How to unf**k your life when you have ADHD — DIY Guide

Disclaimer
Most of this is based on personal experience and amateur research, so it’s not remotely
infallible. Trust yourself, take what helps and ignore what doesn’t!

I wrote this when I was a college student and ADHD mentor. If you can’t afford an ADHD coach,
DIY-ing it is probably your best bet.

Guide often updated without warning.

Table of Contents
● Introduction and Neuroscience
● Step 1: Set up a bujo
● Step 2: Set up your basic needs routines in your bujo
● Step 3: Follow your routines
● Step 4: When your routines fall apart, try again
● Step 5: Tips for defeating comorbidities (anxiety and depression)
● Step ??*: Meds
● Random Addenda
a. Addendum 1, Books and other materials I liked, in no order whatsoever
b. Addendum 2, What’s the point of the bullet journal?
c. Addendum 3, ADHD as a cause of depression and anxiety
d. Addendum 4, Frustrating statistics
e. Addendum 5, The Adjustment/Humiliation Period at the Beginning of New
Situations
f. Addendum 6, Reddit Ryan’s Non-Zero Days

*Meds are really step 0!

INTRODUCTION

Burning the rope at both ends and putting it through

the woodchipper
The ADHD burnout: You start school/work and at first, it seems like it’s going okay. You’ve got
new notebooks and highlighters, you’re writing down everything you have to read in your
planner, and you’re optimistic and excited about your classes.

Things go downhill quickly. A week, maybe two later, you’re starting down into the ADHD
burnout cycle again. You’re staying up later to get your homework done, so you’re struggling to
get out of bed on time. You’re exhausted during the day, so you’re late to all your classes and
then you’re falling asleep in them, you’re leaving your assignments to the last minute and you’re
forgetting everything you need. Maybe you start eating junk food to cope. Your caffeine intake
rises dangerously.

Then the weekend hits and you practically sleep through it, even though you need that time to
catch up. The next week starts and it’s back on the train (careening off the rails).

The very basic neuroscience of it is: brain management system bad. Just taking care of yourself
needs so much mental energy that you can’t focus on your actual responsibilities. It makes
more sense to let sleep and sh*t fall by the wayside and focus your precious energy on school
and/or work.

But the more you do, the less energy you have. It’s a downward spiral.

So now you’re on the unvacuumed floor of your room, hair wet from your shower, in only the
chocolate-stained jeans you dug out of your heaping laundry basket because they were the
least dirty, and you know you have to go get some food before class in 20 minutes but you can’t
seem to want to get up so you’re just holding your phone four inches from your face anxiously
doomscrolling Reddit as the time ticks away and you’re just wallowing in guilt and frustration
and shame and praying your roommate doesn’t get back to find you here, topless. I say “you,”
but I mean “me.”

Basic neuroscience, a bit more

As Russel Barkeley says, ADHD is a disability of behavior, not knowledge. You know what you
need to do, to the point it’s frustrating you can’t. The disability is in the execution.

This is because ADHD is primarily located in the management system of your brain, the
prefrontal cortex. Your behavior is decided by three different parts of your front brain: (1) the
PFC, along with your (2) limbic system (emotions) and your (3) nucleus accumbens and dorsal
striatum (NADS—habits and compulsions).

PFC — Limbic System — NADS

My neuroscience 101 professor described it like this:

 (1) The PFC is the adult of the brain.
It keeps track of time and holds the long-term consequences of your goals in your
working (short-term) memory. It reduces the strength of your emotions and
compulsions for immediate gratification.

(2) The limbic system is a toddler.

It expresses emotions, rational or not, and demands you act on them right now.

(3) The NADS are a dog.

They produce compulsions based on instinctive drives for food, sleep, etc. They
also produce compulsions based on habits, good or bad (ie addictions, cravings).

Your behavior is decided by the conversation between these three parts of your brain. Sorry
about the condescending bolding.

ADHDers have much quieter, less effective PFCs. Our attention and effort are usually controlled
by the other two emotional- and instant gratification-based systems of our brain. Still, we find
ourselves throwing all the mental energy we’ve got, and then some, at our PFC so it can
wrangle the rest of our brain just to get something done.

