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Ep. 1: Adult ADHD A new perspective (Jade's Story)
340 Plays2 years ago
Host Jade shares her own Awaken ADHD story when she was diagnosed with ADHD at 44years. This late diagnosis had her look back over her life through an entirely new lens. Jade talks about how women present differently and the need to challenge the diagnostic tools to capture these differences.
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Transcript
Introduction to 'Awaken ADHD' and Acknowledgment of Country
00:00:08
Speaker
You are listening to Awaken ADHD, a podcast where people share their ADHD stories, their life before and after diagnosis, their support, strategy, strengths and challenges. Hi, I'm Jade and I'll be your host. I'm a counselor, an ADHD coach and a fellow ADHD-er. So join me as we Awaken ADHD.
00:00:32
Speaker
This podcast is recorded on the lands of the Boomerang Country and we wish to acknowledge them as the traditional landowners. We recognise First Peoples of Australia as the original storytellers of this country and pay our respects to elders past, present and emerging.
00:00:54
Speaker
Hello and welcome to episode one of Awakened ADHD.
Journey to ADHD Diagnosis
00:00:58
Speaker
I'm very excited to share this episode and to tell you a little bit more about me and my journey to ADHD.
00:01:08
Speaker
where to begin. I guess the journey to diagnosis would probably be a good place to start so it really is an interesting thing to happen in your life at the sprightly age of 44.
00:01:25
Speaker
to be one minute neck deep in the chaotic post-pandemic existence, I think we all remember that, and the next to be viewing every single live experience through the lens of ADHD. It really was quite mind-blowing and I guess now I understand my life through a different lens and I no longer feel alone
00:01:52
Speaker
And I think it's a bit of an epidemic out there right now, and in particular for women, I would say, because, you know, women
00:02:04
Speaker
were missed, we didn't fit the bouncy little boy diagnostic lens I guess, and now we're all kind of waking up. I guess that's how it feels to me anyway. As if all the little ADHD girls from the 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s are kind of waking up from their I'm just rubbish at life slumber.
00:02:28
Speaker
realizing that they too should be counted that they too alongside those naughty little boys that were lucky enough I guess to not fly under the radar many men of course have flown under the radar as well but that we now have reasons not excuses for this kind of hot mess life we've been living for decades well that's how it felt for me anyway and I really feel that
00:02:55
Speaker
these diagnostic tools need to be shaken out of their patriarchal tool belts and I'm throwing off those rusty ones and adding some shiny and new because I like shiny and new tools that are better suited to the female presentation of ADHD because we have so many different factors at play here including hormones and gender roles and expectations in addition to our capacity to mask, cope and adapt.
Challenges in Getting Diagnosed
00:03:24
Speaker
and I think that is what I did my entire life. I think I definitely masked everything and I would say that my journey to diagnosis was pretty arduous. I remember it was a cold pandemic evening
00:03:50
Speaker
in Melbourne and we had a lot of lockdowns in Melbourne and my sister messaged me a link to an ADHD soul screener test and she wrote I think I have ADHD I scored pretty high on this test and my first reaction was really you ADHD I was skeptical I didn't see it
00:04:13
Speaker
But of course, why would I? It seems that most medical professionals haven't been seeing it either. So the second thought I had was, oh, she's got it. I've got it worse. And not because that's necessarily true, but sibling rivalry.
00:04:28
Speaker
So I took several tests over months and my curiosity was really sparking. You know I was thinking could I really have ADHD? It felt a very bizarre thought when I first kind of played with it but the more I took the more tests I took and the more I read it just really started to make sense.
00:04:55
Speaker
I ended up getting my initial referral, which from the GP was easy. I had a lovely GP that I trusted and so I got the psychiatrist referral. However, the next stage was a little trickier. Finding a psychiatrist that hadn't closed their books.
00:05:17
Speaker
that's like trying to find a unicorn right now. I remember the first place that I sent to, which was referred by a friend, they held my referral for about 10 weeks and I was going back and forth and back and forth, which is really difficult for somebody with ADHD. The admin, the admin was absolutely doing my head in. I had to remember to call them and email them and say, where is my referral kind of in the triaging process?
00:05:48
Speaker
And it wasn't easy, I was getting a lot of pushback and then finally I was told, right, we'll have an appointment date for you by the end of this week. They didn't contact me, so I got back to them and they said, oh no, sorry, their books have closed. So that's it, books closed, I have to take my referral elsewhere.
