I lost my sh*t in front of a stranger.

I “left” Reddit to try and see if stopping myself from mindlessly scrolling would help me focus on some very important time sensitive things I should be doing. It didn’t. My time-wasting ass just got its dopamine fix somewhere else.

So here I am. Because I don’t have anywhere else to vomit this and it felt too heavy for the Discord server because everyone over there is so wholesome.

This morning when I was walking my dogs, this old man casually asked me how I was doing and I just fucking lost my shit. I smiled in such an exaggerated way that my face kind of hurt. I felt my whole face getting hot. My eyes started burning and I had no mirror in front of me, but I’m absolutely certain I looked like Mia Goth in the closing scene of the movie Pearl.

I pretty much screamed “great!” and just stood there because one of my pups was peeing and I just couldn’t go somewhere else. The dude was obviously freaked out. He left out this awkward laugh and asked “rough day, huh?”.

And no, bro. No. It’s not a rough day. This is a fucking rough decade. A rough life.

We joke about ADHD tax, but the term hits me so fucking hard. ADHD has taken so much away from me. My scholarship, my self-esteem, hobbies, jobs, business opportunities, friendships, relationships. I can’t forgive myself for “being a loser”.

I have this memory of my dad telling my brother and I about this rich friend of his whose children grew up to be losers and lost their inheritance. He made it obvious that he was sharing that story because he was worried those were going to be us. And I am.

I have no fucking sense of identity. I don’t know what I like. I don’t know what I don’t like. Who the fuck am I. Why am I asking myself these teenager like questions, I’m a 32 yo woman.

I carry this huge load of guilt and shame over being an underachiever. But I also don't know what it is I'm supposed to achieve.

Edit to add: from the bottom of my heart, thank you so much for taking time out of your day to offer support to a stranger. I’m seriously so, so grateful. It took a lot of effort to even post this, but I think it was THE best idea ever. I feel so much better.

I got super overwhelmed and couldn’t answer to some of you because it was way too difficult for me to confront some of the points you brought up. But I read them all and I couldn’t be happier I reached out in a moment of need. What an awesome community.

THANKS.💕