10 Rules That Traumatise ADHD & Autistic Brains (& 20 That Don't!)

22:29Kristen Pressner:And so that's low dopamine stuff. so what often drives motivation is having sight of the reward like okay if i do the work i'm going to get the shiny thing but if the shiny thing is in the future and you have time blindness you can't see it and therefore it's impossible to get motivated because it's almost like an illusion it's not exactly i was thinking um i i like to believe that i'm someone who gets on the treadmill frequently. And if I set a long-term goal for myself, like, you know, I'm going to, I'm going to be super fit. Um, that is really hard. I think for an ADHD year to get motivation against, like some people will say like, hang up a picture of how you want to look or whatever.

23:12Kristen Pressner:It's too far away. But what I do is I attach, um, something that I want to do. So something positive with something that's hard. And so I'm only allowed to watch ADHD chatter when, because I like to do that, I'm only allowed to do that on the treadmill. So it kind of makes me look forward to getting on the treadmill and makes it less painful. And so I think this idea of kind of marrying up things that something that's hard or painful or requires more dopamine with something that gives dopamine is a really good tack for people than this longer term thinking. Yes. So it's about sort of creating mini rewards on a much more smaller timescale, but bring them as close to your now as possible.

23:57So they're tangible, they're visible, and therefore they have that knock-on effect of creating motivation right now. Exactly. Fascinating. Right, Kristen, number six. Oh, God, I think we've all been told this. This is giving me shudders. Wake up earlier. The 5 a.m. club have entered the chat. Horrible. Wake up earlier. Why does that not work for people with ADHD?

24:19Kristen Pressner:Yeah, I mean, so everyone's a bit different. Are they a morning person? Are they an evening person? but a lot of the research shows that ADHDers can often have delayed sleep phase syndrome. So, they're actually a number of hours later delayed in their optimal working than other people. And so, that's where you get the night owl syndrome. And so, I know for my family members and colleagues that I know who have ADHD, the earlier you have to get up, the more unfunctional they are. And so, to the extent possible, if you can architect your day not to have to get up quite so early, you know because i think what's the wisdom the early bird gets the worm that might not work for someone who has adhd so you have to really be looking at when over the course of the 24 hours am i at my best and then you've got to do the most important things in that window even if it seems counterintuitive i don't think i've ever done anything productive in between like 8 a.m and noon we're not sitting here at 8 a.m i can tell you it's 6 p.m here if everyone's wondering, what's the replacement?

25:21What do we do? Because, you know, life happens. Many things do happen early in the morning. Work typically starts at 9 a.m. What's the replacement? What do we do to solve this problem?

25:31Kristen Pressner:Yeah, I mean, if you have to get up and go to work or school or whatever, I mean, if you have any say over your agenda, I would say try to plan your agenda so you're not doing things that require a lot of brain power or self-motivation first thing in the morning.

25:47Kristen Pressner:So, that enables you to have your most important tasks during your best optimal hours. I think that that requires a lot of self-awareness. And so if you struggle with that, if you're not really clear, I don't know when I'm at my best, you know, maybe paying attention or writing down over the course of a day or ask a loved one or a colleague. Because, again, there's tons of benefits. We're talking about how to mitigate some of the deficits or the negatives, but there's a ton of benefits. benefits and I think that if we could just kind of broaden our perception of what good and normal looks like we could get the benefits of everyone but it might mean for instance as a leader if I had someone with ADHD on my team and they were like I'm best at 2 p.m.

26:29Kristen Pressner:then maybe I would decide to not have my meetings at 8 a.m. I would have my meetings at 2 p.m. if it worked for everybody else and one of my observations as a HR executive is that the vast majority of accommodations that people ask for for ADHD at work are not that expensive and pretty possible to do. So it's not like people are saying, I'd like to work from Fiji. It's, I could use noise canceling headphones so I can concentrate. Or is it possible not to have meetings be back to back to back? And I think these kinds of things, as leaders and as humans, we should have an openness to be willing to accommodate them.

