This is a Global Player original podcast. ADHD coach Aoife Hughes. We are welcoming her back to the podcast. And through her coaching and education work, she explores how language can either build self-belief and empathy, or the opposite, deepen shame and misunderstanding.
And she'll be joining us in just a moment to explain all. Aoife, so lovely to see you. Thanks for joining us again. Oh, thank you, Sam and Casey.
It is a pleasure to be back. Big question to start, but it sort of encompasses what we're going to talk about today. Why does language matter, particularly when it comes to ADHD and us being able to motivate ourselves? That's a very big question.
The area that I'm most passionate about is kind of focusing on is our nervous system, and what our nervous system is able for, and what our nervous system needs. Our nervous systems are sponges. So the words we hear from a young age to where we are now impact our nervous system for the good or for the not so good, the unhelpful or the helpful. And so what we hear can seep into our nervous systems and become our part of our self-talk and our inner critic.
So yeah, understanding the impact of language and the difference it can make. And with ADHD, you constantly have to hack it. You know, just when you have one thing figured out, you know, you have to shapeshift and pivot another way. So understanding the value of language and the power of language really makes a big impact around that.
The other thing ADHD nervous systems really don't like is being told what to do. What do you mean? And the language plays a big role in that. Thankfully, there are lots of, you know, other options for us out there now.
So declarative language and anybody who's talking about neuroaffirming supports declarative language is one of my favourites. And it makes a big difference. Taking a low demand approach is another way that we can focus on the language that we're using either with ourselves or with others. It occurs to me that what we're talking about here is almost like a form of coaching the people around us with the language that they use when they are interacting with us.
So people who might not necessarily have a handle on our ADHD quite as well as we do, sitting here hours every week talking about ADHD. But, you know, the people we come into contact with, members of our family, colleagues, all those different people, about being a bit more careful about the kinds of language that they might use. Because the whole shoulds and the justs are things that I hear all the time from very, very well meaning friends who I know love me and are kind, but will say things that show a lack of understanding of ADHD. And what would you say to anybody who is maybe listening because they are married to someone or with someone who's got ADHD about the language that they use?
Well, if you get the nail on the head, it all starts with understanding. Understanding ADHD and understanding what it really means to have ADHD. Now, unfortunately, you know, we're not talking about that today, but I would always start with understanding the brain and the nervous system and what the ADHD brain is able for it and what the ADHD brain needs in order to set it up for success. So I talk about the brain and the nervous system rather than person.
And also us as adults, it's harder for us to advocate for ourselves around other people. So when we say things like, oh, I didn't really like the way you said that, we're going to get the backups right away. And so when we take the ego out of it, the I out of it, or you, the you out of it, and we say, look, my brain's not able to hear that right now, or my nervous system really struggled with the tone that you used, there's not really much they can do with that. You know, it can't get defensive about a brain or a nervous system.
Well, maybe you can, but less so when you, there's less blame and shame when you're talking about your brain and your nervous system. And so in order to support somebody with ADHD, first of all, it's understanding it. And one of the ways that I like to explain it is, right, let's, we'll just talk about our executive function. Okay, so usually we get that you should be able to organize, you know, why can't you just only plan?
And, you know, what do you mean you can't prioritize or, you know, stop crying, you'll be grand, right? So our executive function is our brain's management system. And the functions are prioritizing, planning, organizing, and emotional regulation. Now, I like to use the analogy of the conductor to represent our executive function.
The conductor is, you know, all the other parts of the brain are looking to the conductor for direction. But for ADHDers, our executive function is permanently impaired. So that means our conductor is permanently drowsy. Now, if you went to a recycle and you knew the conductor was going to be drowsy, you wouldn't expect to hear Bach or Mozart played perfectly because you're like, well, this person is drowsy.
So the question is, well, what does that conductor need in order to get through this performance? And it's just keeping that at the forefront of our mind when we're supporting the people with ADHD. People need that understanding and they need that insight. And it's not about that we won't do the thing, it's that our brains can't.
