Open-letter Advice for a Fellow AD/HD'er

A fellow grad student who, recently diagnosed, is now fighting the good fight against Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (AD/HD), sent me an e-mail asking me for tips on how to stay on-task. As messy as my response is, I liked it so much I figured, hey, why not post it here?


Sorry it has taken so long to get back to you. Let me see if there's anything I can pass along to you that may work...

Of course, the problem with AD/HD is not just the distractibility, but the alternation with hyperfocus. While the methylphenidate (Ritalin) has helped me stay more on top of my general attention, I've employed strategies over the years to help keep me on task that have met with some greater or lesser degree of success.

1) One bite at a time. This is the response to the question "How do you eat an elephant?" Instead of being overwhelmed by a project (which is easy to do when you can see the whole thing in all its ginormous complexity and depth), break it up into doable tasks. If still overwhelmed, break up the tasks into smaller tasks. Make a game of it (Always make a game of it, life is serious enough).

2) Delayed gratification. I make deals with myself to do a task with sight of a small reward at the end (not before starting, not with a little bit to go). This goes hand-in-hand with breaking down big things into small tasks. You can take a lot of pressure off yourself by self-negotiating a reward after completing a small task than by waiting until that "big moment" when "everything" is "done" (and I put these all in quotes because none of these concepts really exist).

3) The egg timer. This can be any countdown timer. I have a Timex countdown timer I use all the time when I do laundry so I don't forget it.

I use a tea bag timer widget that I got off of Yahoo! Widgets (widgets.yahoo.com) that I can keep on my computer desktop and set to whatever time I need and count down. I use this for when I have a task that I know I don't want to do precisely because I'll get carried away with it (like shredding my mail). Start the timer, do it, and stop when the timer goes off. This is best for tasks that you can walk away from and come back to, but will pile up unattended.

4) Choosing battles in the war of attrition. Part of that overwhelmed feeling comes from simply taking on too much. The world is just so full of possibility, isn't it? But not only do we assume we can do so much more in the same amount of time (that now/not-now binary that seems to be an AD/HD hallmark), but because of the AD/HD we can actually take longer than the average person to get things done well. So sometimes you will need to be brutally honest about what you can or can't do on a certain moment, day, quarter, year.

Of course, this requires knowing your priorities, and you can't know those until you know what exactly what you want to do. So go ahead, make a silly collage, post a dozen lists on your wall, do whatever you need to do to create a visually accessible reminder of what you're doing. This will in turn help you make decisions.

Yes, it is all right to use stickers. It is all right to change your mind one month later and go to highlighters.


These of course are very general (and not exhaustive) guidelines, and you'll have to adapt them as the need arises, sometimes on a moment-by-moment basis. Just don't get rigid and inflexible, don't take stuff too seriously, and whatever mistakes you make (and you will make them, because I make them constantly), remind yourself there is always a way to compensate, or correct, or walk away. There is no unfixable mistake. (For the most part. In my optimism I don't expect you to commit manslaughter anytime soon.)


I sure hope she can use the info. It would make one of us. It's not as though I really benefit from my own advice, hehe.