Post of Shame

I have to confess, between last weekend's trip and next week's, I've written off July as a time when I'll get any more work done on my dissertation. August! August is where I'm now focusing my hopes and plans. August is the promised land.

(The trip next week is related to my dissertation, sort of: It's Dickens Universe, a sort of summer camp for Victorian lit grad students and other nerds. Whether that mitigates my feelings of guilt related to dissertation neglect remains to be seen.)

On a totally different note, but one that relates to my (in)ability to get things done, an interesting thing has happened. I have been diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder. It all started a few months ago, when I read an article in the New York Times about professors who take Ritalin for ADD. One described checking his e-mail forty times an hour, and I thought, "That's me!" So I mentioned it to my therapist, Dr. Knitter, and she referred me to an ADD specialist.

I was worried that it would seem like I was trying to scam the system to be prescribed stimulants, so it was with much hesitation that I went to see the specialist—let's call her Dr. Nice—but she was wonderful. I thought she'd laugh me out of her office—after all, I'm not a nine-year-old boy with low school performance and hyperactivity (the classic ADD personality). In fact, I might even be said to have done well in school, having made it this far and all.

Dr. Nice took a history and did some tests and said it's not even borderline: I have it. The first test was an IQ test, which I did well on, but after that there were some seemingly easy tests that I totally failed! To my shock! (I usually test well.) These were tests like saying the days of the week in order as quickly as possible—apparently I am in the lower 30th percentile of people in doing that. Or remembering a list of words ten minutes after I first heard the list: I scored a 1% on that. Ack.

Her recommendation was some kind of post-Ritalin stimulant. I'm inclined to try it, even though I have mixed feelings about drugs, because I always have the hope of finding a magic pill that will solve all my problems. It's not like I'm pristine and drug-free anyway. I take Lexapro and Wellbutrin, antidepressants, not because I'm clinically depressed but to even out my moods and anxiety. So I've already given up on the idea of living without drugs that mess with the brain. I have to say, I'm very curious. Will this make me a better worker? A better driver? Have a less cluttered house?

To be continued...