The seasonality of ADHD
One of my favorite ways to get dopamine is gardening.
I’m not particularly skilled at choosing plants, but I do very much enjoy pruning my rose bushes, moving dirt around, and rolling heavy rocks from one spot to the next.
Gardening is rather seasonal.
You need to plant things in the cool of spring or fall. In summer, everything is in full bloom, and you spend most of your time selectively pruning things as needed. Plants grow slowly at first, before exploding in vibrance.
Throughout the season, you’ll have hot and dry patches. You’ll have days or weeks of torrential rain. Heading into fall, everything is going dormant, losing leaves.
ADHD is seasonal, too.
You’ll have periods where you’ll frantically plant the many seeds in your mind. Then you’ll watch them barely grow, until some of them explode with brilliance.
You’ll have periods of drought, where your mind feels barren and empty. Then the rains come, and the garden of your mind becomes almost overgrown again, in need of pruning.
If a neurotypical person’s brain is a neat, perfectly manicured garden, ours is a wild, enchanted one.
Embrace that seasonality, that ebb and flow. Enchanted gardens are beautiful.