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Neurodiversity with Kathy Charlton - Ep 04
32 Plays5 days ago
In this episode George is joined by his therapist, Kathy Charlton, who is a cousellor and pyschotherapist with a particular interest in adhd. Together, George and Kathy meander through the world of neurodiversity, clarifying some terms and generally chatting about the lived experience of adhd.
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- For rough transcripts of this episode, go to: https://www.archpodnet.com/adhdbce/04
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Transcript
Introduction to Neurodiversity and ADHD
00:00:01
Speaker
you're listening to the archaeology podcast
00:00:18
Speaker
welcome to adhdbc the podcast foraging through space and time to uncover the many positive ways neurodiversity has impacted the human story
00:00:29
Speaker
You're listening to the world we live in and on this show we're going to be diving into some of the most enigmatic and significant events, places and people that have driven humanity from simple tree dwellers to space traveling entrepreneurs.
Meet Cathy Charlton: Therapist and Advocate
00:00:43
Speaker
I'm your late diagnosed neurodivergent host George Lomas and I'll be interviewing archaeologists, academics and neurodiversity specialists in this quest to prove that being on the spectrum is something we can be very proud of. So let's make like ADHD and jump right in. So in today's episode I'm going to be taking a bit of a risk and inviting on my therapist, who is the lovely Cathy Charlton. Welcome, Cathy. Hello. So Cathy is a counsellor and psychotherapist with a particular interest in ADHD and relationships. also happens to be a fantastic therapist and she works for a company called Headstuff ADHD Therapy, who are one of the largest groups of counselors, coaches, and specialists in ADHD and ASD in the UK. And from personal experience, I found those guys online and they got me my diagnosis back in 2020. And that's where I met Cathy. If you remember remember back then, a long way back when COVID was a thing and it was horrible. stma gather Yeah, and online we became the norm. That's right, yeah, indeed. yeah I think that was so my first real experience with Zoom actually back then. So Cathy, we're going to jump into neurodiversity today. Rather than being archaeology heavy, which some of the episodes have been, this is more about neurodiversity. So could you please give us a little introduction about yourself and your relationship with neurodiversity? Yeah, OK. So I think it's important to say that it is a particular interest rather than quoting that I'm you know a specialist of any form um and the reason being is because during my training to ah be a counsellor and then psychotherapist and then relationships counsellor it's actually been a journey within the family that I that I currently live in and also grew up in. During my initial training, my youngest was struggling at school. we also um It was just pre-COVID and he got his diagnosis of ADHD. And then it kind of opened my eyes. I had to obviously learn an awful lot about it. I had no idea just how prevalent it was in my own family. And then I left an article open on the table in the BACP's Therapy Today magazine. And ah my husband read it. It was written by Sarah Templeton, who incidentally runs ADHD, sorry, Headstaff ADHD therapy. And um he went,, oh my God, that's me. So, okay. Then we began to discover how um it can be and inherited very easily. it's It's very much, you know, if one member of the family has it, it's quite often that other members have got it too. And then again, the more we knew about it, the more we realized a second child also has ADHD, but a very different kind, identifies one and behaves in a very different way. And then we then also discovered ASD. so And the more we look at it, the more I can see it in my own family background. And the more we can see it in my husband's family background. And also between the two of us, we've now got a family of ADHD and ASD.
Personal Journeys with ADHD
00:04:13
Speaker
That's how we describe our family. And we and we love being that way too. That's great to hear. It's funny, isn't it? You open up a can of worms when you start picking one ADHD strand in the family. it seems but tends to go a lot deeper and further into the family history and I suppose as well I mean I know with my own experience with that it it starts to make a lot of sense when you when you realize that it's not necessarily but well well you're not actually ADHD are you you're you're one of the few members of your family who aren't. Yeah, which is another anomaly. I don't get away completely scot-free, and I think this is why there needs to be a lot more research into the both um ASD and ADHD, um simply because I struggle a little bit with time blindness, and and yet I don't have all of the other lists that you would normally go through with regards to, you know, the the checklist that you would need to have if you were then to be diagnosed. Yeah, the common traits. Absolutely, yeah. So I don't have the same kind of executive function um issues or or kind of differences to maybe ah the rest of my family. So I'm the organiser and the planner in my and my house because it's not something that becomes ah very easily to other members, you know, and practicalities, that kind of thing. So it's it's an odd one. I don't know why I'm not. But yeah, I feel like the odd one out, actually. um i tell you want to You want to be in the club? Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't. It depends um what's going on around the table at dinner. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I get that. Yeah, it's always interesting. think that you I think with them with families and ADHD, it's ah it's always a very personal experience because there can be a lot of baggage there and a a lot of preconceptions and a lot of judgment as well. I mean, know from personal experience, growing up i undiagnosed, I mean, it wasn't even a thing, ADHD. Obviously, as this podcast is striving to to prove, it's it's always been there, but it wasn't understood. ah So in the environment of 20th century, mine was rural Derbyshire, that was my experience, and yeah, you see yourself as the problem, You see yourself as the the black sheep of the family. And you know deep down that you're not the only one who dis displays certain traits. But even so, by the time you get to adolescence, you have a very poor view of yourself. And ah you end up, well, I mean, from from my point of view, I went through um quite a tumultuous adolescence and early adulthood. ah Some of it I loved, most of it I hated. And it wasn't until I got my diagnosis that I