The Diagnosis

For 30 years, Tracey Mellis struggled with a miserable, messy life. Then she found out why.

- Bruce Grierson

My mother says I babbled non-stop almost from day one, to the point where they almost named me Brook. Even though I was a tiny child—I’m still under one-and-a-half metres at age 31—I was always the loudest person in the room.

We lived in Langley, B.C. At school, I was a disruptive class clown and a constant daydreamer. It was obvious to my teachers that I wasn’t listening, and they called me on it. In Grade 5, one of them finally raised the issue with my parents. “This girl has to get it together,” he told them. I was a poor reader and writer, lagging behind the class—but mostly it was my absentmindedness that was worrying him. “She’s so easily distracted; she needs discipline.”

The meeting put the fear into my parents, who gave me extra homework every night and sent me to a tutor in the summer. Those things helped because it wasn’t that I couldn’t learn, I just needed someone to sit with me and make me do it.

Along the way, a few teachers made it clear that they knew I was more than capable, since I aced the occasional assignment when I was actually interested. “You have so much potential. Why are you wasting it?” was a common refrain. Hearing that over and over was painful. I began asking myself the same question.

BY THE TIME I WAS 14, I was punching fist-sized holes in my bedroom wall in reaction to perceived slights. My emotions were in overdrive, and even small setbacks made me feel like my world was crashing down. It filled me with so much despair that I sometimes convinced myself I wanted to die. My parents finally sent me to a therapist, but the only thing I remember from those sessions is her telling me I was heading for juvenile delinquency.