My Real Memoir
I was ruthless. And for a good reason. I would turn eighteen that May, and if my band The Daily Planet was ever going to be “the next Beatles” it had better be soon! Yes, I loved other artists, especially singer-songwriters like Dylan, Paul Simon, Joni Mitchell and Otis Redding (“Sittin’ On the Dock of the Bay” was released that year and is permanently etched into my soul). But Lennon and McCartney were the artists I most identified with, both musically and personally.
“Who are you more like?” I was sometimes asked, and my answer was always “both.” In the best and the worst sense: Paul’s winsome romanticism, but also his bossiness. John’s absurd wit and hypnotic melodies, but also his explosive temper.
My ADHD showed up in band rehearsals. First in that, although I was wildly distractable in unstimulating situations (Spanish and Math), I was hyperfocused when I was passionate about something (writing, making out with my girlfriend). In band rehearsals my McCartney-side emerged; I’d keep pushing to perfect each song, tweak a chord or a harmony that “could be better.” To break the tension, someone would usually shout mock-hysterically, “I want a divorce!” And then we’d all laugh because we knew we were too good to break up, and that we were brothers forever. But we also all knew that “Mitch was the bossy one.”
My ADHD also showed up when we were trying to scrape up the money to buy a decent P.A. (most high school gyms and civic auditoriums had bad sound systems). So, when we found a phenomenal deal on top-of-the-line JBL speakers, we jumped!
And then we discovered they were el crapo knock-offs.
So we drove back to the electronics store. I plopped the speakers down on the counter and demanded our money back. The manager handed me half the money, explaining that this was their policy regarding “used” returns. Joe, Marc, and Jeph grumbled and started to walk away. But not me. John Lennon burst out of me like the chest-hugger in Alien! I bellowed a string of curses, then hurled the bills and coins onto the counter and blew out of the building like a category 5 hurricane. Was I justified? Sort of. Was I wise? Hardly. My band-mates were furious, and I felt wounded and unsupported.
Only recently did I learn that explosive anger (in its severest form called IED, intermittent explosive disorder) is a classic companion of ADHD. It’s often the result of both nurture and nature. John Lennon’s anger was. And so is mine. My dad frequently blew up. Big. Loud. Scary. Then, boom, over.
Sadly, I’ve done the same (not as often, for what it’s worth). And, yes, I’ve thrown a few things, though never actually at anyone; I’ve never wanted to hurt anyone, only to make them see that they’ve hurt me in some way. Nevertheless, I’ve had to come to grips with the fact that loud, angry words are also a form of violence. So, to anyone I’ve ever hurt in an irrational moment of rock ‘n’ roll rage…
Please forgive me.
My Real Memoir is a series. To read the next one, click here.
I’m uncertain about having ADHD, but I most certainly have shared your explosive anger, throwing things and never intending injury to anyone else. Just expressing my own hurt and grief. Happily, like you, I’ve come to know that wasn’t a good coping skill and have been busy making amends to all I can ever since.
I hear you, Dodi.
Hey I’ve practiced rageful anger too, righteously so and un-righteously too.
When we haven’t learned how to be angry and deal with it correctly we do what we have been taught or what we have learned.
Right thinking is the key. I thank God every day that I am learning right thinking from Him.
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My good friend, Mitch you said in your article ‘my ADHD’. Don’t claim it as yours brother, seriously. By His strips ye were healed. Isaiah 53:5 Our Lord, King and Savior, Jesus already bore sickness and disease on the cross at Calvary. And, you have already been forgiven my brother.
For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you,
Matthew 6:14
I hear you, sis, and I know I’m forgiven. But I also know that asking forgiveness of anyone I’ve hurt is right and good in my Creator’s eyes.
Amen to that! Thanks and enjoy the rest of your day.
There is also a disease called YAD (Young and Dumb) which leads to cockiness, temper tantrums. But what do I know 🙂
;>) I definitely had that too, Bridget, until I was around 40.
