Speaker 1: I'll get a team. It's the bloody you project. It's
Speaker 1: doctor Hannah. It's almost doctor Fatty Apps. Mightn't that be
Speaker 1: funny when I'm an actual doctor Hannah. Oh my god, my.
Speaker 2: God, I can't believe you. Do you mean like pH
Speaker 2: fat or are you like did you just refer to
Speaker 2: yourself as f A T fat?
Speaker 1: Well, I used to be fatty, I was fatty Garati.
Speaker 1: You know that I was a fat kid? Did you
Speaker 1: not know that?
Speaker 2: Tell me about that? Well, I don't know. I'm a psychologist, Craig,
Speaker 2: so I prefer to say you know that back then
Speaker 2: you had some issues with weight, rather than.
Speaker 1: Say fat, Yeah, potatoes, potatoes. I was fat. I mean
Speaker 1: you know I was fat. That's not an insult. That's
Speaker 1: a biological state. I think, you know.
Speaker 2: I feel like there's a lot of hate in that word.
Speaker 2: To say, well, I was fat or I am fat
Speaker 2: just feels very loaded to me.
Speaker 1: I understand that. I understand that, but it's like you
Speaker 1: so fuck Nine people don't get offended and one does,
Speaker 1: and then you go, well, why is that person offended?
Speaker 1: Are they offended because of the word or because of
Speaker 1: their story about the word. I mean, this is that's
Speaker 1: a really interesting conversation. Like for me, like, I would
Speaker 1: never go call a kid fat, right, because I understand,
Speaker 1: I understand the social context and the nuance of you know,
Speaker 1: you know, treating people well and being of course of course,
Speaker 1: but when I'm talking about myself, like I was ten
Speaker 1: kilos heavier than I am now when I was fourteen,
Speaker 1: So you can call it whatever you want, but I
Speaker 1: was morbidly obese. So for me, I I personally when
Speaker 1: it comes to this, and this is about me. This
Speaker 1: is not about any other children or any other human
Speaker 1: But for me, I'm like, well, Craig, be real with yourself.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: For me, that's not self loathing. I don't go I
Speaker 1: was fat. I was a piece of shit. I don't
Speaker 1: go that. I just go, I was the fattest kid
Speaker 1: at school. I was literally called jumbo, right. That was
Speaker 1: my nation and right that parents and teachers and kids
Speaker 1: call me that. This is not like, this is just
Speaker 1: my history. This is not an attitude or a belief
Speaker 1: system or a perspective, right, So I think I think
Speaker 1: at the same time that and I know we've kind
Speaker 1: of taken a left turn before we even started, but
Speaker 1: we will, Like I think that you need to be
Speaker 1: aware and sensitive and kind and empathetic. But also you know,
Speaker 1: it's like I wasn't thick set, I wasn't big boned,
Speaker 1: I wasn't full figured, I wasn't voluptuous, I wasn't fucking
Speaker 1: any of that. I was morbidly obese. And people go,
Speaker 1: that's so this or that. I go it' call it
Speaker 1: whatever you want to call it, but it's also true,
Speaker 1: like if I was six to two, people would go, fuck,
Speaker 1: you're tall, but nobody's bothered by that. Or if I
Speaker 1: had long, blonde, beautiful hair, people go, fuck, you've got
Speaker 1: amazing hair, or like, but when you go, no, I
Speaker 1: was morbidly obese, I'm not saying I was a bad
Speaker 1: person or I'm you know, like this is something to
Speaker 1: be shamed or I get it, but it's also I
Speaker 1: think we need to be I don't know, like I
Speaker 1: understand what you're saying, but I feel like, when I'm
Speaker 1: talking about myself, that's the one time you get a
Speaker 1: green light to be just brutally honest. And if I
Speaker 1: didn't acknowledge that, like if I just pretended like I
Speaker 1: needed to get to a point where I was honest
Speaker 1: with myself because I was just eating everything that wasn't
Speaker 1: nailed down, and I was literally twenty thirty forty kilos
Speaker 1: heavier than my friends at the same age.
Speaker 2: Did you feel quite different like growing up?
Speaker 1: Well, I mean yes I did. Well, how do you know,
Speaker 1: like you've only ever been you, you've only ever felt you.
Speaker 1: But of course I had a social awareness and you know,
Speaker 1: an individual awareness around the group and when you get
Speaker 1: you know, but like I can say things like, ah,
Speaker 1: I was picked last for every sporting team, Well, fuck
Speaker 1: of course you were. You couldn't fucking run of course,
Speaker 1: Like I'm not mad at anyone, and like there's no
Speaker 1: part of this story where I'm a victim, like a
Speaker 1: zero zero, because for me, anyway, I did certain things
Speaker 1: and I created a certain reality, which was a morbidly
Speaker 1: obese body, and with that come certain practical consequences. And
Speaker 1: so I could go, oh, my genetics or my mum
Speaker 1: or my dad or these nasty or you could go, yeah,
Speaker 1: but you fucking eat twice the amount of food you
Speaker 1: eat you need every day, and you can pretend you don't,
Speaker 1: and you can feel sorry for yourself, or you can
Speaker 1: own your behavior and change your behavior and create a
Speaker 1: different reality. And I know you don't think like that
Speaker 1: when you're fourteen, but for me, there's something in that
Speaker 1: because I think when we extrapolate not about obesity, but
Speaker 1: we extrapolate out from that kind of idea of you know,
Speaker 1: being responsible for your behavior and your outcomes where you go.
Speaker 1: You did that though, right now, that's not hateful or hurtful, that's.
Speaker 2: Just true controversial. If I said, but you're only fourteen,
Speaker 2: I feel like I'm already like, is that a controversial
Speaker 2: thing to say? Like you are only a child? You're child?
Speaker 1: I one hundred percent agree. But if that was me
Speaker 1: saying it about another fourteen year old, of course that's inappropriate,
Speaker 1: and it comes across as hateful, hurtful, and judgmental. I
Speaker 1: get it. I completely get it. But I think what
Speaker 1: I am like, I love people, and I'm I am
Speaker 1: you know, well, I'm not always but I genuinely try
Speaker 1: to be kind, empathetic and aware, but also also like
Speaker 1: people have to help themselves.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Like doctor.