Failure to refuel
We lose a lot of mental energy in brute forcing our executive functioning. Then, more is lost
when misdirected into Reddit, Instagram, Wikipedia, Netflix, your new startup idea or novel,
research about toe fungi, you know the drill. It can be exhausting to get through the day, but
that’s all hidden deep beneath the surface; so every day it’s like we’re running a race against
neurotypicals with secret weights tied to our feet.

Then there’s our problem refueling our mental energy—we don’t, at least not very well. Have
you ever had a week during which you went to bed at the same time each night (without being
forced)? Do you eat three healthy meals a day? Are you usually calm and not crazily anxious or
depressed? Do you exercise regularly? Are you okay??

No. You’re not, I bet. Your skin’s sallow, your hair’s frizzy and you ran out of time to brush your
teeth again this morning. You have five different health conditions you need to see the doctor
about but you barely notice they’re there because your interoception’s whack and school’s more
important right now. (By “you,” I mean “me.” When I finally went to the ENT, I found out my
“allergies” was a benign tumor that had been growing in my nose for 15 years. Trainee doctors
were called into the exam room to study me.)

If a neurotypical person doesn’t maintain their health, they experience increasingly severe
executive dysfunction. Their limbic system and NA grow louder, their short-term memory
weakens, their attention span shrinks and they start to act pretty ADHD.
So if an ADHD person doesn’t maintain their physical and mental health, they’re just plain
fucked.

If they do, on the other hand, their ADHD symptoms will diminish in strength and be easier to
manage with planning, routines and brute strength.

But of course the obvious thing about sleeping right, eating right, drinking water, exercising and
not hating ourselves is that they’re all boring and the toddler doesn’t want to do them. They take
a lot of executive functioning. In fact, doing them all takes so much energy for us that, in my
unlicensed opinion, their net mental energy result is either 0 or negative. So, again in my
unlicensed and unasked-for opinion, ADHDers tend more often to skip them to focus on
real-world responsibilities instead. Thus draining their already precarious energy reserves
without replenishment (until the weekend) while seemingly not doing much at all.

The solution is habits.

Habits
We want to maximize our PFC’s abilities by refueling while not using the PFC to refuel. Use the
dorsal striatum, motherfucker.

In other words: use habits & routines (located in NADS) to meet all your basic needs, and help
your PFC out the rest of the way by trickery.

TL:DR: DIY Education

1. Google “jessica mccabe ted talk”

2. Google “how to adhd youtube” and watch the how to adhd youtube channel video
“how to (explain) adhd”

3. Google “executive functioning prefrontal cortex” and/or “neuroscience of adhd.” Plus

anything else at will! Be scientific with your sources.

More specifics will come in the treatment section.

(Neuroscience information from Alex Korb, UCLA neuroscience professor and author of The
Upward Spiral. He is not aware of this stupid write-up. “Treatment plan” inspired Russell
Barkeley, editor of all editions of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder: A Handbook for
Diagnosis and Treatment (4th edition), the 2005 Safren et al study and their 2010 followup,
Safren et al’s book Mastering your Adult ADHD (Treatments That Work) and Jessica McCabe’s
How to ADHD YouTube channel, which deserves a Nobel Peace Prize. Also by Thomas “no, not
that one” Brown’s Smart But Stuck and, of course, the beautiful Ed Hallowell’s Driven to
Distraction and his follow-up, Delivered from Distraction.
Acknowledgements go to my university counseling center, including my intake psychologist, my
first psychiatrist and the coordinators of the “Finding Focus” group; to our university hospital’s
ADHD Clinic; to our hospital’s many therapy groups for people with all different disabilities; to
our university’s huge accessible education center; and, of course, to my first, second and third
long-term psychologists/therapists. The help, resources and/or education that every one of them
completely failed to provide me made this guide necessary.

If any of the neuroscience information above is inaccurate, please direct your blame to Alex
Korb.)

TREATMENT
STEP 1:
Set up a bujo
I’ve found planning routines out in a bullet journal the most effective way to organize meeting
your basic needs every day. It both helps you visualize your time and it minimizes how often
responsibilities get in your way—because you’re putting your responsibilities in right with
everything else.

But if you don’t want to bujo, fine. I’m not in charge of you. I guess you just don’t trust me, huh.

1. Make a bujo.

Use your cheapest available notebook and try to f*ck it up so you don’t get too aesthetic and
become afraid to use it! Stain it, tear it, blot or draw lines, etc.

