You Never Know...

You don't know how far you can go until you go.

That's what I've been telling myself lately during my workouts. It helps me push past that feeling of "I can only jog for 5 minutes at this pace before I need a break" I don't know how long I can jog at that pace, I do know how long my mind is trying to convince me I can go. But until I actually push myself, I don't know. 

Today I jogged at 4.6 mph for 29 minutes. Yes, I know, why not thirty? But that's when the program I workout to clicked down to the cool down and I didn't have it in me to bump it back up for a minute. 

But that was the longest I've gone at that speed. Can we call it speed? Pace. Let's call it pace. The fastest I've gone is 5 mph. But that has only been for two minutes at a time so far. One of the programs I am doing does speed play and laddering and 5 mph is my 8 on the RPE scale (rate of perceived exertion) but my 6 on the RPE scale is 4.6 mph and today I jogged at that level for 29 minutes.

I didn't know I could do that yesterday. I have no idea how much longer or how much faster I will eventually land on. I won't know until I do it. 

But I do know I'll try and talk myself out of it a few times before I actually accomplish it. Whatever it ends up being. 

That's why I'm going through with the doctor's appointments and assessment to see if I qualify for ADD meds. 

Because I don't know what they might do. 

Two big things worry me about all of this, assuming I get the medication. 

The first is that it makes absolutely no difference. That I will have gone through everything just to find that nah, this isn't any sort of answer to why you are the way you are. And then I have to say, just kidding, I don't need this at all. Thanks for going through all the rigamarole though! And part of that is that I've spent my entire adult life figuring out how my brain works, what makes me tick, and I have built a whole routine around that knowledge. You've all read posts where I've tried different things only to come back to what works for me. Schedules, routines, goals, gold stars. 

The second is that it makes a huge difference. Like suddenly I don't have to have three different lists, and two different calendars, and schedules, and goals and gold stars. Like I remember things and just do them without building in elaborate check systems and rewards. 

The reason why that one worries me is because I know that if it does suddenly quiet the buzz in my head and I become efficient and capable and shit then I will wonder what I could have done with my life. I'm already wondering how much I hampered Katie's by not letting them put her on the medication in elementary school. 

Marianne Williamson (great spiritual guru, lousy candidate for president) says, "Our deepest fear isn't that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure." When I first read that, and all the rest of the poem, I was stunned. Because it's true. 

If we are inadequate there isn't much expected of us. We can just sort of exist and be fine. But if we are powerful? If we can do amazing things? Well then why aren't we?

If I could take a pill that would quiet the buzz in my head. That would stop my attention from fracturing into a thousand pieces, then what could I do? 

I won't know until I get there. 

If I get there. 

I also have one other slight worry, what if it works, but it changes who I am fundamentally? I know they have worked on dosage from when these drugs were first introduced and you don't get the zombie compliant vacant person that you got back then. It just mutes the excess noise so they can then function in the world without fighting that. But what if that fight is what makes me who I am? 

The creative spark. The way I see the world askew. My unique way of problem solving. My offbeat and quick humor. All of the things that I really dig about myself. What if all of that is tied to that buzz and constant distraction? 

I won't know unless I try. 

I have a follow up appointment on Monday and eventually I'll get around to filling out that paperwork. Then I guess we will see. 

If I try it and it works that could be amazing. 
If I try it and it doesn't do anything that would be fine. 
If I don't try it and I just keep doing what I'm doing that's not terrible either. I mean, I'm pretty amazing already. 

I won't know until I get there.