Speaker 1: Hannah is not the answer for anyone. Neither is Craig Harper.
Speaker 1: Like doctor Hannah is a resource and an educator, and
Speaker 1: you can steer people and support people and maybe prescribe
Speaker 1: for people, but ultimately the person who needs to kind
Speaker 1: of make their own decisions, live their own life, change
Speaker 1: their own behaviors with support. Yeah, but ultimately the quality
Speaker 1: of an individual's life still comes down to the individual.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, that they say with therapy, one of the
Speaker 2: key predictors of the success of therapy is the person's
Speaker 2: belief that the therapy is going to be effective and
Speaker 2: that they have self efficacy so that they can actually
Speaker 2: make a difference and make a change in their own life. Like,
Speaker 2: that's the key predictor is do you believe that you
Speaker 2: can make a change. And the reason I guess I
Speaker 2: was curious about that we're talking about, you know, hopefully
Speaker 2: talking about the neurodiversity today and feeling different. And it's
Speaker 2: so interesting when I hear adults talking about when they're
Speaker 2: a child and feeling different as a child and how
Speaker 2: that's impacted them as an adult. You know, because I
Speaker 2: see you now and you're so I don't know, you're
Speaker 2: very like your character Craze, Like you have personality of charisma,
Speaker 2: You're larger than life, You've got the X factor, Like
Speaker 2: I'm not just blowing smoke, but you know that difference
Speaker 2: of feeling different, being different, which I'm sure wouldn't have
Speaker 2: been easy for you, contributed to so much. Well, I
Speaker 2: don't know, is that fair to say? Did it contribute
Speaker 2: to who you are today?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Thank you, that's very nice to you. But like, truly,
Speaker 1: this is what I feel. I feel like I'm not
Speaker 1: special or spectacular or gifted. In fact, and I've said
Speaker 1: this probably twenty times in fifteen hundred episodes. For me,
Speaker 1: my kind of mediocrity was almost my magic pill because
Speaker 1: I wasn't super gifted, and I didn't have great genetics,
Speaker 1: and I couldn't run fast and jump high, and I
Speaker 1: can't fucking sing or dance, and I wasn't a brilliant student,
Speaker 1: and like it made me work hard because if I
Speaker 1: wanted to do well, I could have just I couldn't
Speaker 1: just naturally do well. Yeah, you know, like this podcast,
Speaker 1: I did seven hundred episodes, seven hundred, six hundred before
Speaker 1: it made one dollar wow, like most people won't do.
Speaker 1: I'm not saying I am great, because I'm clearly if
Speaker 1: I was great, it wouldn't have fucking taken six hundred.
Speaker 1: What I'm saying is I will persevere like I will
Speaker 1: when I'm clear about something. You know, I don't have
Speaker 1: the best genetics, but I am maybe the most disciplined motherfucker,
Speaker 1: you know, because I will do everything that I need
Speaker 1: to do to optimize my genetics. Now that's just a choice.
Speaker 1: I can't get great genetics, but I can get great discipline,
Speaker 1: self awareness, self control, and I can create habits and
Speaker 1: behaviors that support my genetic predisposition. Now, all of that
Speaker 1: is optional. You know, I can't wake up tomorrow and
Speaker 1: have a one fifty IQ. But what I can do
Speaker 1: is I can optimize my cognitive abilities and my intelligence
Speaker 1: and intellect and creativity today. You know, all of these
Speaker 1: things are optional because otherwise we just become a fucking
Speaker 1: lifelong victim where we're like, ah, this happened to me that,
Speaker 1: And look, of course all of those things are true.
Speaker 1: I mean one of my friends that I've done some
Speaker 1: work with lately, Joel. He's a quadriplegic. He fell over
Speaker 1: a balcony. He was home from the war. He's a soldier.
Speaker 1: He was home from Afghanistan on a couple of weeks
Speaker 1: break no pun intended, broke his neck. Now he's a
Speaker 1: quadriplegic right now, if anyone has a right to fucking
Speaker 1: wing silk moan, he does. He never winged silks or moans.
Speaker 1: I'm not when I I've met him, not when I've
Speaker 1: worked with him, not when we've hung out. Like his
Speaker 1: overwhelming energy that I get from him as gratitude and curiosity. Now,
Speaker 1: if he can have great days, well then I don't
Speaker 1: have any problems. You know. It's like, I know, there
Speaker 1: are you know, lots of variables like genetic variables, sociological variables, environments. Yes,
Speaker 1: we're not saying those things don't factor in, but we
Speaker 1: at some stage we've got to go. I'm driving the bus.
Speaker 1: I'm not a passenger. My life is the bus and
Speaker 1: I'm fucking driving it. And yes, I've got limitations and
Speaker 1: genetic issues, and I've had some bad experiences and my
Speaker 1: old man was a prick and that person did that
Speaker 1: shit thing to me, and we empathize and we understand,
Speaker 1: but we can't undo any of that in the moment.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: That's it. Yeah, It's like that turning point of when
Speaker 2: a per and can have the inner resilience to rise
Speaker 2: above or choose something different in their behavior, which is
Speaker 2: kind of really difficult to like, what is it that
Speaker 2: makes that person click over or get to this turning point,
Speaker 2: whether all of a sudden or maybe over this process
Speaker 2: of an epiphany, decide I'm going to make a choice
Speaker 2: for me, and I'm going to do something for me.
Speaker 2: And I always find out I like to use the
Speaker 2: saying of like, well, what's the difference between a seventeen
Speaker 2: year old and three hundred and sixty four days and
Speaker 2: an eighteen year old and one day? Like we go
Speaker 2: from being a child to being an adult who then
Speaker 2: has to make all these really responsible decisions and take
Speaker 2: ownership of our behavior. And hopefully we've been fostering that
Speaker 2: from when we're a young you know, a teenager, like
Speaker 2: growing up older, we our parents have been helping us
Speaker 2: to foster independence. But so many times it's such a
Speaker 2: difficult little ven diagram of what you're talking about, where
Speaker 2: it's difficulty with genetics, difficulty with trauma. Then you're own
Speaker 2: autonomy to make a decision and whatever we want to
Speaker 2: put in that then diagram of your background. The only
Speaker 2: thing you truly have control over is that part of
Speaker 2: the diagram of your behavior, your choice. What are you
Speaker 2: going to do? What are you going to do? To
Speaker 2: make things different tomorrow. And it's a fascinate like what
Speaker 2: is it that clicks you over to that point of
Speaker 2: realizing if we could put it in a bottle, Craig,
Speaker 2: if we will put it in a pill, wouldn't that
Speaker 2: be amazing?
