Becoming Who I Was All Along... the journey back to finding your purpose- ADHD MidLife REinvention

Our mermaid is leaving the masks & chains behind- heading toward her purpose

The Art of Becoming Who I Was All Along-Unboxed, Untamed, and Actually, Kind of Wonderful. My story of ADHD MidLife REinvention. Raw, So Vulnerable & a REexamined life.

I used to believe that if you were a good person, you’d live a good life. Be nice. Work hard. Don’t yell in the grocery store. Get married, raise decent humans, pay your bills on time, maybe even keep a gratitude journal. I did some of that, quite a few times in fact. I really tried.

And in return, I thought I’d get the deal: A home/family that didn’t fall apart. A life that made sense in the big world. A future I could count on. Predictable. Fair. Also? Fiction.

Because it turns out, the universe does not care about your chore chart or your color-coded life plan.

People leave - in every kind of way.

Jobs end. - by chance, by choice and by circumstance.

Illness - shows up, and takes the hell over.

Mother Nature flexes, and you’re left standing in front of actual mountains of moldy memories, piles of your life taller than your roof.

Your dreams ghost you like a bad Bumble date. IYKYK

And then finally, you’re in a life that... technically checks all the boxes… But (for real) after a lifetime of this stuff, it just feels like déjà vu with droopier boobs and even more emotional water damage. (remind me to explain the black mold of emotional water damage later..squirrel again)

I call it the Lather, Rinse, REpeat cycle.

Same story. New cast. Same pain. I know this song by heart. I got better at masking. Better at mimicking. Better at building a life that marginally looked successful from the outside. Truth was that it never once felt like I could live in it. I couldn’t. Hence I kept leaving it. But damn I tried.

And I don’t just mean the kind of discomfort that comes from a bad fit. I mean the kind of life that made me feel like I didn’t belong in my own skin. The kind that makes you question your existence. It felt like no matter how hard I tried, I was always one volume level, one emotion, one blurted-out idea away from me being finally, too much. Like literally, the real too much. Or not enough. Same, right? (Squirrel: does being told you are too much and not enough happen to you? seems like it would feel different. Hmmm)

Not everyone knows that feeling. But if you do… you know. Which brings us to the bank job. I had one. Little old ladies named Hazel wanting better interest rates on CDs and new savings accounts for grandkids.

I was smiling politely while I slowly disintegrated inside. From the outside? Respectable. From the inside? An eerily quiet, fluorescent version of "Ruthie" hell.

Most of us grew up in survival mode. Be good. Be small. Be grateful. Be quiet. Don’t talk too much. You’re talking too loud. Don’t need too much. Calm down. They called it being responsible. They called that growing up. Felt like trauma.

Listen, if that was the criteria for a “successful” child, I was doomed from before my day one. Not because I was lazy. Not because I was broken. But because I was born wired like a lightning storm, fast, emotional, curious, intense. I was precocious and big and still have so many thoughts per minute that my own mouth couldn’t keep up. That has always been true.

And no one ever said, “Hey, maybe the problem isn’t you. Maybe the box we try to put you in is just too damn small.” So I tried even harder. There are no words to explain how hard and how many times I tried. To sit still. To be quiet. To keep the volume down and stuff the feelings in. To play the role. To earn the lollipop. To pass for normal. (as a personal note, my Mother was obsessed with me being 'normal,' and every conversation we had seemed to hold up my feelings in comparison with how 'normal' people felt things. psssst, I would not recommend this - long term scars)

I sucked at life. That was how I felt.

I didn’t just feel like I was failing at something everyone else seemed to be able to do—I was failing at it. Constantly.

I was blurting out answers in class. Interrupting people mid-sentence. Forgetting simple directions five seconds after hearing them. So, this didn’t just happen in childhood, this stuff happened recently. This week, to be honest.

My brain was on fire. And I didn’t know that wasn’t how everyone else felt. I just thought I was bad at life.

I didn’t understand that their thoughts (neurotypicals) came in neat little rows while mine showed up like a confetti cannon inside a wind tunnel.

I didn’t understand myself. And quite frankly, back in those days, neither did anyone else. ADHD thought to be for little boys, thought to go away at puberty.

I was misunderstood. Then ADHD was dismissed that it was even real… that’s soul crushing and invalidating as hell. (pet peeve... remind me of the rant on people who try to invalidate the truth of a diagnosis that they neither have nor understand... UGH)

So, when I ended up behind that office in the bank with tidy glass walls and a pretty shiny desk, selling checking accounts CD's and pretending I was fine, what I was really doing was reenacting the same lie: If I try hard enough, maybe this time I’ll finally feel good enough. It’s a great job, stable, acceptable. But the giant fluorescent lights and was eerily quiet. HELL, I tell you. Complete HELL.

I was NEVER built for that life. The one I thought I had to have to be okay. But, this was a cosmically/ warp speed, bad idea. And that, right there, was the clue. Not fitting in didn’t mean I was broken. It meant I was never meant to belong there in the first place.

And listen… if you do thrive in that kind of structure, if spreadsheets and routine make your heart sing, I see you, and I love you. I wanted desperately to be you.

But for someone like me? Trying to live that life only creates incredible pain. It’s like forcing a sea turtle to climb a tree and then calling her lazy and stupid when she can’t.

Here’s who I actually am: I like to paint things. Design things. I like to talk about deep meaningful things. I like to understand people and feelings and the ocean. I love the ocean. The quiet, the wonder, the interconnectedness.

I lose time in the details and stretch deadlines like taffy, because I’m trying to make it just right.

I’m an idea machine with poor file management. My brain thinks of million dollar ideas constantly. My guardian angel just wants me to pick ONE, any ONE. Do that.

But me, I leave half-finished projects and trail glitter glue into new ones.

I was made to create—not to comply.

I remember when my boyfriend called me an artist for the first time. I wasn’t quite done with an art project and in a nonchalant way he said, “Babe, you’re an artist,” he’d shrug. And I got pissed. It felt like an insult. As if being an artist meant “flakey” or “not serious” or “just a hobby.” But he wasn’t insulting me. He was calling me forward. Naming what I couldn’t yet claim. Because the truth is:

I am a creator.

That is WHY my brain floods with a hundred ideas an hour.

That’s why I don’t fit in boxes.

That’s why I’ve never been able to “just pick one thing and stick with it.”

And I finally stopped apologizing for it.

So if you’re out there still trying to contort yourself into something you’re not; still trying to make your wild, magical, ADHD-fueled soul look like a productivity spreadsheet;

Please stop.

Stop trying to fit in. Stop trying to pass for good enough. Stop trying to prove your worth by pretending you’re not who you are.

You’re not broken. You’re just done performing, masking and trying to be someone you were never ever meant to be.

And that, my love, finding your purpose is the beginning of freedom.

(I just got finished rewriting this for the 22nd time. It’s so freakin true. But so freakin’ vulnerable. oopfh) I wish my mother could read these… I know she would be so proud of me. Can you subscribe from up in heaven? Maybe you and Aunt Di? Just putting it out there…

If you felt this in your bones, you’re not alone.

Hit subscribe to follow Spicy Living, where we’re turning emotional water damage into underwater cathedrals. And if you’ve ever tried to “be quiet and sit still” while your soul was screaming? Tell me in the comments—I want to hear your story too.

They told me to be quiet and sit still.

So (eventually) I built a kingdom of glitter, broken rules, and unfinished art, and made it home. You are welcome to come... have some coffee, wine maybe? A retreat? An adventure?

You are welcome here. Where we will literally celebrate all of our imperfections.