Your alarm has just gone off, you slowly stir and rub your eyes in a vain effort to wake up and then bam; the to do list starts to run, the overwhelm settles in like a comfortable friend who never wants to leave and the day has begun in a whirl of haze and anxiety with an unordered side of, “How come I just can’t seem to get it together!”
ADHD, or Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder is a beast of a master yet can also be a beauty of a servant when understood. As the Marvel hero’s well know, a Superpower can be incredibly powerful if handled the right way but can easily turn challenging if not understood.
Jo Surkitt describes ADHD ‘like having a supercharged brain that receives and processes information at lightning speed, but with a twist. Imagine your mind as a bustling control centre with countless channels broadcasting simultaneously. While this can lead to incredible creativity and quick thinking, it can also make focusing on one task at a time challenging. It's a unique cognitive rhythm where attention shifts rapidly, making everyday tasks feel like juggling multiple balls in a whirlwind’. However, females tend to seek out ways to mask the condition in order to fit in and therefore can go under the radar of diagnosis for years or even decades.
One in 20 Australians has been officially diagnosed with ADHD. In adults, ADHD is often undiagnosed, or diagnosed through “word-of-mouth”. For a growing number of women, however, perhaps due to peri- menopause, fatigue, stress, busy lives, their children being diagnosed ADHD is becoming apparent later in life.
There’s been a lot of focus on the challenging symptoms of ADHD. Although there’s less research on ADHD superpowers, people with ADHD report that they are more energetic, intuitive, creative, courageous, adaptable and resilient than neurotypical people1.
There are varying reports on the amount of ADHD type’s out there, but there seems to be common consensus for the following seven types as reported by the Drake Institute of Neurophysical Medicine 1
1. Classic
The three core symptoms associated with Classic ADHD include inattention, hyperactivity, and impulsivity.
2. Inattentive
Patients suffering from Inattentive ADHD often have difficulty with executive functioning such as organization, planning, prioritizing, time management, and self-monitoring. These individuals are easily distracted and they typically are not a behavioural problem since they are not hyperactive nor impulsive.
3. Over-focused
In addition to the core symptoms of Classic ADHD, those patients suffering from Overfocused ADHD have difficulty shifting their attention from one task to the next.
4. Temporal Lobe
Individuals suffering from Temporal Lobe can be over-reactive or moody, and prone to tantrums or meltdowns in childhood.
5. Limbic
In addition to the core symptoms of ADHD, sufferers of Limbic ADHD may experience increased feelings of guilt, possible moodiness, and, in some cases, damaged self-esteem.
6. Ring of Fire
Ring of Fire ADHD is characterized by over activity in a global sense, meaning that the brain is over stimulated in multiple areas. Those suffering from Ring of Fire ADD may experience an increase in anxiety, racing thoughts, difficulty falling asleep or sleeping through the night.
7. Anxious
Sufferers of Anxious ADHD are often afflicted by additional symptoms of stress which may include headaches, digestive problems, difficulty falling asleep and low self-esteem.
Given the range of types, how an individual shows up in everyday life with ADHD can vary wildly and therefore the strategies are also many and varied. There are however some core strategies that can be used to help turn destructive power to incredible superpowers.
The first of those superpowers can be the initial diagnosis itself. The relief that can be found from knowing you now make sense, as opposed to continually working out how to ‘fit in’ can be truly liberating. Superman learning that he could fly and shoot laser beams from his eyes was at first confronting and difficult as he’d always felt different and now he knew why. With acceptance of these gifts they however, quickly became his superpower to help the world around him. Leaning into the strength of these ADHD behaviours and learning to be self-reflective can be highly advantageous.
Creativity is a close second place getter. It’s no surprise that the creative arts and entrepreneur worlds are littered with folks ripe with ADHD. The ability to see the world differently, to have creative expressions has powered the likes of Leonardo Da Vinci, Walt Disney, Emma Watson, Margor Robbie, Justin Timberlake, Jessican Watson, Mozart, Michel Phelps, Jamie Oliver, Richard Branson, Michael Jordan, Ryan Gosling to name just a few. Evidence alone in this list shows the enormous creative capability of those with an ADHD mind that were able to harness it for their craft.
There are some tried and true Techniques that help assimilate the ADHD brain and as Jordan Peterson 2, clinical psychologist4, said at his recent Melbourne lecture; whatever we continually focus on and choose to do, will inform the type of person we are and personality we become.
POWERFUL TECHNIQUES
· Follow a routine
· Turn off the notifications on your devices to stop the distractions
· Deep Breathing: breathing in for 5, hold for 2; breathing out for 8
· The use of alarms and schedules
· To do lists (with no more than 7 items)
· Food for the brain (walnuts, oily fish, blueberries, eggs, avocado, spinach, broccoli)
· Brain dump on paper at end of the day
· Meditation
· Drinking water regularly
· Exercise and Brain Gym
· Dancing and singing to music you love
· Positive connections with people you love, that uplift and inspire you
· Journal writing
· Avoiding electronics before bed and when first waking up. Instead on waking up, get outside and stare at the sky for a few minutes to start the day. This gets your circadian rhythm going (which in turn helps with sleep) and floods your body with happy hormones and neurotransmitters. Looking at a screen first thing tricks our body into thinking its midday already from the heat emanating from the device.
· And land the aeroplanes one at a time. (yes we do know how challenging it can be to do one task at a time).
As a wise fella once said, “Imagine you’re an air traffic controller and you can only land one plane at a time, with reference to the planes being the tasks to get done. You need to choose which plane (task) is the most important to land first and then you must land the planes in that order and only ONE at a time”. Genius.
Mia Freedman, creator extraordinaire of Mammamia, who herself has recently come out of the ADHD Diagnosis closet said recently, “Lately it seems like you can’t open Instagram without a woman in her 30s, 40s or 50s, announcing she has ADHD”. Em Rusciano has also recently spoken to sold out events of her journey in detail about her life before and after her ADHD diagnosis, and the impacts it has had on her professional and personal life. Em makes significant reference to the fact, that girls and people assigned female at birth, are chronically underdiagnosed with ADHD, as it is (or was, when she was in school) only boys who would “get picked up” and diagnosed. “There was a Symptom Recognition Bias that developed towards hyper disruptive behaviour, which boys with ADHD tend to exhibit. Girls and A-fab people typically have different symptoms”.
If the mantra, busy life, busy mind reaches out and grabs you with both hands, rest assured you are NOT alone. Becoming aware that maybe this isn’t always the way it has to be can be a truly liberating experience. By finding some supportive resources and that will help navigate this beautifully different and incredibly capable brain will help turn a perceived disadvantage into your superpower, as it has for MANY women before, who were able to turn their ADHD brain from master into servant with incredible results and freedom.
How can Revitalise Escapes’ upcoming Zen Mind, Zen Life Retreat help?
Jo Surkitt, a twenty-year veteran within the Wellness industry, a woman living everyday with ADHD herself has created this beautifully nurturing retreat in November located at the Summer House in Jan Juc.
Your ‘reconnection to self’ will feel truly wonderful. As your energy shifts and awakens, new or long-lost parts of yourself will be revealed. Get ready to explore and discover new experiences, while feeling refreshed, relaxed and energised. You will have the space in which to relax, to connect, to awaken your inner strengths and your own unique superpowers.
Jo knows first hand knows what it’s like to run the gauntlet of never ending thoughts and to-do lists, yet she’s been able to turn this into her own unique superpower of running highly successful retreats and events, along with Guest speaker naturopath and author Rebecca Winkler and a team of wholistic therapists.
If this is calling to you, please visit www.revitaliseescapes.com.au for further information.
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