Swimming Through Molasses: My Daily Struggle to Just Begin
This morning, I was hopeful. I woke up around 7am, maybe a little after. I wanted to get up and go. My entire day was free for me to work on content creation and blog stuff. I desperately wanted to be productive and get stuff done with the time that I had. But did that actually happen today?
Not really. It’s the evening, and I have just started writing this post. Ugh.
This is the worst symptom of ADHD that I’ve been desperately trying to fully understand and manage: task initiation and/or executive dysfunction.
If you are familiar with those two words, then you likely understand exactly what I’m talking about. If not, that’s alright. I’m just incredibly jealous. But, don’t worry — I’ll explain what these are and explain exactly what it feels like. Or, at the very least, I’ll explain how it feels for me personally.
What The Molasses Feels Like — Executive Dysfunction and Task Initiation
So how does molasses possibly correlate or relate to my ability to get up and go in the morning? What in the world does that have to do with task initiation or executive functioning, you may ask? Think of the consistency of molasses: thick and sticky. Similar to honey.
If a swimming pool was filled with molasses (or honey), most people would likely decide against going for a swim. If you did happen to jump in and try to swim, it would likely take a lot of energy to even move an inch. It would likely be nearly impossible. Using typical swimming strokes would just keep you stuck in the exact same place. It’s too thick, much thicker than water.
That’s very similar to how it feels when I’m stuck in executive dysfunction or struggling with task initiation. There is heaviness in my brain, that makes any task require a lot of energy.
And it’s not just mental heaviness — there’s also a heaviness in my limbs. My body just feels more and more fatigued completing each step of a single task. It’s an odd phenomenon — seeing the tasks that you want to complete right in front of you, but your brain and body doing everything in their power to resist and try to push it all away.
Moving Through The Thick and Thin Days
The thickness of the molasses is not always the same; it fluctuates. Some days it’s incredibly thick, some days it’s incredibly thin, and some days it’s in more of an in-between spot. I have found that normally my days feel thicker when I don’t have any detailed external structure. My executive dysfunction and task initiation is definitely worse.
I know this about myself, and I still struggle to prepare and structure my days so that I can wake up and get things done. Some of it may also be related to another symptom, that I’ve recently realized is also difficult — transitions.
I’ve realized that transitions, or changing my flow of attention, are significant disruptions to my brain. Transitioning from one thing to another is similar to task initiation — all of it requires a lot of energy. I’m starting to believe that moving through transitions can be jarring for my brain to fully process, so it actually requires a lot of energy.
Waking up from sleeping is a transition that takes a significant amount of energy. I’ve realized that I need to have a set schedule in the morning after I wake up that allows me to have some time to myself before I even have to start getting ready for my day.
I tend to wake up in the mornings already with multiple tasks that I’m planning on completing throughout my entire day. I honestly don’t give myself the time that’s needed to transition into the morning. My brain becomes completely overwhelmed.
Everything then requires too much energy and I end up putting too much pressure on myself to get it all done. Instead of actually getting started with my day, I fight internally with myself and fail to do any of the things that I had originally planned or wanted to do. It’s definitely a battle. I’m still learning.
Learning to Navigate Through the Molasses
It’s hard working with my brain a lot of the time. It can be difficult to understand the fatigue and what works with my brain rather than against it. But I am learning and starting to get a somewhat better grasp of it all.
Gentleness and empathy.
Those are incredibly important when moving forward. My brain moves fast. A lot of the time, I’m just trying to keep up and make sure I don’t miss anything. There is an internal voice in my head that is incredibly demanding and demeaning. Worrying that things might be missed, that’s ultimately just trying to do what it believes is best for me.
As a kid, all through school, that voice was fueled by crippling anxiety — that’s really the only way that I was able to get things done. Constant hyper-vigilance and always striving for/expecting perfection.
But I don’t want to do that anymore. I actually don’t think that I even have much of a choice to do that anymore. I can’t; it’s not at all healthy.
I’ve got to start talking to myself differently. Build trust and safety with myself, rather than resentment and anger. I will have to teach the demeaning voice in my head (that’s really only there to protect me) to trust me and slowly loosen its grip of control.
But I can only do that by being gentle.
I have to be empathetic, kind, and curious towards my own brain. Harshness never actually works or helps.
It’s hard to be gentle, especially when I’ve spent all of my life up until this point learning to be harsh and cruel. It feels foreign and unsafe. My brain doesn’t respond well to it, but I know that with time it will get easier and will improve my life.
Things will get better. With time, I will learn to better manage and navigate my executive dysfunction.
If relying on anxiety and being harsh towards myself were actually beneficial, I would know by now. It would be working, and I wouldn’t be in a near-constant state of burnout. I wouldn’t feel like such a disheveled mess and would trust myself more easily.
It doesn’t work.
It’s time to try being gentle and soft. I need to actually listen to myself and rewire my brain so that I can trust peace and joy. We should all accept more peace and joy and treat ourselves and those around us with gentleness and curiosity. The world would be in a lot better place, truthfully, if we did.
Love,
Kaitlin
