Try to Focus: A story about ADHD

By Jade Rickman

As a nine-year-old, the only thing I understood was that the problem was inside of me.

I remember sitting at the kitchen counter staring at the math homework I had started two hours ago and still wasn’t any closer to finishing. This is how it was every single day. I would come home sit and stare. I would find myself daydreaming for hours, creating stories in my mind. I would daydream about superheros, royalty, and all kinds of things. My imagination was endless. But I had work to do. Why couldn’t I focus? What was going on? I had no idea what a twisted road I had ahead of me.

I knew there was something wrong, but I only started worrying in third grade. I would be sitting in class trying to work on a paper to the best of my ability, but I couldn’t. The room was quiet. I was sitting in the back of the classroom, what could be wrong? Even though there was no noise everything seemed so loud, so distracting; time was moving faster than I could even write a single sentence. As a nine-year-old the only thing I understood was that the problem was inside of me. I didn’t know what the problem was or how to solve it, but at least I knew it was there.

I remember my mom taking me to a huge sparkling building in the middle of Baltimore, Maryland. I knew this was where my mom worked but I didn’t know why I was here. She walked me through the silver skyscraper taking me to a plain simple white room. A woman with a tired smile told me that we were going to take some tests and that they would help her understand me better. The tests took all day long and I couldn’t focus on any of them. By the end of the day I was frustrated and tired. I just wanted to know what was wrong with me.

When the woman came back, she had a serious look on her face; her smile was gone. She spoke to my mom like I wasn’t there, using words I couldn’t understand. I didn’t know what they were talking about, but I knew it was serious.

Finally, I got my answer: I had ADHD. I really didn’t understand what that meant until I got older, yet I was happy to know what was wrong with me. As I got older, the doctor suggested that I take medication to help me focus better. The medicine does help a lot, at least when I remember to take it. I am slowly learning how to cope with my ADHD, though it is a struggle. I sometimes find myself getting distracted and end up frustrated. But I know not to worry, because even though ADHD can’t be cured, as I get older, I am able to control it better.

I was going to continue with a closing statement, but of course, I got distracted. So this is where the story ends, for now.