Understanding and Working with the ADHD brain wiring
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hello and welcome to the ADHD Impact podcast. I'm Becca Brighty, business psychologist and A DHD coach who received an A DHD diagnosis at the age of 34. I've since seized my professional training to understand how the A DHD brain functions and use that information to change the way I work. The purpose of this podcast is to help people to see how they can harness their A DHD brain so that they can make the impact in the world that they know that they can. And to help those. Working with A DHD is to create environments that help everyone thrive at work.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Good morning, well evening for you, Alex. Welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
I asked Alex to come on the podcast currently doing a second brilliant course with him and his wonderful business partner, Katie, on a DHD for coaches, and I've learned so much from him. So I feel like Alex has a very interesting mix of qualifications and experience. So he's a psychotherapist, a certified coach, and was one of the first 40 children ever to be diagnosed with A DHD in the uk. Hi Alex. Hi. Welcome to A DHD Impact. So I guess my first question is about your diagnosis and that experience of growing up with A DHD when not many people would've heard of it.
Speaker 3 (01:14):
Yeah, it's sort of one of my claim to fames, but at the same time, and I get people going, oh my goodness, that must be amazing that you were diagnosed as a kid. And it's kind of nuanced as you, it's like the adjective of Goldmine Academy. It's all nuanced. Everything is so nuanced. And for me, I didn't really understand it, to be honest with you. I was four right when I was first diagnosed and I was medicated. And at the time in the nineties in the uk, there was a lot of stigma around the zombie children, overly medicalizing children and this being some kind of hangover from America. And so that was kind of the narrative that I was swimming in as a really young kid actually. And my parents were too, to be honest with you. It's super, I think, progressive of them to even want to go and seek out a diagnosis.
(02:18):
But then knowing that there was this kind of negative chatter going on around that time, I think must've been really hard for them. So the thing I would say though about being diagnosed back then is it was very much of its time. All of the support that I got as a kid at school, I was very privileged. My privileged around this is huge because I went to private school and they had specialist teachers that could work with kids who were neurodivergent, had dyslexia, dyspraxia, A DHD, and I ticked all of those. And so a lot of the focus was around helping me get through my education, get the grades pass because that was going to be the greatest determinant of my success. What wasn't focused on was my social skills and my ability to regulate my emotions. None of that was ever talked about, partly because that wasn't really part of what was considered with A DHD.
(03:14):
It was all about behaviour. It wasn't about need and understanding what's going on. The focus was on behaviour. So I'd say that's quite a significant thing for me when I was diagnosed was I remember it was all about trying to be well-behaved and get good grades, and that was the support that was provided and it was all very educationally focused. So I think it's more nuanced now. I think there's much more focus around the needs of children or the needs of adults and we talk about emotions and understanding our needs now, whereas before it was just you just need to try and sit still in the classroom and focus.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
So for you, do you think because I've been through with my diagnosis, a similar thing of like, oh, I've only had known when I was younger, but then this thing of, yeah, but I've been diagnosed in this time where lots of people are being diagnosed and it's, it's not like when I was at school, if you had dyslexia, people thought you were thick. Whereas people like now, no, that's not the case. And a DHD with this naughty boy type syndrome, and now people kind of get it more. So I have go through this constant question and everyone else who's been on the podcast so far has all been late diagnosed people. You work with people, but you also have the experience of being diagnosed young. What are your thoughts around that?
Speaker 3 (04:35):
Well, I definitely felt like I was the naughty boy. That classic cliche was definitely me in terms of how I felt about myself and how I think people saw me. I think getting diagnosed young is a good thing because I don't think of diagnosis as diagnosis. I think diagnosis is about discovery. It's about discovering who you are. It's about understanding your unique needs based on your wiring of your brain. And the earlier you can know that and have a narrative that you can take hold of, that's yours to own. The younger the better, so long as you have the right support around you that can allow for that. But I think we have to move away from this idea of labelling. I think that's actually able is bullshit to be honest with you. I think anything that help you understand who you are and get your needs met, sign me up.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
So is that your view on you being diagnosed young or in this age now where we understand about needs and that it's not this negative thing, it's just a difference. Do you still see it as that it was helpful to you?
Speaker 3 (05:44):
I think so. I think when I start to reflect back now on really key moments for me in my life, knowing about the A DHD was a really, even though it was a challenge, I think it still an important part of my success story. Even though it wasn't a great time to be diagnosed, it's not an either or situation. There were some great things, there were some real privilege that came with that, and there were some huge challenges that were very much of its time and a great deal of therapy has helped. But I would say that this diagnosis young now as well as then I would always say yes.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
And so you mentioned therapy there. That's a theme that seems to come up across quite a lot of people over as a real top 10 for heart to cry with a DH, adhd, was that something you did when you were young or was it not until you did your psychotherapy training as an adult that you did all that therapy?
