Speaker 1: Hello everybody, Welcome back to the show. Welcome back to
Speaker 1: the podcast, new listeners, old listeners, Wherever you are in
Speaker 1: the world, it's so great to have you here. Back
Speaker 1: for another episode as we break down the psychology of
Speaker 1: your twenties. We have a guest on today that I
Speaker 1: I pursued. I'm gonna say it that way. I pursued her. Sorry, Ellie,
Speaker 1: I just spoiled who you are, but you would have
Speaker 1: read it in the title. I was like, I need
Speaker 1: this person on for this topic. She is the perfect
Speaker 1: person to discuss this, to discuss ADHD autism in our twenties.
Speaker 1: She has such a unique story and an incredible voice
Speaker 1: to this matter that I think is both personal but
Speaker 1: also very informed and a little bit different. So welcome
Speaker 1: Ellie Middleton. It's so great to have you here.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much, so nice to be here. Thanks
Speaker 2: for the lovely introduction. I feel like I always sit
Speaker 2: here like blushing at the style and people are saying
Speaker 2: nice things about me.
Speaker 3: I'm like, oh, yeah, that's me, Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: No, I get that it's something you kind of have
Speaker 1: to learn to take sometimes. But imagine if someone like
Speaker 1: sat here and I was like, yeah, I'm not that
Speaker 1: keen on this, like, thanks for coming on. I guess
Speaker 1: like that would even more imparison. Yeah, that's true. And
Speaker 1: you're calling in from the UK, so we got like
Speaker 1: an international podcast crew going on here.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I know worldwide.
Speaker 1: I know, missus worldwides here. So I kind of introduced
Speaker 1: you briefly. You're Ellie Middleton. You have this incredible story.
Speaker 1: You've just released a book on Masked, which is available
Speaker 1: in the UK right now, hopefully by the time people
Speaker 1: are listening to this internationally because it's incredible. But for
Speaker 1: those of the listeners who don't know you, can you
Speaker 1: just talk briefly about who you are, your story, your work,
Speaker 1: kind of a free space to just chat Ellie, I.
Speaker 3: Guess, yeah, thank you. So yeah, I'm Ellie.
Speaker 2: I'm an artistic and ADHD content creator, speaker and writer.
Speaker 2: So I guess the short version is that I got
Speaker 2: diagnosed with both ADHD and autism when I was twenty four.
Speaker 2: So up until that point, I'd always struggled with my
Speaker 2: mental health, had quite a rough time in my teenage years,
Speaker 2: but I'd always been diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder and
Speaker 2: like anxiety related depression and panic disorder and agrophobia and
Speaker 2: all that good stuff in the mental health space. But
Speaker 2: then when I was kind of twenty four, kind of
Speaker 2: realized that that didn't seem to really fit, like it
Speaker 2: wasn't really explaining my experiences properly. Like I wasn't an
Speaker 2: anxious person. I just became really overwhelmed really frequently, So
Speaker 2: it wasn't like anxiety, it was overwhelmed. But I think
Speaker 2: those two things are so closely linked that all the
Speaker 2: doctors I'd seen in the past had kind of just
Speaker 2: assumed that it was anxiety. But yeah, anyway, when I
Speaker 2: was twenty four, I finally got diagnosed with both autism
Speaker 2: and ADHD, and getting those diagnoses just like changed my
Speaker 2: life completely, Like it just made everything made sense. It
Speaker 2: made me kind of understand who I was, and I
Speaker 2: kind of, I guess I've just felt so grateful that
Speaker 2: I got those answers that I was like, oh, my goodness,
Speaker 2: like I can finally like be myself now, I can
Speaker 2: finally like work out how to make my mental health
Speaker 2: better like all of this stuff. That I just felt
Speaker 2: that there must be so many other people out there,
Speaker 2: especially women, who were like in the same boat that
Speaker 2: I was. So they had always been diagnosed with anxiety.
Speaker 2: They knew that they were different somehow, like they knew
Speaker 2: that something else was going on, but they just didn't
Speaker 2: know what that thing was, and they just never had
Speaker 2: been picked up by their doctors or their teachers or whatever.
Speaker 3: It might be.
Speaker 2: So I started speaking about it online, just like hoping,
Speaker 2: like knowing that, like if I'd have seen me speaking
Speaker 2: about it like a few years earlier, then it might
Speaker 2: have been like, oh, that kind of sounds similar to me,
Speaker 2: So maybe I should look into that as well, and
Speaker 2: maybe I would have got diagnosed like a whole lot
Speaker 2: sooner than I actually did. So kind of wanted to
Speaker 2: try and at least like just make one person think, oh,
Speaker 2: maybe that that could be me, and I could go
Speaker 2: away and look into that as well, and then it
Speaker 2: all kind of spiral from there, I guess. So I
Speaker 2: kind of very quickly grew quite a big audience online
Speaker 2: and then I go into quite a lot of companies
Speaker 2: talking about how they can be more inclusive, and then yeah,
Speaker 2: as very kindly mentioned, I've just written a book about it,
Speaker 2: which is like my baby is like the protesting that
Speaker 2: I've ever done. I'm so happy with it. I'm so
Speaker 2: grateful that I've had the chance to do it. But yeah,
Speaker 2: I guess basically, I shout about the importance of like
Speaker 2: understanding the way that your brain works and like being
Speaker 2: gentle with yourself, but also kind of advocate for people
Speaker 2: having the chance to get those answers because so many people,
Speaker 2: like women, people marginalize their gender, people of color, where
Speaker 2: people especially are spending so much of their lives undiagnosed
Speaker 2: and just kind of being missed completely by the system.
