Motor Mouth

At last week’s party, Baby Sis’ friend, Jill,  had us laughing about using the old “Sissh” gesture on noisy, obnoxious talkers.

“I know that one,” I bragged. “it’s the sign for “No.” Snap the thumb and two forefingers together in a “no” sign. I use it with my adult college students.

About a year ago I had a male adult student, who greeted me on the first night of class with: “I have ADHD.’ He announced it like a symbol of pride, almost ”

Oldest Daughter giggled before she asked, “And what was your response to that?”

“In my most sarcastic tone I replied, “Hmm. Really?  I would never have guessed.”

“I heard him talking ninety-to-nothing as I walked down the hall. I remember him as the stranger who, a few weeks earlier, came into another class begging, literally begging, for a bowl of the chili I brought for that class.”

I gave Oldest daughter and one of my best expressions of exasperation ever.

“I also stood with my arms crossed and watched him dominate not one, but TWO, conversations before he even spoke to me.”

Either Jill or Oldest Daughter said he must be a talented guy.

“Gheez,”  I commented while shaking my head.

I continued, “When he tried to excuse his behavior with ‘I have ADHD’, I stopped him with, “That’s not an excuse. They make medications for things like that. You can learn to take control.”

Jill wanted to know if I got through to him.

“Keep in mind sarcasm is not a form of communication, “ I confessed.

“Throughout the first lecture, he talked to students on either side.  I typically walk back and forth in front of students, so that night I stopped several times at his desk, said Sissh, and snapped the “No” sign. I made certain I was good-hearted about the whole thing, and he and the class laughed along with me.”

Jill and Oldest Daughter laughed, but they looked at me as if I have a lot of nerve.

I do.

Problem is, this student was not the only one in the class with obnoxious behavior problems due to ADHD. “Trouble occurred in the next course where the instructor did not exercise as much control, and the student made so much noise with his music and mouth, other students criticized both of them.”

He quit the university because of it.

Oldest Daughter jokingly mentioned, “They should have given him to you throughout his program.”

I looked incredulous, “They could not pay me enough to mentor him four years.”

My Oldest commented, “Dad has ADHD, and even he isn’t that offensive.”

“Hey, your dad is not offensive at all. He does not hold back when he talks to strangers, but there is something about him that allows him to get by with whatever he says.”

Laughing she agreed.

Recently we visited a new restaurant where he told the owner, “If you combined these ingredients in this manner, you would have Feijoada,  a favorite Brazilian recipe.”  I often become embarrassed at his bold gregarious approach to others, and I want to rush away. However, Husband engages people and carries on friendly conversations. As in this case he talked a long time with the owner, who disclosed that he frequently makes Feijoada.

I could have talked on and on about times when his conversation comes across as inappropriate or spontaneously rude, but I just didn’t want to go there. After all, it was Christmas time and our son-in-law’s birthday party. Why spoil it?

Red Velvet Cake

Last week while Christmas shopping, Baby Sis pointed to the Red Velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting and said to me and Oldest Daughter, “Just what is this?”

“Well, it is Christmas,” I replied. “and Red Velvet Cake is a part of the holiday color scheme and tradition.”

“Are you kidding me?” shrieked my youngest.

Oldest Daughter burst into her characteristic laughter as she observed the expression on her sister’s face.

“I know what she is thinking,” said my first born.

“You’re dang straight you know what I am thinking,” cried her incensed youngest sibling.

“Dad always told us that we could only bake Red Velvet cake in June. He said it only would rise well in the early summer months or something along that line. Otherwise, it would be a failure.”

Oldest Daughter howled with hilarity as her sister chuckled and snickered. I stood there with a silly smirk on my face.

“Your dad made the Red Velvet a special treat for my birthday,” I defended him.

“Well, quit making excuses for him,“ Baby Sis chastised. “He just lied to us so he would not have to make it more than once per year.”

“You have to admit that once per year was a really special event. We made the cake last several days because we knew it would be the last for another an entire 12 months.” I attempted to counter.

Baby Sis looked at me with the most incredulous expression. “Humpf!” was all she would reply.

Oldest daughter added, “Well, he did make it from scratch, and it was time consuming.”

Her sister reflected on that memory before she added, “He wouldn’t let us around him while he baked it, though. I wanted to help.”

“He didn’t want your hands in the way,”  her older sister said through tears of laughter.

Baby Sis changed the direction of the conversation by asking, “Since there are commercial-grade Red Velvet cupcakes and other treats, I suppose other people know the secret in making it?”

“What secret?”  Oldest Daughter asked. “You merely make it like any other cake. Follow the recipe.”

