Reading this felt uncomfortably familiar in the quietest way. Especially the part about thinking “it’s just anxiety” for years — I lived there too, trying to optimize my way out of something that was never just a productivity problem. The masking piece… that slow disappearance of self while still performing a life — that one is hard to read without feeling it in the body. Diagnosis didn’t change who I was, it just stopped the constant self-blame from sounding like truth.
Reading this felt uncomfortably familiar in the quietest way. Especially the part about thinking “it’s just anxiety” for years — I lived there too, trying to optimize my way out of something that was never just a productivity problem. The masking piece… that slow disappearance of self while still performing a life — that one is hard to read without feeling it in the body. Diagnosis didn’t change who I was, it just stopped the constant self-blame from sounding like truth.
Thank you for this comment, that last line is spot on. Sorry that you experienced these things too but so happy diagnosis liberated you as well 🤍