[VIDEO] My Channel was a Bit Ableist When I Started

Thank you so much for this. I have got really emotional in a mostly good way. Sadness that despite all my personal development work, real growth and telling others they are good enough and lovable enough and worthy enough, I am still struggling with it myself. Also, relief because I realise it's true and that I can take the bad feelings away by changing. Gratitude to you for being so authentic. Grief for all the years of self-criticism rather than self acceptance.

Just finishing up a Masters in Social Work. After 25 years in a career as an art director, where I could mostly make my ADHD work for me. I enjoyed that but went into because it was the path where I didn't feel incompetent all the time. Didn't know I had an ADHD brain then. Going to grad school was SOOOO hard. I'd known I had ADHD for at least a decade, but I had to finally seek out an official diagnosis. Every assignment was late. Covid and kids who are also diagnosed ND with tons of anxiety and depression (and husband who denies being ND) made it even harder. The whole family runs on my limited EF. So there has been the awesome level of feeling ashamed in front of school personnel because I can't always be right on top of stuff for my children .

Now seems a time more than ever that we all need this new direction. I've been reading about long covid, and so often people's experiences read to me like they have all the executive functioning issues of adhd. So sadly there's likely a huge amount more people who need the neurotypical world to adjust. As always, providing accommodations for a disability helps so many others as well (I also hate the word "accommodation", it implies someone has to be put out a bit so someone else can fit in, when that's not always the case, it can be a change that's for the better of everyone, it just feels hard at first simply because it's a change)

I (day) dream about that world, too. Such a lovely one. As always, poignantly, honestly, and authentically from your heart. Thankful for you and the team, Jess 💙

I loved this video. It was totally real. It inspired me to patreon for the first time ever! You are my first patreon pledge because of this video! The video touched on a bunch of things I have gone through in my life. Learning to love yourself, accept you for who you are, realize that you are okay, these are all hugely important and absolutely necessary to achieving true happiness in this world! A while back, my big wake up moment, was when I took the Meyers Briggs mbti test. I found out that I was an INFP. When I read the description at that time, I literally cried. It said that the INFP was the ugly ducking. That they tried their hardest to be the knight in shining armor or the princess of fairy tale, and that they always felt like they failed, that they were never good enough. It said that most INFP's struggled their whole life, never realizing that they made it, they had accomplished that goal and only they themselves felt that they were unworthy, when in truth, they were all, okay. That was the point where I cried. I was, "Okay"? Really? I didn't feel okay. This test was telling was me that I was okay, and in fact, I was more than okay, I was the perfect me I had always tried to be! Not only was it telling me that, "I" was okay, but there was a test that included me in it, which meant there were others out there like me! I was okay, and, I was not alone in the world! That was so huge! I have spent a lot of time since then, learning, growing, and figuring out who "I" am. I found myself. I learned who I was. I learned to love myself. I learned to accept myself the way I was. I learned it was okay to be me. I also learned it was okay to grow and change and still be true to who I am. I have been wanting to start a YouTube channel for a while now, but have not figured out my niche. I have had a million directions I wanted to go in. I think this video has helped me finally decide which way I may want to go. I want to help people learn to be okay with themselves. It took me a long time and I am still learning and growing, but I have a lot of experience at it now, and there are a lot of people who could really use some advice. There are a lot of people who could use someone out there to tell them that they are okay, just as they are. There are a lot of people who want to learn how to accept themselves. There are a lot of people who are unhappy and don't even know how to recognize what happy looks like. I want to help them all. I am thinking about making my YouTube channel to tell people that they are okay and to help people learn how to accept themselves and learn what happy is and how to reach happiness. That being perfect, may just be, being who you already are, and being okay with that. What do you think? Is that a good idea? Are there enough people out there who might want a channel like that? Thanks Jessica! PS. Your videos have been nothing but helpful for me. I watch them, and then point them out to friends and family and say, "See! I am normal! I am okay! This is what normal looks like!" So you have never seemed ableist to me, only empowering. 😀

I love the idea that we need to create a world that is accepting of us ADHDers as we are! I think this starts with educating neurotypicals about the benefits of how our brains work. Have you done an episode on all of the amazing things about the ADHD brain?

so wholesome :)

Pretty awesome evolution! But I don’t know how to accept myself for who I am when despite all of my efforts my adhd prevents me from reaching my goals. If I am so smart and I can’t achieve anything satisfactory in my life and struggle so hard with the basics still it feels like failure. Worse than torture bc I want to explore and learn and achieve but the road block tells me I can’t and even with accommodations it feels futile. Sorry, had a rough week at work despite trying.

"I have a brain that works this way. It's not my fault. And there's some things I really love about it but it's also not my responsibility to completely erase any trace of me having ADHD for the convenience of others." Brilliant.

This gutted me, but in good way. Thank you.