00:06:10
Speaker
and that's when I really wanted to give up. It was only that my sister was on the journey and a good friend who I mentioned that I wanted to give up she said no you can do it keep keep pushing on you can do it it will be worth it and I I wasn't quite sure whether it would be worth it
00:06:32
Speaker
But I pushed on. We ended up getting our referrals, my sister and I. She will be on here in an episode or two to share her story. We got our diagnosis within a week of each other, I think. I've cried so many times since receiving my diagnosis. And most of the tears have been whilst listening to podcasts where other women share their stories from hot mess to, oh that makes sense.
00:07:00
Speaker
It's like I found my people, found my weird, a group of women and individuals that understand me.
Emotional Journey Post-Diagnosis
00:07:08
Speaker
It's like I feel like I'm connected to others like I haven't been before. You know, so many years of feeling like a misfit of hiding how I really navigate or attempt to navigate the world and how challenging so many ordinary things are for me or have been in the past, like opening mail, sitting still, finishing anything. You know, I'd settle for a train of thought.
00:07:32
Speaker
course there are people in my life that have seen these struggles though I assume like me they just thought I was a bit rubbish really a bit immature hopeless daft vague airy forgetful full-on all of it you get the point and receiving my diagnosis just ignited so many emotions from
00:07:51
Speaker
gratitude and hope and depth of despair grieving all the versions of me that struggled grieving my lost potential grieving for the way I responded to my challenges you know if only I had known
00:08:10
Speaker
And I feel as though I've been stumbling around in the dark in a dreamlike state for so long, bumping into things, tripping over my own feet, never quite sure of where I'm going or why I entered the room. You know, that still happens multiple times a day. And my hands had been tirelessly feeling along the wall looking for that light switch. Surely it's not so dark and lonely for others, I would often think. I just wanted to wake up and for life to be easier.
00:08:41
Speaker
You know, a couple of years ago, I went to my lovely GP and I, an idea maybe that I had MS like my mum. You know, some of the symptoms I was experiencing were like struggling to find words, especially in the morning.
00:08:56
Speaker
And the struggle to find words was really starting to, I guess, frighten my children and even myself. You know, I'd be sitting at the table in the morning and I'd kind of be pointing towards something and say, pass me the dinosaur. Yeah, the dinosaur. Give me the dinosaur. And my kids be looking at me strangely. I'm like, what dinosaur? The salt, mum? Yes. Yes, the salt.
00:09:26
Speaker
That's nowhere close. And this was happening all the time, often in the morning and the evening.
Pre-Diagnosis Experiences and Misidentification
00:09:33
Speaker
And then there was just general brain fog, light and noise sensitivity, I don't know, lots of different things. So she gave me a referral to a neurologist.
00:09:43
Speaker
I never saw that through gee I don't know I don't even know where my referral went not sure if I just got bored of that idea or was too scared maybe I just thought I was being a bit dramatic so I didn't follow it up but after the diagnosis it all made sense through the lens of ADHD like that light switch was turned on
00:10:07
Speaker
I was no longer so scared or concerned about the way I was in the world. Instead I was, I guess I started to embrace it. So I'll share a little bit about when I was little. I remember when I was little I was called Jesus Jade or JJ for sure. And I hated this nickname, even though I played into it, you know, putting on a performance or pretending to be something other than myself.
00:10:33
Speaker
I was given this nickname by one of my older sisters. I have four of them, not sure which one. Because I was clumsy, I didn't think before I spoke. I always seemed to be making mistakes at every turn. I never got anything right.
00:10:47
Speaker
That little ADHD child in me was struggling and no one was available to see it.
ADHD, Trauma, and PTSD Connection
00:10:52
Speaker
I was always in trouble. At school, I never focused on my classwork, never did any homework. It's quite slow to read and write and have undiagnosed dyslexia. I talk too much. It's good I'm doing a podcast now because I do talk a lot. I was distracted by other students. I was about a daydreamer, just stare out the window into the abyss.
00:11:16
Speaker
always kind of making up little stories in my head. After school I'd climb trees with the boys in the neighborhood and tried to stay outside until dinnertime to avoid getting into trouble.
00:11:29
Speaker
At least that's what I did when I was healthy because my childhood was really marked by a lot of hard stuff and a lot of illness. I spent much of my time at our local hospital with asthma and pneumonia and collapsed lungs. As for the trauma and hardship aspect, I guess that just followed me everywhere I went.
