Thanks for the reply, Mark. It wasn't until a few months ago that I've really started suspecting that the TBI could be the cause of my various issues, so I'm glad I found a place where I can bounce ideas off people.

Right now the ADHD is the biggest problem I face. I agree that it may not exactly be ADHD, but it is a convenient short hand. I think of it as more being an addiction to stimulation, and I can remember this going back as far as grade school. No matter where we went, I always had a book on hand. I'd read through each meal, and even during school, mid-lecture. At one point, I was getting a ride home from baseball practice and I was jittery as hell. I remember trying to figure out what was wrong, only to realize I didn't have a book to keep me entertained. Today, I'm either hyper-focused on something I find interested or I'm unable to function. When I first went on Adderall, it was the first time in my life I could sit down and, say, work on a spreadsheet for more than 3 minutes at a time without feeling a drastic need to do something else. Unfortunately, the tolerance built pretty quickly. I'm not as bad as I used to be, but it is still a struggle to get through any drudgery. It's so bad that I can be driving, listening to a podcast, and still feel a strong urge to pull out my phone to do a crossword puzzle. So, I'm not really exaggerating when I consider this to be life-threatening. I NEED to get it under control. Even without the temptations of distracted-driving, it's a miserable feeling to constantly need to be stimulated. I'd love to have the ability to sit still and be at peace for a few minutes without going out of my skull.

Until then, I need to be able to work, not only to pay bills/mortgage, but I have customers (including police stations, doctors offices, etc to take care of.) Taking 90mg of Adderall a day leads to sleep problems, so I take Ambien at night. If I lessen the amount of Adderall, I either can't focus or get so tired I can't get out of bed. If I don't take Ambien, I'm up all night. I have no idea how to begin to break that cycle. I AM under care of a psychiatrist, but we've been mostly working on making sure I can function on a daily basis. I'm hoping a neurologist will give me a path to escape.

You are correct about over-stimulation. Noisy environments make me sleepy, especially if they are cacophonous. That makes parties difficult, or even visiting my family (my sister and her kids have an infinite amount of energy and volume.) You are also correct on expressions. Everyone tends to look the same to me, until I get to know them well. I can recognize obvious cues (smiles, frowns, etc), and context really helps, but I struggle trouble with more subtle expressions. I've started relying on my wife to help suss things out. I've also noticed that I appear to have symptoms of an auditory processing disorder. It isn't uncommon for me to hear someone say something, but it sounds like gibberish. Then two seconds later the meaning coalesces in my brain. It's like there's a traffic jam between the part of my brain that processes sound and the part that interprets it into meaning. My wife and I have figured out a few work-arounds (I try not to automatically say "what?" whenever she talks and if I do, she gives me a few seconds before answering.) This happens if I'm distracted (most of the time) so we agreed on the key word "focus" to help me, well, focus.

I'm lucky enough to be married to one of the few people on the planet that can tolerate all of this. I really don't have any friends, other than my wife's. She is very understanding, and my hyper-introspection allows us to recognize problems and develop tools to deal with them. For my part, I'm freakishly introspective and have been able to recognize behaviors and tendencies that need to be kept under control, For instance, I've come to realize that I LOVE being contrarian and pointing out to be people why they are wrong. Nobody's complained about it, but I caught myself doing it all the time. Nobody wants to be around someone who contradicts every thing they say. Since then, I've been able to start to recognize when I'm about to argue with someone over something trivial and stifle the impulse.

We are both introspective enough to recognize when arguments that may be frivolous and drop it before we fight over something silly. In fact, we've never had a fight in almost 10 years. There really aren't all that many people I want to be around for more than a few hours, so I'm pretty damned lucky to have found someone.

My company is a 4 man operation. We sell VOIP phone systems, IT services, email hosting, etc. I do all the tech stuff with a guy we hire for help. I'm at my best when troubleshooting problems or coming up with solutions to fit our customers needs. I'm almost useless when it comes to actually implementing them. Along with the Adderall, I get through it by constantly listening to podcasts (which keep me entertained, but can be exhausting trying to process while concentrating on work), music (not as exhausting or not as entertaining) or streaming movies. In the rare cases that i have a project that interests me, I can go 12 hours or more on that task no problem. Getting interrupted or being forced to turn my attention to another issue feels like something is tearing inside my head. In other words, multi-tasking is difficult.

Anyway, if nothing else, thanks for letting me spill my guts. The only person I have to talk about this is my wife, and there's only so much a person can stand hearing someone else ***** about their problems non-stop. I do have another question related to my injury, but it is somewhat off-topic so I'm going to start a new thread.