ADHD and Other Vices



Journal Entry

THOUGHTS™

04–28–2022

︎ Writer: Stew Caldo





God, I've missed writing.



I can't hardly go a week without writing about my own fucking life. Kind of narcissistic but I'm realizing it's impossible for me to process my feelings without talking to myself via a keyboard. I've been feeling detached the past few days. Like my body is present, my mind is working, but my soul is living somewhere else. It's like an out of body experience.



It's been hard to speak even. Silences and breaks in conversations feel longer than ever – lingering awkwardly until I have the nerve to mutter some pointless words. I feel a need to keep conversation going. I feel responsible for the time that other's have. Like the weight and burden of everybody's day rests solely on my weary shoulders.



There's two things lately that make me feel myself – journaling, and Adderall.



Journaling gets all of the shit banging around in my head onto paper. It gives room to new thoughts and ideas.



Adderall manufacturers new space in my head. It creates a vacuum of space for sentences to form. Ideas can be concepted and created. It's like it clears a space for Stew's workshop. I can live in it, invite others to it, speak from it, do from it. And then, the backlog of memories, emotions, and all the things that make me human, are marked and categorized in endless rows of filing cabinets. Cabinets down long stretches of brightly lit corridors. Each single file able to be accessed in moments noticed, in such a way that would make on think even the foggiest of memories occurred just the day before. A space for what's happening, what has happened, and what will happen – in my tiny little brain.



I don't think Adderall is bad. I think it can be bad. Not everyday needs to be perfectly organized like that. Sometimes it's okay to be the version of myself that has endless paper work, unevenly kept in stacks through corridors of flickering lights. Impossible to remember the name of a new encounter, much less a memory with a loved one. Not everyday needs to be well spoken, curated, and thought out. It's okay to feel lazy, and not communicate properly.



It's important not to have an identity rooted in a drug. But it's also important to realize there's a problem with how your brain works.



Sometimes, I feel as thought I can't speak. Like there's a conveyor belt and tired workers organizing words on it in some random order hoping it forms a complete sentence. Then add in stress, fear, doubt, anxiety – the belt speeds up. Words are handed to the workers backwards. It's hot, working conditions are not ideal. It sometimes feels impossible to dig into my emotions and muster up a single sentence that would make sense to a normal person.



[REDACTED].



I hope the sun comes out.



I hope today is the best day of my life. It's not too late to wish for that.