Douglas Cootey's Blog, page 10

Check Out These Great Depression Blogs for 2017

Healthline

Every once in a while, out of the veritable blue, an announcement arrives in my inbox that stands out from the noise. Usually, I receive spam from desperate, out of work infographic makers or eager guest bloggers who pretend to read my site, then think I want their guest post about their experience herding yaks. The other week, a guy asked me if I still posted on my blog these days, offered to guest blog for me to promote his book on depression, then told me that I could really use it. Yeah, not a great pitch. DELETE

Then today I discovered that Healthline had featured me in their yearly list of top depression bloggers again. There I was listed with sixteen other fantastic bloggers. I am humbly grateful, and also excited to learn about new bloggers. I hope you will be excited to learn about them, too. There isn’t just one way to write about overcoming depression. We need more voices to fight stigma and reach people who still struggle. Inside this new list of The Best Depression Blogs of the Year for 2017 I hope you find kindred spirits and uplifting material to help you in your struggle.

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If you’re looking for practical examples of fighting suicidism, you should read my book.

ADHD: Who Are You Again…and Again?

If there is one attribute of ADHD that embarrasses me the most, it is my inability to remember names. Like many adults with ADHD, I have problems with short-term, or working, memory. I forget what I’ve heard all the time, unless I make an extreme effort to force the information into long-term memory. When it comes to social events and names, I’m simply horrible at it.

I still remember an incident in college where I saw somebody I recognized from a quarter mile away. I made way across the quad, rushed up to them making waving motions, and promptly forgot their name mid-sentence as I said, “Hey…(insert awkward silence here)”. He even called me on it rather unkindly. Yeah, that was embarrassing. To be honest, I’d probably still be embarrassed about it, except I’ve forgotten his name again. Oh, well.

I thought days were far behind me because I’ve become more adept at redirecting the conversation until my memory caught up. There used to be days where I’d have a friendly conversation, then walk away none the wiser who I had been speaking with, so these days I’m more honest about the problem. After all, everybody forgets names! I found it smooths things over. That is, until I met Juliette.[1]

In January, I started physical therapy again because my surgeries were done. It was time to get my strength back up. As I sat in the waiting area filling out paperwork, a pretty, young woman came out to call me back. I made small talk with her and wondered if she was new, but she wasn’t new. Oh, well then, we must not have worked together much before. No, she cheerily corrected me. We had worked together before. Oh…then…crud! I had done it again. I had forgotten somebody.

I stared hard at her, probably harder than was comfortable, almost willing myself to remember her. Long, brown hair, a healthy glow, striking eyes, a friendly disposition… How on earth had I forgotten this person? Then there it was. The tickle deep in the back of my mind. Yes, there she was in my memory, but by this time, Juliette was on a roll. She had begun to list the times we worked together, including the fact that she was the person who had always called to remind me about my upcoming appointments. I was gobsmacked.

I made my apologies, and she seemed to have a bemused look upon her face, so perhaps I had not offended her as deeply as I feared, but still, forgetting somebody I work with is troubling to me. I feel it is disrespectful, regardless of my excuse. Later that night I listened to old voicemails from last Summer, many of them unlistened to. Yes, indeed. There was Juliette over and over again on my iPhone. Embarrassing.

Working memory is poor for adults with ADHD because of its ephemeral nature. These are the memories that don’t stick deeply. Think of it this way: There is only so much room in your hands to carry things. Eventually, you have to put something down to make room for something else. We prioritize what gets carried first and what has to wait until our hands are free. Since adults with ADHD have issues with inhibition, new information always receives top priority. Old information is discarded simply because there is no room for it. That’s why, for example, I don’t memorize shopping lists when I head out to the store. I write everything down. Even if I limit my list to three or four things, there will always be something new and distracting on my way to the checkout aisle. Milk, OJ, and eggs turns into Milk, that guy cut me off, and wow! That’s a great sale! Do I have enough room in my cart for this case? Hold on, let me move the cookies behind the candle, paper towels, and milk. Wait. Did I forget something?

Even worse is if somebody relays commands and information to me by voice. Unlike other ADHD adults, I process information visually, not audibly, which seems to be opposite what other studies have shown. That means I have problems retaining information told to me. Tell me something important, and it literally travels in one ear and out the other. This is why ToDo lists are so key to my coping strategies. The iPhone becomes my working memory. As long as you are willing to train yourself, using a smart device to record your tasks can help bypass this ADHD shortcoming.

