Episode 14 – QUICK RESET: I Cancel Plans Because I Don’t Have the Energy to Fake My Personality

Jane McFadden

I cancelled plans because I just don’t have the energy to fake my personality. Hello and welcome to the next Quick Reset Episode. Hello and welcome to ADHD Mums, the next Quick Reset Episode. You weren’t avoiding people, but you were avoiding performed versions of yourself.

Hello and welcome to ADHD Mums, the next Quick Reset Episode. This one is, ‘I didn’t ghost you, I just couldn’t keep pretending I was fine.’ This next Quick Reset is, ‘I cancelled plans because I don’t have the energy to fake my personality.’

I cancelled plans because I just don’t have the energy to fake my personality. So, were you actually avoiding your friends? So, were you actually avoiding your friends or were you avoiding the version of yourself you have to become just to be inside that room? You know, the smile, the tone, the energy, the ‘how are you,’ asking the questions and then overthinking all of your sentence structure because you don’t want to overshare, be too intense, all of the mistakes you’ve made before. Is that connection, or is that just performance? Because your nervous system is over it.

I am one of those people that I’m either way out there, overdominant in the conversation, too funny, too much, or I’m completely quiet. And when I’m completely quiet, it’s because I’m overthinking all the last time that I went out for dinner with my friends and I was way too much, way overshared. So then next time I go in there completely quiet, I ask lots of questions and don’t share any of the stories and then of course people say to me, ‘Are you okay?’ because they’re thinking, why is Jane so quiet? But I’m trying to avoid the anxiety of after, when I have to overthink everything I’ve said for weeks and weeks and weeks and after.

And it’s one or the other, I don’t seem to be able to hit that balance. But my nervous system after the events is so over it and over the anxiety that then when I’m asked to go out next time, I feel so stressed about which one of those people I’ll be. Is that antisocial, or is that just being socially tired? A lot of us talk about how we air-quote ‘hate people,’ but do we really, or are we exhausted? Are we rude, or are we kind of auto-correcting our entire existence as we have our conversations? For many neurodivergent women, socializing doesn’t mean being yourself.

It means building a version of yourself that’s kind of palatable for other people — safe, approachable — the one that we’ve gotten more positive reinforcement for, and it may not be the one that’s the most natural. And that version, it’s quite heavy to wear. When neurotypical people talk about the mask — oh, they put a mask on too — they’re actually kind of talking more about something that may be like 10% from their personality.

They may be themselves but just add a little bit more 10% spark. Masking for a neurodivergent woman is actually about the space between your natural personality and how far the mask is. If it’s quite far and you have to wear it for a long time, that’s where the recipe for burnout happens quickly.

So if you have a two-hour dinner and you have to wear a mask that’s quite far from your natural personality, it’s tiring. If your mask is only 10% from your normal personality that you naturally are, you can wear that for a lot longer without experiencing burnout. So neurotypical people don’t kind of understand how socially taxing it is from wearing the mask.

If you are with, let’s say, extended family where you have to mask quite heavily and the mask is quite far from your normal personality, it is going to be really draining. If you have a group of friends that you love and trust and you have to put a little bit of a mask on, but it’s fairly close to your normal personality, you are going to be able to wear that mask for a lot longer. Or, of course, if you have somebody that you don’t mask at all, you might be able to spend a whole weekend with them and not feel that tired.

So if you are someone who cancels, withdraws, doesn’t text back, it’s not because you don’t want to be with your friends, but being around them can cost a lot of yourself. Even doing that pick-up, drop-off — a lot of neurodivergent women say that that can be your whole social energy for the day or the week. And then when someone says, ‘Let’s catch up on the weekend,’ if they’ve had to work and do the pick-up and drop-off, that can be enough for them socially.

Now, Dr. Devon Price, who I really like, he actually calls this like a ‘patchwork identity,’ which is a sense of self built for mirroring others instead of knowing your own needs. And this can be a really neurodivergent woman trait and it’s not necessarily just ADHD. Can I just say that there? But there’s this… So Dr. Devon Price talks about neurodivergent women having kind of like a patchwork identity.

And this isn’t just ADHD, by the way. This is that sense of self that’s built for mirroring others instead of understanding your own needs. So it can look like flaky friend behaviour, but it might also be your nervous system saying, this isn’t safe and I don’t want to go.

And then you might be that person that cancels at the last minute because you just feel stressed even thinking about doing it. So it isn’t about danger in the traditional sense — physically danger. It’s about the neuroception.