So instead of saying, why can't you just plan your week properly? The question is, well, what does your brain need? Because you have ADHD, but that ADHD is that's connected to our brain and our nervous system. Yeah, it's taking a step back, isn't it?
Rather than kind of leaning in and everybody getting riled. It is taking a step back and going, actually, it's about needs rather than just to the next thing. Yeah, and I think, going back to something you said earlier, those external messages become internalized. And so the words that we're focusing on today, you know, I should, I can't, for me become really big stumbling blocks to doing things.
So it's saying, I should be able to do something like somebody else, or I can't possibly do that because I'm totally overwhelmed. And actually, what happens is, because I'm seeing in my head how something works, I'll give an example I've used on this podcast last time before, I can't ride a bike. The reason I can't ride a bike is because when I was a kid, I could see it, it was obvious, it's obvious what should happen, I should be able to do that, but I can't immediately, therefore I'm not going to try. It becomes a stumbling block to actually taking the action you need to get something done.
So how do you overcome those phrases and get to a place where you say, I'm going to take it easy, and I'm going to try, and I'm going to be okay with failure? How do you make that transition? There's three things that have popped into my head straight away. The first is emotional regulation.
Emotional dysregulation, again, which is controlled by our driver's conductor, compounds a lot of the challenging traits of ADHD. So when it comes to riding that bike and the should, so the perfectionism piece is coming in there as well, and perfectionism is a coping mechanism, an unhelpful coping mechanism for anxiety, and it's linked to need for approval, disappointment, and fear of failure. More often than not, we will not only avoid doing something because if we're not getting it right, that's not going to be good enough, but we're also doing it to avoid those very difficult feelings of fear and disappointment and anything else that can come along with a failure piece. The other thing is we have a saying in the coaching world, don't should on yourself, and again, just tweaking the language.
So, you know, I should be able to ride a bike. I could ride a bike. How does that feel in your body, Sam, when we change the I should to I could? It definitely makes a difference, and I think I've started to see that with the therapy I've had, that sense of saying, actually, do I want to?
First of all, would I like to? How do I feel about that? Do I want to be able to access this thing or this, you know, maybe a job that I want to get done? Okay, maybe it isn't going to be perfect.
How do I feel about that? But there's lots of steps of checking how I feel as I go before I say, okay, I'm going to try it. I'm going to try it and see how it goes rather than I'm going to just do it. The other thing that's happening there is there's more autonomy when we change our language from I should to I could, because it's, well, I have a choice, you know, and if we have a choice, then there's a better chance that we're actually going to try and do the thing.
Yeah, otherwise, as ADHDers, we can get ourselves into a terrible situation where we sort of reject it or we freeze because we feel like we're being forced to do it, and then there's a sort of element of refusal about it, isn't there? Yeah, and that's all linked to protecting ourselves from those very difficult feelings and worrying about maybe what other people think. And to go back to the inner critic, what I invite my clients to do is to give their inner critic a name. So, Sam, do you have a name in mind that you could call your inner critic?
Do you know, it's funny you say that, because we talked about this in another episode, and actually, when I went through my therapy, we got to a place where we had young Sam and old Sam, and it was like two different ages, and they tended to sort of switch roles, but it was kind of a younger and older version of myself. Actually, the younger version, funnily enough, is quite often the critic, because the younger version was quite often the one saying, Mrs. Roberts, I don't want to do that, I hate it, and it needed the adult version of myself to say, okay, but maybe we'd like to do this. Maybe I can try it.
Maybe I can make a choice about whether I'm going to do it. And it was sort of talking to myself in that way. And that sounds really helpful, and if you go back to that, you know, young Sam, what you can ask yourself now, and ask young Sam is what was happening about young Sam, was saying, oh, I don't want to do this, and this is boring, and this is rubbish, what was happening for Sam, and what needs were not being met for young Sam, and what could you do differently now, and how can you bring that into your day-to-day now? So that's the, you know, the young Sam and the older Sam, but going back to the inner critic, right, so our mind is separate from our brain, and our mind generates 50 to 80,000 thoughts per day, and these thoughts are not facts.
