Putting your foot in it
The other day after a very productive meeting about AdultADHD, cofounder Alex emerged from the toilet looking mightily annoyed with herself. In a moment of carefree relaxedness Alex dropped her phone in the loo. We were all extremely sympathetic. I think we understood how easily that could happen to anyone. How especially easily it could happen to an adult with ADHD. It’s one of the most frustrating things about our disorder. Always at the most carefree of moments some article of clumsiness or forgetfulness or impulsivity will drop us quite literally in the shit. (Alex would like me to clarify there was no shit in that incident).
It has taken me a few weeks to write this short piece. I was hunting for examples. There are so many to choose from. I could make this article a great big list but I have found there are too many for that approach, and that most of them aren’t actually that major. They are tiny and super frequent. For example, I quite often double book myself on the spur of a moment, despite the systems I put in place to stop that happening. It is usually easily remedied. Though each time I realise, I feel the stab of panic that readers with ADHD will know very well.
Forgetting to bring something is another example. Tell yourself every day leading up to take it with you. Put it by the door. Write it on your hand. Say it out loud repeatedly as you prepare to leave. Only to realise you forgot it halfway to your destination and now you’ll be either late, or unprepared despite all that anxiety in preparation. Cue the panic again.
Losing things. Everyone, ADHD or no, has experienced the feeling of patting their pockets and not finding their wallet or their phone where it had been before. The rising dread that maybe you won’t be able to get into your home. Or pay for your groceries. Or contact your friends. Everyone knows this sensation. But people with ADHD know it very frequently indeed. They don’t even have to have lost the item. They could just absentmindedly have put it in a different pocket in a moment where they were distracted by other thoughts. One article calls it the milk in the cupboard syndrome. I like that analogy. It is always a mad moment of relief when you find something you thought you had lost. Then comes the embarrassment. Did you have everyone looking for it? Did you spend fifteen minutes swearing and pacing and making a huge mess only to discover it in your back pocket? Did you put the milk in the cupboard? What an idiot you must be.
Totalling the time I spend walking back and forth for not picking up everything I needed the first time would be staggering by itself. We laugh that all the walking is good for us but frankly it annoys me every time I do it.
Blurting offensive shit is a big one. This one can destroy relationships. With medication many can learn to curtail some of their more outright rude outbursts, but I personally never shook the anxiety which means I must carefully watch myself. On some days I forget to take my tablets in the morning. Realising it fills me with dread. What will I do? What will I say? What will I lose? The feeling that I am only worth your while when I have had my medication contributes to an overall anxiety and sense of inadequacy which makes ADHD that much more disabling.
I learned growing up that to my friends and family I am annoying. I am not the only person with ADHD who knows this about themselves and wishes it weren’t so. We adopt coping strategies. Some try to be funny to break the tension. Some grow angry and dare their friends to express their annoyance. Some are ashamed and endlessly apologetic. However, none of this works in a romantic relationship. Your partner does not want you to be funny or sorry and especially not angry. Not if they understand ADHD. But good luck unlearning your lifelong coping mechanism in order to open up. I honestly think this practise is why a disproportionately high number of stand-up comedians have ADHD. They’ve been practising the art of defusing tension all their lives.
I could go on, but we would be here forever. I think the best thing to do for this article is to open the floor. Everyone with ADHD knows what I’m talking about here. I invite them to share the shame. All your foolish moments, your stupid decisions, your biggest impulsive regrets.
You are not alone.
(please leave a comment or two if you relate!)
Adrian — I tend to keep myself on high alert in professional and social situations. I think the effort it takes to keep monitoring my comments adds to the exhaustion of such occasions.
I’m more likely to blurt out comments in the company of those I feel “safe” with. It’s a double-edged sword and not much of a reward for those I trust, i.e. they get to appreciate my impulsive thoughts and uncensored feelings!
I was part of a study group and we met regularly for years. One time a friend was talking about a possible job opportunity with an approaching interview more of a formality. I blurted out, “Mmmm, they must be desperate.”
I had a feeling at the time this could come across badly but hoped my internal convoluted logic made sense. What I meant to say was, “Such a job could be appealing, but what’s going on if there is hardly any competition for the position?”
