I have a hard time prioritizing what needs to be done. I think I know, and I do sometimes, but often I find myself needlessly bogged down by things that do not need to be done while neglecting things that should be a higher priority. Yesterday after school I picked the girls up and drove to Target to get my burlap board. On the way there I realized that I had forgotten the things I wanted to take back. When we arrived I went to the rear of the store and found a mirror that I felt might work in my front hall. I picked it up and put it back. My oldest daughter and I walked around Target with a cart that was filled with objects I don't really need. My youngest crawled into a shelf, my oldest kept putting items into my cart, a rug for her teen hang out room, swimsuits, and a quilt that she wants for her dorm room next year.
My youngest was snarly so I sent her to the car. She did something to my oldest so I told her to stop, she said my oldest had done something that annoyed her so she lashed out in anger and frustration. I need to get my kids in to see someone. I can't remember if I wrote about our insurance not being accepted by the practice that was recommended. I can find someone else, it just feels like I can't. I called the chiropractor yesterday. He's going to be out of town for a week. I made an appointment for next Monday. I called a friend on my way back out to Target. The rest of my family went to see his cousin who was having a party. I didn't want to go, but I feel like I need to get better about making appearances at family functions that are hosted by his side.
Furniture that does not go together gives me a lot of anxiety. I bought a bed the other day. I like it. It's a nice bed. I have no idea what wood it was made out of, but it's been stained a bright red color and I was pleased with how well it went with the walls that need to be repainted. Then I saw the dresser. Before the bed, I liked this dresser. Now it is too brown and I'm having trouble with that. It is not a big deal. This is really not important. Nothing will happen if a bed and dresser clash, but my nerves are jangled and I feel like it's harder to breathe. On a side note, dust from the dandelions is leaving a fine yellow powder on practically everything. There is a physical component related to spring and grasses and trees, but there is a mental and psychological one as well.
I found an OCD workbook that I could order. I know that I can order this. All I have to do is go online, punch in my credit card number, and add it to my cart. But something is holding me back. I think I'm afraid of what other people might say. I feel like if I order this book then I had to admit things about myself that I don't want to, or maybe I feel like I am blowing something else out of proportion. I do not have confidence in this area and I know I don't. Last night I went to Target and did not buy anything. We walked out of the store without purchasing a single thing. My daughter was astounded, she mentioned it to me, astonished that we were leaving the store without handing them money and taking something home.
When I went back I explained that the quilt was not what I had envisioned. This is before the new bed was set up and I realized that the quilt was probably close to perfect as far as the color, pattern, and intensity were concerned. I took it back anyways. I received ninety dollars back from Target after I left a basket and quilt there. Yesterday I asked my sister why I couldn't be obsessed with exercise or nutrition or something good. I have been obsessed with those things in the past. There are no healthy obsessions. The healthier people know that exercise, decorating, laundry, and food preparation and serving are priorities at different times and devote a reasonable amount of time to each of these things. I felt pretty calm last night so I was able to step back and see how the things I obsess over are hurting myself and others. I need to order this workbook. I can and will spend the money on it.
Out in my garage is a desk that I felt we could use. When it came home I found that I had been misled so now I am upset. But we have this desk and we could use it. I have a lot of trouble with compromise. When I give in, it feels like I'll never get my way again. This is not really true. My husband does not like the desk. I do not like the desk, but it is a desk that we have and if I can get him to use it, I can get my dining room table back that he's using as a desk. It's not a desk so there are no drawers and things get piled up in stacks on the table because he has ADD and procrastinates and lacks the ability to sort and organize papers in a way that will be meaningful and sensible later on when these papers are needed. Some of them won't be needed, I put a waste paper basket near the table, it doesn't get used very often and papers continue to sprawl.
