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Home Turf by Erin Dingle

Have you wondered what ADHD coaching could do for you?

This is a poem written by Erin Dingle, following a session with Laura Godfrey, her ADHD coach, that answers that question. Find out more about ADHD Coaching at CanLearn here.

Laura has a lock on my basement secret cells.

She turns them over at 10 AM once a week.

She spills keys while I spit up safe crack sarcasm and mock the fence of my milk teeth shaking.
She has warm green tea waiting for me.
After so much whine cellar sober living

Laura opens the windows to my shameless tall tree.

This garden rustling inside.

She points at a home that stops hiding in halfways.

“You will get there. Trust me.”

She teaches me concrete foundations.

Scaffold structures.

Basic brain housekeeping routines.

She teaches me over and over.

She understands the rip and winkle of nomad memory.
She grins as she makes me write it in my calendar immediately.

Laura gestures back at all the doors I have already opened in myself.

Over and over.

Because she understands

(as no one else has quite understood)

how much I struggle to forget this
and still remember that.

She understands the risks in a still house.
Unlike most

Laura cares for the low ceilings in my messy basement as much or more than the high glow of my curb appeal.
She tells me that many homes are built like mine.

It is Ok.

She says these kinds of cluttered homes have a magic artist charm all of their own.

It is Ok.

She says proper renovations are expensive. But these walls of aluminum tin can and foil will come down. It just takes longer than we hope it will. Always.

It is Ok.

She says every home needs different maintenance. Every home has different flaws. Every home has dent and bang different dark corners. Unless it is a show home that no one lives in and properly enjoys.

It is Ok.

Laura is my ADHD coach.

Not a Nurse. Not a Doctor.

She says she learns far more from the doing than from the training.

She says she has so much still to learn.

She listens to what I learn.

She applies it.

She respects my insights
regardless of my passionate degrees
or the wander in my wonderings.

She is more Healer
than most.

In her own building.

In waiting patiently at my doorsteps in motion.
Her hand extends through these shatter months.

She leads me into another week of consistent social engagement.

She is listening.

Like she understands this connection consistency is the most difficult and frightening room for me. But is also the space I need most.
She sees me trying to close the door to my messy basement. Shoving hard against my hide.

She tells me that is not necessary.

Lots of people have messy basements.

It is Ok.

She says she is ready to help me build new doors and landings.

Re-model self-perspective and perception through scheduled routine.

But “when and only when I feel ready”.

There is no rush.

Like Laura understands the harried of always feeling hurried hard from the inside.

I run away. I circle back. I try again.

She says there is no hurry at all.

Over and over.
She offers perfect healing touch pressure.

She never questions why I sleep in a leaking tent or cry on the front lawn or howl at his back door today instead of diligently slaving in my office.

She laughs with me.

She hugs me when I leave.

Laura is better medicine than any psych or MD or PHD.

She is Holmes on my ramshackle Home ward bound journey.
My front porch is pillar gratitude.

Rows and columns will arrive
to hold up the rest
in good time.

She brings me crayons to brighten
the other stories
while I wait.

I welcome Laura onto this porch

Every week.

In every whether or not.

Over and over.
I am thankful.
Fortunately, this pattern is my most consistent.

It is my home turf.

It is a good place to start any building.
There is only one step up into Gratitude.

From anywhere that I am.

There is a porch. There is a swing.

The screen door is already wide open.

Erin Dingle – https://digitaldingle.com/

Are you ready to connect with a professional who understands the ins and outs of ADHD? You don’t have to do this alone. Click here to find out more about ADHD Coaching at CanLearn. 

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