A Talk on Executive Dysfunction

It's fairly common for ADHD and autistic folks to struggle with Executive Dysfunction, which is a series of symptoms that make it difficult, generally, to begin tasks. Once you start them, whoo boy, get out of the way. But anyway, feel free to read about my experience with it!

TL;DR: uh...just cause I'm not doing something doesn't mean I don't want to. In fact it usually means I absolutely can't do the thing. I wish I could. I truly want to. But I can't.

Executive dysfunction isn't laziness. It's a literal inability to begin a task because the parts of your brain that would normally do so are ... stuck ... in some way.

My executive dysfunction typically looks like this:

• Good day: make coffee
• Regular day: grind beans into filter, filter into coffee maker, water into coffee maker, start
• Bad day: what is the first step?

Though there are days when my executive dysfunction looks like this:

• Good day: coffee
• Regular day: beans, filter, water, coffee
• Bad day:

What does this mean? It means that I sometimes struggle to task because I can't pinpoint the starting point, but sometimes I can't even conceptualise the steps to complete the task needing to be done.

Let's put this into a perspective that's not coffee. If you are not a scientist or a mathematician, reading the following will be what the second form feels like for me:

Calculate the Jacobian used to convert an integral from rectilinear coordinates into the variables u=x3-y3 and v=x3+y3.

Even if you are a scientist or mathematician, you may still find that description entirely opaque and have no way of conceptualising the task to even begin it. Sure, if you have had some multi-variable calculus, you sorta get the notion of what's going on, but otherwise it is just garbled jargon with no obvious meaning.

If I am having a Type 2 bad day, then "make coffee" not only seems impossible but doesn't even have a real meaning to me. How does one "make coffee" when one cannot understand the concepts that go into "making coffee".

And this applies to really any task being affected by said executive dysfunction. And I am likely not even aware of it until I am struck by such a moment. It's not something that impacts *every* task. Nor does it happen *every* day. Otherwise it would probably have been investigated far sooner.

I discovered that I had this issue a long time ago. I've found ways around it. But it still happens. And when it does, I typically find myself stuck for long enough people will *definitely* notice. I don't usually speak up about it. I wouldn't know how.

Anyway. Thanks for reading that, if you did. It's on my mind today.

Author's Note

Generally, executive dysfunction is pretty badly misunderstood. If you or a loved one struggles with ADHD or autism, then you may benefit from reading about executive dysfunction and some of the strategies that exist for getting around the limitations it poses.

I promise you that you are not alone, and you do not have to deal with those issues without support. Take care of yourself. You matter.