“WHHAAT?” Baby Sis moaned. “You mean all these years I thought it took special knowledge to bake it? I could have been making Red Velvet cakes on my own?”

“I understand there is now a Red Velvet cake mix which tastes like the one made from scratch,“ I told her.

“Oh, Lord,” she said not irreverently. “Is there no justice?”

Oldest daughter nearly choked on her own hysterics.

I saw her reach for her constant-companion cell phone. “Listen to this,” I heard her as she began the conversation with their brother, Crown Prince.

“Your other sister just now found out that Dad lied to us about making Red Velvet Cake.  No, I am not kidding. She believed him when he said he could only bake it in June.’

The three of us heard him laugh on the other end of the phone.

“Now she knows,” was his comment when he finally caught his breath.

Baby Sis announced, “I am going to make a Red Velvet Cake for Christmas, and then I am going to ask him what else he lied to me about.”

http://youtu.be/82QDeXB-ya0

We're Having So Much Fun

The first time we watched George C. Scott’s version of A Christmas Carol, Tiny Tim’s faint high-pitched voice proclaimed, “We’re having so much fun, Fawtha.”

That scene was in Husband’s mind a few nights later when his dad phoned. Husband answered with a high-pitched voice, “Oh, Fawtha, we’re having ever so much fun.”

 “What is going on?” father-in-law stammered and coughed.

Actually Husband was going through a time when he really didn’t like talking to his dad. His comedy afforded the right amount of cover up as he avoided being too newsy with his dad.

Just a couple of years before he refused to talk with his dad at all, which meant I served as the go-between Husband and Father-in-law. In those days before caller ID, Husband fequ ently just hung up when his dad called.

I even now blush thinking about it.

However, on the night he mimicked Tiny Tim he was having ever so much fun. He was excited to talk about it.

Husband said, “Atha bought me a pair of roller skates for Christmas. No, I haven’t been to the skating rink. I’ve been skating along our sidewalk with the kids.”

It was the beginning of the fad for in-line skates. Husband, who roller skated much as a child, wanted a pair of skates. I bought them at the roller skating rink, so they were bona fide bright blue adult skates with yellow accessory stripes.

When Husband opened the box, he immediately tied them on and wobbled out to the sidewalk. The kids followed close behind.

Three kids ages 12 through 5 chased behind one dad nearly 40 years old.

Let the neighbors laugh, I always say, and a couple of them actually did come outside to watch and snicker. It was cool to watch Husband regain his skate legs and balance, and he didn’t fall at all. A couple of times it was close, though.

That’s what makes it fun to have a dad with ADHD. He is not too inhibited to play.

The first time I saw him play with our kids without inhibition was when Oldest Daughter was less about 19 months old.

I brought home a child-size kiddie pool and dressed her in a new little swim suit. The pool was not totally tiny giving her plenty of play room.

Husband filled the pool with water, and I put her in it to splash.

He disappeared into the house and returned shortly dressed in his own swim suit. He even brought toys.

He got into the water with her, which only happened because we were younger and much slimmer in those days. He sat with his backside in the pool and his legs over the sides, and he placed her in the space between his knees

They splashed water everywhere: on each other, on me, and on the grass.  I can’t remember who laughed more; I think it may have been Husband, but the baby was super delighted to have daddy “go swimming” with her.

Of course, he and the kids enjoyed dozens of other times swimming in a regular size pool. The tiny Crown Prince and little Baby Sis each enjoyed their moments hanging tightly on his back as he swam through the pool at the YMCA, giggling together as the babies learned not to be afraid of the water.

However neat that was, those moments do not compare to the first time he went swimming with Oldest Daughter.

Not to Offend

The advice in About.Com said, “Send only business Christmas cards that are tasteful. You may think the Christmas card with a naked Santa is hilarious, but this is not the time to try and find out whether your client has a sense of humor.”

The thought of it caused Oldest Daughter to cry with laughter.

“Doesn’t this remind you of dad?” she said through her amusement and literal tears.

Niagara Falls

“Your dad does not send cards to clients. He doesn’t own a business.”   

I responded without giving it deep thought because I was concentrating on grading papers.

“You don’t get my point,” she continued to laugh. “I can see him doing something like that and then get offended because the other person did not think it was funny.”

As I consider it, she is correct. I have seen the younger version of Husband tell jokes or poke fun expecting others to laugh, and when they didn’t he was hurt and held a grudge for many years afterward.

The entire idea reminded me of the story he tells about his mother. It seems she thought it funny to box up a scoop of dog poo and send it to a relative.

It was about 50 years ago when she raised numerous Collie show dogs. She placed a shovel full of it in plastic bags inside plastic bags, lined a mailing box with newspaper, and sent it via mail to the recipient.