Resources:
■ “how to adhd bullet journal plus tips and tricks.”
- Watch any other videos you want from the channel on bujos, too.

■ Google “ryder carroll updated bujo”

I recommend using a bujo to start just because it’s the most comprehensive, visual & flexible
planner for adhd brains I know of atm. Like, by miles. Jessica McCabe has a video on why.

My mentees have to start with bujos and can ditch them later if they really don’t like them.

Other tips
 - If in school, operate with three spreads: a semester-long spread, a weekly spread and a
daily spread.

My weekly spread(s):

2020:
2019:
My daily spread(s) (includes some journaling, enjoy my innermost tortures/doodles):

2019:
STEP 2:
Set up your basic needs routines in your bujo
Start with your morning routine. That’s what’s worked for me.

Now, in your bujo, you’re going to set up routines that get you through the stuff you have to do
every day.

Basically, you’ll use your routines to make sure you get enough sleep at an early enough time
and that you eat, exercise, meditate, take your pills, caffeinate etc.

And just get yourself showered, teeth brushed and fully ready for the day without having to think
too much about it and without it taking 5+ hours to start your day haha ha ha

These are necessary and required as they contain much more important info:
1. Watch HTADHD’s video on “habits”

2. Watch HTADHD’s video “why routines are better than new year’s
resolutions”***** no. 1 most important video imo!****

3. Any other HTADHD video ON ROUTINES ONLY that catches your fancy

4. Plan out two routines in your bullet journal in list form: a MORNING routine and a
NIGHTTIME routine. Break them down into as specific tasks as needed.

Step 2.5 Things to include in your routines (in no particular order):

Will likely chart this in the future

Meditation
1. “ADHD and meditation.” “How to do grounding exercises.”
● Meditation is GREAT for temporarily increasing executive functioning. Good to build this
into your routine right before you have to do work, schoolwork, etc
● Grounding exercises such as just sitting upright (preferably outside) and spending two
minutes trying to take in all your surroundings, visually and auditory(ly)?
● Some options for apps:
○ Smiling Mind app,
○ Insight Timer 7 day lessons for beginners,
○ UCLA Health meditation app.
○ Balance (from u/starfishTsunami1!)
● There’s also a book on this, I think! The Mindfulness Prescription for Adult ADHD. Intro:
https://en.calameo.com/read/0000392570bf0e177d7dc

Exercise
2. “ADHD and exercise.”
 ● Music can be a significant motivator, and this is neurologically proven (I just can’t
remember how atm). Don’t start exercising by exercising; start by turning on power
music. Put it into the routine. That’s a much easier task to get started than, well,
exercise.
○ I’m talking power music, like “The Final Countdown” or “Freedom” from Bey’s
Homecoming album.
● Some exercise options: 30 days of yoga with Adrienne! Can’t go wrong with any of em.
For more advanced, I use Yoga with Tim or Kassandra’s 10 minute morning yoga
○ https://youtube.com/c/yogawithadriene (one of her monthly challenges; do one
every day and you’ll be cured of ADHD in no time!)
○ For ten minutes of morning yoga only:
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLW0v0k7UCVrlLpvX-rz-mrGCoElFpj44D
■ It took me a year to finish one of Adrienne’s monthlong challenges. I had
to keep restarting when I lost my tiny amount of muscle tone. I finally got
through in about 40ish days.
● “From couch to 5k”-type programs are also good for running.
● Really any type of exercise clearly organized/parceled out, and daily or close to it.
Dancing, boxing, swimming, running
● Go slower and easier than you think you need to! You want to be able to do exercise
every day or almost every day to cement the routine

Food
3. “ADHD and food/glucose.”
● Basic meal prepping is your friend! I prepped six PBJs on Sundays for lunches
○ Great meal prep apps:
■ Paprika
● https://blackgirllostkeys.com/adhd/100-no-cook-meal-items/
● Have scheduled times to eat, and good, easy, regular meals to prepare at the drop of
a dime
● Shipt, Instacart, etc. will be your best friend if you can afford it. And if you can
afford it, you can afford it.
○ On the flip side, Doordash has been my worst enemy
● A BIG protein breakfast is your best bet. Two eggs with avocado, peanut butter waffles,
yogurt. Also have frozen breakfasts and dinners ready to microwave.
○ ESPECIALLY if you take meds. Protein will improve the efficacy of meds, though
be careful not to eat too soon before/after short-acting stimulants
● Don’t eat anything with Red 40, or at least give it a small try first and see if it makes
you weird because it makes me weird
● Sometimes ADHD results in a food addiction, which can be more minor or major. Other
times, it goes further into eating disorders. Both need treatment.
○ For reference, food addiction is when you feel you don’t have complete control of
your eating, ie constant cravings for ice cream
● Vitamins likely good; we’re often deficient in iron or b12. “ADHD vitamin deficiency.”
Google responsibly—there’s a lot of quackery out there.
 ● Use only one type of each dish and develop a habit of cleaning them off after use, if
possible

