Real Life

© Illustration Daniel Föllmi

And yes, I realise that that sentence alone just filled about half of my spanking-new column here, which leads me to believe that freshly diagnosed Lily might not actually be the only member of our family who has ADHD.  If you’re anything like me, I’m sure you personally know a bunch of people with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. It’s one of the most common neurodevelopmental disorders of childhood, and has been whispered by yours truly on many an occasion, usually under my breath when one of my friend’s sons was acting like a stick-wielding maniac around my two girls. And before you start typing out your angry email to H Magazine, hear me out: for years, I believed that ADHD was so easy to spot (just grab the stick!) and so straightforward to treat (just give them their smart vitamins!) that I ended up doing my daughter a complete disservice while raising her into the witty, intelligent and challenging almost-adult that she’s currently turning into at 19 years of age. She’s smart, she’s funny and she’s excelling at school, thanks to phenethylamine, commonly known as Ritalin.

To be honest, anyone who ever met Lily, from the girls at daycare to her frustrated primary school teacher right up to her Year 8 teacher, asked us if she’d been evaluated for possible hyperactivity, and believe me: my husband and I not only lovingly called her Godzilly for the first few years of her life, but also went through the process of IQ tests and behavioural evaluations three times – only to be told each time that it wasn’t ADHD, but that she was simply a.) very energetic, b.) talkative and c.) gifted with a high IQ, but only in terms of the speed of her learning, and that she was terrible at figuring out how she can file away all
that information in her memory. Her grades were always fine, she’s always had lots of friends and honestly, my husband and I recognised so many of her quirks in ourselves that we figured we were in the clear … until Lily herself insisted on being seen by an ADHD specialist for adults once she turned 18.  His assessment was as clear as day, and he was the first person who was able to explain to me properly that stimulants, as he called them, weren’t the performance-altering drugs I was so wary of, but a tool that can help people like Lily discover that they’re not actually stupid or slow, but simply wired differently. The way she described the feeling of being able to sit still and listen to her biology teacher for a full hour for the first time ever after taking her first dose both upset and thrilled me: I felt bad for not taking the signs seriously for the entirety of her childhood, but thrilled that she’s discovered a path that will take her wherever she wants to go, whether it’s an academic career or becoming … well, if her current interests are anything to go by, an artist with a messy atelier who screenprints sweatshirts and owns three dogs. It’s not surprising to me at all that quite a few of my adult friends have now sought out their own adult ADHD diagnoses, and honestly: with how much I’ve now learned about attention deficit disorder, I’m almost certain that I’m on the spectrum, too. Just because I’ve kept a stiff upper lip throughout my life and have turned my talent for multitasking into a career, that doesn’t mean everyone has to. Including, and most especially, my uniquely challenging, inspiring younger daughter. Now, where did I put my glasses?