Why Can't I Just

In this solo episode, I’m talking about a phrase that’s been hounding me for decades: why can’t I just? Why can’t I just be easygoing? Be normal? Be fine with things that make no sense? It sounds small, but it’s actually huge—and it’s shaped so much of how I’ve lived. I’m pulling apart the layers of self-management, shame, and survival that come with being neurodivergent in a world that isn't always clear or understandable. And I’m wondering out loud what changes when we ask that same question—but with curiosity instead of criticism. 

Why Can't I Just  companion essay

Transcript

Hi, welcome back. This is Amy. And today I want to talk about something that's been on my mind since my last conversation, the one with Kelly Shannon and something that we said in that conversation was, why can't I just,

And that phrase keeps repeating in my head as it's done most of my life. Why can't I just has been around since I was a kid. It was there while I was trying to fit in. It was there when I was trying to understand what other people did to be liked and to be included. Why can't I just was there in college. It was there when I dropped out of college.

It was there in my 20s and 30s and 40s and it's still here in my 50s.

Why can't I just is the thing that I don't know for me. It's the, the thing that tells me that I'm, I'm straying away from being myself. What I'm figuring out about why can't I just is that it's the, it's the piece of me that wants to be normal. 

That wants to understand what's happening and why it's happening. And it just wishes somebody would explain what's going on but doesn't know how to ask.

In therapy this week, my therapist and I were talking about something that is a theme for my life, which is not looking foolish or ⁓ just not messing up. It's really uncomfortable for me to think about getting it wrong. And so I spent a lot of my time ⁓ trying not to get it wrong, trying not to... upset people or be too much or take up too much space.

And so the ways that I ask myself, why can't I just, it's almost like, Why can't I just become a machine?

God, that makes me so sad. ⁓

One of the biggest things that I want is to be alive.

One of the things that is in me is that there's this person that I am that is here as me in this form only one time ever in the whole history of like all of it.

and

that that why can't I just feeling

feels like.

It feels like it's killing my spirit. It's erasing me.

The things that we tell ourselves to get through day to day to day. Why can't I just has such a long history for me? It's, you know, like I said, back in school, it was working, you know, why can't I just be cool with the way people are? Why can't I just be cool when I get here on time and

I'm setting up and someone else is late every day and eating tacos while we're all working. Why can't I just be cool with that?

Why can't I just stop being so me?

It seems like such a...

such an innocent question and kind of a hopeful one too that instead turned into

judgment.

dismissal.

It's such a small question, it really, relates to one of the major themes for me in my life that has started to make more sense now that I understand my neuro types. ⁓

It's such a question, it makes it sound so simple. Like it's so easy. It's so easy.

Be different. Just don't be who you are and then everything will be okay.

I'm so tired of fighting.

with my nature.

When we say things like, can't I adjust to ourselves? It means that we are leaving ourselves out of the conversation. And to me, it's like, there's this neurotypical manager part that comes in and is trying to protect me and wants me to get it right and has the best intentions.

doesn't want me to get hurt, but also...

It's getting in my way.

And that one little question is the thing that has slowly made my life smaller and smaller and smaller.

It's funny to look back on how, ⁓ willful I was and how I just imagined me in my twenties waiting tables. So, ⁓ needing everybody to follow the rules and not understanding like why some rules were for everybody, but then some weren't.

why it was okay to give this person a free drink but then ⁓ you give this person a free drink and you get fired which happened to me.

Why?

It reminds me of one of my favorite stories. Actually, I was working at a restaurant, ⁓ two kids. So I must have been, I guess I was.

I I must have been, I was in my late 30s, I must have been probably 39, maybe 40. ⁓

And I was working a private party and the kitchen had forgotten to order bread. I was, ⁓ the party had asked for more bread and I went in and cut the last started cutting the, there were three left. So I was cutting two to take into my, to my party. And the owner came up and said, you can't take that. That's all we have.

Like, yeah, I'm on the private party. They're spending a lot of money. I'm going to take them this bread. He's like, no, you're not. It's like, yeah, I am. Like, this is my whole night is making these people happy. And it wasn't my fault that we didn't have bread. Why are you yelling at me?

Why was I getting the brunt of the frustration about an issue that I had nothing to do with?

And so I took the bread.

And at the end of the night, figured out that I had gotten taken off the schedule for two weeks while this man was off on a two week vacation.

Why can't I just listen?

and do what I'm told.

I never have been able to.

I couldn't listen to my parents. I couldn't just listen to my teachers.

