This year, I started treating my newly diagnosed ADHD with talk therapy and a small beginning dose of Adderall. I take it only on workdays because they help me focus and concentrate at work. I was told not to take the med on Saturday and Sunday so that any chances of addiction would be minimized or eliminated. The Adderall doesn't help with crushing anxiety. The ADHD that explained so much of my personality and the way I think sits uneasily atop my wild anxiety like a toddler on a bucking horse.
I was very sad yesterday and burst into tears. I haven't cried in months, probably. I was overwhelmed with a sense of impending doom, like death and/or destruction was waiting for either me or my husband just outside the door of the seafood restaurant in which we were trying to enjoy our lunch. A creeping dread wrapped its tentacles into my brain and didn't let go until the evening. Maybe I was just generally overwhelmed. I've had episodes in the past where I was sure that some maniac with a machete was just around the corner or an out of control car was barreling down the street in my direction. I hadn't had one of these episodes in a long time, though. It was similar to a panic attack.
Although most people have an inner monologue, I'm more accustomed to "this is your conscience speaking" episodes, where I'll hear disapproving (and purely self-generated) comments regarding my life or work in my brain as my attention is busy with something else. These episodes can prompt a full blown panic attack: accelerated breathing, a feeling of isolation and a rising sense of fear and dread. I can be busy at work with a pile of records to go though, then a little voice in my ear whispers "you're going to die young like your mother did". The hyperventilating will then start.
Other hits in this Desolation Row juke box are "something bad is going to happen to you.....your husband....your friends and there's nothing you can do about it"; "you're not smart enough for this job"; "you're going to be fired soon"; "you're going to be homeless one day"; "no one really cares about you, people only tolerate you". Listening to music or podcasts while I work are really the only way I can keep those thoughts at bay. Having other people compliment me on whatever I am doing doesn't even help because I don't believe them. I can only believe myself and those positive thoughts just won't come. I don't know how to think positively of myself. I only know how to tear myself down. I had hoped that age would alleviate this self-loathing but it has not. I honestly don't know what will.
1 comment:
Honey I spent the last three years taking care of my mother. I tended to everything. I took care of her groceries, her cats, I showered her, made sure she was well cared for and loved. I was stressed out and frightened that if I didn’t do all of these things that my mother would leave me and die. What I should of been doing was instead of worrying about her meds or eating, I should of been enjoying looking at pictures, and holding her hand when she was afraid. Being a daughter and not a doctor. And after doing all of these things, she still became too weak to do anything, and eventually her stroke took her ability to speak. I’d missed all of those precious moments of conversation. And she died anyway. We can’t be afraid of these things if it keeps us from enjoying anytime together. Live in the moment. I love you, and I’m here for you.
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