A huge part of my reluctance to be a mother turned out to be undiagnosed ADHD (and yours might be, too)

I didn’t think I was the kind of person who could handle motherhood, but it turned out my decision was being influenced by a condition beyond my control, writes Eve Menezes Cunningham

I adore kids, but I know my limitations (Getty Images)

Back in my drinky days (I’ve been sober since 2001), I sobbed my heart out with a very patient friend over not being able to have kids. 

“Why?” she asked. 

“Because I only know how to cook one thing!” Cue more serious sobbing.

With hindsight and way more self-compassion than I ever had back then, I can see how I could have worked around this by learning to cook (which I did, eventually). But at the time, this sense of inadequacy kept me up at night.

I was struggling so much to take care of myself, the idea of being responsible for tiny humans absolutely terrified me. 

I’d done work experience, a few years earlier, when I was 13, in a creche and sometimes would think to myself “Awwww. They’re so gorgeous! I hope I have loads when I grow up.”

Other times, it was quite the opposite: “Gaaaaggggghhhhh! They’re so noisy! I’m never having kids.”

Even at 13, I knew this emotional flip flopping was not child friendly. If I ever did become a mother, I wanted the child/children to know that they were magical, wondrous miracles.

I had no idea how anybody managed to be the kind of patient mother that all children deserve. So many demands on their time. All those meals to make. And the school run. Every morning (and afternoon, but it was the idea of early mornings that horrified me most). For decades. Not to mention extracurricular activities. Social stuff. And the expense of it all.

I hated the idea of inflicting childhood on anyone. So much emotional pain accompanies being alive. The idea of not being able to protect them from the general ills and traumas of life still makes my blood run cold decades later.

I couldn’t imagine enduring hearing “The Wheels on the Bus” once, let alone the million gazillion times. I imagined having to grit my teeth and bear it, in order to give my imaginary infants any chance of making friends early on by attending the mother and baby groups.

And the energy needed to get through the basics of everyday parenting. What if they or I were ill – wouldn’t that make an already impossible task ten times harder?

These little things added up to me telling myself from a very young age that I simply couldn’t manage motherhood. When I was eventually diagnosed with endometriosis in my twenties, I came to terms with the possibility that I might never become a biological mother sooner than I think many other women do.

Being a “childless cat lady”, I’ve been an intersectional feminist for decades. Regardless of whatever a certain US candidate for vice-president thinks, I know that women are worthy of life whether or not we procreate. Still, I wondered if menopause would hit, and I’d suddenly be filled with regret and loss.

I hadn’t met a man I ever even imagined becoming a parent with until I was perimenopausal. When menopause hit over a year ago, I still wasn’t bowled over with any kind of enormous grief or loss over it being too late. 

Then, last month, when I was finally diagnosed with “severe ADHD with combined presentation”, I learned more and more about ADHD, and that wave of grief finally hit me. 

It wasn’t a tsunami – I’m fine. I’m happier at 48 than I’ve ever been – but it was still a gut punch. 

I realised that most of my reasons for not becoming a mother weren’t personality traits, but ADHD symptoms. My flip-flopping emotional states; my phobia of mornings; even my one, solitary meal recipe.

I adore kids, but I know my limitations. I work with adult survivors of trauma to help them end cycles of abuse and not only to reparent their own inner children, but to be better parents to the tiny humans that are completely and utterly dependent on them.

I would have hated a child of mine to ever see how frustrating I imagined I’d find so much of motherhood. How awful if they believed themselves to be at fault for my grumpiness.

If I were younger, I might rethink things. Maybe.

If any of this resonates with you, it may be worth looking into whether your feelings around parenting are being influenced by something that can potentially be treated. I don’t know if it would have changed things for me, but I wish I’d at least had the option.

Eve Menezes Cunningham is the host of The Feel Better Every Day Podcast