That Sinking Feeling. Episode 6. Hopes and Fears.
Elizabeth Rynecki
In 1953, a combined ocean liner cruise ship called the Kungsholm made her maiden voyage from Sweden to New York. In the summer months, she made transatlantic crossings. Between autumn and spring, she operated luxury cruises to exotic ports of call.
Audio from the Vacation on the Atlantic (M/S Kungsholm) Video
From top to bottom, the Kungsholm is a work of technical mastery. And that’s the mood for the entire trip: leisure and luxury, without a care in the world.
Elizabeth Rynecki
Encouraged by her success, the Swedish American line placed an order for a new ship, confusingly also called the Kungsholm. The original Kungsholm was sold. The new ship, equipped with eight passenger decks, three pools, three restaurants, five bars, a 300-person theater and a gym, went into service in October 1965. Like her slightly older sister, the second Kungsholm was a real beauty. She was, as the song written about her proclaimed, “the ship that would not only give you a thrill, it would fulfill all your ocean travel dreams.”
The Kungsholm Song – Mattias Enn
Of all the ships that sail the sea, the ship for me is the Kungsholm. More than just an ocean liner, not a ship that’s built is finer.
Elizabeth Rynecki
The Kungsholm, which means Island of the King, oozed elegance. And maybe because of that, her passengers expected first class, topnotch, uninterrupted service. Service where nothing ever went wrong. Because the thought of anything going wrong, even a minor something, was inconceivable.
You’re listening to That Sinking Feeling.
My name is Elizabeth Rynecki. I grew up listening to my father’s stories of ship salvage jobs. I’m also the mother of a son with hyperactive, impulsive, and inattentive ADHD symptoms. And I think you know this by now, but That Sinking Feeling is about the unlikely intersection of ADHD and the world of ship salvage.
While having a son with ADHD definitely isn’t like being aboard a super fancy cruise ship, sometimes I feel like I paid for my reservation on the Kungsholm, but instead ended up on a well-traveled regional ferry. I’m unclear as to the destination or the route. All I know is that it will be a long journey. All of which is to say that I don’t think ADHD is a superpower, but I also don’t think it’s a curse. ADHD is an unexpected trip into the unknown. All of these episodes include a shipwreck and a salvage job. The Kungsholm story is no different.
It was, I imagine, a beautiful day. The passengers had spent the afternoon exploring the island of Martinique, and then boarded the ship for their next port of call.
But as the ship left Fort de France, instead of navigating out into the open waters, the passengers felt a slight tremble as the ship ran hard into a reef in the harbor. As the ship shuddered, the captain quickly reversed engines. It did nothing. The crew radioed the island agent, requesting assistance. A tug dutifully tried pushing and pulling the ship, but she didn’t budge. The captain ordered the crew to pump almost 400 tons of fresh water overboard to create much-needed buoyancy. It made no difference.
The next morning, two new tugs tried more of what had been tried the previous evening. Two were not better than one. Their combined horsepower proved no match for the portion of the ship resting solidly aground. Sensing they needed someone with more knowhow, my dad got the call to come and coordinate the salvage job.
Alex Rynecki
It was a passenger ship. Quite large, I don’t remember the length of it exactly, but it had a lot of passengers on board. And it had run aground at Fort de France, Martinique. And I was called in to go down there and, you know, see what we do. And the one thing you always think about that jumps to your mind right away is, ‘what can you offload the ship to reduce the ground reaction?’ And I remember running a calculation on how much I thought all the passengers weighed.
Elizabeth Rynecki
I’m going to jump in here and say that this story, which my dad sort of glosses over, is worth explaining a bit. The ship carried 450 passengers. Assuming each one weighed on average 150 pounds and each had 60 pounds of luggage, their combined weight totaled approximately 95,000 pounds. Dad quickly concluded that while offloading the passengers and their baggage couldn’t hurt, it wouldn’t make much of a difference. Everyone stayed aboard during the salvage process.
I like to think about what the passengers must have thought about the whole experience. Some would have discovered that they had a good story to tell folks back home. It wasn’t as though they were shipwrecked on a deserted island. The crew continued to serve fine wines and elaborate meals every evening. But others must have been angry, their scheduled cruise disrupted.