Speaker 1: It would? I mean, I have people like I did
Speaker 1: a workshop last weekend, which was a private workshop, twenty people,
Speaker 1: and one of the ladies who was in it came
Speaker 1: up and told me a story about a workshop that
Speaker 1: she was in. She started with, you changed my life
Speaker 1: four years ago, and I went, I did not change
Speaker 1: your life, but carry on, right, And so she went
Speaker 1: to workshop. I said something, doesn't matter what it was,
Speaker 1: but there was a decision that she knew she needed
Speaker 1: to make at home. She addressed things, she acknowledged some stuff,
Speaker 1: she made a life changing decision or two. She subsequently
Speaker 1: did the work, and now her life is infinitely better.
Speaker 1: She's better, she's a bowl, she's grown. Her life situation
Speaker 1: and her life experience are much better. And she was
Speaker 1: kind of saying, if not for you, blah blah blah, right,
Speaker 1: and I said, thank you, but that's not true because
Speaker 1: there were probably three hundred other people there who heard
Speaker 1: the same thing on the same day who didn't change
Speaker 1: their life. Now, the fact that they're in the same
Speaker 1: spot is not my fault. And the fact that you
Speaker 1: are now this new fucking two point zero version of you.
Speaker 1: Congrats by the way. Also, I don't I don't deserve
Speaker 1: the praise for that because, like you think about, we
Speaker 1: have fifteen one hundred and fifty episodes in that's fifteen
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty episodes of information, inspiration, education, conversation, a
Speaker 1: bit of bullshit, a few laughs, right, and there are
Speaker 1: people who are quite different. It's quite different because they
Speaker 1: listen to the show, but then they go do the work. Yeah, right,
Speaker 1: So you know, insight, information, awareness, recognition, you know, personal ownership,
Speaker 1: all of those things. You and me can't make anyone
Speaker 1: do that or be that. You and I are going
Speaker 1: to have a chat today, and for some people it
Speaker 1: might be fucking life changingly transformational, you know, and for
Speaker 1: somebody else it could be the biggest crock of shit
Speaker 1: they've ever heard and they've already tuned out. But that's
Speaker 1: not about you or me. That's about how people interpret
Speaker 1: it and then what they do with it, yep, which
Speaker 1: is well, and again, like you know, you've given people
Speaker 1: advice and prescription and they've got amazing results. And other
Speaker 1: people you've given just as much love, energy, care, and
Speaker 1: they don't. They's a variable. There's a variable that's out
Speaker 1: of your control, and that's their behavior.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeap. And what they choose to do is I
Speaker 2: suppose the information that's given to them. And you know,
Speaker 2: I find it really interesting when we talk about the
Speaker 2: journey that we've been on, Like you talking before about
Speaker 2: obesity in childhood and making decisions in adulthood. For me,
Speaker 2: I had crippling anxiety as a child, and I had
Speaker 2: to make some choices to go and see a psychologist,
Speaker 2: and I did for many, many years. For like, in
Speaker 2: my twenties, I saw three different psychologists. I took antidepressant
Speaker 2: anti anxiety medication Craig like I was taking Ssrise for
Speaker 2: a while because I was struggling with crippling, crippling anxiety,
Speaker 2: which you know, everyone would say to me, Oh, you'll
Speaker 2: be fine, you'll be fine, You'll be fine. And it's
Speaker 2: interesting because a lot of my closest friends and family,
Speaker 2: their advice would be things like, you don't need medication,
Speaker 2: you're fine, you're fine, you can do it. Yourself and
Speaker 2: talking about any inner resilience and me getting through it myself.
Speaker 2: But actually, at the time, I really did need help,
Speaker 2: like I really did need assistance. And when I finally
Speaker 2: had the courage because there's a lot of stigma around
Speaker 2: mental health. There's a lot of stigma around getting help
Speaker 2: for depression, anxiety, ADHD, autism, there is so much stigma
Speaker 2: around it still to actually finally go, I need to
Speaker 2: talk to a doctor. I need to go and see
Speaker 2: a psychologist. I need some help. And when I did
Speaker 2: finally do that, which was actually the more courageous decision
Speaker 2: then to just plow through it like everyone was recommending
Speaker 2: I did it. It took more guts to go and
Speaker 2: see the doctor, go and see the psychologist. When I
Speaker 2: finally did do that, my life completely changed and I
Speaker 2: was finally able to go, oh, my god, is this
Speaker 2: how other people live every day? Like well, up into
Speaker 2: my thirties, Craig, I had no idea how calm you
Speaker 2: could be inside and that life wasn't a constant anxiety
Speaker 2: race inside. I didn't realize that my internal state was
Speaker 2: so anxious until someone showed me what a new baseline was,
Speaker 2: and then I could work on those skills myself therapy
Speaker 2: and apply those I don't need that medication anymore in
Speaker 2: many years since I have. But that's because I made
Speaker 2: a choice to go and get the right kind of help.
Speaker 2: You know. It wasn't making excuses. I'm not saying that
Speaker 2: I you know, I just was charming off the choices
Speaker 2: or the behavior to something else and popping a pill
Speaker 2: to make it all better. It was the choice and
Speaker 2: the action and the effort to go and get that assistance,
Speaker 2: go and get that therapy so that I could then
Speaker 2: apply those skills without needing that, you know, that help
Speaker 2: from the medicine.
Speaker 1: Does that make sense one hundred percent? And by the way,
Speaker 1: I know this sounds, you know, condescending. I definitely don't
Speaker 1: mean it to like, well done. I'm super proud of
Speaker 1: you because I've worked with lots of people and so
Speaker 1: of you and it's it's real, and you know, it
Speaker 1: is so crippling, is so disempowering, it is so paralyzing,
Speaker 1: it is so life debilitating. And I think one of
Speaker 1: the problems is that you know people that love you
Speaker 1: and know you right, but they're not experiencing what you're experiencing.
