ADHD challenges have little to do with intelligence, caring, the lessons their parents tried to teach, or what they know to be right or wrong. It has more to do with (1) having difficulty focusing one’s attention right now, (2) on the most critical task, speaker, or activity, and (3) once focus has been achieved, maintaining it instead of yielding to distraction.
As one prominent ADHD expert, psychologist Russell Barkley, says, “The challenge is not knowing what to do. It’s in doing what you know.”
So, instead of calling it an attention-deficit disorder, we could call it an intention-inhibition disorder. That’s because it’s a condition in which the best intentions go awry.
The way I experience ADHD is like being at a loud party where everyone’s talking and the music is blaring, and you’re trying to hear what one person is saying but you can’t because you’re seeing, feeling, and hearing everything happening around you at the exact same time. Then five minutes later, it’s like you’ve finally locked into what that one person is saying, but the focus is so intense you’re no longer aware that the rest of the universe exists and so you miss your ride home. Repeat this situation 100 times a day.