realized, well, I was like 38, I think, when I got my diagnosis back in 2020. Again, I can't do numbers, so I might be way off on that, and even on my own age. But and but I suppose what I'm what i'm trying to get at is when you get the diagnosis, you get the the understanding, you get the the knowledge that it's not your fault, but there is something going on there, and that can be quite an emotional thing. How how did that work out with you guys? Did did it bring a little bit of peace and quiet or did did it help a little bit so or did it help enormously I suppose it's it's on mixed fronts and obviously I can't speak for every single member of my family and obviously other friends and family that I have or even you know clients but one of the things I think is really important with a diagnosis is it helps you look back and join the dots, you know, because there might be significant things that have happened in your life. And you think, oh, my goodness, I now have an understanding, have a reason. I get it. I know what was now going on and for me. And also it does give you some information. So it gives you almost like a ah keyword. You start talking the same language as what's out there for information. So once you have that particular term, you can then research it. You can find out. You can actually get a lot of information. So it can also help you feel like you belong to a group of people. And I think belonging is partly, you know, often what I hear about with ADHD and ASD is being other or on the outside or different. Well, actually, you know, um when you understand that you belong maybe to a ah kind of a another category and that you're not too much or not enough enough that's okay because actually maybe with the wrong tribe yeah which links into your archaeology aspect here yeah absolutely i mean did they they that i can't remember where i read this it was ah it was a few years ago where the domino effect of one person in the family getting diagnosed and somebody else gets diagnosed and you look at great uncle, whoever, who was very eccentric and somebody who had a very terrible life and and and on a lot of the and maladaptive behaviours they were displaying were symptomatic of neurodiversity and didn't you get this, yeah and you also get the grief as well of looking back and thinking what could have been if you'd have just known. Because one of the things we don't talk about a lot, or enough I don't think, is because obviously we want to sort celebrate ADHD and autism and neurodiversity. And we do want to do that in this podcast. But we also have to recognize the fact that it comes with it, especially with being undiagnosed, a lot of shame, a lot of guilt, a lot of hatred, a lot of self-hatred. Even now, with all the awareness I have now, thanks to yourself, Cathy, and other healers and specialists, I still find myself doing it. that I'll blame myself for any mistake that I make. And it might be a stupid mistake. It might be a simple mistake. But that voice that comes through is very strong. The judgment that you have against yourself for making those mistakes. it's I wonder then if that's because of maybe not appreciating quite where you fit in the world and how you see the world's actually okay.
00:10:46
Speaker
And often, you know, late diagnosis, I think, brings all of that, you know, as you've just described. And so I suppose that's one of the reasons why we're trying to champion getting kind of, sorry, diagnosis, but also screening as early as possible. And then you can actually stop the issues kind of coming into the school and also, you know, beyond. Because obviously a lot of people with ADHD often find themselves excluded from school for various different reasons because it's not being picked up. They just see the behaviour as negative or bad. And then you end up with a kind of exclusion through the school into the prison pipeline. That's one of the things we're trying to avoid as well. So, you know, everything you describe, you've been fortunate maybe that you've had some positive people in your life that's kind of helped you get to where you are now rather than it going down a more challengingly, possibly destructive
Environmental Impacts on Neurodiversity
00:11:44
Speaker
route. Oh, absolutely. I was very fortunate growing up. I hated a lot of isolation because that's what my life was. I grew up in a hamlet and there was just nobody my age. There was nothing going on. It was a nightmare for a busy ADHD at that age. And I got in trouble. I did things wrong. And the typical ADHD behaviours, if you don't mind me saying this. I think I would say that if I was brought up in a city, I'd have really struggled. I think I would have got in with the wrong people. I think I would have ended up down that route. So I'm very grateful and lucky to have grown up in rural Derby. But yeah, it's a slippery slope and it's such a tragedy as well that all these maladaptive behaviours and all the negative internal processing ends up with so many issues and so many problems that are only there because the world is structured in certain ways that don't bring out the best in, well, the neurodiverse in general. I think we struggle. I mean, ADHD itself, I've got ADHD and autism and God knows what else. So I know I can feel them battling out my special interests and my love of routine and my hatred of routine and my need for stimulation and my need for peace. They battle it out. And it's a really difficult thing to navigate when you're undiagnosed. As soon as you get that diagnosis and you can start to see the strands coming together and you realise that one element of you has certain needs and the other aspect of you has other desires and requirements. And it gets really tricky, doesn't it? And I think what we could do in a few moments is have a chat about some of these terms and try and clarify them a little bit so that people like myself who happen to be neurodivergent and have a diagnosis or don't have a diagnosis, that that's not necessary. It's really important in certain settings like school and work and so on. But if you're neurodivergent, you're neurodivergent. You just are. That's not something we need to worry about in terms of clarifying whether or not you have a piece of paper or not. You don't need that piece of paper, but if you have it, great. But yeah, I think they're all quite commonly discussed, certainly on social media, the more negative aspects of neurodivergence. And I think really in in this this podcast what we're looking to do we're looking for the positives and the there is an awful lot of that so if you just take the idea that in the modern setting we are struggling neurodivergent people are struggling a lot. And it's understandable. It's not a blame thing. It's