The Brain Game

I have low-level, high-function (when I want to be) form of ADD. It’s been there most of my life, and when I look back on my years in school where I was taxing my physiological resources just to maintain a 3.0, I think I could have done more, or better, had I known – or accepted – that I had something different happening. The more I learn about how our brains work, the more I realize that ADD is not taboo or a sentence to a muddled, unfinished life.

tumblr_kqumrr0YW41qzpwi0o1_500 — *Accused of being a “Grammar Nazi,” I simply detest lazy writing, but I am in no way “anti-Semantic.”*

Here’s kind of what it’s like to have ADD when I’m not feeling great:

I recently lost an argument with my wife, which took place ENTIRELY IN MY HEAD. I didn’t want to go to a certain place for a home project, but I knew she’d want to, and every time I thought up a reason why we should NOT go, her voice kicked back why it was better to go there. I just agreed and, outloud, said “Fine, fine, we’ll do it your way.” I WAS ALONE IN THE KITCHEN AT 6:45AM, WAITING FOR COFFEE TO BREW.
I started to empty the dishwasher, which I hate doing but wanted to “get something done.” The top rack was a mish-mash of cups and smaller plates, and… plastic dishes with no tops. There were no tops in the dishwasher. And my brain put the brakes on, and started figuring out ways to wiggle out of this. “I can’t do THIS. There are no tops. I’ll have to dig through the cabinet for tops. Who the hell is using these as dishes? We have perfectly good dishes. We have small bowls. What if there are no tops for these, like we got them from somebody else? Who did we get these from? Was I there? Are these from a kid’s friend’s house? What play-date did they go on?”

That’s how an ADD brain works. Sometimes the smallest thing causes my Professional Crastination skills to fire up. I’m a ProCrastinator. When a task seems “too big,” I pump the brakes. I pretend, sometimes, that I’m “planning” or getting notes together to do it right. But we all know that you can’t eat an elephant in one bite. You have to own a national sandwich shop and have the money from that pay for your big-game excursion to hunt and kill it!

I heard about Dr. Robert Cooper, Ph. D. on a podcast a while ago, Bulletproof Radio with Dave Asprey. Dr. Cooper’s a neuroscientist who has studied not only How our minds work, but Why they do what they do. His insight into the natural programming of our brain’s commands (Find something that works, stick with it, avoid change so we don’t falter or die, etc.) and how to change (i.e. UpWire or “hack”) the command center via Conscious Awareness has changed a lot for my own life. I highly recommend his podcasts for insights for everybody’s better understanding of how our minds work, and how to be conscious of little things that could hinder our Best Selves.

Eventually I’ll have something pretty funny to enter here. I hope. Right now my comedy brain is inundated with some new material about our upcoming elections, voting, and using drugs. Pretty sure one thing leads to another there.

Please leave any comments or tips you have for getting focused for Life stuff. I know sleeping enough, getting some exercise, and eating well are three main components. What else? High-grade fish oils? The will to see your enemies drown in the wake of your success? Whatever’s good…

And as always, my deepest thanks for reading.

May 23, 2016 0

You Big Dopamine – Motivation, Neurology, And Execution

There is a root cause of every problem, but we don’t always know something is a “problem,” and often think whatever “is” just “is.” Like having 11 toes, that extra piggy isn’t a bother until shoes don’t fit right or somebody says “Hey, what’s THAT?” In trying to find out the Why of things in Life, I highly recommend a little RCA, or “Root Cause Analysis.” That’s the cause, not the symptom. If your carpet is wet every morning and you dry it out every night, you don’t need a carpet that dries itself (symptom), you need to stop taking Ambien and urinating in the family room (root).

I found this article about what Dopamine is, what it does, and how to start harnessing it for your own good. You don’t have to be ADD’ed to benefit from the news here, as Dopamine comes into play in many ways in our daily living and “GSD” (gettin’ shit done).

HOW TO HARNESS YOUR BRAIN’S DOPAMINE SUPPLY AND INCREASE MOTIVATION

A major issue with ADD (which I am writing to include ADHD) is the lack of dopamine or the ability to process it properly in the brain. Dopamine is the “outcome predictive” chemical. It is also the “pleasure bath” your brain is submersed into when you accomplish something. So it’s feeding your brain a signal that “Something we like can be had if we do XYZ, even if it’s a moment of saving our own ass when the cops show up.” (or whatever you do on Thursdays) This also plays into our metabolism, sleep, and interpersonal relationships. Take Dopamine down, or out, and you’re gonna be a crank.

