I Am ADHD, ADHD Is Me: How Your Mental Disorder Becomes Your Personality

Having ADHD sucks.

It's my constant enemy, thwarting my best intentions. It makes me fail, time and time again. It always makes me late. It makes mountains out of molehills. It sends me into shame spirals and destroys my self-esteem.

It eats time. It harms social interactions. It robs me of my memory for the most basic things, and most important. It is my arch-nemesis.

I don't know if I could live without it.

It is me.

When you live with a mental disorder like ADHD for 36 years without knowing that it's there, it becomes a part of your personality. All those quirks and ways my brain worked differently were ME.

I AM those quirks, that out-of-the-box thinking, the creative problem-solver who knows how to make people laugh, yet fears rejection even from lifelong friends.

It permeates all that you do, all that you are.

It shapes your values. It crafts hope and dreams, this brain defect that won't leave you alone.

Who am I without it? It's scary to say, but I honestly don't know.

It's not that ADHD is all that I am. But where is the distinction? The line that separates the true ME from the disorder?

A cure for ADHD sounds amazing... for someone else.

I just want to be me, and I am ADHD.