Before I started medicating my ADHD I was unable to work or concentrate around other people unless I wore headphones. The problem was two fold. I was unable to filter out sounds in my surrounding, and I kept wanting to answer people’s questions, even if they were talking in the other end of the room.

The first one was a problem for me which I solved with an iPod before I started medicating. After that I was soon able to get work done even without my iPod.

However, now I do not use medication and I am still not having the same kind of problem. This is because I’ve learned to accept that I won’t be able to answer conversations I hear, which in turn means that I don’t even bother listening to them. I simply do not care.

If they have a problem I might be able to solve, then they can come to me or mail about it or otherwise communicate about it. After all, you’re not required to answer questions before they have been asked!

Before I got my diagnose, it even got so far that a colleague of mine – my boss never mentioned who it was – complained that I was butting on on people’s conversations. The fun part; I got no complaints whatsoever. Apparently the sanctity of a conversation is one of these rules you’re supposed to just “know”. Well well…

Now, after having attended treatment with Mindfulness and Acceptance Therapy I was even able to sit on the train, tune out everything just to realize some silly teenager was probably trying to get a rise out of me by calling me… I don’t remember the name, but when one of his friends say “his name is probably not – whatever it was,” and I looked up and realized we were the only ones in the train car I have to assume he was talking to me.

That was a pretty drastic 180 degree turn, if I may say so 😀