“Increased dopamine in the nucleus accumbens signals feedback for predicting rewards. Your brain recognizes that something important—good or bad—is about to happen, thus triggering motivation to do something.”

I always research anything I think is going poorly, can be enhanced, or needs to be down-regulated, even if it’s my behavior, my kid’s behavior, or my friend’s use of the phrase “a whole ‘nother” because ” ‘nother” isn’t a word.

I have supplemented with NOW Foods DOPA Mucuna and Tyrosine, 2 natural dopamine precursors. The former provides a very easy focus and mental ecosystem of being motivated and process-oriented. The latter is a little more “tightly focused” without the kind of chilled-out feeling DOPA gives you.

I’m not a doctor, but I do advocate for my own well-being at all times. I’ll soon post a note about how I had to close a treatment-gap I had with an endocrinologist, one where the two options he gave me were so far apart you could almost fit his desire for a bigger boat in between them.

Thanks for readin’, sorry this isn’t too funny…

May 19, 2014 0

Managing ADHD Without Medication

It can be done, this whole management of ADHD and ADD without the use of medication. If you have the precursory chemical and/or behavioral makeup for either, you have likely coped for many years with the struggle of focus, focus, focus, listen, store, recall, etc. I am amazed at what I have been able to accomplish in my life prior to my diagnosis.

That being said, I still think if one goes to a doctor who is a specialist in a field, and you DON’T walk out of there with a diagnosis in their field of practice, that doctor isn’t doing very well in general. That may explain why I took my wife to the doctor last week and now I have a pap smear in April, but anyway…

This was a great LifeHacker article wherein the author stated their ability to manage ADHD while in school, and I can see how it would fit very well into the real world. Not that school isn’t real, it’s just not reality. Wait until those “Tiger Kids” start hitting the job market, with their Valedictorian status, and their ability to play 3 instruments and speak 4 languages and completely deny all levels of social leisure. Nobody wants to work with a person who can’t chill the hell out for 10seconds.

There are many silos of diagnoses for ADD, btw. I can focus on something I am interested in for long periods of time, including writing. For some people it may be gardening, but not plumbing repair, nor dryer vent-cleaning. So, what, that person has ADD, right? Do we have to focus on everything all the time? Maybe all I needed to get over my intellectual inferiority complex in high school was a tap on the shoulder in Trigonometry class, and somebody to tell me;

“Hey man, you’re sitting between 2 of the hottest girls in school, an hour before lunch, and you lifted weights 30min ago. You shouldn’t be interested in graphing cos t any more than you’re interested in wearing a high-top fade. Chill. Get Kristie’s number and chill.”

With all of science working as hard as it has, there has yet to be a pharamceutical breakthrough that makes boring people more interesting.

March 17, 2014 0

The Task of A Thousand Steps Begins Just After This Coffee Break

This post is the first of 30, wherein I will be dropping 30 posts in the month of November as part of NaBloPoMo, or “National Blog Post(ing) Month,” or Nablo Pomo, former left-handed reliever for the class-AA Donxberg Burros. Long strider, wicked curve ball, but like a lot of young men in his era, he got caught up with the Wicked White Witch and never came off the ride. Talkin’ about sugar, friends. The diabetes got ‘im.

OK, OK… I’m slagging off some things in life because they don’t seem to capture my attention. I realized in the past 48hours I had started a few small things, made calls I needed to, and got things in order for the changes in my life from Affordable Care Act-fallout. But then, for some of these things and calls, I didn’t get a response right away. So now they slip off the radar. The ADD brain doesn’t appreciate that. In fact, one returned call was a voicemail that made almost no correlation to what I had originally called in about, further confusing the scenario, and causing another step for me. Again, added clutter to the brain space of an ADD mind. Not good, bro.

And I realize that procrastinating isn’t unique the ADD’ers, it’s just more prevalent. I have a “do now” gear and a “do another time” backlog. It’s not prioritized, although I have a long list of things I need to get done in the next few weeks to makes we’re all on the same page with life and society. If you looked at it, or a police officer was searching my car and found the list, well I’d have to probably walk through it to show you I mean no harm and YES, I’m fine, so let’s all just chill out for a bit. The BrainBath list is so good for me to do. It’s a constant reference point of things that seemed important at one point, and keeps my brain free of debris and detritus. The trick is going back to it.

