Jigsaw Hearts

"We didn't need couples therapy. We needed Google Translate."

Dr. Melanie du Preez spent 26 years diagnosing ADHD in other people. It took a kitchen-table argument about a rubbish bin, a lost suitcase at Lanseria Airport, and a diagnosis at 50 to help her recognize it in her own marriage.

Jigsaw Hearts is the follow-up to Puzzle Pieces - the story of what happens after the diagnosis, when you realize the person you married has been running on a completely different operating system the whole time. The wedding he wanted to "let flow organically" and the spreadsheet she built instead. The bin neither of them could agree to buy together. The 4:30 AM verbal download that sounded like nagging and was actually her brain's only way to hold onto a thought. Twenty-five years of "relax" landing like an insult neither of them understood.

This is a book about marriage, parenting, friendship, and family through an ADHD lens - written by a clinical psychologist who lived the research before she had the language for it. Across eight chapters, expect:

· The translation guide she and her husband built after two decades of talking past each other

· A psychologist's-eye view of rejection sensitive dysphoria, sensory overload, and attachment styles inside a long marriage

· Scripts, templates, and accommodation strategies for the neurotypical partner as much as the ADHD one

· The real story of parenting three ADHD-wired people (herself included), navigating friendship as an adult with ADHD, and rebuilding love after twenty-five years of miscommunication

Dr. Melanie du Preez is a clinical psychologist with 26+ years of experience, based in Klerksdorp, South Africa. Jigsaw Hearts is Book 2 of The Jigsaw Mind series.