better and was more in line with what I’d actually like to do with my life.

It seemed like a good plan, because every time I’d been into the store where I used to work, my former boss had said that he’d love to put me back on the schedule.  It sounded like a done deal.

So I applied there.

And then I waited.  And waited.

And then I called them about my application, and it turned out that there had been some changes in the management staff, but I landed an interview.  I was told that my previous employee evaluations looked good, and that they could probably use me, but I should call back in a week to follow up.

So I did.

And I was told that they hadn’t made their decision yet, and I should call back in a week.

So I did, and I was told that they hadn’t made their decision yet, and I should call back in a week …

And it went on like that for about six weeks, at which point they decided to go with someone else.

Which is fine, I guess, but did they really have to string me along for six weeks?  And actually, it’s not fine.  It’s a bit of an ego blow to get turned down for an incredibly boring, menial job that I worked for five years; a job that I can do in my sleep; a job for which the company would not even need to train me.  I had pretty good evaluations at that place — and if they won’t hire me, why the hell would anybody else want to?

A few weeks after that, one of my applications actually got a nibble, and I was asked in to interview.  It was a tough interview, what I later found out was a “behavioral interview“, that began with the interviewer pressuring me to disclose “things I didn’t like” about my previous management.  I was caught off-guard, and since I was totally unprepared for that kind of interview anyway, I totally bombed it.  I know I bombed it because I received an email form letter less than 24 hours later telling me they’d decided that “another applicant was a better match for their needs” — this after they’d told me the day before that they were still interviewing a lot of people, and wouldn’t be making a decision until mid-June.  They didn’t know who they liked, but they knew it wasn’t me.  Ouch.

And all of this is on top of my ongoing problems with employment — the fact that I was never able to land an entry-level professional job, because the skill sets for all of those jobs are in the exact areas in which I am learning disabled.  Administrative assistants have to be organized and able to prioritize.  They need to keep track of other people’s schedules and contact information.  They need to know where everything is, and often they’re called upon to do light book-keeping.  Try doing that when you have dyscalculia, dysgraphia, and ADD.

Lest you assume that my problems are simply psychological, that I’m psyching myself out, let me state that my problem is not that I haven’t tried doing this sort of work.  I have.  I have tried, and I have failed, and I have gotten fired.

What kills me is that when I describe this situation to friends, they often tell me, “Yeah … you really need to be at a high enough level so that someone else is doing that work for you!”

Great!  That helps so much!  But I can’t be at a high professional level, because I can’t get my frakking foot in the door.

So I have been stuck doing retail and customer service, and all kinds of informal teaching in the arts, and at a time like this that just isn’t good enough.  My work history is all over the place, and I’m competing for jobs with people who have been focused and successful.  I hate the kind of work I’ve been doing, but I don’t know how to dig myself out.  I’m smart, I’m competent, and I learn quickly; I’m a good problem solver, I’m analytical, and I write well; and I turn 35 this month, and I still don’t know how to work around my learning disabilities.

I immediately felt better.  On the first day. I had more energy, less fatigued, and was not tempted to gorge [...]]]> Last week, I wrote about how I had “virtuously” cut my fat intake, with disastrous results.  My trainer/personal therapist told me to eat more fat, especially at lunch.  So I decided to give it a try.

I immediately felt better.  On the first day. I had more energy, less fatigued, and was not tempted to gorge on cookies in the evening, a bad habit which has bee creeping up on me in the last several weeks.  I’ve lost about half of the three or four pounds I gained.  Even my seasonal allergies are better, in spite of the evil trees outside my house continuing to bloom shamelessly.

Yesterday my husband rambled across a blog by a PhD named Stephen Guyenet who studies the neurobiology of body fat regulation, and sent me a link to an post on the health benefits of full-fat dairy products.  It seems that consuming your dairy products full-fat allows you to metabolize fat-soluble vitamins, such as K2, which protects against heart attack.

Wait, what?  Saturated fat PREVENTS heart attack?  That can’t be right, can it?  This needed further investigation.

And so, I spent a few hours on Whole Heath Source that should have been spent on my job search.   I write about what I learned here because of the constant allegations about ADHD, nutrition, and the “ideal” diet that can be used to “treat” or even “cure” ADD.

