MacWilliam Associates Established 1993

About the Author of Sit Still Timmy! ...

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Tim MacWilliam was diagnosed with ADHD at fifty-eight years old, having endured a lifetime of incidents and mishaps, but somehow he still managed to find a way through the confusing daily maze that ADHD threw at him.

 

A keen writer and broadcaster, Tim has presented shows on commercial, community and BBC local radio. He was a regular match-day commentator for partially sighted football fans at the home of Norwich City in the Premier League and Championship. Tim has run four London Marathons and completed numerous triathlons.

 

Tim is a Fellow of the Royal Society for Public Health and the founder of MacWilliam Associates. He is married to Katherine, and they have two grown-up daughters.

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About Sit Still Timmy!​

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​The original title for this book had two parts ‘Sit Still Timmy!’ followed by ‘What the hell is wrong with you?’ I dropped the second part on the advice of an editor from across the Atlantic who suggested it was offensive (I guess he hadn’t read what else was written inside!)

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Sit Still Timmy is a self-help book combined into a life story of late-diagnosed ADHD designed to assist those with the condition, those yet to be diagnosed, and close family members forced to endure the daily fallout of unpredictable behaviour.

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The number of people diagnosed with ADHD skyrocketed during the Covid-19 Lockdown. As a result, there is a Tsunami of people that are desperate for first-hand knowledge and help from someone who has first-hand experience of what living with the condition before and after diagnosis is like, to give a level of understanding and empathy.

  

A genuine roller coaster of ups and downs of the heart and head will take the reader on a journey of battles with suicidal thoughts, self-harm and addiction, all of which may be entrenched with adult ADHD. Theft, failure, rejection and hurt; dodging live ammunition during a charity walk on the Isle of Wight; losing young children on the beach, car keys in the sea, and multiple driving test failures along with the everyday scrapes and challenges that living with ADHD throws up.

 

A dip into how other associated conditions such as OCD, depression, sensitivity, extreme daydreaming, issues with anger and epilepsy are all associated with ADHD. A chapter is also devoted to the medications and therapy available and their effect. Katherine, my wife, has a chapter and features throughout the book. Sit Still Timmy is for the spouses and relatives too.

 

The pages are written to be entertaining, moving and at times graphic, with invaluable information throughout and written with humour and an element of grief for the time lost through late misdiagnosis and the opportunities squandered for what might have been.

 

I was branded lazy and foolish by teachers, relatives and peers and left school with only a Grade 4 CSE in European Studies and regularly walked out of or was sacked from endless ‘dead-end’ jobs.

 

I always knew there was probably something different about me, although I had no idea what, yet I was perhaps more intelligent and clear-thinking than my accusers. I had built up a renowned sports memorabilia business by the time I was nineteen and, in the early nineties, formed a training consultancy, out of necessity from being endlessly fired, that has endured to this day. 

 

Those with ADHD are often gifted and have a heightened sense of thinking but are also prone to some rather large faux pars, many of which are included within the book. For example, I regularly presented a three-hour talk show on live radio for many years, although my condition did inadvertently take the same station off the air! 

 

My diagnosis took the longest route possible. But first, I had to play my part in creating and raising my daughter, who went through school and university before becoming a specialist in mental health. So, it was she who, one day suggested, and seemingly out of the blue.

 

“Hey, Dad, have you ever thought you might have ADHD” 

 

At that moment, life made sense for the first time in over half a century. Sit Still, Timmy! Aims, in turn, to help those recently diagnosed make sense of their life and realise it is OK to be you.

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If you would like to send in comments or questions, email tim@macwilliam.co.uk

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Book Excerpts