00:11:52
Speaker
And it's only now as I deep dive into the world of ADHD that I've come to really understand the exacerbating impact trauma has on the ADHD individual. Having been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder in my mid-20s, I really understand how this co-morbidity or multiple diagnosis is linked to the increased symptom severity and the poor academic and social outcomes.
00:12:20
Speaker
My teenage years were filled with suicidal ideation and self-medicating with drugs and alcohol and I took so many risks and really had very little regard for my own safety.
00:12:35
Speaker
In my early 20s I became dangerously close to devastating eating disorders. First I stopped eating, became unhealthily thin. Though that real kind of disorder perception I looked in my reflection and thought I was still big I guess. I didn't see myself clearly.
00:12:59
Speaker
I was eventually hospitalised with acute respiratory illness that almost cost me my life.
00:13:06
Speaker
And a few years after that, I began obsessing about food again, only this time I was eating and then throwing up. And I felt like food was too fatty or oily for me. Fortunately, I emerged from these unhealthy eating patterns and behaviours. This disordered eating, I guess, before they did any real damage.
00:13:29
Speaker
And it wasn't until I sat before my diagnosing psychiatrist did I learn that many ADHD is experience eating disorders. And my mind was really blown. Was that another thing I could have been saved from experiencing? Was that another thing that had I had the awareness early on, I would have been able to manage differently?
00:13:58
Speaker
You know, in the past my ADHD has made it really difficult to stay in regular employment. For many years I worked in a temporary agency, you know, that way I could just use my skills of adaptation and high energy and motivation. You know, things are shiny and new and that excited me. My brain needs that constant stimulation and I could use my skills of adaptation whilst hiding my perceived flaws.
00:14:27
Speaker
I was easily bored, I needed constant stimulation, I didn't have great admin skills, I made careless errors, I was forgetful, low attention to detail. And I was just so bored. Even with the variety and challenge I'd offered, I was just bored but too scared.
00:14:46
Speaker
to try something new you know i didn't know where to go to next i really wanted a career and to be seen as some competent professional i guess to protect me from that unworthiness i'd always felt you know as a high school dropout the if only she applied herself and she'd stop talking i think she's just lazy she never completes her work on time she's a daydreamer
00:15:13
Speaker
just a few of the regular comments I read or heard from teachers and family members. Plus a special shout out to my grade 5 teacher who kept me in at lunch every day because I couldn't do my maths on time. She really solidified my earliest fears that I was in fact a stupid child that could not learn like other children.
00:15:34
Speaker
remember the following year when she was let go I skipped out to the car park with a box of her belongings in my hand humming to myself ding-dong the witch is dead and and also to my year eight maths teacher while we're doing a shout out who held up my maths test to the class and read out the score and announced to everyone with a sneer this is how to not do maths
00:15:59
Speaker
I think I gave up even trying after that and didn't really try academically again until my counselling degree when I was 31. I can only imagine what life would have been like had I thought I was more capable and competent. Had I realised that ADHD and dyslexia meant that I needed extra support with learning.
00:16:22
Speaker
I recall wishing that I was in a private school and could study in a quiet library enveloped within a booth, shielded from the noises and the visual distractions. I think somewhere deep down inside, I knew if I had a quiet, safe and supported environment that I would be capable of learning. It's tough. When I look back on my relationships from an ADHD perspective,
00:16:48
Speaker
Not even sure what to make of it. I guess I always had a big loud personality and that's not really everybody's cup of tea. In my younger years I was always too much and maybe that wasn't as much of a problem but I would certainly overshare, interrupt people, finish their sentences, talk too loudly
00:17:11
Speaker
want to be the life of the party and inevitably drink too much and then cry. Yeah actually that about sums up my 20s. I also felt rejection pretty darn hard. I have
00:17:26
Speaker
you know a great deal of that over the years. In my defense I'm also fiercely loyal and a fun friend and partner. You know that that people pleaser in me would always go the extra mile to make sure people felt cared about. You know I kept reaching out to people
00:17:48
Speaker
And maybe, I don't know, that I was a little slow on the uptake. They weren't keen to continue the relationship. Even to this day, I struggled to not question every relationship. Do they care about me? Are they just tolerating me? If I stopped reaching out, would they even notice? You know, it wasn't until I really started deep diving into ADHD did I understand that these feelings and challenges are really shared in the neurodiverse community.
00:18:17
Speaker
I remember when I was 30 I took off on a big solo adventure in South America.