It’s about the neuroception, that unconscious scanning that your body does to assess threat. Your brain might say, ‘It’s just coffee with my friend,’ but your body might remember every time you masked, you masked or you overgave, or you left a catch up feeling really emotionally hung over. And when you have children who are neurodivergent as well and you are really in those trenches at the time and you’re really in that time where you’re feeling in the trenches, I think it’s really normal to not have a lot left for coffee with friends.

If you feel exhausted and you’re the person who cancels or can’t even think to plan and you’re in the trenches right now, I don’t think — I think that can be a really normal experience that a lot of women don’t talk about. And it’s not necessarily that you don’t like that friend or that you’re unsafe with them or it’s a toxic friendship or it’s something negative about the friendship. It’s not that necessarily that they are unsafe, but it may be that you don’t feel like you can be fully you with them.

And if your body starts to opt out and your nervous system says no, it can really go into that. It can really mean that you physically, your gut, your whole body doesn’t want to go. And it can be that fight or flight response where you feel frozen, you feel tired, you can’t get up, you can’t text back, ‘Oh, I just don’t think I can go, I suddenly feel unwell.’

All of those responses can be a part of it. And it’s not always — don’t get me wrong — but this can be something that could be happening to you. And it can be why neurodivergent women aren’t exhausted during the event but after they are.

Or they just don’t show up at all and they cancel right before. Or you arrive and you could shapeshift, which is what Dr. Devon Price talks about with the patchwork identity, where you can shapeshift through the room. You read the room, you look at the tone, the volume, the eye contact — the eye contact you scan, check, and then you try and mirror it.

You try to be chill, fun, emotionally available, smiling, or you’re asking about other people, you’re watching and watching and taking it in. And this is where I talk about neurodivergent experience, where it’s like driving a manual car, where you’re shifting through every gear. But if you were neurotypical, you would just naturally walk around, have a good time, be yourself, and you wouldn’t necessarily feel tired.

However, for a neurodivergent woman, it can feel like self-editing in real time. So it’s not necessarily socializing — the relaxed experience that a neurotypical person can have. It can be you editing your performance in the time as you go, and it can be for hours.

And that can cost massive energy. Trying to stay present while your inner critic goes off can be huge. And then the fallout afterwards, when if you have rejection sensitivity dysphoria, where you then overthink it for — can be years afterwards — one or two interactions, that can have a massive amount of energy.

And so again, Dr. Devon Price talks about that identity patchworking, where your sense of self is kind of put together by mimicking others, overcorrection, thinking, and overthinking — not necessarily from like being really authentic. And so having a single coffee day or one mum’s dinner can actually leave you quite wiped out for the rest of the weekend. And then if you hold yourself up to a neurotypical expectation where the next day everyone else is doing a picnic at the park and they’re doing something else, and then you put yourself through that, you push through, and then you feel completely wiped out after that, and you wonder why, and then you’re in absolute burnout all the time from trying to do that.

Or you feel shit because you just can’t go and you don’t know why, and you make excuses, and then you’re seen as flaky or you always cancel. But you’re not bad at friendship or bad at being with people, but it can be because that version of you that showed up wasn’t really real, and there was a huge tax associated to that. So how does this go on? How does this play out in everyday experience? It can mean that you can leave a play date more tired than what even your kids are.

For example, if you have younger children — my kids are under nine — and so particularly with the two younger ones, when they talk about having a play date, I know it’s going to be taxing because I don’t even know what’s worse. And at the moment I’m having this thing go on because my 9-year-old daughter has had some play dates recently, and that’s fine because the girls are pretty self-sufficient, the parents drop off, not a problem. However, my boys who are younger — seven and six — when they talk about having a play date, what that involves is that the parent will either come in and stay, which sometimes is preferable because then I don’t have to parent multiple children that I don’t know, but also on the other side of it, if the parent leaves, I’ve really got to monitor them because my boys are quite high-energy, to put it lightly, and they attract high-energy kids.

And so for me, if they’re attracting high-energy kids who are ADHD or not, I don’t necessarily know, but I know I’ve got to keep an eye on them. They’re the kids that will run into the bush and try and find a snake. They will jump in the pool. They will jump off the slide. They will do something crazy on the trampoline. I’d actually have to keep quite intense eyes on them, or the parent comes in and I have to talk to the parent for two hours.

And so when they mention a play date, my two boys, I just feel dread because either way, I just don’t want to do it, and I don’t have the reserves necessarily on the weekend. But then all of those thoughts follow, but then after those thoughts, it follows guilt. I’m guilty because I don’t want to have the play date. I’m not the easygoing mom. I’m not like, ‘Yeah, come over, let’s go to the park on Friday afternoons when they want to go to the park with their friends.’ I usually send my husband because I don’t really want to go.

It’s that whole, and then I feel awful. Or I do it, and then I drive home feeling exhausted, and it’s like a lose-lose situation for me. So let’s talk about quick reset strategies.

