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Want to remember everything? Write it on the wall.

Organizing Task Management1 Comment on Want to remember everything? Write it on the wall.

People with ADHD forget a lot — a lot of things, and very often.

We frustrate ourselves. Even worse, we frustrate, hurt, and disappoint the people we love. ADHD is cruelly egalitarian, in that we forget our spouse’s birthday as easily as our dry cleaning.

post-it reminder photo
Photo by isaacbowen

Even if we lived in total isolation, we’d still generate the same ideas over and over again, wishing we could remember them at the right time.

My solution: shorten the distance between myself and a good container for my thoughts. I call this “storing my brain outside my head” because my brain is such an unreliable container.

I’ve learned it the hard way, again and again: I need to write everything down. Everything. If I catch myself thinking, “that’s too important, I know I won’t forget it,” it’s a huge red flag.

Not only do I have to write everything down, I have to do this before I forget. It happens in a matter of seconds. As a result, I maintain writable surfaces all over my house: post-its, dry erase boards, chalkboards, you name it. Even the bathroom mirror. If there’s anyone out there who considers me a good friend, spouse, parent, or relative, it’s because I never trust myself to remember anything.

Instead, I remain vigilant for ideas — pen in hand.

Collecting ideas

There are some potty training methods that — bear with me here — require constant vigilance, so you’re ready to airlift your naked naked toddler to the potty just as he empties his bladder onto the floor. I picture my brain as this naked toddler. The moment it thinks of something — anything — I need to whisk it to a writable surface.

I should mention I use David Allen’s Getting Things Done system religiously to process all my notes. Allen insists that you need to be able to trust your system — or else you’ll get discouraged. “One of the main factors in people’s resistance to collecting stuff into ‘in,'” Allen writes, “is the lack of a good processing and organizing methodology to handle it.”

When I’m running a tight ship with my GTD system, I’m much more enthusiastic about writing down my thoughts. If you haven’t read Getting Things Done, I highly recommend it.

Our home’s writable surfaces

Bathroom mirror

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There’s a reason you have so many ideas in the shower. You’re relaxed, relatively free of distractions, and experiencing a nice dopamine rush from the hot water. Your brain is primed for idea generation.

I keep dry erase markers near the bathroom mirror so I can write a quick note before I’ve even dried off. The mirror is also a great place to leave a loving note or drawing for your spouse. When I worked in IT, my mirror notes reminded me to do early-morning server maintenance from home. Visitors occasionally spot our markers and join the fun, too.

Pantry door chalkboard

Our home is on the small side, making a big, common-area dry erase board impractical. Instead, I created a cute and functional chalkboard on our pantry door. It’s not as easy as tossing a few dry erase markers in the bathroom, but it’s a project pretty much anyone can do. I sanded the finished wood lightly, added a couple coats of primer, then applied this Rust-Oleum chalkboard paint. My son has taken over the bottom panel, and we use the larger top panel for grocery lists, reminders, fledgling Spotify playlists, and anything in between.

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 Small dry erase board

I purchased a small dry erase board for my dorm room door when I left for college. Somehow, I managed to keep it for over a decade and through several moves. This former clutter object now hangs on the side of the fridge and collects phone messages.

Post-its, post-its, and more post-its

I keep a pad of post-it notes in almost every room: on my nightstand, on my desk, in the basement, next to the coffee maker, in the car. I order sticky notes in bulk packages meant for large offices. Walking more than 10 steps to the nearest sticky note feels like too much.

Isn’t there an app for that?

I didn’t include any electronic note-taking tools here. There are some great ones available — Evernote, Toodledo, Google Keep, and PlainText, for example — but I find computers and smart phones too distracting. When I unlock my phone screen, I rarely make it to my note-taking app. Several minutes later, I realize I’m checking my Instagram feed and have no idea why I grabbed my phone in the first place. A simple pen and paper works best.

How do you capture ideas, especially when you’re in a place where you can’t easily write something down?

Hey there! Are you enjoying The ADHD Homestead?

