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#executive dysfunction #alcoholism #alcohol #damn

Okay so I see some posts about executive dysfunction that kinda misrepresent what it is, so I wanted to clarify.

Executive dysfunction is not: laziness, lack of motivation, lack of willpower, lack of self-control, bad attitude, an excuse to not do something Executive dysfunction is: an actual deficiency in the function of the frontal lobe that can be seen and measured in an MRI scanner, associated with neurodivergencies such as autism and ADHD, and mental illnesses

When you can’t do something because of ED, it’s not because you aren’t motivated enough or lack self-control. It’s because your brain literally isn’t running the commands needed to make your body move and do the things you need to. You may be hella motivated and determined to do something and you still won’t be able to because you don’t know where to start or how to proceed to the next step or what to do at all. You may be very hungry, know that you have a frozen pizza in your fridge, yet not be able to do the “fairly simple” steps to cook that pizza because of ED.

Executive dysfunction cannot be helped with more motivation, rewards, hard work or whatever. The part of your brain that is supposed to break the task into steps and guide you through them isn’t working right now, and no amount of rewards or discipline will make it work. The only things you can do is accommodate for the lack of this function: either ask someone near you to guide you through the steps of your task, or have a list of steps prepared beforehand, while your frontal lobe was more merciful. Shouting, crying, blaming, punishing yourself, etc won’t do one bit to help it.

And for people who don’t know what it’s like to have ED and have people around them who do have it, here’s the thing: instructions have to be very precise. I know you never pay attention to this because you don’t have to, but here’s the deal - even the smallest steps have to be akwnoledged. For example you may think that an instruction to make tea looks like this:

1. Fill the kettle with water and boil it. 2. Put a tea bag in your cup. 3. Add sugar if you want 4. Pour hot water into your cup 5. Take the bag out after a minute or two 6. Enjoy your tea

But it has many, many intermediate steps that a typically functioning frontal lobe will figure out, but a person affected by executive dysfunction won’t be able to do. So instead that instruction will look more like this:

1. Open the kettle 2. Open a bottle of water/turn on tap water 3. Fill the kettle with water 4. Turn off the tap water/close the water bottle 5. Close the lid on the kettle 6. Push the button to turn it on

And so on. So that one step in the first instruction is actually six steps in the second instruction. And giving a person with executive dysfunction the first instruction probably won’t help them at all. And btw this is might be the reason that person in your life leaves the lights on or doors open or products out of the fridge all the time - their brain just doesn’t guide them through it.

So, things to remember: 1) Executive dysfunction is a real thing and it’s not the person’s fault 2) It cannot be helped with motivation, self-control, discipline, rewards or punishments 3) It can be helped with careful, thorough instructions prepared by yourself beforehand or by someone else without ED 4) It is very difficult and frustrating for the person experiencing it first and foremost 5) If you have ED, be kind to yourself. Learn ways around it. Rest from time to time. Don’t be afraid or ashamed to ask for help. And be honest to yourself about whether you can or cannot do the thing yourself. Trust me, it will help you in the long run.

shake666pro

the difference between laziness and executive dysfunction

Laziness: “There’s a thing I have to do, but I don’t wanna do it, so I’m choosing to go and do other things instead. The thing may cause me stress in the future, but for the time being I don’t really care about it”

Executive dysfunction: “There’s a thing I have to do, I’ve been trying to get started on it for the past few hours but I can’t get going. Not being able to do the thing is currently causing me a lot of stress, but it seems that all I can do for the time being is just sit here”

r--evol-ution

Am I Using My Disabilities As A Reason Or As An Excuse? A biography by me, featuring interviews with my internalised ableism.

prokopetz

I think the perfect illustration of how absurd the psychology of executive dysfunction is that, when I’m having a bad function day, I often find it helpful to groan like an annoyed zombie before undertaking some physical task. Like, it doesn’t just make me feel better - it legitimately helps. I have performatively registered my protest against the very concept of Doing Things with whatever powers might be listening, and can therefore proceed to Do The Thing.

