I promised a new look for the blog that was “coming soon” but now it is here!!! I am not sure if I will stay with this set up or not but let me know what you think. I am trying to get it so that i have multiple pages at the top where posts related to ADHD for example are shown. So far, I am having difficulty with that. But stay tuned and I will see what i can do to improve the sight before i get busy when I go back to school. Thanks for everyone’s support!
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~WHN
I know how much you, my lovely readers, love my posts about ADHD so i decided to start a series called “Into the ADHD Mind”. In this series I plan to talk more about my experiences with ADHD to better explain what goes on in an ADHD mind. I hope this will help others dealing with their own ADHD and caregivers of people and children with ADHD. So then, let’s get to it!
The average person falls asleep within 3 minutes of lying still. It can take me upwards of 30 minutes to wind down and shut down my mind enough to fall asleep. During this time of trying to wind down is an onslaught of everything. Bits of conversations, music, and TV shows. Images flip through my mind like a slideshow. Ideas and memories flow through like Niagara Falls. This is all happening at once. Constant onslaught of all of this. For those of you who do not have ADHD this may seem overwhelming but this is how my mind runs all day, everyday (i’m use to it!). This slideshow becomes worse when i settle down to try to fall asleep. This is the point of the day when I am most creative. It also tends to be the time I am most awake and alert. Yes, I am most awake when its 9-11 at night and i am being told to go to bed. Now I can usually help slow down the slideshow using a variety of techniques. First, and most effective (for me) is to listen to music. I tend to listen to 4 songs before i go to bed. Each song is of a different genre of music. I listen to a pop song. I repeat the words in my mind. By doing so i block out everything else trying to stream through. Then I listen to a catchy song. Normally a song from My Little Pony, because, lets face it, little kids’ shows have all the best catchy songs. I purposefully get the song stuck in my head. With the song stuck in my head. The onslaught slows down as most of my brain power is focused on singing the song. It is really effective. Then is a song with a hard beat and dramatic melody. This song tends not to have any words because i am still keeping the 2nd song stuck in my head. The 3rd song is to help me focus on my breathing at a steady pace to wind down. The last song is a slow, instrumental song that takes me down into a sleep-like/meditative state. By this point I am usually able to fall asleep. The last song is played very quietly so that i really have to concentrate to heard it. This helps keep Niagara Falls at bay. The biggest issue with this routine is that it take close to 20 minutes. So it is not quick per say but it is effective.
Other solutions: one other solution i have tried but is not as effective (for me) is to concentrate on the work “blank”. I try to really picture a while blank room in my mind and practice keeping all the windows and doors shut as the river of ADHD tries to break through and take over again. This is difficult but sometimes it works. I also find it as good practice for clearing my mind which is VERY difficult for me to do. I also count. Sheep. Pigs. Cows. What ever I am feeling like. The problem with this is i end up naming all the sheep and making them clothes and then we all go on grand adventures together. So not the most effective for me.
Now lets say i have fallen asleep, here comes the much more interesting part.
The average person has 7 dreams a night. When you ready you enter what is know as REM sleep. This is when you have your lucid, almost real dreams. People with ADHD tend to have about 3 dreams a night. Here’s why, our minds do not shut down enough to enter REM sleep most of the time. As a result people with ADHD dream less often. But when we do, its nothing like you will ever experience. ADHD dreams are more life like, colorful, and loud than an average’s person’s dream. ADHD people also can remember their dreams far better than the average person. I remember most of my dreams days after. i still have dreams that i had months to even years ago that i still remember in vivid detail. As a project for school we had to keep a dream journal for a couple weeks. But I woke up most mornings without dreaming. However, since i remember dreams i have i simply wrote down in vivid detail all that i remembered, even though some of them were months old. Let’s take a look into my dreams.