And in that space is the place where I got caught in the middle, in this liminal space of...

Why can't I just?

There comes a point where, why can't I just?

needs to be asked differently.

It's such a small thing, but it's the, it's the way that you say it that makes a difference. in thinking about this, since interview with Kelly Shannon, I thought,

If I change the way I say it from, can't I just to

Why can't I just?

It opened something up that I just hadn't really recognized.

which was a willingness to see myself not as bad and wrong.

but as a human being.

with my own ways of seeing the world.

and that me trying to not look wrong.

Me trying to do everything right. That part of me that manages that is like, it's really taking the life out of my life and I'm letting it.

What I'm not seeing in that.

what I'm not feeling in that.

you know, manager.

It doesn't realize that true safety comes from self-acceptance, not from this impossible performance of perfection. And that it protecting me is actually the biggest threat to my emotional freedom and genuine connection.

Like this part of me, this why can't I just part of me?

is the thing that's actually causing my deepest pain.

that by trying to control every interaction to prevent potential rejection, it's creating the exact emotional isolation and disconnection it's attempting to protect me from.

It blocks me from genuine connection.

It creates this persona that keeps people at a distance.

It perpetuates this cycle of self abandonment and it prioritizes externals over my own internal wellbeing.

And what it really does that why can't I just, what it really does is it reinforces the belief that my needs are less important than others potential reactions.

It's like living in this space of.

performative competence.

And so going back to asking it differently.

After that night where I got taken off the schedule at my job for two weeks, at my job where I made money to support my family,

I for two days, stress the fuck out. I've got two little kids, my husband and I have a house payment. We're trying to support this family. How can I lose two weeks of pay? Like just not, what am I gonna do? And he's out of town on a vacation, so I can't.

Like there's nothing I can do. What am I gonna do? How can I get this job back? How can I work?

Why can't I just figure this out?

And so I remembered thinking about this, that on the third day, this idea came into my head.

Why can't I just?

Call my old boss. See if he needs any help.

So I did.

And he did.

and I.

By asking that question differently, I opened up space for me to have another way to do it.

I wasn't boxed in.

by anything other than my own.

way of seeing and saying what was happening.

So why can't I just, why can't I just leave this job and go get another one?

Why can't I just takes away?

options or it gives them. It really just depends on how you say it. And when I went to pick up my paycheck that following Friday and the manager came up to me and said, I'm so glad you're here. Listen, I talked to the owner and he said, it's okay if you could want to come back and we could, you can go ahead and, I've got you on the schedule for next week and

working, start working tomorrow. Just like, I don't work here anymore. No, no way. And it felt so good.

to.

choose myself.

to choose my dignity.

to not make myself choke down something that felt poisonous to me.

In that moment, all of the things that all of the why can't I just, what can't I just.

Behave.

Be quiet, stop being so much, not ask so many questions.

Why can't I just like socializing and loud places?

Why can't I just?

not care when things don't make sense.

The way we talk to ourselves is important, y'all. How we say things is important.

Doesn't seem like a big deal, but it's so. ⁓

critical in.

recovering from.

being a refugee.

in my own life, in the country of my own life.

where I'm trying to be allowed to come back home.

Why can't I just stop all the bullshit? Why can't I just,

Why can't I just wear noise canceling headphones in the grocery store? can't I just?

have friends I don't see a lot.

but it doesn't mean we're not close.

Why can't I just make a life that looks like me?

Why can't I just stop asking myself?

choke down what feels like poison.

Well, I can.

I can.

because it's all really in the way that you say it.

Being neurodivergent, growing up in the 70s and 80s, the experience that I've had in my life.

It's given me.

So much doubt, so much shame.

And also, it's given me a will to live.

And for me, that is the most important thing of all. I get to live. I get to ask, why can't I just?

I get to have that piece of freedom.

And I hope that by listening to this, maybe you have something that you say, a phrase that you use, that maybe you don't even realize that you say it, a way that you keep yourself.

protected.

a way that you manage yourself.

so you don't stick out.

and maybe find that phrase, find that thing and see how you can say it differently.

See how yours can change. Just like my, why can't I just became, why can't I just?

And thank you so much for listening. Next time I'm going to talk about friendship and connection. And I think this, can't I just really ties into the ways that we've created rules for friendship and connection. And I'm so interested in neuro queering those rules and changing them and making them.

so that our friendships and connections.

fit in ways that work for all of us

And until then, keep rebelling.