adhdpie:

adhd is a terrible name for this disorder because it’s not that we lack the capacity to pay attention to things (a deficit of attention): it’s that we lack the capacity to control what we pay attention to (failure of prioritization).

The ADD/ADHD person’s focus center is just … hideously bad at self-regulating.

(& the reasons are poorly understood, though we’ve identified some pretty effective treatments.) 

where most people’s brains are able to prioritize tasks based on weighing time sensitivity, ‘importance’, how long it will take to complete, cost-benefit analysis, etc, ADHD brains prioritize tasks based on two things:

  • is it interesting? (‘new’ also counts as ‘interesting’.)
  • is it due now? aka: is it urgent? (if not, it is due ‘later’ and is ‘not urgent’.)

if nothing is interesting and/or due now, we cannot prioritize. everything is equally unimportant (boring).  otoh if something is interesting and/or urgent, our brain can seize on that thing and focus extremely well, going into hyperfocus and totally shutting out everything else.

by the way: the only understanding we have of time is ‘now’ and ‘not now’. like

Calendar: *shows the final is tomorrow*
ADHD Brain: fuck the calendar! everything after today is *~THE FUTURE~*!
ADHD Brain: and *~THE FUTURE~* is far away. like millions of years away.
ADHD Brain: so that’s why we’re going to read about a totally random subject for 10 hours instead of studying.

but then the next morning is like

ADHD Brain: HOLY SHIT THE FINAL IS TODAY
ADHD Brain: CRAMMING TIME

and has no problem focusing on the important subject material that it couldn’t focus on the night before.

that’s how you know it’s not a lack of care, by the way. if you didn’t care about it, urgency wouldn’t change how much you can focus on it. it’s just that your brain can’t tell how urgent it is until it’s too late, because it lacks the ability to prioritize ‘normally’. 

and those problems can’t be fixed by willpower alone. here’s an example of some tools we use to help:

  • meds can make it easier for our focus center to self-regulate by giving it the chemicals it needs to reward itself for prioritizing properly, the way non-ADHD brains do. and because we usually do understand prioritization, it can make it easier for us to focus on the stuff that’s important at the time we want to.
  • otoh, it’s also very helpful to practice good organization habits until they’re so habitual they bypass the focus center, happening on autopilot. it keeps us from self-sabotaging our efforts to be focused on the right thing by reducing distractions like clutter or not having the tools we need to do a thing. day planners can help with this, for instance.
  • it’s also helpful to have a person who doesn’t have focus problems to check on us and help us stay on task, or guide us in selecting which tasks are most important to get done.

tl;dr: it’s okay to need help with picking your focus or organizing big/long-term projects, even as an adult! ADHD impairs our ability to self-regulate our focus and prioritize things, so developing healthy coping habits is a good thing.

(via justemotionalabusesurvivorthings)