Speaker 3 (06:42):
For various different reasons. I have been in and out of therapy my entire life, and part of that I think is trying to understand who I am. Part of that is to do with feeling very othered, but not knowing this concept of othering because you don't understand that until someone teaches it to you and you start to have this concept of feeling different and why am I different? So I think a lot of my therapy has been undoing a lot of small T trauma and trying to validate myself, advocate for myself, like myself, dare even say love myself. And I think that therapy has played a really important role in that. And ultimately that it didn't happen because I trained to become a therapist. In fact, I trained to become a therapist because I burnt out of a career in the film industry really. And I went back into therapy and then some friend said to me, really good listening to people, Alex, maybe you should become a therapist. And I was like, fuck off. I'm sitting in the other chair, I don't sit in that chair. I'm the client. And then I, on a very A DHD impulsive move, decided to sign up to an evening class and the rest was history.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
Oh, right. I didn't realise that. So you had a career before?
Speaker 3 (08:03):
Yeah, yeah. I used to work in Hollywood and la. Oh wow. Yeah, yeah. I have a colourful past.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
Is this the standard A DHD, like five different, separate, completely
Speaker 3 (08:17):
Distinct. Oh, I mean, yeah, of course it is. I mean, my career in the film when she started in stunts, I was trained to become a stunt man. So I went into camera state. But I mean, it's so stereotype. I've done the camera department, I've worked with producers. I mean, I want to become a writer. Yeah, I've flowed around all the different roles in the film industry and then utterly burnt out. But what's interesting about my story with A DHD and being diagnosed as a kid is when I graduated from high school, I went to do a degree in film and it was a very practical degree and I loved it. And I got a, first, I got D's and E's at school and I got a first at university. Why? Because I love film and it was very technical and practical, totally work with my brain. So I thought at this point, I've grown out of my A DHD, I don't need meds.
(09:17):
And then I went into a career in the film industry that was so dopamine fueled. Everything was great. It was so cool. Every day was different. But what I didn't realise was I was just working myself into an early grave. And then I had a bit of a breakdown and I left, went into therapy. And it was only actually in my final year, I did five, nearly six years of psychotherapy training, which is very expensive group therapy by the way. It was only my final year that a colleague of mine said, do you not think, because I was failing all my essays, I would do really well in all the other work, but essays just always failing them and had to resubmit them. And they said, do you not think that this might be to do the A DH adhd? And I turned them and I was like, fuck you, I've grown out of that. And then I started thinking, oh God, what if they're right? What if I is still a thing? So I reluctantly went to go and get an assessment and of course had a DHD haven't grown out of it. I ended up going onto medication and my final paper that I submitted, it was like an 8,000 word paper. I got distinction. It was the first, and it's like, I don't know if that's a coincidence, but it's the first one I submitted and I was medicated and I knew more about my A DHD.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
There's a couple of things there that That's so interesting. This thing to think of you, I just associate with you as the oracle of A DHD.
Speaker 3 (10:42):
Oh god, no pressure. Becca. Jesus.
Speaker 2 (10:45):
This is Alex, the oracle of a DH adhd. So just for people listening, you mentioned dopamine there and the fact that a university thing was so dopamine fueled that made you think you'd gone out of a DH adhd. Why is that? Dopamine important?
Speaker 3 (11:06):
Dopamine, we think about dopamine as being this pleasure neurochemical, and it really isn't almost like the thing that we get when dopamine happens. Dopamine is actually about wanting, it's a chemical that helps us to want to do stuff. And so that's why A DHD is we have interest based brains because when we're interested in the thing, there's so much wanting and we get into it and we want to do it. For me, film was such a niche special interest for me. It was an environment that I was super interested in. And so it was like going to Alton Towers, dopamine Central. I loved it. So because I was so interested in it, I was riding that dopamine. I had loads of capacity to focus. Also, I was a student. I didn't have any kids. I didn't any cares in the world. I could spend all day every day thinking about film, which led to getting good grades, which led to getting really, and I was passionate about it.
(12:03):
I was really passionate about storytelling. And so that's why I associate that with, I didn't have many challenges. I didn't have to think about much beyond myself and my own needs. And there weren't also the way that the course was set up, there weren't loads of exams, there were a lot of coursework or having to create films and that was what you're being marked on. So actually it was very interactive. Got to use different parts of my brain. So there wasn't a lot of time to get bored. So that's why there's so low to dopamine there. Does that help?
Speaker 2 (12:41):
Yeah, yeah. No, that's really helpful. But what is the issue? What's the issue for A DHD is with dopamine? Why is that so important? You
Speaker 3 (12:48):
Have, so if you have a DHD are dopamine transmitters that are a series of neural pathways in our brain, we have these transmitters and they release dopamine. And if you have a DHD, the dopamine, the way that dopamine is released in the transmitter in the brain functions differently than if you don't have a DHD. And I kind of liken it. If you can imagine, if you're listening, imagine you have your two fists and imagine that your two fists are clenched and facing each other and one fist is the transmitter and the other fist is the receiver. Imagine there are thousands, millions of these that are all connecting each other in a neural pathway. When dopamine is released, it's like the transmitter, one of the fists, it's the transmitter. Like imagine that fist is now just released a bunch of dopamine, and that dopamine goes into this gap between your two fists called the syn gap, and then it gets picked up by this fist, the receiver, and then the information goes down your arm and down the neural pathways in your brain.
