Motivational and inspirational writer, Bryan Hutchinson is the author of several books about life with ADHD including the highly acclaimed, best selling "One Boy′s Struggle: A Memoir" and the author of the hilarious eBook that went viral "10 Things I Hate about ADHD"

Is the burden of ADHD causing lost Childhoods?

Is the burden of ADHD causing lost Childhoods?
on: December 22, 2010 by: Bryan Hutchinson 38 Comments , , , , ...

I am not like everyone else, I have ADHD and my childhood wasn’t normal either. Quite frankly, I don’t want to be like everyone else. I don’t want to conform to be someone better than anyone else or to be ‘normal’ and I certainly don’t want to be average. I have no such desire. I used to and it would drive me crazy. I like being me. I have some hard luck stories, I can tell you of all the mistakes I have made and the challenges that overwhelmed me, but sometimes the point is missed. I still have ADHD and many of the issues that come with it, but that is not my point. The reason I have revealed so much about myself is because I have overcome many challenges, found some decent workarounds and I have moved forward to a more positive place. But, I didn’t entirely conform […]

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ADHD and the Gift of Creativity – what price are you willing to pay?

ADHD and the Gift of Creativity – what price are you willing to pay?
on: December 19, 2010 by: Bryan Hutchinson 14 Comments , , , , ...

I believe creativity is inherent in everyone. No one is born without the gift of creativity. We all have this wonderful ability to be creative in our own special ways. In a recent blog post called Turning ADHD Disadvantages into Advantages, I wrote: Many will tell you that creativity in of itself is not a ‘trait’ of ADHD and I do tend to agree with that, because all people are creative in their own ways. But even so, if you combine our symptoms and traits of distraction, out of the box thinking and hyper focus, among many others – we come up with some amazingly creative things that even the most creative people without ADHD would never dream of. I do believe that creativity can be an advantage for many of us with ADHD. However, at the same time I think for far too many, creativity is unintentionally discarded. Unfortunately, […]

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The Amazing Year of 2010 My Top Ten plus 1

The Amazing Year of 2010 My Top Ten plus 1
on: December 15, 2010 by: Bryan Hutchinson 4 Comments , , , , ...

It’s nearing the end of the year and as I do {most} every year, I am going to take a moment to reflect a little. In the past when I reflected back on year’s gone by, I had a tendency to look at the negative things that affected me, but not this time, not this year! I am not going to write about how I survived a terrible bout of Mono, no, not going to do that. Not going to talk about strangely swollen glands or, wanting to sleep, but couldn’t. Nope, not going there, not going to talk about how I had a root removal and synthetic transplant and another tooth pulled, or how taking antibiotics temporarily covered me in a rash due to undiagnosed Mono. The rash was a gift as it helped discover the Mono (ha!). Did I mention when I rushed to the hospital no less than 3 times? […]

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Educating the Public about ADHD

Educating the Public about ADHD
on: December 12, 2010 by: Bryan Hutchinson 11 Comments , , , , ...

Pick a disorder, any disorder, that you do not know much about. Find someone with that disorder and I’ll bet they wish you would understand the issues they are dealing with a little bit more. They may even wish that you would walk in their shoes for a day or two. The thing about educating the public about ADHD is that it can be so different for each and every one of us. ADHD is a neurobiological disorder with a spectrum of symptoms. Truly understanding ADHD can be mind boggling just for us, not to mention there’s so much disagreement in our community on how we should talk about it, perceive it and respond to it. Then we have the media that shouts out to the public the latest research and statistics about ADHD, but doesn’t really tell folks how people deal with it on an individual basis, each different […]

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Turning ADHD Disadvantages into Advantages

Turning ADHD Disadvantages into Advantages
on: December 7, 2010 by: Bryan Hutchinson 8 Comments , , , , ...

If you’re tired of hearing about all the bad, negative things about ADHD then this post is for you! This post isn’t to downplay the serious consequences of living with ADHD, it’s to take another perspective and reframe it in a positive way which has worked for me. Of course, many of these on my list have serious consequences which I have had to work through. ADHD isn’t curable, but sometimes we let it kick us when we are down and like the boxing coach says, ‘stay down’. I’ve never been one to ‘stay down’, I’m stubburn like that! 1) Distraction. As I wrote in a recent blog post, I have learned to appreciate my distracted nature. It has taken me places I would never have gone, or much less dreamed of. It really has led me on some awesome adventures down alleyways, backwoods and vivid, spectacular places in my own imagination […]

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ADHD and the Gift of Being Distracted

ADHD and the Gift of Being Distracted
on: December 1, 2010 by: Bryan Hutchinson 12 Comments , , , , ...