27:05Absolutely. Advocating for yourself is so important. And I think to schedule the hard things in your life when your brain says yes rather than the world says like this is when you should do something and also just generally like zooming out from that like how you turn up as a person I think so many people have this kind of preconception of how you should look or how you should speak or how you should hold yourself and that's deeply uncomfortable for many people like masking right it's a huge conversation and you put so much effort into putting out the version of yourself that you think the world expects when really we should just learn to put our most comfortable self forward.

27:43But having that awareness to schedule the hard things that require more dopamine, like when your brain has the dopamine and not when the world says you should be doing that task.

27:52Kristen Pressner:Yeah, exactly. But it requires a lot of self-awareness and self-advocacy. And I know a lot of people aren't in a position to be able to bring that self-advocacy or to have that be well-received, to be perfectly honest. And so I do think in my experience, people with ADHD have a lot of gifts and benefits, and it's really important to find employment or a place to contribute that really plays to your strengths. And so it's worth to get underneath what are my strengths, when am I best, what aren't my strengths, when am I not the best, and do everything you can to kind of stack the deck for your gifts being able to shine and be appreciated.

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29:10And now it's even more simple with the AI planning assistant, a simple voice prompt when you have to plan something, and the new AI planning assistant smoothly transcribes it into an easily digestible list of instructions to guide you. Give it a go, and use the link in my bio for 30 % off. Just a note, though, this code is only applicable on the web browser, not on the smartphone. Back to the show. Number five, Kristen. Now, the H word. I think everyone's going to hate this. Build consistent habits.

29:40Kristen Pressner:Oh, habits, yes. I was wondering what H word you were talking about. It's that atomic habit, fans. They're going to need a moment. Yes, exactly, exactly. So why do you think people with ADHD struggle to build consistent habits? Maybe habits isn't the word we hate. Maybe it's consistency. What do you think? Yeah, I guess they go kind of hand in hand because if it's a habit, it's almost like the implication is you do it without thinking. And I think that's the hard part. Anything that's super boring, there's no dopamine, is not going to be easily done without thinking for an ADHD-er. and so um i think the notion of build habits make it so it's something that you do without thinking it's this impossible hurdle to get over um i don't think that that's going to happen but i think instead you can say well what what is the outcome that i would wish for from the habit and maybe there's another way to enable that outcome that isn't so much of a dopamine suck build consistent habits almost implies that you're going to be the same person with the same mood and the same energy levels every day for you to stick at that habit.

30:45And we know that people with ADHD are very, it's the same person, but we can have different brains on different days. So to maintain something that relies on that consistent state of mind almost seems like it's doomed to fail.

30:58Kristen Pressner:And what we talked about before, which is like, and the moment it goes off track, it's a failure. So it doesn't have any grace in it to just be like, okay, today's a day where I'm not doing the habit. A habit is something you don't not do. And so I think to build into your system, this is something I do when I can do it, and it's okay if I can't do it on certain days, but over time, there's still positive momentum. So for this one, what do you think the replacement is? Is it a case of rather than congratulating yourself in doing something consistently, instead of that, is it just congratulating yourself for getting something done?

31:32Rather than I'm going to clean my flat every week, which will be tricky to maintain that consistency. So you're like, if you, if you clean your flat, then congratulate yourself for doing it.

31:41Kristen Pressner:Exactly. And I think instead of setting it, like I've built a habit of cleaning my flat weekly and I've missed a week. So therefore I failed. It's when I clean my flat, which is something I like to have a clean flat. When I clean my flat, I've associated that with a reward that I really like to reward myself for doing that, to give myself an incentive. And I think that's a great way. You don't make it all hang on always doing it. You make it hang on a reward for having done it. Number four, I feel like this one really destroys people. And it's heartbreaking. When people say like, just push through.

32:16Kristen Pressner:Oh, yes. Why do you think people with ADHD, why is that so painful for someone with ADHD? Just push through. First of all, it starts with the J word. Just. Just again. Exactly. But I would say, you know, we talked about this riding the wave and you said, you know, the ADHD brain is different any given day or any given moment. And so just push through implies it's a matter of willpower. And it's the same amount of energy for everyone. And I think this is the thing that, again, it's invisible. If it wasn't invisible, you would see the hurdles are this high today. And so just pushing through would be so heroic and cost so much energy and maybe not be worth it.

