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15/7/26 - Neurodivergence and the Crab Pot

When you are neurodivergent some things are hard. Sometimes they feel impossible. Technically speaking they are easy. On paper they shouldn't be a problem. They don't require superhuman feats of strength or endurance, or a phd in fluid mechancics. They are things like doing your homework, sending in a job application, listening to someone when they are talking to you, following simple cooking instructions without getting confused or agitated, calling your mother, remembering a birthday, replying "haha, yeah" to a text, getting off the computer, writing a list, dealing calmly with mild inconvenience, putting up with a loud environment for five minutes, sticking with a simple routine, writing a post on the vaguely defined feed on your website that nobody visits. I've tried to cover there as wide a spectrum of these things from as many types of neurodivergence as I could, because this is not an ADHD thing. In fact, it's not even a neurodivergent versus neurotypical thing. Because the thing I'm getting at is the hurtful bafflement, scorn or pity other people throw your way when you can't seem to get your shit together for the simplest of things. And those people are just as likely to be autistic, have ADHD, depression, bipolar, dyslexia or dyspraxia as they are to be a garden variety normie.
The thing is, we are often just as frustrated in ourselves - usually moreso - as they are. After all, we've had to live with and suffer the consequences of our struggles for our whole lives, and usually we're the ones to be most impacted by our failures. And often trying to explain that you have a neurodivergent condition and these things are just harder for you just ends up sounding like an excuse or laziness, even to yourself as the words leave your mouth. It's truly hard to try to put into words why something so simple is giving you so much trouble.
People are prone to think that you just don't care or don't try hard enough or are selfish or callous, and you tend to think you are useless or inadequate. You find yourself thinking you just need to want it more, or try harder. Because the fact is, sometimes the problem itself is not trying hard enough. After all, when the hurdle is simply putting your pants in the dryer from the washing machine, it's not as if you fail despite trying as hard as possible - there is no difficulty in the task. You didn't try to do it and fail - like you got up, fell over your feet, knocked over the washing machine and accidentally flung the pants into the bin. Well, maybe you did, but that's not the hypothetical I'm talking about here. There is simply a short circuit between wanting and doing, and there seems to be a persistent myth, even in people who shold know better, that wanting and trying are the same thing. So often I want to try. I want so hard I could almost cry. But no matter how hard I want, I still end up just sitting there immobile, or forgetting, or drowning in anxiety, or convincing myself I don't want it after all.
It feels like being in a crab pot. There is an exit for the crab - it's actually pretty wide and easy to get through, but the crab simply doesn't have the mental equipment to recognise it, reach it or navigate through it. All it knows about getting out of things is to push forward, and if that doesn't work, push harder.
I'm slowly learning to find the little breadcrumbs that can lead out of my mental crab pot (because it's my feed and I can use mixed metaphores if I want), but I have a long way to go. The first lesson I needed to learn, I'm realising, is not to listen to those messages from people that say try harder. That's just the crab scratching against the side of the pot again. You already know you can succeed at so many things if you can just bring yourself to the stage of trying - the trick is to bridge the gap from wanting. Once you are genuinely trying - ie putting in effort and determination - you will succeed. Worrying and getting anxious about the fact you can't bring yourself to try is counter-productive. It makes you feel shit about yourself, and makes you flail ineffectually against the walls of your mind prison.
The bad news is, simply knowing that first lesson - that trying is not the hard part or even where your focus should be - is the only obvious step, and the only one you can be told. Every struggle from then on is one you need to tease out painfully for yourself, including how to actually internalise that first lesson and not just 'know' it. For every task you find it impossible to even try despite how much you want to, you need to discover a bespoke solution. A way to tack across the face of the hurdle, rather than trying to sail directly into it, and to make that lesson stick when you've learned it. Because screw you, I'm changing my metaphore again.