Ever wonder why Adders tend to be very intelligent people and know more than they should, considering ADD ADHD is a learning disorder? There is a misconception about Adders that we do not read or take in information very well. The truth of the matter is quite the opposite:
Adders LOVE to read and we take in information with incredible detail. The issue isn’t that we do not like to read, or that we can’t read, or that we can’t absorb information! The issue has to do with what interests us the most.
I can understand the reading misconception, since teachers think we do not read very well, because, we fail tests so frequently that come from reading assignments. We fail a lot of tests, but more so, the ones in which we were supposed to read something. Let me give everyone a very simple clue and what I consider to be an obvious truth: BOOKS IN SCHOOL ARE ABOUT AS BORING AS THEY COME! That is just the way it is. Ask any Adder. I do not remember one single book that I was supposed to read in school that interested me or caught my attention. My fellow Adders will attest to the ‘boring factor’ of school book reading assignments.
I love to read. I have read so many books it’s impossible to give a specific number, but it’s in the thousands. I read multiple books at the same time and my brain keeps each topic and story line separated–sometimes I read the exciting parts of books first, skipping around. I won’t read boring books or books with obvious outcomes—I just won’t (stamping my foot!) my brain refuses. The books I read must be interesting to me, exciting and suspenseful. I like both non-fiction and fiction, as long as it is written interestingly enough or if I am interested in the subject enough.
Adders are well known for their amazing abilities to analyze things and come up with workable, commonsense, yet abstract solutions. Adders are sought out because of this and many Adders have become high paid self-employed consultants. Adders have a tendency to see what is going to happen as a result of any certain action, not because we are clairvoyant, but rather because we are extremely analytical. Part of the reason, and I go into detail in my book “One boy’s struggle”, we Adders are so capable of discovering solutions is because our minds analyze everything—it’s also the reason why we are always so distracted. Our minds do not shut off and just go into dream words. Our minds are hyperactive and are always analyzing, analyzing, analyzing! Not only that, but I have discovered that my mind not only analyzes things, it also cross-references through everything I have ever learned. Talk about a busy mind. Thankfully, this analyzing and cross-referencing does not happen on the surface, it is carried out more in my subconscious.
Some think it’s funny that many Adders who cannot complete school often eventually become great successes in the world outside of school. From my own experience I know that my mind learned everything I was taught, but processed the information in a different manner than was accepted by the school system and often I could go home and read chapter after chapter only to fail tests given the next day; however, and this is important, I would be able to Ace the same test if it were given a week later. No, I didn’t go home and re-read the chapters—my mind literally needed the time to finish analyzing and cross-referencing what it had read, sometimes this would take weeks. You know what? When the information finally came to the surface of my mind I would not only be able to Ace the test, but I would also be able to offer counter arguments and/or solutions to what I had read. What’s funny to me is, many times my fellow students had already forgotten the words of the reading assignment by the time “I got it”.
As I have gotten older my mind has gotten faster at analyzing and cross-referencing and today I can usually absorb and analyze things on the fly. That mostly has to do with understanding my ADD. I believe if this information would be taken into consideration with younger, learning Adders, they would have a much better chance in the future of finishing school and not having to wait so long to ‘understand’ things. ADD is a gift, in my opinion, and the way we read and learn is part of that gift. Maybe it’s time educational systems take that into consideration with the young Adders of the world.
~Bryan
