Gross Sh!t I Learned about ADHD

Not that gross, but kinda gross

This post is for paying subscribers.

There is gonna be a somewhat gross photo later in this post, which I why I went with the generic logo for the feature photo. It’s not that gross, but a little gross. You’ve been warned.

People really liked my piece titled Dr. Pimple Popper without the video, and this is kind of related to that.

I received tremendous feedback regarding my piece Diagnosed with ADHD at Age 53. One person sent me a message as an FYI that “skin picking” was common in those with ADHD. It can be quite extreme and also related to obsessive compulsive disorder. I have the slightest bit of OCD as well, in that I tend to obsess over things like wallet, phone, and keys. When I am downhill skiing between moguls, I will quickly pat three different pockets to make sure I haven’t lost any of those three things. I will stop in the middle of a ski run to make sure the zippers on those pockets are done up tight. It’s annoying, but I’ve never lost a wallet, phone, or keys in my life.

But I sure picked a lot of scabs.

From as early as I can remember I picked at every scrape and scab. As soon as it was hard enough to come off, it came off. My mom gave me so much shit over it. Then my wife. I have various scars across my body that would be much lighter or not there at all if I didn’t pick the scabs off. Can’t help it. And the meds don’t matter either. I started ADHD meds mid-November, and had a bicycle crash in late November, and you can bet that all those scabs got picked. I’d also use Bactroban though so at least shit doesn’t get infected.

The only place I can maintain a semblance of control is on my face. I don’t want to make that all nasty. I think I learned that the hard way by figuring out what zits could be popped and which ones needed to be left alone because fucking with them just made them worse.

Anyway, this is about a sebaceous cyst on my right arm.

It showed up about 20 years ago. I noticed on my shoulder that there was a tiny, almost invisible hole in the skin and a slight lump underneath it. You can’t see the bump, only feel it. So I squeezed. I had to squeeze quite hard because the cyst was deep. A squiggly line of white goo eventually came out. I squeezed and squeezed until it no more came out. My arm looked like a bit of a war zone afterward from the fingernail marks. I’d kept squeezing long after anything came out because there was still a lump. I don’t know if that lump was from swelling or the “capsule” containing the goo or if there really was still some arm cheese in there that refused to come out.

Every once in a while, I’d squeeze the shit out of it and more goo would come out. Then, about half a dozen years ago, the goo began to smell. I called it arm cheese, and it smells like stinky cheese. Ick. Get that shit out of me. Squeeze squeeze squeeze I want it gone and I don’t care how much I massacre my shoulder with fingernail marks just get it out of me.

But I’m never satisfied. I can poke a pin in deep and feel the pin popping through various layers deep inside my shoulder then yank the pin out and squeeze for all I’m worth and get stinky arm cheese to come out and there is STILL a fucking lump there taunting me to squeeze some more. I fucking hate it and I can’t stop.

I just did this to my arm this morning:

Yeah I threw a flex in there too because what the fuck why not.

Anyway, I’ve given up on trying to resist purging the arm cheese. I’m getting that fucker cut out. I’ll be seeing my dermatologist soon and am going to request that she just cut the whole fucking thing out. It’s the only way to get me to stop digging at the fucking thing.

That’s it. That’s the story.

I just published a new ADHD post about a major “ADHD moment” I had yesterday. It’s for paying subscribers. You can access it here.