Yay, it's ADHD: reason #5
Many people find getting their diagnosis is really helpful. In this blog series I‘m taking you through some common responses I hear from my clients. Maybe one resonates with you particularly, maybe they all do. Here’s Reason 5:
Now I know how to explain how I work
Understanding how your brain works makes it easier to explain to other people what you need and how you work. It helps with cutting yourself some slack too.
So many of my clients have run into problems in relationships at home or at work because their spouse/friend/boss expected them to behave in a neurotypical way - and often they expected it of themselves too.
With my clients, and with my family, I find that expectation management is the key here, rather than whether you can force yourself to behave/work like everyone else. If you can explain to others that, say, your fidgeting actually helps with focus, and is not a result of you not listening in a meeting, the (maybe all neurotypical) people you work with will have the context that they didn’t have before, and understand that your fidgeting is different from their fidgeting. This type of shared understanding leads to easier and more productive relationships - at work and at play.
Here’s an example:
I used to work with a very skilled medical doctor who had ADHD. When patients asked him to book their next appointment, he would tell them: ‘My secretary will contact you to make a new appointment with me. She knows exactly when I’m available.’ When he got to know patients well, or if they had ADHD too, he’d say: ‘You know, there is very little chance I will be at your appointment if you and I make it now. I will write it down wrong, or I’ll forget, or there’s something else already booked at that time. It really is much better to go through my secretary.’ He was a great doctor and great at the stuff that mattered, which was patient care. Managing appointments? Not so much. So he managed expectations around that.
You may have examples that come to mind as you’re reading this story - maybe you have already found yourself explaining to a colleague that you are in fact listening to them when you are fidgeting or doodling, and that you do this to increase your focus.
The other side to this is that if you understand why you do what you do, and can explain this to others, not only do they understand you better, there may also be less pressure to ‘behave neurotypical’. If you say: ‘I’m just leaving this on my desk so I don’t forget to deal with it first thing tomorrow’ or ‘I’m leaving this on the table so I don’t forget to come back to it after work’, chances are your colleague or partner will go: ‘Oh, OK. Fine.’ Instead of you tidying it away, and then stressing about it/forgetting it/both. In a sense, this is you organising your environment in a way that works for you, rather than trying to function in a neurotypical environment (btw, that’s called compensating, or masking, and I’ll probably write about that at some point. Suffice to say here that it costs major amounts of energy and bandwidth and life works better if you don’t have to do too much of it. Avoiding it completely would be great of course, but most people end up doing some of it, some of the time).
So now what?
Well, now you know you’re dealing with ADHD you can start using those strategies more consciously - and outspokenly, when you wish to. As well, you can start to find what else works for you.
And you don’t have to do that all by yourself. Plenty of people have been where you are and done a lot of the figuring already, and there are great books, magazines and other resources out there.
And, if you want, ADHD coaching can give you a dedicated space and a bunch of support to help you figure out what’s next - for you specifically and individually. This is important because there is no one-size-fits-all, or even fits-most. So I work with my clients to, together, work out what managing ADHD looks like for them. I’ve got a lot of experience, but you know you best.
Sounds good? Contact me for a free 30 minute session to get started.
Curious about the other reasons? They are here:
Reason 2: Phew, now I can start figuring out what actually works for me.
Reason 3: OMG I can stop doing what doesn’t work.
Reason 4: Ha! Now the weird stuff I do makes sense!
Reason 6: Now I can figure out what’s me, and what’s ADHD.
Reason 7: Oh, now my family makes sense!
Here’s a link back to the main article if you want to read about the flipside – because that can be very real too.
