Has it made me creative, or has it held me back? Shaparak Khorsandi on being diagnosed with ADHD in her 40s
DWhen I told you in my forties that I have ADHD, it was a bit like how, I think, Tarzan felt when he found out he was a human and not a chimpanzee. For years he must have wondered why he was so different from the other chimpanzees. Why did he have to use rope instead of his arms to swing from the trees? Why did he prefer berries to termites and why, no matter how hard another chimpanzee shook at him, he didn’t get the horn.
I know what it feels like when people around you think you’re not doing things their way just to be annoying. “If only you put the same emphasis on swinging on branches as you do on making things with your hands, you wouldn’t be so behind,” his chimpanzee teachers must have said, as he was chopping wood to make a cutlery set .
Like so many of us who are diagnosed as adults with our differences, Tarzan must have been frustrated that he couldn’t do what his peers seemed to find so easy. ADHD affects my executive functions; my brain has lower levels of the neurotransmitters norepinephrine and dopamine. For me, this meant that I had huge problems with regulating emotions. My kids have seen more of my tantrums than I have of theirs.
A deficiency in my basal ganglia (a part of the brain and not, remarkably, a pasta dish) means my brain is short-circuiting. It doesn’t communicate effectively with other parts of the brain, which can lead to a complete lack of attention if something doesn’t pique my interest and shake it off, along with impulsiveness, when I can’t always weigh the pros and cons. painting my ceiling bright pink before I actually do it.
People often comfort those of us with late diagnoses, who look back on a trail of destruction, by saying, “but that makes you creative. It makes you who you are.” I’m not always sure about this link. It is true that a large percentage of those who make a living through the creative arts have ADHD. But so do a large percentage of prisoners. No one comforts them by cheerfully saying, “but it’s what makes you steal cars!”
A study by University of Michigan psychologists Holly White and Priti Shah suggests that the huge number of neurodivergent creatives could be because people with ADHD have “differences in inhibitions.” This might explain why being booed off stage as a stand-up has never deterred me. It might also explain the time I sang (Hey) Big Spender on a crowded bus, completely sober, to annoy someone who was listening to his music out loud.
So we are risk takers. Risky behavior increases dopamine levels. It could be art, it could be shoplifting. As a child and teenager I drew and wrote on my bedroom wall. I’ve also shoplifted before. Although my parents had no idea I had ADHD, they encouraged my creativity/vandalism. I now realize how this graffiti calmed me down after a day of sensory overload and masking at school.
When the first Covid lockdown was announced, the first thing I did was buy a can of purple paint and put huge purple hearts on our walls. I am not an artist; hearts were shaken. But things like this calm the chaos in my head.
I don’t think it’s ADHD itself that makes me creative. If anything, it held me back. Imagine what I could have accomplished if, when I started writing, I wasn’t suddenly looking for “where is the cast of La Bamba now?” and not come back to the surface for three hours.
For decades, it was virtually impossible for me to channel my creative flow when inattention and anxiety overwhelmed me on a regular basis. The relentless “She’s not working at her best” message – as a child, teenager, young adult, and comedian – undermined my self-esteem and exacerbated the debilitating perfectionism associated with ADHD. I sat overwhelmed as producers took me to lunch, unable to put my ideas into words as my brain scattered in a thousand directions. Fear and creativity can confuse each other.
When I found a psychotherapist in 2021 who really understood ADHD, things started to change for me. I learned about rejection-sensitive dysphoria (no one likes rejection, but when someone doesn’t answer your “hello” at work, instead of thinking, “Well, they have other things on their minds,” you spend the next few months convinced because they want you dead), which helps me better understand my diverse brain.
If we don’t fit into the framework that our work and education system offers us, as people with ADHD often cannot, then we make up rules and blaze paths that are risky, but meaningful to us. This ‘creativity’ is a survival tool and does not diminish the frustration of being overlooked and unsupported in other areas.
I imagine the other apes thought Tarzan was merciful for setting up impromptu jungle dance workshops instead of hunting colobus monkeys or checking his cousin for nits, but this kind of creativity over practicality made perfect sense for Tarzan. And for me.