Knowing Better Doesn’t Make My Brain Cooperate

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It is currently 12:34 a.m., which feels like an excellent time to mention that I was supposed to be going to bed early tonight.

Technically, I am in bed. I just also happen to have my laptop open, because apparently my brain has decided that right before sleep is the perfect time to suddenly have thoughts worth writing down.

Classic.

I don’t even know if anyone is still reading these little rambles, but at this point I’m trying to care more about consistency than whether every post is some beautifully constructed piece of literature.

And, somehow, I’m 4 for 4.

An entire month of actually posting when I said I was going to.

Not too shabby, Winchester. Not too shabby.

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AnywayI

One thing about me is that I am painfully self-aware. Like, almost annoyingly so. I know what my problems are. I know what habits I have. I know exactly where I get in my own way.

Therapy would probably just be someone sitting across from me going, “So why do you think you do that?”

And I’d be like, “Oh, I already have a twelve-point presentation prepared.”

The frustrating part is that I also know what I’m capable of.

I’ve seen what happens when I actually lock onto something and put my entire brain behind it. I can get a ridiculous amount done. I can build things from basically nothing. I can become completely consumed by an idea and somehow make it real.

And then the other 98% of the time, my brain is standing in the kitchen buffering because there are three dishes in the sink.

Executive dysfunction is fun like that.

I have ADHD and a mild learning disorder, and one of the weirdest parts about knowing that is realizing that understanding why your brain does something does not magically give you the ability to stop doing it.

I’m also fairly convinced there’s a spicy little case of the ’tism hanging around in there somewhere.

Even my psychologist basically went, “If there’s one, there’s more likely to be another. These things tend to travel in packs.”

Thanks, doc.

The bigger problem is that a diagnosis only gets you so far when medication, therapy, assessments and everything else cost money.

Knowing what’s going on in your brain can absolutely help you understand yourself better, but then comes the part where you actually have to figure out how to live with the thing.

And that part?

Still working on it.

I’ve picked up little tricks over the years. I’ve built systems. I’ve abandoned systems. I’ve downloaded approximately seventeen productivity apps because apparently this one was definitely going to fix my entire life.

Spoiler: it did not.

But I’m learning what works for me, what absolutely does not, and when I need to stop trying to force myself to function exactly like everyone else.

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It is now 12:54 a.m., which means twenty minutes have passed and I have once again proven the entire point of this post by writing it instead of sleeping.

So I’m calling it.

Maybe I’ll add more before I hit publish.

Maybe this is exactly what you get.

Either way, peace out, homies.

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My brain isn’t broken. It just refuses to create in straight lines.

Talk soon, Kass. ☕✨