It makes sense that I'm an athlete. [As a child], I was always going to the hospital for jumping too high or hurting myself or breaking my arm. When I started snowboarding, all of that energy got funneled into my sport, which is a symptom of ADHD [1] I didn't know about. You can hyper-fixate on one thing, and for me, that was snowboarding.
Snowboarding became my life. But when I wasn't snowboarding . . . I didn't know how to manage. I forgot appointments and plans I made with friends. I didn't feel like myself. Getting diagnosed [2] and discovering that everything had an [explanation] was the most refreshing, freeing feeling.
As an athlete, we know when something's wrong with our bodies. My knee hurts, or my back hurts, or I'm bleeding — it's so obvious. But when it comes to mental health, it isn't. You don't know what you're working with sometimes. That was a big part of my ADHD journey. I was so unaware of what I was experiencing because it felt understandable in a lot of ways; I am very busy. I have a lot of things I need to do. Of course I'm going to be overwhelmed, of course I'm going to be exhausted. But surprise, surprise, there's a world where that doesn't have to be the case.
I found success during my formative years, so I really relied on the opinions of the adults in my life. In moments when I was starting to feel overwhelmed, I was being told that I needed to go to therapy and that there was something wrong with me and that I needed help — but I wasn't being told that I should go see a psychiatrist.
"I thought I was just lazy."
Now, based on my journey, it's important for me to shift the narrative and start spreading awareness on what [ADHD can] look like. I didn't think I had ADHD because I wasn't hyperactive. I thought I was just lazy. I was like, "I'm laying in bed all the time when I'm not snowboarding. There's no way I have this." But I did — it just looked different for me.
I'm able to process many things at once, which led to my demise in a lot of ways. But [I'm also] able to look at things from different perspectives. I appreciate how different my mind is, and I think that's what has allowed me to find success in my sport. I'm able to watch videos of myself snowboarding and say, "OK, I think I would've landed this if my arm was a little more back." I'm my best and worst critic.
I'm still going to be exhausted at times, but it doesn't have to be so hard. I wish I had gotten diagnosed sooner and done a better job of checking in with myself. But also, how could I have known? That's why I'm so excited to work with Supernus Pharmaceuticals [3] on the Ms. Represented campaign [4], because I think that ADHD is truly misrepresented. Now, I feel like I have the rest of my life back.
[ADHD] is a spectrum. People experience it completely differently, and just because your experience doesn't align with someone else's, doesn't mean that it's a "you" problem. You're not lazy . . . some of us just need a little extra love and attention.
— As told to Chandler Plante
Chandler Plante [6] (she/her) is a staff writer and PS Fit Producer. She has over six years of industry experience, previously working as an editorial assistant for People magazine, a social media manager for Millie magazine, and a contributor for Bustle Digital Group. She has a degree in magazine journalism from Syracuse University and is based in Los Angeles.