(14:01):
This function is different if you have a DHD because the function of dopamine being released is released by interest. And we struggle because we're not interested in as many things, partly because of the way that the transmitter works. So if a task is important, like paying a bill, a utility bill, it's not very interesting. It's important. And that importance doesn't activate your dopamine transmitter to go right, guys, information here, we've got to pay a bill, release the dopamine so that this person here wants to pay it in a DHD. It's like it's not interesting. It is interesting when the utility company sends you reminders and goes, we're going to reclaim your house if you don't pay it. And you go, oh shit, fuck, I've got to pay it. Because what happens is suddenly the interest becomes negative interest when we talk about interest. Interest is an emotion. We can have positive interest and negative interest. Anxiety is very interesting. When you're anxious, what do you focus on? The thing that's making you anxious us? Very activating. So that's why we have this challenge around interest versus importance. Does that make sense? If I made that clear, that's really helpful
Speaker 2 (15:23):
For me. Even I've looked into it, I've never fully, I knew there was an issue around dopamine, never fully,
Speaker 3 (15:31):
And this is why we have stimulant medication. Stimulant medication is essentially supporting the dopamine release in the transmitter. It's helping that dopamine transmitter to function well. So when there are tasks that might be slightly less important, for instance, that your dopamine transmitter has the capability of releasing dopamine, releasing it so that it goes into that little gap and then gets picked up by the receiver and the information gets passed on down that neural pathway to where it needs to go in your brain so that you end up taking action, fulfilling the want, right? Because once you fulfilled the want, you feel the pleasure.
Speaker 2 (16:16):
That's very interesting. And so why did you want to stop taking the medication then?
Speaker 3 (16:20):
Because I didn't feel that I needed it because I was surrounded with so much interest. I didn't really have any struggles with my focus. I didn't feel that I was falling behind because I was literally living in my favourite place, which was film. Everything was great. All the coursework was great. I got to make movies, make music videos, write film scripts and get graded for it. And I was so interested in it, I got amazing grades. But the challenge though that I wasn't really aware of was I had a really good close group of friends, but now when I think back, they are amazing friends. I still hold true today, but in some of the early days in being at uni, I think I really gave them a hard time. I think there was some challenges around demands that I put on them, partly because of my hyperfocus and not turning up to things or getting distracted with things and whilst academically or fulfilling the criteria as a student, I was doing well. But I think there are some other areas that when I think back now, I think I can see the A DHD, if that makes sense.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
Absolutely. And this seems to be a theme for people is they can do well in one area of their life at a time. Is that something you recognise?
Speaker 3 (17:48):
Yeah. So there's a model that we talk about in our training, as I am sure you're aware of is situational variability, which is this idea that everything is variable for us as A DHD, when we're thinking about doing a task wherever the task is, we have to take into consideration the environment. We're doing it in the time that we're doing it, in the people that are around us when we're doing it. We also have to take into consideration our needs like eat, sleep, exercise, our executive functions, lots of things. And depending on what's going on for us, we have to nuance everything. So if I was a student at uni doing that degree again, but I was a single parent, there's a lot more impact on me and what I need to be thinking about, which will have an impact on my ability to focus.
(18:37):
I mean, that's a massive one because I know you're a parent as well, and I'm a parent and the demands that we have on us are huge. So there are different needs and demands on us at different times in our lives, partly to do with age, partly to do with lifestyle and life choices. Does that make sense? So that you could be epic at say your job when you were younger and maybe a role that was maybe more interesting to you, maybe you had less responsibility so you felt less stress. You could start going through all these different variables and go, well, yeah, of course I was flying in that, but now I've got this, this and this to think about and I've got a mortgage and I've got this and I've got that and my parents are raging. And you start adding all this stuff and it starts to paint a picture as to why certain things are more challenging than certain things.
Speaker 2 (19:23):
Yeah, yeah. I was speaking with a chief people officer and she was saying that when she was younger, if when things got stressful, she'd just do her job. So she's always done well in her job, but then friendships would suffer or relationships would suffer because she couldn't be good at everything. So it would be like, oh, I'll folk. And maybe it's that hyper focus thing of I just need to overwhelm, oh, there's too many things, but I can do this one thing.
Speaker 3 (19:49):
And that's so normal for our brains because if I can just be good at this one thing, it gives me this sense of control and security, which feels safe. And that ticks all the boxes in our brain because the primary focus of our brains, whether you have a DHD or not, is to be safe. So if I can hyperfocus on this, it means I don't have to think about that. And I have control over this and I have this kind of sense of security. But of course the reality is you can't put life on pause. You have to return to that thing. And that's the challenge.