not a we need a revolution thing. It's just we need to understand this so that we can change things. And I think it's important to look at ADHD, autism, all sorts of neurodivergence as something that is genetically inherited. This is something millions of years in the making. You know, you didn't just pop out of the factory and you hadn't been made properly. That's not how it works. You are exactly how you are supposed supposed to to be. be you You are are exactly exactly who who you you are are supposed to be and in the right environment that is a totally different game and that's something i want to talk about later on in the podcast in in this episode sorry we want to go back and think about different times different periods when being neurodivergent was an absolute blessing and And I'm sure there were periods and times and moments when there was madness and trouble and problems and maladaptive behaviors, of course, because the human story is incredibly volatile. There has been some horrific events from nature from humans from all sorts of areas and that will have caused a tremendous amount of trauma and difficulty and i think having nervous highly sensitive nervous system which a lot of us have in neurodiversity is going to cause all sorts sorts of trouble. So someone like you, Cathy, would have had a job throughout the human past. It's never been totally easy. But in
Understanding ADHD: Beyond Stereotypes
00:16:55
Speaker
the context of this episode, we're talking about environments, and the modern environment is particularly challenging. Schools relationships there the internet it's a bit of a nightmare if you don't know what's going on or if you've not developed a proper understanding of who you are and where you're at so i think we're going to take a little break now but when we come back, I'm going to ask Cathy to talk about neurodiverse terms, and we're going to look at applying those later in the episode to various places in the past and see how different that would have been, those experiences. So we were talking then about having some experiences of having ADHD and diagnosis, and we did talk about some of the negative or more negative aspects and maladaptive behaviours that come with being undiagnosed and in difficult environments. I mean, trying to mention the positive side of it as well, which we haven't really got into yet. But I think in general, it would be good to talk about neurodiversity and not necessarily much the terms or the definitions, but the language used around it and how we view it. Cathy, how do you feel about that? Yeah, so one of the things I think I pick up on quite quickly is the use of neurodivergence and neurodiversity. They are actually quite different. So we generally say neurodiverse. So neurodiverse or neurodiversity, we all are because we're so different. It's the human condition. We're all diverse in the way that we think. You know, we all have different experiences that impact on how diverse we are in our brains. But actually, the neurodivergence is what is more coined for ADHD and autism or ASD. So I think that's sometimes helpful to clarify because we're all diverse, but it's the divergence, I think, is what we're talking about here with those two. Yeah, so as an umbrella term, I suppose, neurodiversity, neurotypicals are within that umbrella as well. It's everybody, every human, every human being that's ever lived is neurodiverse. But only those on the spectrum essentially are neurodivergent. Yeah. And the other thing that I often come across is misunderstanding who can actually be ADHD because there's the old, I suppose, adage, you know, it's a naughty boy syndrome, ADHD. And actually, you know, there's different types of ADHD. And so, you know, you've got the inattentive, the hyperactive, which is the one that's more readily seen, especially in young children. And then the combined, which is, you know, those two together. So again, you know, this is one of the important things that happened in my family, which was, it was very apparent, because it was quite obvious when it came to the hyperactive or the combined child. But it wasn't until we actually got more information and we delved into it that we realised that inattentive is very much part of the same, you know, sphere of that neurodivergence, which is ADHD. Yeah, and it's really interesting because, I mean, obviously we need a framework of understanding and categories to help define and understand and hopefully um i don't know heal make better the from from your family's perspective and from uh my own experience what i found as well we need this framework we need the categories but they're not sort of yardsticks they're not there to to sort of gauge uh well they are in terms of getting a diagnosis and so on but what it doesn't do is show the fluidity of these comorbidities so for myself I am combined so I have moments of being inattentive and moments of hyperactivity, and I don't really get much say in that. It's the same things like hyperfocus and so on. They come in as a separate thing to that. But the diagnosis itself is really helpful, but it also doesn't really tell the full story, does it? It doesn't give you all these details of uh individually the saying of you you know you've met one autistic person you've met one autistic person same with adhd we're all different anyway and we're on a sliding spectrum and it's the environment and all sorts of factors come into play with that so i think that's probably how that probably highlights how difficult it can be or easy it can be to be misdiagnosed. Yeah. So while why it can sometimes only happen at certain stages of your life as well, because it can evolve. You don't grow out of ADHD or you don't grow into it. It actually is. It just can kind of seem slightly different or nuanced as you as you grow through your life as well. You know, hormones will have a lot to play in females, for example. You know, puberty impacts the brain as well. So that's going to kind of change the way that you might behave or seem to be behaving, you know, to others, you know, and also your relationship with yourself grows and evolves doesn't it as you as you kind of absolutely yeah yeah with the the with all this in mind it's it's understood anyway but i think it's important to to talk this. When we talk about ADHD, for example, and we talk about so many aspects of having ADHD and that lived experience, we talk about the environment and how challenging it is. So if we go birth through life, for example, so born into challenging circumstances, that stimulates the nervous system anyway. You know, there's been, I can't remember where I read this, but there was some research on, or there's been a lot of research, sorry, on when you're having a