You needn't feel bad about things that really aren't within your control. But don't just walk away and blame your ADD. With just a few tricks, you, too, can have the dinner party of the century.



Let's break it down into chunks that your ADD can manage.

The cooking can be frightening in itself if you're someone who often forgets that things are cooking. Set timers! This is extremely important. Modern appliances usually have them built in, but if your appliances don't, go out and buy a few timers and set them for each course that you're cooking. Start with the course that takes the longest to cook, and go from there. So, if you're cooking something like a turkey that needs three or four hours, that's the first timer you should set.

Then, use one for what's on the stove, and one for what's in the microwave--however many you need. And be sure that they don't stop beeping so that your ADD brain can't ignore them and forget. Be sure that they're loud enough so that you can hear, in case you're in the next room, too.

But cooking is only one part of a dinner party, right? You need to clean your house so that your guests will be comfortable. OK. Sit down and make a list of the things you need to do: putting things away, dusting, vacuuming, cleaning the kitchen and the bathrooms, sweeping the front porch, or whatever you have to do to make sure your house is clean. Then, decide how many days you have before the party and approximately how long each task will take. All you have to do then is to divide up the time you have by the number of tasks you need to do. So, let's say you're having a dinner party in one week and you allow yourself one hour each day. The first day, you may be putting things away that your ADD left behind. It takes two hours, so you need two days for that. The third day, you tackle the dusting, which takes only an hour. The next day, you clean up the kitchen, and so on. If you choose budget your time, rather than trying to do all the cleaning at once, you'll find that it's not so unappetizing and you'll be more likely to do it.

Buying food in bigger quantities than you're used to could be a problem for someone with ADD, too. The easiest way to remedy that is by sitting down with a pad, a pencil, and your cookbook. Decide what you have and what you need, and make a list of the things you need. Be sure you write the list on brightly colored paper that you can't miss when you're going out the door, or put the list with something you can't leave the house without, like your driver's license or your shoes. Take the pencil along to the supermarket, too, and as you find the things you need, you can cross off each item. That way, you won't get home and realize that you have to turn around and go right back because you forgot something. Or, even worse, feel bad because you don't have something important when your guests arrive.

These are basic steps that anyone with ADD can follow, whether they're male or female, but it's usually things like dinner parties that ADD women with families have trouble getting together. The whole key is to come up with ADD-friendly solutions that work well for you. When you can do that, your life just runs much smoother.