Morning Joy
Joy
Morning joy
I’m always up before the birds and the sun
Always been a morning person
Partly due to a strategy developed in my early twenties
To hit the deck as soon as my eyes opened
In order to avoid falling into the depressive abyss
I often lived inside of
Struggling to climb out
My autistic, ADHD brain kicks off well before my eyes open
Problem seeking and solving by nature
It scans, scans, scans
For problems to solve
Like that time in 1987
When I accidentally told my guitar teacher
I had been gifted water BUMSInstead of water BOMBSFor Christmas
And I wanted to sink inside of myself
Or fall into a hole
4am
Reliving that moment
An absolute cringe fest
In fact, my brain never stops
I’m often jolted out of reverie
In a panic, as my brain acts as an alarm
Being a PDAer also means that as my threat response
Is largely overactive
It too, remains on watch
Never entirely shutting down
Friends in my teens commenting, joking“She can hear a stone in the gravel move in her sleep”
And it was true
I sensed human
Movement
Energy
My ADHD neurology does not respond to exhaustion
In the same way a non ADHD brain might
It creates a greater frequency of energy
My thinking ticks over, faster and faster
My body completely disoriented
And hyperactive
The two attempting to meet in the middle
Late to sleep?
Still early to rise
And yet
I’ve never known anything else
And so
This is my normal
I’m always up
Hours ahead of my family
Coffee had
Writing done
Daily planning
Thinking
Watching the sun rise
Quiet moments
No humans
Animals chatting
Birds bickering
And singing
My family join me
One by one
And I greet them
With excitement
Intensity
Overwhelming intensity
I try so hard
To be patient
Considerate
To tone it down
But I dance
And I sing
And I stim
And I laugh
Morning is joy
Pure joy
Another day
My husband sits
On the side of the bed
And I greet him with an explosion of thoughts
And feelings
And analysis
Over previous events
Or something I’ve read
While he rubs his face and sinks his head into his hands
No idea what I’m saying
His brain still catching up
And I realise
It’s too much in this moment
And so I try to tone it down
But I can’t
So I rejoin my children
And we laugh
And sing
And play
An abundance of beautiful
Chaotic
Energy
A dance
Of colour
Joy
Morning joy
And off they go
All of them
One by one
Out the door
And I am regulated
And happy
And calm
And they are regulated
And happy
And calm
Joy
Morning joy
.
.
.
.
Kristy Forbes
inTune Pathways