Not related to ADHD but similar none the less. I’m eating some leftovers (literally fork in mouth) and my mom asks me if I want to heat it up. I said if I wanted it heated up I’d have put it in the microwave. I’m 37.
I used to get that question a lot when I was a kid. I always politely said “no thanks”.
It turns out my face always said “Are you fucking stupid? I understand how to heat things” while I was trying to be a little polite. I found this out when I visited my parents recently and found out that, while I’m still trying to be polite, my face still tells my mom that I’m capable of deciding on the temperature of my food.
My face says things that I don’t mean to say even when I’m trying not to be an ass.
So they went to the trouble to point out what your reaction looks like, but they have not once in x decades reconsidered the strategy of asking you annoying questions.
People that ask annoying questions never do.
My mom is super loving and well meaning. She just has a “not the way I want it” problem.
Ahh the ol’ parental, “I’m cold, so you need to put in a jumper!”
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My face is the same. I remember someone trying to start an argument with me because my face apparently didn’t match what I had said. I was incredibly confused because no one had ever pointed it out to me before so he was telling me about my facial expression and I was disagreeing because I had no idea.
when I’m trying not to be an ass
You mean she’s still asking? It might not be you who needs to try not to be an ass.
She’s a mother. That’s what mothers do. They don’t see their babies as fully grown men / women, they remember the tiny kid that she could hold with one hand when stirring soup with the other. If you weren’t a 100kg, 185cm chunk of flesh she would still be doing it if she could. Asking about the food temperature, if it’s good, is part of it, even if you’ve eaten the same favourite meal for 20 years straight and it is perfect every time. Asking if you want a sandwich, or if she should make a simple meal is too. It’s not that you can’t, or you are too grown up to need someone to make you a sandwich. It simply is their way of showing that they care about you.
And I am saying this as a guy who still gets told that colder food upsets the stomach, being asked if I need any food in a house literally stocked to the ceilling in the kitchen. Being upset about such a tiny thing is really narcisistic.
Thank you for putting it in perspective! I have a very similar mother, and it tends to drive me absolutely mental whenever I visit - but next time I’m home I’m going to remember what you wrote.
Moms never stop. I loved living with my mom, but it does mean that I have certain mom-related annoyances in my life. She is constantly trying to get me to eat more and leaves all the lights on everywhere. But, there’s advantages too. For example: I love my mom.
Not neuro divergent. If you turn the lights on when I am sitting in the dark you will officially be on my shit list. It is entitled behavior and you should be punished.
gravely castigated i say
persona non grata
Fuck people who turn on the light, they give me a headache and burning eyes
Fuck the Big Light™
For real. I get migraines and one or my big triggers is lights being too bright. With good old Sol being the worst offender. Luckily everyone else in my house is some flavor of autistic/ADHD so pretty much everyone agrees.
Fuck the Big Light™
For me it’s the damn LED lights. I heard how they work is basically by constantly turning on and off and on and off at a speed imperceptible to us, but the end effect is that they are basically strobe lights. So those of us susceptible to strobe lights can get migraines if exposed to them for too long in one sitting.
I believe that’s fluorescent, not LED. I consider fluorescent lights to essentially be the devil.
I’ve heard it’s actually both! Which sucks, like I love the efficiency aspect of LEDs, but some of them really are not built well…
Only poorly made leds.
I identify with this because of my ADHD.
But also, because ADHD, I spent about 15 minutes in a “does not compute” loop because bats can see perfectly well in the dark, so using them as an analogy involving something being lost and helping them by turning the lights on is just not making sense to me.
I’ve broken out of the loop, but I still am not sure why “bats”
This has the same energy as:
- “Who are you?”
- “Who? Who is but the form following the function of what and what I am is a man in a mask.”
- “Well I can see that.”
- “Of course you can, I’m not questioning your powers of observation, I’m merely remarking upon the paradox of asking a masked man who he is.”
It’s been too long since I saw V for Vendetta apparently. It definitely sounded like V but I had no memory of that line until I looked it up.
V was absolutely on the spectrum…
The hyperfixations were real. Verily, his vichyssoise of verbiage would’ve taken about as much prep work as any of his actual plots.
I’ve never actually watched it, but it’s been on my list for years and years.
It’s a good watch. Watch it in the dark.
Thanks to this post I now identify as a lost bat. I consider it a marked improvement.
No shit, but that is not a neurodivergent issue. If I’m viving in a given lighting and someone changes the lighting without proper warning I’m gonna get pissed.
As always, this is a boundaries, respect and communication issue.
