Self reflection - truly dull unless you are also overlooking a helpful diagnosis

Nb: coffee n brownie part of self medication!

A friend was talking about her role supporting women who have not been diagnosed with autism until later in life and have suffered ‘burnout’. Something in that sentence hit a deep resonating note.  I felt truly burnout, frazzled to a useless crisp but why?

So I researched burn out and then found my particular brand…ADD burnout.  It all suddenly made colossal sense. Not just now but then.  The pain of meeting deadlines, the constant inner voices and inability to focus, agony of decisions, the sudden peaks of concentration and mania that enabled creativity, my tendency to overshare, feel depressed – so many convergent symptoms that ticked many boxes.  Then I discovered that transitions can trigger burn out.  I rebound from one coffee to another and am self-medicating to stay alert enough but mainly yearn for sleep to control the wave of panic and anxiety of all I can’t face.  

I am incredibly forgetful and dithery and aware that my sense of anxiety has spiralled since the girls arrived.  Can parenting be a trigger for burn out too? The sea of stuff and demands batters me into submission.  I can just about keep my head above water for their sake and keep their clothes clean and supper on the table but my needs have been dropped.  I no longer exercise or eat well or …the list of all that I do not now do is long.  

I’m dyslexic and ADD often accompanies it but girls are harder to diagnose, (as masters of masking).  I wonder if I had known 40 years ago if I might have found ways to ease the rocky path.  Or would I have seen it as a disability and been cowed by it?  Of course there may be a magic pill out there that would make me feel bold, brilliant, better?!  For the first time in my life I could become a drug addict.  That is a strange thought as I have spent so much of my life fearful of drugs and lack of control.  I suppose it’s the opposite – there may be a drug that gives me back control?  So the winding path of discovery continues.

Nnb: those are simply the BEST * brownies ever. Dopamine delights! Sent by post by same immensely wonderful friend who helped me on to the path of self awareness. 

*Gower Cottage Brownies

 

 

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