Over the last two months, I’ve made sure to use Juliette’s name whenever I see her. I do the same any time that I talk to her on the phone. I am certain that I have smoothed things over. I hoped that through repetition, I could commit her name to my long-term memory. That’s why I was so relaxed when I called the clinic this morning.

“Hello, I need to cancel my physical therapy appointment today. Something’s come up. Is Jane or Elle available?”
“Jane’s eating lunch right now.”
“I see… Well, I don’t want to go into details because I don’t know you. Maybe I’ll…”
“Oh, you know me!”
“I do‽”
“Yes, I’m Juliette.”

I’ve changed the names. Here’s hoping I don’t call her “Juliette” the next time I see her.  ↩

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If you have problems with ADHD short-term memory, I haven't written a book about that, but here's my list of books anyway.

Upsides to ADHD: Overcoming Your Sense of Underachievement

One of the distinctive aspects of ADHD in adults is an overwhelming sense of underachievement. Sometimes this is due to them never getting out of the gate while their peers race ahead, and sometimes they have actually accomplished a great deal, but from the wrong ToDo lists. Both examples can leave ADHD adults with a pervasive feeling of underachievement, even if they accomplish a great deal more than their peers.

I imagine the skeptics out there are sitting up and asking, “But doesn’t everybody miss goals? Don’t even overachievers miss goals? Everybody misses goals!” I’ve heard similar comments like that for years from people who believe ADHD is a myth. It makes me wonder if they are the type of people to dismiss the sickness of a loved one with “What are you complaining about? Everybody sneezes. Everybody coughs.” As you can guess from the example, it’s not the symptom itself that marks a problem, it’s the intensity and quantity of the symptom. Yes, everybody does indeed miss goals here and there. It’s a part of life. What makes this unique for people with ADHD, is that the sense of underachievement is overwhelming, sometimes to the point of becoming debilitating. Many adults with ADHD are so used to falling short of the mark that they come to expect it of themselves.

Therapists will focus on this sense of underachievement, giving the patient advice on how to think better about themselves, how to be better focused, and how to give themselves credit for what they have successfully accomplished. This is good and necessary advice. A lifetime of under par performances, mistakes, and reprimands creates very low self-esteem.

The Exceptions to the Rule

It’s interesting to note, however, that not all adults with ADHD have this problem. If you’ve studied ADHD online, you’ve come across the lists of successful people who have ADHD. Actress Emma Watson, singers Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake, JetBlue founder David Neeleman, Glenn Beck, and Virgin Group founder Sir Richard Branson have publicly stated that they have ADHD. The message of the lists is clear. “Don’t give up! You can succeed with ADHD!” The questions I always had after seeing those lists, though, was how do they do it? What’s their trick? What are they doing differently that I am not? How do their thoughts about ADHD shortcomings diverge from mine? In the past, when I was floundering, these lists didn’t help me. You might as well have told me to be perfect. I was too deep in the flaw. What I learned over time, however, was that the answer to all those questions was simple: Stop thinking of ADHD as having only shortcomings.

I believe that every character flaw is a talent gone awry. Strong self-confidence can become arrogance. Laser focus can become tunnel vision. It’s the excess that turns a talent into a flaw. If we come at ADHD’s sense of underachievement from the opposite direction—as a talent gone awry or as an advantage instead of a shortcoming—what could the upside of such a damaged sense of self be?

A Compelling Awareness of What Needs to Be Achieved

Celebrities and business execs with ADHD experience failure just like everybody else, but they prioritize their focus on what needs to be done in the future instead of focusing on what hasn’t been done in the past. They take our lovely ADHD hyperfocus and apply it to progress instead of rumination. It’s a matter of perception: positive vs. negative. Obviously, I have no crystal ball into the minds of others. However, I have read their interviews. New projects and lists of things to do are treated by them as opportunities to display their abilities, not future evidence of their failure.

David Neeleman of JetBlue understands this quite well. “I knew I had strengths that other people didn’t have, and my parents reminded me of them when my teachers didn’t see them.” A positive perspective makes a monumental difference in how they approach a project as opposed to those who are shackled with an overwhelming sense of underachievement. Successful people in general give themselves credit where credit is due. They are satisfied with their efforts and feel good about themselves. The ADHD twist on this is intensity, frequency, and hyperfocus. They are not only aware of what needs to be done, they feel compelled to go do it.