baby, if your circumstances are challenging, that's going to impact the child within the womb and at birth and so on. So if there's a volatile world that you're born into, that's going to impact how your ADHD manifests because you've got this incredible brain, you've got this incredible nervous system, and it is wired and geared up for life and if life isn't going well or if it's challenging that energy that potential is going to be moved and pushed around in different ways so when we talk about archaeology and adhd we're looking for, in this podcast, we're looking for markers, we're looking for traits of ADHD in a very positive way. From a counsellor's perspective, Cathy, you will know that there's not been a, what I'm trying to say is it's very easy to take this view that the modern world is very difficult and in the past it would have been easier to have ADHD. That's not true. It's true, but it's not the full story. It's not the full story. So there have been countless, well, every single human being goes through challenges. Nobody goes through life scot-free. That's not how it're all we're all put to the test with adhd in the modern setting the test has been completely personal completely inside of you because you mask it because you realize that you're the problem or you believe you get this belief that you are the problem or lots of the other classes sat there looking at the board writing down what they're supposed to write happy days even if they hate it even if they're bored of it we on the spectrum tend to struggle a bit more with that and that can lead to all sorts of problems and self-belief problems with environments impacting us so much.
ADHD Traits and Historical Roles
00:25:48
Speaker
Yeah, so where am I going with this? With the environment impacting ADHD the way it is, is it possible to, because it's really, really easy to sort of look at Tom Hartman's Hunter Farmer theory, which came out in the 90s, I think, and proposed that ADHDs are the direct descendants of hunters or something along those lines. And I buy into it. I do. I think it's a really great and exciting idea. I love that notion. But obviously, that might not be entirely accurate. We'll have to bring that one up in another episode but for today with the environment impacting ADHDers and autistic people so much is there anything you think we could do in schools to help create or foster an environment that is more suited to the neurodivergent brain? Well, I suppose what I need to clarify is I'm not an educational specialist. But what I do find is that it's quite narrow with regards to what we're trying to get children to fit into, you know, so the kind of academia, you know, I think for a long time we've been fed quite recent and more kind of recent decades to, you know, university, university, university. And actually there's an awful lot of people who are neurodiverse, divergent, I should say, who actually do very well in those environments and actually academically excel, you know, especially if you're going to look at things like autism and ADHD, where there's a hyper focus or a particular interest and it really propels them, you know, and they become, you know, experts in their field. But it's the other side, which is, you know, when, you know, academia is just not floating your boat, you know, it's just not going to be your thing. And so you find generally, you know, creative medias, you know, so you've got kind of musicians, you have artists, you know, you have dancers, you know, people that like to move. And then you've got sports and athletes, you know, people who are very good physically, you know, and athletically. And also then, you know, just anecdotally, in my own lived experience, when we established a inner city school where some of my family were and we set up a school garden, you know, the parents and teachers got together and I noticed a particular child who struggled within the actual school environment, really didn't have a great track record, you know, got the label, you know, known as that child. And when we had him in the garden, he excelled. He really excelled. And to the point that we were able to give him, you know, an actual kind of role. And he would then show other children some gardening tips or skills. And, you know, he really, he really excelled in that. And that was, he, you know, had a sense of pride and something that he really felt good about himself. And this is long before I had my understanding of what was going on in my family and during my training since. But even back then, when I look back at this child, I can't say that he was because I'm not qualified to make a diagnosis. However, I do often think about that child thinking, I bet my career on it that he must have been and will be ADHD of some description. Okay, so I love that idea of the inner city garden. and I'm sure it wasn't just that one child that benefited from it Cathy. Could you tell us a little bit more about how that came to be and the benefits you saw from it? So one of the things that I can use my kind of knowledge now that I see come into my therapy room quite a lot, which when I look back now at the children and also that garden setting, is often I get this tug of war between two extremes. One is to say I'm never enough. And then the opposite, which is the real dichotomy of ADHD and autism is too much. I'm too much, you know, so I have too much emotion. I don't have enough, you know, wherewithal to pay my bills on time, you know, and it just, and it swings between the two quite heavily at times. Yeah. I mean, the responsibility side of things, especially with executive dysfunction and rejection, sensitivity, dysphoria and so on, it's really challenging, isn't it? I'm just trying to imagine now, because I love doing this. I love to jump around time and space and use my imagination. And I wonder how many cases, how many instances there's been of ADHDers throughout the past, throughout millions of years, who have sat there feeling that they're not good enough or that they're too much i i don't think it's fair to say that it's just exclusively a modern problem i suspect that throughout human history the there have been people suffering because they're they feel they're in the wrong environment or maybe maybe it's not just down to the way we talk about the environment I'm not just talking about the setting the weather and the climate and the surroundings we're talking about the people they're with the politics and the relationships that are going on around them now with having a highly sensitive nervous system or you know a superduper nervous system that is just brilliant at processing information, but it can't filter out information, so you're getting everything all at once and it's exhausting.
