Lost & (Maybe) Found Again: Update

So, back in May of last year, I posted the following:

I managed to lose a cosplay gown that I had custom made, after only having worn it to one convention. I've searched everywhere in places that made sense and places that did not. It's well and truly gone. So I commissioned a new gown to replace it, and I'm at least 80% sure that once I get the new gown, the first one will turn up, because that's just my luck.

I received the new gown in July (shortly into my Absence). A literal two days after the new one arrived, I found the original one. It was "sharing" a hanger with another cosplay dress, which was on top of the gown, rendering it invisible. I didn't find it until I had pulled out the other dress to get ready for a convention. Imagine my surprise (and fury...) at finding it! Part of me was relieved; the other part was pissed AF, at myself. Why didn't I catalogue my cosplays and put them all in one place!? Hell if I know. I'm never one to do a logical thing. (Screw you ADHD!) :CRIES:

For those of you curious, I give you a shot of the gown I lost and found:

Neo Queen Serenity

Sailor Moon

So my next convention is coming up in 2.5 weeks. Being responsible, I've already started gathering together items that I need to pack for the event. I should make a list... "But it's so time consuming!" "STFU, you! Do the responsible thing!" "Whaaaaaa! Don't wanna!" On and on, the conversation with myself goes, until I stop caring about doing the thing at all, hate myself, and then eventually do thing (in this instance, a list). So I present you with... a list:

• MOTIVATION

• Get your ass in gear, we are doing the thing!

• GUILT

• Why are you not doing the thing? I'm so disappointed in you.

• ANGER

  • Who are you to say I'm disappointing!? Screw you!

• DEPRESSION

• You are so worthless! What is the point of your life even?

• MOTIVATION (Part II)

  • Okay, you can do this, one step at a time, take little baby steps...

• ACTION

  • Do the thing.

This is one of the more frustrating things about ADHD, the internal conversations with yourself which inevitably end up leading to a plethora of negative emotions, some of which trigger absolute self-loathing.

Famed blogger Allie Brosh, of Hyperbole & a Half, did an excellent piece on this called "This is Why I'll Never be an Adult." Using prose and iconic illustrations, she presents a highly accurate representation of what it's like living with ADHD (without actually mentioning ADHD), in a very silly, memorable way.

The truth is, I have started a list. The problem is that I don't always remember something TO list until I actually see it, and unfortunately, there is a lot of clutter in my place, so I have to go digging to find any one of the several locations I've put stuff. It makes for an ass-backwards routine in which I write things on the list, as I find them, and then immediately check it off the list, congratulating myself for doing the list, and then getting to the hotel and realizing I forgot to pack a random-but-important piece of my cosplay, sending me into a spiraling panic.

This whole mental meltdown is absolutely exhausting, not to mention counter-productive.

But hey, at least I found the dress!

The Absence

It would be easy to say the absence was due to my ADHD. (Let's face it, that IS a thing that happens.) Unfortunately, my absence was due to my mother having chemotherapy and multiple surgeries over the past six months as cancer treatments. Before I go into any detail, I want to assure you that she is now okay and currently cancer-free.

The day after my last post on July 11, 2023, I called my mom because it was my birthday (July 12) and I always send her flowers or some small trinket to thank her for the gift of my life. (After all, she was the one who did all the work, and that with me in a frank-breach position to boot -- ass first, in case you're wondering what the term means.) My mom and I are very close, so we talk frequently; on this day I called her and we talked for a few minutes, she wished me a happy birthday, and then, after a lot of hesitation, I finally said, "Spill," and she said, "So I have a large cancerous mass in my bladder." Happy birthday to me.

In late August, she underwent the first surgery to remove the mass, where her doctors discovered the mass was far larger than what they saw in the imaging. Pathology said it was a "fast" cancer. She bounced back fairly quickly, and shortly after that, in early September, she started chemo, which lasted eight rounds in a two-weeks on, one-week off fashion until she finished the entire course. (She did not lose her hair.) She ran her chemo course on schedule until early-November, due to her needing to be off chemo for at least six weeks before her cystectomy (bladder-removal surgery).

