something that people really dont understand about ADHD is that we dont “jump from one idea to the next”
we have very fast, very associative minds that connect ideas. we have a train of thought, it just goes WAY faster than yours!
example: im thinking about dogs. that makes me think of pitbulls, which makes me think of an animal planet show i enjoy. the show connects to tv in general, which makes me think of my favorite cartoon. i associate my favorite cartoon with art and animation, and i wind up thinking about shading techniques.
TL;DR: having ADHD is kinda like playing a lifelong game of 7 Degrees of Kevin Bacon
“having ADHD is like playing a lifelong game of 7 degrees of Kevin Bacon” is one of the most accurate and easy to understand things I’ve ever heard about ADHD.
I don’t have a lot of the other ADHD symptoms, so I don’t think I have it, but my brain is like this so much. It’s not at all infrequent that I say something after my brain has made several leaps and the people around me are like ‘…what? What are you talking about??’
But with my partner, he’s generally really good about following. When I do this, there’s like a pause as his brain calculates what path my brain likely went down, and it’s a nearly seamless conversation.
But often enough he just gives me a blank look and I have to contextualize my comment and he’s just like ???? How did you get to that? XD I wish I could remember the one from the other day because it was so random I asked him if he really wanted to know how I’d gotten there. No clue tho!
To be fair, I’m generally really good at not jumping when I’m with strangers. But it’s like, as soon as I let myself relax and get comfortable… ¯_(ツ)_/¯
PHOTOS: Transgender Elders Show Us The Meaning of Survival
In the many years that Jess T. Dugan, a Boston-based trans photographer, has spent capturing images of gender-variant people, she says she’s consistently noticed a striking absence in both art and social sciences: imagery of older trans folks.
“And,” Dugan explains further on her website, “those [representations] that do exist are often one-dimensional.” So Dugan set out to fill this gap, teaming up with social work researcher Vanessa Fabbre since fall 2013 to develop the evocative photo project, “To Survive on This Shore.” In the recently released collection, diverse trans elders ages 50 to 86 are pictured at home or in meaningful spaces, gazing unapologetically into the camera, as if asking the viewer to look deeper into their unique context and life story.
I will say, as much as this has been and continues to take out of me, I have such wonderful friends. Everyone that I’ve talked to about the upcoming intervention with and the troubles going on have been ready to leap into Ultra Friend Mode and do I want to make plans to hang and recover with them? I’m generally the type who wants to be alone when I’m feeling really bad, but it’s still so sweet. And during mid level moments would be super refreshing.
Even talked with my ex last night as we were close the last time I went through this, and she told me to just say the word and I can fly over to her or she could fly to me. It’s always helped me in rough times how my support network all waves their hands and reminds me they’re there. 🧡
My dash refuses to be in order and I’m so sick of it. Scrolling down, I see a post. Scroll past that one, and it’s a reply to the post above. Keep reminding my settings Best Stuff First should be off but the posts remained with the older one before the newer. 😤
so apparently april is ‘autism awareness month’ and a ton of well-meaning people are gonna be ‘lighting it up blue’. most of them have good intentions but please oh my GOD DON’T. DO NOT.
the whole ‘light it up blue’ thing was started by a ‘charity’ called autism $peaks, who basically treat autistic people as sub-human, have rallied with racist hate groups, and believe autistic people are tragedies who need to be cured. members of autism $peaks have literally spoken about killing their autistic kids while the kids were in earshot, and they support electroshock and food/sleep deprivation therapy to ‘cure’ people of their autism.
a lot of autistic people have started up a thing called autism acceptance month instead, and encourage people to light it up RED instead. so if you want to show support, support that instead. i’m not autistic myself but autism $peaks is honestly trash and needs to b u r n.
thank you!!
I’m autistic and I approve of this message.
Please consider supporting the Autism Self Advocacy Network (ASAN) instead! It’s, well, exactly what it sounds like. An organization run by autistic people to advocate for the needs and concerns of autistic people.
They have a bunch of resources for education, they work on public policy initiatives, and lots of other projects.
