Hair

Originally posted on 29th June 2024 on NeuroDiversity University Blog FaceBook page.

Those reels showing jokey Adhd clips of forgetful, ditsy, distracted people are not made up. Not even exaggerated.

Ableist advice like 'Prepare for the gym the night before, pre order what you need, arrange Tesco food delivery, set timers', is seriously missing the point in terms of finding strategies. It shows us that you have no clue. It shows your ignorance in how quickfire and jumpy and spontaneous our Adhd Brains can be.

Note those last descriptors are not automatically negative.

Yes those strategies have potential to work.

If you have straightforward Executive Function.

Or if being hyper organised is a natural stimulant for you and it is for some Adhders in some situations/circumstances.

Mostly, and unless it's a monotropic interest, it isn't for me.

Which is why, this morning with 40 mins to get up out and on the road, being time blind with a tendency to not remember nor read, instructions, I decided that I could chuck on some blue/purple conditioning toner (that keeps my bleached hair ash colour rather than yellow) whilst in the shower.

Multitasking at it's finest.

Yes it said use gloves but I'm in the shower and can wash my hands straight away. So no.

Yes I forgot it was a dye rather than a conditioner.

Yes I realised my hands were getting stained which resulted in me wiping the 'toner' on in a feral, urgent, frenzied, random way.

Yes my shower cubicle looks like a blue alien has been murdered.

And yes, I now have unintentionally blue streaked hair.

I also have white legs that are turning brown and streaky as I type because I plastered fake tan on in about 90 seconds flat.

I'm not even going to tell you about the beetroot and celery shenanigans on Thursday.

Nor will I tell you about the parking ticket I received yesterday for the car park I DID buy a ticket for but probably used the wrong number plate.

Nor the yummy looking rice cake/fig/carrot/chocolate balls I made that used every bowl/cutlery/gadget I own, resulting in these lumps of yuk going straight into the bin.

Yes, I can laugh about all this because life is good and I'm well and these are tiny hiccups in my privileged, adjusted, well supported life.

But the Adhd mechanics behind my tales apply, in varying ways, in others, for whom life has been shitty, and for them, it leads to debt, mental health crisis and poor life outcomes that are not their fault but for which many blame them and they blame themselves.

These Adhd and Autistic ways leave me up against loads of barriers even with my privileges and luck. And yes the laughs. And advantages. But many things are a bit harder even for me.

So do think carefully before you give us your simple advice.

Think carefully before you judge us.

And do laugh at me with these unintentional hair stripes that I kind of thankfully, accidentally do like.

Pic description: top of my head/face. White round face, blonde and blue streaky hair, selfie in a van, straw hat in the background.