Speaker 1: So they're looking so they're they're judging and evaluating, not
Speaker 1: in a bad way, what you're going through through their
Speaker 1: lens or their window of understanding, right and so and
Speaker 1: so It's like when someone says, to somebody who really
Speaker 1: has significant food issues, for example, which are real, and
Speaker 1: I had fucking massive food issues, when someone says, just
Speaker 1: eat less and move more, like you most just tounched
Speaker 1: me in the face, because if it was like and
Speaker 1: I know that theoretically that is part of the answer.
Speaker 1: You know, it's like telling someone like you can't often
Speaker 1: how often how often the well meaning people say don't
Speaker 1: worry to someone who's worried. It's like, and I've said
Speaker 1: this before, it's like saying someone who's tall, don't be tall.
Speaker 1: It's a fucking comment because if I could turn off
Speaker 1: the worry, it would be turned off. So you saying
Speaker 1: something stupid, all be it well intended, it's probably gonna
Speaker 1: make it worse because now I realize how much you
Speaker 1: don't understand what I'm feeling.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and also it warps your brain a little bit.
Speaker 2: You do get a little brainwashed, well not a little,
Speaker 2: definitely get brainwashed by the society and culture that we
Speaker 2: grow up in. Which is saying to us, mental health
Speaker 2: is something that we should be able to flick on
Speaker 2: and off like a light switch, and we should be
Speaker 2: able to have a teaspoon of concrete and harden up
Speaker 2: and keep calm and don't panic. And our motto of
Speaker 2: Australia is She'll be right, no worries. That's what it
Speaker 2: is to be Australian and it's ingrained from a young age.
Speaker 2: You know, big boys don't cry, big girls don't cry.
Speaker 2: We don't show those feelings. So you grow up kind
Speaker 2: of being reinforced and reinforced and reinforced it's not okay
Speaker 2: to have mental health issues. And the amount of people
Speaker 2: who I'll see in the clinic who will be finally, finally,
Speaker 2: you know, I'll see people in their twenty thirties, women
Speaker 2: in their sixties, Craig finally coming forward to say I
Speaker 2: think I have ADHD sitting in the clinic, you know,
Speaker 2: breaking in front of me, because they've had a lifetime
Speaker 2: of you know, this inerttention, this this restlessness, this inability
Speaker 2: to do all this, this need to put one hundred
Speaker 2: and fifty percent effort in when everyone else can put
Speaker 2: one hundred percent effort and they have to put one
Speaker 2: hundred and fifty in. They're exhausted, and of course they're anxious.
Speaker 2: Of course they're stressed. Of course they feel down. But
Speaker 2: that's all people see is the anxiety or the depression,
Speaker 2: and tell them, you know, cheer up, cheer up. Why
Speaker 2: don't you just try, you know, don't worry about it,
Speaker 2: and never actually dealing with the root cause of what
Speaker 2: was going on, which was, oh, actually, you know, maybe
Speaker 2: your brain's a little bit neurodiverse, and that's why things
Speaker 2: have been so difficult for you, and that's why you
Speaker 2: haven't really felt like you've met your full potential yet.
Speaker 2: So just that that active, being courageous and reaching out
Speaker 2: to get a little bit of assistance can in some
Speaker 2: ways be quite life changing because you don't know what
Speaker 2: you don't know, especially in a culture where we are
Speaker 2: brainwashed into thinking, you know, maybe maybe I just need
Speaker 2: a hard art.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, I one hundredsent agree. And I mean, I
Speaker 1: think one of the things that's really common now is
Speaker 1: that we think, oh, you know, like this is all bullshit.
Speaker 1: Back in my day, nobody had OCD, nobody was on
Speaker 1: the spectrum, nobody had ADHD. It's a lot of fucking well, no,
Speaker 1: they had it, they just weren't.
Speaker 2: Diagnosed or institutionalized.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. All right, So let's do a little neurodivergence
Speaker 1: pop quiz. So what am I going to do? I'm
Speaker 1: gonna I'm going to give you a name of something
Speaker 1: that kind of falls in that neurodivergence space I think
Speaker 1: I am. Anyway, if I say something that is in
Speaker 1: in that space, you educate me and correct me, and
Speaker 1: then you just tell us what it is. Because we're
Speaker 1: going to do a little bit of a because I
Speaker 1: think that there are so many things that kind of
Speaker 1: fall in that neuro atypical or neurodivergent kind of area
Speaker 1: that it can be confusing for us who are not you, right,
Speaker 1: So let's just start with autism spectrum disorder ASD.
Speaker 2: Just what is that neurodivergence? Yes, that is a neurodivergence.
Speaker 2: So autism spectrum disorder is a different wiring of the brain.
Speaker 2: So what we think it is? People? A lot of
Speaker 2: people have heard the word autism before. And if you're thinking,
Speaker 2: if you automatically go to this idea of rain Man
Speaker 2: or the awful media depictions of what is autism, just
Speaker 2: take that out of your head and throw it away,
Speaker 2: because that is not necessarily what autism is at all.
Speaker 2: Autism is a a different wiring of a person's brain.
Speaker 2: So there are three levels of autism Craig. There's level one, two,
Speaker 2: and three, and a person can also have verbal or
Speaker 2: non verbal autism. So a really high functioning person, they'd
Speaker 2: have level one, and somebody who perhaps couldn't speak and
Speaker 2: was nonverbal and was very severe, that person would have
Speaker 2: level three. So we used to have a term called aspergers.
Speaker 2: You know that word asperges. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we used
Speaker 2: to have that term in our diagnostic statistic statistical manual.