Turning a Sense of Underachievement into an Awareness of What Needs to Be Achieved

Before we can flip the switch on this ADHD trait from detriment to asset, we should understand that knowing what needs to be done is not the same as never being satisfied with our efforts. In my experience, people confuse the two concepts whether they have ADHD or not. I have been cautioned in my past on many occasions because people assumed I was never satisfied with my efforts when in reality, I was fully focused on what needed to come next. The problem was that I had low self-esteem and allowed their words to deflate me. And who knows? Maybe I was a lot more negative than I should have been, giving others fuel to criticize and caution. I was certainly not as self-confident then as I am now. I hadn’t learned what Paul Orfalea of Kinko’s had learned: "With ADD, you’re curious. Your eyes believe what they see. Your ears believe what others say. I learned to trust my eyes.”³

To learn to trust ourselves after a lifetime of being swatted on the nose, we need to change our perspective. We already have the awareness of what needs to be achieved. The problem is that it’s focused backwards. Because of this, we’ve developed negative cognitive habits. Try these exercises to help train your ADHD mind to think forward.

Let the past go – For many of us, our past mistakes were used like a rolled up newspaper to punish us. With all the mistakes that people with ADHD tend to make, this turned attention in our lives to our failures. Now it’s time we stopped dwelling on the mistakes of the past. It’s not healthy or constructive. As soon as you realize you’re dwelling on your lack of achievements again, stop, then focus instead on something you’re looking forward to. If you must think about an unfinished project in your past, form a mental image of how you could have done things differently, then jot down on a piece of paper your devised action plan. Now crumple it up and throw it out. The trick is to commit to doing things differently next time, but turn your focus onto something you have control over. Learn to think forward. Apply yourself to things you can still change.Think of one positive personal accomplishment every day – Since appreciating our strengths, skills, and accomplishments doesn’t come naturally for many of us, we need to practice at it. Think of a positive thing that you’ve done. Write it down. When that gets easy, think of two. Do this every day for three weeks, and you’ll be on your way to a new habit. For some of you, it will be difficult at first. Being positive about your accomplishments may not come naturally. Your sense of self-worth, as mine once was many years ago, may be so wrapped up in a pervasive identity of failure that you cannot conceive you’ve done anything good or worthwhile, so start small. I’m not talking about making a list of grand achievements that shaped mankind. Think about the small things that you do despite your ADHD every day—the tiny victories that need to be knowledged. “I was on time to work today,” “I didn’t talk over anybody,” or even “Paperwork filed on time.” Climb higher and avoid the low hanging fruit after a few days. You are more accomplished than you realize.Pick two to three past projects, and fix them on paper – If you’re having a hard time letting go of the past, it might be a productive mental exercise to pick three projects that you feel were personal failures, then write down on a sheet of paper the things that you did right versus the things that you did wrong. If it helps, record it on audio or video. Whichever way works best for your thought process. Analyze the project’s ups and downs, but only address the elements that you had control over. There may be any number of reasons why a project failed, but it’s easy to blame other people. Focus only on your responsibilities. What could you have done differently? Then commit yourself to doing those things differently in the future. If you feel anchored in your past, this may be a way of helping you process the past in a more constructive fashion. However, if you cannot trust yourself to keep this as a mental exercise only, go on to the next step.Pick three projects and plan out how to fix them – Those famous people with ADHD who aren’t burdened by a sense of underachievement are doers. They are always busy working on the next thing. It’s time for you to work on the next thing. Pick a project, small in scope, that you can finish in perhaps a day or two. Organize your time so that you can tackle this project from start to finish, and then go do it! Afterwards, be prepared to feel good about it. Then start the next project. Build on the complexity of the previous projects. If these projects dovetail well with work, then all the better, but if that’s too big of a leap, start with something small. Tackle your email box. Tackle that pile in the den. If you have a taste for something more complex, tackle the garage, for example. Break the project down into smaller steps, and take on each step one at a time so that you don’t get sacked. The trick here is to do something small scale and simple that gives you a sense of accomplishment. There may be other ADHD traits that affect your ability to undertake this step, which is why I recommend that you start small. Persevere. It’s worth the effort.

