I Called Myself Stupid for Years. Then I Found Out It Was ADHD.

Laurie Groh, MS LPC SAS · 2026-08-06

For most of my life I had a private word for myself. I would never have said it to a client, or to my kids, or to anyone else. When I lost something, forgot something, or made a mistake, the word was stupid.

Show notes

I'm a licensed therapist with a master's degree. I have spent my whole career helping other people talk to themselves more kindly. And I was carrying that label around in my own head the entire time.

This episode is the relaunch of the show under its new name, Without the Couch, and it's also the most personal one I've recorded. In my 40s I found out my brain had been running on a program nobody ever named: ADHD.

Why a label like "stupid" sticks

Labels are sneaky. "Stupid" has all of the emotion and none of the direction. It doesn't tell you what happened or what to do next. It just hurts.

A diagnosis is also a label, but it's a different kind. It comes with an explanation and with useful information. That difference is the heart of this episode.

Why ADHD hides in women like me

Late diagnosis is common in women, and the reason is masking. We build systems on top of systems on top of systems. We're smart, conscientious, and we care a lot, so the wheels don't visibly fall off. We just quietly exhaust ourselves keeping them on.

From the outside it looks like competence. People say "you seem fine," or even "how do you do all of that?" On the inside, the conclusion most of us reach is: the problem must be me. Why can't I get it together?

What perimenopause does to an ADHD brain

Here is the part nobody warned me about. Perimenopause turned the volume all the way up.

Estrogen and dopamine work closely together. When estrogen starts to drop, a brain that has been quietly compensating for 40 years may suddenly not be able to. If you're a woman in your 40s thinking "I used to be able to do things, what is happening to me?", there may be a real physiological answer. It is worth asking about rather than blaming yourself.

Related reading: Is It ADHD, Burnout, or Perimenopause? How to Tell the Difference and Perimenopause and ADHD in Midlife.

Grief and relief at the same time

When I got the diagnosis I felt two things at once, and they didn't cancel each other out.

• Grief for the girl who spent all those years calling herself stupid when there had been an explanation the whole time.
• Relief, because a label from a clinician is different from a label from your inner critic. This one came with direction.

Many late-diagnosed women describe the same mix. Both reactions are normal, and you don't have to pick one.

What this show is, and what it isn't

Without the Couch is what therapy conversations sound like when you take away the couch, the intake forms, and the six-week wait. It's me, and often another therapist or provider from the practice, thinking out loud together.

It is not therapy. Listening doesn't make me your therapist. Therapy is a relationship with someone who knows your story and knows the next right question to ask, and a podcast can't do that.

What a podcast can do is hand you language for something you've felt for years and couldn't name. Sometimes that's what gets a person to finally reach out for the real thing.

Underneath all of it, this is an anti-shame project. Over and over, someone describes what's "wrong" with them, and it turns out it was never a character flaw. It was a nervous system doing its job, or a brain that was never taught about itself.

Who this episode is for

• Women in midlife who feel like their operating system got updated overnight without permission
• Anyone who has read the books and done the things and still feels stuck
• People who are burnt out but wired, exhausted but unable to relax
• Anyone who loves someone whose brain works differently and wants to understand it rather than fix it

Key takeaways

1. A harsh self-label carries emotion but no information. An accurate explanation gives you somewhere to go.
2. ADHD in women is often hidden by masking and over-built systems, which is why diagnosis frequently comes in the 30s and 40s.
3. Falling estrogen in perimenopause can unmask or intensify ADHD symptoms that were previously manageable.
4. Grief and relief after a late diagnosis can exist together.

If this one hit close to home

If you recognize yourself here and want a professional evaluation or ongoing support, Shoreside Therapies offers adult ADHD evaluations and therapy in Wisconsin and online in several other states. Our intake coordinator will help you find the right fit, even if it isn't us.

More on this topic: ADHD in Women hub · ADHD in Women: Late Diagnosis · RSD in Midlife Women

This episode is for education and entertainment. It is not therapy and does not create a therapeutic relationship. Hosted by Laurie Groh, MS, LPC, SAS.