Yesterday my sister was telling me about her husband. It sounds to me like he has some ADD tendencies, but whenver I mention that to her, she brushes me off and says that he's just lazy. I disagree with her assessment. The way my therapist explained it to me is that the people with ADD lack a critical component of executive function in their pre-frontal cortex. Her analogy compared it to a company without a CEO where employees were all very busy running around, but they were duplicating effort in certain areas while forgetting others entirely. The people with ADD mean to do the things that they are supposed to be doing that would make sense for them to do. But when they have a piece of paper in their hand, or a pair of socks that they just took off, they temporarily put these things somewhere because they know that they can always come back and attend to them later.
But later never comes. New things come in and then they have to process and react to those things. My sister wants her husband to use a calendar and to plan things instead of just winging it all the time. He feels like a budget, a calendar, or a plan is her telling him that he can't do things and limiting his creativity when this is not really the case. A plan helps establish boundaries. This is desirable because when there are no limits, creativity is diminished. My Furnishing Forward book addresses this, and I've read it elsewhere. Forty choices are not better than four choices. The human brain is easily overwhelmed when it is given too many choices. Creativity is a byproduct of feeling as if there are too few resources and not enough time.
If I tell myself that I have the rest of my life to write a book, where is the urgency? If I write on the computer, there are no notebook pages that carry me closer to the end. I have a seemingly endless capacity to put things into scratch pads or Word documents. A plan allows you to compare what you want with what you have. Things will not go according to plan. This is a fact. Why have a plan? Because it allows you to think through things that could work, and helps identify things that probably won't. My husband's computer program allows him to enter things in to scale. My free hand drawings are not done to scale. Both plans have value. My plan is not useful for determining how much paint we need to buy, or what size of rug I want. His plan lacks an artistic component, is more time consuming, and lacks the physicality of my sheets of paper that I can easily transport.
By calling people with ADD lazy, we are mislabeling the problem. I am not a lazy person. I can get a lot done. Sometimes I don't feel like doing certain things. Right now I have dishes on my counter that I could wash. Instead I am taking the time to write this. I feel better when I write. I feel better after the dishes are done, but I get greater satisfaction and more peace of mind when I can get my personal writing done earlier in the day. Yesterday I didn't get started until very late and that threw me. No routine is a routine just like no plan is a plan. It's just not as effective as a plan or a routine that you put some time and effort into. People with ADD can hold down good jobs and perform well at them.
My brother-in-law is geat at work because he can remember lab values on a patient from that morning without having to look them up. Like me, he has a great memory. When he has people who are establishing the order for him, he can be in the operating room and is an asset there. Like me he is very social and open. My sister and my husband are not like this. They can't understand why we would want to be sharing the information and details that we do. For us, we have a need to talk about these things. We want to share them with others that we may know and work with. We aren't maliciously discussing my sister losing her job or my husband facing the possibility of a client he's had for years switching over to corporate computer support. Talking to others helps us. We get support and reassurance that way.
While it could be true that my brother-in-law does not have ADD, I think it would be worthwhile for them to rule it out. I'm not a professional, but I've read up on it, been diagnosed with it myself, and a lot of the things that my sister is complaining about are familiar and resonate. My brother-in-law gets a lot done. It isn't always what my sister wants him to be doing, and I can see how some of his habits are not helping either of them. She says that he's a slob. Part of that is a fair statement. He leaves clothes and other possessions lying around. He can't find things, wears clothes that are dirty, ripped, and sometimes stained. He eats in his vehicle and drops food on his shirt and pants, but he's also doing a lot of things at work that he's not getting credit for where he should be.
My sister is very negative and critical. She notices what people are not good at and are not doing. She is better about choosing her battles than I am. I want to fight about more things because I am angry and the fight helps clear the air (I only think this when I'm mad, when I'm not I can see that I need to let more go). My sister said that she can see herself and her husband drifting apart. That scared me and it scares her too. I wish they would go in for counseling. My sister says that she knows what's wrong and just needs to work on things. Yes, and no. Not long ago I was at an antique store. I found a bookcase that I really liked and wanted to buy. When I got home I wrote out a wish list. I was going to put these items down on paper so when I had extra money I could get them for myself.