Fish oil
● Again, I’m NOT a quack. Numerous studies have shown that omega-3 fatty acid
supplements can help alleviate some ADHD symptoms. As Dr. Ned Hallowell
recommends fish oil supplements, so do I.
○ NAQ (Never Asked Questions)
■ How do they taste?
● Like fish, but like you opened your mouth and the fish jumped
down your gullet, not like you had to chew and swallow (heh, like
the bird)
■ Isn’t that literally a phrase meaning “fake”?
● You’re mxixing it up with snake oil. Sure, both are amphibians, but
is anything really real?
■ Should I talk to my doctor?
● I didn’t. You probably should. If you don’t, because you won’t, just
take it slower than you think you need, goddammit.
■ Are you okay?
● I just ate my omega-3 supplements and a LOT of homemade
chicken pot pie and suddenly my body has decided it’s bedtime.
Forever? We shall see, young warlock. What a show, man. What a
damn show.
■ I feel like I’ve forgotten something important.
● Hey! You’re stealing my thoughts for questions! Jail for a thousand
years

Sleep
5.” ADHD and sleep adults,” and “delayed sleep phase syndrome,” plus clinical treatment
options if needed. Some options:
● To get up: Put alarm clock on OTHER side of the room. Set 5+ alarms
○ If somehow you can get a loft bed or top of a bunk bed and your roommates don't
mind you leaving your alarm down at the bottom, this is a GUARANTEED way
you won’t be going back to bed after your alarm
○ Another option is to RESPONSIBLY get a dog or cat
● Have clothes and caffeine pill (cheap on Amazon!!) laid out, and morning routine
written v big and clear nearby
● Consider an alarm clock that mimics the sun rising (as in they get f*cking bright in the
morning).
● Open blinds before going to sleep to get as much natural light in the morning as
possible, if can
● To get to sleep:
○ Melatonin supplements!
■ Even if they are just placebos, hey, placebos can work
 ○ Keeping ANYTHING interesting out of your room, starting at a certain time and
using external forcing and/or routine.
■ ALL technology, music, books, puzzles. Not just electronics. Anything that
might be more interesting than sleep.
■ Force yourself to just be bored and fidget and daydream
○ Get ready for bed early in the evening to avoid nighttime haze (when you’re so
tired and executive functioning-ed out that it’s hard to get to bed)
○ EXERCISE EVERY DAY
○ Cut way back on the sugar
○ Go to the doctor if you think you might have another sleep problem, such as
restless leg, obstructive sleep apnea etc
○ MORE ADVANCED: If you have wireless earbuds (and possibly a smartwatch)
and a steady sleep schedule set, I listen to podcasts to go to sleep. I start them in
the other room on my phone w/a sleep timer set, then go to bed.
■ On .08x speed when I’m feeling normal or 1x when I’m more hyperactive.
■ I think this only works for me now because my body’s adjusted to a sleep
cycle (after two decades of absolute nonsense aka delayed sleep phase
syndrome). That took following the above “absolutely nothing interesting”
rule for a while. When I hear the dulcet tones of my favorite true
crime/horror podcast, I drift right off to sleep. The power of habit, bitches

Electronic avoidance
● In accessibility settings, greyscale your phone (saw mentioned on reddit, will find
username; I’ve done this too!)

Water
6. “Cognition and dehydration.”
● Consider getting flavored packets for your water bottles if you won’t drink otherwise!
Steer away from extremely artificial flavoring.
● Brita water filter kept always in the fridge is highly recommended (u/starfishTsunami1!)
(seconded by me!)
● Have a bigass water bottle always near ya

Work/School
- Google video: “russell barkeley adhd treatment presentation”
- HTADHD
- Wall of awful
- Motivation
- Emotions
- Pomodoro
- Procrastination
- Etc
(This section requires much more work!)

