There has been a change in my life that is massive and boring, miraculous and quotidian. After decades of failing, flailing, and frustration, I am on medication and in therapy for ADHD. My brain is finally beginning to work properly, and the biggest breakthrough is the smallest: now I rinse the last dish.
Perhaps you think of ADHD as a racing mind, a restless energy, a propensity to focus a little bit on a lot of things, but for me, the symptoms were all in the sink. I'd always been good at starting to do the dishes. I'd come in hot every time, then get 85% of the way through and burn out. My mind would flash to any of the other dozen tasks I'd left 85% done, and I'd rush off to finish one of those. A dirty dish and a fork left to be tended to at a later time, when I was 85% into something else. There was always a little bit of laundry left unfolded, a bill or two left unpaid, a to-do list almost all crossed off. That's what my ADHD looked like in adulthood: small piles of good intentions strewn around the house. |
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