I can’t emphasize enough how important it is to start small, then build up to greater complexity. You won’t be doing yourself any favors if you impatiently take on massive projects. You don’t want to have yet another project abandoned in your backyard or yet another unfinished task to weigh upon your mind. However, if you can train yourself to think forward for a change, can think positively about yourself, and can follow through on finishing small projects, you will be well on your way towards flipping the switch on this ADHD trait. When hyperfocus is coupled with healthy self-esteem and a game plan, the ADHD adult is grounded in a sense of self-accomplishment and armed with powerful tools for success.

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Saturday – 6:58 PM: My original goal was to publish a draft of a chapter from my Twelve Ways to Fight Off Depression book every week, and do the same for Upsides to ADHD on the 10th, 20th, & 30th. Obviously, that has not happened. While it is true that I’ve been sick with a nasty virus for the past FIVE weeks, the amount of work involved in these two first chapters is making me rethink my game plan. I love pingponging between the two subjects, which works wonderfully with my ADHD, but I don’t want to sacrifice quality in order to make a self-imposed deadline. I will give myself March to see if I can pull this off, then reevaluate my plans accordingly. It’s only by pushing myself that I can discover my limitations, then devise workarounds.

In the meantime, research is mostly done for Pokémon Ultra Beasts in 5 Easy Steps. I’m still trying to discern a repeatable path from Ultra Beast to the older Legendaries. Since Pokémon Sun and Moon (SuMo) are Generation VII games, they have a brand new format for Pokémon making them incompatible with older games, similar to the break of Gen III from Gen II. Moving a Pokémon from Omega Ruby or Alpha Sapphire (ORAS), for example, requires a Pokébank account, then first transferring the beastie from ORAS to the bank, then transferring it into SuMo. Needless to say, not a lot of people bother doing that except collectors, so those old legendaries are hard to get. You have to be offering exactly what a rare few people are looking for. At any rate, I hope to wrap that research up over the weekend. Then I can add writing this sequel to my list of too many things to do.

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If you want to know more about the books I have already written, you might find this stupendous link click worthy.

500,000 Unique Visitors!

Sometime before midnight on January 31st, my blog crossed a threshold that I’ve been waiting for a long time to see. A Splintered Mind has hit 500,000 unique visitors. Considering the blog just had it’s twelfth birthday on January 2nd, this seems a fitting month to achieve such a milestone.

Thank you, one and all, for your support over the past twelve years. I’ve grown so much as a person and as a writer. In fact, we’ve come so far together since the days years ago when I would blog about my wet socks, and you could leave comments—back before my blog template became damaged beyond repair. Maybe that’s a bad example. My socks are still a water magnet. It’s so irritating. I change them almost twice a day. I just stepped in a puddle a few minutes ago. Why was water waiting to lovingly soak my socks in that particular corner? How did the water get there? Why didn’t anybody else step in it? And why am I talking about wet socks, anyway? I didn’t start blogging about wet socks until my blog was nine months old. I started this blog whining about my bad luck with electronics, which stuns me to think that half a million people later I’m still writing about it. What were we talking about again?

Personal growth! Yes, I feel blessed to have shared this journey with you, even with competition from Facebook, Twitter, and Netflix. I’m lucky that I still have readers, to be honest. Those that have stayed have put up with my meandering coverage of depression, ADHD, and writing. You empathized with the reasons why I’m wary about taking psychmeds. You were there when I came forward and shared my struggles with suicide. You watched me get writing gigs, like my current one at ADDitude Magazine. You’ve seen me earn awards and then finally publish my first book, then a second book. You made a blog I wrote eleven years ago on fighting depression one of the most popular articles on this site, so much so that I’m basing my third book on it. Most of all, you were there rooting for me and cheering me on. I am glad to have shared this journey with you. Thank you for all your clicks and comments.

~Douglas

Don't Forget To Plan for Detours

Day 17 – 11:56 PM: I’ve put together a heavy schedule—a roadmap—that will lead me towards achieving my goals, but as usual with lists, life has a way of giving them a flat. Fortunately, the lists still work as roadmaps, even if distractions and responsibilities put detours in front of my deadlines.

The point of writing openly like this is to share a bit of the process. I believe strongly that if we identify our stumbling blocks, we can learn to work around them. Some people who don’t have mental health issues look upon that belief as letting my diagnosis limit me—as if I could suddenly, for example, not have a tic disorder if I just stopped thinking about it so much. On the other extreme, I’ve met multitudes of people who allow depression, anxiety, ADHD, and other disabilities define and rule them. They give up and behave exactly as those who stigmatize mental health expect. I’m caught in the middle, just like a lot you.