Relaxation
- HTADHD dopamenu video
- “Importance of free time” “importance of relaxing”

STEP 3:
Follow your routines
Now, you follow your morning routine when you wake up the following morning.

To make remembering/completing easier, here are some essential apps/tools:

● Brili (free trial),
● Tiimo (free trial),************ recommended!
● Owaves (free but for MORE ADVANCED ADHDERS ONLY ie after you’ve got the basics
of routines down and can implement them semi-regularly)
● Whiteboards or large signs/sticky notes everywhere with your routines written on them
● NOT your family and friends. They’re going to try to talk to you and throw you off your
routines, especially over breakfast. Do not fall for it. Put your earbuds in and listen to
some isochronic tones and ignore them. Love is not as important as money.
● Apple watch etc good

STEP 4:
When you fail, get back up, adjust and try again

You definitely won’t build Rome in a day. Or a month. Or three months. You’ll f*ck up a lot, but
each f*ck up is helpful, even if you feel frustrated and hopeless. You’re just going to have to
ignore that.

The core of this step is:

A. Figure out how to make things you WANT to do as easy as possible (aka have a set
routine which includes laying out clothes for the following day)

B. Make things you DON’T want yourself to do as hard as possible (aka put parental
controls on your phone, or have a no tech in bedroom rule – may need external
enforcement/routines to keep up with sometimes)

Remember your Tiimo, etc. And keep adjusting each time you trip up until you stop feeling so
hopeless.
The following week of one of my example spreads:
M
STEP 5:
Comorbidities (anxiety and depression) and therapy

Once you have the basic stuff down, it’s easier to handle the anxiety and depression. Meds for
these are also very good!!

Anxiety and depression make everything worse, but especially ADHD. Social anxiety,
perfectionism, depression can all make you not want to do things that might not be particularly
difficult.

Also, people who grow up with untreated ADHD have huge guilt complexes and tend to keep a
constant mental PR person on retainer in their brains to represent them both to themselves and
to others, which is exhausting. (It’s because of the disability, by the way, it genuinely isn’t your
fault.)

1. Look up “ADHD and girls” if that’s you

2. Look up “ADHD rejection sensitivity disorder”

3. “Maladaptive daydreaming”

3.“ADHD developmental delay social” and “ADHD changes in brain from childhood to
adulthood”

4. Best anxiety/depression treatment resources in general IMO: The TedTalks by Brene Brown!
And any of her books. She’s GREAT on shame!! Google “Brene Brown TedTalks.” This isn’t,
like, treatment, it’s just a talk. But ADHD people have self-worth problems through the nose (and
I know noses!!)
- Social anxiety:
- DIY social anxiety CBT workbooks are available online. “ADHD social anxiety”
- Immersion therapy helps social anxiety…. Ever wanted to be a reporter?
- Generalized anxiety/MDD (needs more)
- The Feeling Good Handbook
-
- DBT handbooks are also online, with a bit of digging. These are especially good for
emotional regulation/anger

5. Validation
- *****r/ADHD, r/adhd_women and r/ADHD_anxiety****** (names may be slightly different).
- google “ed hallowell driven to distraction audiobook” on youtube. SOME OF THE FACTS
ARE OUT OF DATE but more recent editions aren’t free sooo. It’s 100% worth it)
- Me! Or other community members.
6. HTADHD again

7. Oh, yeah, and eventually, get theeself to a therapist

- Therapists specializing in ADHD preferred, but rare

STEP ???:
Medication notes

1. AVOID CITRIC ACID WITH STIMULANTS as it will nullify em. So will food or beverage
(non-water) w/in an hour before or after taking fast-acting (IR) meds

2. Finding the right meds is often trial and error. I’ve tried five diff adhd meds, currently take a
strattera(nonstimulant)/vyvanse combo. This is underutilized IMO, so please ask for it if you
think it might help and see what your psych says

3. Stimulants are bad with anxiety and need to be monitored!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! A

zero-monitoring situation may end with you experiencing a two-day panic attack, hypothetically

4. If you don’t eat or sleep while using stimulants, you WILL have the stimulant taken away after
you have had a breakdown. see previous

5. STOP FEELING GUILTY ABOUT ASKING FOR MEDS

● You wouldn’t look at a person with only one leg and say “you shouldn’t use that
prosthetic because we sit down most of the time nowadays” WOULD YOU?
● This is an incredibly common feeling among ADHDers pre-medication. Like, “I don’t
really have it bad enough, do I really need it? I could get along okay if I just worked
harder. I feel like my psychiatrist will think I just want stimulants to abuse or sell….”
● Then those people get the stimulants and realize, “Oh, I was stupid, I need these to live.”
You’re a cliche.

