On pausing and the real reason I need slow living

…now that possible ADHD is in the mix

Three months into 2022 and I feel like I’ve done very little. When setting an intention at the start of January to pause, I absolutely believed by the end of March I would know exactly what my plans for work/life would be for the rest of the year.

Clearly, that hasn’t happened.

New Years Day was the breaking point for me (I know, what a way to start the year, right?) as a simple request for yogurt sent my already overwhelmed brain into hyperdrive and led to the biggest breakdown I’ve ever had. I spent the next two weeks in bed, sleeping and doing as little as possible. I called my GP to double my anxiety medication and mentioned that I was starting to think perhaps how I was feeling was more than post-natal depression.

It was ADHD all along

Four weeks later as I checked in with the GP again, I’d essentially diagnosed myself with ADHD. My younger sister is currently waiting for an assessment for it and the more I read about it (by ‘read’, I mean ‘laughed painfully at a lot of memes’) the more I could see myself reflected. When speaking to the doctor, and 10 days later, a mental health practitioner, I hyper focused on explaining all the reasons why I felt an ADHD diagnosis could apply to me. On this second call (the screening), I was interrupted shortly after I’d begun speaking to be told I’d talked non-stop for 9 minutes already and it was clear I have a lot to say, my brain was all jumbled up and my mind was racing. A further 50 minutes on, lots of laughs at ridiculous things I’ve done in the past, and we’d established I have a chaotic daily routine and it was ‘more than likely’ I have ADHD.

‘I just thought everyone’s brain was like mine…’

‘No, they’re really not. Mine isn’t.’

Oh.

So, here I am - a few months off 40 years old - and I suddenly understand why life has always seemed that bit harder for me than everyone else. Why I jump from one thing to another and rarely complete things. How I can feel my brain trying to compute something and often just…STOPS. Late, forgetful, hyper focused or completely uninterested, often unable to control my emotions, socially anxious or awkward, distracted, clumsy and ‘ditsy’. Saddest of all, now I know why I have felt stupid my entire life.

It’s a lot to process.

But along with this sadness and a pull to wonder ‘what if?’ and ‘who could I have been?’, is a certain amount of freedom. Because I no longer need to beat myself up for not achieving ‘things’ in the same way as others. I now know there is absolutely no point putting together some big marketing plan for my business because there’s almost zero chance I will ever follow through on it. Figuring out the one career and way of working for the rest of my life is neeeeever going to happen. And whilst I kind of already knew this about myself, I also still desperately believed there was some kind of magic out there that would eventually lead to a Utopia where everything in my life and work just came together easily. The ‘if this one thing could just work out, everything else will too.’ NOPE.

ADHD and slow living

What makes complete sense now is why I have been drawn to slow living for so long. I thought it was because the world around me was so fast that my brain was all over the place: now I know it’s that my brain is the one racing, jumping and never being quiet. Of course I need to live slow! Of course I need to give myself permission day after day to rest as much as necessary (I’m also hypersensitive to various things & all that processing on top of ADHD is fricking exhausting). Of course I need to focus on only what lights me up - I simply cannot drag myself through anything less. This is all great information for me to have!

So, what’s next?

I’ve been referred to the ADHD Service team for an official assessment and hopefully, diagnosis. Assuming they think me worthy of one, I’ll be popped on the waiting list for that and hope that it’s not a two year process. For now, I’m continuing to read a lot about it and speak to friends who have also been recently diagnosed (ADHD often presents differently in girls and is therefore overlooked in favour of the ‘hyperactive schoolboy’. Not the case). It feels strange to be part of a growing group of women in mid-life being diagnosed. As more and more people become aware of it, it almost feels like a ‘trend’ which is a pretty weird thing to say about a neurodiversity but there you go. I need to work on what to say when faced with comments such as ‘everyone is a bit ADHD’ (who knows, but all I know is the ‘bit’ ADHD I am has actually impacted my life a fair amount and genuinely makes very basic things feel insurmountable).

In the meantime, I’ll just be carrying on figuring out how best to approach life with this new perspective. Because nothing has changed and everything has change