Speaker 2: That was the previous one. They got rid of that
Speaker 2: term aspergers and they've replaced it with these levels one, two,
Speaker 2: and three. So level one is like the highest level
Speaker 2: of autism where you're very high functioning. A person might
Speaker 2: not realize that you have autism if they met you,
Speaker 2: and those people can carry on in life and you
Speaker 2: know they have difficulty socially, they have sensory sensitivities, they
Speaker 2: have rigid patterns of behavior, but you might not know
Speaker 2: that that person has autism until you've spent a fair
Speaker 2: amount of time with them. So I see a lot
Speaker 2: of people with level one autism who have realized inside
Speaker 2: themselves something, something feels different, something feels different in the
Speaker 2: way that they're relating to people. They often will report
Speaker 2: wearing a social mask, so that they put a mask
Speaker 2: on to fit in with other people. They're very sensitive
Speaker 2: to sounds around them and they want to know what's up, Like,
Speaker 2: something feels different, I'm not quite sure what it is,
Speaker 2: So that that's a lot of the people that I
Speaker 2: see in the clinic are coming to see if they
Speaker 2: have a level one autism.
Speaker 1: All right, love it. Now, I'm going to tell you
Speaker 1: some names. You tell me what these people have in common.
Speaker 1: Albert Einstein, Leonardo da Vinci, Richard Brandt's Tom Cruise, Steven Spielberg,
Speaker 1: Orlando Bloom, Jamie Oliver, the chef, Sure Picasso, John Lennon, Salma.
Speaker 2: Hayek, incredibly talented. Yeah, incredible talent. Is that the common dominator.
Speaker 1: That's one of them. The other one is they're all dyslexic.
Speaker 2: Oh wow, right, so they all have a neurodiversity.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So listen to this. In an attempt to learn
Speaker 1: more about the minds of millionaires, a team of psychologists.
Speaker 1: This was on Craig Harper's bloody instagram by the way,
Speaker 1: the other day, in an attempt to learn more about
Speaker 1: the minds of millionaires, a team of psychologists and business
Speaker 1: experts spent today testing a group of entrepreneurial millionaires. They
Speaker 1: were put through a series of tests. Forty of the
Speaker 1: three hundred millionaires who participated in the comprehensive study had dyslexia.
Speaker 2: Wow, how amazing. So not surprised.
Speaker 1: Three hundred is one hundred and twenty I think if
Speaker 1: my maths served me so, one hundred and twenty of
Speaker 1: the three hundred millionaires that they did the research on
Speaker 1: were dyslexic. Talk about that.
Speaker 2: So, dyslexia is what we under falls under the umbrella
Speaker 2: of a specific learning disorder. So a person who has dyslexia,
Speaker 2: it's kind of it's kind of tricky because you might
Speaker 2: not know that a person has dyslexia because it's a
Speaker 2: difficulty with the phonemes connecting to the graphines. And what
Speaker 2: I mean by that is you're you know the letter
Speaker 2: A like you draw draw an A in your mind,
Speaker 2: that symbol is called a graphine. And what sound does
Speaker 2: an A make?
Speaker 1: Craig uh Well, from if you're a bogan at or
Speaker 1: a at.
Speaker 2: Ah yep, so a makes a sound yeah very good.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I guess so a house, a house a hat.
Speaker 2: Oh.
Speaker 1: But I was thinking about like if we say back
Speaker 1: and I and we are at, Oh, yeah, that's true.
Speaker 2: It makes an app or an up sound very good.
Speaker 1: It makes an at sound if we say so true bad,
Speaker 1: that makes an app sound very good.
Speaker 2: Phonological awareness, Craig. That's what we call phonological awareness skills.
Speaker 2: So some types of tyslexia, in the main type of
Speaker 2: dyslexia is this inability to connect the phone the uh,
Speaker 2: with the graphmee, the A symbol, and so people with
Speaker 2: dyslexia will often have to rote learn and memorize those symbols.
Speaker 2: So it's sort of like if you were to try
Speaker 2: to learn Arabic, for example. You know how when you
Speaker 2: see the symbols of a language that you're not familiar with,
Speaker 2: Eventually they start to look like little patterns and you're like, oh,
Speaker 2: that's giggly one that means this, and you're not really
Speaker 2: recognizing the letter, but you start to recognize the pattern
Speaker 2: of the shape of the symbol, and you can kind
Speaker 2: of wrote learn and eventually memorize what those symbols are
Speaker 2: to sort of kind of start to learn the language.
Speaker 2: But it doesn't really come naturally when you're learning a
Speaker 2: second language, does it. For people with dyslexia, that's what
Speaker 2: they're doing from a very young age. They're wrote learning
Speaker 2: what is an A well sound as an A, make
Speaker 2: what sounds as a B make, and they can forget.
Speaker 2: It doesn't come naturally to them. Takes a very long
Speaker 2: time for them. So reading can be really difficult. Spelling
Speaker 2: can be really difficult, but they can often mask it
Speaker 2: really well by having very good verbal skills, so they're
Speaker 2: often good talkers. They're often very articulate. They can be
Speaker 2: very charismatic, very bright, very very intelligent. But it's like
Speaker 2: if you've ever met someone who can't tell they're left
Speaker 2: from their right. You know, it's just this part of
Speaker 2: their brain that you know, it's not connecting, it's not firing. Yes,
Speaker 2: I can think about what hand do I write with.
Speaker 2: I can do my left, you know, doesn't make the
Speaker 2: L shape with my hand. I can wrote learn left
Speaker 2: from right, but it doesn't naturally come to me which
Speaker 2: way is left from right. So it's just this this
Speaker 2: kind of little missing bit that won't allow them to
Speaker 2: do it as quickly as people who are not dyslexic.
Speaker 1: My friends who are dyslexic, all of them I have,
Speaker 1: maybe probably I have more than ten, but ones that
Speaker 1: I know of them I have. Yeah, one of my
Speaker 1: training partners, Christian, he's really dyslexic, and he's very creative,
Speaker 1: very funny, very good at solving problems. You wouldn't call him.
Speaker 1: I mean, he's certainly not done, but I think he's
Speaker 1: highly intelligent, but not in an academic sense, even though
Speaker 1: he could still get stuff done. But it's funny how
Speaker 1: many dyslexic people who can't just read things the way
Speaker 1: that you and I can read, or look at maps
Speaker 1: or look at street signs or just you know, look
Speaker 1: at the back of a pack of whatever and read
Speaker 1: the nutritional info. But they're so great because they have
Speaker 1: to spend their life to an extent, surviving, improvising, and adapting.
Speaker 1: They're really good at intuitively and instinctively figuring shit out,
Speaker 1: which we don't have to so much because we guess,
Speaker 1: we get told how to do everything and how everything works.