6. With your psychiatrist: Emphasize the serious mental health impact of living life in constant
severe stress due to ADHD to psychiatrist.
● If you’re near burnout, say it.
● If you’re causing relationship issues, say it.
● Don’t say things like “I feel hopeless”; say “I am doing this and this, and I’m optimistic,
but I’ve found it’s still not enough for some reason. I am getting very frustrated. This has
been a long-term problem with me despite (list of things you’ve tried).... even when I was
young, (symptoms, parental/teacher attempts to address). I was diagnosed with ADHD
as a kid (if so) and I think...” If you sound TOO anxious and depressed, your ADHD
symptoms might be overlooked because “it’s just depression!! You’re doing too well!!1!”
 ● If needed, bring recent studies from respectable sources to prove you can actually have
it even though you are not a preadolescent white boy in a classroom. These are google
scholar-able
● Another great post discussing docs and ADHD better than me (warning reddit):
https://www.reddit.com/r/GiftedADHD/comments/gn6kg7/how_to_interview_your_new_th
erapist_or_other/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf

7. Some medication alternatives:

● Caffeine, and lots of it. Not near bedtime!
● Exercise. Hard exercise.
○ I know someone with unmedicated ADHD who self-treated with 2hrs hard
exercise every morning.
○ Daily cardio preferred
● Meditation/Grounding
● Yoga
● Strict routines, full fulfillment of basic needs and all the tricks and tips combined with all
the above

8. Revenge of the ADHD

● Some people will find that their ADHD takes revenge on them after their medicine wears
off. Of course I’m talking about rebound symptoms.
● The only cure is to be prepareddd and set up your ultra-adhd(hd) self for success (or
bedtime) the same way you would, say, a toddler, or a dog. Prepare your bedtime steps
in advance, remove distractions… everything I’ve talked about before, just a bit more.
■ And in general, techniques for guiding/controlling toddlers or dogs work
great for ADHD!!

COMING SOON(ish):

6. Chores
● Less habitual and I struggle more with these myself because they’re not as regular.
These are just tips, not guarantees.
○ Taking meds using the auto pill dispenser/caps
○ Laundry
○ Groceries and meal prep
○ Keeping clean and organized
■ The purgatory shelf (reddit)
■ Command hooks
 ■ A place for everything and a label for every place

7. Classwork
● Stress and motivation; discussion of arousal, amygdala
○ Importance of being genuinely interested in what you do
● The Wall of Awful video from HTADHD and past failures to work/pain impacting present

ability
○ That was an accident skull but it’s funny and so remains
● Scheduling work; the massive semester-long work assignments spread, parceling it all
out in such a way that catch-up is possible after bad days/weeks
○ Never max workload, no matter how excited you are for the challenge. You can
max other career stuff later, promise—school is just not built for ADHD
sustainability
● Going to lecture on time and paying attention
○ Otter.ai?? Better to record or no? I don’t know.
○ Accomodations
○ Notetaking, doodling
○ Sit in front and listen how?
■ DON’T SIT IN THE BACK
○ Yes, tell those talkative bitches behind you to shut up. I can say bitch, I’m a
woman
○ Be very selective in your professors’ lecture styles; if too slow or boring, drop if at
all possible
● Reading and annotating??
○ Software to change to audio
● Writing essays
○ Write like a reporter
○ Citations (from adhd_college)
○ I feel like a fraud here; I never reached a second draft!
● Studying??????????
○ Outlining what to know and making a checklist
○ Humanities
 ■ Gamification
■ Flashcards
■ Retaking notes/visualizing with one page notes
○ STEM
■ how the fuck
○ When/where to stop and not get too crazy on section 1A when you have eighty
more sections to go (allocating effort like that is an executive function we lack)
■ Answer: just don’t do that
● Tips n tricks
○ Meditation
○ Quick discussion of pomodoro
○ “Working for only five minutes to start” and task initiation post-habit
○ Various site and electronic blocking tools and how they may sometimes work
■ Ended up looking at stupid jokes for hours instead of assaying to essay
○ Body doubling
○ Gamification (from adhd_college)
○ There will be more
● STEM grad school (from adhd_college)