Personal Growth and Self-Management
00:18:23
Speaker
It was quite a feat, really. Unimaginable to me right now. I wrote a book whilst I was travelling, never finished it of course. I've never managed to finish anything. Only my counselling degree and that was more of a struggle than I'd like to admit. I became a real perfectionist through that journey.
00:18:42
Speaker
And with hindsight, I now understand why I needed to go away for entire weeks to write my essays. Not weekends, really. I just really needed that uninterrupted solitude for that ADHD focus to kick in, or hyperfocus, so that I could make sense of the absolute chaos I'd been creating in the name of essay writing.
00:19:03
Speaker
I remember saying in my 20s that I'd only go to university if I found something I was really passionate about. And now I understand that's because I have an interest-based nervous system. I'm constantly seeking that stimulation and those situations and chasing that quick fix of dopamine and surge in motivation that it brings.
00:19:27
Speaker
I guess I feel very fortunate that the shiny new object that eventually caught my attention and drove me to break through my fear of failure was a mental health degree. It really drives my motor every day, sometimes to my own detriment.
00:19:44
Speaker
and I never seem to get bored of learning. Of course I'm currently reading no fewer than seven books and when I say reading I mean listening to audiobooks whilst I walk clean fold stretch audiobooks seem to be designed for the ADHD. I remember when I was a little girl and I would read my Judy Blume books and I would be walking the perimeter of the large oriental rug in our lounge room
00:20:11
Speaker
That's strange. I don't think other children did that. And even in my 20s, before audiobooks were around, I used to walk the streets of inner city suburbs where I lived, walking to work, reading a book, just a paperback book. That's dangerous. Anyway, I digress.
00:20:37
Speaker
And probably this podcast will have a lot of tangents and digression. I guess the point I was trying to make is that, you know, cultivating that counselor self has played a huge role in helping me calm the chaos. Every day I practice the art of sitting still, of emotional regulation, of slowing my speech and softening my voice and ordering my thoughts.
00:21:02
Speaker
Some clients will even say to me, I wish I had your calm way of being. You talk so slowly and softly and at that point I have to laugh because this is not my natural disposition. Rather it's a practiced art form. Honestly believe it's what saved me from self-destruction. However it's not without sacrifice. You know I can only tolerate the the quiet counselor self for so long before I feel
00:21:30
Speaker
Fried, you know, it takes a lot of energy to be sit still and be quiet. And after a busy day of clients, I just want to jump and wriggle and talk loudly, but I don't have much energy left. So, you know, the demands of, you know, my family life can wear me out really quickly. And I guess I'm still yet to, you know, master the art of balance. I guess now that I've got my ADHD glasses on,
00:22:00
Speaker
I can begin to cultivate that new sense of compassion for myself. Maybe create a less demanding life that is more tailored to the way my brain works.
Self-Compassion and Tailored Living
00:22:15
Speaker
And quieten the voice that is, why can't you just and why do you struggle so much? Everybody else seems to manage just fine and really make sense of it.
00:22:30
Speaker
not an excuse, but a reason. And I was so relieved, I remember when my psychiatrist remarked that much of my experience of anxiety or stress is likely ADHD related. The inadequacy, the imposter syndrome, the stimulus overload, and possibly unrelenting, most unrelenting of all is that rejection sensitivity dysphoria, which I know is anecdotal,
00:22:59
Speaker
know evidence-based experience but I certainly do feel interpersonal rejection or perceived rejection quite intensely
00:23:12
Speaker
as a therapist that really came into sharp focus and my counselor self has you know had to be cultivating the skill of not buying into those stories for a long time now you know in other words if somebody doesn't book another session I don't immediately think I'm a terrible therapist you know I pause and I take a breath and I you know talk myself into depersonalizing the situation it's it might be about me but it might not be
00:23:42
Speaker
It's harder in my personal life. I'm getting better at it. And knowing that I'm not alone with these thoughts and fears of rejection goes a long way to, you know, soothing them. If I view my ADH journey into motherhood, you know, it was 11 years ago. And if I look through my ADHD glasses, it really sheds a new light upon that as well.
00:24:13
Speaker
because it's a lot of demands, extra demands on your executive functioning. I remember I had quite high expectations of myself and that fear of failure, fear of not being a good enough parent, you know, I had not great modeling growing up.
