ADHD

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    Do You Have The Highest Rated Personal Financial Tool?

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Tools & Strategies, Blog

    This is the first time I can ever remember being so excited about a  financial tool. Personal finances just is not a subject that gets me really fired up. But when I used mint.com, I was floored by its potential to help people, like my clients with ADD, who struggle to get a  handle on their finances. Highlights of my experience: All bank, credit card, loan, mortgage and investments accounts are updated daily and visible in one place Using the information from your accounts, the program breaks down your spending by category If you set budget amounts, you can instantly see  if you meeting your budgeting goals Sends you automatic alerts Gives you all the information you need, like the interest rate on loans or…

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    ADD – ADHD: What Is Your Purpose?

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Organization, Blog

    Have you ever forgotten to ask yourself, “Why?” That is, “what is the purpose of doing what I am doing?” For many of us with ADD, this is often times the case. Sometimes we exert significant effort toward a goal, before asking, “Why am I doing this?” What if you earned a degree in economics, attended law schools twice, went back to school to earn a Post-Baccalaureate Teaching Certificate, taught middle and high school, and never asked, “Why”? You might have spent a lot of time working hard to achieve goals that may or may not have been the “right ones.” As you may have surmised already, I did all of the above. While it was certainly a circuitous path to get to where I…

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    ADD – ADHD: Failing and Celebrating?!

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Organization, Blog

    If you are playing a big game, and by necessity experimenting with different strategies and tools to meet your goals, rather than playing it safe, you know that you cannot get it right 100% of the time. When you push your limits you will inevitably hit some speed bumps along the way. When you have a setback, you can choose to see it as a cautionary sign to slow down or as an excuse to come to a complete stop. If you are prone to adopt the common ADD tendency to think in terms of black and white, you may think that there are only two options when you hit a barrier; you can go full speed ahead and just try harder or give up….

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    ADD – ADHD: What Does Stress Have To Do With It?

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Treatment Options, Blog

    Stress, perhaps, more than anything else can exacerbate your ADD symptoms and get in your way as you pursue your goals. You probably find that the executive functions that you find challenging because of your ADD will hinder you even more when you are stressed. So, managing your stress level is necessarily a part of managing your ADD. In addition to making your ADD symptoms worse, you know that stress can cause you to not eat well. not sleep well. feel overwhelmed. get sick more often. So, then how do to you manage your stress? Part of the answer is to take care of yourself in all of the ways covered earlier in this section. Eating well, exercising, maintaining connections etc. will certainly help decrease…

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    ADHD and Clutter: There Is Help.

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Organization, Blog

        Those of you who struggle with clutter, whether space or paper, know very well the impact it has on your life. For the purposes of this post, the question is: What affect, whether direct or indirect, is it having on your ability to reach your goals? In some cases the impact is obvious. Perhaps less obvious is that that physical clutter can lead to If you are ready to address your clutter there are three steps. The first step is cleaning out the clutter. ADD-Friendly Ways To Organize Your Life by Judith Kolberg and Kathleen Nadeau has helpful strategies for this. If you feel that you need help, you may enlist your family or friends. Hiring an organizer may be the answer for…

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    ADD – ADHD: Who Can Help Me?

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Treatment Options, Blog

    A question I am asked all of the time is: Who do I go to for help? Knowing which professional to go to for help is critical in receiving the correct kind of assistance for diagnosis or treatment. Yet, it can be confusing, as there are so many different resources. The first step is knowing what kind of help you are seeking. Below is a brief explanation of the types of professionals who can provide the help that adults with ADD commonly seek from a professional.   EVALUATION First, I strongly caution against seeing your family doctor for advice or evaluation for any suspected mental health issue, as they typically lack the needed specialized knowledge. This lack of expertise can result in delays in receiving…

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    ADD and Nutrition: Can You Get To The Finish Line?

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Treatment Options, Blog

    When you do not eat properly you lose focus and find it hard to attend. Sounds familiar? Like other self care issues, lack of a proper diet can worsen an already compromised executive function system for an ADDer. Likewise, a balanced diet can help you in these areas. Common wisdom suggest and studies have shown that consuming the recommended amount of protein can help you to be more alert. Also, there is anecdotal evidence to suggest that taking Omega 3 can help you focus better. At the same time, eating too many carbohydrates can lead to increased tiredness. The bottom line is that the dietary needs and impact of different foods and supplements is going to change from person to person. For more detailed advice…

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    AD/HD and Doing It Your Own Way…

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Symptoms & Diagnosis, Blog

      The quote below, which was sent to me from a client, serves a powerful reminder of the power of perseverance, as well as the need to find your own way to accomplish what is important to you. …every now and then even streams and rivers have incredibly tough obstacles between their starting points and where they want to meander (like mountains!) but over the years they just keep on chipping away and turning and finding other ingenious ways to access where they’re going. So I’m not fluid like an established flowing river, but I’m slowly carving out a crooked sort of flow… Ok off to do some eroding. As the above quote suggest, by taking into consideration your areas of weakness and strength in…

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    Do You Want To Know How Stop Procrastinating and Start Exercising?

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Treatment Options, Blog

    For many of us, it is the lack of motivation that is the roadblock to creating a workout routine. One step to creating that motivation is envisioning what exercise will give to you. If you started a routine tomorrow, how would your life be different six months from now? Hold on to that vision. Now that you have a vision of how your life would be better, what are some possible excuses for not executing your plan? not enough time can’t get outside to run/ can’t get to the gym too out of shape never been able to keep to a routine. If you have used the above excuses, and I think we all have, you may thinking “this is the way it is.” Making…

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    ADD – ADHD: Do You Want To Hook Up?

    ByMarla Cummins ADHD Communication, Blog

    No, I am not referring to dating. Though, if that is what you are looking for, by all means, go for it! Rather, I am asking you, if you want to make positive connections with people who through their actions or just their presence in your life provide you with support. It is all too easy in the hurriedness of our daily life to forget the value of nurturing our important relationships with family and friends. Though we may say that these people are important to us, the “task” of maintaining these relationships is often the first that goes by the wayside. Hmm… The last few weeks I have mentioned the tendency of those with AD/HD to get caught up in “the here and now”…