Here's the thing: I don't like ads. I don't want to sell your attention to an advertising service run by the world's biggest data mining company. I also value my integrity and my readers' trust above all, which means I accept very few sponsorships/partnerships.

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Below you will find two buttons. The first lets you join our crew of Patreon pals and pledge monthly support for my work. Patrons also have access to my Audioblogs podcast. The second takes you to a simple donation page to pledge one-time or recurring support for The ADHD Homestead, no frills, no strings. Do whichever feels best for you!

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You are your problem coworker

Health & WellnessLeave a Comment on You are your problem coworker

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If you’ve ever worked in an office, you’ve encountered some difficult personalities. Even in the loveliest work environments, someone makes life difficult from time to time.

In your relationship with yourself, you are that problem coworker.

Practice being fair to yourself

Let’s face it, you do find yourself difficult to work with, don’t you?

The trouble is, we tend to hold ourselves to a different standard than our troublesome officemate. We beat ourselves up over mistakes, we scrutinize awkward conversations long after others have forgotten them, and we constantly remind ourselves of how we should be different — and better.

If you thought and felt this way about everyone around you who wasn’t perfect, you’d drive yourself crazy. And, though we’ve all wasted energy stewing over a tense working relationship at some point, most of the time we say “that’s just how he/she is.” Our approach to professional interactions can provide some important wisdom.

Accept, strategize, and move on

Despite my relatively poor social skills, I often felt I had an easier time working with my office’s difficult personalities. When it’s your job to collect important human resources documents or present a new health care plan, impasse isn’t an option. The work simply must get done correctly and on time.

How did I do it? By accepting people as they were and creating strategies to give them what they needed from our interactions. If someone managed email exceptionally poorly, sending email reminders would lead to strife and missed deadlines. If a colleague couldn’t stand being interrupted, I wouldn’t get anywhere by approaching her at her desk to discuss her incomplete timesheets — even if that was the method preferred by the office culture.

I learned how people operated, how they saw things, and what their priorities were, and I worked from there. The people weren’t going to change, no matter how much I berated them or set them up for negative consequences. The best thing to do was create a strategy for working with them.

Then, I moved on. I didn’t waste my time or energy complaining — aloud or to others — about how problem coworkers could stand to improve. If I stumbled in my dealings with them, I refined my strategy and kept going.

Developing a long-term working relationship

Would our lives be different if we remembered more, got distracted less, exercised better judgement, managed our calendars more effectively? Sure. Are we likely to start making these dramatic improvements tomorrow? Certainly not.

When things go wrong, don’t assume it’s because you just need to “get yourself together” or “learn how to manage that type of situation better.” That rarely leads to anything but negative self-talk, and it deprives you of the opportunity to figure out how to do better next time.

Instead of beating yourself up for not being perfect, figure out what went wrong. Learn what situations trigger your temper and irrational behavior. Learn whether you communicate best via email, text message, phone, or face-to-face conversations. Learn when you’re most likely to overindulge in sweets. When you know what steers you toward trouble, you can figure out how to keep yourself from getting there.

For my coworkers, sometimes it was as simple as catching someone by the coffee maker and talking through what felt to them like an impersonal, tedious process. For myself, sometimes it’s as simple as putting a pad of sticky notes in my glove box so I quit forgetting important things between the car and the front door.

Whatever you do, don’t write yourself off. You still have to work with yourself tomorrow. You’d be smart to make the best of it.

Hey there! Are you enjoying The ADHD Homestead?

Here's the thing: I don't like ads. I don't want to sell your attention to an advertising service run by the world's biggest data mining company. I also value my integrity and my readers' trust above all, which means I accept very few sponsorships/partnerships.

So I'm asking for your support directly. For the cost of one cup of coffee, you can help keep this site unbiased and ad-free.

Below you will find two buttons. The first lets you join our crew of Patreon pals and pledge monthly support for my work. Patrons also have access to my Audioblogs podcast. The second takes you to a simple donation page to pledge one-time or recurring support for The ADHD Homestead, no frills, no strings. Do whichever feels best for you!