“Yesterday was pretty clearly semi. My dream reflected the excitement of semi. This dream was not particularly long because it was hard to fall asleep with the chaos going on in my mind which was reflected in the dream. The dream was one of the most chaotic of all my ADHD dreams. Song lyrics from various songs would blast through my mind randomly at full volume. Lights of the strobe lights on the dance floor would flash through my mind just (or more) vibrantly than they had at semi. BLUE. PURPLE. PINK. WHITE. FLASH. FLASH. like a strobe light. Can you have a seizure while you sleep from a strobe light in you dream? Quick couple seconds of the dancing would flash through in sync with the flashes of the lights. It was chaos. I kept waking up because of the chaos but every time I fell asleep it would start up again. “
Some important things to point out here. When I “ADHD” dream i can hear music and sound as loud, or louder, as they would occur while I am awake. My “ADHD” dreams have no plot or story line. They are just chaos like I described above. When I have these kinds of dreams I often wake up more tired then when I fell asleep.
Here is another “ADHD” dream:
“This dream is hard to describe. There were so many images that flashed in. The scene changed constantly like watch 10 movies all playing together into one movie. The scenes were very vivid in color and sound. There was music playing in the background as vividly as if I was wearing headphones. Many of the pictures were of school. Things about test/Quizzes. Conversations. Bits of lectures given in various classes. Other scenes were of various thoughts, stories I read, or videos I had watched. Lots of talking from various conversations from various people. To anyone else this seems crazy and confusing but I am able to follow along because it is like I am sitting in the middle and these images, sounds, and feeling just swirl around me constantly. It didn’t seem like my eyes were open but yet I was still seeing the images. “
Again, notice how vivid this is. Also how chaotic it is.
Now, when I do dream, it isn’t always an “ADHD” dream. I do have ‘regular’ dreams about daily life with plot lines and characters. But these dreams I do not remember as well. Then there is a third type of dream. My “Anxiety Dreams”. These are important because they are normally about me pushing my limits and conquering my fears and having positive experiences overcoming my fears. I wake up feeling empowered and satisfied. They tend to be a combination of a ‘regular’ dream and an “ADHD” dream. Here is an example:
“Last night my dream was more than interesting. This giant wild beast kept running through the forest near our house causing us to hide. We hide many times in fear for our lives that night. Once the giant creature picked up our house and I thought for sure we were going to die. But I looked the monster in the eye and commanded that he put us down. Seeing my determination, it let us go. Now I don’t really remember what the monster looked like but it seemed to be the embodiment of fear. After, we still saw the monster but it never bothered us again. But still, I remained on guard, always looking over my shoulder for the creature of fear.”
Notice how it is both vivid but also a story.
Well, I hoped this posted helped you or helped you come to a better understanding. If not, I hope you enjoyed it anyways. Thanks.
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~WHN
Summer is traditionally not one of my favorite times of the year but i am having a great summer this year, so i am enjoying it. Last summer for me was probably this worst summer i had because of all the medical issues from minor things like strep throat to major things like poison ivy, last summer kinda stunk for me. But this summer has been amazing. I was lucky enough to get sponsored to a youth leadership conference. It was a weekend-long experience at a local college that is meant to teach and empower young leaders in my area. It was truly the best experience of my life. I have set so many goals, but more minor things. I am often held back in my life by fear but after this weekend i feel like i can do anything i want. I am pumped to start conquering my fears, one at a time. First, I plan to spend more time outside, this will help with my fear of bees. Then i want to conquer my fear of roller coasters. This summer is shaping up to be amazing.
I challenge all of you out there to follow my lead and do something small that scares you. I am looking forward to my first ride on a loop roller coaster and soaking up some fresh air this summer.
At the end of the conference i was awarded an award for Best Speaker! 🙂 I came close to getting the scholarship for “Most Likely to Change the World”. I got beat out of the running by a girl who is going to college 2 years early. I met her and she is truly an amazing person and i whole heartily believe she deserves it.
This summer is going to be the best and I am going on a long journey to conquer my Anxiety Disorder because I am tired of fear running my life. I will take all you lovely readers along with me on my journey in the hopes that I can inspire some of you to conquer your fears too. 🙂
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~WHN 🙂
Random Thoughts of a Girl with ADHD 