I can’t help ignorant or clueless people see the world differently. They require me to be more successful than I am currently before they will regard my accomplishments with any degree of respect. Learning to understand other people takes patience and a willingness to be taught, something that can be hard for them if they can’t relate. However, I can help those who struggle to believe in themselves. I can help them see that they can accomplish more than they realize. What I accomplish isn’t so amazing to most people, but for me, fighting family hardships, a tic disorder, depression and ADHD, I am sometimes surprised how far I have come from that guy who wanted to die so many years ago.

Maybe I do define myself by my disabilities. Maybe I haven’t learned how to work around them enough. Maybe my perspective is still too low to see beyond the obstacles out to the open vista awaiting me. Or maybe this is what life is: one step at a time, moving forward. Some people can race; other people can only crawl. I like to believe that I’m hobbling ahead just nicely.

I remind myself of that when I see how many goals for the month I missed. I did a lot of necessary research today for my Pokémon book sequel despite my new cold. Then I took care of my daughter after school, fed her, entertained her, got her to her therapist, made phone calls to multiple doctors for her, made her dinner, and administered her meds before her mother showed up. Then I was so sick I vegetated in front of the TV for a few hours. It’s easy to beat myself up when I missed posting a product review, as well as getting the second chapter for Twelve Ways to Fight Off Depression up for my readers. My amazing list didn’t leave room for any of those things! There was no room for sickness, ticking, and child-rearing. It’s funny how I always do that. I get so excited planning out my projects that I make no allowances for obstructions, as if life is a perfectly paved road laid out in front of me with no potholes, detours, or accidents.

Trust sickness to rudely remind me how hard reality can smack you when you aren’t paying attention. Still, I’m excited about what I will accomplish this year. This is only a temporary setback. There are still plenty of miles to go before my fifty-first birthday.

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Struggling with suicidal depression? My book can help.

Writing in a Fishbowl v3 – Day Sixteen

5:56 PM: I’ve had a flurry of productivity and focus lately. I know exactly why, but I haven’t decided to share the reason yet. Last night, I fell asleep while watching Jeremy Brett’s Sherlock Holmes “The Final Problem”. This was not due to the plot boring me. I’ve had a hard week of family drama, family emergencies, and ticking. In fact, minutes before I fell asleep, I had just been laughing out loud during the scandalous nude scene. There I was minding my own business watching Sherlock investigate Mona Lisa forgeries, when this guy

Don't Put Your Suicide Message in a Bottle

“Oh please, dear Lord, take me home.” ☜ Somebody posted this on Facebook last night. I had been reading this woman’s cries for help for weeks, but never spoke up because dozens upon dozens of people jumped into each post to give her love and encouragement. I didn’t believe that I could add anything that her peers hadn’t already expressed. Last night, however, this post bothered me. If you’ve read my blog, you know how I feel about drive-by suicide notes. These types of posts are cathartic for the people who leave them, but they burden the folks who read them. They aren’t constructive and smack of wallowing. I felt compelled to leave a comment, but what would be the best approach? How could I help her believe that she could take control of her suicidal tendencies? I didn't want to scold her. She was as down as a person could be, but she didn’t have to needlessly suffer, either.

Most drive-by suicide notes posted in the comments on this blog were usually posted by anonymous people who left their cry for help, never to return again. Over and over, I tried to reach out to them via email, but these people, if they weren’t just trolls, never replied. It made me feel impotent and helpless. Eventually, they began to make me mad. Cries for help with no way to receive help weren’t really cries for help at all, but self-indulgent suicide graffiti sprayed onto the lives of people who cared, but who were denied the opportunity to truly be helpful. My readers left the most heart-felt, passionate replies, but the person was long gone. How were my readers to tell the difference between somebody trolling the comments section and a legitimate cry for help? I analyzed the pleas and found patterns to distinguish valid expressions of suicide from drive-by suicide notes, then I made the policy to delete the drive-bys.

