Term: Jumping the Gun
Jumping the gun is a reaction that comes from a plethora of circumstances. At an early age, I had learned to mind read everyone’s emotions before they could tell me, so that I could be prepared if I was going to be hurt. It works the same way in awkward or sometimes tense moments. Jumping the gun in everyday interactions can look like over-explaining yourself, trying to address the elephant in the room when the elephant is only made up in your head. Oftentimes, this is used to avoid disclosure – trying to avoid the conversation to be had when someone else reveals a part of yourself that you are trying to hide (i.e. losing my train of thought, my stimming is too obvious, having a short attention span). Jumping the gun often comes in tandem with Actively Trying to Avoid as both of them try to over-do and compensate social situations with hopes to fill in gaps caused by my ADHD"Sorry if any of this is confusing to any of you." Rhovi. No one is confused.
Occurrences of jumping the gun will appear in–not as a surprise–in neurotypical spaces; particularly, for myself, academic institutions and institutional places in general were places that I often felt out of place in. They were spaces that were not designed for neurodivergent/disabled people, and I often had to fight for my place in these territories. On top of that, I had to consciously try hard to be normal; I did not want to be the odd-ball, not to mention ADHD has very common misconceptions already. I would rather not double down on their perceptions of me–or what I think their perception of me is.
Patterns like these can appear as: pointing things out myself before someone else can make fun of a mistake I made due to my ADHD (ex. I will often skip words because my brain works faster than my hands could type), saying sorry if I have already told a story before because I cannot remember for the life of me if I have actually told it before. Pamela Saunders writes: “...encounters or performances that are governed by a tacit cultural script and that conform to normative understandings of timing and appropriateness…acquiring these skills is not merely to get along with neurotypicals, or to make interactions as comfortable for them as possible.” (Saunders 2020). In the context that Saunders writes in, addresses the acquisition of mimicking the neurotypical mannerisms (faking a smile, shmoozing, laughing at jokes, etc.,) In conversation with this idea, I have acquired the skills of habitually trying to point out mistakes or even apologizing beforehand, because in the case I cannot mimic the typical expectation. I do not want to have to explain anything to really anyone (turning stuff in promptly, having executive function, etc.,). Many situations have resulted in this type of communication, as I do not care to explain myself that studying anatomy and physiology feels like–quite literally–peeling my skin off with every forced thought I have trying to finish the task. I would rather overcompensate in social situations instead of bringing just enough to be myself. I have only ever been drained from showing that vulnerability.
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