Speaker 2 (20:21):
Yeah, that would be really, really nice. I sometimes think of my children, I could just look after themselves like a month and I can just do this. Then I'll come back and I'll look after them. But for 11 months, don't, they're not up for it.
Speaker 3 (20:36):
Yeah, I know, I know. And this is the challenge if you're a parent, because I think I mentioned this word, executive functions, I dunno, people have talked about this, but this is part of the challenge if you have a DHD is around our executive functioning, this process that happens in our brain that's situated justifying your forehead in the prefrontal cortex. It's like the management system of your brain. And if you're a parent with A DHD, and the likelihood is potentially our kids will have a DHD, it is fairly highly hereditary that you're having to do the executive functioning for your kids as well. So unbeknown to you, you've now been contracted to handle the executive functioning of your children. And in a way that is the role of a parent. We help them understand their, we don't talk about executive function. We should, I will do that with my child as she grows up, but it is understanding what it is that I'm doing for you, what it is that I'm helping you under so that you can then go and do likewise. But it's even harder when you have a DHD because we have up to a 30% impairment in our executive functioning.
Speaker 2 (21:46):
I think the parenting thing, I don't never really hear people talking about that challenge of being an A DHD parent having 50 50 chance of having a child with A DHD. So I was thinking, I am not sure if you're familiar with NCT, it's like this mother's
Speaker 3 (22:05):
Group
Speaker 2 (22:05):
Need to be pregnant year just because you've moved to New Zealand six months ago, so you must have forgotten everything about the whole of the year life. Yeah,
Speaker 3 (22:12):
I'm basically not British anymore,
Speaker 2 (22:15):
Really.
Speaker 3 (22:16):
I'm a Kiwi through and through. No,
Speaker 2 (22:18):
We have this thing in England called NCD, national Childbirth Trust and all you meet moms when you're pregnant. And so all our children are now turning four and they're all having, the other children are having parties, but Lily finds parties just massively overwhelming. And so for her, I just planned to go to this place she loves nearby called Adventure Valley with her sister, who's 11 months old, and then her cousin was going to come who's two. And then our family, like my dad and her grandpa, who's my mom's husband, my mom, my sister, my husband, but then she's going through a really emotional time. We went on hold her for a week. So she's really overstimulated. And so then it's like this thing of the other parents are just booking it, not just, I know it's a mission to book a soft play or whatever.
(23:10):
They book the soft play and they send out the invite and that's all fine for me. It's like, okay, we're going to go to Adventure Valley, make sure what time are we going to get up, make sure she has a good breakfast, and then we need to get not too many presents where she's going to be overwhelmed, but enough so she's not going to be disappointed. And then so we'll have breakfast at this time, my sister can come and by then 10 o'clock my sister can come and give her a present. That'll be fine. And we need to arrange with all the other family members who might want to talk to her around a birthday to do it the day before or the day after, because that'll be too much on a birthday. And then my dad will have to come round to look after her so me and Dan can get ready and pack the car and put our, get my baby ready, and then we're going to go there.
(23:54):
And then everyone can't be too excited, even though it's a four year old's birthday and it's like this massive, I was like yesterday, so this was on Sunday, and then yesterday I was so tired and it's like this is just a plan going a child's birthday. And I think it's something where I would never have imagined that situation and how much thought needs to go into maintaining a child's emotional regulation when, I dunno whether she would get a diagnosis or what it would be. But she's definitely a highly sensitive child. And then I had to go back to work yesterday and I'm so exhausted. Trying to concentrate was just so difficult.
Speaker 3 (24:36):
This Becca, I think what I'm hearing from you is actually just speaking, okay, two things. The first thing is speaking to your awareness around the importance of need in your child and regulation, because that same situation for me as a boy acting out would've been seen as, and not because it was intentionally trying to be harmful, but just you're being badly behaved, you're being ungrateful. They wouldn't have been looking at need. And that's what you are talking about is her need for regulation. And there is more kind of, because we know more now and we're more aware now of this, it's like there's more sort of responsibility or choice in, we could mitigate quite a few meltdowns, which wouldn't have happened in the nineties. They would just happened and then it would've, you would've been told off.
