There’s this thing with ADHD where you only have two speeds: zero and 60. For most of my life, if something wasn’t due tomorrow, I wasn’t doing it. That’s unsustainable and awful, obviously. I’ve managed to get past it, mostly, but I’m left with a lot of lingering…I don’t know what to call it. Fear, maybe. Misplaced urgency.
Shame, let’s say.
Between medication, support, and healthy coping mechanisms, I’ve become pretty good at breaking up projects into chunks. I understand and respect my limits. I make manageable goals, and I can stick to them about as often as your average NT person. I hit deadlines without panic. It’s new and exciting and DEEPLY relaxing. I’m super proud.
But also, like, today?
I’ve been working steadily on a project, deadline about two weeks. I hit today’s goal, did a bit more, and then knocked off. I’m on track and have plenty of time to finish without rushing, but my lizard brain doesn’t know that? So I’m quietly freaking out because I haven’t finished yet? “What if I just did a little more? And then a little more? And then a little more after that?” Never mind I’m hungry and tired and wouldn’t be doing my best work, and need to stretch my poor arms/wrists/shoulders. I HAVE TO FINISH IT NOW, else things fall apart, the falcon cannot hear the falconeer, etc. Nothing is good enough. I’m shaking as I type this.
This happens a lot, it’s stupid, I hate it, I resent it, I resent the years and people that brought me here, I’m angry and tired and I just want to relax. I want to unclench my jaw and stop glancing at the calendar in fear of the thing I’ve inevitably forgotten.
I lived in a constant state of urgency for a long time, because the only coping mechanism I knew was “try harder.” Or apply myself, or whatever it was people kept saying.
My daily planners were a horror show. My room/apartment was a clusterfuck. My notes, when I look back at them, are illegible disasters of trying to sort out my own thoughts. I kept lists obsessively, drove like a bat out of hell, set my clocks ahead, went to school without breakfast or lunch or books or glasses or coat or socks, pushed the limits of exactly how little sleep I could get and still function well enough to shit out a paper, knew exactly how much of which drinks would get me through an all-nighter, lay in bed at night listening to my heart try to escape my chest, had what I now know to be panic attacks, got deeply into debt, fantasized about driving my car off a bridge or breaking my own leg rather than go to work. More than once I taped a sticky note to my forehead before bed. I got yelled at everywhere, all the time, by everyone. I had trouble falling asleep, trouble waking up. I self-medicated with gallons of caffeine and sugar and am so fucking thankful I didn’t know where to get cocaine.
I cried all the time.
I tried until it hurt, until I made myself sick, until I just wanted to die, and then I kept trying. but I dropped the ball over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and–
Nowadays I’m fine. The apartment is fine. My creative output has never been better. I’m (almost) always on time, prepared, and wearing clean clothes. A rational human being could understand my to-do lists. I kicked caffeine with no trouble except a headache. I’m properly medicated. I understand how my brain works, and so do the people around me. But shame is beastly hard to shake. It lives inside my bones, between my teeth, in my veins, so I have no choice but to hear it. One of these days I hope to finish unpacking its baggage and send it on its way, but in the meantime…sometimes…it is just so, so hard.
October is ADHD Awareness Month. I am pretty damn aware, so let me speak to the other members of this weird little club: I see you.
I see you. I see your struggles. I see you trying. I see the chattering shame monsters following you around. Wherever you’re at; whatever people are saying to you; I see you. I can’t fix anything, I can’t take the hurt away, but by Grabthar’s hammer, I see you.
Our failures are not a sign that we are a failure. Our worth is not defined by our production. Our reasons are not excuses. Our disorder is not made up. Our medication is not a study aid. Our best is good enough.
I see you. And we deserve to rest.