32:55Yes. I feel like what neurotypical people don't understand when they give this advice, when they say to someone with ADHD who's clearly struggling, like, just try harder, just push through is they don't get that the overload like it looks like laziness that's that can be the optics of what that can look like for someone who doesn't understand and what they don't see is like what's happening inside and that just is sometimes complete shutdown yeah in those

33:18Kristen Pressner:moments like physical paralysis sometimes yeah exactly i remember one of my children you know seemed to have plenty of energy to go out on the weekends but when school would roll around on Monday wouldn't feel well. And I remember thinking, you know, just gather yourself up and go. And, you know, all of us maybe don't feel it on Monday, but you need to go. And once I became more aware of this, that I have to trust her read on what she can and can't handle and what her energy does or doesn't allow, I became much more open to it. And it was interesting because recently there was someone that she really wanted to go see.

33:54Kristen Pressner:And she said, I actually, I don't have the energy to go see them today and that was when it hit me this doesn't only happen when it's Monday morning I don't want to go to school it happens when she really really really wants to do something but doesn't she can't power through right and so we're learning to be able to understand how to better sense and understand her own energy and not push through when it's not the appropriate thing to do because the cost would be too high so is it a case of like framing it as rather than rewarding outcomes, rewarding time given to doing something? Oh, it's a good question because I think a lot of the just push through is around someone saying, I don't have it in me.

34:33Kristen Pressner:And the conventional wisdom is, we'll power through anyway because I can power through anyway. But I think that there's a difference in how high the hurdle is or how much energetic cost there is to power through. I can power through. I might not be feeling it, but I could do it. And so I expect someone else to do it, but I don't see just how high their hurdles are and how hard it is. And so what's the solution is a different question, but I think we all need to understand not to fall in the trap of just and assuming everyone has the same amount of experience in doing one of these things. Gosh, I'm never going to wear Nike clothing again.

35:09Kristen Pressner:Just do it. Constantly triggered on the little tick. Exactly. So is it like, rather than saying, just push through it just go outside today and do 10 000 steps is it why can you perhaps go outside for 30 seconds yeah lowering that hurdle as low as possible yeah i love that you know it's like what's the smallest thing you talked about ice cubes and ice chips right and what's the smallest thing that you could do that's in the right direction so you know maybe instead of um just power through and go to school that day maybe it's you know um read the class homework or uh dial into class or get the notes from a friend or whatever.

35:48Kristen Pressner:But again, it requires that self-awareness for what can I handle. Sometimes, you know, I'm like, oh, you're not feeling it today. Well, why don't you get ready for school and see how it feels? Yeah. How damaging can that be? Because if you're in a relationship with somebody or in a family dynamic that doesn't understand ADHD and you're just getting a constant bombardment of just, just, just stop being lazy, just push through, just get on with it. But you're physically paralyzed the overwhelm is too much and you just get called lazy all the time if there isn't this understanding how much damage can that cause yeah i mean this is this is where the conversation gets dark right because uh it can cause a lot of damage the research shows that um adhders have a three to five times that death by suicide rate um are highly likely like 80 plus percent likely to have other comorbidities like depression anxiety disordered eating substance abuse disorders these things are deadly and that adhd can can lower lifespan by about a decade so it's not squirrel haha funny like a lot of people think it is and it's not the adhd that's causing that it's this cumulative effect of just do this or the assumption that the hurdle is the same height for everyone to do these mundane boring things and it's not just my perception as an outsider looking in it's the perception that the individual themselves has.

37:09Kristen Pressner:If they're looking around and for everyone else doing laundry is pretty easy, then you feel really bad about yourself if doing laundry for you is pretty hard. And I think we just need to broaden our perception of what normal and okay and in range is because for some people doing laundry is hard or for some people finding their keys is hard or for some people whatever, but that comes with equal and opposite gifts on the other side. And for me, it's kind of like the perfect match. If it's easy for me to do laundry, then I do the laundry. And I'll save original thinking, creativity, connecting dots for my family members who are way better at that.