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7 ADHD-friendly purchases we actually use

Organizing Task Management1 Comment on 7 ADHD-friendly purchases we actually use

We’re two ADHD adults with an Amazon Prime subscription. I don’t have to tell you how challenging it can be to reign in impulse purchases.

That said, among the duds we’ve made some indispensable ADHD-friendly purchases over the years.

Every individual and every household has different needs, so your list may look different. I’d love to hear your success stories in the comments!

P-Touch labeler

David Allen recommends automatic labelmakers for more successful filingI balked at this when my husband first bought it. A fancy label maker felt extravagant when we already owned perfectly functional pens and pencils. However, I’m now sold on the benefits — espoused by organizing guru David Allen — of printing labels for file folders as opposed to hand-writing. The labeler makes this quick and easy, which makes us more likely to file documents in a timely manner.

Not only that, I’ve started labeling every storage container in our home. Remember, your ADHD spouse may not intuit where something goes, even if it seems obvious. You may not even remember your system a month later. Creating a clear system encourages everyone to put things away in their proper homes.

Pill case

I’m paranoid about forgetting my meds. I’m also paranoid about forgetting I’ve taken them, then accidentally double-dosing. We have seven-day pill cases (different colors for each of us!) that hold our meds and vitamins. I’m diligent about taking pills only from the case. This makes it very clear whether or not I’ve taken my stimulant meds for the day. It also helps me track how often I’m remembering to take my vitamins.

Electric razor

My husband has used an electric razor for years, but I only recently discovered the ladies’ models. I take short, irregular showers, especially in the winter when my skin is dry. Shaving in the shower was not working  at all because I needed to remember to leave time for a longer shower. The wet/dry electric razor allows me to take care of this pesky task whenever (and wherever) I think of it and have a few minutes.

Spray bottles

I keep spray bottles of homemade multi-purpose cleaner spray bottles(a 2:1 water:vinegar solution with a little squirt of dish soap) hidden all over the house, most notably under the bathroom sink. Like the electric razor, this allows me to clean whenever I notice something and have a minute. It’s cheap, easy, and convenient — all good news for ADHD homemakers.

Post-it notes

I use a lot of post-it notes. I keep them in almost every room of the house, in my glove compartment, and in my purse. People have asked me why I’m obsessed with post-its when I have a smartphone with multiple list-making and task management apps.

It’s simple: sticky notes let me write things down distraction-free. The moment I unlock my phone, a whole pile of shiny apps scatter my focus. Almost invariably, I forget what I wanted to write down in a matter of seconds. Post-its save my sanity. I toss them in my inbox and record them on my to-do list later.

Time Timer

time timer

This timer provides a visual representation of time that many ADHD’ers find immensely helpful. I use it almost daily to curtail my social media use. The disappearing red segment forces me to ask myself, “is this how I want to be spending this time?”

Christmas is right around the corner. This is a great gift for all your loved ones with ADHD, and there’s an app for Android and iOS if you don’t want to invest in the physical timer.

Document scanner

I rolled my eyes when my husband ordered this one because we already own a nice flatbed scanner. However, I now use the document scanner almost daily. It’s fast, easy, and has allowed me to eliminate so much paper filing from our lives. Do you have a big stack of papers “to file” somewhere in your home or office? Thought so. Make sure you have a backup service like Dropbox or Crashplan set up, then give one of these a whirl.

A document scanner is a fast, easy way to reduce paper clutter

 

Hey there! Are you enjoying The ADHD Homestead?

Here's the thing: I don't like ads. I don't want to sell your attention to an advertising service run by the world's biggest data mining company. I also value my integrity and my readers' trust above all, which means I accept very few sponsorships/partnerships.

So I'm asking for your support directly. For the cost of one cup of coffee, you can help keep this site unbiased and ad-free.

Below you will find two buttons. The first lets you join our crew of Patreon pals and pledge monthly support for my work. Patrons also have access to my Audioblogs podcast. The second takes you to a simple donation page to pledge one-time or recurring support for The ADHD Homestead, no frills, no strings. Do whichever feels best for you!

Become a Patron!




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