Supporting ADHD in Modern Contexts
00:32:13
Speaker
These relationship-based issues and politics-based issues and whatever's going on around you at the time, it's not all going to be cave bears and saber-toothed tigers. It's also invading armies and pestilence and all sorts of issues. It's interesting to think about it, but where do we draw the line? Where do we say the modern world is unhealthy for ADHD in certain ways and is if you look at your inner city garden the effect that had on that little child and on probably countless children who were there where do we say how do we say that we need to do more in classrooms more in work environments to allow the space the time the freedom the room whatever is required to enable neurodivergent people who aren't necessarily the best academics or the best athletes. They just want to be alive. There's a lot of this on social media about ADHD is a superpower, autism is a superpower, and those who are experiencing great deals of success. More recently, Paris Hilton. Have you seen that yet, Cathy? I haven't. Oh, my God, you need to see it. It's mind-blowing. Basically, this is a lovely segue here. We've gone off on a tangent, but basically, Paris Hilton's just dropped a video of her pop song about ADHD and having ADHD. Wow. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You need to let Sarah Templeton know as well. Yeah, I need to ask the kids because obviously they've got their finger on the pulse. It's great because they come and tell me things. Kids, you know, my and and and uh friends and clients but i suppose what you're talking about if i'm understanding what you're saying is is that it's all about benchmarks isn't it we've got tables and benchmarks and you know know, even even from from when when the the baby's baby's born born, we've we've got got this this graph graph of of, you you know know, or or graph graph, i I should should say say, my my accent accent coming coming out out, you you know, which way, you know, whether the child is kind of growing quickly enough, you know, have they got all these, you know, skills, you know, which is the macro and the micro, you know, and I find that really interesting. And then we have tables of when you can kind of read and write, when you can do particular, you know, skills or not skills, you know, and I find that really, that I find troubling. I know we need some kind of way of judging academia with regards to getting into university, but actually is not the whole of life and I think we need to really make sure that we're very careful about the benchmarking this and the tools that we use to kind of measure people to work out where they need to go in life and sometimes it looks like like you failed. Sometimes it looks like you're, again, you've not quite managed a particular benchmark. And so you're not good enough. I think actually just shows you that this is not the right avenue for you. There may be different avenues. And there's benchmarks everywhere. We've got unwritten rules. We often, the classic is, you know, oh better or i should have known or i ought to do this a different way or not to be who i am you know so again we have society benchmarks as well don't we in standards of what we should and shouldn't be doing and being um so it it creates a sense of shame i think as well that again like you said you know what i was saying at the beginning but not good enough or not enough you know um it's about finding your own your own place in the world there's a space for every single person it's finding out what your space is and i love that yeah Yeah. looking It's at your own race, isn't it? Absolutely. Absolutely. I know this concept of the modern world being the problem. So I wonder if thousands of years ago, there were ADHDers out there who were looking at their tribe and the way things were done in their culture and thinking, this is wrong. I'm not a hunter and I'm not a gatherer. I'm an artist, goddammit. I'm going to go and do some cave paintings. I wonder how different it would have been to have exactly the same genetic package that we've got. Because technically we can be transferable. We can move ourselves into any culture and assimilate more or less seamlessly. So, yeah, what what I'm i'm trying trying to to say say – no no, i've I've forgotten forgotten what i'm trying to say now but we're basically sort of circling around the negative side of things again and i want to bring it back to the positive so obviously in hunter gatherer settings uh for example or lots of other prehistoric cultures being neurodivergent would i think have been less stressful in terms of social pressure to remember to well do your taxes do your paperwork to pay the bills to do all those sorts of things i i like to think that there was less immediate pressure um but then again i we did an episode recently on theophrastus um his obtuse man and in that this um stereotyped ancient athenian character uh was displaying all sorts of hilariously adhd i'm going to call it i'm sorry if anybody's suffering with this at the minute, but those wonderful aspects of ADHD where you, I think Theophrastus is an obtuse man. He put salt in his food twice. He was supposed to go to court and forgot about it and went to the countryside. So I'm sure there was ever have adhd been a pain in the backside but um it's nice to think about the positive aspects of of neurodivergence and the creativity the out-of-the-box