People with ADHD have a similar range of attitudes, but it can be hard to look on the bright side of ADHD or to take the whole thing in stride.
Annalivia
The positive aspects of ADHD are so hard to think about. But I’m trying to see the positive sides. If I’m thinking about the negative sides, I should be thinking about the positive sides.
Noah
Creativity. Getting a lot done in a short amount of time.
Owen
I think the–the real positive is just having a different perspective than a lot of people around you.
Noah
Optimism for sure. Hyperfocus. Sense of humor.
Ann Rivello
People with ADHD, literally their brains are wired differently. And oftentimes, that results in being very creative, because they just think differently.
Noah
Entrepreneurship, risk taking, mastering new hobbies. Empathy for sure. Yeah, those are the ones that definitely stick out.
Anonymous Dad
I feel very fortunate that my kid is a very smart kid, and I think his strong willpower, combined with the fact that he’s just very intelligent, will allow him to be okay.
Linda Lawton
ADHD isn’t a tragedy at all. When it’s a tragedy is when it goes unrecognized, untreated, and the translation of that is, ‘you’re a bad person.’
Noah
I think if you can learn to live with it, it can benefit you in a lot of ways.
Shannon Watts
I think a parent’s biggest fear is that their kid isn’t going to turn out to be a productive member of society.
Elizabeth Rynecki
Owen is now 20. He’s been treating his ADHD in a variety of ways over the last few years. He takes Guanfacine, a non-stimulant medication, which helps regulate his sometimes over-the-top emotional reactions. He lifts weights, which isn’t just good for his physical health, it’s good for his brain — releasing dopamine, which helps ease his stress and anxiety. And this summer, he began meeting with a therapist, something he asked to do. And all the various ways he’s treating ADHD have helped not only him, but me too.
Owen
My mom, she was not the healthiest, most helpful part of my life.
Elizabeth Rynecki
It’s kind of Owen to be vague here about all the ways I tried to control him out of having ADHD, all the ways my lack of understanding caused him pain, made our lives worse. I think he’s trying to protect me, which I appreciate, and which shows how really at the core, despite our frequent clashes, he’s a sweet and loving kid.
Owen
I love her. She’s wonderful. But things have happened. I think in the future, it will be more positive.
Elizabeth Rynecki
Having a bit of a positive outlook isn’t typically Owen’s style, but sometimes it sneaks in there, perhaps courtesy of his dad’s outlook.
Steve
I want Owen, honestly — like, if I could pick one thing, it would be happy. But two, I want him to feel independent and successful in his own way. And that is a huge struggle for Owen. And the fear is, you know, I mean, everyone shares the same fear. The fear is that at age 40, Owen will be living in our basement and not have a job. And, you know, not that we would let that occur, but like, that’s the fear is that Owen fails to launch and, you know, I think that that’s, you know, that would be really sad and depressing for everyone, Owen included. So I don’t think anyone wants that. But the question is, how do we get from here to there? And so I’m always a fan of taking what’s the step I can take today that leads to some sort of positive outcome for today?
Elizabeth Rynecki
And how do you remain so optimistic?
Steve
Well, I had pretty severe challenges growing up. Several stepfathers of various flavors, none of them positive. And I feel as though life has gotten so much better for me over time that, you know, I just have a ‘this too shall pass’ attitude toward the challenges of daily life. You get what you get. And honestly, you know, it could be so much worse. And so that’s what I like every day. I try to be grateful for something, you know, that’s not like that’s something that people talk about. But really, I just feel very fortunate to have a positive life, given that most days of my childhood were not so much fun.
Elizabeth Rynecki
I try to adopt Steve’s attitude, but some days are just too daunting. Especially knowing that people with ADHD struggle with these kinds of boring tasks long into adulthood. One of the interviews we did was with a musician in his 40s. This particular interview was especially triggering for me, because even though I get that ADHD makes executive function challenges harder, I still struggle to be empathetic about it. And there was something about this interview that reminded me so much of Owen — the talent, the kindness, and the struggles — that made me wonder if I’d gotten a glimpse of Owen’s future.
