I've never been great at juggling multiple things at once. Back in high school, it drove my mother and teachers crazy. No one seemed to understand why I could excel in half of my classes but struggle with the rest.
Telling the adults in my life that juggling was so difficult was like talking to a brick wall. There was always this consensus among them that I was too smart to be struggling so much, which ultimately made me feel stupid. At the very least, I thought something was seriously wrong with me. I felt as if I was drowning just to stay afloat.
That difficulty grew more pronounced in college. I was often sick and had no social life because I was holed up in my dorm room, trying to finish my work. Was everything supposed to take me so many hours to complete? When I couldn't keep up, school administrators acted like I simply didn't care and wasn't applying myself.
If they saw me talk to another student in the cafeteria or mail room, they'd point it out and use it as “proof” that I just wasn't applying myself. That I was just goofing off.
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