Somebody Else's Lightbulb

The 35L box that changed my life so that I could change somebody else's

ADHDers love to suddenly realise things. Every opportunity to be alone with our thoughts is an opportunity for an epiphany about something; usually an idea that will fundamentally (but sometimes temporarily) flip our view of the world.

Yesterday I spoke at a disability workshop for school kids as part of the International Day of Persons with Disabilities, which was on Wednesday. I felt very privileged to be able to talk about my disability* confidently. Sometimes it can feel uncomfortable to talk about neurodivergence as a disability, or at all, because of stigma. During the workshop, I had an epiphany; I realised that I need and absolutely WANT to do this for wee Isla, and all the other wains blindingly flailing about without an anchor. I have this incredible opportunity to be a lightbulb moment for some little kid out there.

I never had a lightbulb as a kid, I just stumbled around in the dark. My lightbulb came from a ted talk about ADHD that I watched before I was diagnosed but during a time when my awareness of that anchor and identity was gradually coming into focus. The woman doing the talk shared an anecdote about how she’d bought a 35L box at some shop and then lost it on the way to her car. That same week I’d bought two tins of rice pudding (and nothing else) at the supermarket and lost them both somewhere between checkout and the car.

I bawled my eyes out listening to that woman’s story. Obviously you can’t diagnose somebody with a disability because they lost their shopping, that’s not what I’m saying. Hearing her story was the culmination of everything I had already learned about ADHD and how it reflects my experience of the world. It was the the arrival point, the moment that I really understood.

Analogies seem to be the easiest way to translate these feelings into words. Lightbulbs and ships. I’ve always identified my experience of life with a ship. The ship was sinking before I was diagnosed and I only had a tiny leaky bucket to bail the water out. After I was diagnosed it was like somebody tipped the boat upside down, emptied all the water out then sent me on my way again. Same old ship, thriving not surviving. Sometimes a little bit of water still gets in but that’s okay, I fixed my bucket.

Maybe I was somebody’s lightbulb moment yesterday. My epiphany was that maybe I can gift somebody else an epiphany. How sublime is that?

Happy Friday x

*People are disabled by society, not by their bodies or minds.