But the problem is, we haven't been taught that from age nine, like my son is nine now, and his, so he's named his Fred, so Fred has started to become quite loud and amplified, and he's like, oh, mum, when, you know, when I'm upstairs, I feel this. Now, that's a big mistake a lot of people make, you know, that's not a shaming statement, but if they haven't been taught any other way, they won't know, but so many people talk in using that sentence, I feel like she's annoyed with me. That's not a feeling, that's a thought, but when we use that word feel, it has such a big impact on our nervous system, the feeling might be worrying, that feeling is still really valid, but I think she's really annoyed with me. Is that a thought, or is it a fact?
And maybe that's, you know, Fred, or let's call mine Mary, and my Mary is saying, oh, I bet she's annoyed with me now, I can tell by the way she's looking at me, she's annoyed at me, or if we go back to the inner critic and being able to do something, oh, you know, I'll never be able to ride my bike, because I didn't learn when I was a kid. That's Mary, that's not me, and so the way we reign in Mary is we use what I call thought interrupters, so how do I know, or what do you mean, how do I know I'll never ride a bike? You don't, and what do you mean you'll never ride a bike? Well, like, I mean, you know, what's the point of me ever learning to ride a bike?
I mean, sure, well, that's a different, that's a different thing, that's a completely different sentence, what's the point? And so I love those two phrases, how do you know, and what do you mean, because they help us to drill down and reduce the intensity of the Marys and the Freds, you know, I have one client, and she calls hers Donny, it's so powerful when you name your mind, and you take the ego out, and you realise, this is me, this is Mary, or this is Betty, or this is Fred, and what I love telling my son, who's nine, is that you can tell Fred where to go, you can tell Fred to be quiet, you can tell Fred, you know, he's not wanted now, and what you're doing in that moment is that you're going, oh my God, okay, so I am in control here, and I can be in control, because it's that loss of control, that sense of loss of autonomy, feels very scary. So much of this, and Sam and I have talked about this before, so much of this comes from a sort of societal expectation of how we should be anyway, doesn't it? And, you know, when we talk about perfectionism, and expectation, and what you were talking about before, trying to avoid feelings of fear, and disappointment, and all that kind of stuff, it gets very complicated, doesn't it?
And these are all kind of classic ADHD experiences, that feeling of not being enough, not showing up, and not being enough, and it's so hard when you hear it from other people. I mean, that must be where it starts, presumably, it's about what you're hearing around you, that must contribute to how you respond to those sorts of things. Absolutely, like I had a client yesterday who told me that she found her school reports. I mean, how many ADHDers can go back and read their school reports, and, you know, my biggest book bearer was Aoife has so much potential.
Mine too, yeah. And, yeah, and it's really shaming, and judgmental, and a really unfair thing. If you can explain to an ADHDer about what something looks like, sounds like, and feels like, there's a less likelihood that they're not going to understand what's going on, or what you mean. So Aoife has so much potential, and I heard it on the basketball court, and it crippled me as a basketball player.
Like, I was screamed at, because people assumed I was this great player, because I'm six foot two. And then in school, because I wasn't academic, but they knew that I had potential. But nobody told me, I didn't know what potential, I didn't even know what that word meant. I didn't know what Aoife having potential looked like.
I didn't know what Aoife having potential sounded like, and I didn't know what it felt like. But I find the best way to explain to anybody, whether you're in work, or whether you're talking to your 80-year-old granny, is that if you bring it back to, how would I ask a five-year-old to explain it to me? Well, five-year-olds are actually really good at explaining things so much better than adults are. But if you can talk to their inner child, and just bring it back to what's simple, and I find that piece, well, what does that look like?
What does that sound like? And what does that feel like? Like, for you, Sam, when you go back to learning to ride a bike, your brain went straight to, I should be able to ride a bike. You probably might have had a vision of yourself in Tour de France, right?