(25:36):
So there is differences here, but I think one of the things you're speaking to is the mother load or the parent load around being aware of the needs of your child and of course wanting to love and care and support your child and also being mindful of just the cost that is to you. And you just mentioned kind of the classic A DHD not now thinking, which is, I've done all this work to make sure that she has a great time and then I got to go to work on Monday, and how many fucks do I have to give for that because I actually haven't accounted for that. That's a D, H, D, do you know what I mean? I think that's the real significant thing that still bites me, where I'll do things and then go, oh my God, I've got a busy day and then I've forgotten that we're doing a dinner party at the end and I'm cooking and I'm like,
(26:26):
And it's not that I don't want to do it, it's not that I don't, it's just this really hard for us, this is part of the work I think for A DHD is managing our energy, managing expectations, and also let's face it, do often trying to create the perfect birthday and trying to make sure everything is okay for our child when it won't. You know what I mean? There's also something about going, what shit might get real here and I'm just going to have to deal with it. Do you know what I mean? I think I noticed for me as well when you were talking thinking, I'm feeling very seen here and also noticing sometimes the need for this to feel not be perfect, but try and make sure we've accommodated everything and we kind of almost go above and beyond, if that makes sense. And that really takes a toll on us. And over time, that can leave us feeling quite resentful, particularly to the person who doesn't have any awareness of quite how much effort. Well,
Speaker 2 (27:23):
Not every day, just it was her birthday of you feel like, oh, they're inviting their friends and all that kind of stuff and you feel dead sad for them. But then I know that she would hate that and she might think that that's what she wanted to do, but then she'd feel really uncomfortable, but you just like, oh, because I know that she's in some ways going to miss out on certain things or certain things in her life are probably going to be more difficult. You're like, have put this extra pressure on yourself. But I think one of the things that actually last night I was just like, I don't know if this happens to you. I got so exhausted. I was trying to cross a road and I couldn't work out which way the traffic and stuff was going to come from. I was just like, eh, because it was a T junction and I was thinking, well, how are the cars going to turn down here? And so I was so tired and then I thought, I'm going to put my calendar basically for the rest of time on the day after her birthday and big capital letters do not do anything.
Speaker 3 (28:18):
Yeah, that's great. I love that
Speaker 2 (28:22):
Noticing and being like, right, what can I learn from this situation? Yesterday was a really full on day. I had planned loads of things in which was ridiculous now upon reflection, but it's a whole learning journey, isn't it?
Speaker 3 (28:37):
And when we're really asking, let's face it, planning a whole day of birthday celebrations is running a marathon. When a DHD is a sprinters, we do things in intense fits and bursts. But if we have to be on all day, particularly for coordinating, we're essentially asking ourselves to sprint a marathon. That's the toll that it takes on us. And so factoring in stuff afterwards is really important for us. This is the self-compassion work that I often talk about in coaching, which is thinking about, for instance, if you're going into a conference conferences, you're on your feet, you're talking to people, you're listening, we have to factor in recovery time. We have to factor in. And that's not that you are failing. This is normal for A DHD. We have to factor in time when we've been giving out huge amounts of effort because I sprint, everything I do is a sprint. So I have to figure out how I manage my energy around sprinting, around how much energy things take for me to do.
Speaker 2 (29:47):
And so I think one of the great things about being self-employed is once you start learning about this kind of stuff, you can to a large extent manage your own environment and put things into place. Like I've talked about with you guys, how I've learned about a lot about the executive function and then I now treat every day like an executive function marathon and have these executive function breaks, et cetera. How can people do that in the workplace and what can workplaces do to help people with that?
Speaker 3 (30:19):
That's a big question. I think there's lots of ways that we could answer that, but I think the beginning, I think workplaces have to start from the foundation of what does being inclusive look like in this workplace and in the culture of this workplace? And I think leaders need to be educated and understand the system that neurodivergent individuals are in. And we're talking about intersectionality here. We're talking about what access and privilege people have and don't have because the needs of someone with A DHD who's a single parent with two kids who's working is different to the guy with A DHD who just graduated from uni. Their A DHD looks very different. And so we have to take, I think if we're thinking about A DHD on a case by case basis when we're thinking about supporting individuals, we can't just go oh A DHD and apply a blanket understanding or support around that.
(31:32):
I think that for people in the workplace, particularly if you are neurodivergent, it's about creating environments where people feel safe. They trust their manager, they trust people so they can start to talk about their A DH, ADHD and their experience. And I think that's a really key point that we just sort of overlook. And when we think about this concept of psychological safety in the workplace, it's a word that's used and I talk about it, it's just a nice word until it actually becomes, it has to be an action. Psychological safety is an action, not a nice word, a nice thing to have. And so yeah, I think that's an important piece here because when someone in the workplace tells you they've got a DHD, they're not coming out, they're letting you in, they're letting you in to something really personal. And we're still living in a world where there's huge stigma around A DHD, not just A DHD, but dyslexia and autism and Tourettes and dyspraxia, and there's huge amounts of misunderstanding. So I think that's probably the place I would start with when it comes to workplace.
Speaker 2 (32:49):
And so what can you actually do? So psychological safety is this whole big concept around making people feel safe, but it's such a complicated topic. And like you said, all the things you mentioned like intersectionality and all these culture and everything, it's like if you are running a business and you wanting to be more inclusive, but then you're reading things that are saying to you, you just need to work. You need to work on psychological safety and you need to take an individualised approach for every person. For me, I'm like, well, I've got a thousand employees. I am just going to give up because, so how do you take this thing that is, and no two ADHD is are the same? How do you take this thing that is an individual experience and everyone needs different things and apply it to an organisational setting?
