Man when I was growing up and dealing with my undiagnosed, unmedicated ADHD and having the worst time, my parents would say, “If you can’t do this now, how are you going to handle being an adult?” all. the. fucking. time.
But all of my problems are actually so fixable.
My mom is out of town and asked me to take out her trash. I forgot. And when I remembered I had two seconds of freaking out before I put together a plan: I got two big plastic boxes, loaded her trash into the trunk of my car, and threw it out in my apartment complex’s dumpster. The only bad thing that happened is I had a small leak into one of the boxes, and I’ve already got that soaking with bleach in my tub. FIXING my terrible ADHD mistake took less effort than doing it properly and you are the only people who will know.
But nooooo when I was a kid it was always ~do it right the first time exactly how we expect or it can’t be done at all~. No fucking wonder I’m a mess of an adult now.
And can we talk about how “how are you going to handle being an adult?” encourages suicidal ideation as well? Bc holy FUCK
The fact is, if no one teaches you these coping strategies, if no one encourages your creativity and problem-solving, you WILL suffer as an adult - but that’s still not your fault.
SO many ADHD kids that go undiagnosed because they’re “gifted” or fly under the radar crash and burn in college. So many crash and burn trying to hold down a stable job.
This isn’t mean to be doom and gloom, it’s meant as an admonishment to parents and teachers and administrators and therapists and all other adults: if you see a child who is struggling and you do not give them coping techniques; if you do not teach them a different way to accomplish the task, or if you don’t encourage them to think up ways that work for them, you are setting that child up for failure.
I’ve had to do so much work just to stay afloat as an ADHD adult. It’s hard. Sometimes it feels impossibly hard. But I just keep trying to stick with the tricks I know work; to try out new ones, and if something is novel and works for a bit, great!! If the novelty wears off and the coping technique stops working, that’s normal for ADHD too. You are not FAILING if the thing that worked for two weeks suddenly isn’t working anymore. We thrive off novelty, period.
Some of the techniques will stick, I promise.
My parents spent years and years trying to teach me to keep track of my keys with shame.
Never. Fucking. Worked.
I’d do shit like walk around the neighborhood for two hours in winter rather than admit that my keys were lost again. And even when I could keep track of my keys, it was a constant drain of executive function points that I could have been spending on things like homework.
My husband hung little key hooks by the front door, and it worked instantly. Not 100% effective, but like 99% effective. And when my keys do get lost, instead of blaming myself, I stop and think about why the system broke and how I might need to modify it. Oh, there was snow, and dealing with boots and other outerwear distracted me as I came in the door? Yeah, that might happen. How do I incorporate key hanging into the process of wet boot removal?