In mid-December, she had the cystectomy. Her doctors said that the cancer had already started forming again, but did not show any metastasizing to elsewhere in her body, thank God. They said she should bounce back from surgery in about 8-12 days. I took two weeks off starting at day eight, when she was projected to leave hospital.

Three and a half weeks after surgery, she was still in hospital, unable to keep anything down, including water, and was still incredibly weak and fatigued. Instead of caring for her post-op at home, I spent my two weeks in the hospital with her, keeping her company while she was awake, reading a book while she slept, and repeating this process every day for the full two weeks, including the weekends.

They started an NG tube, which goes up the nose and down into the abdomen, in order to pump out extra fluids, while also putting in a feeding tube so she could get at least some nutrients. It didn't stop her from losing fifty pounds.

Physical therapy was hardest on her. She had no strength to do much in the way of multiple daily walks down the hallway, and fatigued easily. After nearly four weeks in hospital, she was discharged to an in-patient physical rehabilitation facility. After a few days there, she was finally discharged to go home, where she has slowly been gaining her strength and appeitite back.

It was an extremely difficult time for our family, and between working 8+ hour days five days+ a week and caring for her, I was too exhausted to post here or do any sort of creative writing, for which I offer my deepest apologies.

So my mom is finally on the mend, and I'm trying to ease my way back into a regular writing habit, both here and working on some of my personal projects. (I still have those two novels half-written that need finishing.)

My next post will be up soon and deal more with my neuro-spiciness. (Yes, ADHD, I'm talking about you.) So with that, I bid you adieu.

The Art of Procrastination

The definition of Procrastination is the act of putting off or delaying a task or tasks, especially something requiring immediate attention.

Is this an art? Not really, but "The Art of Procrastination" sounds better than "Oh shit, the building is on fire and it's probably my fault!" As any ADHDer will tell you, when a task is interesting, they can lose themselves for hours in it. If it is deemed uninteresting/boring, procrastination abounds.

I was tasked with creating a few binders at my office. Binder-making is one of the job tasks I hate most. It is boring, requires running back and forth to the printer, and attention to detail. I'm typically fine with the attention to detail, and I get my steps in by going between the printer and the assembly area, but it is massively boring and I would rather do anything else. (Just like I'm doing right now. I have two half-done binders that need finishing, but here I am, working on this blog post.)

It's far from ideal, and eventually, at some point today, I will finish the binders. It's the meantime. I tell myself I'm waiting for a document from someone and shouldn't abandon my desk in case it comes in, but in reality, those binders are not going to make themselves, and the excuse only allows me to procrastinate so long before turning into an emergency.

For me, procrastination comes mostly from boredom. If I find a chore or task uninteresting or tedious, I avoid it as long as possible. This is even with the medication that helps me focus. And it does; I am currently focusing on anything other than the thing that needs doing.

Why is this so common among ADHDers? Because we ADHDers thrive when our interests are piqued. We will spend hours hyper-focusing on all the interesting, fascinating, fun things we possibly can, but when it comes time to do something boring or tedious, we'd rather pull teeth from a crocodile than deal with the boring thing. Boring/tedious is so beneath us.

The threat of the deadline is what spurs us to action, to get the thing done before all hell breaks loose, but it can be so stressful, especially as time is not exactly linear for ADHDers. Interesting things will speed time up; we lose track of time when we're enjoying ourselves. However, time slows to a standstill when faced with something utterly outside our happy places. So the binders will make time go by slowly for me because I hate them. Screwing around on the internet is so much more fun, especially with sites like wikipedia.org where I can lose myself in subjects that fascinate me. (I'm a big geology buff. Plate tectonics, earthquakes, volcanos, tsunamis, carbon dating? Yes please!)

So what is my deadline for this binder project? Close of Business (COB) today. That means I've still got several hours to complete them. But what if something with a higher priority comes up in the meantime? The binders will remain incomplete and unfinished, which is very bad.

So... I have procrastinated long enough. I will get to it as soon as I finish the lunch I haven't started yet.