When a YouTube video just resonates with ya.
A friend sent me a video today of Glenn Howerton and Katee Sackhoff talking about adult ADHD diagnoses, and one thing Katee said really stopped me in my tracks:
“I always assumed I was really good at multitasking.”
That line hit me hard because, for most of my life, I thought multitasking was my superpower too.
Over the past few months, though, I’ve started learning something uncomfortable: multitasking is basically a lie. Or at least, not in the way I thought it was.
What I actually became good at was building systems to survive.
I’ve always been organized. I’ve always been able to juggle schedules, appointments, responsibilities, and chaos. But now that I’m looking at my life through the lens of ADHD, I’m realizing many of those “organizational skills” weren’t just personality traits. They were coping skills.
Somewhere along the way, I learned that if I didn’t write something down immediately, I’d forget it. If I didn’t build routines, things would fall apart. If I didn’t stay three steps ahead mentally, important things would get missed.
So I compensated.
And honestly? I compensated well.
I was in counseling. I was managing life. My kids had everything they needed. I was making sure my neurodivergent children got to counseling, OT, school, appointments, and evaluations. I advocated constantly for their needs while trying to keep the household running.
From the outside, I looked “okay.”
The funny thing is, it wasn’t even my own struggles that pushed me toward getting evaluated.
When my youngest child was being re-evaluated, I started noticing similarities I couldn’t ignore anymore. Ironically, I actually thought my husband would be the one who would end up diagnosed. Especially when stress hit, there were behaviors I thought clearly pointed toward being on the spectrum. I thought maybe if we understood what was going on, we could start building his “toolbox” of coping skills and strategies.
So we both got tested.
And somehow, I was the one who came back with the ADHD diagnosis.
That moment made me pause and completely reevaluate myself.
What surprised me even more was how unsurprised everyone else seemed.
My counselor wasn’t shocked. The evaluator wasn’t shocked. Even the person who manages my children’s ADHD medications wasn’t shocked.
Meanwhile I was sitting there like someone had quietly handed me the missing instruction manual to my own brain.
There’s something strange about realizing other people may have seen pieces of you more clearly than you saw yourself. Not because it was anyone’s responsibility to say something, but because it creates this weird moment of reflection where you start replaying your entire life in a different context.
Suddenly all those things you thought were personality quirks, flaws, or “just stress” start rearranging themselves into a pattern.
And honestly, I’m still sorting through that pattern.
I’m learning that some of the things I thought made me “high functioning” were actually exhaustion wrapped in color-coded calendars and coping mechanisms.
I’m learning that surviving and thriving are not always the same thing.
And maybe most importantly, I’m learning that being “okay” doesn’t mean something wasn’t quietly difficult the entire time.
The YouTube video that started this rant:
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