Am I Stupid?(…Or Just Still Trying to Figure It Out?)

When I was younger, I’d sit at the kitchen table doing my math homework—my least favorite subject. No matter how hard I tried, the numbers never quite added up the way they were supposed to. I’d erase again and again, determined to get to the right answer, until the paper was worn thin and covered in smudges.

Sometimes my grandfather would catch me erasing a problem or see how frustrated I was trying to find the right answer. And that’s when he’d say,
“What are you, stupid?!”

The words would sting, even though deep down, I knew he loved me. That was just his way—rough around the edges, sharp tongue, but big heart. Still, all these years later, I can still hear his voice.

Every time I drop something, every time I make a mistake, every time I’m asked a question I don’t know the answer to—
I catch myself whispering under my breath, “Ugh, I’m so stupid.”

The truth is, I’ve been calling myself stupid for so long it feels like a reflex. Like blinking or breathing—it just happens automatically.

Lately, I’ve been thinking about that more. I just started a new job after spending 25 years in a career where I knew exactly what I was doing. I was the expert then. Now, my boss will explain something that I just don’t understand, or ask a question I don’t have an answer to. And there it is again—that familiar wave of embarrassment, that old echo from childhood:
“What are you, stupid?!”

I wish I could say I’ve healed from it. That I’ve learned to speak kindly to myself or silence that voice in my head. But I haven’t. Not yet, anyway.

Sometimes I genuinely wonder if I’m stupid—like I missed some unspoken lesson everyone else already learned. I feel like I’m faking my way through conversations, through work, through confidence I don’t always feel. Sometimes I hold back from trying new things, just to avoid that familiar sting of feeling stupid again. And sometimes, I simply feel small.

Maybe it’s okay to acknowledge that some words—no matter how lovingly they were said—can leave bruises that take a lifetime to fade.
They linger quietly, tucked away in the corners of your mind, showing up when you least expect them.
They shape how you see yourself, how you react, how you shrink.

I loved my grandfather—God rest his soul—but his words have followed me into adulthood, into every job, every decision, every quiet moment when I start to doubt myself.

So am I stupid?
I don’t know.

But I do know that I’m trying—trying to learn, trying to understand, trying to undo years of believing something that maybe was never true.

And maybe that counts for something.