I’ll begin with fat.  The idea that there are good fats has been gaining credence in recent years.  We all know that unsaturated fat is good, and saturated fat is bad.  Right?  Well, not so much.  According to the Guyenet, whether the fat is saturated or unsaturated is less important than amount of omega-6 fatty acids.  Omega-6’s seem to be the real “bad fats”, whereas omega-3’s are good for your brain and stuff, which is why fish oil supplements have exploded onto the market.

Omega-6’s are present in plenty of vegetable oils, like corn oil, soybean oil, and canola oil, which are ubiquitous ingredients in American food.  They’re also found in animal products derived from animals that live on feed lots — turns out livestock feed has quite a bit of things like corn and soy.  The omega-6’s in the feed makes its way into the food these animals produce, whether we consume their flesh, their milk, or their eggs.  Animals that are pastured (like the laughing cow, pictured above!) eat a more natural diet, and the food that comes from them is much healthier — lower in those omega-6’s.

Guyenet’s take on carbs is also interesting.  We all know about the Demon Carb from the Atkins Craze a few years ago, and, anecdotally at least, many people with ADD have found their symptoms improved by a low-carb, high protein diet.  Guyenet believes that the problem is not carbs themselves, but the kind of carbs consumed by industrial cultures.  Sugar and refined flour are problems, of course — but so is any kind of wheat flour, and grains should be consumed sparingly and carefully.

Throughout most of our evolutionary history, we have not had access to grains, let alone the refined flour from which most Americans get their carbs these days.  Back in the day, we got our carbohydrates in the form of fruit and sometimes tubers.  When we did consume grain, it was fermented and processed in such a way as to break down the gluten, rendering it more useful to our digestive systems.  Apparently sourdough is sometimes a way to do this if the sourdough is “properly prepared”.  I wish I know what that meant.

Which gets me to the crazy-making part.

How is anyone, let alone anyone with ADD, supposed to keep track of nutrition research?  It’s a nightmare clusterf*ck of vested business interests, government subsidies, and tainted science.  And then, even if you do decide to experiment with your diet, it’s not always easy to track down grass-fed milk, eggs, and cheese.  If you can track it down, it’s damned expensive.

However, those of us with ADD are a population that suffers disproportionately from overweight and related metabolic syndrome.  While I do not reduce a complex syndrome like ADHD to a “food allergy” that can be “cured” with diet, the fact is that nutrition plays a huge role in controlling my own symptoms.

Sadly, finding decent information about nutrition is extremely difficult — and that’s why I was happy to find Stephen Guyenet’s site.  Guyenet’s posts are rigorous while remaining accessible to the layperson.  He supports his points with hard data.  When he comes across a flawed study, he takes its authors to task for everything from methodological flaws, to cherry-picking data, to sloppy language (what exactly was in that “high fat diet” that you studied?).

If you’re considering amending your diet to treat your AD/HD, Whole Health Source is absolutely worth perusing.

Seriously.  I’m an American.  Who doesn’t eat enough fat. Obviously I am a commie pinko traitor who hates all that we stand for in this country.

I learned this after complaining to my physical therapist/trainer today that I’m gaining weight.   I was frustrated, because [...]]]> I have been informed that my diet does not contain enough fat.

Seriously.  I’m an American.  Who doesn’t eat enough fat. Obviously I am a commie pinko traitor who hates all that we stand for in this country.

I learned this after complaining to my physical therapist/trainer today that I’m gaining weight.   I was frustrated, because I had recently added an extra half-hour of cardio onto my workouts.  The extra cardio made me exhausted later in the day unless I ate more, but it seemed like no matter how much I ate, I was always ravenous.

My trainer asked me to describe my diet.  Protein, carbs, some fat, and ideally some greens at breakfast.  Protein shake and a banana after working out.  Low-fat protein, carbs, greens at lunch.  A bit of trail mix for a snack.  Bean-based vegetable stew for dinner, with a slice of bread, and more greens.  Except sometimes I just couldn’t stop eating the damn trail mix.

“That sounds really good,” he said.  “But you should try to work  a bit more fat in there, especially at lunch.  A few slices of avocado should do it.”

