So, in yesterday’s post, I was musing about growing up with hidden disabilities. Well, presumed because I haven’t been tested for them. And I mentioned in the last post that I was scolded for not paying attention to what I was doing as I was doing it (as a kid). I absorbed that I was clumsy, ungraceful, and a dolt. Even though I did several different physical things with dexterity (including ping-pong, tennis, volleyball, dancing (tap, jazz, ballet), playing the cello, just as a few examples), I still felt like a total clutz.
In talking with a friend about various neurospicy issues, she said that many people with neurodiversity issues feel that way (that there is something wrong with them). I knew that ,but it’s hard to personalize it. What I mean is that if someone else said that they felt that way, I would sympathize and bolster them as much as possible. I don’t think someone should feel bad about neurospicy.
But. And of course there’s a but. I didn’t feel that way about myself. In part because I did not know that I was neurodivergent. Or rather, I knew my brain didn’t think the way other brains thought. That was pretty obvious. When I was a kid, however, I just thought there was something fundamentally wrong with me. Oh, and my family. Not in the dysfunctionla sense, but because we were Taiwanese in a very lily-white area.
I felt like an alien. I had no idea how to act around other kids. It was partly the very isolating Taiwanese Christian family, but it was also just…I did not think the way other kids did. I didn’t care about what they cared about, so I spent most of my time lost in the worlds of books. That was my safe space, and I read almost every moment I wasn’t in school.
I read as I walked, too, which contributed to me thinking I was clumsy. But, see, I had to occupy my mind in order for it not to be flooded with bad thoughts. It kept the demons at bay, if only just. I was deeply unhappy as a kid and wanted to be dead. I just did not want to be alive. I had a mental breakdown when I was in college, but managed to fight my way through it. Not well, and it left me but a husk, but I scraped by. I garduated magna cum laude, but that was just because school was easy for me–and somewhat of a a safe space. Meaning, I liked learning. It was one way to keep my mind occupied. So that was almost cheating for me. School, I mean. I put in about a fourth of the effort of my classmates and managed to get mostly As, regardless.
One incident that has stuck with me all my life. I was in a neuropsychology class (psych was my major), and I had a classmate who wanted to study with me for a test. She was also Asian, which isn’t relevant, but interesting given that there were like three of us in our year. A small, private liberal arts college in the 90s? Yeah, there weren’t many of us. Anyway, the weeks leading up to the exam, she would toss out questions at me as she passed me on campus. I’d just shrug and say I didn’t know.
I di not want to study with her because I study better alone, but she would not take no for an answer. The night before the test, I went to her room to study around 7 p.m. I had not studied at all before then because my M.O. was to wait until the night before around midnight and cram in three hours of study before going to bed.
After a half hour of me saying I didn’t know and that I hadn’t studied, she finally gave up in frustration. I went back to my room, fucked around for a few hours, then did my usual cramming. The next day, I took the test and did not feel good about it. I didn’t like neuropsychology in general, but had to take it for my major. When my professor returned the tests, she prefaced it by saying, “I have never given a hundred before, but I did today.” She had taught for decades at this point.
I got my test back. I got the hundred. I shouldn’t have, but let me answer essay questions, and I will always score better than on a multiple choice test. Plus, she really liked me. Like a lot. I looked at my grade and turned the test over so the grade was facedown. My classmate came over to try to guess who got the hundred. She had gotten in the high seventies. She guesesd this person and that, assuming that I wasn’t the one to get the hundred.
I did not deserve the hundred, but I was, indeed, the one who got it. I have always been good at school. In some ways, this was the worst thing possible for my neurodivergent issues beacuse it allowed me to bullshit my way through a lot of my schooling. That’s not to say I wasn’t smart–I was and am. Nor was it to say I didn’t desernve my grades–in general, I did. But it was to say that I didn’t put in the effort my classmates did.
Then again, grades in general are bullshit, so theer’s that as well. Plus, as my Taiji teacher is fond of saying, it’s ideal to put out as little effort as possible to get the best/most/biggest output.
As a kid/teen, I relied way too heavily on my brain power because I thought I had nothing else. It wasn’t until I started studying Taiji that I became more comfortable in my body. Before that, I just considered it a nuisance meat bag that carried my brain around. I did not care if I ran into things and hurt it because it wasn’t me. Only my brain was me.
Because of this, I hurt myself a lot. Not on purpose (well, I did self-harm as well, but that was something different), but I just did not care what happened to my body. I burned it multiple times on the oven, sliced it several times on jagged edges and such, and on one memorable occasion, I swatted at the glass window in the garage door because there was a fly. I didn’t realize how thin the glass was and put my hand through it, resulting in a ropey gash on my left wrist. I’m done for now. More tomorrow.