Van Life Diaries - A Letter to Wandering Minds
Welcome to van life diaries!
My name is Noah and it’s just, myself and my dog Noodles in my van today.
No edits. No script.
Today we’ll be discussing something incredibly personal to me - my struggle with ADD …
I don’t share this story, lightly, in fact it’s incredibly hard for me - but I hope that, if you’re listening and you can in some small way benefit from he next few minutes.
We’ll also take listener questions at the end…
Until then,
I’m going to grab a drink, if you’re in a position to as well do so one and let’s hang out..
I’ve always had a tendency to daydream ….
About school, life the future the past …. Whatever the subject - I was largely in my head…
Not particularly in a bad way - my grades were fine, I was happy and social, but as it turned out - in a way that was noticeable to several teachers in Middle School…
One week I saw myself as a normal kid, the next week I was put on ADHD medication and began to feel entirely separate and different.
For the next year my focus and grades improved but I felt empty, like a robot, checking off tasks.
If you’ve taken an ADD drug like Adrenal or Ridlen, you know the feeling, but for those who don’t (explain)
One day, I was a freshman in high school, I said enough was enough, and refused to continue to take the medication …
It took a while to readjust, years really, I had to work harder, longer but I learned to work with what was largely considered a weakness and graduated college Magna Cum Ladda…
Wither the diagnosis was rushed or not, the medication was required at the time or not, there is value in embracing what others deem a weakness, because in so many ways that “weakness” makes you uniquely yourself - as I would really come to know in producing my podcasts…
Now, as an adult, the stigma behind something like ADD isn’t as large - but it’s there’s always a piece of you that struggles to embrace the validity of thinking differently.
If took a while but shit I really leaned into it …
Now I wander not just in my thoughts by physically, haha
Driving from place to place - story to story.
It feels, for the first time in a while, very right and natural and easy…
I’d really much rather not share this part of my life ,
I tell this story and bring all this up because I wish someone had told me this:
If you’re listening and feel or have felt different. Whatever condition, circumstance, perceived shortcoming it may be …
Know that uniqueness can be strength, pain is temporary, and you aren’t alone.
Wander away and cheers.