To the neurodivergent mom...

encouragement if you're struggling

To the neurodivergent mom:

You might feel like you’re the wrong person for this job.

Career paths that are typically suggested for people with your brain almost never include “mother.” (Part of that is probably because this job doesn’t pay.) Maybe things that you feel like you’re supposed to be good at don’t have any overlap with your actual passions and talents.

What seems to be easy for other moms—and that they even enjoy!—feels impossible for you. Not just challenging, but impossible. Other people—including your spouse—might make moral judgments about your practical struggles, assuming you’re lazy or selfish, but they’ll never know how hard you’re trying.

But here you are. Ready or not, this is what you’ve been given, so you must be more ready than you thought. Someone calls you “Mom,” and they don’t identify you by your struggles, but by your love. They see you as you. Uniquely, beautifully, you.

There are ways that you can love and inspire your kids that no one else can. You might be surprised by ways that other moms who seem to have it together look at you and think, “I wish I could do the things that she can do.” Their house might be cleaner, but maybe their jaw drops when they see you and your kid play. She might be better at regulating their emotions, but maybe she wishes with all her heart that she could have a Joie de vivre like she’s seen in you.

Comparison might be a trap, but diversity is something to celebrate.

How terrible (and boring) it would be if everyone was good at those things that you struggle with and no one had the passions and abilities that you have. It would be like walking into a botanical garden and only seeing one kind of plant! How boring and even ineffective; many plants need cross-pollination with a different variety to even be able to bear fruit!

Though friendships with other moms—and even your spouse—might feel difficult and draining, there are ways that you can help each other be better parents because of your differences, not despite them. If you can both humble yourselves and learn from each other’s strengths, you might be surprised by the rich depth and growth you’re able to find, as unnatural as it might feel at first.

I do also hope that you find a mom-friend whose brain works like yours. I promise she exists somewhere, even in your town. (But she most definitely exists in a Facebook group, too.) There is nothing like the moment when you explain your struggles—as silly as they might sound when you say them out loud—and the person you’re talking to says “Same here.”
There’s nothing like being able to text her a picture of your completely disorganized home or of a dizzying journal entry and to receive a picture back of something similar that she’s done.
There are other moms dealing with what you’re dealing with. You’re not as alone as you think.

Also, the way a lot of these things work is that there’s a good chance one of your kids might have some of the same struggles (and strengths) that you do. It’s hard for you, and it’s going to be hard for them, but who can better help them navigate and find joy in all this than someone who is living through it herself? You can help your kid feel seen, known, and understand, in a special and real way. They know your struggles because they see them firsthand, so when they see you face them with courage, they know that’s real, too.

Let this quote by N.D. Wilson sink in: “The truth is that a life well lived is always lived on a rising scale of difficulty.” Whether you chose this path of motherhood or not, you are doing hard things. You are facing a challenge and persevering in it.

Many of these moments of intense frustration and failure are going to be family legends someday, or captivating chapters in your memoir, or interesting dinner conversation. Or maybe you’ll forget about many of your low moments as you slowly make more and more victories and gradually forget how far you’ve had to come.

But I hope you see what a gift you are to the world. As-is. You.

It’s been said that everyone’s a basket case if you get to know them long enough. Everyone is more broken than they look. “Everybody is somebody else’s weirdo.” -Scott Adams

So if everybody is weird, maybe it’s not just you. Maybe we’re all just weird in different ways. And maybe that’s a good thing.

Warmly,

Hope from Family Scripts