The Ferrari Brain Diaries Part 2: Healing from Burnout, Embracing Neurodivergence, and Finding Authenticity

How I Navigated ADHD, Autism, and Burnout to Reclaim My Mental Health and Purpose

This is part two of the “Ferrari Brain Diaries” series. If you haven’t read part one or need a refresher click here to read part one.

Overcoming Burnout and Embracing Neurodivergence: My Ferrari Brain Journey Continues

So, it’s 2017. I’m freshly single, still a barista, and spending a lot of time going out with coworkers—having a blast. I couldn’t afford to live on my own, so a few of my coworkers and I decided to rent a house together. We called it “Barista House.” After spending my adolescence getting rejected and bullied, it felt like a dream to have enough friends that I could live with some of them! This was the life. Or so I thought.

After months of clubbing, throwing parties, and hanging out with each other all the time, we started to have some disagreements. Eventually, it started to feel like it was everyone else against me, just like it felt in middle school. I was heartbroken, this group of close friends that I thought understood me well and liked me for who I was started to look down upon me for things I had trouble maintaining control over.

Photo by Darius Bashar on Unsplash

I stopped spending as much time around the house and spending more time at my new boyfriend’s place and some of my responsibilities started piling up, adding more fuel to the fire. I decided, 6 months into my new relationship, that moving in together so early was better than staying in a place that I was no longer wanted.

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After leaving school, changing jobs, and navigating toxic roommate dynamics I was in limbo. I felt numb, exhausted, and burned out. In my new relationship, I was still dealing with emotional residue from past breakups and friendship breakups that echoed my childhood relational trauma. Dissociation was not a stranger and neither were my vices, vaping, scrolling, and smoking weed.

It felt like my “Ferrari brain” was stuck in neutral. Eventually, this relationship stopped working too—in the worst, most explosive way ever, and I wound up retreating back to my hometown to live with my mom. I wrote about the experience of living with my mom on my other Substack, Natalie After Dark here.

At this point, I had been working from home as a customer service representative. I took phone calls for a credit card company helping customers with managing their accounts, resolving problems, and being their emotional punching bag. It was exhausting.

I found myself, once again, in the depths of burnout. I’d have these emotional breakdowns, that I now realize were “autistic meltdowns,” and shut down completely. I could barely find the time and energy to do things I enjoyed, let alone take care of myself. Preparing meals and doing laundry became huge hurdles that I could barely climb. It was rough.

How I Found the Right Therapist and Psychiatrist for My Mental Health

Around the time one of my cats became gravely ill with a deadly heart condition, I realized I was at my breaking point. To be completely honest, I was wondering if I even wanted to be alive anymore. I opened up to my parents about how I was feeling and they helped me find a great psychiatrist. She’s better than any I’ve had before. She listens to me, understands me, and works with me to build and refine the system that I need to support myself. She also helped me find my therapist who I cherish dearly.

My therapist is someone that helped me put all my broken pieces together again and believe in myself enough to continue pursuing my passions. By then, I’d already started a few blogs and couldn’t stay consistent. I’d feel embarrassed by my own vulnerability and eventually rebrand or quit. Now, I feel more confident and capable of committing consistent time and effort to my writing. Knowing I have this support system in place brings me so much comfort.

Discovering My ADHD and Autism: A Journey to Self-Acceptance

Anyway, it was after starting therapy, for the umpteenth time—this time with the right fit—that I proposed to my therapist and psychiatrist that I might have autism. I’d been seeing a lot of content about it on my social media, took several tests online, and found various articles about how it presents differently in girls and women. So much of what I’d seen had resonated with me from having difficulty handling social situations and sensory issues to having “special interests” that I’d hyperfocus on; it really seemed to fill in a lot of the blanks that I had in my life. With the support of my mental health team, I got professionally evaluated and found I did, indeed, have Autism.

I’d already known for a while that I had ADHD but it wasn’t until I’d started learning about autism that I really started to understand myself. Thanks to the internet, I learned more about both conditions and was able to finally go from clinging on to the labels of “lazy” and “broken” to “running a different operating system than most people.” My psychiatrist told me something once that mirrored an analogy I’d thought of myself. She said, and I’m paraphrasing, “Most people run on MacOS or Windows, but you’re running Linux; it’s more complex and less user-friendly at first, but capable of amazing things once you learn to work with it.”

Living with a Ferrari Brain: Embracing Neurodivergence and Authenticity

Finally, it clicked. My “Ferarri brain” wasn’t defective—it was built for a different track. All those years of burnout and feeling like I was “too much” weren’t failures. I’d been trying to force a Linux system to behave like Windows, and no amount of software updates or tinkering with the hardware would fix that mismatch.

The “Ferrari brain” and “gifted” labels I’d received when I was younger were both trapping and eye-opening. Now that I have the support (and medications) that I need, I see my brain as powerful, creative, and unique—even if it does require some more troubleshooting in a world mostly occupied by and designed for neurotypical people. I spent years of my life being gaslit by society and partners into believing my worth was tied to my productivity, not humanity.

Now I recognize that my true worth lies in allowing myself to be myself. I’d gotten help before, but this time I was finally rebuilding my nervous system and learning to feel safe in my own body, not just popping different pills to figure out which ones would take the symptoms away. Yeah, I am medicated. But my psychiatrist isn’t my drug dealer (lol), she’s my collaborator and someone I look up to for her approach.

My wonderful psychiatrist worked with me to figure out, through genetic testing and trial and error, what medications and what dose work for me. We’ve also included supplements, another special interest of mine, in my treatment plan and honestly—my life has changed so much because of them. Let me know if you’d like to hear about what supplements I take in the comments and I’ll be sure to write a post about them!

Photo by Ksenia Yakovleva on Unsplash

Learning about Autism and ADHD through the internet has been lifechanging. I’ve been able to connect with other “AuDHDers” (people with ADHD + Autism) on Reddit and other social media platforms that have offer communities filled with genuine support, validation, and shared experience.

The relief I get when I see someone talking about experiences like mine is priceless. You mean I’m not crazy? Or an alien? OR A CRAZY ALIEN?! Embracing my authentic self and speaking my truth about these matters via my writing and posts I reshare on my personal social media accounts has become a source of power and healing. I’ve been learning to let go of the need to fit in or be liked by everyone so I can focus on accepting myself and my creative self-expression.