Driven
On defying neurotypical, capitalistic standards for success and reconciling disability and ambition
I've been [over]ambitious my whole life.
Perhaps as a result of my inherent perfectionism, or from growing up without much money, or because of my diligent, unconscious masking1 - likely some combination thereof, and any number of other factors - I have always been a person who is driven to excel.
I believed the adults around me when they told me I could do and be anything I wanted, and I had big plans.
By the time I was in middle school, I had told everyone in my family that I wanted to be valedictorian, and that I expected to not only be the first in my family to graduate college, but that I would do it at Harvard, or another Ivy League school (on scholarships, no less).
For a while, encouraged by my family, I also thought I might become a famous artist. Then, in eleventh grade, I became interested in cake decorating and decided someday I'd like to work with Buddy, the Cake Boss.
Any dream I've ever had, I always imagined going right to the top.
Due in part to my ever-shifting interests and to my undiagnosed neurodivergence, I struggled through the last couple years of high school. Rather than taking the AP courses I had originally expected to, I reluctantly took on an easier workload in my senior year and made it to graduation somewhere around 15th in my class.
Still, I entered my first year of college in 2011 (at Marywood University - definitely not Ivy League2), major undeclared, determined to get through it and make something of myself.
I was driven the forty-five minutes to and from school most weekends by my dad or grandpa, because I did not yet have my driver's license. I had to renew the permit I'd gotten as soon as I turned 16 (twice) before finally getting up the nerve to take the test, which I passed, shortly before I turned 21.
When I unwittingly burned out and dropped out of college mid-junior year at the end of 2013, I told myself I was going to write, and use my free time to start a creative business of some kind. I saw myself writing and painting joyfully every day, and ending up with a book deal, and a whole portfolio worth of best-selling designs in my etsy shop.
The burst of creative inspiration I'd felt upon leaving school quickly fizzled out, and I stopped writing. My first etsy shop, where I sold hand-painted canvases and hand-lettered cards, closed with less than a handful of sales after more than a year of being open; I had struggled to complete any projects to keep it stocked.
After putting all my energy into wedding planning and working part-time at a DSW, I burned out again, this time with my undiagnosed chronic illnesses flaring, and leading me back to unemployment at the end of 2016.
From the time I was very little, I always knew I wanted to be a mother. I'd loved caring for the babies in my large extended family and felt that surely, this was the one thing I really would excel at, that I was made for.
My husband and I wanted to wait to have a baby until we’d been married at least a year, so I spent about a year and a half nannying for my friend before I had my oldest, Sybil, at the end of 2018, and quickly realized I could not handle both mothering and nannying at the same time. But that was fine, I thought. Maybe I was only meant to care for my own children.
Then I had my second, Oren, mid-2021, and promptly spiraled into burnout, with postpartum depression and anxiety, panic attacks, and near-constant chronic illness flares for most of 2022.
For almost a year, I barely left the house except to go to doctor's appointments, which my husband, of course, drove me to.
I had stopped driving, due to anxiety, after getting pregnant with Sybil, and tried desperately to make myself begin again toward the start of the pandemic (because I'm an adult, and a parent, and driving is something I'm supposed to be able to do); I gave up again as soon as I realized I was pregnant with Oren.
I have never once felt comfortable in the driver's seat, not even when I took the same route to and from my parents' house for visits, and the same route to and from work, multiple days a week for months as I prepared for our wedding. No amount of practice ever seemed to decrease my anxiety behind the wheel.
At the beginning of 2022, when I tried, once again, (with the encouragement of my therapist at the time) to practice and become more comfortable with it, driving became one of the triggers for my panic attacks, and I haven't tried again since.
It was shortly after this, in the spring of 2022, that I became aware I was autistic, and began reframing my entire life.
A year later, here I am, writing this newsletter, while simultaneously crossing my fingers that I'll be able to get through the day and keep myself out of burnout.
There is a meme I saw somewhere recently about not feeling like an adult because one's definition/idea of what being an adult looks like is ableist.
Going from being a kid with my sights set on Harvard to an adult who can't drive themself or their children to a doctor's appointment has been… hard to swallow.
The truth is, the adults in my life were wrong when they told me I could do and be anything I wanted.
There's a lot I can't do. There's a lot I could do, with better support, but which I might never get to do.
The truth is, my idea of what I thought I should do and be when I grew up has always been inherently ableist.
Being able to drive me or my kids to doctor's appointments doesn't make me an adult. Being able-bodied and earning a regular income doesn't make me an adult. Those are neurotypical, capitalist standards for success in adulthood.
The truth is, I have always been, and will likely always be, driven, in both senses of the word.
I am a person who is driven, figuratively speaking; someone who has many goals and passions, who wants to contribute something positive to my family, and to the world.
And I am also a person who is driven, literally; someone who struggles with what many consider to be an easy task - someone who struggles with many things, period - who has varied and ever-changing limitations due to invisible chronic illnesses and disability.
This is still a hard thing for me to reconcile.
I turned 30 this year and have, in many ways, never felt like an adult, thanks to my own internalized ableism.
Needing accommodations (like someone to drive me places) while also being full of ambition and creativity, and realizing that, in many ways, I'm capable of more than I could have known, is both confusing and frustrating.
Yet, here I am, writing this newsletter, while simultaneously crossing my fingers that I'll be able to get through the day and keep myself out of burnout.
I watch the number of readers creep up slowly, knowing that this newsletter will probably never pay any bills, knowing I might never be able to put as much into it as I'd like… and knowing that it's worth something, anyway.
I usually try to give a simple prompt here at the end, with questions based on the content of the post, but I wanted to do something a little different today. I tend to get comments from the same few people (y'all know who you are, and I love you!) and I'd love to encourage everyone to introduce yourselves and let me know what drew you to this newsletter.
If you're more comfortable doing so privately, you can reply directly to the email, or send me a message at awestgate93@gmail.com. I'll look forward to hearing from you!
As always, feel free to share if this post resonated with you.
Attempting to act neurotypical
I gave up on my dreams of attending an Ivy League school after being snubbed by a Harvard rep at a college fair for no discernible reason other than the somewhat-tattered (but very comfortable and warm) hoodie I'd decided to wear that day.
Really appreciated what you share here. And I agree, "those are neurotypical, capitalist standards for success in adulthood."