kriegsrhetorikinspace-blog

as a child, i had this really interesting way of dealing with executive dysfunction:

when i needed to do something but did not get the impulse to actually start, i counted to 20.

and at 20, i did the thing.

i started this in order to get me out of bed in the morning, and after a few weeks it was a reliable source of starting impulses. every time i hit 20, i got started.

somewhere along the way i stopped doing it, because it was weird and nobody else needed to count in order to do stuff.

it makes me wonder, how many brilliant coping skills do we loose or never develop because we live in a neurotypical world and nobody teaches us these things? because we think they’re weird, because we don’t have words for what we’re doing, because they seem to have no place in this world?

sapphicautistic

*finally makes bed after sitting on the bare mattress next to the clean sheets for 4 hours*

quantumghosts

getting ready is physically a 15min task but emotionally, anywhere between 30min to 5 hours

feetdonttouch

ADHD culture is being so incredibly tired but refusing to sleep

rce-archive-blog

shout out to my exec dysfunction ppl whose rooms are always a mess, who have weeks and weeks of dirty laundry lying around, who have trouble doing objectively “simple” chores and tasks, who get told that they’re lazy and just not trying and told that they need to do better. i know you are trying your best even when everything takes an enormous amount of effort or seems impossible. i love y’all

star-anise

Executive dysfunction life hack

Instead of telling yourself, “I should get up,” or “I should do this,”

Ask yourself, “When will I get up?” or “When will I be ready to do this?”

Instead of trying to order yourself to feel the signal to do something, which your brain is manifestly bad at, listen to yourself with compassionate curiosity and be ready to receive the signal to move when it comes.

lemonsharks

Things I did not actually realize was an option

star-anise

What’s amazing is what happens when you do this with children. I hit on it when working at the foster home, where nearly all our kids were on the autism spectrum, and they weren’t “defiant” around me because I said things like, “How long do you need to stand here before we can move?” and “Come into the kitchen when you’re ready” instead of saying, “Stop staring out the window, let’s go,” or “Come eat dinner,” and interpreting hesitation as refusal to obey.

star-anise

Yup, that’s way better for toddlers and younger kids. It helps when they don’t have the self-awareness, attention span, or concept of the passage of time to estimate when they’ll be ready by themselves.

I have also definitely found that doing the “okay when I finish counting down from twenty is getting up time” has been useful.

star-anise

WELL OKAY WHOOPS XD I should not have been overspecific, I was just thinking about teaching this stuff to the parents at my job and your reblog made me immediately think of you with Banana and the kidlets.

redshiftsinger

Another hack: when you want to get up but are stalled by your brain and frustrated – stop. Breathe. Think about what you want to do once you’re up, without thinking about getting up. Treat it like a fantasy, no pressure, just thinking about something you’d like to do in the future. Instead of thinking “I should get up” over and over, think about having a bagel for breakfast, or getting dressed in your soft green sweater. Imagine yourself doing the thing. I find that exercise often side-steps the block and the next thing I know I’m out of bed and on my way to doing the other thing I thought about. Works for other things too, if you’re stuck on one step and having a hard time doing it, think about the step after that. Need to do laundry and you can’t get yourself to gather up your dirty clothes in the hamper? Think instead about carrying the hamper full of dirty clothes to the laundry room. And when you get to that next step, if you get stuck again, think about the step after it – you have a hamper of dirty clothes that needs to be put in the wash, let your subconscious handle the “carry hamper to laundry room” step while you’re thinking about the “putting them in the wash” part. YMMV of course, and this doesn’t even always work for me (particularly not when I need to do a collection of tasks in no particular order, like packing for a trip… “pack socks, pack underwear, pack toothbrush, pack pants, pack shirts” is the kind of non-linear task list where this trick doesn’t help at all), but it’s something I’ve found helpful often enough.

