God, I’m expensive. Not in a chic way. Not even in a distasteful bourgeois way.
I’m not talking about my skincare regimen, my mortgage, my Afterpay balance, or the little indulgences that make life worth living. I mean that the cost of being me — as I am, natural, unmanaged, without intervention — is egregious. Let me explain.
I accidentally fell off my ADHD medication for a little while this year. Pharmaceutical shortages, out-of-date blood tests, executive dysfunction ..
. it all got in the way, and my prescription lapsed. I’m now back in the land of the medicated, focused and quasi-productive, and as I play catch-up with all the admin in my backlog, no matter which way I crunch the numbers, it all comes out to the same result: I just can’t afford to live without my meds.
Credit: Robin Cowcher Recently, when I was scrolling through my transaction history looking for proof that I had paid my water bill in June, I learned two grim things: I definitely had not paid my water bill, and by forgetting to cancel my subscription before the end of the free trial period, I had bought a full year of Fitbit Premium. I don’t even know where my Fitbit is any more. I tagged the payment “ADHD tax”, and I’ve thought of little else since.
What other debts has my diagnosis racked up? Pre- and post-prescription, what else has this differently wired brain cost me? Late payment fees and missed appointments. All the planners I’ve bought over the years, convinced a Moleskin and.