Do You Have Trouble Explaining Your ADHD to Others? Here are some possibilities.

Compiled by Cynthia Hammer, MSW, Author, Living with Inattentive ADHD

My brain is either a sampler platter of all my responsibilities and interests that I will think about in random 5-second bursts or a dinner table-size steak of a new niche that I will DEVOUR non-stop for a week straight and then lose all interest in. The problem with both of those scenarios is that I ordered the salad.

     The psychologist who diagnosed me (who also has ADHD) explained it like this. Most people have a filter that lets their brain decide what to focus on. With ADHD, that filter doesn't work right. So we are thinking about everything all the time. Thoughts come into our heads, and we can't filter out the unnecessary ones. Most people can have an idea, recognize it as unimportant, and move on, all in a split second. People with ADHD can't.

     It's like your brain is a car, but instead of driving the car yourself, you have one monkey controlling the pedals, one controlling the gear shift, and one controlling the steering wheel. You keep telling the monkeys what to do, and occasionally, they cooperate just for fun, but they usually laugh.

     It's like having a thought tornado constantly raging in my brain and pulling my focus in different directions. It takes a lot of effort to stay focused on one thing and not get carried away, which is mentally exhausting. If I try to look at everything at once (say, I need to do a big project with too many parts), I get overwhelmed and can't grasp just the one part I need to focus on now.

      Once saw a meme about how it's like carrying a lot of marbles. Everyone else has a bag to hold theirs in, but you, the ADHDer, have them in your hands. And we can hold on to our marbles, usually, but people can't understand why it takes us longer or so much more energy than them to do so

     A book about ADHD explained it well by using the metaphor of a symphony orchestra; all the different instruments can't harmonize because the conductor (i.e., our brains) isn't functioning in a way that keeps the whole in tune!

      Imagine the most tired you've EVER been. Just exhausted that's the feeling your brain gives you when you're supposed to do something like the dishes or fold laundry. Plus, there are at least three radios in your head, none of them are on the same station, and you feel like everyone hates you.

      I also like the car analogy. Your brain is a car. Everyone else's cars do exactly what they should. Every so often, other people have trouble with their cars, but their cars get fixed and continue to operate as they should. Their cars get places on time and never cause their owners' significant stress.

      Your car runs out of gas when you least expect it. It breaks down randomly. You can't find parts. Some days your car works and takes you where you WANT to go, but it always makes you late. No one understands your car problems. They have cars, and theirs don't give them problems. They ask, "Can't you fix it?" Your car gets you fired and causes you to lose relationships. It's not right, but everyone is in the same boat, right? We all have cars. But I wonder, "Why are their cars reliable and mine isn't?

     Then one day you find out everyone has Teslas, with complete road side assistance and navigation... and you have a forty year old Corolla with bald tires, blocked fuel lines and a sextant and compass for navigation. But it's still a car, right....?