Tuesday, October 30, 2012

I Missed ADHD Awareness Week [Unfinished]

Last week was ADHD awareness week, and I completely missed it. I regret missing a whole month where I could've actually helped raise awareness about my own condition and help others who are in the same boat as me. I guess the least I could do now is to try to talk [write] about ADHD.
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I have almost no memories from my early childhood. It's all one big blur. Other people have childhood friends. I have people who walk up to me on the street and start telling me how much they've missed me or they start talking about some event in grade school or something but I don't remember. I don't remember them. I remember somebody like them, a blurry faceless silhouette of a person in the background while I daydreamed my days away.
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I got into fights a lot as a kid. I had a temper. I'd be sitting down in my seat getting playfully teased by some little boy, then before I know what's happening I'm standing in the middle of the classroom with my fist raised and the little boy holding his mouth where I had apparently punched him. I have no memories of the punching incident. Only anger. I remember being angry. But I don't remember getting up, grappling with my opponent, punching him repeatedly, and receiving a few punches myself in return. I don't have a continuous sequence of events outlined in my head; only a before and after picture in my head. This lead to more fighting incidents; the little boy had a lot of friends after all, I mostly only had my drawings and doodles in my notebook.
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I draw. I draw to pass the time because I'm so bored most of the time. I draw because there are stories in my head that I want to translate into paper but I'm too young to write or read novels. The television doesn't interest me a lot because the stories are just so predictable now. I only watch TV shows until the middle and then start playing with my toys or drawing when the ending become oh so obvious. Eventually I barely watch TV at all, I concentrate on my toys and my art materials.
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My classmates in grade school are talking about how exciting a particular TV show was last night. They talk about specific scenes and how cool it was that the character punched him like this and how the enemy was thrown away like that. But I don't remember any of that. I have a general summary of the TV show episode in my head. It went like this: The good guy fought the bad guy. Boring. I wanted something more.
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I started loving basketball because there were just so many things you could do. You could be a point guard. You could be a Center. You all had specific roles. You all had a job to do. There was strategy. There was enough to keep me interested. I wasn't bored when I thought of basketball. I eventually became team captain because I like strategizing, even though I wasn't the best player. But my plans were never followed by my team mates during actual games. They praised our star player because he was fast. They praised him because he could hit impossible shots. Even though he strayed from the game plan. I eventually quit basketball when I was introduced to books.
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I love books. I love plots. I love wondering about how books would end. Eventually, even if I knew how a book would end, I loved wondering on how it would reach that ending. What would the characters do? What would happen to make things fall into place? I devoured all of the Hardy Boys Mystery books. I loved them. Their plots just seemed more complex and interesting than what I saw in TV shows. My classmates loved Scooby Doo. I hated it because it was so predictable. My classmates in I didn't get along very well. I grew closer and closer to books.
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My teachers don't like me. They say I misbehave. All I do is draw in my notebooks when she's lecturing. What's so bad about that? And I make faces now and then. At least I don't makes farting noises or tease the girls like my other boy classmates. And  I get the questions right when they ask me. I also get good grades; I would eventually make it into the honor's section. So why don't they like me? Why am I standing in a corner? All I did was draw. I didn't do anything.
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When I don't have books I walk. I walk around campus. It gave me time to think and see new things. The regular lunch time routine inside the class room bored me; "Guess who has a crush on blah blah blah." "Ooohhh secret!!!" "Hey can I copy your homework?" Boring. I apparently made a lot of friends during my grade school walking time, they're the ones I told you about; approaching me when I visit my home town, or telling my parents about me when they see them at the hospital. "I was classmates with your son!", or "We were friends in Grade school!". But I don't remember any of them.
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In highschool I started remembering things more concretely. I sort of started being aware. But I always felt like I was at a disadvantage, socially. People had cemented ties and alliances during grade school, and I felt left behind. Also, people were starting to see me as weird, I was the boy who would day dream or draw most of the time. Some people also remembered me as the boy who got into fights a lot. It's weird how the people I saw everyday thought of me as weird, but the people I only met occasionally thought of me as a fun guy.
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