Corey
I am a musician. Just got my PhD in music.
Elizabeth Rynecki
It’s a hugely impressive accomplishment in and of itself, but also because he achieved that goal while struggling with some executive function skills. And because this was an interview we did on zoom, at one point, the professor of music picked up the camera to show us his apartment.
Corey
I feel I have no ability to organize my time and my things, my — my materials, my belongings.
Elizabeth Rynecki
It’s a mess. There are piles of dirty dishes, stacks of books, and teetering mounds of clothing scattered throughout his place. I’ve watched shows about hoarders, and it wasn’t that bad, at least not yet. But I could barely see the floor and the pathway from where he sat in the kitchen.
Not everyone needs to live in an immaculately clean home. Mine is far from perfect, but his? His was worse than mildly cluttered. And what I saw terrified me, because my son already struggles with organization in his room, doing the dishes, and parting with things he no longer uses. The interview sent me into a kind of spiral. Was this the future of my bright but organizational challenged kid? So I was surprised to learn that some people with ADHD have the opposite struggle.
Paula
One of her things that she uses as a soothing mechanism — she, you know, with the OCD — is cleaning. She loves to clean. I do — I will never have the issue with her being the kid who has the room that’s really messy. Never been a problem. She finds it very self-soothing for her to come home, and sometimes she doesn’t even talk, and it’s like 10:00 and she’s cleaning. And I’m like, ‘why is she cleaning at ten? Why is she not going and getting ready for bed?’
And then I have to go, ‘she’s— maybe there’s something stressful that she’s not telling you or that happened, or she’s feeling the emotions going on inside of her internally.’
Elizabeth Rynecki
Whether people with ADHD are messy or overly attentive to cleaning, being neurodivergent means that they come at the world from a different perspective. They don’t easily fit into neurotypical norms and standards.
Rachel Blatt
I’ve told him this since he was little. I’m like, ‘You’re like a fighter jet plane. You have the ability to like, go farther, faster, and higher than anybody else. But you have very difficult controls. Like everyone else is flying a Cessna, and you’re flying a fighter jet. So once you manage those controls, you’re — you’re soaring farther than any — higher and stronger, better than anyone else.’
Elizabeth Rynecki
Celebrating differences is great, but I know from my own life how emotionally taxing ADHD has been on Owen, his brother, me, my husband, and our extended family.
Tatiana Guerreiro Ramos
It’s a very painful place to be, when your kid is struggling. Parents are exhausted, crying. Often crying, often fighting if they’re still together with their partner. I’ve had to mediate fights before. It’s a very vulnerable and stressful place to be.
Linda Lawton
That thing that the parents cry about, that they really are so heartbroken about their own failures. And — and feel it so deeply.
Elizabeth Rynecki
Owen and I are working through our wounds. And as he works his way through community college, he started talking about transferring to a four year school. Someplace with a solid history program. This gives me great joy, but I try to keep it on the down low, because I want the idea to be his. And I’m afraid if I get overly involved, it might spook him. Like all of us, he wants — and needs — agency over his own life. And perhaps most importantly, he seems to have found his people: online and in person. A community of neurodivergent folks who have some of the same challenges he does.
Owen
The vast majority of my peers that I interact with consistently have their own ADHD or autism. Or, some even say they have AuDHD, which is autism and ADHD. So I think we’re all very understanding of, ‘we all have something going on, we are all going to have some real bad days and some real good days, and we’re just going to have to work through that with each other and figure out where it goes.’
Elizabeth Rynecki
I love that Owen has found his own support network, and I’m grateful for all the progress he’s made. But I still worry about the future because, well, because I’m a mom. And like a lot of moms, we worry.
Ann Rivello
If they find the thing that is the right amount of challenge, where they’re super engaged, they get that laser focus. Then it’s like, amazing what’s happening, right? Until they stumble. And then you have to remind them, or hopefully they remember that, you know, all is not lost and it’s not as terrible as they think. And they don’t have to, like just intensely beat themselves up. But it’s hard to watch, right? Because you’re like, ‘Aw man, I wish you didn’t have to be so hard on yourself.’