With the above in mind, when I read this poor woman’s post, old feelings of frustration came to the surface. Didn’t she know she had to fight suicidal ideation? Didn’t having four children dependent on her give her the motivation to live? Didn’t she know that suicide lies?! What did she want people to say with a post like that‽ How was that post not simply a cry for attention instead of a cry for help? Obviously, the answer to many of these questions was that she was a person in pain, overwhelmed, and flailing in desperation. Unlike the anonymous posters who spammed my comments sections, however, I knew this person. I could reach out and help. I share my reply here for you:

████, twenty five years ago when I was at my lowest point, moving beyond suicidal ideation into suicidal planning—when I was moments away from executing my plan—I asked myself if I had any reason to live. My daughter and wife came to my mind. Who would take care of my daughter when I was gone? I was a stay-at-home dad. She needed me. I held onto that as a lifeline, and I learned to love myself. That lifeline grew into a family of four beautiful daughters. Even when my wife left me several years ago, and I struggled again with suicidal thoughts and urges, my daughters were the reason I kept going. And I wanted to keep going. The truth is that I didn’t really want to die; I just wanted the pain to end.

Where depression can seem like a heavy, smothering blanket of sadness, suicidal depression feels like a sharp ache. It warps how we think. We start to believe that people will be better off without us, but that is suicide’s lie. Things truly will improve. You can learn to control this, and push it deep below the surface. Start by finding reasons to live. Make a list and keep it handy. Train yourself to think more positively with thankfulness journals. You can offset the chemicals in your mind. You have said in the past that you love your therapist. Ask them about cognitive behavior therapy. Your family loves you and needs you. They are worth all the effort to turn your thoughts around. My prayers are with you. You aren’t alone.

To you out there struggling with suicidism, I want you to know that you aren’t alone. Your pain is real and hard to bear, but it can be healed. Don’t keep your pain buried in secret. Seek help immediately. Please keep in mind, however, that there is a world of difference between saying, “Hey, guys. I’m struggling tonight. I feel suicidal.” and “Oh please, dear Lord, take me home.” The former is a confession of pain that invites help. The latter is a self-indulgent comment that has already shut down the conversation.

I know about the warping affect suicidal depression has on the mind. Taking your own life seems so logical when you are at the nadir of life. It can even seem like a blessing for your loved ones. Aside from the trolls, this warped negativity is likely at fault for the maudlin posts that many suicidal people leave. I understand this all too well from personal experience. Yet the problem with this Facebook friend’s posts was that she was abdicating responsibility for her own mental health and laying it on the shoulders of others. This is an incredibly irresponsible way to ask for help. Facebook could bury your comment through their algorithm. It could get lost in the heavy flow of people’s timelines amidst all the kitten videos and Nazi-Trump references. I favor a proactive approach to happiness. Don’t send out a message in a bottle! Call an actual person and get some help.

If social media is your only method of reaching people, don’t spam your channel. Reach out to specific individuals. Reach out to the people who can help. I cover this a lot in my book (Chapter 22: Knowing Whom To Rely On), but I can tell you here that you need to start compiling a list of supportive people today. Not everybody that you admire or pin your hopes on can handle suicidism. Their minds may melt down at the mere mention of the concept. But supportive people do exist. It is your responsibility to find them. Sometimes you can get lucky when they reach out to your first, but it’s good to have a backup network.

Lastly, be kind to those that follow you on social media. Nothing makes us feel more helpless than reading about somebody who wants to die and isn’t interested in our input. More people care about you than you know. Learn to care for them back. Start with caring about yourself. You are worthy to be alive.

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If you’re looking for tips to help a suicidal loved one, you should really read my book.

Seven Ways to Handle Election Anxiety


 I’m seeing a lot of fear & anxiety on social media these days. People are dismayed, alarmed, and outright paranoid. The panic is so palpable that it’s bound to be affecting those of us dealing with depression or anxiety. Maybe you’re getting caught up in more online arguments these days; maybe you spend an inordinate amount of time defending yourself and others, or maybe you’re the one who’s enraged and attacking everybody you think has ruined your world.

It’s time to take a deep breath and relax.

Regardless of where on the political spectrum you fall, I suspect you and I aren’t that much different. We feel passionately about our political causes and get discouraged when others disparage them. We want to see the right people elected and feel down when we think the wrong people are elected. Aside from a political spectrum of ideologies, there is an emotional political spectrum, too. Most people don’t care much about politics. Others care deeply. But on the far end of the spectrum are those of us who become emotionally invested in a candidate or issue. This can lead to crashing depression and heightened anxiety when the outcome isn’t what we wanted.

