Something New

It has been 3 months since my ADHD diagnosis, and since then life has been – as the kids say these days – a fever dream.

I have been taking inventory of so many things. What serves me, and what doesn’t. What interests me, and what doesn’t. I am trying to learn the way my brain works. It basically feels like I dumped out the contents of my life, like you would your purse, and am putting them all back in very carefully. I’m trying to throw away the equivalents of the extra napkins, snack wrappers and receipts, and put back the favorite lipstick and an organized wallet.

I have learned that if I don’t prioritize my mental stimulation, my brain will get the dopamine hits somewhere I don’t want it to, like staying up late watching TV, so in addition to my real-life duties, I am sticking with the basics: good sleep, whole foods, less sugar, less consumption of mindless stuff. More exercise, more writing, more reading, more listening to smart people on Audible, podcasts, and YouTube while I do housework.

While these changes are simple, they make a big impact. I’ve lost weight, wake up feeling refreshed, and have a constant desire to write. My mantra has been: ‘Everything I ever wanted is on the other side of a good night of sleep’.

So many good things have come out of this, and I am very intentionally going through my days trying to attend to my duty first, and the 5,346 other things I’m interested in after that.

I have been quiet on social media while I go through this process. The really interesting thing about my diagnosis is it has made clear what parts of social media are difficult for me (and probably for lots of other people too):

• Things are either so interesting and give such big dopamine hits on social media that I lose track of time, subscribe to a million free webinars that I don’t have time to attend, or come away thinking I really should open a farm-to-table restaurant that employs all of our friends with disabilities and send the proceeds to Reese’s Rainbow stat. While this idea is beautiful, social media generates too many of them, and so I start to lose my bearings if I am not very focused on my goals.
• Or things are so uninteresting. I have realized how much of social media is so boring. Zero dopamine hits. I get repeated reminders of well-meaning advice that is meant for neurotypical people and is lost on me. Also, ADHD people really like to do things their own way so they don’t like it when people tell them what to do. Since social media is 76% of people giving advice, this makes for a lot of discomfort. Most of the rest of it feels like lots of ads, influencers, mixtures of influencers and ads that are trying to connect, be impactful and serve a community that is not me.

I sincerely love the community I know on Instagram that sneaks in between all this stuff. The other mothers and writers and beautiful souls help me in ways I can’t begin to count. But I know I crave an intimacy that is lost on social media because acquaintances from high school, my old boss, and my mom’s neighbor can see everything I put out and as a writer this makes me not share what I am thinking out of discretion.

All of this is to say that I am trying something new – I am starting a Substack called Chasing Logos to write about faith, growth, love, and truth, basically where God and my curiosity take me through Lent. It is free for subscribers. As most of you probably know, logos is a Greek word that means logic, knowledge, reason, word, communication, and The Word, or Jesus. I was gobsmacked when I first learned about in my college philosophy courses, so much so that I went back for my Masters and started my PhD in philosophy. Though I dropped out of my PhD program when I had my oldest and our family moved back to New Hampshire, the love of the word took on new forms in writing and learning about finding God in all things, His logos enlivening the whole world always. So chasing after it in the hopes of finding Him has been the joy of life for me. I hope it is fun. I hope it is the opposite of boring. I hope I can reveal the crazy passionate love God has for us in a new way. I would love if you can follow along and hopefully make the time spent reading and nourishing that sweet soul of yours well spent.

And I will be starting a newsletter for my wonderful subscribers here called The Joy Letter – you can subscribe over there on the left. This newsletter will be lighter than my Substack, more recipes and book recommendations, things that light up my interest and bring me joy and I can’t wait to share. I am hoping to have a chance to talk more intimately to friends and readers than I can on the world wide web. No one is more scrutinized on the web than the parents of teens (ask me how I know). So I can’t wait to reach people in their inbox, far away from the prying eyes of teenagers. 🙂

I am so excited about these new changes, and hope to get to know the community I have known on social media in a way that is much more meaningful with a lot less distraction.

Cheers friends, I hope this Lent leads you there and back again.

xoxo Katie