Elizabeth Rynecki
That laser focus on something good and productive is what we so desperately want for Owen.
Tatiana Guerreiro Ramos
I love what I do. There’s — probably some of it has to do with the fact that my job is very different every day. And so that helps me. But also, I found the thing that I’m really good at, and is one of my superpowers.
Katherine Ellison
For both me and my son, I think that our ADHD has come with some really interesting — I don’t know if you can call them gifts. ADHD as a gift that’s really hard to unwrap.
You have to manage it a lot. But it does seem to come with a certain lack of inhibition. Which can get you in a lot of trouble, but can also be a source of creativity.
Ann Rivello
Reframing is so important. Helping them to turn it into a redemption story about, like, ‘I had all these differences, it was really difficult. And now I have this really creative thing that I like to do,’ rather than, ‘There’s something wrong with me.’
Elizabeth Rynecki
The stories we tell ourselves are important. They shape the way we see and engage with the world. Which, honestly, is why I like the story of the Kungsholm so much. The passengers could have chosen to be angry, to fume at the crew, to glare at the tugboats. They could wish everything was different. Or they could laugh about the moment and take advantage of the unexpected opportunities the grounding and delay caused. And some did, because the cruise line understood the grounding was an inconvenience, and so they made efforts to accommodate the guests in different ways.
Alex Rynecki
So we just offered them daily trips into the port, and they offered them, I think, free drinks and dinners and stuff like that, trying to keep everybody happy.
Elizabeth Rynecki
Some of them even got to have dinner with my dad.
Alex Rynecki
They were curious, what we were doing. And how it was going.
Elizabeth Rynecki
I love knowing that some of the passengers leaned into the moment. They drank fine wines and peppered my dad with salvage questions. I want to be like those passengers.
Alex Rynecki
That’s the only time I’ve ever been on a cruise ship. However, I was way ahead of the passengers because they were paying me [laughs].
Elizabeth Rynecki
It’s easy to be angry at the ways ADHD negatively impacts my son’s life and ours. And while I’m not always particularly good about flipping the negativity upside down and finding the humor in it, I know I’m a better parent when I do. Recently, Owen took the wrong train and called home feeling stupid and stressed that he’d be late for his meet up with friends. Everyone’s taken the wrong exit. Gone to the wrong airport. But for Owen, this wasn’t a small mistake. It was a traumatic error, one he played in his mind again and again. So when I picked Owen up from the station and drove him to his destination, I tried to help him pivot in his thinking. Instead of berating him about his inattention, I told him it was just one of those things. It was the ADHD tax and we both were paying. That seemed to lighten the load for both of us. Accepting these differences, not as shameful, but just as a part of your reality, is a great stepping stone for staying focused on what’s important.
Noah
I feel like, everyone’s got shit. It just comes in different ways, you know what I mean? I just look at it like, it’s who she is, and we got to support her and try to move her past it. So I don’t feel any shame in that way.
00:18:37:21 – 00:18:45:14
Shannon Watts
I am okay not knowing where I live. So I think because of my ADHD, I have no sense of direction. I use Google maps to get everywhere. I dropped my stepdaughter off this morning to get coffee down the road. I don’t know how to get there, and I don’t know how to get home, and I don’t really care.
Anonymous Mom
Now that he’s at a school where all the parents are parents of neurodiverse kids, there’s this amazing community. Because we could talk freely about the level of exhaustion, the level of burnout, the resources, the medications. And if we have a play date and things go south, there’s no judgment there.
Katherine Ellison
My three best women friends today are women who had crazy, or — or let’s, let’s not say crazy. My three best women friends today are — are mothers of challenging sons. And that has been a bond that has lasted more than 20 years.
Elizabeth Rynecki
When Owen was younger, our family traveled to France. After a long flight, we weren’t sure which train to take. My grade-school-French was of no help. As we tried to use the ticket vending machine and worked out how to get Owen a snack before his hangry attitude engulfed all of us, Owen burst out with an angry list of injustices. The signs were in French. The menu was in French. The announcements were in French. Worst of all? Everyone spoke French! In France! How dare they!
