Hello lovely readers. It’s been a while. I have found myself recently in a state of overwhelm and I’m wondering if others relate. Nothing is bad, everything is fine. But it’s also not somehow and I’m struggling to find a path to solutions to what’s ailing me.
The fall semester has begun over here and the kids are doing just fine. Luca is back to school in Berkeley and enjoying her classes. Pete is in the midst of his internship through the adult school. He enjoys it a lot and comes home happy. I am just exhausted, though. Neither of my darling children drive, so I am driving them around daily while working my FT job. It has been suggested to me that I’m doing too much, but I don’t know what else to do. Pete has decided that at least for now, driving is not something he feels comfortable doing. Luca has some anxiety around driving that she/we are working through. I am reluctant to push too hard as I have a lot of empathy for the anxiety, but when is it time for me to push her out of the nest? I don’t know the answer, and I know it’s an individual decision for me/Luca and not a general one.
Sometimes I think of all the stuff I just figured out on my own as a young person with no support from anywhere and I am amazed. Different times, I know. Am I wrong for not wanting my child to suffer in some of the ways I have suffered, though? I think if I’d had more guidance in my earlier years, maybe I’d not be so anxious now? How can you know you’re making the right decisions in parenting?
What I know is I’m so tired of planning, carrying around information about others’ schedules in my brain, making sure people have lunches and dinners and that the dogs have seen the vet. I’m just TIRED. People help me when I ask, mostly enthusiastically. I am grateful. But what I wish is that somone, anyone would see me and step in from time to time. That every now and then, someone would say “I’ll make dinner.” Have I spoiled them all so much that they don’t even consider it? Sometimes I’m am literally too tired to speak. Like it takes too much energy, energy I don’t have, to ask for help so I empty the dishwasher myself or whatever. That’s how tired I am.
Krista and I (and my sisters and I, constantly) have discussed this at length. We want to take responsibility for our own happiness and our own trajectory in life. We are acutely aware that the clock keeps on ticking, as evidenced by the rapid growing-up of our kids and the fact that people in our own age-range have experienced things like heart attacks and serious struggles with incurable dieseases. We know that each day is not promised, and that we better get on with things.
The truth is I don’t know anyone who is not struggling in some way. We are all so aware of how things that happened in childhood or early adulthood are now negatively impacting the way we walk through life. One person I know went through a round of ketamine therapy, which was super impactful but also really painful and difficult. Other friends are tackling alcohol use, trying to eat better for health (not to adhere to stupid beauty standards), and trying to forgive and LET GO of shit that no longer serves them. I know zero people without some kind of baggage that haunts them.
Someone suggested to me that I finally have the space to deal with some of my demons because I’m not currently struggling financially, which was a situation I found myself in for most of my adult life. She is right — I have the privilege finally to have some space to just think. What I am learning both astounds and relieves me, and I guess makes me say “well, obviously.” I have suggested on this blog a couple of times that I think I, like both of my children, may be neurodivergent. The more I read about this and think about my past, and see my past through the lens of neurodiversity, the more I say, “well, obviously.” I had always thought that the autism came from Paul’s side. I don’t say that as a put-down, for the record. Just that I know that spectrumy stuff is genetic, and it seemed clear that Grandpa Pete was on the spectrum. Paul suggested that he, himself was also on the spectrum. So I guess I left it at that. But in the subsequent years, I can see that other members of my extended family that are not Ditos are on the spectrum, too, so it makes sense the there is a genetic thread from my family of origin as well.
I have always thought that I am just a very flawed person. That I have been unable to keep up with things that I see other people doing. My house has never been as organized and clean as my sisters’ houses, for example. My car is dirty most of the time. I am often overwhelmed and seek solitude frequently. I avoid doing tasks because of anxiety. I procrastinate like nobody’s business. Still, I have managed to oversee a household, mostly on my own, for years and years. My kids have always had the things they needed and most of the time the things they wanted. We always have clean laundry and food on the table. I am also organzied in my own way, having developed systems to keep important documents safe. We see the dentist and eye doctor regularly and have all our vaccinations. I think because of all this, I did not consider that I could have ADD or some other difference in my neurology.
I have a very black-and-white way of thinking that is really hard to circumvent. I have very few acquaintances and my friends are a super small, tight circle. It’s hard for me to maintain relationships with people who don’t feel 100% safe to me. I tend to catastrophize everything and do “worst case scenario” thinking to assure myself that even if the most terrible outcome happens, I can handle it. I live with an incredible amount of anxiety, but feel so lucky that I am surrounded by people and family members who accept me and love me and help me. I hope that my experience with all this has helped them, too.
I used to hate meeting people in a public place because I was convinced they would forget. Not forget we had a meeting set, but forget that I existed. That was my fear, that a friend or boyfriend or family member would forget that I was alive. Since I was a small child I felt very different from other people. I never shared those feelings with anyone because to talk about it made me feel even more defective. It was a secret I carried with me for a long, long time. I can remember being around 5 years old and just feeling like I could see things that other people could not, like people being cruel to each other. I could feel people’s feelings and that often caused me pain. I was deemed shy and “too sensitive.” But despite all this, or maybe BECAUSE of all this, I never had a particularly hard time making friends. Girl friends, that is. I was afraid of boys and men. I have always had friends, further pushing my thoughts away from having some sort of spectrum issue. Friendship was relatively easy.
Luca says that neurodivergent people just find each other. Almost all her friends are on the spectrum. Which leads me to wonder: is that one reason Paul and I found each other? What about other friends I have had or have now?
I think I am finally at a place where I am no longer repressing my true self, and this is part of being the age that I am. I am trying to be nicer to myself for my shortcomings, and consider that maybe some of it is not my fault. Maybe I am doing the best I can with what I have to work with, and that having a dirty car is less important that working my way out of intrusive thoughts. Maybe I can decide how to use my limited energy for things that actually matter and let the rest go. I am not suggesting a free pass; I know my black-and-white thinking has most certainly hurt some people. I’m thinking it through and asking forgiveness and trying to adjust my possibilities.
Cheese Holiday 