37:45Kristen Pressner:And then together, we have all of the things. So what would the replacement be for this particular point? Is it a case of rather than approaching your partner or your family member that has ADHD with judgment, rather than saying like, just push through? Is it a case of approaching it with curiosity and saying, why are you struggling today? I think that's a really great point. One thing we try to do in our house is nothing's with judgment. And so I always say, you know, I'm not judging. I'm just curious and I want to understand. And because I think sometimes they also don't understand for themselves what's going on.

38:17Kristen Pressner:So I just ask a number of nonjudgmental questions. You know, how are you feeling? Why do you think it might be? So on the, you know, just do the thing, just power through. You know, what I get back is kind of like, I can't today. I'm not feeling it today. It feels impossible today. And if we unpack it a little bit, it becomes clear. I'm out of energy. I didn't sleep well, whatever. And once we've diagnosed what is, there's no judgment. It just is. And then we can take the right action for what the current state of is is. I can feel the shame dissipating from the listeners as I can see that advice being played out.

38:53Incredibly helpful.

38:54Kristen Pressner:Yeah. It's easy to say and hard to do though, because I think there's the shame that other people put on ADHDers by saying just do these things. But there's also, in my experience, the shame that ADHDers put on themselves because they feel like it should be easier. And so I think if we're going to ban the word just, we should also ban the word should. What's a replacement then that someone with ADHD could tell themselves? How can you correct that internal critic, that horrible monologue that so many of us have? I guess my invitation would be to just be a curious observer of what is. It isn't good and it isn't bad.

39:35Kristen Pressner:It isn't right. It isn't wrong. It just is. and I also find in a lot of the folks that I've been around who have ADHD there's a lot of dismissing or minimizing extreme gifts and talents because they feel easy and so being able to accurately assess what's hard for you and what doesn't work but also accurately assess what are you gifted at or good at or better at than the average person and I think really then being able to architect the circumstances that enable you to be more in the zone where you're not pushing a rock uphill and less in the zone where things are supernaturally hard. Kristen, I mean, that's phenomenal.

40:19Incredible. Thank you so much. I want to move on to number three. And I feel like this one is almost quite traumatic and is going to be really relatable to anyone who's run for a train, missed the train, looked at their phone and had a text message saying, where are you?

40:33Kristen Pressner:and it is why can't you manage your time better oh yes that one's a hard one we talked a little bit about time blindness or having a different sense of time but it's also for me it's not even just past present future it's also how long things are going to take and i think you know all of us have noticed this before where it's like spending time with your loved one the time flies by you know spending time you know in line at the market the time drags like or you know behind a red light it drags forever so we also do have different perceptions of time all of us and i think my experience of adhd years is that the the perception of time can be very fleeting and shifting and that's what makes it really hard to just do that yes i feel like people with adhd are almost very optimistic with their perception of time they're over optimistic so if for example if you're sat on the sofa in your pajamas and you got to leave the house and your partner says right we're going in five minutes in your head you're like five minutes that's enough time for me to stand up go upstairs have a shower find what I want to wear get ready get back downstairs find the car keys and leave yeah but it's never enough like you're so optimistic with what you can do in five minutes yeah I feel like for me like the replacement is okay let's acknowledge that we don't really have an understanding of what five minutes is no shame there whatsoever but rather than say five minutes say 300 seconds because as soon as you say 300 seconds you sort of see the 300 start counting down like 300 299 298 and suddenly it's not long at all i like that and that is you're bringing back in also the um make it visual technique that we talked about so i like the idea of instead of you know looking at the clock and having it inform or not inform something having um a timer with sand in it or something so you can see the time going um can be a real motivator but i've also found um with um some people it's um because i think the things that generally get adhd years going are some things that are interesting or novel or fun but also do or die urgent and that has a place uh for motivation and it also can have a cost for motivation but um oftentimes at least in my house it's the five minute warning that creates the urgency to jump and get in the shower.