Owen laughs about it now. And it is funny, but it’s also very much representative of Owen’s ADHD. Like, a lot of people with ADHD, Owen finds learning foreign languages difficult. A new vocabulary and thinking in another language is totally overwhelming to him. And to be suddenly immersed in French completely overstimulated him and depleted his coping mechanisms. Owen wasn’t trying to be funny. He was just trying to say, ‘I’m overwhelmed.’ But he didn’t know how to say it in an appropriate way. Or in French.
What I want more than anything is for Owen to be a little less rigid and to laugh at himself more often. To look around and see the other passengers on the ship, to know that he’s not alone in dealing with his ADHD. This episode is our last, which puts me in the tough spot of wanting to offer closure, while also knowing that when this episode is finished, my son will still have ADHD and I’ll still be trying to navigate it.
All of which is to say that it feels really hard to offer a tidy conclusion. So instead, what I want to offer you is a bit of perspective and hope. What I wish for everyone is a sense of humor to get them through the tough times. And I hope that eventually you’ll make it to a point where these things feel a little less awful and a little more hopeful.
Hope and community is what keeps me going. Hope is what inspired me to create this podcast. And being on the wrong ship? There’s really no such thing. It’s just a different ship. And I think that I’m finally okay with that.
And what happened to the Kungsholm? She had many different lives after my father’s time with her, including being sold, being repainted, and being renamed. She served as an educational ship, a floating hotel during an Olympics, and as a filming site for The Love Boat during her time in Australia. She also ran aground a few more times, once in Italy, another time in Latvia. She was ultimately scrapped in 2016 at a ship breaking yard in India.
Thank you for listening to That Sinking Feeling. We hope you’ve loved it, found it thought provoking, and that you feel inspired to tell your friends about it.
A gentle reminder that although working on this podcast has taught me literal boatloads about ship salvage and ADHD, I’m not an expert on either topic.
If you need a ship salvage engineer, my dad is retired, but there are still lots of people who do maritime salvage work. And if you’ve got questions about treating ADHD, please speak to someone licensed to do so. If you want to learn more about the salvage jobs mentioned in each of our episodes, please visit our website for videos, newspaper articles, and other interesting tidbits. Details on how to do that are in the show notes.
After many rounds of edits, I sincerely hope I got the history of the two different Kungsholm ships right. If I got any of the details about my father’s salvage job of the Kungsholm wrong, I’m sorry. A shout out of gratitude to everyone who took the time to share their stories with us, and whose voices you’ve heard throughout this podcast:
Owen
I’m Owen. I’m the son of Elizabeth Rynecki.
Alex Rynecki
My name is Alex Rynecki.
Steve
I’m Steve, Owen’s father and Elizabeth’s husband.
Annalivia
I’m Annalivia.
Ann Rivello
My name is Ann Rivello. I am a therapist and mom.
Noah
My name’s Noah, and my daughter has ADHD.
Anonymous Mom
I’m a mom in the San Francisco Bay Area. I have two sons with ADHD.
Allison Landa
My name is Allison Landa.
Katherine Ellison
I’m Katherine Ellison. I’m a journalist and author of Buzz: A Year of Paying Attention.
Paula
So I’m Paula from the East Bay.
Lauren
My name is Lauren.
Rachel Blatt
My name is Rachel Blatt. I have two boys. They both have ADHD. And I also have ADHD.
Corey
My name is Corey. I hope I am some form of new A.D.D.
James
My name is James. I’m a medical doctor and a psychiatrist.
Anonymous Dad
I am a parent and a musician and I have a wife with ADHD and a six year old with ADHD.
Tatiana Guerreiro Ramos
My name is Tatiana Guerreiro Ramos, and I’m the co-director of Classroom Matters, and I have ADHD.
Linda Lawton
My name is Linda Lawton, and I’m an educational therapist.
Shannon Watts
I’m Shannon Watts. I have ADHD, and I’m the founder of Moms Demand Action.
Tony Kaplan
That Sinking Feeling is produced by me — Tony Kaplan — Elizabeth Rynecki, and Jacob Bloomfield Misrach. Audio engineering provided by IMRSV Sound.