Being a Good Girl: How I Stopped the Self-judgement and Finally Learned to be Proud of my ADHD Brain
My preschool teacher’s name was Ms. Margaret. Behind Ms. Margaret’s glasses were the kindest eyes I had ever known. She taught us, played with us and comforted us. I loved her. Each day, as I arrived at preschool, I would make a mad dash for the tiny kitchen. I loved that Ms. Margaret would fill the tiny toy sink with warm water and soapy bubbles. I took joy in carefully scrubbing the dishes and drying them with soft, worn dishtowels. As I joyfully performed my kitchen duties, I remember Ms. Margaret say in her sweet, sing-song voice, “Good girls take good care of their homes” and “Good girls always finish their work.” Now, this was the eighties. It was just a different time. It was also a Catholic preschool. I took those words to heart and they are still with me nearly 40 years later.
I’ve always tried to be a “good girl.” I worked hard in school, got good grades and supported those that I love and care for. As I got older, got married and transitioned into the minutiae of adulthood, I could never seem to get a handle on managing my life. “Good girls take good care of their homes” would pop into my head as I sat on my couch willing myself to fold my mountain of laundry or unload the dishwasher. “Good girls always finish their work” would play in my mind as I struggled to complete my work tasks each day.
After a lifetime of so much difficulty, this is what I deduced: good girls take good care of their homes and finish their work. I don’t do that, so I must be “bad.” I believed that my value as a person was dependent on the number of boxes I checked off on my ‘to do’ list each day. For most of my life, I kept score on myself. I qualified myself based on how useful I felt. I was never “enough” for myself and when you are not enough for yourself, you can’t be enough for anyone else. Most of my relationships crashed and burned. I felt terrible about who I was as a person. I didn’t take chances and try new things because I believed I would fail...so why even try?
It wasn’t until after my ADHD diagnosis and working with the right ADHD coach that I was able to even begin realizing that I had morally qualified myself for years. Moral qualification is the act of equating personal value with one’s accomplishments. “I’m a good person if (enter action)” or “I’m a bad person if (enter action).”
Working with other “bad” girls as an ADHD coach allowed me to see this from a more objective point of view. We all do it. We all morally qualify ourselves and others. We all have had a Ms. Margaret in our life, those well meaning authority figures who teach us that in order to be “good,” we have to produce desirable results.
This belief will never fully leave us, but we can take steps to dismantle it a bit.
You will find it in your self-talk. Listen for those messages that come through from your inner-critic. They usually come through when we are taking part in activities that we find difficult or that we have a tendency to dread.
You may not realize this, but those messages that come through from your inner-critic were not put there by you. They were put there by others, usually the well-meaning authority figures in our lives, like parents or teachers. Ask yourself “Who’s voice or message is this?”
In basic terms, reframing a thought is when we turn a negative thought into a more positive thought. Spin the message. If your inner-critic is saying “You never finish your work,” you can reframe it into “It can be a challenge to finish my work sometimes, but I am choosing to believe that today I did a pretty darn good job with sending emails, writing my report and communicating with my boss.”
When you have a win, celebrate it! Acknowledge your effort and the result! In order to begin winning over our moral qualifying tendencies, we need some victories! Chances are that you actually accomplish way more than you give yourself credit for! It doesn’t matter how small the victory. Did you feed your dog? Celebrate! Make a tough phone call? Celebrate! Put your mug n the dishwasher? Celebrate!
“What would my life look like if I stopped equating how many boxes I check off of my list each day with my value as a person?”