Recently I went on a new medication for ADHD. I don’t work with people with ADHD specifically (although many of the clients I have worked with over the years have presented with similar traits to me) because actually my ADHD diagnosis is really new, although I was fairly sure I had it, and it came as no surprise.
Over time, I will gather resources and experience to help people get the most out of life with ADHD, but for now, I am still acclimatising myself to the stimulant medication prescribed by my trusty psychiatrist. It’s been explained to me (by him) that the medication is the cake, and that the rest of the tools are the icing on top of the cake, but it’s best to master the cake first. I have to be patient. All mental health treatment takes so much time. No one medication suits one person. I am sure one day scientists will come up with a blood or DNA test to work out which individual suits which medication (or have a better guess about it), a little like those diets where they take your blood and say what foods specifically make you personally put on weight. For me of course, it’s all the things I love, namely pasta and crisps.
Mental health is an ongoing journey, and one that despite having a lot of wonderful support, you take alone, because of course, you are left with your own inner psyche. It was once explained to me that we are born alone, and we die alone, really. That feels a little too profound for a blog post about coffee but my wayward mind has taken me to things philosophical as I sit in Royston Costa after a monster food shop that my ADHD brain does not relish unloading and organising.
The medication for both OCD and ADHD have not been a ticket to utopia as my magical thinking mind often believes will be the case. The medication for OCD has helped me as if it is the difference between night and day. The change is incredible, but I still get anxious, and I have to keep applying the tools, which I can help you with if OCD is your thing.
The ADHD medication is a little more subtle. Once again, patience is required. It is always patience. Just now I filled up my car with petrol, and, again, due to my lack of patience, I was annoyed at the big queue in front of me. I don’t want to waste my life in the pump station at Tescos, I want to write a bestseller, after all. I cannot factor how to get my Tesco Clubcard out, my debit card, and then scan them all without losing my mind – forgetting my debit card was in my wallet and then leaning over to the passenger seat of my car onto a half open yoghurt pouch that very nearly squirted all over the place. “What is wrong with me?” I murmur to myself. Will things always be this way?
I am so used to and addicted to stress, coffee playing a part of this of course, that it has become like an old friend. My adrenal system knows it so well, and it’s so hard to get out of. I set up these little scenarios where I don’t quite have enough time to do what I want to do, and if I do have enough time, I will put something else in so that time becomes short. It’s all about, I think, after a decade of trying to undo these patterns (I’m pleased to tell you it has got a lot better, and it’s worth doing the work) – NOT BEING ABLE TO SIT WITH MYSELF. Yes, I rush, because slowing down means facing me, and that’s hard.
Back to reality. Having been shopping, another ADHD meltdown nightmare for me, where my scattered mind cannot fathom the aisles in Tescos, I reward myself with a coffee, the point of this article.
I was advised by my psychiatrist to significantly reduce the coffee due to the stimulant mediation I am on. The reasons I hope are obvious. The word that springs to mind is wired. I am happy to say that I haven’t had a drink or drug for over 12 years. I am, however, totally addicted to coffee, and in the short time I have tried to give up coffee I have been miserable, and wanted to go to sleep there and then, on the floor. This isn’t great with four year old twin girls, so I’m back on all coffee stations go, reducing the Ritalin, and taking the consequences.
All of the behaviours I exhibited when trying to get off the booze at the end of the noughties are in full flow now. I am bargaining with the great dark bean, and I am in denial. “What if I just have one now, or then, or in an hour, and take the Ritalin a little later?” The scales have not tipped enough – I haven’t had enough pain yet, and, unlike the booze, no Divine Providence has swept in like it did in January 2012 when I one day just thought “I can’t do this anymore.” It wasn’t after the worst drunk, or the worst hangaxiety episode. I ended up through a series of extraordinary events talking to a friend’s brother who runs a rehab after seeing an article about him in the paper. Before I knew it I was in his office, doing the NHS 20 alcohol questions. I will never forget him looking up from his clipboard and saying “you’re a chronic alcoholic, and if you don’t stop, your life will only go one way, and that’s down. What do you want to do about it?”
Coffee doesn’t have the same consequences as alcohol, and I don’t think I’m in the chronic phase, so I am not too worried about it, but it’s been interesting to witness my addictive behaviour, which has not gone away, and perhaps never will, and that’s OK. I think it is about being OK being me – the whole thing, I think, is about being OK, being me. As per earlier, and this article was not meant to be this long at all, it’s learning to sit with myself, to accept myself. I enjoy helping clients to do the same thing. As you can see I have no way got it licked, but I am better than I was, and that’s great.
I am determined to tie up my thoughts on Hamlet (stay with me for a moment) and mental health, and why this character is as important today as he was half a millennia ago. But it’s for my next blog post. The last sentence of the last paragraph got me thinking on ‘To Be or Not to Be’ which must be the most important question we will ever ask ourselves – and if we are ‘To Be,’ then surely the most important thing we can do is accept ourselves.
I’m off to see The Hills of California with my brother and sister in law tomorrow, so I will write about that too. I sadly missed Jerusalem, so I am looking forward to seeing Jez Butterworth’s new creation. More soon. If you would like an appointment to help with OCD and anxiety, please email me jessica@jessicadrake.biz
Jessica Drake - OCD / Anxiety Psychotherapist 