naamahdarling

This is one of the most beautiful threads I’ve seen on Tumblr simply because it deals so compassionately with an issue so many of us have and can barely even articulate to ourselves, let alone to anyone else. <3

the-rain-monster

I think I get overwhelmed from the thought of all of the consequent steps, so maybe I’ll do the reverse of the advice above and try to focus on the first one.

jumpingjacktrash

@the-rain-monster i was just about to say something similar. that can work too sometimes. instead of going “ugh i need to eat something” for four hours, i try to focus on each step in turn.

and i mean each TINY step. just getting out of my chair has this many steps:

pause music

remove headphones

hang headphones on laptop screen

pick up laptop

leg-bend recliner footrest shut

set laptop aside

stand

and i reckon that’s why i get stuck on it; because i’m trying to treat it as one thing, while executive dysfunction is treating it as seven things, and choking on trying to skip to step seven.

concurrent with this is a method i call ‘junebugging’. which is where i go to the location of the thing i want to do, and just sort of bump around the region like a big stupid beetle until the thing somehow accidentally magically gets done. this is an attempt to leverage ADHD into an advantage; i may not have the executive function to make myself a sandwich on purpose, but if i fidget in the kitchen long enough, some kind of food is going to end up in my mouth eventually. and hell, even if i fail on that front, i will probably have achieved something, even if it’s only pouring all my loose leaf tea into decorative jars.*

@star-anise please may i give you an internet hug *hug!* because god how i wish anyone had known to do that for me when i was a kid. my childhood was one big overload, and like 99% of the huge dramatic meltdowns that made me the scapegoat/laughingstock/target of my entire elementary school were simply due to people not giving me time to process the next step, and interpreting a bluescreen as defiance/insult.

*this happened when i was trying to do dishes actually but the principle is sound

roachpatrol

yeah i absolutely echo what j’s saying about the steps, it’s a lot like that for me too. i get overwhelmed at the prospect of something that should be simple, and have to slow down and sort out how many steps it’s actually going to take, and what a complicated endeavor it actually is, even if no one else thinks so.

also, i thought i should put in: try to honestly figure out what you’re averse to, that makes things so tough. making a whole bunch of decisions really fast? the potential of things to make a horrible noise? the shame of failure? having to put down what you’re doing now? having to clean up whatever it is you might go do when you’re done?

for instance, for me, the difficulty rating on anything goes waaaay up when a step of a task is ‘go somewhere people will look at you,’ which is for me about the unpleasantness equivalent of ‘jump into a very cold swimming pool right now’. you know you’ll be fine and even have fun once you’ve settled into it, but it still takes a lot of shuffling around and bracing yourself first to go for it. and some days you just don’t fucking want to go swimming.

i discounted this factor for years because i wouldn’t admit that i was so daunted by something so silly as as people looking at me. but, now i know what i’m so aversive about, i can factor it in to plans, and work around it, and be kind to myself. for instance, i was never able to get fit since highschool PE, because i couldn’t make myself go to a gym, or even out jogging. once i figured out the big problem wasn’t avoidance pain or difficulty, it was avoidance of doing a New Thing that i was Bad At in front of Unknown Quantities Of Strangers, which is like a triple threat of stressors, i started working out quietly and safely in my room at night, and i’ve been doing really good on it!

star-anise

Absolutely loving the tag #you don’t make a broken car work by yelling ALL THE OTHER CARS WORK FINE

doriangaymer

I’ve found when my brain won’t “list” that I’ve managed a similiar effect by narrating myself as a character. Out loud if necessary.

himynameisalcoholic

me defending what I drink now

Insomnia Thought

Alcoholism is the inability to control your drinking, regardless of the degree or frequency. I am getting really fed up with this “it’s not alcoholism if” or “alcoholics do that” nonsense.

#insomnia #alcohol #alcoholism #notajoke #notfunny #nonsense