What Were Our Childhood Habits Really Hiding?

Sometimes the smallest quirks are the loudest cries for help — if we only know how to listen.

What’s a ‘harmless’ habit you had as a kid that you realize now was a cry for help?

When I was a child, I collected notebooks.

Not to fill them with dreams or drawings like most children might — but to plan, to organize, to control things I couldn’t. I would write out “schedules” for my days down to the minute. I made endless lists: things to fix, things to improve, ways to be “better.” I thought it was just a quirky habit. A cute sign of ambition or responsibility. Adults praised my “maturity” without ever asking why a 9-year-old felt the need to carry the weight of precision on her shoulders.

Now, I see it for what it was: a silent scream for stability.

In a world that felt unpredictable and sometimes cruel, I built a fortress out of routines. I was trying to create safety where there was none. I was trying to earn love by being perfect, trying to fend off chaos by mastering my tiny corner of the universe. My endless planning wasn’t about getting ahead. It was about survival.

We don’t always recognize that children’s strange little habits — the perfectionism, the daydreaming, the hoarding of trivial things — are often sophisticated coping mechanisms. They’re the small, fierce ways we fight back against the tides that threaten to drown us.

The notebooks taught me something, though. They taught me that even the smallest act of organizing a world that felt too big was an act of hope. It was a belief, however fragile, that life could be shaped into something bearable.

I don’t keep meticulous schedules anymore. But I still find myself, sometimes, scribbling lists when life feels overwhelming — not because I believe the list will save me, but because it reminds me that I am still here, still trying. And sometimes, trying is the greatest triumph of all.