thinking the the energy the seeing the world from a different perspective do you see more of that in school than you do the negative aspects? Or do you see it as sort of a double-edged sword and that the schools, or even the pharmaceutical industry and the medical fields are focusing on the negatives because we're seeing it as a problem and not catering enough to the talents and potential? I think it's a mixed bag, to be honest, because, again, I'm going to speak about, you know, anecdotally, I've seen children who are ADHD thrive in secondary school. That's because they've maybe found a particular mentor, teacher or subject they particularly like. You know, so you think about what's driven you to do archaeology, George. I know school, you described it earlier in this episode of it not being the best place for you, but actually, you know, something was there because it gave you the opportunity to study archaeology. You know, there was a hook and it got you in and that became your kind of interest and part of your career. So I think it's often to do with, from what you're describing when you talk about in the past you know there i wonder if difference was more appreciated or allowed so you know you may not have had the strength of being somebody who um you know we didn't have to worry about taxes but somebody would have had to think about the detail in certain groups um and then they had the big the big idea thinkers about, you know, taking maybe the tribe to the next location, you know, somebody had to, you know, kind of think, right, is it worth the risk? And we're going to, we're going to have a go and we're going to try it out. So, you know, there are definitely lots of positives and it comes out when it's allowed to shine to blossom so it might be in school it might be in a particular subject it might be in sports it might be in creative medias and arts it might be sciences it might be about you know who thought of putting us on the moon you know, know somebody somebody had had to to have have that that thought thought. and And at at the the time time, it it would would have have been been considered considered absolutely absolutely, you you know know, bonkers bonkers. and And really really, you you know, but eventually it became possible. So, you know, we need that difference, you know, and I think what is challenging is that we have a criteria, which is what focuses on the negative because often with medication and support it's done in a way that says right let's look at how it's impacting you and negatively kind of causing you problems in your life then you're going to get some help and actually wouldn't it be lovely if anybody who actually is screened and does have this neurodivergence that they are going to get help regardless of whether it's negative or not. And actually, it's going to be kind of, well, let's do this because we need to make sure that we really support everybody. And everybody has a place in the world. Like I said, everyone has a space. And so we need to kind of help everyone. I suppose the difference between a nurturing society and a society that just decides, well, this is kind of how I want everyone to be. You know, this is a very narrow set of criteria. And so I don't think until you actually get into the world of work, you realise just how diverse that is. You know, I mean, I don't know how many different types of skills and jobs are available in the world of archaeology. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely. Yeah. So we need we need all of that. But I think if, you know, we're not harnessing a really quite a big section of society, you know, then that's a problem. Because if you want, we can always have a look as well of the actual, I suppose, signs of ADHD and autism, and then look at it as, you know, well, actually, how can that be a strength? Yes, it can also be hindrance, but it can also be a strength. And let's kind of grow towards
ADHD Traits as Strengths
00:43:50
Speaker
that. Let's look at what we can do rather than what we can't do. Can we just, I think it's probably a good opportunity now just to, because we've only got sort of 10 minutes or so left. So let's just clarify and talk about some of the traits that define ADHD and autism. Kathy, can we do that? Absolutely. Okay, so let's start with ADHD then. Obviously, I've got ADHD. I'm pretty sure my kids have got ADHD. It's everywhere. I understand it from my perspective. So for somebody who's listening who isn't sure if they've got ADHD or if somebody they know or care about, what are the sort of main signs that you'd point to to help, not necessarily diagnose, but just to help them understand? Yeah. So I suppose the list is very general because we've all got aspects of this, but it's more when they all start adding up together. So signs of inattention, and that's kind of struggling to pay attention, difficulty kind of like following through on tasks, you know, kind of completion, often forgetting kind of responsibilities. So that can be, you know um forgetting to do certain chores or things at home or even forgetting to kind of turn in that piece of work that homework yeah no yeah maybe making what might seem as careless mistakes but again it's because your attention's not on not switching the tap off you you know, leaving the tap running in the bathroom or not reading the last page of a test or something like that. Stuff that you would kind of kick