21adhd

[21adhd]

I DON’T UNDERSTAND US SOMETIMES ???

[21adhd]

if ya need to hear it:

you are so much more important than your grades

you are so much more important than your to do list

you have a value that can’t be measured by any rubric or numerical system that’s been created to determine your worth

your peers are struggling too, you aren’t uniquely horrible

it’s ok to be average. it’s ok to be below average. you’re carrying a lot on your shoulders and you’re doing your fucking best.

take your meds. get some sleep. it’s gonna be alright.

[21adhd]

i have a little switch in my head. its two settings are “do everything immediately” and “do nothing at all”. i do not control what the switch is set to, and there is no third setting

[21adhd]

turns out the overdue project I've been putting off for days is actually pretty easy and i should've done it earlier. i won't learn anything from this though

[21adhd]

ADHD moodboard

[21adhd]

As someone recently diagnosed with ADHD as an adult, one thing that’s been helping me grapple with the intense shame I have over all my “wasted potential” is accepting that potential doesn’t exist and never did.

This sounds so harsh, but please bare with me.

I procrastinated a lot growing up. I still procrastinate today, but less so. And yet, I got good grades. I could write an A+ paper that “knocked [my professor]’s socks off” in the hour before class and print it with sweat running down my face.

I was so used to hearing from teachers and family that if I just didn’t procrastinate and worked all the time, I could do anything! I had all this potential I wasn’t living up to!

And that’s true, as far as it goes, but that’s like saying if Usain Bolt just kept going he could be the fastest marathon runner in the world. Why does he stop at the end of the race??

If ANYONE could make their top speed/most productive setting the one they used all the time, anyone could do anything. But you can’t. Your top speed is not a speed you’re able to sustain.

Now, I’ve found that I do need to work on not procrastinating. Not because the product is better, even, but because it’s better for my mental health and physical health to not have a full, sweating, panicked breakdown over every task even if the task itself turns out excellently. It’s a shitty way to live! You feel bad ALL the time! And I don’t deserve to live like that anymore.

So all of this to say, I’m not wasting a ton of potential. I don’t have an ocean of productivity and accomplishments inside of me that I could easily, effortlessly access if I just sat down 8 hours a day and worked. There’s no fucking way. That’s not real. It’s an illusion. It’s fine not to live up to an illusion.

And if you have ADHD, I mean this from the bottom of my heart: you do not have limitless potential confounded by your laziness. You have the good potential of a good person, and you can access it with practice and work, but do not accept the story that you are choosing not to be all that you are or can be. You are just a human person.

[21adhd]

I rarely post, let alone create, but I was inspired. 

[21adhd]

Say you break your ankle. You could know everything there is to know intellectually about the injury. Even with this vast knowledge, you will still experience physical pain.

Now take this logic and apply it to things like ADHD, autism, clinical depression, and other less visible/divergent disabilities. You cannot think your way out of feeling.

That is to say: you are not a bad, lazy, or selfish person for struggling, even if you know why you are struggling.

[21adhd]

One minute my life is like

And the next it's like

[21adhd]

[21adhd]

Let go of striving for perfection

And live for growth

As terrifying as it maybe be

I must succumb to the realization that

I am not perfect or more special that i think i am

And i dont have to be either

Nobody expects perfection of me

So why do i

All i need is a good starting point

To grow from.

So start,

Start bad, start clumsy,

Find your way as you go.

Do not let fear of inadequacy

Define you or your work

So long as you commit

Whatever you put out will have worth

And never the less, you will always too

[21adhd]

You can’t know the PAIN of having executive function issues and having a neurotypical say ‘haha me when I’m lazy’

[21adhd]

[21adhd]

Don't mockingly tell me how "easy" the task was, I've been hearing it from myself for the last hour at minimum.

[21adhd]

[21adhd]

Credit where it’s due: u/Putrid_Ad2141 thank you for putting it into works

Adhd is

ADHD is being smartdumb: the chronic cognitive dissonance from constantly being made aware of evidence suggesting that you’re extremely talented and intelligent and evidence suggesting that you are working to a dangerously below-average standard compared to all of your peers (and someone’s mad about it, and it’s definitely your boss)

ADHD is learned helplessness from feeling the weight of a lifetime of abandoned projects, failed courses, broken relationships and disappointed superiors - wanting to believe that you can achieve better, but being overwhelmed with evidence to suggest that failing and disappointment are just what it means to be you

ADHD is going to extreme lengths to hide that you don’t have a life outside of procrastination and “catching up”, because you feel like no one could possibly understand

ADHD is saying “I’ll never let it get this bad again” ...

ADHD is knowing you’re busy all day because you agreed to one commitment at 8pm

ADHD is downloading Duolingo to learn Mandarin

ADHD is speaking passionately and authentically about a subject you care about ... then simmering in shame because you feel like you just massively overshared and everyone thinks you’re neurotic and boring so maybe you should just shut up

ADHD is going to university because you must be some sort of masochist

ADHD is sitting through yet another round of motivational advice from someone who seems to think they know something

ADHD is just hanging out in your knickers for the day, because apparently you took your pants off at some point

ADHD is getting a notification from Duolingo

ADHD is investing substantial effort in carefully crafting witty, charismatic responses that might make people like you more

ADHD is reading your try-hard messages back to yourself for your own amusement

ADHD is me doing that after writing this post

ADHD is wondering how you’re supposed to make three meals a day for the rest of your life

ADHD is wondering what the hell do other people even eat three times a day

ADHD is the same sandwich four times instead

ADHD is making friends easily

ADHD is losing friends easily

ADHD is not reaching out to people you literally care about because... because of a vague anxiety and deep fear of rejection? And actually messaging people makes you feel guilty and icky, so you’d rather push the whole thing out of your awareness and get back to procrastinating

ADHD is lying to the question “so, what have you been up to?”