And now I'm crying... The internalized ableism is so difficult to get past. I did not get diagnosed until just a couple years ago at 48. The diagnosis and learning more about ADHD has helped put so much in perspective. I now understand that I followed a very 2E trajectory of not living up to my potential and then hating myself for it. I'm trying to be more accepting of where I am now, but it is still challenging. I've also realized that the internalized ableism that I had towards myself likely made me a lot harder on people who were probably also neurodiverse. There was a lot of, "Yeah this activity (keeping a schedule, staying on topic, staying still,...) can be difficult, but I'm not holding them to a higher standard than I hold myself." I have some pretty heavy feelings that I'm working through about having held others to neurotypical standards that I was barely managing at best. Being critical of people for exhibiting the things we dislike in ourselves is not great for either side. It's unfair to them and just reinforces the ableism in ourselves. Thank you so much for the work you've done on this channel sharing your story and the information you find! It has been a huge part of me learning to accept myself, my struggles, and the neurodiverse people in my life. I don't know if I would have ever sought a diagnosis without you and your channel. I'm certain that I would not be managing as well as I am with things not even two years into an adult ADHD diagnosis.

I love this, it is so honest and reflective. It is really hard to overcome those messages from society! I once described it as being a shape with an unusual number of corners, and society was trying to knock my corners off so I could fit into a square hole. I decided I wanted to find a hole that comfortably fit my corners instead. (A tiny point - I found the sudden jumps in zoom really hard to watch and had to scroll away from the video so I could just hear the audio. I don't know if anyone else struggles with this too? It felt really stressful to me and distracting.)

Thank you for putting this into words (clearly and beautifully). I'm 36 and recently diagnosed, so I've lived my life with that internal voice saying I AM the problem, not the expectations from others or those that I internalized. I had such a "oh that's why" moment watching this video. Even as a kid my mom would wonder why I put so much pressure on myself when doing basically anything and maybe this is why. I got the messaging and internalized it, and then have spent my life fighting my own brain.

I’m 74. I was finally diagnosed with adhd after struggling my whole life to be normal: to shut up and let other people talk, to get things done, even to organize my desk! My only strategy was hyperfocus, which, you know, does little for relationships. I was driven every day to “be better.” Ironically my best friends tend to be people tending toward OCD, the organizers, like my wife of 52 years. I had a borderline autistic friend once who asked me why I cared so much about my writing. “Because I want to win the Nobel prize,” I told him. His reply: “And what would that mean to you?” Pondering that question has been the turning point in my search for mental health, and your post today is another giant step. Thank you for this work, and maybe more, thank you so much for knowing what my life has been like.

Jess, your journey and your insight are an inspiration. You will never, ever know how many lives you've changed, literally how many people's lives you have SAVED from addiction, self-harm, and who knows what else. So don't let the inner critic get too grouchy :) You have enabled people to accept themselves, to challenge themselves in new and more fulfilling ways, and to know that they can change their story - if they want to. Keep being your awesome self, stay on your journey, whatever it looks like, and we'll come along for the ride, for as long as you let us.

I needed this exactly now. Thank you!

I could give a big long diatribe on this, but I don't want to spray a wall of text that will be difficult to read. If ever you are interested, I would willing go into details. That said, your responsibility in this world is to be the best "you" that you can be. "The best" is defined by being a person AT LEAST happy in their own skin, but maybe more like the journey you are on; you are trying to help everyone be comfortable in their own skin. Ableist or not, you have helped a GREAT MANY PEOPLE who would be terrified or feel lost without assets like your channel. I know because I got a late life diagnosis, and your channel pretty much functioned as a safety net for me. I now share links with people who are struggling to your videos, and encourage them to peruse your channel, or even subscribe. So, no -- do not measure yourself against neurotypical standards, unless you need to meet one or more standards to accomplish something important to you. And then only because it is a means to an end -- a tool if you will - to accomplish your wishes. Think of it as someone who wants to win the boston marathon and you are 100 pounds larger than a successful marathon runner usually is and you have trouble walking to the kitchen. You have to conform to what it means to be a marathon runner to achieve your goal. But never forget WHY you are doing things. In most cases, it is because you want the end objective. Other times it is for other people that are important to you. And anyone who doesn't think you are enough is not someone with whom you need to interact -- unless they are a step on the way to achieving the goal important to you. Finally, there are so many people with so much internalized critical thoughts on themselves, I don't know what I can do; I have met no one who is not enough, but. They just think they are. :-(

Gaaaa, this is so beautiful. Thank you for seeing this truth and showing it to us. I love the idea of a world in which we can all just be who we are. Where no one is belittled or told to "be better". (Obvs if someone is doing HARMFUL things, that needs to change, but that's not what you're talking about.) What a revolutionary idea that being valid and "enough" and doesn't mean being like NT's, or exhibiting fewer of our "obnoxious" ND traits. Who we are is beautiful. Full stop. No need to add "too" or "but" or anything else. Thank you.