Speaker 3 (33:41):
I think the first part is actually to run inclusive training. I think you need to run training where people understand A DHD and ultimately having that training that is led by people with lived experience of A DHD. I think then depending on the workplace, it's also about figuring out how you can have courageous conversations. Because ultimately, if an A DHD feels empowered, they're the ones that start to advocate for themselves and say what they need as opposed to expecting an employer to do it for them. I think this is the thing about when I feel empowered and feel safe to talk about my A DHD, I can then start to figure out what it is that I might need and what is it that I can advocate for myself. And that starts from the psychological safety. So you also have to have a sense that other people know a bit about A DHD and also that I feel like I'm safe to disclose this with you so that I can then start to talk about it. Because the answers don't lie in the other people. They lie in the people who have a DHD, and this is ultimately what coaching is, right? I'm not here to save you. I'm here to empower you so that you can advocate for yourself, you can validate yourself. And I think that's the approach I would take. But that comes, I think if you have no experience with training, that's training that's led by people with lived experience.
Speaker 2 (35:11):
And what would be, from your perspective, obviously I know and I have a perspective on this, but what's your perspective in terms of why would a business bother? Because it's an investment financially, why would a business pay to do
Speaker 3 (35:25):
This? I had this love hate relationship with that sort of question because any system and businesses are systems, any system that is diverse, thrives, doesn't matter if you're a business or not. If you've got a collection of people who are basically all the same, you won't survive. And I was talking with one of the lead dnis at Google, and they have a policy around, well, I wasn't speaking with them, but I was speaking A CEO who's working with them and they have a policy with their recruitment that there is a minimum of, I think 20% has to be neurodivergent in their employment because they know that it makes business sense, as in we need divergent thinkers. And the worst thing is if you've got divergent thinkers who feel unsafe, what some of your greatest untapped resources are not being realised, why would you not want that? Right? Because divergent thinkers who feel safe, you try fucking stopping us, right? We are firecrackers. And I think that's the thing here. It's not just about profit. It's about this is so good for business because everyone wins in investing in this. So that would be my answer.
Speaker 2 (37:05):
That's exactly what I think. Surprise, surprise. Relationship with the question. What's the,
Speaker 3 (37:11):
What's that? Sorry?
Speaker 2 (37:13):
What's your love hate relationship with that question?
Speaker 3 (37:15):
I think my love hate relationship with that. I think because it's often asked by people who kind of just see this as a bit of a hassle. It's just another thing we have to think about. It's like we are a hassle. It's like I think you miss a crucial point here about why this is so important. This isn't a cost. If you're seeing this as a cost, then you're fundamentally missing the point as to why you're even thinking about why we're thinking about this, which is to have safe, have a diverse team is a wonderful thing. The benefits are huge.
Speaker 2 (37:55):
Yeah. Yeah. I know from my own experience of what I was like and then what I'm like now, but what I was like and then what I'm like now that I've actually gone to the effort to learn a lot about it and change how I do things, I do at least five times more work every day with less time and less. And then I have energy at the end of the day a lot of the time. And so big businesses could do that. That would be
Speaker 3 (38:24):
A massive
Speaker 2 (38:25):
Win for them.
Speaker 3 (38:26):
Absolutely. I was coaching a while ago, a lady who was a sales director for an American corporation, and she only worked 50% of the year. She had a DHD, bipolar type one and a few other diagnoses and an incredible, incredible, just incredible human being. And when she really understood her needs and understood what was being asked of her in her job, her KPIs are way more than her neurotypical counterparts. And she only works 50%. She works half the month and then she recovers. She's in a very privileged position to be able to do that. But it kind of goes to prove the point. If you expect me to marathon run, which is work a hundred percent of the month, I will never meet my targets. But if I'm allowed to sprint for half the month, I will give you what you need and you'll get the best from me and I'll get the best from me, but this is how my brain works and this is what I need. And that's a really good, it's an extreme example, but it kind of proves the point.
Speaker 2 (39:34):
Yeah. Oh no, I hear a lot from my coaches of that. They feel bad not working eight hours a day. They're too tired to do that. But I'm like, but how much do you do in four hours? Are you doing the same amount as other people?
Speaker 3 (39:46):
Exactly.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
Does it matter really whether you're doing it in eight hours or if you're doing it in four hours, you're not being paid for doing eight hours of work a day. You're being paid for an output.
Speaker 3 (39:58):
Exactly. Exactly. And really, if we're going to break this down, the idea that you should be expected to work those eight hours is a very ableist, old hack way of thinking, right? I know of organisations here in New Zealand, there's an insurance company who moved to a four day week and profits have gone up, productivity's gone up. Employees are happier. I am not saying this is the golden answer, but it's interesting when you do make some shifts to work patterns, what is the impact? And working more doesn't necessarily mean better.
Speaker 2 (40:42):
Yeah, definitely. I used to job sharing, I'm sure. And so I worked three days and I think I did as much in that three days as I would've in five. I only had that time. So that was really good for me. Now I know why it was so good. Of course,
Speaker 3 (40:54):
Time pressure. Helpful.