The gift was not well received, though Husband and his mother thought it was a most hilarious thing to do.

I suspect the family member is still mad at her even though she has been dead since 1974.

I often wondered if she broke any laws doing it?

We’re talking about impulsive behavior here and lack of social inhibition. Husband makes sense of appropriate behavior based on his understanding from what he has been taught.

He doesn’t mean to be rude, at least much of the time.

I mean he would send one of his sisters an inappropriate card because they have a similar sense of the hysterical, and they would think it is funny, not rude or inappropriate.

He thought the one-eared elephant joke he made during our early dating years would impress me in a positive way. When it didn’t, he got embarrassed, and later told me that I approach life too rigidly!

I think I may have hurt his feelings.

“You’re too stiff,” he once said referring to what I did and did not think was funny.

He’s made similar comments to the kids when they did not laugh at a few of his jokes.  I can imagine his insulted look as he told them they are too much like their mother.

Don’t get me wrong, not all of his humor is ill-fitting. It is sharp and spontaneous like the time he rolled down the window when our son, Crown Prince, was driving. A woman in another lane kept switching lanes and pulling in front of them.

“Where’s your signal?  We can’t read your mind. What do you need, a fat crayon and a Big Chief tablet?”

Or it is like today when he phoned to wish his brother Happy Birthday. When the receptionist answers brother’s business phone,  Husband always says, “Is Ebenezer in?”

He says she always laughs, and says. “I’m sorry, I don’t know who you are asking for.” Husband says, “Yes you do. Now let my talk to my brother.”

Gotta Dance

“He can spend hours meandering  the aisles of a grocery store,” Husband’s mother once told me.

“Well, he does like to cook,” I defended him. “He gets the ingredients for his recipes there.”

She slightly shook her head, and the expression on her face indicated that she thought I was rather young and naïve.  She may have thought I was totally simple-minded.

Actually I had followed him through grocery stores by then and thought it pure genius that he had such a vast knowledge of foods and how he can use them.

It was long before we settled house together while I raised children and did the mundane of keeping a home.

By that stage in our lives, I just want to get in, get my groceries, and get out. Crowds offend me, and I do not get emotionally attached to grocery items.

On the other hand, Husband delights in an hour wandering his favorite health-food store when I am teaching a night class. He checks the produce aisle, inspects the sale items, reads health magazines, and contemplates the specialties.

When he picks me up after school and says he had been at Green Acres, I know his bag will include asparagus and bananas. It is the things he buys over and again that he remembers.

Last week we decided to prepare a menu of Mexican foods.  On the list I included two bags of tortilla chips. He got home without the chips.

“So ,what is the big deal?” you may ask. “Everyone forgets things now and then.”

Now and then?

It is a way of shopping around here. I don’t even bother checking the grocery bags to see what he forgot.

He will eventually spend extra time going back for the items he missed.

It used to be that when he forgot, he made an excuse for it. Now he merely laments.

I think he forgets because he gets distracted. The rows and rows of shelves and hundreds and hundreds of items grab his attention and melt his memory.

In our early years we most always shopped together: groceries, drugstores, and department stores. It was exciting because we spent  thousands of dollars in our minds without opening our wallets.

Where I can block the piped-in music to the back of my mind and attention, it grabs Husband’s attention, and he has to respond to it. Just as his mother said many years ago, he must dance.

Several times in those early years as I read labels from shelved items, he would whisk me away from my task and dance with me down the aisle.

He thought it great fun. On the other hand, I with the two left feet hung on until dancing feet stopped. Had you seen us, I was the one with a bright red face.

Stores are the places where he sees people and make comments, a number of which are really very not nice.

I think he picked up making negative comments as a child growing up with his siblings; they loved to make each other laugh with their critical remarks.

Husband has perfected this habit to an art, and his thirst to do so can be insatiable. Sometimes I tell him that he is plain mean or grossly unkind.

“Don’t flatter me, Atha,” he will tell me.

Beef Heart and Other Thoughts

When he was in 8^th grade general science, Husband and class studied about the human heart, which he thought was fascinating.

He came home that afternoon to find his mother cooking a cow’s heart for dinner.

He thought, “Yuck! If I have to eat that, I only want a tiny piece of it.”

Later when his younger sister asked what Mother was cooking, he told her, “I’ll give you a hint. You can choose the right ventricle or the left one.”

Mother scolded him. “Don’t tell her that; she won’t eat it.”

I don’t know how the other siblings felt about eating beef heart, but it was the last time she fixed it, even though it was only $.39 per pound.

Later Husband told me that the heart was about twice the size of a human heart and quite tough.  Mother didn’t even clean the inside of it (the clots), but she did fix a dressing side dish for it.