I can imagine how frustrating I must be to live with. I have always been a guy who, when given a task and tools and time, will get to work and get something done if left alone to do it. But that work style and parenting don’t exist in the same housing development, let alone cul de sac. I often tell my wife “It takes a long time to be me.” What I mean is that, in order to get in order and stay in order, I need time TONIGHT to prep for TOMORROW, or tomorrow will just be a bust and nothing’s going to get done. Clothes packed for work after the gym, laptop bag packed for work, lunch ready to go, coffee set to auto-brew come the morn, etc. And it’s usually only stuff I can do for me, which makes my time “in my space” seem like avoidance of the family, and it’s not at all.

This is all retro-perspective now of my ADD brain as an adolescent; when given a task I wanted to do, I’d nail it. But add layers of unnecessary complexity to my Summer job of mowing neighborhood lawns (other people, bad tools, sunbathing step-daughters asking if I like Mötley Crüe) and my ability to get the work done slips. Now we have unfocused people with no ability to steer an edger, and they’re too hot to work and now I hate my friend. Then I would have to be more of a leader and say “Guys, we gotta get this done so we can get to the next lawn and get paid and see if Brendan’s brother can score us some wine coolers.” And then somebody would bitch about me being a dickhead and I’d give ’em $10 and send ’em along.

So I am learning that the best way for me to avoid procrastination is do one thing NOW. It’s proven that multitasking is bunk, your brain can only focus on “a” task at a time. You don’t want a surgeon taking calls when they’re 2 knuckles deep in any part of your body. So if you have an ADD’er in your life, and you notice half-done work, odds are they were on their way to Finishberg and got pulled away, not “sidetracked.” If you have the money to shop for your groceries, but no time… or the time, but no money, what good is any of it? Give me enough time, and space, and things get done. Give me however much time you THINK it should take and stand around asking rhetorical questions about toilet replacement codes in remodeled bathrooms, while not handing me a pitch-dark porter, and you may as well be winging full diapers at my head asking me to sing “Girls, Girls, Girls” without warming up. I’m gonna be hoarse and there’s gonna be a lot of crap laying around.

November 1, 2013 2

Alone In Public

We spent some time in a small berg in Eastern Washington the other day, picking the day that was both the hottest day of the year AND the most-crowded day of the year in that berg. The effect 11 degrees Fahrenheit can have on one’s ability to throttle age or odor-related epithets in a crowd is REAL, folks. And having a very curious toddler weaving across foot traffic into ANOTHER store selling kettle corn… WHO NEEDS THIS MUCH KETTLE CORN… compounds one’s calm demeanor, even when your dopamine levels should be up.

I don’t know if I have ever had a real panic attack. I feel like I’ve teetered on the edge a few times, and frankly I am over-tired of people who act like my need to excuse myself from cacophonous areas and tightly-packed rooms is a weakness. I am grown up. I am an adult. There are some times I can totally tough it out. And other times I have nothing to prove to a small store full of strangers, none of us making eye contact, while a 3 year-old yanks porcelain figures off the “DO NOT TOUCH EVEN THOUGH THIS IS AT TODDLER LEVEL” display. And as my head filled with white noise and people seemed to gear-down from “sloooow” to “barely moving,” I had to get out. The medical term is “get the fuck out right now.”

The feeling of being stuck is bad enough for me to deal with. There’s something about being penned-in that bothers me greatly, even though I can see there’s NOTHING dangerous happening. I think more it’s the fact that I look at people’s faces and they seem to be totally unaffected by the mass they have created. Same thing in traffic. I know, I’m part of the mass, but why isn’t anybody moving? Why aren’t we moving a little more quickly, even a half-step more? Add to that a kid who is eye-to-butt with a lot of people and is touching things he’s not supposed to only because we’ve made a horrible choice to come into the Crystal Solitude retail outlet, and how about I just scream and run out with my kid over my shoulder like the dam burst? Because that seems more rational than the 8 minute route we’re taking to the exit.

My real issue with this is that my need to loosen up my bounds is looked upon like some personality disorder. For some reason, be it that I don’t like crowds that cannot move properly, or I am an Aquarius and can only take some much of being surrounded, or because I’m somewhat neurotic about keeping my kid from side-arming a $395 ceramic Halloween Gnome across the room, my “must have space” need gets the stink eye from people. And with our society slowing down thanks to technology (I am advocating a roped-off area for all publicly-standing texters) it’s only going to get worse. But not for me.

