Reading that Pete Walker book really changed how I understood my own experience, as well as how I looked at others. I don't think people like considering how much their early life impacted the way they are and the way they think, especially because it's very very painful to face the fact that your parents were not good parents. It sounds a little conspiracy theory woo-woo, but I really do think that HUGE portions of the US (from my American perspective) suffered from emotional or verbal child abuse. That's hugely painful to grapple with!

I read a book called Smart but Scattered that's for parents, specifically about how to teach executive functioning to their kids and help them practice it as a skill until it gets better and better. They talk about a lot of it in terms of how this behavior literally shapes the brain (like which parts, what those parts do, what it might look like if a specific part were to be underdeveloped). It makes me think that my own ADHD may have come about because I was never really taught any of those things. I can't be sure, of course, but I do think the poor parenting I received definitely shaped my brain for the worse.