Thread by @TheGraceK

I want to talk a little bit about AHDH and burnout.

In particular I want to talk about how some things we associate with ADHD are actually behaviors we learned to deal with a disabeling environment.

#neurodiversesquad

I am currently recovering from burn-out and have returned to work after a month off. Before I went off I was having panic attacks, insomnia, crippeling executive dysfunction and constant fatigue. I was also convinced that a) I was fine and b)nothing could make me better.

I still have some shit to figure out in terms of why I crashed as hard as I did (and why it keeps happening) but one thing that is becoming clearer and clearer to me is that all thoughout my education I have been actively discouraged from taking care of myself

One thing my therapist kept coming back to in our sessions was that I have stupidly high expecatitions of myself. That I do not allow myself to rest.

The thing is that is not how I see myself

And if I think about why that is I think of all the countless times growing up that I was told I have potential but need to apply myself. That the unpolished quality of my work was a sign that I wasn't taking things seriously enough. That I was smart but lazy.

Growing up with undiagnosed dyslexia and ADHD I was constantly failing at things that others find easy while being able to do things others find very hard easy. I understand why people would think I simply wasn't trying when I handed in good work one week and bad work the next

But the tragic thing is that there was no connection between how hard I was working (or trying to work) and how well I was doing.
But because I had no way to understand that I internalised the idea that I was to lazy/arrogant to study things that didn't interest me.

I'm sure there's other good theories out there on why people with ADHD are so prone to burn-out (and I am really happy to learn more) but this one really struck me.

We think of people with ADHD as impulsive and not being able to self-regulate.

But how am I supposed to know how to do these things when adults I trusted through almost 20 yeast of education have constantly encouraged me to work harder and harder at tasks I was doomed to fail simply because my brain doesn't work that way?

I have seen some of the discussions on autistic twitter about how some of the traits associated with autism are actually trauma responses.

I think this is an important discussion to have for all neurodivergences.

Anyway I hope this is useful for some of you.

The trauma of growing up in an environment that actively encourages you to develop habits that harm you is a fucking lot to deal with. Give yourself a break for not being able to do things that were trained out of you

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