Because that's what our brains do. They bring us so far ahead of what we should be able to do. Yes, Olympic winning. Yeah, we talked about this before.
That's where you go immediately, isn't it? It's either that or nothing. It's where your Mary or your friend or your Betty brings you, your mind brings you, right? But what you need is, well, what does learning to ride a bike look like?
It's literally, first of all, getting a bike that fits your size, you know, getting the bike, and then writing out all the steps, or pointing out all the steps of what learning to ride a bike looks like. What does it sound like? Ah, falling off your bike 20 times. You know what I mean?
And what does it feel like? It feels scary, and it's okay to feel scared. And that's something that, you know, people wouldn't have known back then. They wouldn't have been like, oh, just get on the bike, get on your bike, get on your bike.
Yeah, get back in the saddle. I think, I mean, that perfectionism certainly is a stumbling block, and that's been so useful to hear. The other thing that strikes me when we're talking about the words we use is this phrase, I can't, sort of swings both ways for me, in the sense that sometimes I have to realistically say, as we've talked about, actually, my brain works differently. I'm tired, I'm burnt out.
I can't expect to do that in the way that other people can. But actually, sometimes I need to say to myself, yes, I can, but it might be hard, or it might be more difficult than it is for others because of my brain. And I think that is something that I've come to realise, because sometimes the I can't is just a phrase that I use because it all just seems too much. Well, okay, but if I want to do something, maybe I can do it, but I have to accept that it might be difficult.
It becomes a sort of avoidance strategy, I think, maybe. And again, you're avoiding the feeling that I can't is making you feel. Again, when we're projecting, oh, well, I can't do this, and I can't do that. Well, if I get on a bike, I'm going to fall, and I'm hurt myself.
I don't want that. Sometimes things are too much. And again, if you go back to what does my brain need in order to learn how to ride a bike? What does my nervous system need in order to ride a bike?
And maybe you need to go out at 10 o'clock at night time, obviously, where it's lit up, where nobody sees you. That will make your nervous system feel more safe because you don't want people watching you. You know, and so bringing it back to those two questions, what does my brain need? And I notice with that word, I can't, the ego's right back in there again, having a great time.
Ironically, talking about ego, the fact that I know about children who are learning to ride a bike, the ego. I'm now becoming slightly embarrassed that I can't ride a bike. So that might give you the motivation to actually do it. Interesting.
But the lovely thing about children is that you can ask them, you can actually make this into a fun activity as a family and say, you know what, Dan never learned to ride a bike. I got really scared. And I'm wondering what tips could you give me? And do it that way.
And if you do it through the eyes of your children, it might feel more fun and safer as well because kids are very forgiving and understanding and intuitive. Yeah, and what a wonderful lesson for them as well to see their parent acknowledging vulnerability. I mean, that's such a vulnerable thing to say about yourself, isn't it? I can't do this thing.
I can hear our producer outside planning more social media content if you want to ride a bike. Exactly. It's about letting yourself off the hook, isn't it? And when other people have expectations of you, encouraging them to let you off the hook or showing them the way of how to let you off the hook and not have expectations of you that you can't meet yet.
You might get there, but you need a different route or a different way round. And it is complicated. For me, sometimes I fall down with the perfectionism. There's a sense of, I'm not going to do that, so don't even start.
And that's the thing, that kind of sense of society expects you to be brilliant at this or at least, OK, and I'm not there yet, so I'd be too ashamed and too embarrassed to even give it a go. And it's hard. But what you said about changing, it's essentially changing our expectations in a way, isn't it? It's sort of saying, I might be able to do this or maybe I'd like to do this.
It's not saying to yourself, I'm going to be an Olympic gold medalist. It's saying I might just be able to talk about the shots. Yeah, nudging yourself into a different direction rather than having to turn yourself completely around. Another phrase to change, I suppose, is the what's wrong with me, isn't it?
