I would say that one of my biggest struggles my entire life has been with Imposter Syndrome. I have always known that I do not belong, I try to fit in but I don't quite get there. So at first this was fitting in with the general population. At school even though I had friends, and was social I always felt like I couldn't fully be myself with them, I had to hide certain interests and things. As I got older I would try to process how I was different and try to give that some kind of label. But then I would meet someone who genuinely had a condition or quality to them and I always felt my experience never matched up to that so I got very worried.
One example was when I found out that there is a genetic disease that runs in my family known as Huntington's disease. When I was getting towards my late teens I began to convince myself that I had it, I would see the symptoms, the more I learnt about the disorder the more I realised this was impossible at the time, because yes even if I did have the condition I would not be symptomatic until the same age as my mother and she is in her 60s and not displaying, but anywho...
Another biggie is my struggle with mental health. I would fear telling anyone that I had these dark thoughts, because what if I was the only one? Then I wouldn't want to get help because I wasn't as bad as other people who talked about their mental health struggles. For instance my mum had to stop working, she can struggle to leave the house, and spends lots of time asleep, I wasn't like that. Then you hear about others who self harm, and I am like yeah I do that but not quite the same, mine never felt serious. I would more scratch myself then cut. Never needed hospital or treatment so could I really say I suffered from anxiety or depression?
Currently I am facing a heavy hit of imposter syndrome as I go through an Autism and ADHD assessment. Because ever since my GP mentioned she thinks I could be neurodiverse, and I took the preliminary assessment, and researched about it, and spoke to others I can really relate to these conditions. But I am terrified all the time that someone from the community will be like, but you aren't. Stop pretending. YOU DON'T BELONG HERE!
It's almost like I want to convince myself I am special, but at the same time my inner critic hates me so much I can never think there is anything special about me.
So I am trying to battle my struggle with imposter syndrome by being a bit kinder to myself. A statement I will repeat is that, we are all different, we experience things differently, so my struggles with mental health, or my displays of autistic/ADHD traits are going to vary from others. AND THAT IS OKAY.
But like with all things in my recovery journey I don't always follow this rule, some days are better than others.
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