This Time In My Words

Before I Knew

I lived a long time without knowing I had ADHD.

I just thought I was scattered. Lazy. Too emotional.

I thought I was the problem that couldn’t be solved—

always almost getting it right, but not quite.

Always one step behind what everyone else seemed to do so easily.

I was the kid who couldn’t sit still, but also couldn’t start.

The teen with 100 ideas and 0 follow-through.

The adult with calendars, lists, alarms, and still… forgotten messages, misplaced things, unmet expectations.

I didn’t know why everything felt so hard.

I just learned how to hide it better.

Diagnosis Isn’t a Cure—It’s a Mirror

Getting diagnosed didn’t fix it.

It didn’t magically make my brain easier to live in.

But it gave something I didn’t even realise I was waiting for:

CONTEXT.

It let me soften the shame a little.

It gave me language for the chaos.

It gave me permission to stop calling myself broken and start calling myself wired differently.

And that matters.

Because when you’ve spent your whole life overcompensating, overthinking, and over-apologising,

being able to say “This isn’t a flaw—it’s a pattern” feels like finally letting yourself breathe.

It Still Sometimes Feels Like a Lot

ADHD still feels like walking around in a storm sometimes.

It’s wanting routine, but resenting rules.

It’s needing stimulation, but burning out fast.

It’s forgetting to eat, then bingeing on everything in sight.

It’s working twice as hard to prove I’m not falling behind, then collapsing under the weight of trying so hard.

It’s thinking in ten directions at once.

Caring deeply and reacting fast.

Speaking before thinking.

Feeling everything before I can process what I feel.

And Yet… It’s Me

It’s the reason I’m creative. Curious. Passionate.

It’s why I notice what others miss.

Why I can connect dots, feel energy, jump between ideas, and see the world through a different lens.

I’m not just my ADHD, but it shapes me.

And after years of fighting it, I’m finally learning how to live with it

not against it. That is a choice.

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To Anyone Still Undiagnosed, Still Unsure

If you’ve lived your whole life feeling like you’re constantly falling short…

If your mind is loud, your energy unpredictable, your heart too full or too fast…

If you’ve blamed yourself for years because no one else could explain what you were feeling…

Please know:

You are not broken.

You are not lazy.

You are not failing.

You’re just navigating a world that wasn’t built for your brain. Systems that asked of you what you were not wired to understand alone.

And that’s not your fault.

Having a name for it won’t solve everything.

But it might help you start being a little kinder to yourself.

It did for me…

—Liv 🤍