What Top Drawer Is All About.

My name is Shane and you're looking at my AD/HD rehabilitation journal.

So I think you may be asking yourself what is Top_Drawer all about anyway?

Below is an actual picture of my top dresser drawer. If you look close you could see that I have a neck tie stuffed in there

Upon closer look one could see that there are also two different types of underarm deoderants in there. There is also scented oil, bicycle intertubes, and an Ipod charger.

I decided to scatter the contents of my drawer on the floor so people could get a better visual. There are gloves in that mess, batteries, a belt, and a sock. What am I going to do with single sock? I have no clue. There are shades down there, a note pad, black liquorices Altoids, and Adderall which is my AD/HD medication.

I am going to ask you to take a moment please and gaze further into that mess. Discover that which is not easily detected. If you're complying with my request you would then you may realize what it is like to live inside my head. My mind is a disjointed, scattered, and enormously messy.

Normal people utilize the top drawer to store their underware and socks. However I’ve never been capable of defining myself as a normal person. I cannot pay attention to where I set items down long enough to recall later where they're stored. Things like shades, belts, underarm deoderant, and Altoids. So instead of searching aimlessly for these elusive itmes I decided a good solution would be to just stuff everything in my

"TOP_DRAWER."

"This is me, yes I am a little upset. I just started taking my medication and the side effects causes irritability."

Normal people do not conduct themselves like that. Normal people can keep track of where they place their Altoids, or Ipod charger. I wish that I could be considered as normal too.

"The picture above are my friends celebrating the fact that I had lost 100 pounds. Yes I used to be 100 pounds over weight. I can transform my body by force of will and hard work. However I cannot use those same principles to evolve my mind."

After I was diagnosed with severe and disabling AD/HD it was like being struck with a sledge hammer. I do not want to be disabled. However it was also a relief.

I wish I could explain to people what it is like to live in my head. How painful it is for me to work so hard and never achieve success. Do you know how humiliating it is for me to come home and face my wife with the news that I had lost another job? Can you imagine telling your significant other four to five times a year that you had lost yet again another job. I do. I know what that is like.

I would tell my wife that I would just get another job and work even harder at that job. I did do that too. I worked harder than my coworkers and out performed my entire department. I was aware that I had AD/HD, I just convinced myself that I was not going to let that fact prevent me from being successful. Inevitably my superiors would all terminate my employment because I was guilty of making so many mistakes. I've since then been enlightened to the fact that if hard work alone could do away with AD/HD nobody would have it. One cannot by force of will do away with a neurological disorder.

I want what other normal people desire out of life. I want to pursue that which contributes to my own happiness. I want to work and contribute to my household. I want to make my wife proud of me, because right now I don't believe that she is. I do not want to feel stupid and worthless all the time. But most of all I JUST WANT TO BE NORMAL. My psychiatrist believes that I can make a full recovery and reclaim my life. My symptoms will never fully disapear, but they will become more manageable. However I will never be normal and I just have to learn how to accept that fact.

Watch the video and get kind of an idea what it is like to live in my head.

Now that I am properly medicated my wife and I are cleaning up and organizing our house. This is just a piece of the work we have to do so far."

April 7 I went to D.V.R (Department of Vocational Rehabilitation) to discover if I could qualify for services. When a person applies for aide from DVR a case counselor will evaluate the severity of the applicants' disability and determine the appropriate designation. My disability warranted that my case should be classified as category one. Which meant my case will be considered as a high priority. Next Month on the 14th my vocational rehabilitation will begin.

Yesterday during my session with my psychiatrist I told her that I've experienced real relief that for the 1st time in my life. I informed that I can finally focus and concentrate without great effort. She told me that she believes that I am properly medicated. Being properly medicated is only a part of the process on the road to rehabilitation. The other part is learning to adopt positive behavior. I need to train myself how to become organized and that task is so overwhelming and incredibly difficult for me. Right now as I am writing this for my blog it is 11:23 in the morning and I haven't eaten breakfast yet. Not having an appetite is one of the side effects of the medication I am taking.

I am properly medicated now and the symptoms of my AD/HD are not so intense for me, I have begun the process rehabilitation. I am going to get my life under control. I wish I could say that I am going to get my life "BACK" under control. The truth of the matter is that my life has never been under control. Its my goal to become a productive member of society.

I am making this blog both as therapy and to chronicle my rehabilitation process. This is going to be the hardest thing I've ever done in my entire life. losing 100 pounds is easier than it is going to be rehabilitating the way I think and live. My entire life I conducted myself like a devestating train wreck. For the 1st time in my life I have my mind under control. Now that I can think clearly I need to educate myself how to operate as a thinking entity. I do not know to act now that I am not a slave to impulse all the time.

This is going to a long and dificult journey. I am positive that I will be able to accomplish my goal of becoming productive. I am sure I'll be able to achieve success too. However nothing I've done thus far in life has compared to how important this is going to be.

Writing in this blog is on my master list of things to do daily. Please check back and see how my progess is coming along.