It seems my problem was a fairly common one.  The extra cardio made extra metabolic demands, and triggered my body into starvation mode.  Body thinks it’s starving, sends hunger signals to the brain, yada yada yada, you’re hungry all the time, and your body tells you to take a nap to conserve calories, so you lay down fat instead of the muscle you’re need in order to do that extra cardio.

The stupid thing is, that for much of the winter I had been having a some guacamole with my lunch.  I loved it.  I get the avocados at my local farmers’ market, so they’re super fresh, and my lunches were incredibly tasty — but I felt slightly guilty, thinking that I didn’t really need that extra fat.  Then, several weeks ago, I heard a program about research into food addiction and nutrition on the local NPR station.  Fats and sugars, apparently, trigger dopamine in much the same way as addictive drugs like opiates.  This means that when you start eating them, it’s hard to stop.  Of course, your body needs carbohydrates and fats in order to function.  “But,” said one of the guests on the program, “if you live in America today there’s very little chance you aren’t getting enough fat.”

“Wow,” I thought, “he has a really good point.  I really don’t need those extra fat calories from those avocados.  Besides, the dopamine system is the one that goes haywire in ADD, which is probably why that guacamole tastes so incredibly good.  I’ll stop eating it.”  And I did, and I felt virtuous.

If I’d stopped to think about what he said, I would have realized that I was committing a logical fallacy.  I inferred from the fact that I live in America, and the standard American diet is high in fat, that my diet was therefore high in fat (it’s the fallacy of division, kids! Yay!) .  The problem here is that I do not eat the standard American diet.  I’m a vegetarian, and that simple fact alone means that my diet is not “standard”.  It does not necessarily follow that any vegetarian diet is low in fat, but mine is — because I take scrupulous pains to make sure it’s healthy and balanced, because if I don’t, I experience brain fail.

Of course, if I’d stopped to think at all, I would have realized that it’s stupid to change a diet that’s working for you based on a throwaway line from a radio show, even if the person speaking it happens to be a neuroscientist who studies the effects of addiction and nutrition on the brain.  Yeah, fat triggers dopamine, and yeah, that means it can be addictive — but, as the neuroscientist would have been happy to tell me, sometimes dopamine is triggered for very good reasons.  Those guacamole soy-chicken wraps tasted probably tasted wonderful because they contained what my body needed.

Obviously, I didn’t stop to think.  My decision to deprive myself of that tasty, tasty guacamole was based on an almost unconscious equation of  “deprivation” with “virtue”, and the assumption that what I saw as morally “good” was going to be “good” for me (another logical fallacy, btw).

There’s probably a whole essay here about the Obesity Epidemic(tm) and the media.  Why was I so quick to assume that there was something wrong with how I eat?  Why did I take that off-hand statement to heart, when my weight is Normal(tm) and I’m in excellent health?  How many other people out there take statements like that to heart, and inadvertently sabotage their own health and fitness in the process?  And how can we have a much-needed national conversation about health, exercise, and nutrition when it’s all so damned complicated?

That’s an essay for another day.  In the mean time, I’ve learned a lot from the aftermath of that fateful decision to forgo those few ounces of guacamole:

1. Nutrition, while basically simple, is very sensitive to individual situations.

2.  Self-deprivation for its own sake is super lame.

3.  My body can tell me what it needs, and I should damn well listen to it.

4.  In spite of my Liberal Arts Education(tm), which trained me in the rigors of Critical Thinking(tm), I am just as vulnerable as anyone else to making irrational, emotionally-driven choices.

and

5.  Did I mention my body is smarter than I am?

For now, I’ve reinstated that guacamole, and after only one day I already feel much better.  I didn’t get ravenous in the afternoon, I didn’t fall asleep, my mood was stable, and I could even focus mentally.  Virtue can go to hell.

Usually, what this means is that I can count on April and May to be my good months.  The [...]]]> The weather in my neighborhood is usually fairly predictable.  Rain from January through March.  Sun in April and May.  Fog from June through August.  Sun in September and October.  Fog or overcast weather in November and December.

Usually, what this means is that I can count on April and May to be my good months.  The days get longer, and the sun shines.  As I’ve written before, both my depression and my ADD are highly responsive to the amount of sunlight I get.  I can usually count on April and May for a better mood, incredible energy, and the ability to really focus on getting things done.