Unfortunately, I don’t often back the winner, so I’m all too acquainted with disappointment on election eve. Here are seven tips I have learned that might help you take control of your election anxiety:

Unplug – You don’t need politics like an IV drip. Take a break. Put the phone down. Close the laptop lid. Put your computer to sleep. Get up and walk away for a while. Anxiety and anger can ramp up excessively on social media networks. Too much contention will agitate your mind and rob you of peace. Go find something positive to do instead of battling friends and enemies on the internet.Avoid fear-mongering news – Sensational news sells. They need the clicks. They need the eyeballs. Why report something straight when you can spin it, score political points, and make money, right? A steady diet of partisan news skews reality. Both conservative and liberal news sites have this problem. The news will make you angry for no reason. Most of these events aren’t as bad as they are being portrayed, or the truth has yet to be fully reported. There is usually no need for fear or panic. On a day that you feel particularly susceptible to alarmism, stay away from your usual news sites. It’s OK. Friends and co-workers will keep you up to date on the truly big news. Everything else is just noise.Build a bridge – This one may be hard for some of you, but have you considered reaching out to somebody on the other side of the aisle? For example, if you are upset about President Trump, ask a conservative friend how they handled their anxiety and depression without panicking or despairing during President Obama’s eight years. If the protests are frightening you, ask a liberal friend how they held themselves together during the height of the Tea Party movement. Don’t just dismiss your friends because they voted for the “wrong” candidate. Their coping skills may help you.Decide to be in control – I am surprised how many people don’t want to be comforted. They feel their fear is justified, so they hold onto it like Gollum’s ring, despite it making them miserable. Instead, we should employ our coping strategies when things are at their most heightened. Don’t let fear carry you away with the political winds. You aren’t a leaf. Plant your feet firmly on the ground and decide to be calm. You can’t do much to change who was elected until the next election, so change what you can. Start with yourself.Write to your elected officials – Use your fear and anxiety as fuel. Refocus that apprehension into something constructive, like writing to your elected officials. Even if they belong to the opposing party, they still represent you. There is no such thing as a mandate in America. Let your thoughts be heard. Be civil. Be kind. Be constructive. This can be a healing and productive activity.Don’t panic over imagined fears – Focus only on what is real, and what has happened. Fake news, partisan news, rumor, and lies will feed your fears if you allow them to. We can imagine such terrible things! But how much of it is born of our anxieties? Fearful ideation harms us and feeds the part of us we have no control over.Presidents come and go. Relax – The flipside to our wonderful, stable form of government is the rancorous election we experience every two years — complete with all that drama and heat. This has been part of our grand tradition for 228 years. Each election cycle, the pendulum swings a bit left or a bit right. Some arcs are wider than others, but the pendulum never stops swinging. Breathe… It will be OK.

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If you like politics, you may want to read the chapter on tribes in my book.

I Can't Get Rid of ADHD by Blowing My Nose

Maybe you can relate to this: You can’t think straight. You’re easily distracted. You keep forgetting what you’re supposed to be doing. It’s ADHD, right?

Despite the two surgeries I have had in the past three months, I’ve been unusually healthy. This is a delightful change for me. No bronchitis in Winter? Unheard of! I can go out into the wet cold and not spend the rest of the day coughing and sniffling in bed? Unbelievable! In fact, it’s been so long since I was last sick, the events leading to New Years Eve caught me off guard. As December 30th hurried along, I became less and less productive and doubly frustrated. I couldn’t remember things from one moment to the next. I would walk from room to room in a daze. I was strangely tired. I made careless mistakes.

Now, to anybody who knows me, they’d likely wonder why I’m bothering to mention this. After all, aren’t I like this all the time? Well, thank you, imaginary straw friend, but no, I’m not like that all the time. This was worse. Even on a bad day, I can still muddle through it. Task lists keep me headed forward, alarms remind me of when I need to be somewhere, and a bucketful of coping strategies keep me focused — or at least give me a semblance of focus. The point is, I get things done no matter how unartfully accomplished. The day in question, however, I was not getting anything done. This is because I was sick and didn’t know it. I bumbled about all day until, finally, in the evening, I began to notice that I was croaking when speaking. This, not the train wreck of my day, was my clue. It was only then that I took medicine, took care of my body, and .