Speaker 1: But in their world, and again, because not everyone experiences dyslexia,
Speaker 1: in the exact same way. All right, let's move on.
Speaker 1: I'm going to ask you a hard one. It's not
Speaker 1: really hard. Dyspraxia.
Speaker 2: Oh wow, that is a tricky one. So there's three
Speaker 2: different types of specific learning disorder. There's dyslexia, discalculia, and oh, dysgraphia.
Speaker 2: Oh that's not even dyspraxia. Well, dyspraxia is a type
Speaker 2: of disconnection between seeing and picking things up and using
Speaker 2: those things. So this inability to use objects the way
Speaker 2: our brain intends for them to use. There's a great
Speaker 2: book by all of A. Sas called The Man who
Speaker 2: Mistook His Wife for a Hat. It's another book, and
Speaker 2: one of it's about all of Sacks is this amazing neurologist,
Speaker 2: and some of the stories are from his experience treating
Speaker 2: very unusual neurological conditions. And a gentleman who had a
Speaker 2: type of dyspraxia couldn't recognize objects. So he's reaching for something.
Speaker 2: He's trying to reach for his hat, but he couldn't
Speaker 2: recognize that what he was reaching for was his wife
Speaker 2: and it wasn't actually his hat. It was trying to
Speaker 2: pick his wife to foot on his hat. But it
Speaker 2: was actually completely wrong because his brain couldn't connect what
Speaker 2: it was looking at with the meaning of what it was,
Speaker 2: which is a very a more rare type of neurological
Speaker 2: condition that's less of a neurodiversity and more usually associated
Speaker 2: with like a brain injury or some kind of acquired
Speaker 2: insult to the brain. So injury or an infection to
Speaker 2: the brain.
Speaker 1: Perfect, good work. Okay, you're three from story at the moment.
Speaker 1: All right. Tourette's syndrome.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, that's really true. Okay, so torette. That's
Speaker 2: not my specialty area, but I have heard a lot
Speaker 2: about Tourette's. Sometimes it does overlap ADHD, which is more
Speaker 2: of my specialty. So my understanding with Tourettes is this
Speaker 2: compulsion COMPULSI like an obsessive compulsion to stay something or
Speaker 2: do something. And the reason it can't go from OCD
Speaker 2: into too rets, I believe is because of the nature
Speaker 2: of the content of what the person's doing or saying.
Speaker 2: So it's like part of their brain is saying, don't swear,
Speaker 2: don't swear, don't swear, don't swear, and it turns into
Speaker 2: a bit of a compulsion until that sort of erupts
Speaker 2: out of this person in an uncontrollable fashion, which results
Speaker 2: in inappropriate behavior or expulsions coming out of them. So
Speaker 2: often it's associated with swearing, saying phrases that might be
Speaker 2: really inappropriate. Whatever that person's thinking off the top of
Speaker 2: their head, and they can't help but that thing come
Speaker 2: out of their mouth, which can obviously cause them a
Speaker 2: lot of social difficulty even issues.
Speaker 1: There's one of my best friends. His name is Bobby Capuccio.
Speaker 1: Bobby lives in the States and he's been on a
Speaker 1: show probably twenty times. He's one of the best stage speakers,
Speaker 1: like I know, like talking to a corporate audience, talking
Speaker 1: as an educator, as like an inspirational speaker. He's fucking amazing.
Speaker 1: But he has turets and so he's very quirky and
Speaker 1: he I mean, he's spoken about this, so I'm not
Speaker 1: throwing him under the bus, but he has these little
Speaker 1: ticks and screws up his face and twitches his mouth
Speaker 1: and strokes his shoulders and but once he starts talking,
Speaker 1: all that goes away, Like when he's on stage, it
Speaker 1: goes away. Wow, it's super interesting. There was also a
Speaker 1: dude on whatever it's called The voice or one of
Speaker 1: those shows maybe six to eight years ago. Now, a
Speaker 1: guy who had a beautiful voice. He also had turetts
Speaker 1: and he was this young dude and he Delta Good Room.
Speaker 1: Delta chose him to be on her team, and she
Speaker 1: came up and gave him a hog and said, you know,
Speaker 1: and he's just standing there and he goes like in
Speaker 1: the middle of this thing, and this was it was beautiful.
Speaker 1: So I'm not throwing him under the bus because they
Speaker 1: spoke about his turets and Delta gives him a hug
Speaker 1: and he's just standing there and he goes, Delta's hot,
Speaker 1: Delta's hot, Oh my god, like on National Telly.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: But everyone kind of got it, so it was all okay,
Speaker 1: and she was a sweetheart and he's like but it
Speaker 1: was like, I think it was actually good because people
Speaker 1: are like, you know, we get it, and it made
Speaker 1: it I don't know, like it made it real, you know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and people just.
Speaker 1: Loved him anyway, and it was you know, he could
Speaker 1: have said worst things. That's not about not the worst
Speaker 1: said about you. I was thinking that, yeah, it could
Speaker 1: have been worse. All right, let's talk about your area
Speaker 1: of experts. Teas among many IDHD attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
Speaker 2: Yes, it's a mouthful, isn't it. ADHD for short that
Speaker 2: this is one of my I love autism. I love
Speaker 2: ADHD especially in women. I'm like a big fan of
Speaker 2: the lost girls, which is a term that we use
Speaker 2: to describe the women who weren't diagnosed or haven't been diagnosed.
Speaker 2: Because our diagnostic statistical manuals with all the criteria is
Speaker 2: based on little boys and men. So women's version of
Speaker 2: autism and ADHD isn't as well known as men's are.
