{"id":2263,"date":"2021-05-14T13:12:48","date_gmt":"2021-05-14T18:12:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/wordpress\/autisticme\/?p=2263"},"modified":"2023-11-26T16:27:28","modified_gmt":"2023-11-26T22:27:28","slug":"perfectionism-is-disabling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/autisticme\/2021\/05\/14\/perfectionism-is-disabling\/","title":{"rendered":"Perfectionism is Disabling"},"content":{"rendered":"

My work has to be perfect.<\/strong> My grades need to be excellent. I dislike mistakes, especially my own. I am a perfectionist, and that\u2019s not a good quality.<\/p>\n

Anyone trying to turn perfectionism into a positive isn\u2019t really a perfectionist. I hate when people use \u201cI\u2019m a perfectionist\u201d as the faux \u201cnegative\u201d trait during job interviews.<\/p>\n

Perfectionism leads me to discard weeks, months, or years of work. It paralyzes me when I experiment with hobbies. There\u2019s no \u201cgood enough\u201d for me. If I\u2019m trying to play music, it needs to be very good, not okay or good enough. If I\u2019m cooking, I\u2019ll throw out food that isn\u2019t right.<\/p>\n

When I have spoken about perfectionism to teachers and guardians, too many are surprised that it can be debilitating. There\u2019s a misconception that perfectionism stops with the \u201cA\u201d or even \u201cA+\u201d grade. It doesn\u2019t stop there.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve blogged before about how my self-doubt and insecurity leads me to over-prepare for tests. That fear of failure has helped me, but it comes with a high price. A perfectionist doesn\u2019t relax.<\/p>\n

Until my junior year of high school, I had to have the highest grade in every class, on every assignment. Eventually, I came to realize I could pace myself and earn the score I wanted, higher or lower than someone else. Yes, I would score an \u201cA\u201d but not the highest score.<\/p>\n

My undergraduate degrees were traumatic.<\/p>\n

My identity was linked to being the best of the best, the student with various academic awards and recognitions. In the honors program at a major university, I was average among those peers… at best.<\/p>\n

Unlike other people, I didn\u2019t have the social skills to enjoy the culture of college life. I was on the school newspaper staff and to this day people don\u2019t remember I was a reporter and columnist. (I saved the clips, so at least I have the evidence.)<\/p>\n

What was I if I wasn\u2019t an outstanding student? If I wasn\u2019t a section editor on the newspaper staff? If I was merely one of many programmers and consultants in univeristy computing services?<\/p>\n

I felt like a failure in college. I still feel like a failure most days.<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t about comparing myself to others, though that doesn\u2019t help. It\u2019s that I know, deep down, that I can and should always do much better on any given task.<\/p>\n

No matter how valid the reason is for not being perfect, I dismiss it as an excuse.<\/p>\n

Throughout three graduate degree programs, I earned one B+ grade, and that was because I was taking a statistics final right after two eye surgeries and wasn\u2019t in a good place for speed reading or writing.<\/p>\n

Think about it. I could not see, had been through various medical procedures, was diagnosed with anemia, and I still wasn\u2019t happy with passing the hardest class I have ever taken.<\/p>\n

Perfectionism isn\u2019t merely wanting to be good… it is needing to be perfect.<\/strong> It is hating yourself, despising yourself, because there\u2019s no acceptable reason for not scoring 100 on every test, not playing every note perfectly, not being the best at something.<\/p>\n

I am haunted by two grades, even though I know I did my best in those courses under the circumstances. Yet, I cannot reason with myself.<\/p>\n

Perfectionism is a weakness. It\u2019s a disability. It prevents people from accepting themselves.<\/p>\n

Parents and teachers need to take the problems of perfectionism seriously. It\u2019s not enough to tell a student that missing a point or two is okay. Don\u2019t assume the student is going to \u201cget over it\u201d with time.<\/p>\n

The Neurodiverse struggle in ways that lead to imperfect work. Being an autistic perfectionist can be a miserable experience.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My work has to be perfect. My grades need to be excellent. I dislike mistakes, especially my own. I am a perfectionist, and that\u2019s not a good quality. Anyone trying to turn perfectionism into a positive isn\u2019t really a perfectionist. I hate when people use \u201cI\u2019m a perfectionist\u201d as the…<\/p>\n

Continue ReadingPerfectionism is Disabling<\/span> <\/i><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":4014,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"iawp_total_views":72,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5,13],"tags":[54,218,324,531,616,678],"class_list":["post-2263","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-education","category-employment","category-writing","tag-anxiety","tag-disability","tag-grading","tag-perfectionism","tag-school","tag-stress","entry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.tameri.com\/autisticme\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2023\/12\/Podcast-HD-1920x1080-comp-scaled.jpg?fit=2560%2C1440&ssl=1","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pfivLC-Av","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/autisticme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2263","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/autisticme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/autisticme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/autisticme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/autisticme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2263"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/autisticme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2263\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3542,"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/autisticme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2263\/revisions\/3542"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/autisticme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4014"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/autisticme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2263"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/autisticme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2263"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/autisticme\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2263"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}