COMING EVENTUALLY:
A more substantial step 5. based on my post-covid research on social anxiety/perfectionism,
childhood development and somatic experiencing/EMDR/therapy (The Body Keeps the Score)

Addendum 1,
Books and other materials I
particularly liked, in no order whatsoever

Books
1. Driven to Distraction (Ed Hallowell) and Delivered from Distraction
(ditto)
2. Smart But Stuck (Thomas Brown)
3. The Upward Spiral (Alexander Korb)
4. Women with Attention Deficit Disorder (Sari Solden)
5. Thinking, Fast and Slow (Daniel Kahneman)
6. The Righteous Mind (Jonathon Haidt)
7. Taking Charge of Adult ADHD (Russel Barkley)
 8. The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog: And Other Stories from a Child
Psychiatrist’s Notebook
9. The Body Keeps the Score (
10. How to Stop Giving a Fuck
11.Rewire Your Anxious Brain (
12. The Feeling Good Handbook
13. Mini Habits
14. The Gifts of Imperfection
15. The Imperfectionists’ Handbook

Workbooks, Studies and Medical Texts

1. Mastering Your Adult ADHD (Safren, Sprich, Pearlman and Otto)
2. ADHD Adult Clinical Workbook
3. 4th Edition Clinical Handbook for ADHD
4. Oxford Textbook of Psychiatry: ADHD
5. Overcoming Social Anxiety and Shyness (Gillian Butler)
1. Driven to Distraction
2. ADHD adult clinical workbook
3. Smart but Stuck
4. The Upward Spiral
5. The 4th edition clinical handbook for ADHD (libraries have it!)
6. How to ADHD. Again. Just can’t stress it enough
7. ADHD Oxford Textbook of Psychiatry (2020)
8. Thinking, Fast and Slow
9. The Great Courses Plus has psychology and neuroscience courses!
10. ADHD in Women
11. Black Girl, Lost Keys
12. For other ADHD books, the Libby app. Often, city libraries might have e-cards available to
all residents of a state. If you have relatives in other states, they can get you a library card from
their big libraries, too. Biggest ebook collections in US are NYC Public, LA Public and LA
County
13. Scribd
14. More to be added

Great courses
1. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy: Techniques
Addendum 2
What’s the point of the bullet journal?

ADHD inhibits executive functioning:

There’s no set number of EFs – time management, or time visualization, is generally considered
one, too.

Moving forward, you need an organizational system to address these deficiencies. It needs to:
1. Externalize your working (or short-term) memory,
■ (Working memory dysfunction)
2. Help you visualize your day,
■ (Time management dysfunction)
3. Help you build routines and use tricks to do everything you don’t want to
do
■ (Task activation/Task switching dysfunction – the hardest, in my opinion)
4. Offer distraction delay capabilities,
■ (Maintaining attention/interest/focus/effort dysfunction)

While also being flexible, easy and available enough that you don’t avoid or skip it. A regular
organizational system won’t really cut it.

The bujo hits at most of these: you have to keep it open and nearby, but it externalizes your
working memory. The fact you have to write this out also helps encode in your memory better
than digital. It helps you visualize your day clearly and simply enough that your short-term
memory doesn’t get overwhelmed. Done right, it helps you plan out specifically what you have
to do week by week and consciously break down tasks to navigate around the EF dysfunction
that makes you kinda hazy about where to start and ends up with you five feet away on your
phone. And it offers distraction delay in that you can jot something down and return to your old
activities.
Addendum 3,
ADHD as a cause of depression and anxiety

[Originally headed for Reddit]

True ADHD experts—Dr. Ed Hallowell, to be specific—would say depression and anxiety can be
caused by ADHD, and you need to feel more in control of your ADHD to make progress on
depression and anxiety.

That makes sense to me, too, because anxiety is caused by the three Cs: (1) Consequences,
(2) Control and (3) Chronology (time) [The Upward Spiral]. If you don’t feel in control of yourself
or your capabilities, you’ll be anxious. And ADHD is all about lacking control of key parts of your
brain.