Speaker 2 (40:57):
Yeah, really good. And so I just want to move on now quickly to the psychotherapy. I am conscious that it's very late for you and your medication one off
Speaker 3 (41:07):
It was many hours ago.
Speaker 2 (41:11):
So one of the things that really struck me when I met you is how calm you were and how in touch with your emotions. So on the course for people listening, Alex will cry, but it's not like when I cry, I'm heaving. My face is really ugly, I can't breathe. Alex has just got his expressing his emotions this lovely way. And he talks in, well, you've heard, she talks in this calm voice, which is not something I associate usually and probably most of the other is when you're listening back to this podcast, you'll know just the difference in the tempo between the other guests. So does that come from psychotherapy, do you think? Where does it come from? Basically this calm, Alex,
Speaker 3 (42:01):
You experience a side of me in the course. That is partly my role as a facilitator and experience that training and leading with vulnerability. Leading with vulnerability is I'd say a hallmark, like a value system for me about vulnerability. I've done a lot of work in my life around seeing and vulnerability being a real strength for me and not apologising for crying when I do feel emotional, not shaming myself for it, but allowing it. That's been years and years of therapy and also going into psychotherapy training, which I feel like often when you go into coach training, a lot of neurotypical coach training, at least you sort of start with the client in mind. Therapy training, you don't start with the client in mind, you start with you and you spend several years focusing entirely on you because you need to understand your shit if you're going to sit in the room with someone else's shit. And I think what it helped me was to become very comfortable with intense emotion
(43:16):
And become more able to identify feelings in the moment. So quite often if I'm feeling really overwhelmed, I notice myself going, and what kind of overwhelmed is that? Sad, overwhelmed, humiliated. I'll sort of go through the emotions wheel that we use in the training a lot, and I'll use an emotions wheel and I'll see it. But I think for me as a therapist, so much of the work is trying to decode and unpick my relationship to feelings and often to trauma because when we're working with clients, we're working with trauma a lot. So I need to really understand what's going on for me in order for me able to sit with somebody else and support them. So I think a lot of this calmness that you talk about is probably in part a reflection of that work that I've done on myself, both in therapy and in training to become a therapist. But I lost it with my partner and my daughter yesterday, and I felt deeply full ashamed because I was busy, busy, busy. And then I was trying to cook dinner and she was screaming and crying and I just shouted and I just was really unpleasant. And then she went off screaming and crying and my partner was like, we're going out. And I was like,
(44:36):
Moment of dysregulation. I completely bust my window of tolerance. This happens. I don't have it all together all the time. I'm inconsistent with this calm regulation that you might see on the course. So I guess I want to sort of deep pedestal myself here. Is this sort of, you're
Speaker 2 (44:58):
The oracle?
Speaker 3 (44:59):
No, I'm not. That's the thing. But I think it's about this continual staying with the work of wanting to stay with my emotions. I think that's the point here is it's sort of like if you stop going to the gym, your muscles won't be toned. I think this is, especially if you have a DHD, the work of getting clear on your feelings and knowing how your feelings manifest, knowing the environments where you might feel certain things and knowing that, and because we really can't get any of our needs met unless we don't have clarity on our feelings. Feelings are the root to needs. And for a DH, D is feelings just tend to be overwhelm. I'm feeling everything or I'm feeling nothing. It's like these extremes. And so I guess for me, a long-winded way of saying is just lots and lots of practise, and I'm really interested in the practise of it. I'm really invested in, interested in wanting to know more about my feelings. So I think that probably plays out in the calmness as well. That was a very long answer, but hopefully that helps clarify some things.
Speaker 2 (46:12):
That's how I answer all questions.
Speaker 3 (46:15):
I'm just going to give you everything here.
Speaker 2 (46:18):
Five minutes. I know that was really helpful. But so for people who don't have seven years to go to psychotherapy and training, how can people start to do that kind of work?
Speaker 3 (46:33):
I think this work I'm seeing happening in my role as a coach with clients who come to see me, people often go, oh, feelings are for therapy. No darling, feelings are part of coaching, especially if you have a DHD. How are we going to contract for these strong feelings in coaching, particularly if you're going to see someone who might be an A DHD coach, for instance. So I think a lot of the work can begin in coaching, in helping you unpack and understand your feelings and doing it with somebody else can be very regulating, can be very helpful in helping you decode the feelings and try and make sense of them and feel a bit safer around our feelings. So I'd say coaching is one way, therapy is another way. I'd also say if, you know have other friends or colleagues who have a DHD starting to use emotions, wheels, these visual wheels that kind of help you pick emotions. If you just Google emotions wheel, you'll see what I mean. I think doing it with other people is always helpful for an A DH, adhd, if I'm doing it in community, I feel more belonging if feel more connected. You have a DHD, so there's some commonality here that can be really helpful. I know people who have little groups where they just meet to talk about their A DHD, and lo and behold feelings come up. So it's a great place to be exploring that, do it with other people.