Speaker 2: And we're realizing that the way a woman, yeah, the
Speaker 2: way a woman presents is very different to how a
Speaker 2: man presents. So ADHD has three types. So there's predominantly
Speaker 2: inattentive ADHD, which means you have trouble paying attention. You
Speaker 2: might be quite disorganized. You might, you know, constantly be
Speaker 2: that person who does a million different tasks at the
Speaker 2: same time it gets nothing done. That person who really
Speaker 2: struggles to kind of focus in their attention, but at
Speaker 2: the same time have this amazing ability to do hyper
Speaker 2: focus when under pressure. So right before the assignments due,
Speaker 2: they pull the all nighter. They work you know, the
Speaker 2: twelve hours or the twenty hours to get the report done,
Speaker 2: and then they somehow managed to get a distinction and
Speaker 2: do amazing at university even though it was a blur
Speaker 2: of last minute procrastination. So that's predominantly inattentive. The second
Speaker 2: one is predominantly hyperactive impulsive. Now this is the one
Speaker 2: that typically little boys would present as, which is if
Speaker 2: you think about like swinging off the chandelier, Craig, like
Speaker 2: jumping off the furniture, that classic picture of a child
Speaker 2: who is hyperactive. That's why boys got picked up because
Speaker 2: they were very obvious. If you have a little girl
Speaker 2: who's daydreaming and staring at a window, you're going to
Speaker 2: notice the boy who's jumping up and down off the
Speaker 2: desks over the little girl staring out the window. So
Speaker 2: boys get detected quite early on, but women tend to
Speaker 2: get missed until much later in life and usually self present.
Speaker 2: The third type of ADHD is a combination of the two,
Speaker 2: So you can get ADHD inattentive but also hyperactive impulsive.
Speaker 2: So that's people who experience both of those conditions together.
Speaker 2: So yeah, that's in a nutshell ADHD, which is awfully Also,
Speaker 2: I should say, all of those conditions dyslexia, autism, ADHD.
Speaker 2: That type of neurodiversity means your brain is different, yeah,
Speaker 2: to be one in one hundred a different brain. It
Speaker 2: means you think differently. And I think this is why
Speaker 2: it's associated with giftedness, very higher IQ. People who are
Speaker 2: you know, entrepreneurs, people who are you know, amazing creators
Speaker 2: or inventors, because they know how to think outside of
Speaker 2: the box, they know how to they think differently. There's
Speaker 2: something different about the way that they think. They're not
Speaker 2: like the typical the neurotypical population, and they're usually the
Speaker 2: ones who come up with really innovative ideas or you know,
Speaker 2: answers that somebody hasn't seen before because they approach it
Speaker 2: from a different angle. So today is all about sort
Speaker 2: of advertising that you can get a diagnosis. There are
Speaker 2: ways of getting diagnoses. There are people out there who
Speaker 2: are willing. We talked earlier about making choices to help
Speaker 2: yourself and to take the steps to help yourself, and
Speaker 2: I think over the last four years I've in my clinic,
Speaker 2: I've really seen a lot of people after COVID come
Speaker 2: forward and take some steps to really take it to ownership.
Speaker 2: In their life and change their life for the better
Speaker 2: by getting some help, actually getting some help. And part
Speaker 2: of that sometimes is getting into the diagnostic process and
Speaker 2: figuring out what's going on for me. Maybe my brain's
Speaker 2: a little neurodiverse.
Speaker 1: Well, we're going to talk about something that you were
Speaker 1: doing before we wind up, But two things I want
Speaker 1: to talk to you about before we get to that.
Speaker 1: So one is so typically, not always, but typically boys
Speaker 1: kind of for one of the more neurologically accurate term,
Speaker 1: boys mature later than girls, and the brain develops at
Speaker 1: a different rate in boys versus girls typically, so you know,
Speaker 1: and sometimes like I remember when we were at school
Speaker 1: and we were seventeen, the boys, we were fucking idiots,
Speaker 1: and it was like the girls were four years older
Speaker 1: than us. There was so much more responsible, studious mature,
Speaker 1: Like we're all climbing all over each other, wrestling and
Speaker 1: being dickheads and catching footies and you know, And it
Speaker 1: was funny because when I was in year twelve, I
Speaker 1: had a girlfriend called Karina who wanted to be a doctor.
Speaker 1: I was a fucking idiot, and she was just I
Speaker 1: don't know what she saw in me. I think she
Speaker 1: maybe it was like she just felt compassion or something.
Speaker 1: But like when I look back at how I was
Speaker 1: and how she was in terms of our attitude about
Speaker 1: things and our application and the way that she studied
Speaker 1: versus the way that I didn't study. Yeah, there's a
Speaker 1: at that stage of development, there typically is quite a
Speaker 1: gap right in the development of refronts or cortexs am, I.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, So it's part of the reason why if
Speaker 2: you've noticed with young boys and girls with driving and
Speaker 2: getting their alplates and the cost of insurance of girls
Speaker 2: and boys. So if you're a male driver identify as male,
Speaker 2: you have a higher insurance premium well up into your
Speaker 2: mid twenties because the risks associated with you and with
Speaker 2: a male driver and having an accident are far greater.
Speaker 2: There are a much more statistically high likelihood of a
Speaker 2: young male driver being in a very significant car accident
Speaker 2: than there is to a female driver because of the
Speaker 2: propensity for young male brains to take greater risks, to
Speaker 2: engage in more risk taking behavior and more sensation seeking behavior.
Speaker 2: I risk your driving on the road, speeding on the road,
Speaker 2: and driving under the influence, Like so making a dysregulated choice,
Speaker 2: I'm going to get behind and we all laugh open
Speaker 2: having some drinks. So yes, it is a very real thing.
Speaker 2: That's not to say that men aren't as smart as
Speaker 2: women or that anyone's better than the other. It's just
Speaker 2: to say, yes, you're right, brains developed differently, and we
Speaker 2: know people with autism are different between male and female.
Speaker 2: You know, males tend to be more clear and obvious
Speaker 2: social difficulties, females tend to socially masked. In ADHD, males
Speaker 2: tend to have that more hyperactive presentation and inattentive presentation,
Speaker 2: whereas females might tend to have more of just an
Speaker 2: intentive presentation or restless presentation. We know that their brain
Speaker 2: are different and it makes and that's because your frontal
Speaker 2: lobes are different, which is what's affected in autism and
Speaker 2: eighty HD your frontal lobes. So yeah, there are clear
Speaker 2: signs to tell us that there are a bit different
Speaker 2: between males and females.
Speaker 1: And there's one other very significant contributing factor that doesn't
Speaker 1: get spoken about that much. Between when you talk an
Speaker 1: eighteen nineen year old girls versus boys and risky behavior
Speaker 1: and dumb decision making. Is testosterone, right, you know, like sex?