When I reviewed my list, I discovered that the items that I felt that I couldn't live without were not as appealing as they had been. Sure a bookcase would be nice, but it's not going to do anything other than store books and maybe look nice in my home. I would still like to see what the blue planters do for us, but they aren't the ulta high priority that I thought that they were when I first spotted them. Yesterday TheDeadGuy used the phrase 'walking around money'. I need to leave home with some walking around money so I can blow it on whatever. If I leave with too much money, it gets spent on things I don't need and later regret. If I don't have any money I feel..., I don't know how to describe the feeling, but it isn't a good one.
Money is symbolic in my life. It represents control and power. It's a type of freedom to me to have money in my wallet, even if it's only a dollar. Credit and debit cards are not money to me. I hate them and try to use them as infrequently as possible. When your car broke down before credit cards and cell phones, people made it work. When I was working on my will it was gratifying to find that my debts of less than a thousand dollars could be paid with the money my benefactors will be inheriting. It probably makes sense for me to get some life insurance since there will be extra costs associated with child care if I were to suddenly die without warning. My net worth is not huge, but at least I'm not leaving people with a ton of debt after I depart which is more important to me since I can't expect to inherit a large sum of anything except debts from my dad.
Smart people doing dumb things could fill a book. My dad is a smart guy who did a lot of dumb things so now he's decaying in a nursing home that he shouldn't be in, but my next youngest sister hasn't put in the time and effort to get him out of there and into a more suitable place. Today I am going to transfer money into a retirement account. I have to think about whether I want the tax deduction that we could use now, which makes more sense to most, or just stick it into a ROTH IRA right away which makes more sense to me. This is another thing that I have to work through in therapy because I can't figure out why I want to go straight to a ROTH. This is the type of thing that happens to me frequently and I would like to get to the bottom of it. Contributing to one or the other or both would be better than sitting here frozen because I can't decipher this.
It's pretty cold and rainy here. Not ideal track meet weather, but I'll just have to make the best of it. I really want this striped lunch bag that I keep seeing at the store. I'm going to put it on my wish list to see if I still want it in a week. I've found that letting the list chill for a while gives me some distance and perspective. I'm going to start carrying a small note pad so I can write things down while I'm out. I have a phone I could use, but I find that writing things down works better for me. I prefer low tech solutions when possible as they tend to be more economical and environmentally responsible. Note paper requires trees, but I can't believe that making an iPhone consumes fewer resources than a notepad does, and my paper never runs out of batteries or breaks when I drop it.
I'm feeling pretty good today despite not having gotten much sleep. Today I would like to work on getting my dishes in my cabinets and off of my counters. I have a couple sets and I need to make some decisions that will be tough for me about what stays and what I need to say goodbye to so others can use and enjoy them. I had an idea for a rummage sale where people could box up things they want to get rid of and I would come and pick it up for them. I'm going to send an email to my family and offer this to them. I'll see how it goes from there. Another thing I feel like I could do, but need some help with is printing off things I've written. I'm thinking daylogs would be a good start, but printing things seems very wasteful to me. I want a collection of things I've written so I can go back and see what they look like when they're all together.
I'm really worth however much paper, toner, and electricity it takes to do this, but something about the process seems as if I don't deserve it. I can ask myself what I'm going to do with this once I have it printed out. That's kind of scaring me too, this thing that's mine and might have a lot of sentimental value that I won't want to part with or let others read since it is so personal. I can tell I'm getting worked up about this so I'll put it on my wish list and see how I feel at some future point in time. Anxiety is not my friend, but at least I'm getting better about recognizing it and have some better strategies for coping. Writing is helping me more than I thought that it would. I've been very disciplined which has been its own reward for me.
Have a wonderful day,
Jess