You and every other man 🙂
;>)
I don’t think they allow links in comments…or maybe that’s YouTube. They have treatments for it nowadays. Mayo Clinic diseases-conditions/intermittent-explosive-disorder/symptoms-causes/syc-20373921 … mayoclinic.org if it might be of interest to someone. Never know someone might need to see if it not you. You’re brave enough to admit it. Half are saying nope, it doesn’t exist, it’s not you…seems like a familiar strategy for a lot of other things out there…de Nile is more than just a river in Egypt. Might help someone to know the link. Some things to avoid. Best wishes.
Thanks, Jean.
I hung out at drug store magazine racks reading every available scrap of information about Lennon and McCartney back in the day. You painted a good description of the two. Hopefully, following Jesus has tamed your ADHD. 🙂
Oh, yes. Not that I no longer have ADHD, but I have come a long way, Nancy.
Mitch, looking back to 1967 when my band was at its peak, I think the entire group may have been ADHD, but back then, we didn’t know that term or what caused the outburst. We were all prima-donnas because we had a record charting, and you’re with some top acts, so we were full of testosterone and musical vanity. Stupid teenage behavior was more like it. Only three of us remain, but we do keep in touch and our bass player and I reccounted in 2000 and played in a band until 2018, so, you can go home again, in a way. My oldest son ( deceased ) struggled with ADHD in elementary and high school. He took meds, but they only worked to a point. The side symptom of the condition is also drug abuse, which is what ended his life when he was in his forties. Many kids struggled with it back then, and there was no medication that we knew of, maybe Pot and a butt whooping, but nothing else. As far as the PA system, after experimenting with VOX and Fender tower speakers, we chose 4- 4-Kustom towers with four 12-inch speakers with two horns and a 500-watt Kustom brain with an Echoplex loop delay instead of reverb. Those old units didn’t have much of a ground, so with holding an energized electric guitar and touching your lip to that mic..Yikes, it hurt. That PA setup worked like a charm. Many of the teen clubs didn’t have a decent sound system, so we always packed our own. As I mentioned once before, we are brothers in arms through teenage rock n roll music. Good read, and thanks for being so up-front about your early years.
And thanks for sharing some of your parallel experiences, Phil. We also ended up with a terrific two-column P.A. made by a short-lived company called Foundation Electronics. We bought it from a small shop on Hollywood Blvd. called Threshhold Music, and while we were there talked with a singer who was renting one for a gig at Hollywood High School that night. He was in a newly-formed group called Three Dog Night.
How cool is that, one of my favorite bands. I guess all bands start that way. I know ours did, playing for chicken fights and funerals for $25.00 for the entire band.
I have known people with explosive tempers. I didn’t know it could be connected to ADHD, though. Interesting. I find neurology interesting in general, fearfully and wonderfully made.
I think it’s awesome that you know yourself so well. I’ve written about IED – a character in one of my unpublished novels has it, but I didn’t know it could be connected to ADHD. Love the post, John, er, Paul, I mean Mitch…
Thanks, Kellye. ~John/Paul/Mitch
I’ve seen this in my husband (with ADHD) from time to time when he’s stressed. I’ve learned that it’s a companion of anxiety that tends to ride sidecar with ADHD.
Right you are, Susan. I’ve also wrestled with anxiety over the years. https://mitchteemley.com/2019/04/24/my-age-of-anxiety/
It’s a relief to be able to look back and realize we are no longer that person.
It is, Pam. Although the impulsive anger still emerges from time to time. ADHD is the gift that keeps on giving (or trying to at any rate).
Embracing ADHD as a gift is a healthy outlook. So many of my students saw it as a hindrance. Seems like a book is due about how one person’s hindrance is another person’s gift. When you have the time😉
I don’t know why I read this backwards but I can sure identify with it. The Beatles were my favorite too. I could play just about every Beatle song. I had a wicked temper too. Now all I can manage is, a little puff of smoke comes out the top of my head. Then I go to sleep. LOL!
“Little puff of smoke.” I’ll have to try that, Darrell. ;>)