Anyway, I’m not autistic, but ASAN is a great place to find out more about autism from actually autistic folks and a great organization to support if you want to help autistic people and not, yk, a pretty gross organization that doesn’t at all have their best interests at heart.
do you ever look back at a childhood memory and think that it should have by all rights become a significant theme in your life and you wonder why the fuck those things/people haven’t come back around yet and then remember that your life isn’t a perfectly plotted out novel?
Aww shucks. It’s almost like I asked for this opportunity. (I did. Thank you for indulging me, @laughingthelaughiest) General warnings for the description of things involved with terrible car accidents – aka screeching metal and lots of blood. Happy ending though, I promise! Nobody died.
I am six years old. My father plows snow in the winter months, which means that bolted onto the front of his work truck is a very heavy snow plow that – when not in use – rests primly about a foot above the ground like a lady lifting up her skirts as she steps over a puddle.
“Hey kiddo, do you want to come to work with me?” my dad asks one day during a relatively minor* snowstorm.
(* minor my ass)
Because there was nothing more exciting to me at this time in my life than sitting in a warm truck and watching what is essentially a large metal trough push tons of snow from one end of a parking lot to the other, I practically yell, “WHY YES DAD, THAT SOUNDS GREAT!!!” and we get in the truck.
Only instead of arriving at our intended destination, we encounter a car coming from the opposite direction that spins out on a patch of black ice and manages to hurtle broadside at full speed into the plow.
I am pretty much just flung forwards, and terrible things happen to my face when my body continues on its general trajectory towards the windshield. Thanks, momentum!
Luckily (and novel-like), there was a nurse a couple of cars behind us who stopped to see if everyone was okay. She opened my door to find that I was very clearly not okay, and while my father did his best to staunch the blood that was streaming down my face, she tasked herself with keeping me conscious until the paramedics arrived.
Being six and probably concussed, she didn’t talk to me about anything complicated. I did not know who the president was. I sure as heck couldn’t have told you the date. But my favorite subject in school? I know that! Reading! My favorite color? Yellow! My favorite animal? GIRAFFES.
It’s important at this stage to mention that this car accident occurred on a street where people lived, and there had been a group of boys playing in the snow two houses up from where the truck stopped. Boys + crushed cars + blood = apparently just riveting, because a couple of them were staring at me/the vehicles from a couple yards away.
At my presumably slurred but very enthusiastic response of “GIRAFFES!” one of these boys split off from the rest and hoofed it through the snow towards his house. I was too focused on wanting to sleep and the nurse not letting me to notice this, but it for sure happened. As you will see.
Several sirens later, I am loaded into the ambulance wearing a neck brace and what feels like all of the gauze on planet Earth. My dad climbs in next to me, and the paramedic is just about to shut the doors when there’s a very small voice from outside.
We are all as so:
My father: probably still terrified that I’m going to die, literally could not care less what this other tiny child who is not his has to say, wants to get to the hospital, still has to call and tell my mom that I’m injured
The paramedic: good at his job, knows I’m stable, has a moment to spare, leans back out of the ambulance.
Myself: still in shock, staring up at the rows of medical supplies and disgustingly bright lighting, more concerned that my dad will crush my fingers than anything else going on in, say, the bleeding face area. (Severe head injury? Who’s she? DAD I KNOW YOU LOVE ME BUT PLEASE LET GO OF MY HAND THAT HURTS.)
The boy who had hoofed it home and then evidently hoofed it right back: “Would you please give this to the little girl who got hurt?”
Me now in the year 2018: wanting to cry because I still can’t believe this is a real thing that happened to me in real life and it wasn’t a dream it was real
So the paramedic says “Yes, of course. She’ll love it!” or something equally as efficient because I am still technically quite injured and they really do need to get to the hospital at some point. The boy leaves, the door is shut, the paramedic sets something on the stretcher next to me.
[pause for dramatic effect]
We tried to find the kid who gave him to me, but nothing ever came of it. In the back of my fully healed head I’m still waiting for the novel that must be my life to shoehorn that boy back into the plot. Where are you, giraffe man? I have to thank you for the best gift I’ve ever been given.
Thoughtfulfangirling 