I find it fascinating that when my mental acuity becomes impaired due to illness, I am so used to ADHD being at fault that I begin to apply my ADHD coping strategies. This isn’t so surprising. Coping strategies are only effective when they become habitual. What is surprising is that when it should be obvious that I am under the weather, my true attention deficit disorder becomes so fixated on mastering myself that I fail to notice the other signs. It’s like driving a car on slippery roads and blaming your grip instead of the snow when you have a hard time keeping the car straight.

I share all this with you because I hope to help people who don’t have ADHD understand our thought process better, but also I hope to help people with ADHD avoid this common pitfall. When we are sick, none of us are at our best. For adults with ADHD, we are more forgetful, more distractible, more irritable, and less likely to implement coping strategies. Old habits flare up for me at that time. For instance, as I found it more and more difficult to be productive, I browbeat myself for not having my act together. I had books to write, articles to finish, and other important things to do. I couldn’t get out of my own way, yet I still expected myself to perform as usual. The more I criticized myself, the angrier with myself I became because of my failure to focus. I long ago taught myself to control this self-destructive instinct, yet here I was doing it again effortlessly.

Since it is Winter, and I will likely be sick again before the sun comes back from its orbital vacation, I have created some new coping strategies to be added to the bucket:

Three strikes and you’re out – The next time I forget to start the same task three times in a row, I will stop and listen to my body. If only I had taken Tylenol before New Years Eve. I may still have had to cancel my party plans, but I certainly would have checked at least one thing off my ToDo list.How steep is the hill? – If a common task has suddenly become difficult to do, it is time to take a break. Illness, low protein or blood sugar, fatigue, etc. can all impact performance. Next time I’m frustrated with how slow I’m working, maybe self-flagellation isn’t the best solution. I will eat something, take medicine, or take a nap before beating myself up instead.How much will it cost? – Goals are great, but sometimes we need to be flexible. Take a moment to think about what you have to put aside to push forward on a goal. Is your health that unimportant to you? *ADHD offers hyperfocus, which can be a blessing for those all too used to foggy focus. However, the flip side of hyperfocus is tunnel vision, which can be very detrimental, especially if we ignore our health. Sometimes I forget the lesson I learned when Jim Henson died of pneumonia because he was too busy working. I can end up exactly the same way if I’m not mindful of my own health.

Only when I am sick am I so oblivious to my body’s needs, and unfortunately, ADHD only makes the situation worse. However, with these new coping strategies made into habits, I know I can avoid this mistake again. If you have ADHD, what coping strategies do you have that keep you out of the doctor’s office? How do you remind yourself to take care of yourself? Do you mistake illness for ADHD at the beginning of a cold, too? For those who have loved ones with ADHD, they may need your help developing mindfulness, but it is a skill that can be learned through repetition, so keep at it.

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If your ADHD child enjoys Pokémon, you should read my book.

Writing in a Fishbowl v3 – Day Eleven

11:24 PM: My birthday today was practically perfect. I started book three. I spent time with my lovely daughters watching a bell choir perform. My soul was filled to the brim. I did, however, say that it was practically perfect. Even the spectacularly bad customer service & food at the terrible downtown Burger King could compare to the blow to my evening joy that was Dunkin Donuts being closed at 9pm. When did that happen? I enjoyed going there after ten all the time. The lobby was empty. There was no hustle and bustle from customers. It was a perfect environment for writing. Hey! I bought a donut or two. To think that losing my business four months ago when I moved across town would affect them so badly. I feel just terrible. I’m sure the lack of customers late at night had nothing to do with it.

Being resilient, I recovered and then picked up some Krispy Kreme donuts at a gas station. It wasn’t quite the same ambience that I was looking for, but the donuts weren’t terribly stale, and fun was had by all. I celebrated my fiftieth birthday with a pre-used “7” stuck on my donut while my family sang “Happy birthday” off key. Like I said. Perfect.

And now I shall make my last goal for the birth year. I mentioned before that I would start book three and post the chapters online. I made the deadline of my birthday. What I didn’t mention was that I was going to challenge myself to write it within two weeks. That means that book four, which I will begin in moments, won’t see much traction until I finish book three. But I will begin it today. Only twenty minutes left to my birthday.

The purpose of all this public writing is to hold myself accountable to others and to show people who struggle with depression or ADHD that they can make great goals if they apply themselves. I don’t think I’ve accomplished anything truly great yet, but I feel great. That’s almost as good.

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If you like feeling great, it will feel great to buy my book.