Speaker 2 (48:05):
Okay, thank you. That's really helpful. Now my final two questions, and I ask everyone is the first one is, what tip would you give to a DHD as to help them make the impact that they want to at work? Business entrepreneurship.
Speaker 3 (48:19):
I'm trying to think of a tip. Like one thing my brain's gone like a million things I'm racing and I can't pick one. It doesn't slow down.
Speaker 2 (48:29):
It's no rush.
Speaker 3 (48:30):
Okay, my tip is get really familiar, comfortable, and clear on your natural strengths. The thing you discount all the fucking time, because you in your brilliance is you in your strengths. You have to know them first and you have to systematically stick them in your brain A, because it will be you at your best. And winning B, getting to know your strengths as a self-regulation practise, right? C, everybody else wins as well as you. So that would be my tip. Use the VA character strengths or use the Gallup strengths finder. Anything that has a positive psychology lens on your natural strengths and brilliance. And this is a hard tip because it's really unfamiliar our entire lives. We've been focusing on the deficits and what doesn't work and how we can mitigate them. And that often leads to dysregulation and hating ourselves, and we have to counter this wave. And I would say it's, it's not like a quick tip or trick, but it is the thing that will see you soaring.
Speaker 2 (49:44):
Yeah, strengths have been life changing for me. I have an exercise on strengths that I'll put a link to for people. Brilliant. And then the final question, what tip would you give to those employing people with A DHD to help them thrive in the workplace thrive?
Speaker 3 (49:59):
I think I would invite them to get curious and ask them about how they see their A DHD, get to know their A DHD, ask 'em about how they see it positively impacting their job as well as the challenges. We don't often ask that, how do you think this positively? Normally it's never that. And I'd say also never assume why something's happening. As in the neurotypical perspective on an A, DHD behaviour is almost always incorrect. They haven't done that because they're lazy or they're procrastinating just because they have a DHD. It's like, no, it's not that simple. So I would say get brave and curious about asking them questions that will help them sort of help inform you so you have a real clear picture of what their A DHD is for them.
Speaker 2 (51:07):
Okay, that's great. And I love the fact you've even picked up on strengths in that one as well. So it's like even the manager can help that person to understand their A DHD strengths by saying, how does that,
Speaker 3 (51:17):
I mean, if the workforce allows for it, if you can share strengths and you as a manager knows your employee's strengths, it's a great common language in which to talk about work. Like how could your strengths benefit you in this task? When you talked about this, I wondered which strengths were showing up in that. You said you were struggling with this. Is there anything of your strengths that you might need to consider if we're going to look at alternatives with this? Does that make sense? It's those sorts of questions. If the two of you have agreed on using strengths, it's a great vehicle. Another reason for this is because of rejection sensitivity that we're really sensitive to perceived or actual criticism. If we take a strength approach, it really softens it and allows for possibility, and we're not focusing on the problem, we're focusing on a natural strength-based approach in order to come up with creative solutions. Again, it's a win-win.
Speaker 2 (52:27):
I love that. Perfect place to end on a win-win. So thank you so much for all your time this evening. You're welcome. I've had a great time. So I'll speak to you soon, Alex. Bye-Bye.
Speaker 3 (52:38):
Thank you. Thank you, Becca.
Speaker 1 (52:42):
Thanks for listening. If you want more information around this topic or details on the ways I support individuals in the workplace and help businesses to be more A DHD friendly, please go to a adhd impact.com or follow me, Becca Brady on LinkedIn.
In this captivating episode of The ADHD Impact podcast, join host Becca Brighty as she delves into an enlightening dialogue with Alex Campbell, a renowned psychotherapist and ADHD coach.
🎙️ Becca and Alex explore the intricacies of the ADHD brain, shedding light on the role of dopamine and the challenges ADHD individuals face in completing tasks. Discover how medication can help bridge the dopamine deficit and enhance productivity. 💡
Alex shares his wealth of knowledge on ADHD, drawing from personal experience as one of the first diagnosed individuals in the UK. Gain valuable insights into the unique challenges of parenting with ADHD and the importance of creating neuro-inclusive workplaces.
Join the conversation as Becca and Alex discuss the vital role of understanding our brains, meeting our own needs, and creating supportive environments for all neurotypes to thrive. 🌟
Episode Highlights:
Understanding the ADHD brain and the role of dopamine
Overcoming challenges in completing tasks
Parenting with ADHD: navigating the unique challenges
Creating neuro-inclusive workplaces for business success
🧠 Insights:
Importance of medication in managing ADHD symptoms
Strategies for fostering neurodiversity in the workplace
📚 Connect:
Follow Alex Campbell on LinkedIn: Alex Campbell's LinkedIn Profile
Explore more about GoldMind Academy, the business co-founded by Alex: GoldMind Academy Website
Don't miss out on this insightful episode! Tune in now to embrace the power of neurodiversity with Alex Campbell. 🚀