Speaker 1: Then no, no, no testosterone. I mean you put like
Speaker 1: it's almost like there's an inverse correlation, like you fill
Speaker 1: a sixteen seventeen, eighteen year old boy with testosterone. And
Speaker 1: I don't mean this to be fucking controversial, but it doesn't.
Speaker 1: It doesn't make bad behavior. Okay, of course, bad behavior
Speaker 1: is bad behavior, no doubt. Stupid choices are stupid choices,
Speaker 1: no doubt. But unless you're a sixteen seventeen year old
Speaker 1: boy and experienced like the overwhelm of testosterone, like it's
Speaker 1: a biological fact, now, that doesn't make bad behavior. Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm underlining that. But it's like when you know somebody's
Speaker 1: got a a biochemical issue in the brain, we we
Speaker 1: factor that in and we go, well, no wonder you're anxious,
Speaker 1: no one, because all this shit's happening right. Also, when
Speaker 1: you've got testosterone flooding through your body, fucking there's an
Speaker 1: inverse correlation between that and IQ for a period of time.
Speaker 1: Like I don't know people once, but it's like the
Speaker 1: propensity for young guys full of testosterone to do dumb
Speaker 1: shit just look out, you know.
Speaker 2: And then you add alcohol to that and you've got
Speaker 2: you know, a whole whole Pandora's box.
Speaker 1: A hundo as the kids say, Hannah, and think about
Speaker 1: the like in Victoria anyway, how stupid is it that,
Speaker 1: when we're at the peak of our stupidity, our pre
Speaker 1: frontal cortex is lagging four years behind yours, testosterone is
Speaker 1: dripping off our fucking elbows, and on the same day
Speaker 1: we go, all right, well, now you can drive, and
Speaker 1: now you can drink legally and you can't go. You
Speaker 1: can't do them together, of course, but you can legally drive,
Speaker 1: and you can legally drink, and you can legally vote.
Speaker 1: And even though yesterday you're a kid, today you're an adult.
Speaker 1: Off you go, try not to fuck up. Well, good
Speaker 1: luck with that. That's why I think kids should be
Speaker 1: able to drive from sixteen or seventeen, at least a
Speaker 1: year or so. And I know it's seventeen in New
Speaker 1: South Wales, but in Victoria, I think in Tazzi it
Speaker 1: might be. In South Stralia, I think it's sixteen. And
Speaker 1: I think it's a great idea because you give them
Speaker 1: one or two years of driving experience and skill before
Speaker 1: they're allowed to before they're allowed to legally drink booze,
Speaker 1: you know, all right, Well, that's all amazing information. You're
Speaker 1: amazing and I know we're just by the way. None
Speaker 1: of this was prescriptive anyone. We're just opening the door.
Speaker 1: We could probably do a ten hour podcast on neurodiversity.
Speaker 1: But I think it's good that we educate ourselves. We
Speaker 1: get a little bit informed. Every time I talk to Hannah,
Speaker 1: I learn now speaking of learning and maybe even being
Speaker 1: assessed in some way. I know that you're doing a
Speaker 1: workshop soon and tell us all about what is that?
Speaker 1: What is going on?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, thank you. So we're going to I'm doing
Speaker 2: a webinar on the twenty fourth of June, so that's
Speaker 2: Monday coming up. If anybody's interested, if anything that's resonated
Speaker 2: for you about ADHD autism, like in yourself, in a
Speaker 2: family member, perhaps a friend, and you want to learn
Speaker 2: more about this process of getting a diagnosis. It is
Speaker 2: really expensive to get diagnoses, Craig. It can be one
Speaker 2: thousand dollars two thousand dollars, depending on if you see
Speaker 2: a neuropsych or a psychiatrist. A lot of peop there's
Speaker 2: a lot of infusion about how do I get a diagnosis?
Speaker 2: So I'm doing a little webinar for people to learn information.
Speaker 2: We're doing an hour on ADHD and how do I
Speaker 2: get a diagnosis? Where do I go to get a diagnosis?
Speaker 2: What does it mean? So that'll be at seven o'clock
Speaker 2: on the twenty fourth of June, that's the Monday, And
Speaker 2: I'm also going to do an autism autism webinar at
Speaker 2: eight o'clock straight afterwards on the same day, the twenty
Speaker 2: fourth of June, where we talk about what is autism?
Speaker 2: You know, what are the signs I need to look
Speaker 2: out for and how would I go about getting a
Speaker 2: diagnosis of that. So just running through the process of
Speaker 2: understanding neuropsyche assessments in autism and ADHD. So if you're interested, guys,
Speaker 2: come along check it out. We've kept the cost down
Speaker 2: as much as we possibly can. It's like forty bucks.
Speaker 2: Come and join us, Come for the evening and we'll yeah,
Speaker 2: I'll just be deep diving for the whole hour on
Speaker 2: ADHD and the whole hour on autism.
Speaker 1: And where to paper book? How to paper book?
Speaker 2: Yeah, so you can go to invent Britz. So it's
Speaker 2: an online webinar understanding ADHD, Autism and neuropsychological assessments with
Speaker 2: doctor Hannah Coral, that's me, so K O R R
Speaker 2: E L Coral. Check it out. Check you can find
Speaker 2: me on event brit and maybe I can put the
Speaker 2: links down in your show notes. Perhaps Greg make it
Speaker 2: easy for everyone.
Speaker 1: That'd be awesome. And I think everyone it might be
Speaker 1: called event Bright and doctor Hannah event I think doctor
Speaker 1: Hannah might be dislike sick. Well you heard it here.
Speaker 2: My mom is just like six, so probably.
Speaker 1: So it's actually called event Bright, so you can go. Nonetheless,
Speaker 1: that's webinar.
Speaker 2: It's my first time, Craig.
Speaker 1: It's well, it is, it is. It is a weird name.
Speaker 1: But we'll have a great time. You'll have a great time,
Speaker 1: and we appreciate you. Thank you so much for coming
Speaker 1: on again.
Speaker 2: Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: Thanks, Thanks like you're a gun. All right, we'll talk
Speaker 1: off it.
Speaker 2: Thanks, Hannah, do you Craig