finding the right adhd meds is like wearing glasses
The work you produce is not a result from the medicine you take, you did that not the medicine. The medicine simply tapped into an ability u already had and were able to do but it probably would have taken you twice as long and ten times more effort and you would have probably given up before even finishing because our societies discourages brains like yours.
Society runs on a time is money mindset. So living in this society conditions your perception of how you function as an inability to preform at the same pace and efficiency as others, your slow,lazy, dumb and incompetent.
But your none of those things it’s not that you are unable to preform it’s quite the opposite. You try harder then any other person you know. You are more than capable of if not the same then better work than others. But your procees is different than most people and society trained us to define different as synonymous with worst. So you never even give yourself the chance to finish because the voices in your head calling you slow, lazy and dumb are too loud for you to ignore and not cause you to feel helpless.
Your process of working is different because of certain chemical neurotransmitter deficiencies. The medicine you take doesn’t create higher intelligence or new skills, it enhances the abilities you already had and it makes it an equal ground as others who don’t have those deficiencies.
Finding the right medicine allows your brain to work on an equal playing field as others have always had and it’s like wearing glasses for the first time. The right prescription changes how you see the word. It makes u realize that blurry was normal to you because that’s all you had ever known. You realize that this is what others already had and until you had put on those glasses for the first time you never fully understood how much at a disadvantage you were at until experiencing how drastically different 20/20 vision is like. Before this you didn’t view yourself at a disadvantage you saw life as it has always been.
The moment you realized your having a hard time viewing the board in school compared to your classmates it sparked the realization your struggling a lot more than others do and need help.Glasses are the remedy to this as they correct the deficiencies in your vision and does this depending on what your eye sight is already like. Your prescription number allows you to see clearly because of how your eyes already see and how your eyes always have had the ability to see clearly you just needed the medium to achieve this. Struggling with eyesight is seen as a disadvantage but with glasses it isn’t because glasses make the playing field equal. The prior disadvantages can be addressed but if you view yourself as helpless then it can never be solved because as long as you identify yourself with that label nothing will help you bc “helpless” implies there is nothing that can be done to help you.
When someone gets glasses no one ever blames them for not being able to see clearly without them. People don’t say it’s their fault and they just aren’t trying hard enough and need to squint more.Because that’s silly. It’s silly because we all know that no one would ever blame them because why would they? They can’t help it, they can’t help their eyes see the world differently then most,and there is no point in saying they need to try harder because we all know how their eyes are wired to view the world is out of their control. No matter how much someone strains their eyes and squints they can not compensate their biological deficiency. So if this is all common sense, then why don’t most people ever feel this way when it comes to ADHD medicine?
Sent October 19, 2018
This is a great analogy and a fantastic question. Thank you for sharing.
My opinion, in case anyone is curious:
Because our symptoms and difficulties tend to look like moral failings, people assume we are choosing to do or not do things. This means that if we just tried harder and stopped being lazy, we would be fine. Medication is, therefore, seen as the easy way out; continuing to be lazy instead of just working harder to achieve success.
-J