I have written and published an article on Substack pretty much every week since October of last year. It’s a consistent writing habit that I have never had before and I’m extremely proud of it.

But I’m under no illusions that it will remain this way. I am AuDHD, and I experience what I call my ‘AuDHD pendulum’.

I use the word ‘pendulum’ to describe how one minute I will feel capable of initiating a task, and another time, under the same set of circumstances, I won’t.

There are days when the friction in my head feels minimal, and I can complete household chores and other life admin with relative ease and focus. I use this momentum to get a lot done at once, because there are other days where those tasks just seem impossible. On those days, my brain just does not want to even contemplate thinking about the task that needs to be done.

Take the hoovering, for example. Sometimes I feel like all the steps that lead to me being able to do the hoovering are an insurmountable challenge. Other times I will feel like I can ride an unexpected wave of energy and complete the task really well. I have no idea where this energy comes from, because it certainly isn’t from rest!

The pendulum works the same with my special interests. When it sways onto a new special interest, it consumes me totally, usually for a long period of time (most of my special interests tend to last a year).

Then one day, without warning, the pendulum swings away, and I no longer have any interest in the topic whatsoever. The swing of the pendulum leaves special interest after special interest abandoned, gathering dust.

I live in fear of the pendulum swinging away from my newfound love of writing.

I love the experience of being deeply interested in an all-consuming special interest. My special interests fill me with joy, they help to regulate my emotions and provide me with a sense of belonging, as most of my special interests come with some form of online community.

My consistent writing practice is one of my current special interests. I find the act of writing to be exceptionally calming. It’s a way of processing my thoughts and allows me to understand how I feel and what I think. I express myself a lot better through writing than I can through my speech. I have met loads of lovely people through Substack. Writing currently ticks all the special interest boxes.

But all special interests go away, for me at least. Some come back, either rapidly or slowly, but some never return.

I know that one day my brain will not find Substack interesting anymore and I will move on to something else. Like a magpie, I will be drawn to a new and shiny thing, leaving Substack to die along with all my other forgotten hobbies (RIP cross stitch, crocheting, sketching, and baking).

For me, the same pendulum that sways from ‘this task is easy’ to ‘this task is not getting done’, is the same pendulum that crashes from special interest to special interest.

It reminds me of the fascinating concept of monotropism. The website monotropism.org says that ‘Monotropic minds tend to have their attention pulled more strongly towards a smaller number of interests at any given time, leaving fewer resources for other processes.’

That’s me! I think rather than having lots of capacity to focus on a wide selection of things, I can only focus on a few things at any one time, but the focus is strong. When I do the hoovering, that floor is getting cleaned, you know? When I get into a new special interest, I am all in. I am all or nothing. And then there is the famous ADHD need for novelty.

Maybe my ‘AuDHD pendulum’ is actually ‘monotropism + need for novelty’ (I’m no researcher, I’m just a person from Lancashire with a laptop and too many opinions).

I don’t particularly vibe with the idea of an internal pendulum that swings randomly without rhyme or reason, but now I have recognised it, I’m learning to live with it. Rather than try to resist the changes of narrowed focus that my brain craves, I now try my best to just go with it. Who knows what my monotropic mind will hyperfocus on next? I hope it remains on Substack for a while longer.

Thanks for reading.

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