00:24:35
Speaker
But, you know, parents are meant to pay bills on time and organize play dates and enrich their children's lives at every foreseeable opportunity. I had to prove that I was good enough. So I studied full-time, I worked part-time, I baked cakes, I threw extravagant birthday parties, I made new mum friends, I joined kinder gym and met other parents at noisy cafes. I put a lot of pressure on myself, like so many mothers do.
00:25:03
Speaker
However, the light sensitivity and noise sensitivity and overstimulated under focused and undiagnosed neurodivergent mother in me would quickly burn out and feel hopeless.
00:25:16
Speaker
I recently read a chapter in a book called Women with ADHD by Sari Soldin and Michelle Frank and they were describing emotional distress syndrome, how living with undiagnosed ADHD breaks down your emotional tolerance. You know, just like the concept of body shaming that all women are familiar with, we may develop shame around the way our brains were
00:25:40
Speaker
The things I was called upon to do regularly as a mother, like send out invitations, reply to invitations, return items, make appointments, manage finances and calendars. It was a challenge. And I always laughed it off saying, oh, I have many other gifts and talents, which is of course true, though it didn't ease the shame of my perceived shortcomings. So I kept hiding, kept baking muffins all the while marvelling at other mums that remembered to send the thank you cards.
00:26:11
Speaker
You know, I think a combination of age, self-awareness, motherhood and self-discipline means that ADHD presents differently these days than it did in my childhood, my 20s and my early 30s. For one thing, I no longer take huge risks and I don't tend to self-sabotage or not that I'm aware of. However, it's a fine line between masking and managing.
00:26:40
Speaker
And I think that's where the true power of diagnosis lies for me. That I can learn to witness my ADHD self, offer compassion and support, rather than simply hoping that people didn't notice.
00:26:55
Speaker
You know, I understand my noise and light sensitivity. And when I'm at a friend's house, I can now ask for what I need. Hey, can we turn the TV off? I'm struggling to focus on you with the TV playing or, you know, can we put the lamp on instead of the overhead lights? And that's that's okay for me. I don't feel like I'm being fussy or demanding. I'm just
00:27:26
Speaker
accommodating for my needs and it's okay. So I can now open mail, by the way, so that's something else that I can now do. I remember I came into this relationship with my husband. I've now been married for 10 years and I came with a giant garbage full of mail that I hadn't opened for years. I remember a look on his face. He's like, what? Who doesn't open mail?
00:27:56
Speaker
I do now right out of the post box just open it up it's amazing. I do still go through or down a lot of rabbit holes you know when you get really excited about a new topic ADHD is my new topic and I go into hyper focus and get into that frantic mad scientist state but
00:28:20
Speaker
I'm not doing the reading the article whilst watching a lecture, answering emails, jumping between 20 browser tabs, I open up my phone and my laptop and my brain.
00:28:30
Speaker
now I can actually sit and do one thing at a time and it does take discipline and I do have to keep reminding myself but you know I am I am getting more accustomed to giving myself compassion reminding myself and bringing myself to things so I feel that I'm you know more accomplished I guess
00:28:58
Speaker
and I'm astounded. I've made it through to my mid-40s. Given the rocky path I've traversed, it's amazing I'm still standing still in one piece, let alone married with two children and running a successful counselling and coaching practice. And I guess I'm pretty proud.
Launching 'Awaken ADHD' Business
00:29:17
Speaker
People have asked me what difference does having a diagnosis make? And I say all the difference in the world. I'm no longer a passenger just snoozing in the backseat. I have awakened ADHD. And now I'm in the driver's seat for what feels like the first time.
00:29:33
Speaker
And as soon as I got my diagnosis, I signed up to an ADHD coaching training course. And my sister said, Awaken ADHD, that's your new business. And it felt so right to me to become an ADHD coach and combine my lived experience and professional skills and knowledge. And I started creating my website moments later. Hyperfocus, here we come.
00:29:58
Speaker
And also working, I'm also a relationship therapist and working with neurodiverse couples has been wonderful. I really, really love it. It's a great reflection for myself and my own relationship.
00:30:15
Speaker
So that's that's I guess my story in a nutshell and I hope that some moments have echoed or reflected your experience and if you would like to share your experience and your ADHD Awakened ADHD story please visit me AwakenedADHD.com.au and you can get in contact with me and I'd love to have a chat
00:30:45
Speaker
I thank you for listening and look forward to episode two. See you. This podcast is not a licensed mental health provider. It represents the personal opinions and experiences of individuals. No content should be taken as professional advice or recommendation.