Kimra Traynor Herb

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Kimra Traynor Herb
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Hyper? Not me

The other day, someone very earnestly asked me if I had adult AHD. If I am not mistaken, the AHD stands for Adult Attention Hyperactivity Disorder. I may be wrong about the exact phrasing was clear: "What is WRONG with you?!"

Hyper? Me? I consider myself one of the most laid back folks on the planet; but now, apparently, in my forties, I need to be on drugs or seeing a behavior therapist to calm me the heck down.

"I think it is an organizational thing." One of my friends explained it, when I was bitterly railing against the issuance of the AHD label.

"An organizational thing?" I queried. "Are you saying I am not organized?"

"Well....... " she trailed off, motioning to the heaps of music I was thumbing through all the while I was being distracted by the birds in the feeder just outside the window. "Well....." she tried again.

And then it hit me. I WAS AHD. I really was. I thought back to how I clean my house. I begin by loading the dirty dishes, only to realize that if I don't start a load of laundry AT THAT EXACT MOMENT that there simply won't be time in the day. After starting to load the washing machine, it will occur to me that if I don't get some Tilex on the bathroom walls at once, mildew will certainly set in and do major damage to the tiles. On the way to spray the Tilex I will see cat fur under the piano and pull out the vacuum to remove the offending fur, realizing as I do this that I haven't finished loading the dishes. As I return to the kitchen I see a pile of mail that has stacked up on the dining room table and begin to clear the mail when I see a bill that needs to be paid. It goes on like this for hours until it is time for me to pick my son up from school; nothing is completed and by the next day the endless cycle will begin anew.

My gosh, I am a profoundly sick individual. I realized. It is an amazing fact that I had made it this long in my life in a relatively successful manner; so debilitating is this sickness. I know; I had read a lot about it.

Then I begin to calm down. After all, if I HAD managed all these years to compensate for my attention deficit disorder (which of course has not ACTUALLY been diagnosed; save the one woman and my own schizophrenic self-analysis), then, obviously I must be one of those functioning AHD sufferers among the millions who apparently cannot continue life without the aid of therapy and drugs.

Come to think of it; I was, in effect, a WALKING MIRACLE! My daily existence; my ability to stay focused on the subject at hand all through school and college was a tribute to my hard work and perseverance through adversity.
Or, of course, the alternative was that the first woman who called me AHD was full of crap and so was I for buying into her line of hooey. After all, what self respecting woman with three boys of different ages and needs, a hubby, two dogs (with ailments too numerous to mention here, but trust me, horrific doesn't cover it), two cats (again with hosts of issues), a fitness regime really too strenuous to contemplate (so I don't), a suffering writing career, a commitment to a musical ensemble, and director of the church children's choir; and a house somehow not big enough to hold all the junk necessary for all the above needs but somehow also too big to actually clean- well, what woman (and here I will just come out and say it) creeping towards menopause wouldn't be, somewhat MANIC when faced with all of life's amazing and continual challenges?

Does this make me sick? I don't know. I guess if I think about all I do on a daily basis too long and too hard I might start to want to attach some initials to my name. After all, Kimra Herb, AHD sufferer sounds a heck of a lot better than Kimra Herb, generally overwhelmed and under compensated. To have an actual "excuse" for my lack of organization in dealing with the sometimes undealable, would certainly be convenient, although, to be honest, not all together courageous. Just because I sometimes look at the birds when I need to be organizing my music doesn't make me challenged, does it? Sometimes just a little time stolen from the day's basic hassles watching the birds can mean the difference for an overwhelmed chick like me from the loony bin and chugging on through another day; initial free.