Coping with ADD

[cbloom]

Well, I have the same problems as everyone. In poker, I can play well online multitabling, but I just can't play live, it's way too boring, I start thinking about other things. Obv. you have to find a job where you can be stimulated enough or you will do a horrible job at it.

As others have mentioned, social situations are probably the hardest. I cannot for the life of me talk on the phone to anyone. It's just too boring, I totally zone out, or watch TV and email and get on 2+2 at the same time and then I'm not really carrying on a conversation. So, all my friends & family just know that I'm not going to talk much on the phone. Text messaging is good.

I also can't really just sit with someone and talk casually. This can be a problem with girlfriends, but I've found a few solutions. Basically I need to do some other activity and talk at the same time so that I'm engaged enough. The best thing for me is just to take a walk and talk. Any time I need to talk with a GF I suggest we take a walk together and then we can talk while walking. Talking over dinner or while playing cards works too.

One of the biggest problems is alienating people who don't really understand my condition. At work I would have problems where someone would come up and talk to me and just be talking so slowly, so I would get on the computer and do some typing while I talked to them. Obv. people find this rude and insulting and it's bad for the office relationship, but if I didn't do it I'd either zone out or want to kill them.

As for going out at night - I can't really handle just sitting around in a bar or whatever normal people do, it's so boring, so I try to encourage my friends to actually do something when we go out, like go to play lasertag, or go dancing, or something active so I don't just go nuts. If we do just go out to bars I can't really have a conversation with the group, I either zone out and get bored or create action/trouble.