The need to over-explain everything
Some of the most stressful things in life are socially evaluative…
And regardless of how it came about…
If you’re like me and were ever diagnosed with ADHD…
You were one of the “bad kids” in some way or another…
You weren’t good enough…
Weren’t trying hard enough…
Always acting up around peers, or in class…
And this is a self-perpetuating cycle…
Because the child with ADHD is simply expressing the fact that they have certain needs that aren’t being met. And they’re expressing it the only way they know how, because they don’t have words for it. All they know is “something isn’t right.”
And this “odd” behavior is met with rejection…
Again and again…
The child learns not to trust himself, his bodily sensations must be misleading him if what all the adults are saying is true…
Thus, the need to over-explain everything…
Out of fear of being rejected, yet again.
And once we understand how these things have come about, we can begin to let them go…
They no longer need to be a part of our identity…
They no longer need to have any control over the outcomes of our lives.
Until next time,
Kevin