I write to heal. I lived with a disability I didn't know about.
It's not news, but looking backwards, after living your life, you can see just how much becomes understandable that wasn't understandable at the time. I made my choices with no knowledge, as if my life were 'normal.'
And it didn't happen in any other way. My parents know that. There is freedom in me accepting that.
I cannot hold myself responsible for choices I didn't make. I cannot demand that the person I was should somehow have understood what wasn't explained.
It happened. It didn't happen in any other way.
It was right that I should have known.
Not because I should somehow have worked it out for myself, but because living with a disability without knowing you have it changes the choices available to you. You interpret yourself and your difficulties differently. You explain yourself to others differently. You make decisions from an incomplete understanding of your life.
But there is also judgement.
Presenting differently is noticeably different. And being noticeably different courts attention. When your disability is mild, it's harder to brush off, because the obvious signs aren't noticeable. Neither is the sympathy you might get: like with a broken leg.
This is where you need to separate acceptance from approval.
Where you can accept that your life happened exactly as it happened without pretending.
We all live with our experiences. We don't need to invent another past, because there isn't one or seek approval for the life we have had to live.
It is may past to look at and say:
It didn't happen in any other way.
I missed out on not knowing, and having no mental and emotional support.
I should have known.
Both are true.