I am making a pledge right now that I will be more vocal about people slowing things down, walking the wrong way, leaving their grocery carts unattended, staring at their phones, being rude, and in general, acting like they are alone in public. Because that sounds lovely, and if I can’t have it, everybody won’t.

August 23, 2012 0

ADD’ing It Up – Alpha Brain, NOW Foods, and Hope

I may have ADD. I’m pretty sure I can’t chalk up the numerous side-steps and half-done projects of my life to being distracted by others all the time. Some of these loose ends are perhaps my nature, but some of them are things that, left undone, leave me worse-off. A lack of focus, or a compulsivity to anti-work, combined with a desire to really, truly WANT to finish something is a fantastic step towards the maddening of everybody who depends on me in some way. Like Family and Work, you know… no bigs. New baby, longer commute, less sleep, oh yeah, recipe for success, folks.

Whatever level of ADD I have, however it’s categorized, isn’t like a form of mental illness, for me. There’s a point of medication a “crazy” person can take that dials down the crazy to a level where they can function as a person, but perhaps not a spouse or parent or friend. I feel for those people, having seen my own father lose a battle with dementia at too early an age. I’m not crazy; more like my brain runs 10,000 RPM most of the time, and it’s shooting sparks and ideas and things I ought to go do, but nothing is there to put it in gear. That’s where my new adventure comes in. I am positive and happy that a lot of people in our lives have a cocktail of brain chemicals that are better off stirred with a little extra shot of this-‘r-that. But that’s not where it stops, in the doctor’s office.

The past few months have been somewhat cleaner, mind-wise. First, I was turned on to something called “Alpha Brain” via Joe Rogan’s tweets. I’m skeptical of most things, but imagine playing a game of bumper cars with your ideas every day. DO THIS, I’M DOING THIS RIGHT AFTER I DO THIS, BUT FIRST I’LL DO THIS AND THAT WILL BE THERE LATER… what was I going to do again? Then just a period of unproductive screen staring. Go into a room to get the laundry. Clean the room. Forget the laundry.
Seriously, this cannot be just boredom with life. Plus there was a feeling as if I had a fog, a layer of fuzz in the middle of my head that was like the fog of a hangover without the pain. I feel most days like my brain is holding its breath all day. So when I saw Alpha Brain, I was willing to try anything. Plus it’s a natural supplement. I can’t be staunchly anti-pharma when trying to medicate myself back to normal wavelength, but I do believe that Nature holds a cure for nearly every human ailment. And holy shit, folks, Alpha Brain is the REAL DEAL. The fog was gone. The acuity was razor. The 3-steps-ahead thinking was automatic. I’m not talking “Limitless” starring Bradley “A-List Ass All Day” Cooper, but the closest I’d ever get. I have a few Alpha Brain left for some of my more important days coming up. $35 plus shipping.

It was a bit pricey for me to keep re-upping at the time, so I researched NOW Foods, and found 2 of their supplements close to what Alpha Brain delivered. First, Brain Elevate, and also, True Focus. Natural supplements, not loaded with lab-borne items.But the cocktail of BE and TF have served me very well in the past 2 months. Most days I’ll take 2 BE and a TF in the morning with water and a cup of coffee. There’s not only a focus but also a calmness; I’m not buzzed, I’m just There. No panic, no mental ping-pong. Focused and cognisant of what I’m supposed to do. True, this is a medicated version of me, and probably a laconic one. But I’ve also performed comedy after “dosing,” and I’ve never felt sharper or more in-gear than those sets. Total investment, $22 through www.Netrition.com.

So now I’m about to start trying something called Concerta, a.k.a. Methylphenidate. Yeah, this stuff costs $153 on my Aetna plan, thanks a ton for the NoPremium/HighDeductible plan! Concerta may help me a bit better or worse than where I am. It may zone me out. It may dial me in. I don’t really know. But for $153, it either has to work all the way or I’ll be incredibly pissed off. This is a prime example of why BigPharma is going after supplement companies in Congress. See the giant gap in the Supplement Price vs. Concerta? $100 less for all-natural ingredients. Still not sure I’m gonna go on this stuff. I fear mostly the zombie effect that these drugs can throw into the day. If anybody has any experience with it, lemme know. For the most part I feel as happy and dialed-in as ever without something like this, not knowing how strong it is.

But I ain’t losing sleep over it.

January 8, 2012 10

Tag: ADD