Fall Transitions

The past few weeks I've been hearing a lot about schedule transitions. Educators back to school schedule; kids back to school schedule.

I've also been hearing a lot of high expectations about the beginning of fall. It's as though we think we should have gotten our entire lives clean and spiffy, in new outfits, and ready to run like clockwork from the first day of Johnny's 3rd grade (and Janey's 5th grade. and your new work schedule. and the gym's new class schedule. and classes you/your spouse/your kids are all taking/giving in the evening/weekend that all start around now but not now and observe different holidays and….)

People with ADHD tend to have more difficulty with transitions than the general populus. This includes transitions from breakfast to getting out the door, from paying a bill to doing the laundry, from vacation to back home– and certainly from a summer boatload of schedule factors to an autumn cruiseshipload of the same.

I talk a lot about using a calendar- in other words, getting your schedule and upcoming appointments in some form that you don't have to remember it all, and can look at it to see when you have time for what. That is one tool to make it possible to hold things together, and if you haven't done it yet, write down what's going on in some kind of calendar now- the regular stuff and the occassional stuff, the early release days, the days off, etc.

Doing that is part of transition time right now. But even if that's perfect, remember that it will take you time- in your mind and body- to get the hang of the changes. It's not fair to expect yourself to "be productive" completely the day you have a new block of time available. It would be useful to start to do things, and decide what you want to be doing and set it up– but give yourself a break. Give yourself time to transition.