You really need to identify who in your life are kind of safe people and who are performance people. So when I talk about safe people, I obviously mean who do I feel relaxed around? Who do I feel like the time passes quickly, my shoulders aren’t tense, my voice doesn’t go up in this really weird high voice, and my brain doesn’t spin out, and it doesn’t feel like walking through concrete trying to have a conversation with them. So those people are safe for me, like I feel safe in my body, and it’s like a low-effort friendship.

That for me is like a safe body person, and those people, to be honest, are usually neurodiverse. Or performance people, which are people that it does feel like I have to walk through concrete. It feels like there’s a large mask. It feels like there’s a big cost, and it feels like at the end I’m relieved when it’s over. And I need to categorize those. So if I know that I can’t get out of a play date for one of my kids, it’s definitely their turn. I’ve been dodging it for months. I try and pick a friend that has a safe parent attached to them.

And it’s easy to recognize which ones they are, but when I know I’m low and I’m low on reserves and I have to do something, I will push my child towards the one with a safer parent. However, my kids are younger, and it’s easy for me to sway them around. So it might be more difficult for you. But if the child’s older, if you have older children, you can also be really clear in text.

‘Hey, feel free to drop off and run.’ Like a lot of parents are very keen for the drop off and run. So feel free to be up front about how this play date is going to go and to actually say that up front.

So you can build that social script that serves you. So we can have rules for ourselves, particularly if you’re also autistic, about how things should go. So I should be able to respond.

‘Oh, you’re vacuuming now? Oh, yes, gee, that was quick. Yeah, we have an hour left. Oh. So we’ve been here for two hours. Have you really? Great. Where are you going to vacuum? We normally start down here. Oh, okay. Well, you know what? Why don’t you start? I’ll turn off, and then if you shut that door, it’ll be fine. Are you sure? Yeah, no problem. Yeah, no worries. Thank you for letting me know. I appreciate it.

Hey, Chelsea, I’ll just finish off, but you just ignore me, because when it gets loud, I’ll turn off. Yeah, I’ve only got — like you start. I’ll turn off when it — thank you so much, Chelsea.’

So you may have rules for yourself, like ‘I must respond to that text today. I must match their energy. I must be upbeat. I must have snacks ready. I must invite them in. I must offer them a coffee.’ You may need to think about the rules that you’ve made up for yourself, because I doubt that there’s a rule that a friend or a child’s friend has given you, like ‘You must invite me in for coffee.’

There are parents I know who I will drop off a child, and they will stand out the front of their house. It’s very clear that they don’t want me to come inside, and they will say ‘Thank you very much’ or text you if there’s an issue. They have very strong boundaries, and I’m like, I’m sweet with that. So feel free to put boundaries up that you’re comfortable with, like it’s okay to text tomorrow. I can be flat. I can wait out the front of my house. I can say no. I can leave the message unread if I don’t have the capacity. I can say no.

Think about some boundaries or have a think about some other parents and boundaries they have, and really have a think about what rules you have, why you have them, and if you can replace them with a boundary.

Next is instead of focusing on how to fit in, ask, do I feel regulated around this person? Do I feel like I can breathe slow? Do I think clear? Do I feel okay? If so, that’s your green light socially. If there’s laughter but it’s also tension, if you feel judged, if you feel stressed, that’s more of a nervous system trap. So start to really think about your friendships.

If you have low energy, do you start with somebody that is more taxing to be around? I would say no. Now, if you’re loving this episode, I would have a look at my Playground Pickup Guide on the website. It goes into neurodiverse, neurotypical connection, social scripts, how it all works. It’s so long and detailed. I really recommend it.

So in closing, you don’t hate people, but you may have stopped liking who you have become. So you didn’t stop liking people, but you may have stopped liking who you’ve had to become around people. It’s not rejection. It might be the truth of how you feel, and that might be your authentic self.

You may not be antisocial, but you may notice that there’s a big recovery to being around people and that there’s a cost to yourself to be socially acceptable. But you get to change the rules. You don’t owe anyone anything. You’re allowed to be boring, blunt, late, messy, real. There are people that make you feel safe, not judged, and they are your people. You don’t have to perform to be loved.

But you’ve been trained — you may have been trained in the past — to feel like you have to perform to be liked. But that’s not true. So this is your quick reset for this week. And you’ve already started just by listening. You don’t need to push harder, but you do need to feel safer. Take the pressure off. Let your feelings be real. You don’t have to perform to be worthy. You can be a work in progress.

You are doing better than you think. And I’ll be here next week when you have a reset. Thank you so much for listening. Feel free to put up your boundaries and hold them. Well done. Have a great week.

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