One of the most frustrating things about ADHD (have I already started a post like this? It feels like I’ve already started a post like this) is the ever-growing list of things I haven’t finished.
I will legitimately be committed to a life of needlepointing, do hours of research on the absolute best supplies for only the most serious hobbyists (maybe even a profitable side gig!), get my starter kit for semi-professional competitive needlepointers in the mail, set it on my dresser, and watch it gather moss for months until I finally move it to my “I will definitely get to this later” drawer where art supplies go to die.
It’s easy to focus on all the hobbies and interests I started (or started to start) as failures. But you know what? I’m too old for failures, and I’ve begun to embrace my neurodivergence recently, so come with me while I flip the script.
This is an ode to the things I’ve started.
Yes, there really was the needlepoint, but there was a happy ending to that saga. I was convinced I would follow in my mother’s footsteps by hand-needlepointing Christmas stockings for all of my children, found the cutest pattern for my eldest son, purchased the dozens of thread colors needed to complete it, and proceeded to leave it in a closet at my parents’ house until my mom finally picked it up and finished the stocking herself.
Before the stockings was my mom’s old sewing machine, which we got refurbished so I could become that mom who sews smocked clothing for her children. I took a sewing class in high school so I was well prepared. Alas, after following us to Massachusetts for my husband to go to grad school, it sat on a set of stairs leading to nowhere in our late-1800s basement apartment until we put it back on the moving truck to return home with us three years later. I never even bought a spool of thread.
My most recent handwork hobby attempt was a simple, all-in-one embroidery kit from Etsy or some other cleverly named boutique sewing website, which I was sure would be a winner. It now rests alongside my acrylic paints and charcoal drawing set in the art supply graveyard drawer in our kitchen.
I believe I’ve learned my lesson with needlework by now (though I of course still have the embroidery kit and harbor delusions of finishing my youngest son’s stocking one day). The planners, however, are another story.
I had a pretty good planner-less run after my dreams were dashed upon the rocks of the pandemic in 2020—hours of googling had led me to a beautiful, inspirational, overly aggressive planner purchase. This was my year, I told myself.
We all know how that ended.
It wasn’t until my ADHD diagnosis that planners reentered the chat. Now that I knew what’s been holding me and my beautiful planners back all these years, I told myself, I could go into it eyes wide open, expectations low, process simple, and find success. Oh, plus I found a really pretty one that was similar to the system I had (briefly, with marginal success) followed with an ADHD coach.
Don’t make me relive the gory details of abandoning that and then another beautiful, personalized planner that still sits, months later, in my abandoned book pile in the corner of my room. I’m positive the next planner will be the one.
I’ve started at least half a dozen businesses in my head, many of which I’m convinced would have been viable money makers. My current one is tentatively called “House Fairies,” and there’s no need to go into the details of my nonexistent business plan for it.
The number of unfinished books on my bookshelves is dizzying—although, in my defense, I absolutely plan to read them all eventually.
But you know what else I’ve started? Journaling, in eighth grade, which continued through college and eventually led to my writing career, including this Substack.
Baking, which allows me to provide yummy, healthyish sourdough bread for my family, fun birthday cakes for my kids, rolls and pies for friends and family members, and the occasional decadent cheesecake.
Journals for each of my kids, which served as their baby books and remain on my bedside table so I can record important milestones as they come up.
Indoor plant growing and propagating, which got a little out of hand until I realized I could take my growing outdoors and have since let the outdoor plant growing and propagating get out of hand as well. But hey, I made some cash helping other people with their gardens this year, and in a few weeks I’ll have enough flowers blooming to bless others with happy little arrangements throughout the summer. Oh, and I got to write an article for a new magazine about the benefits of gardening for neurodivergence, so I could reasonably argue that gardening has furthered my writing career.
This also led to a love of flower arranging, which has provided flowers for my church, a neighboring nonprofit, and even a few weddings.
So yeah, I could choose to focus on all the things I’ve tried and left unfinished and feel pretty crappy about myself. Geez Wesley, pick a lane and stay in it, how inconsistent of you!
Or I could choose to focus on all the things I’ve tried and stuck with and see the joy and beauty they’ve brought into my life. I can embrace the chaos of a life lived creatively, a bit less linearly than the average person. My life would be really boring if I hadn’t started dozens of hobbies over the years, and if there’s one thing the ADHD brain can’t handle, it’s boring.
So maybe I’ll never be a semi-professional competitive needlepointer or the owner of a business that provides laundry fairies and dish fairies for overwhelmed mothers who need help around the house. But I’ll always be the type of person who thinks one day she might be, and I’ve decided I’m okay with that.
I know I’m not the only one here obsessed with starting new hobbies—I’d love to know the craziest hobby you’ve tried (and succeeded or failed at) starting. Drop it in the comments below.
xoxo,
Wesley
I do not have ADHD—I swear I don’t—but I can see myself in today’s writing. I’m a great starter, a horrible finisher.
I feel this deeply!! Enjoying reading about your journey. 🩷