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RE: I Can't Read This! Glimpses Into a Life with Inattentive ADHD
My boyfriend kept telling me I have ADHD, and I didn't understand it. I typically get so focused on a task that the rest of the world ceases to exist - I won't hear people speak to me or notice that it's gotten dark. Isn't ADHD about an attention deficit?
It turns out what I so regularly experience is a destructive behavior termed hyperfocus in the ADHD world. And that all my other restless behaviors fit neatly into the box, too.
Now I've learned that there are all sorts of brands of ADHD, all of them focusing on, well, focus! I've barely begun to figure out how to work more healthily with my brain, but I like how you've learned to deal with yours by doing discrete tasks.
Thanks for sharing those insights @therovingreader! I am quite familiar with hyperfocus... but I have to "break through the wall" to get there.
The easiest place tends to be with my artwork... which can be quite meditative and hypnotic, especially if I put on the right kind of music (listen to a lot of melodic progressive house and trance), it only takes me about 30-40 minutes to get "there."
With other stuff-- be it paperwork or working on my eBay store or something like that... I break through the "I wanna sleep" barrier in about two hours... after which I can stay "in the zone" for 12 hours straight, without a break... it scares people how much I can get done. Once, under considerable time pressure, I cranked out an 80-page business plan in about 14 hours. My manager at the time just looked at me and said "That normally takes three people a WEEK to do..."