I have ADHD. I strive to reframe and rephrase my disadvantages and turn them into advantages. It’s something I try to do as much as possible. ADHD is a serious disorder that affects millions of people. The symptoms cause very serious challenges. Each person develops their own, personal coping skills in order to deal with their symptoms. Many of us, as I was, can easily become overwhelmed and will need very specific, specialized treatment, perhaps even medication. My point of view is part of my coping skills. It’s been working for me and I will tell you why. Over the years I have learned that I tend to get bored with certain tasks quickly and as a consequence I become easily distracted. To compensate, what I have learned to do is multi-task. That’s part of my answer to distraction. I spend short bursts of time on projects and quickly turn […]

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ADHD and Higher Standards

ADHD and Higher Standards
on: November 21, 2010 by: Bryan Hutchinson 11 Comments , , , , ...

Think about it for a moment and consider that people, like you and me, with ADHD, we are seemingly held to higher standards. I don’t mean higher standards in that we are better than anyone else. I mean that if you have ADHD you are expected to do more to improve yourself. Our responsibility to ‘self-improvement’ is much higher than the average. First we must strive to attain what normal people attain, and then we must compete to be even better. Due to public opinion of ADHD we are constantly proving ourselves. Even so, it’s not the general public that concerns me, it’s the attitude and behavior of ‘a few’ who take it to the next level and are quite offensive towards anyone with labeled imperfections. Even with Michael Phelps’ success in swimming and achieving there are a few who say ‘oh you just wait his day of under achievement is […]

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Does Positive Thinking Work?

Does Positive Thinking Work?
on: November 13, 2010 by: Bryan Hutchinson 15 Comments , , , , ...

In the last few years I have read thousands of emails from readers all over the world. Many love what I have written and thank me for going out on a ‘limb’ to share my life experiences. You, the readers are my driving source for writing, sharing and you inspire me to keep on keeping on, to continue sharing – it’s a very positive, uplifting and learning experience each time I read a letter or email from someone that has been touched by my writing. And what’s just as special is our ADDer World Social Network is nearing 2000 members! Originally, I had foreseen a couple dozen members of blog readers where we could get together and communicate a bit easier. Seems I am not the only one interested in finding a positive outlook, no, not by far and that’s awesome! Together we are never alone, no, never alone and […]

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The Boy That Became a Fiery Phoenix

The Boy That Became a Fiery Phoenix
on: November 11, 2010 by: Bryan Hutchinson 3 Comments , , , , ...

I fully believe in the process of looking on the brighter side, it’s my way, it works for me. Each and every day is a day of opportunity, good things can happen and more often than not, when I expect good things to happen, they usually do. It wasn’t always this way. Having undiagnosed ADHD most of my life led to a lot of heartache and tragedy. I was constantly in the mode of waiting for the other shoe to drop and the other shoe typically dropped very hard indeed. What I have learned is that we usually get what we expect and to a degree we can create our own life-forecast.  It’s true. How many times have you heard a hard luck story of a person that was far worse off than anything you have experienced and the story goes on to tell about that person rising from the […]

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Hyper Focusing and Writing

Hyper Focusing and Writing
on: November 2, 2010 by: Bryan Hutchinson 28 Comments , , , , ...

During an interview recently, I was asked to discuss how I used my natural ADHD ability to Hyper Focus to help me write my life’s story in One Boy’s Struggle: A Memoir. I’ve written about it before, but I thought I would write about it again. There are few things I enjoy more than hyper focusing and writing, together they are sublime. I consider the ability to tune out the world and hyper focus a wonderful trait and it is very difficult to clarify to anyone who doesn’t have ADHD. It’s very similar to meditating, but whereas with meditation you are basically trying to relax and tune out the world while thinking of nothing, hyper focusing is similar, but instead of doing nothing one is able to complete tasks, even extremely complex tasks. There are, of course, some serious drawbacks to hyper focusing. Therefore, I have devised some ways to […]

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