42:54Moving on, Kristen, to the penultimate piece of bad advice that doesn't work for people with ADHD, and that is when someone says, just prioritize. Just do the important thing first. Yes.

43:05Kristen Pressner:Yes. So, I've got this huge hurdle that literally the act of prioritizing is hard, and you're telling me to just do it. Just do the thing. Just do the super hard thing. I think what makes that so hard is, Like I said, if we could visualize how much harder it is, you know, ADHD is a dysregulation of the neurotransmitters in the brain that enable you to get going and do those kinds of tasks. And so, if you say, well, just do the thing, but there isn't the neurotransmitter to enable you to do the thing, how awful is that feedback? It is so hard, isn't it, to, like, prioritize tasks when you don't have a perception of time.

43:45because I feel like in order to prioritize tasks, you have to have some kind of ability to visualize different futures, if that makes sense, and to almost like recognize the consequences of if you don't get a particular task done or if you don't get another task done. Like if I don't iron my shirt, I am going to go to that dinner and I'm going to be worried about what people think of me because I've got a creased shirt. I think it's very hard for me to like acknowledge the feeling associated with the shame that is going to happen at the dinner table with a creased shirt because that's in the future.

44:15and therefore it doesn't exist. Therefore, the need and the importance to iron my shirt now isn't there. Yeah, yeah.

44:22Kristen Pressner:Plus, prioritizing is, you have to attribute what has to precede what. So I have to iron my shirt before I can wear my shirt, before I can look nice. And it also requires that you're kind of not only doing what needs to precede what, but in what order things have to happen. So it takes a lot of executive functions to prioritize tasks. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I feel like you should never have more than three things on your to-do list. Exactly. I'm like your bracelets, you know, no more than three bracelets. And if they're all off, you get a reward. The neurotypical advice is like put all of the stuff on a to-do list.

44:56But I feel like people with ADHD, it's helpful. And this is the replacement to have two different lists. One is like your backlog, which is everything that you need to do. That can have like 20, 30 different things on it. Then every day you move no more than three things from your backlog onto your to-do list. And you don't do more than three in a day.

45:13Kristen Pressner:Yeah. I like that notion of kind of triaging and prioritizing and boxing in instead of having an infinity list of things. I'm imagining one of those Trello boards where you're moving things forward physically. So in your house, you talked about the whiteboards and maybe you've got post-it notes of things on the backlog and then things that get promoted onto Alex's to-do list. Yeah, gosh. All right, Kristen, I feel like we need some kind of drum roll for the final one. And this is the universal piece of terrible advice for people with ADHD. And that is try harder. I mean, it is heartbreaking, isn't it?

45:49We've all been told that we should just try harder. Why? I've got my feelings. Why do you think that's heartbreaking for someone with ADHD to hear?

45:57Kristen Pressner:First of all, because it implies you're not trying really hard. And I think that's what makes it so hard that this is invisible and so widely misunderstood. and why I feel like it's important to get the word out that people better understand it. Because in my experience, they're trying so hard. They're running twice as hard to get half as far. And so if you were running twice as hard to get half as far, and someone says, try harder, how would that feel to you? Yeah, I mean, it's that invisible workload. I think you said, like people with ADHD, I think just try harder than neurotypical people full stop.

46:37But it's like that invisible workload. And it's so clear that effort isn't the missing variable. We put so much effort in. That's why we're exhausted all the time. We go through this cycle of burnout, this feeling of just, oh, I'm so useless. And that's the horrible internal feedback that many of us have. Neurotypical people have this traffic light system. Imagine the traffic lights outside of your head and a task will come in and it will like get stopped at the traffic light it'll go the light will go green one task go in your head at any given time you action the task you complete it and then it leaves and then the traffic light goes green again one more task comes in so you do one task at a time people with aghc we don't have that traffic lights we've got bombarded with like 50 60 different thoughts 50 60 different tasks at the same time and it is incredibly effort effort a huge effort to try and manage those that overwhelm and often it just leads to paralysis

47:32Kristen Pressner:yeah i wish there was a way to visualize what it actually feels like inside y 'all's head right because i think there would be a lot more empathy and appreciation this is what's so tricky about it being invisible is that we can't tell how hard things are for each other but try harder implies that the person isn't trying very hard. And in my experience, I often remember observing what feels like someone laying around scrolling on their phone or killing time or even they would say, I'm procrastinating. And it wasn't until the ADHD diagnosis came and we better understood the ADHD brain and what will work and what won't work that we realized we don't use the word, I'm procrastinating.

