The Forums › Forums › The Workplace › ADHD-Friendly Careers › Anyone out there have a traditional, 8-hours a day, 40 hours a week job? › Reply To: Anyone out there have a traditional, 8-hours a day, 40 hours a week job?
@jojosephine and others pondering this whole being able to make it in the world of work thing….
I fully, absolutely believed that I would never be able to manage full-time work. I did the mom thing right off the bat, so didn’t have a whole bunch of work experience to draw from. But I spent my entire 20s and half of my 30s comparing myself to other working parents, and truly believed that part-time is all I would ever be able to manage. And imperfectly at that. Even before my diagnosis. I just thought that the whole working parent thing was a hoax, a trap to keep people unhappy but productive, part of the big economic machine, or whatever justifications I came up with in order to keep myself from feeling like I wasn’t living up to my potential. (It has been such a ground shift for me that it’s difficult to remember how I used to think).
I have to say that one of the most amazing, defining times of my life was realizing that I CAN! The year that the impossible became real.
True ADD – fashion, the realization came because it was a sink-or-swim situation. I began my first full-time career almost exactly one month after finding myself on my own, with 2 children to take care of, after 15 years of a fairly co-dependent marriage. I was terrified of losing our home. Failing at my work was simply not an option for me. I was extremely fortunate to have landed a job that fit and brought me together with wonderfully supportive colleagues.
Lots more detail than that, but I just wanted to share because that experience really taught me how powerful our thought patterns are. “Positive thinking” can sound so trite, but it literally changed my reality. I had help from amazing people who kept me thinking that I could do it. And boy, I did it!
I love my job and I struggle with juggling my two passions (my loves at home and my “borrowed loves” at work.) I am far from perfect at what I do and at times I feel like my house is falling down around my ears. But the question is no longer “Can I or can’t I work and be a good mom?”. Now it’s “What changes might I need to make in order to make life more balanced?”
@jojo, I was lucky enough to be able to get by without working too much when my kiddos were young. It’s awesome, and no, you never get that time back, so enjoy them while you got ’em! (My stinkers refuse to be 3 years old again. I sure miss those times). Trust “Other You” to be able to handle things when it’s time to get back into the workforce, and try to stay in the moment. Thanks for letting me wander through my memories, your story has really struck a chord.
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