There’s a moment many neurodivergent people experience that hits like a wave, often in childhood but reinforced across years:

“You’re too much.”

Too loud.

Too sensitive.

Too emotional.

Too intense.

Too difficult.

Too different.

The echoes of these messages can live in our bodies for years. And for neurodivergent parents, those echoes often resurface, amplified, when we raise children who also defy the mold.

This post is about what it means to be told you’re “too much” and how, in truth, you might be exactly enough; for yourself, your child, and your own healing.

When You’ve Internalized the “Too Much” Message

For many of us, the label “too much” wasn’t a one-time comment, it was a lifelong theme. Maybe your teachers said it when you couldn’t sit still, or peers reacted when you got excited and rambled. Maybe a partner shut down during arguments, telling you to “calm down” or “stop overreacting.”

These moments create a feedback loop:

• You express your natural feelings or energy
• Someone responds with discomfort, rejection, or shaming
• You internalize the belief that your emotions are wrong
• You learn to suppress, mask, or “tone it down”

Eventually, you don’t even need the external voice anymore. You’ve absorbed it.

Neurodivergent Traits Often Get Labeled as “Too Much”

Let’s be clear: the world is calibrated for a narrow range of emotional and behavioral expression. Many neurodivergent traits exist outside that range.

• Intense emotions? Too dramatic
• Hyperfocus on a topic? Too obsessive
• Sensitivity to sounds or fabrics? Too picky
• Emotional honesty? Too raw
• Bluntness or directness? Too rude
• Passion and enthusiasm? Too excitable
• Needing rest or recovery time? Too lazy

The problem isn’t the intensity; it’s the world’s inability (or unwillingness) to  meet it with understanding.

How This Impacts Parenting

When you become a parent, especially to a child who is also neurodivergent, your old “too much” wounds can resurface:

• You feel overstimulated, but tell yourself to “suck it up”
• You struggle with executive functioning, but feel ashamed to ask for help
• You become dysregulated, and shame floods in because you “should know better”
• You parent differently and question whether it’s “wrong”

Even well-meaning parenting advice can feel like another layer of judgment:

“Be calm and consistent.”
“Don’t take it personally.”
“Set firm limits without getting emotional.”

You may try to shrink yourself, to be the perfect gentle parent; patient, regulated, attuned, and feel like a failure every time you have a sensory overload or emotional spiral.

What If You’re Not Too Much?

Pause for a moment and ask yourself:

• What if I’m not too much?
• What if I was never too much to begin with?

It’s a radical thought, because it dismantles the entire story you’ve been told. It invites you to consider that the problem wasn’t your intensity; it was the lack of a safe space to hold it.

You were never  too much. You were mismatched.

Your Intensity is a Gift. Not a Flaw

What others call “too much” often signals:

• Deep empathy
• High sensitivity to injustice
• Fierce advocacy
• Creative thinking
• Emotional attunement
• Passionate focus
• A strong sense of values

Your child needs that.

You need that.

And the world is slowly starting to need it, too.

Reparenting the Inner Child Who Was Shamed for Being Intense

Reparenting means offering yourself what you needed but didn’t receive. For the “too much” child inside you, it means:

• Validating your emotions: “It makes sense that I feel this strongly”
• Honoring your limits: “It’s okay to step away or set a boundary”
• Affirming your traits: “My intensity is a strength, not a flaw”
• Letting go of comparison: “I don’t need to parent like someone else”
• Rewriting the script: “I don’t need to shrink to be loved”

This is not just healing work. It’s generational repair.

When you accept yourself more fully, you model that for your child. You show them that they don’t have to twist themselves into knots to belong.

What This Looks Like in Real Life

Reparenting isn’t always graceful. It might look like:

• Taking a break during a meltdown because you’re on the verge of one, too
• Letting the dishes pile up because your nervous system needs rest
• Saying “no” to a school volunteer request and not feeling guilty
• Letting yourself cry when your child screams, “I hate you” and telling your partner, “That really hurt”
• Writing affirmations on your mirror that remind you: “I’m enough. Just as I am”

These aren’t signs of weakness. They’re signs of recovery.

What If You’re Just Enough?

When we ask “Am I too much?” we’re really asking, “Am I lovable as I am?”

The answer must be yes.

Not if you change.

Not when you’re more regulated.

Not after you parent better.

Now.

You are just enough in this moment. Even in the chaos. Even when you fall apart. Especially then.

Because that’s when your truth comes forward; not the masked version, but the real one

If You’re Still Unsure, Remember This:

You don’t need to earn rest.

You don’t need to explain your feelings.

You don’t need to regulate perfectly.

You don’t need to mask your differences.

You get to show up fully; messy, honest, human.

You get to take up space in your parenting and your life.

And if you still wonder whether you’re too much, I hope you ask:

Too much for whom?