The Wedding of Katy and Sonny Rollins

They did it! Katy and Sonny Rollins: two ADHDers who met, fell in love and then got married. Katy has shown herself to be extraordinarily self-perceptive, well aware of her “gift,” well aware of life’s challenges. I’m sure that Sonny is just as intelligent, just as self-perceptive as Katy.

As you begin your great adventure together I want to give you both some very important advice.

- Never, ever lose your sense of humor. Humor will help to get you through the challenges ahead. Sure, some days will be downright frustrating. Some days your anger will get the best of you. But after you have talked it out, look for the humorous side. (“You sure looked ridiculous after I dumped that bowl of cereal on your head. Sonny, don’t you think the Fruit Loops® looked great with your curly red hair?”)

- Never stop growing together. In six months you will not be the same people you are now. In six years you will not be the same people you are now. Don’t fight these changes. Go with it and grow with it. It’s all part of the process. You are like two plants that have been grafted together. The result can be more beautiful than a plant growing alone.

- Be realistic. Take everything you think you know about relationships and throw it out the window. Marriage is not like any relationship you have been in before (unless, of course, you were married). Some days you will wonder, “Why the hell did I do this?” You’ll know exactly why when you both lie in bed together, exhausted after a long hard day and then, something funny occurs to you both and you both start laughing. You’ll know why when you are sick with the flu and the other person brings you some chicken soup. You’ll know why when your boss or a client makes you angry and, after telling your partner about it, he gets angry too and he’s ready to punch that person in the nose. (Not literally, of course.) There will be many more moments when “you’ll know why.”

There’s much more I can say but you will have to discover it for yourselves.

There has to be some mystery in life, no?

Congratulations To You Both.

This is the

Beginning of Your Great Adventure.

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There is a thought stuck in my head today. I want to have ADD.  Please don’t take offense, it’s not a joke – I feel left out. I feel like a freak in my own home. Feelings are just that – emotion. No logical sense to them, they just are. It’s not supposed to make sense. Practicality and logic are at war with emotion. I want to be able to understand the ADD – I want to be able to live in the moment and not be constantly worried about the future. I want to be unaware of Time. I want to live by my thoughts, desires, and emotions…and not be aware of the thoughts and emotions of those around me. I want to be creative and have dreams.

I can feel it – it’s in the air and it’s real, the difference in time, the difference in thought, the difference in speeds.

I am like the slow and steady plowhorse that somehow got hitched to the cart with a racehorse. He sets the goal and I try to go in that direction, steady and slow – but it doesn’t take long and he’s chomping at the bit. Life at Slow and Steady isn’t very interesting. The goal has changed and the direction has changed and poor old plowhorse is being dragged along and hasn’t gotten a chance to get it’s feet under it, or for it’s head to stop spinning. Productive it’s not. There’s usually a mess from such a change in destination – maybe bits and pieces of plowhorse hide and expensive cart repair…and hmmm lost a wheel somewhere…I want to feel alive and desired and appealing. I want to be lively and fun. I want to be loved and respected. I want to be a partner and to be important for what I bring into this partnership.

NT’ers (neurotypicals) read body language. To us, a lot of what is said is body language. When an ADD’er is off in hyperfocus constantly, say on the TV, or a video game, or the internet, to us they are removed from Life, and from us. When we speak and aren’t heard, or are shrugged off, or feel not heard… well, our brain says “hey he doesn’t think you’re important”. When we have issues and we speak up, it’s like we are saying that there is something wrong with you, when all we mean is “I have a problem, help me.” We can’t get by the anger, or the wall of defensiveness ADD puts up when you feel threatened…our needs, and us with them are brushed off, we are a problem and worthless. We are unloved. We internalize all of this because we know the only thing we have control of is ourselves. We know it’s not done on purpose once we know how ADD traits affect you – but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t do damage. When our ADD partner is having a bad day, hurting and angry…we see they tend to lash out, perhaps say things they don’t mean about us, pick us apart. Or they withdraw from reality and hide in hyperfocus.

I wish I had that somedays. To say what I want and not care who catches the shrapnel. To be able to brush it off. To not be bound by the subtle rules of society and the boundaries of responsibility. To not be the bridle and the brakes. To be able quit my job on a whim and have no doubts there is another one to take it’s place. To not worry about next week, next month.
I want to lift up my ADD’er, not hold him back. I want to be his strength and his shoulder when he needs to take a breath and refocus. I want to be benefit, not nemesis.

It’s like a foreign country, and damn it I lost my guidebook!

Teach us how to reach you, how to build the bridge. We think we find a way through the wall, only to be shoved out by stress and life and issues we have no comprehension of. It tires us to try and find a new way through, the old way has usually been cemented over. I try not to judge. I try not to resent or hold anger. I try to find some comprehension, to adapt. Some days I fall down, I only wish there was someone to notice and pick me back up.

 - Written by Crimson

“Love all, trust a few. Do wrong to none” ~~ William Shakespeare

“Thoughts are the shadows of our feelings – always darker, emptier and simpler.” ~~Friedrich Nietzsche

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