yourself for afterwards. And then potentially coming across as being quite disorganised. And, you know, that might be kind of losing things. You put your keys down in a different place each time and never quite knowing what coat pocket they're in. Yeah, so that's the other thing. So familiar, all of that. So that's more inattention. And then you have kind of more for the hyperactivity side of things. So you've got obviously the obvious one is difficulty sitting still. Fidgeting can often feel quite restless, you know, constant motor keeping running. Difficulty waiting a turn, you know, sitting in a queue of traffic is quite challenging and potentially being quite over-talking or finishing someone else's sentences or being kind of quite quick and in there, you know. But there's an awful lot of other things that kind of get missed but don't necessarily come up on the list that, you know, you would go through if you were to be diagnosed. So things like sleep, there's a lot of comabilities like dyslexia, dyscalculia, dyspraxia, that kind of stuff. Often they're common bedfellows, you know, and then things like emotional regulation as well. I think that is something that scores quite highly, you know. But I think, again, this still fit into um some really positive things about adhd and autism you know um so dysregulation they call it dysregulation of emotion but actually you know that is really a very strong sense of fairness on on, you you know know, things things not not being being okay okay. justice Justice sensitivity sensitivity, is is that that what what it's it's called called? yeah Yeah. yeah Yeah. yeah Yeah. stuff Stuff like like that. So, you know, but actually if something's making you angry and you're really cross about something, I think we forget that anger's actually a, it's, it's an action emotion. It actually drives us to act. And so if you think about it, if you've got a really strong desire and motivation to act on something that you think is wrong then that's where we get a sense of justice and and kind of you know i wonder if that's part of our society making up of what's okay and not okay what's right and wrong in the world you know what that that must have been one of the biggest driving factors in human history and that i want to change that this is this is wrong i don't like this exactly yeah and then if you think about you know emotional you know again linking into when people say oh that i'm too much i I have have too too much much, emotion, I have too big a reaction to things. Actually, empathy is a fantastic skill, or at least, you know, superpower to have. You know, I find a lot of people driven, you know, who can find themselves in this world often are also strong empaths, you know, they really link in with, you know, people's, struggles. you know's And you'll find that a lot of people who are ADHD also find themselves in the world of counselling, either therapists themselves or coaches of some sort, or actually in a helping type profession that taps into their So, but we need empathy to also back up that strong sense of fairness, you know, so, you know, to kind of really kind of look after our, you know, the people who are struggling or need a bit more help or, you know, I often find, again, it's a huge generalisation, but generally the first one to come to my aid is is often they have ADHD you know if I'm in the street and they're quite happy to step out and say you okay it's a really difficult thing that is Kathy you know when you see somebody especially in a busy city and you can see they're upset that impulse to go over and comfort them and ask if they're okay or if there's anything you can do it's it's difficult to to hold back uh but obviously i don't know nine times out of ten seems a bit excessive but yeah a lot of the times people don't want you to they don't know you're just a stranger is it's a difficult and you take that with you because one thing i've noticed is that in those situations, I'll go away and I'll say, right, no, they don't want me to go over. It would be weird if I went over and it would be inappropriate and uncomfortable. And they may get angry at me or judge me negatively. But then you take that with you and you carry that around, that feeling that you you should have helped you should have done something and you feel sorry for that person it's uh then doesn't that kind of point towards you know um again you you can educate me i'm george on this that really we're not built to live in cities we're built to live in smaller communities we've only got the capacity in our brains for the 200 200 odd people or something like that absolutely you know so generally you wouldn't have to come in contact with so many strangers you know you would literally be kind of that strong sense to kind of support and help your community um or your kind of your fellow black neighbors or tribe or whatever you know that would have been okay because you wouldn't have been a stranger or as much of a stranger in that kind of community. Whereas in the city, we're in a very different environment. Absolutely. I mean, that might just be a really interesting sort of evolution in action, but how quickly civilisations have blossomed and the human population has rocketed. Our nervous systems, genetically, we haven't caught up with that yet. So the argument, going back to the Hunter-Farmer theory, of we are unsuited predominantly, but not exclusively.