Not so this year.  The winter rains just haven’t stopped.  California needs the rain, gods know; we’ve had a running drought for a few years now, and all this rain may finally be pulling us out of it.  But my own selfish needs are not being met.  I’m trying to juggle my online writing, a job search, and an art project that needs to be finished on a deadline.  I could use a little help from the sun right about now.

Since it’s already mid-May, I’m afraid that I may not get my sunny Spring this year.  We may just get rain, rain, and more rain, until the fog rolls in and covers the land for the summer.  This is not a good thing for my brain.

And that’s not even getting to the drafts from previous months.

I’ve really got to do something about that offline life

Now comes the difficult part.

After two virtually structureless weeks, weeks in which I could go wherever my whimsy took me, weeks in which someone else cleaned my room [...]]]>
Well, I’m back from France. It was awesome for all kinds of reasons. The food, the art, the food, the history, the architecture, the food …

Now comes the difficult part.

After two virtually structureless weeks, weeks in which I could go wherever my whimsy took me, weeks in which someone else cleaned my room and cooked my food, I have to return to my normal routine. But before I even do that, I have to recover from jetlag. At the moment my body has no idea what day or what time it is, and my mind has no clue about where it should be directing itself. I haven’t felt truly hydrated since getting off the plane Saturday night.

Overseas travel is a challenge to anyone, but for adults with attention deficit disorder, it presents unique challenges. We’re more sensitive than others to disruptions in our normal routine (as much as we may struggle against the very idea of routine). This is particularly true when the disruptions are physical. Changes to our diet, our sleep, our intake of water, alcohol, or caffeine — all of these can wreak havoc on our ADHD symptoms. And all of these are an inevitable part of travel.

I’m trying to give myself some slack as I recover from this trip. Of course, I feel like I should be hitting the ground running; but this isn’t fair. I’ve been trying to think in French for two weeks. I’ve been eating a lot more fat and carbs than usual. I’ve had more caffeine and more wine than I normally do (because you just can’t have pain au chocolat without coffee, dammit, even if it is decaf!). And my body clock has had to abruptly re-set itself by nine hours twice in the last two weeks.

Yesterday I gave my brain the day off, and spent the whole day watching tv. Today I worked out, which has already helped, and made sure to drink an electrolyte beverage afterward. That seems to be helping with the hydration issue. And I’m working in my studio, with all its daylight spectrum lighting, and letting the light work its magic.

“Attention” [...]]]> I’ve blogged before about the seasonal aspects of my ADD.  Unsurprisingly, things have been even worse since the return to Standard Time (ptui!) and the loss of another hour of light in the afternoon.  I’ve been more tried, more hungry, more spacey … and paradoxically, less able to get to sleep at a reasonable hour.

“Attention” is a neurological state that’s heavily dependent on dopamine, the brain’s reward chemical.  Dopamine, in turn, is heavily dependent on a number of factors, including sunlight.  Most people are aware of seasonal and weather impacts on their mood and habits, but for some people, these effects can be extreme.  I obviously fall into the second camp.

My doc and I decided to up my Vyvanse from 50 to 60 mgs.  My hope is that this will improve my concentration, attention, and ability to take initiative.  He also advised me to spend time in my art studio from 4 pm until 7 pm ever day.  If you’ve read my previous post, you’ll know that my art studio is equipped with a full-spectrum daylight bulbs.  My doc says it takes 5 or 6 “average” 150-watt bulbs to produce a therapeutic amount of light.  I already had four, and I knew my two overhead lights would put me into therapeutic territory; this was a major impetus for getting off my ass and hanging the lights.

Finally, he advised me to start taking melatonin before bed.

Today is the first day I’ve managed to be in my studio right at 4 pm.  I’ve got to admit it feels pretty good. I am noticing, however, just how hard it is for me to stay in one place for more than an hour.  My inclination is to jump up and go do something, and come back, and jump up and do something else, and come back … it’s so annoying when you have to fight ADD tendencies in order to treat ADD.

In general I’ve been sleeping better, but it does seem harder to get up in the morning.  Whether this is the melatonin or the increasing dimness of my bedroom I’m not sure.  Tomorrow will be my seventh day on the new regime.  Maybe things will settle in and get better.