So many people love to listen to audiobooks. Or podcasts. Or basically anyone reading things so that they can do other things and multitask. Go running or clean the house, or whatever. Or even as an accessibility tool for those with low vision. That’s all fine and good. Me? My brain does not do audiobooks well. The probability for distraction is hilariously high.

I used to think it was tied somehow to my seizure disorder. Thinking I was having what they once referred to as petit mal seizures. Chances are I was just experiencing normal ADHD moments. But I hadn’t been diagnosed, because ADHD was a “BOY THING” and also, my family was … strict I guess is the kindest way to say it, so there was no excuse for not being a quiet, functional (if totally masked), acquiescent, docile, and agreeable girl. (Mind you, my grandmother was *NOT* and I think she was hilariously on My Team, but died when I was 11, so my teen years were more of a struggle without her.)

So putting on headphones and listening to someone speak words at me has quite a few issues for me. Only the first is what I will call Distraction Factor. The audiobook might have me listening for a short bit (and I mean *SHORT*) but then something will catch my attention in the book, and my brain will wander, a lot… and when I veer back into listening it’s like 17 chapters later and the main character is on fire. Here’s an example of someone just telling me about what they were listening to on *their* audiobook.

Friend = A.B; Me = Q.C.

A.B: I’m listening to an audiobook called Beak of the Finch about a research team that observed evolution happening on the Galapagos within a matter of decades in the 70s and 80s. Right now they’re doing this experiment where they’re presenting finches with dead birds posed in mating positions to test if and how the finches would breed outside their species. I feel so bad for the birds. They’re being tricked. Weirdo scientists. Sorry, just had to share.

Q.C: I’m picturing the birds going “dude, are you guys okay? Like, do you need some help? These birds are *dead* man. They are not gonna mate with ANYTHING

A.B: I know! And yet they did the dance and everything. I don’t think they really got it. Poor birds.

Q.C: *Shuffling away*

Q.C: The Galapagos version of “Please back away slowly, the scientists have been away from society too long

A.B: Hahaha. They’re evolving themselves. The Origin of Species, Part 2: Weirdo Scientists.

Q.C: *Live bird pokes dead bird*
“Hey Du-” *bird falls over, wing falls off due to sketchy taxidermy*
*AAAHHHHHH*

A.B: Awww. 😢

A.B: Worst Date Ever.

Q.C: This is why I don’t listen to audiobooks. I’d never make it through the book. Or never know what went on during my Mind Adventure.

See, I have to scroll back to where I last remember what was going on. This keeps happening over and over. One book could take me about 12 years to get through at this rate. And while I do kinda do the same thing while physically reading a book, I can bounce my eyes back so much faster. (Yes, my eyes will continue to move like I am reading while my brain is totally checked out. It’s wild.)

Second part is the Voice Factor. My brain has a specific need for how the narration in my head should “sound” because I don’t really do well with other voices reading things sometimes. If it isn’t how I expect it, it is jarring to me, and I just will not finish the book. I can’t. I especially don’t like higher pitches. Or ones with certain accents (unless meant for the character, and then only for the dialogue). For example, does the person have a non-rhotic speech pattern? Absolutely not. You can keep that book. I had that speech affectation as a toddler and outgrew it.

In addition, I tend to read fairly fast. I wouldn’t necessarily say I speedread, as that implies a level of ‘skimming’ and ‘taking breaks’ that I don’t actually do, but I always have just read fast. Far, far, faster than if I try to read out loud. In fact when I try to read aloud I find myself feeling awkward as I feel like I am reading super slow. In my brain I don’t “pronounce” entire words. I know what they are and move on, so a paragraph is like a second or two. I have a recurring dream where I am trying to punch through water only to feel like the water is the consistency of molasses. That’s what reading aloud is to me. And audiobooks feel the same. The readers read so *SLOW* because they read at average speed.

“But you can speed up the reader a bit on the audioplayer.”

“To what? Alvin from The Chipmunks? Then we circle back to high pitched sounds…”

I don’t mind reading to others. When my son was small I read to him. Now occasionally I will see him pick up a book and try to read to himself. As a voracious reader in my early childhood, it makes me so sad that he doesn’t have the ability to enjoy books the way I did. The escapism of fiction, the infectiousness of learning, the mind being blown wide with new information, how to critically think and triple check that information for all non-fiction and journalism. Even humor, he doesn’t understand it. And so I weep. But for myself? Not a single thing I enjoy about reading is something I want someone to read TO me.

And I do understand others that have blindness issues, where they want to read books, but can’t. And I am sure Braille copies of books are hard to come by, expensive, and take up cherished space in houses that may not have available real estate. I am not saying audiobooks have no place for anyone. I am saying I personally don’t like them for me because I have specific quirks, and I really didn’t realize these quirks had links to other things until recently. (Apparently I am a ‘visual’ learner, not an ‘audio’ learner, and that makes a huge difference in ADHD brains. Like, I can picture my living room, go into a store, stare at a couch, and it will fit in a space with an inch to spare. But if you tell me numbers from a tape measure, no. Because 1. you said them out loud, and 2. numbers in decimals and or fractions.)

So… Improv at the Neurons. Just gimme the Tree Meat copy. I’ll support the author and build my library. Or let me read my stuff online. And everytime someone I know passes, I donate trees (multiple) rather than flowers that die, and we recycle. We’ll call it the Circle Of Gutenberg.