48:13Kristen Pressner:I'm lazy. Because that's not what the root cause is. The root cause is differences in neurotransmitters in a prefrontal cortex that have great benefits for the world, but it's a brain that works differently. And I think us having a better understanding in the world that there are brains that work differently and not assuming that what I see equals what it would mean for me. If I sat on my phone all day scrolling when I should be doing something else, I might be being lazy but if someone else is that doesn't mean they're being lazy yes if someone's with ADHD and they're listening and they are in a relationship or they're in a family dynamic or in a workplace and they are the recipient of that comment just try harder what advice would you have for someone in that situation is it a case of just signposting your colleague your partner your family members in the direction of like education so they can understand what's going on?

49:09Kristen Pressner:Yeah, that's a hard one. I think, first of all, I think it's got to start within the ADHD or to not be judging themselves or feel shame. So to recognize that there is a difference in the brain and that difference has very positive sides to it. It's not all negatives. But the conditions in which an ADHD brain will be lit up and will be able to shine are just different than average. And that's exactly why we're doing this podcast because we're talking about what's the conventional wisdom, why that doesn't maybe work for you, and what might, and it might be counterintuitive. Some of the stuff we said today might be counterintuitive, but the point is it doesn't have to be intuitive.

49:49Kristen Pressner:It has to work for you. And so, instead of just try harder, if the person could understand, in what circumstances do I thrive? What time of day? Or do I need to see the visual timer? Or do I need to body double? like figuring out how to concoct as much circumstances in which you can shine as possible then the just try harder goes down because people see that you're able to be successful and you're trying plenty hard yes absolutely adhd definitely isn't a lack of effort it's effort towards the wrong systems like systems that are designed for a non-adhd brain yeah exactly i think you know i've looked in my own family because there was a point in time where everyone was just basically holding on to survive.

50:37Kristen Pressner:And it was because we were trying to throw all the conventional wisdom at them, and they were using all of their effort to try to make the conventional wisdom work for them. And when we pivoted to, aha, that doesn't work for you. And so what might, and we started to find what might work, it blew my mind, the thriving that came. And for me, it was a big fundamental difference in our mindset and our approach, but it didn't cost a million dollars. It really was a matter of understanding, aha, these things don't work for you. No judgment, no shame. That is what will work for you. Let's try a few things and figure that out.

51:14Kristen Pressner:And now let's set the conditions where you get as much of that as possible. And like the blossoming and the thriving that happened blew my mind. And that's partly why I wanted to give the TEDx talk to help everyone else understand that because the world needs that potential. The world needs those gifts. And I would argue in a post-AI world, more than ever, the gifts that are associated with ADHD are differentiated and can't be done by AI. And so I think that the time and the moment has come, but we need to all have a better understanding of how to enable that thriving. I'm so pleased, Kristen, that we managed to sit down and have this conversation today.

51:49I know it's going to be incredibly helpful. And to have a conversation with you when you're in town is a true honor. And I don't remember if we did the letter when you were last here to your younger self. We did do that? We did. We're going to do it again. Okay, cool. Let's do it. We got a new letter. Every guest writes a letter to their younger self, and I'm going to deliver to you the last letter that was written by the previous guest. I'm

52:11Kristen Pressner:going to deliver it to you. Awesome. There we go, Kristen. Thank you. When you're struggling with juggling the complexities of life, when you think you're a failure because you believe you're letting down everyone dependent on you when you think you should have never taken that new opportunity just remember that your strengths took you here incredible what a what a finish and i think on behalf of everyone listening and watching who is struggling and grappling to understand what advice they should pay attention to what advice perhaps isn't right for their adhd brains a huge huge thank you very much Thank you.

53:16Equinox.com.