Of course, the treatment mental health professionals generally offer for it is pretty much useless,
as so few seem to actually understand or keep up with the disorder. I’m not the kind of person to
make sweeping statements like that lightly. On the personal level, I’ve had four therapists and
none of them helped me manage my ADHD. On the societal, about half of medical practitioners
won’t even diagnose ADHD. At that rate, I wonder how well the rest can treat it. Personally, I
think it’s criminally understudied and ignored.

BUT. ADHD IS manageable, to a large extent. It’s not a life sentence. My psychiatrist has
ADHD. So do my dental tech and an investigative reporter I know. All women, by the way! I
learned how to manage my ADHD relatively well, and I mentored other ADHD college kids
before I graduated who also saw significant, quantifiable improvements.

It’s REALLY frustrating because there ARE scientific studies that have demonstrated successful
ADHD treatment programs. There’s a whole clinical handbook. But again, no one seems to be
practicing what the experts are putting out.

Addendum 4,
Frustrating statistics

About 20% of US prison populations have DIAGNOSED ADHD:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4301200/

CW for self-harm One in four women with ADHD will attempt to kill themselves:
https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-12/uot-oif121520.php
One in three students with ADHD will drop out of high school, a higher rate than students with
any other mental health condition:
https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-12/uot-oif121520.php

About 20% of ALL adults with substance abuse disorders have ADHD. 5% of adults have ADHD
in the general population, by the way.
https://www.psychiatrictimes.com/view/adhd-and-substance-use-current-evidence-and-treatmen
t-considerations

ADHDers have lower quality of life and more severe symptoms of depression:
https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=depression+and+anxiety+adhd+adults+diagnosed&hl=en
&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart#d=gs_qabs&u=%23p%3DlIo8OKaMaRQJ and
https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&as_vis=1&q=adhd+diagnosis+wome
n+adults&btnG=#d=gs_qabs&u=%23p%3D6AO7GyrVUdoJ

ADHDers’ most common comorbidity is perfectionism:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0165178116302815?casa_token=NiwTKayV
OCAAAAAA:dRRWgqUiNc-z0Zpql_heYe2E5B7fGBuq5BotLfygoSkQNxT_oE9HVBjctGRBUPBx
WejAu06Wu-o

And yet! Even though it’s super common comparatively and VERY impactful objectively, the
actual treatment ADHDers commonly receive is terrible.

Half of all primary care doctors are uncomfortable diagnosing adult ADHD, and 44% don’t even
know the diagnostic criteria.
https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=depression+and+anxiety+adhd+adults+diagnosed&hl=en
&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart#d=gs_qabs&u=%23p%3Dox9z4e0Q9GQJ

On average, ADHD women are diagnosed MUCH later than men.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/health/how-women-and-girls-with-adh
d-are-given-short-shrift-with-treatment-other-forms-of-help/2020/05/15/a7971486-8596-11ea-87
8a-86477a724bdb_story.html%3FoutputType%3Damp

And yet!! Treatment is not that difficult. Stimulant medicine is helpful in 90% of cases of ADHD.
And behavioral therapy taught by someone who knows how ADHD works can improve quality of
life substantially.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1876201816303963?casa_token=Dffa_Zxm8
DUAAAAA:A2tAGs1XZJj3-z4y65_0X82EceSHOrpxl6SpWbT1xm5q_Y6ePherMv94TRtMhOTje
Xmkl9LzQTg

It’s all very frustrating.

Addendum 5,
The Adjustment/Humiliation Period at the beginning of most new situations

I think I’ve come to terms with an inevitable fact of life for me: New situations usually
occur with an Adjustment/Humiliation Period.

Every new situation means many, many novel details to process all at once. For
neurotypical people with decent detail-orientation, this period is probably less intense
but still present. I miss details all the time, though. And I also refuse to ask for help or let
people know I’m worried (I pride myself on my initiative-taking and independent
thinking). So, flooded with new details to process, I’m usually a bumbling idiot for a little
bit in new situations. It’s an inevitable fact of life for some people with ADHD, or at least
me.

Addendum 6,
It’s Always a Good Time for Ryan’s Non-Zero Days

Read:
https://www.reddit.com/r/getdisciplined/comments/1q96b5/deleted_by_user/cdah4af/?ut
m_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf&context=3

Secret Addendum,
The current external structure for my routines:
My year-old puppy