ADHD is becoming a child prodigy before you can even tie your shoes

ADHD is suddenly realising one day that you’re the only one left in the class that can’t

ADHD is when this keeps happening to you

ADHD is getting heart arrhythmia during the school register if your last initial falls somewhere between A and Z

ADHD i- by the way everyone hates you, you should really think about that

ADHD is never feeling truly seen in how hard you actually do try, how sick the stress makes you, and how much you genuinely give a shit

ADHD is posting an impassioned, heartfelt and politically brave Facebook status

ADHD is quick, because you need to delete that right now because it doesn’t have any likes yet and it’s been 20 minutes and why are you so embarrassing

ADHD is people who have no idea what executive dysfunction even means advising you to basically just [insert method that requires executive functions] to override your literally disabled prefrontal cortex - which, would invariably open up a wormhole passage through spacetime where you can go back to a time before they were ever born and tell their mum that their dad is a men’s rights activist

ADHD is not knowing how to tidy up at 27

ADHD is still checking the cooking instructions on the back of a can of beans - at 27

ADHD is not going food shopping

ADHD is getting a notification from Duolingo

ADHD is automatically absentmindedly typing “Facebook” into every search bar because you probably even check notifications in your sleep, yet you experience chronic amnesia when it comes to brushing the teeth you’ve had to brush twice a day for as long as you can humanly remember

ADHD is noticing your gums are bleeding again and then wondering how you’re supposed to actually keep all of your teeth from falling out for at least another 30-40 years

ADHD is living in a museum dedicated to things you used to do with your time before you couldn’t be bothered to have hobbies anymore

ADHD is being hungry, thirsty, exhausted, and googling about why your relationship isn’t making you happy today

ADHD is regretting making plans, cancelling last minute, and going back to bed

ADHD is being super excited about your new ukulele

ADHD is crying again

ADHD is regretting making plans, but not being able to cancel again... but you’re really glad you went, and it felt really great to see everyone and we shouldn’t leave it so long next time

ADHD is definitely cancelling next time

ADHD is lying to yourself that the random items you kept from abandoned hyper-focuses are an honest representation of your genuine interests and passions, rather than souvenirs of fleeting curiosities barely explored

ADHD is when your shower curtain is a portal to a 7th dimension where 10 minutes is experienced as an hour back on Earth

ADHD is intuitively sensing yourself on the brink of being fired - but as a lifestyle

ADHD is listening to unambitious neurotypicals appropriate your experience if you ever try to bring it up

ADHD is not making things and unironically still writing “artist” in your bio

ADHD is googling “how old am I”

ADHD is fetishising your sadness because you’re so bored in life that you’ll squeeze whatever meaning and sentimentality you can get from any experience that doesn’t require you to actually do anything

ADHD is pretending not hear the person who just asked you for the time, because the only available clock is analog and you just need a minute

ADHD is not feeling emotionally ready to open that email yet

ADHD is knowing you’re lying about having ADHD, even if you do have a sink full of dishes, piles of paper perimetering the room, 30 unopened messages from people you apparently like talking to, and also you’re going to miss that thing tomorrow and get in trouble again

ADHD is giving away the ukulele you never used

ADHD is getting excited about your new sewing machine

ADHD is learning through Facebook that it was someone-you-still-thought-of-as-your-best-friend’s wedding last week

ADHD is learning through Facebook that it was someone-you-love’s birthday last week

ADHD is when this happens for every birthday, every year

ADHD is being Schrodingers Potential: you’re simultaneously an extremely gifted golden child and a literal piece of actual dog shit

ADHD is having to constantly create new and novel ways to remind yourself of your daily responsibilities to stop them becoming invisible to you

ADHD is taking your laptop to a coffee shop to work extremely inefficiently because you want to be the kind of person that writes in coffee shops

ADHD is Google image searching Nietzsche quotes for your cover photo and feeling cultured about it

ADHD is hoping no one actually tries to start a conversation with you about Nietzsche

ADHD is hyper-focusing on creating a comprehensive ‘6am start’ schedule to include all of the goals and hobbies that matter to you, staying up all night to finish it, congratulating yourself on being so productive and then going to bed at 9am

ADHD is feeling like a trapped animal attempting even one day within this cruel, inhumane dictatorial regime of productivity

ADHD is setting up a notification system as an ongoing reminder to drink water, but just so you can make scrolling marginally more laborious for your dehydrated two-weeks-from-now self, who just experiences them as mildly annoying, context-less interruptions at random intervals throughout the day that they would turn off if they could only bring themselves to be bothered enough - but they can’t, so they won’t

ADHD is needing one whole day per commitment with rest days in between or face the consequences

ADHD is being literally everything and anything but a hyperactive little boy

ADHD is me still editing this post hours later

Finally,

ADHD really is you giving the very best you have within you, in spite of this disability - breaking through personal glass ceilings for your entire life without anyone ever understanding what it’s like to be you enough to know just how much there was to congratulate you for

And, in case nobody has told you this today, Duolingo misses you.

[21adhd]