I commented to him that she needed training on how to stretch the limited grocery budget Father-in-law set for her. I felt sorry that she tried hard to stay within her limits since I understand the implications of her possible ADHD.

Husband said, “Instead of thinking of this as water under the bridge, think of it as a sewage that continues to back up.”

He always, and I mean all the time, comes up with clever and comical comments when I attempt to be serious.

Our friends Patty and Gary have told me how much they like my husband.

“He is so funny, kind, and caring. He is interesting to talk with.”

What they say is undeniably true. Something about him makes his behavior all worth their while in many ways, and it seems to be that way with other people as well.

People accept things from him that would totally offend if they came from other people.

Like the time he asked a waitress, “Can I switch this chair for another? I am afraid this will not hold my fat ass.”  She laughed aloud, and said he had made her day.

Or when we were in college and he belched and then told me “Excuse me; I usually fart.”

He is exceedingly outspoken when an occasion warrants it for him, and he can do it without flinching. Where others likely would get angry with me, they laugh or receive his comments without resentment

The problem is his low self-esteem.  Often tells me, “I don’t have friends. Nobody likes me. People like you better than they like me.”

You’re kidding me, right?

How about when we are shopping and people will speak to him before they even remember my name?

What about Guy and Willa who would begin to smile every time he came into a room. They bragged on his way with babies and small children.

Or there was Hattie who loved it when he said. “God gave me the talent of cooking”  to which she retorted. “Wonderful! He gave me the talent of eating.”

And all the adults with developmental disabilities will call his name after several years of not seeing us. I was the one who did all the work for them, but it is his casual and practical acceptance they recall as well as his no-nonsense way of helping them control their behavior.

Once he watched a group of cognitive challenged guys watch an X-rated movie. “You shouldn’t be watching that trash,”  he said. “But we like it”, they retorted.

He in turn asked, ” What do you know?  You’re  retarded.”

He totally did not care if it was politically correct or not.

Those same guys seek his attention to this day if we see them in public.

I don’t think it is true that nobody likes him. For one thing, I liked him when we first met, and I like him even more today. Many people like him, and I suspect those who read this blog are among that number.

Backed Into a Corner

In a phone-bridge conversation the other night, I heard a familiar whiny tone and words I have heard dozens of times.

“ I am tired of her trying to back me into a corner,” said the voice.

It was a young college woman who felt as if her instructor was making unfair expectations of her. I know this young woman is a self-confessed person with ADHD.

The young woman played a verbal blame game for a full three minutes.

I know because I counted them: tick… tick… tick.

That whiny voice and the game of blame grated on the one good nerve left at the end of a long and busy day.

Back me into a corner. Wow! That is one familiar phrase.

I remember when I first heard it. It was about six months into our marriage.  I asked Husband a question, one that I must have thought was innocent enough.

Likely it was one of these:  “How does my hair look? Do I look like I am gaining weight? Do you like this outfit?”

You know the types of questions newly married women like to ask. They are seeking approval, or affirmation, or some sort of social mirror.

The questions are also the ones that make any husband sweat a bit whether he has ADHD or not.

Husband used an angry tone. “I am tired of you trying to back me into a corner.”

Stab. Pain. Ouch! I was taken aback because I had not seen that coming.

Now I can laugh as I realize the answer to any one of those above questions must have been negative. Or, it could be he was off in Me Land thinking about himself, which was and still is his favorite subject, and he merely did not have time to jar himself out of those thoughts to attend to me.

Either way I remember my angry response. “I am not backing you into a corner! Why did you say that?”

Of course, he angrily justified himself.  It was probably one of the coping mechanisms he developed in order to survive. Remember we did not yet know about ADHD and his life-long pattern of pain and constant sense of pressure.

A sense of pressure does it. Examples of other times he has felt “backed into a corner” include:

The soffits on the house were in disrepair for several months.

The second bathroom in our house was not completed.

I made the decision to work on an advanced degree.

Any time he is asked a direct question

I once heard that persons with ADHD often have a three-ring circus going about in their heads.  It is as if they experience the sounds of past and future fears, fear of saying what they really mean, and even trying to figure out what the other person really wants from them.

I am the type of person who shoots straight and wants straight answers and responses.

It does not always make for words and meanings that are the same between us.

The phrase back me into a corner is not on my list of all-time favorites, as readers can likely tell.  It is a defense method when a person knows he or she is wrong, but does not want to accept the responsibility of admitting so.  The person with ADHD must take responsibility for actions and thoughts. In order to help him or her do so, others must offer direct communication.

Returning to the phone-bridge conversation, another member on the line asked our college friend, “How is it that your instructor may be correct?”  (In other words, “How have you been slacking off?”).