ADHD in History and Society
00:51:42
Speaker
A lot of neurodivergent people suffer or suffocate in education and workplace. And that may just be another facet to that, that we haven't caught up with that. We don't know that our subconscious brain, whatever part of us that generates empathy, hasn't caught up. It hasn't to the point where it screams at us, help these people, do something to change that. But, of course, we're not all in a position to do anything to help. So the knock-on effect of that is you feel poorly about yourself because you didn't help or you couldn't help or they didn't want you to help. So there's a rejection element to it. It's quite complicated, I suppose, if you get into it. I suppose because we have a drive, a need to belong. We survive in groups. That's, we've got that empathy gene, which is why, you know, when one person yawns, everyone else around them yawns as well. You know, we're kind of, we're essentially pack animals and we survive by helping each other out. And so when we're kind of in a position that we're being, you know, societally kind of conditioned that, that we oh, no can't step in and we can't get involved or helped or, you know, we're worried about the negative reaction, you know, it kind of jars a bit, doesn't it? It doesn't actually sit with how we maybe would like to be, you know, we want to help help it's a strong driving force in being human and i wonder if that sort of triggers that desire for a better world in general yeah which goes back to that kind of fairness you know and so it's great because you know i wonder if if you look at anybody who's been a campaigner or a force for change i wonder how much they've also have a propensity to be ADHD and autistic as well. You know, I wonder, you know. But, you know, problem solving, it goes really hand in hand with dyslexia. You know, that whole idea of being very visual and having kind of like being able to put things in 3D in your brain, you know, and then, you know, add that with risk, add that with impulsivity, add that with good and emergency, add that with, you know, a high sense of, you know, unfairness, add that with high energy if you're hyperactive as well, add a bit more hyper focus in there, sensory seeking seeking, you know like if you really want to kind of get your hands in there gosh all of this you know um and and doing it for a really kind of like positive reason you know the empathy side of things they all are really fantastic drivers to making the world a better place making your community a better place you, you know. So I'm not suggesting everyone with ADHD and autism are, you know, wonderfully good citizens and perfect and kind, because obviously, again, we're all so different. And yet I would say in the main, that's the superpower of ADHD. It has the potential to be such a positive force in the community for lots of reasons that I've just described. Absolutely.
Advocating for Neurodiverse Inclusion
00:55:10
Speaker
I think the way you beautifully described the various aspects and traits of ADHD, and you could almost imagine if we had the ability to use the dials on them all so we could turn up the hyperfocus a little bit or bring it down a little bit and turn the empathy up or down and create an idealized ADHD. It's not possible from a place of ignorance and in difficult circumstances. But also, I think if you look at it in a different way, there's a possibility to encourage and improve and come to understand. So you can make yourself feel like a better person or enjoy the experience more be more useful in terms of being a citizen or problem solving um but also equally i think if anybody's really suffered so we talked earlier about i'm conscious of time actually but um if we talked earlier about the unfortunate slippery path from school to prison. Nobody with ADHD asked to be ADHD. This is a massive story. We inherited these genes and our place in the world and in the state of the world. That came down to us didn't ask for anything the environment or the genes but here we are and i think if i mean i i've i've struggled i've made mistakes and i i think that there's a a really positive idea here in you can alter certain aspects of what you have your condition and a lot of because a lot of it is raw energy and potential and if it's in the wrong environment or if it was in the wrong environment or in a challenging difficult circumstance and the energy went maladaptive unfortunately that happens but that's not the end of the road there's still still's ways of... I think a lot of that has to do with understanding and having people around you that are understanding. So if you could kind of also, I'm going to go back to a couple of your points, which was, you know, you did say, you know, like kind of turn the dials up and down a little bit, you know, which would be fantastic. And I think we could all do with a bit of that at times, you know. However, that doesn't give us the opportunity for mistakes. It doesn't give us the opportunity to come across things inadvertently. You know, if we control it too much, I think it then gives us a very narrow, again, it kind of, it will take us only as far as our own kind of knowledge and creativity will take us. But if we actually inadvertently, and I'm going to use this again, too much, we have too much of a response. Actually, we suddenly then come across something that we didn't set out to do or try or be or find and you know but actually we we have the opportunity for mistakes to happen and actually we learn an awful lot from mistakes we learn an awful lot about ourselves about our environment our community you know i would imagine a lot of science breakthroughs are on mistakes as well, from what I can gather, you know, the whole kind of penicillin story. So, you know, again, you know, I think we have to really be open to we're not perfect. None of us are. And this is everybody under the title human. You know, we all have things that we feel we could do more of and less of. We all wish that we were whatever and less of the other, you know. So it's, you know, it's about allowing us to be who we are. And I come back to this. where do we fit in the world? What's our reason for being here? So it almost sounds a little bit kind of spiritual, but I think that is really important. You know, we all have a place. We all have, you know, something that we link into another cog to get the world moving and keep the world moving. We're all supposed to be here regardless of what you believe. We are here therefore we are supposed to be here and you are who you are because you inherited those genes and born into their environment. We all have value. Absolutely.
Conclusion and Credits
00:59:58
Speaker
Wise as ever Cathy. Cathy I'm afraid we have run out of time so we're going to have to pick this up another. But thank you so much for coming on. I hope you enjoyed it and carry on
01:00:09
Speaker
thank you thank i
01:00:22
Speaker
um this episode was produced by chris webster from his ah rv traveling the united states tristan boyle in scotland
01:00:32
Speaker
Archaeology Podcast Network, and was edited by Rachel Roden. This has been a presentation of the Archaeology Podcast Network. Visit us on the web for show notes and other podcasts at www.archpodnet.com.
01:00:46
Speaker
contact us at chris at archaeologypodcastnetwork dot com