I was feeling protective toward my friend but their self-confidence was particularly low at the time. I avoided checking with them if I had caused any hurt — I didn’t want to feel that intense guilt.
Fortunately my friend did contact me and my intuition was right — I had upset them by my comment. I bumbled through an apology and explanation, I’m not sure they were convinced. We have moved on but at the time I remember feeling awful.
The challenge for me, and I am not sure if it is an ADHD or personality trait (or both) is separating myself from the action. So if something I say, or do, (or forget to do) makes a person upset or angry I feel a worthless, terrible person. I can’t reconcile that my approach to a situation could have been dealt with differently but does not confirm I am bad, unkind, or selfish.
When emotions are so fast and overwhelming it’s almost like my brain can’t explore an assumption other than my whole self is broken and in need of fixing. Interestingly, medication has lessened the emotional intensity I feel at times, and I think this gives space for a little more rationality.
Amy — Putting my foot in it… this has been a tough task for me to sit down and contribute to. I’ve sat down several times over the past weeks to write this and found that I had so many ideas, that I couldn’t focus on just one and was left with a multitude of broken part thoughts, feeling overwhelmed and unable to piece things together. The result, up until now, was me moving on to something else without even realising that I’d neglected to tick this off my list. I’m sure that sounds familiar to whoever may read this…
My eagerness to please and feel worthy of people’s acceptance coupled with my impulsivity constantly leads me to quickly commit to things, neglecting to consider my own current commitments as well as my financial and time constrictions. This often impacts on my personal time & wellbeing and more often than not leads to overwhelming self-critical thoughts taking over and getting in the way of me being productive with any one task that I’ve eagerly put myself forward for. The result is that nothing gets done and I damage my credibility, reliability with friends, family, co-workers and myself. I put my foot in it constantly with this. I’m always the first to say, “I’ll do that for you”, “that sounds great, I’m in”. It’s become a running joke with the people I care about. Those people’s opinions matter to me greatly; there’s no avoiding that. I’ve found that I’m constantly up and down with my energy levels, productivity, time management, sleeping patterns…. the list is endless! I often need to sleep and just shut down completely. I find that this often happens when I’ve committed to being in a social situation with a large group of people over a long weekend. I’m slowly learning that this is my minds way of telling me that I find these events; the run up to, the event itself and the aftermath, hugely taxing in many ways and to avoid this I need to think of myself a little more and learn that the people that truly care about me will understand my intentions as well as my limitations. Communication on my part is key for this to help people understand where possible, but also sometimes I just need to learn the power of the word no and trust that everything and everyone will be okay!
Alex — I like Amy have struggled to write this one because every time I have sat down to write this a million( and I mean a million!) situations have been relived in my head( Yeah, cheers for this one Francis, really appreciating this god awful trip down memory lane!) and I start cringing so hard that my mouth is in pain from all the work its doing sucking in my lips and my brain starts working overtime trying to distract itself from the terrible, terrible moments its being forced to replay.
The one foot in mouth situation that really sticks in my head and a situation my brain will NEVER let me forget is when I moved into my flat 5 years ago, the first day I moved in I realised my washing machine wasn’t working so I called my landlord up( who I’d only met once!) to come up and have a look and he said “I cant fix this, I’m going to have to get Jim to come up and have a look” and quick as a flash before my brain could stop me( not that it would have) I said “Oh will Jim fix It!” And this was after everything had come out in the press about Jimmy Saville being a predatory sex offender. My landlord just stared at me blankly but I could read everything he was thinking in that face, it was a face that said “did you really just make that joke?!”
There was another time in college when an ex friend (we actually didn’t fall out over this incident, I don’t know how though. Alas another friendship lost at the mercy of ADHD.) was being really annoying in class and doing my head in and I went to go and vent to another friend over text about her and yep, you guessed it…I accidentally sent the text to the very friend I was ranting about! I said something like ‘Toni’s being a real twat today and annoying the shit out of me’ she then proceeded to read the text out loud to the whole classroom while confronting me about what I’d said. I wanted the ground to swallow me up…
By the way for anyone who’s interested, the phone spent way too long in the toilet lake while I was dithering about whether I wanted to try to save it or whether I wanted to spare my hand from having to dive into a public lavatory and so it went to where all the calculators go, silicon heaven.
Costliest poo of my life.