It's a sense of, well, I can't do that or I should be able to do that because everyone else can. There must be something wrong with me. I mean, that's another thing that presumably needs to be tackled and challenged. Well, these are beliefs that we have developed from what we've been hearing from society growing up in a world that isn't neuroaffirming becomes what's wrong with me.
And I'm like a broken record, but I will just keep going back to the brain because nobody can argue with the science. What does my brain need? And what is my brain able for? And then you were talking earlier at the start of this about how can we, you know, or how can other people support us?
And unfortunately, a lot of it has to come from us advocating for ourselves because people don't know what they don't know. So we can't expect them. It does become exhausting becoming this constant self-advocate, but we can do it in a gentle way and we can do it in a fun way. And that's why, unfortunately, I call ADHD the eye roll effect because people are like, oh, another one.
And so if there's something coming up or if there's an expectation that's put on me, I'll say my brain's unable for that. They don't hear the word term ADHD. So they've not got something to dismiss. So something there, their assumptions and expectations about ADHD don't go into it because you haven't mentioned ADHD.
That's really interesting because I agree with you. It's like a trigger word ADHD now for certain people, isn't it? Ah, have you? You've got ADHD, have you?
And it is absolutely a kind of, I also find I have to use it carefully. I have to sprinkle it very carefully and tentatively these days before I reveal. So somebody's listening to this and they've got a project that they want to do or there is some big event coming up in life and they feel like they've got to run a hundred miles an hour and they should be able to do this perfectly and they've got to nail it and they're worried that they can't do it. Where should they start in terms of talking to themselves, in terms of managing their expectations?
What's the first thing they should do? Are you familiar with that image where there's two ladders and the ladder on the right-hand side has like seven rungs up to the top and the person standing at the bottom of the ladder can't even reach the first rung and the ladder on the left has 20 rungs and they're all really tight together and that's what we need to keep at the forefront of our minds in terms of supporting ourselves is what does my brain need to set me up for success so that I will succeed with this project so I can go to this event. Look, even going to a wedding. I went to a wedding last September and it was like, right, what does my brain need?
I would struggle with social anxiety and different things. I'm six foot two and I always hate looking for clothes and outfits and all the things and I knew that what my brain needed so that I could really enjoy the wedding was to outsource and so I got my hair done, I got my makeup done, I got my nails done, I got my tams done and one thing is, right, well, who else can I outsource the things that I struggle with? So if we go back to that conductor, our conductor is grousey so the pieces that we struggle with, planning, prioritizing, and organization, what tools can we use? So AI is amazing and I give a lot of my clients permission to use AI because not using AI is like walking around with a blindfold.
You know, especially as ADHD is, it's like something has come along that's like, here you go, this will support your executive function. So giving yourself permission to outsource, whether, like, it doesn't have to be a financial thing, you know, it's like using ChatGPT or, you know, and then again, breaking it down. So there's so many steps to completing a project but within those steps there's micro steps and if you notice and listen to your body, if your body is telling you and you look at a micro step, oh my God, even this is too big, well, then we need to pull that micro step out and we need to give it its own ladder and go, right, what are the steps I need and it could be something simple like turning on my laptop, turning up the night. So if you're in a very anxious state, number one, we don't have access to our prefrontal cortex and so noticing what's in your body and what's your body telling you and listening to your body and then asking the question, well, what does my brain need?
Yeah, that's a really helpful advice. Thank you so much for doing this. Thank you both so much for having me. Such a great chat with Aoife about how the words we use either build bridges or walls and how changing our language changes our empathy.
Next time you catch yourself saying should, try asking why instead. Yeah, it is a challenge to change those habits and also a challenge to maybe educate other people about... That's what it's about really, isn't it? If you're trying to create a safe space for yourself and trying to find this new world, post-diagnosis, it is about bringing people along the way, isn't it?
Huge thanks to Aoife Hughes for joining us and to you for listening to Your Wrong About ADHD. If you've enjoyed today's episode, please rate, review and share it. It really helps others avoid it. Take care and we'll see you next time.
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