It’s Not Your Fault: Combatting Guilt for the Neurodivergent Individual
By: Austin Harvey
Tags: Neurodivergent, Adhd, Attention Deficit, Self, Life

Neurodivergent guilt stems from being held to neurotypical standards.

Psychotherapist Rebecca Olmsted writes, “What appears to others as problematic behaviours…may be perceived internally by the person with ADHD as just more reasons why they really are fundamentally flawed.”

An ex-girlfriend once criticized me for starting a lot of projects I never finished, which was true. I came up with many story ideas I liked, but I’d get discouraged or bored halfway through and abandon them, onto the next thing. However, she only said this after we broke up, so I internalized it and assumed it must have contributed to the breakup. In fact, I took on every bit of criticism and reached a conclusion: I was a broken, lazy, unlovable person.

I was 22, failing to meet the expectations that were put on me. I worked as a waiter in a burger restaurant, and I had no plans of moving to LA to “put my screenwriting degree to use.” My car had a broken heating system, and it rattled every time I hit a bump in the road. I was depressed and prone to panic attacks. I blurted things out — even things I wasn’t meant to share — without thinking, and it hurt people around me. I drank a lot because it was the only thing that shut my brain up. When other people looked at me, they saw a sad burnout with a drinking problem going nowhere in life.

Actually, that’s probably not true. It’s what I felt and what I assumed they saw. I saw myself achieving less than my peers, and I thought it was because I wasn’t putting in the effort. I felt like I was cursed to a life of mediocrity and unhappiness. I didn’t know why I felt so unmotivated and lethargic — just that I did — or why I had such a hard time doing important things even though everyone around me could. I was ashamed.

Evidently, shame is a major side effect of undiagnosed ADHD in adults. Psychologist, New York Times bestselling author, and podcast host Edward Hallowell, writes, “The older you get, the more shame you are apt to feel if your ADHD is undiagnosed…you may feel the only way you can be accepted is by putting on a mask. In addition, you may feel that the real you is fundamentally flawed.”

Shame, he explains, is traumatic. It raises your stress hormones and fragments your memory. It also inhibits your ability to feel any sense of pride in yourself. You might opt not to apply for a job because you assume you’d never get hired anyway. You might not ask someone out because there are twenty better people at the same bar. You might receive an accolade and say it’s a fluke. You’d never earn one, after all.

“You imagine harsh judges everywhere,” Hallowell continues. “You project the harsh judgments you are making of yourself out onto everyone you meet. Soon the world becomes like a huge set of judgmental eyes, looming down on you, and your only option is to hide.”

New York psychiatrist Scott Shapiro takes this idea further. “Shame is not only a feeling,” he says. “It is also a belief that one is broken, damaged, or defective. Having this belief, this experience of shame, can create strong feelings of anxiety and fear. Beliefs are very powerful. Beliefs influence how we see ourselves, how we see our potential in the world.”

Consider too that ADHD often goes unnoticed in adults, and without understanding what we’re dealing with, we can’t learn how to deal with it. Adults with ADHD are also at an increased risk for depressive disorders and anxiety disorders which, in combination, severely impact our lives.

Feelings of depression and anxiety can intensify the shame we feel and the guilt we put on ourselves for “not being good enough.” Another study acknowledged the link between substance abuse and ADHD, finding that those with undiagnosed ADHD are more likely to turn to substances as a means of managing their issues.

Undiagnosed ADHD can lead to behaviors for which we have no explanation and for which we might feel even more shame — turning to alcohol, for example, when you’re feeling anxious. Shame makes feelings of depression worse, making us less motivated to perform tasks, thus leading to further shame.

It’s a vicious cycle, one that’s difficult to address unless we identify the underlying problem: our neurodivergent brains.

This is the trap I’d fallen into over and over again. I’d let someone whose brain functioned, for lack of a better word, normally define what success and failure meant for me, and when I started to believe in those definitions, I also started to believe that I fell on the end of “failure.” It’s the same way I felt when talking to my mom on the phone: I made an impulsive decision to quit a job, but now I’m struggling again because I can’t do basic things like stay on task or manage my money.

Shame reared its ugly head again, and I had no one to blame but myself. I’m the one who didn’t set money aside. I’m the one who took a risky career jump. I’m the one who wasn’t good enough to succeed at it.

I laid on the couch, apathetic and waiting for Ibuprofen to take the back pain I’d gotten from sleeping stiffly away, hating and blaming myself for always being such a failure. Then I realized beating myself up wasn’t doing anyone any good. It’s not my fault I have ADHD, I thought, but it’s the reality of the situation, so what am I going to do about it?