ADHD paper / study

ETA: Better link courtesy jinasphinx: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Delivery.cfm/4985832.pdf?abstractid=4985832&mirid=1

It’s by Alexia Hetzel and it is about ADHD. It is a good example of qualitative research: an online survey distributed through various online methods, asking questions about what works and what does not work for people with ADHD, with the goal of finding people whose lives work well while also having ADHD. The goal was to find research gaps (things people said helped them that were not reflected in the literature) and to identify areas where the research matched people’s lived experience well. Finally, it advocates for taking things that people say work and are supported by the literature and applying them more widely in clinical practice.

It’s a very enjoyable and informative read. Appendix D is particularly nice if you want a short, relatively comprehensive list of Things to Try and Careers to Aim For / Avoid.

I found nothing to criticize in this work, which is pretty amazing for me. It advocates for using strengths rather than focusing on weaknesses. It advocates for identifying sources of supports. And it advocates for environmental changes to provide support / not hinder. That all aligns very well with my approaches.

In looking for research on ADHD and exercise, I am finding all kinds of weirdness. Like, people with ADHD average more and more consistent exercise, but articles about ADHD and exercise are about how more and more consistent exercise is beneficial to people without ADHD, while not necessarily acknowledging the group as a whole is already above average in this area.

Also, I’m seeing more of the, whoops, our control group did better than our proposed intervention in some ways.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4911251/

Turns out structured play with kids with ADHD is also good. I mean, who woulda thunk it.

No One Wants Your Stuff: a head scratching discourse

I’ve been reading about decluttering for a really long time now. I blog about it at intervals; it’s a pretty normal activity for me during the winter. I’ve made a lot more progress than normally this year, for two reasons. First, there is one fewer person in the house to slow me down by asking questions over and over and over again, forcing me to produce explanations, resulting in me abandoning the project in favor of really anything else that generates less interrogation.

If you want to stop someone doing something, just ask them questions about it until they can’t take it any more and go hide. Really, this is the basis for most political resistance, now that I think about it.

Anyway.

In the course of reading about decluttering, I inevitably have read a ton about decluttering around the time of death, or downsizing or moving to a senior living facility or whatever. In general, I would summarize that as “No One Wants Their / Your / My Stuff” discourse. It is often framed as an attack on boomer culture, altho the details suggest it is more often than not Silent Generation in the crosshairs. When you read the details, it is usually a bunch of quotes from professionals who help clear out in these situations and/or their clients. Sadly, not a ton of quotes usually from people who are haulers, and who often do a ton of “last mile” work in this area, trying to reduce what they have to pay at the landfill.

Here is a good sample: https://www.forbes.com/sites/nextavenue/2017/02/12/sorry-nobody-wants-your-parents-stuff/

Most of this discourse is explicitly: no one wants it. But what is meant by “no one wants it” is, no one wants to pay what you think you should be getting for it (“endowment effect”). This leads to people advocating (including towards the bottom of that same article and other like it) donating / giving away for free vs. trying to sell things.

I ran across this in a forum on a website I used to hang out at:

https://forum.mrmoneymustache.com/welcome-to-the-forum/sell-donate-or-throw-out-old-stuff-(i-throw-out-and-here's-why)/

Extended quote unattributed here (you can follow the link above):

“If you do not need the money, the article says give your things away instead.
Reselling your clutter adds time and energy, anxiety and frustration.
I agree and i used to donate.
Then 2 things happened:

1) I used to be part of a local neighborhood FreeCycle yahoo group.
You list things you dont want and people respond if they want it. Then you msg them item location. (ie: curb on XYZ street)

I found a new unopened electronic item in my closet. I had no use of it anymore.
I listed it on Freecycle and i got 3 msgs almost the same from 3 different people:
- Would love in my house.
- Your would look great in my home.
- I could really use that at my place.

All 3 mentioned using it at where they live, which i found odd.
None of my previous listings had that type of response.
it was more generic responses like "I would like that, if still available."
As if all 3 were putting an emphasis on the item not being re-sold.
Which made me think all 3 were re-sellers and were going to re-sell the item.

2) I then shifted to giving stuff away at my local Goodwill.
Till they were caught throwing away big items (furniture, cabinets, chairs, etc) at the community dumpster.
Why go through the trouble of bringing them items when i can save the trouble and throw it in trash in front of my house?
(My items are small and are mostly clothing.)

So that's why i just throw old items away instead of donating.
How about you?”

My summary: I freecycled until I realized people were reselling. Then I donated to Goodwill until I saw them throwing stuff away. Now I just throw stuff away because it’s easier all around.

I want to be clear here: I think we’ve really overdone the shaming on throwing stuff away, in exactly the same way we’ve overdone the fatshaming. Hoarding disorder and eating disorders have a ton in common in their lived, internal structure — people who get through life based on a set of rules, and who experience distress when they don’t perfectly adhere to the rules, who often lack mechanisms for modifying the rules, and who are then screwed by those rules and then go, fuck it, I’m just gonna whatever it is was their earliest impulse.

So. No shame here. I’m pointing out the way global application of locally sensible principles has really outlandish results.

I’m going to look for some research in this general area next. There’s a guy out there advocating hard for minimalism, donation and local donation to charities whose values align with one’s own values and this entire portion of the discourse is full of echoes of him (including the mustache forum I quoted), which is limiting the diversity I’m seeing right now on web searches.

Saturday brunch crepes

I used this recipe:

https://sallysbakingaddiction.com/make-crepes/#tasty-recipes-73952

I omitted the sugar. I replaced the butter in the batter with avocado oil purely out of being too lazy to melt more butter. I made a half recipe.

They turned out really nice. I did not eat them (milk allergy). I put sliced strawberries, whipped cream (“president” brand from Roche Bros, “french style gourmet” and “extra creamy” FWIW), nutella on and/or in them. For the third one, I added a little maple syrup, too. I used the nutella to try to glue the wrap together and that worked pretty well. It took a couple tries to dial in the right amount of nutella — too little the first time, too much the second, third time pretty close to perfect.

R. will be down from Duo in a bit and we’ll get his opinion and then if there is batter left, it’ll go into the fridge for tomorrow.

R. bought some chocolate oat milk when Roche Bros was out of the lactaid chocolate milk about a week ago. It’s very low fat and fairly sweet. I’m thinking of making myself some chocolate crepes for lunch using it.

ETA: Maybe for dinner. R. is now making “loaf”, which is always nice to have sitting around. Mmmm loaf sandwiches.

An Update on Making the Treadmill Less Horrible

R. has installed the can conversions and the flushmount Tiffany-style lights. They are lovely. I also received the table lamps and rearranged the bookshelves in the treadmill area so there was space for them. In practice, we are predominantly using the table lamps (this does not surprise me). But we now have a range of lighting levels, and it’s working for us.

R. taped a piece of black construction paper on the treadmill to cover the display, which A. said is too bright. You can flip it up to adjust things and then return it. And A. is 100% correct. This is a huge issue. Even this incredibly annoying solution is an enormous improvement. So now, I’m going to try to make it nicer.

I was thinking maybe some kind of plastic sheet that was grey, and went looking for that on Amazon, and after a bit I was looking at “lightdims”. These are like the blackout stickers or clings you can put over LEDs so the room is dark, but you can get them to reduce instead of fully blocking the light. So now I’m waiting for those to arrive. Fingers crossed! I’m also waiting for a treadmill desk attachment to solve A.’s other issue, which is not enough space to put a book or device while on the treadmill. I’m feeling very optimistic that we will be able to make this a place that is easy to spend time, instead of an infuriating grind.