Overzealous coping mechanisms

Maybe losing our tricks is exactly what we need

It’s a warm and sunny August afternoon in Ohio as I pack up the last of our vacation vibes into suitcases to travel west. I’ve spent the previous week interrogating my life for signs of this supposed ADHD fiasco. Irritation grumbles as I notice my brain in ways I’ve conveniently dismissed.

Then a brand new thought pops into my forty-year-old brain.

Maybe the coping mechanisms aren’t who I really am?

Ask anyone who knows me fairly well and they’ll tell you I’m an enneagram 1, first-born, type A, responsible, on-time, people-pleasing, rule-follower. That’s been my thing since elementary school. I got the group project done when everyone slacked. I organized the trips with friends. I kept an eye on the clock and the schedule everywhere I went, convinced my ability to control reality would ensure my survival.

Yeah.

In my hyperfocus ADHD research, I came across a comment on a Facebook thread that slowed my roll and felt eerily true.

“You’ll have to unpack a lot of overzealous coping mechanisms put in place since you were young to compensate for ADHD symptoms.”

Cue exploding brain molecules.

Wait. There’s a chance all these “strategies” I’m noticing are an adjustment? A way of coping? A way to get around something I didn’t understand?

Well, if that’s true, what’s underneath the overzealous coping mechanisms?

I turned to my trusted journal and tried to make sense of what was unraveling faster than I liked: There has always been an energy in me that felt too wild. That I needed to control. More than my fear or taking up my space, what if this energy was an overactive brain? I could never contain or understand it. It’s driven me bananas for decades. Everything I’ve ever done was trying to control this energy. This flow. It was so strong. I couldn’t organize or corral it. It was always beyond me.

Then the magical fireworks arrived for anyone who realizes their anxiety may not be a character flaw after all. It could have a source. A birthplace. A reason it exists, beyond my personal failing.

Maybe I’m not simply a worrier by nature. Maybe I could stop shaming myself for being such a control-freak. Maybe all these symptoms of internal chaos could diminish if I finally found the true source of their beginning.

I stood in the mirror the next day and my mouth dropped open. I looked into my clear blue eyes and saw the depth of truth: This internal chaos is what I’ve tried to hide my entire life. And it has a name.

Every single coping mechanism went to work ensuring I would be on-time, organized, focused, intentional, articulate, and well — a kick-ass woman doing all the things the world expected her to do. And I did them. Well.

Which is why a late diagnosis for women with ADHD is so mind-boggling. I hear what people think, “Look at everything you accomplished. You can’t have ADHD. You come across so put together and on top of things.”

Yes. I do.

It’s called masking.

And it comes at a deep cost.

Verywell / Laura Porter

It’s worth noting that, in my context, not all masking was terrible. I’m grateful for the many of the things I learned how to do. The good news is that now I get to choose the energy I bring to situations. I can choose the overzealous coping mechanism that is sometimes still needed. Or I can choose to be my full brilliant ADHD self. Best of all, I’m learning to enjoy more of the traits of who I really am.

I can be messy. I can be clean.
I can be forgetful. I can be organized.
I can make quick creative decisions. I can think it through.
I can be impulsive with my kids. I can be intentional with them.
I can ride my emotional roller coaster. I can sit quietly with big feelings.
I can arrive late and ease into things. I can be on time when it matters.
I can struggle to start a task. I can hype myself and hack my dopamine.

Feels like freedom.

Let’s take a walk up to the balcony for a more expansive view. I’ve got some good news for anyone who finds themselves masking traits and behaviors they sense aren’t welcome in our patriarchal, white supremacist, excessively polite, hustle-or-die, consumeristic air.

We disrupt these inherently flawed systems when we choose to stop masking.

The systems and the people who subscribe to them would love for us to mask. To contain. To control ourselves so we fit neatly into boxes prescribed to us.

But we don’t have to.

The women in Iran are showing us how. The US women’s soccer team are showing us how. Brave humans talking about mental health, being queer, stigmas, sexual abuse, climate justice, body positivity, very real threats to democracy, police brutality, and gun violence are showing us how. These humans are refusing to mask their beautiful selves. They are screaming their stories to anyone who will listen.

Here’s the wild thing. When we realize we’re masking something about our true self so we can fit in and go along with how things are — we’re awfully invested in convincing other people to keep masking too. Because we know, deep down, that if they stop masking, we’ll have to come face to face with a terrible truth: We are not living inside our full self. We’re half alive and hoping no one notices.

Photo by Dmitry Schemelev on Unsplash

What about you, my lovely reader?

What does it feel like in your body when you’re living from your true self? The place that feels like home. Where you can breathe a full deep breath.

When do you pick up a mask so you can fit in? It may be slight. Or maybe it’s significant. Simply notice.

Do you have to mask?

What might happen to the system you’re in if you didn’t mask? Would that be as terrible as you’ve been trained to believe?

I’m with you, friend. Taking off these masks is difficult and real. It’s freeing and scary. But, best of all — it’s possible.

A friend of a friend said during the pandemic: “I feel like all my tricks have been exhausted and I’m left with nothing but the grace between the womb and the tomb.”

Yeah. Maybe losing our tricks is the best thing that could happen to every single one of us.