Speaker 2: So it's like honors to advocate for ourselves. So yeah,
Speaker 2: that's a a long and short version.
Speaker 1: I guess I love it. It's really interesting what you said.
Speaker 1: What you just said about how you had this litany
Speaker 1: of diagnoses before you got to the right one, And
Speaker 1: I don't know if that's even the right way of
Speaker 1: saying it, Like it's almost like the answer seems quite
Speaker 1: obvious now. I'm sure like you're probably questioning, like, how
Speaker 1: come no one ever said this to me? How come
Speaker 1: it was never an option, how come it was never
Speaker 1: on the table. I'm sure that must have been so frustrating.
Speaker 1: And speaking from like the experience of friends, I was saying,
Speaker 1: I had a close friend who was recently diagnosed. And
Speaker 1: when you said everyone just told me I was anxious,
Speaker 1: I just immediately thought of her and how much that
Speaker 1: that was always the reason given to her for this
Speaker 1: pattern of behaviors, this pattern of tendencies, and it wasn't
Speaker 1: the right answer. No one thought to look deeper into
Speaker 1: it. It must be like so mentally frustrating.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think there's like a couple of stories in
Speaker 2: particular from my childhood and teenage years that I look
Speaker 2: back now and I'm like, how the heck did nobody
Speaker 2: like notice what was going on there? Like there's one
Speaker 2: I think my mom like struggles with this one a lot,
Speaker 2: Like I think she feels a lot of guilt. When
Speaker 2: I'm an August baby, so I was always the youngest
Speaker 2: in my year group. In the Uki year group's run
Speaker 2: for I don't if it's same over there, but we
Speaker 2: run from like September to August. So I'm like the
Speaker 2: youngest in my year. And when I was at nursery,
Speaker 2: so I was like three and the rest of the
Speaker 2: kids in my year were four and we were about
Speaker 2: to go up to primary school. The nursery teacher like
Speaker 2: pulled my mum in and was like Okay. Academically, Ellie's
Speaker 2: definitely ready to go up to school, Like she's really bright,
Speaker 2: she knows what's going on. But socially, you might want
Speaker 2: to consider holding her back a year.
Speaker 3: Like she's very shy.
Speaker 2: She doesn't really interact with the other kids, like she's
Speaker 2: just not really interested. Like we've tried to encourage her
Speaker 2: to play in their games and do all these different things,
Speaker 2: but all she really wants to do is like she
Speaker 2: just comes in every day and I would like sit
Speaker 2: in the same room, on the same table and just
Speaker 2: do like painting every single day. And that was all
Speaker 2: that was interested in. And I look back at that
Speaker 2: now and it was kind of just like, oh, okay, well,
Speaker 2: you know, she's just the youngest girl in the year,
Speaker 2: so she's just a bit shy, Like it'll be fine,
Speaker 2: it'll come with age, Like it's no, like, no worry.
Speaker 3: She's just like a shy little girl.
Speaker 2: And I look back and I'm like, if that was
Speaker 2: like Elliott rather than Ellie or Ethan or whatever, it
Speaker 2: might be like a little boy, a young boy that
Speaker 2: is like very academically bright but struggles socially, does the
Speaker 2: same thing every single day, Like I don't know, he's
Speaker 2: lining up his dinosaurs in a row every single day.
Speaker 2: He doesn't want to talk to anybody. They've tried to
Speaker 2: encourage him to, like straight away, that would be like
Speaker 2: alarm bells. They'd be looking into it, they'd be trying
Speaker 2: to find out what was going on. They'd be thinking
Speaker 2: that was autism. But because it was a little girl,
Speaker 2: it was like, oh, she's just a bit shy, Like
Speaker 2: it's fine, she's just a young girl. And it's like
Speaker 2: that was like I was three years old at that point.
Speaker 2: Like if I'd have been diagnosed at that point or
Speaker 2: even had it looked into at that point, like my
Speaker 2: whole life could have been so much different. And then
Speaker 2: there's like kind of similar stories in high school where
Speaker 2: teachers were saying that, like I was being had a
Speaker 2: really hard time like socially and was kind of being
Speaker 2: bullied quite badly. And one of my teachers had said, like, oh, well,
Speaker 2: Ellie says things that are rude sometimes, so she can't
Speaker 2: be upset when other people are rude back to her.
Speaker 2: And my mum was like, well, what does she say
Speaker 2: that's rude, because like she's not she's not a nasty person,
Speaker 2: like she wouldn't she wouldn't do that, and then be like, oh, well,
Speaker 2: she had got like an A rather than a star
Speaker 2: in one of her exams, and she was kind of
Speaker 2: saying to the other girls like, oh, I'm so annoyed
Speaker 2: that I didn't get the A star that I wanted,
Speaker 2: whereas some of the other girls had struggled to scrape
Speaker 2: a C or a D and they were like, that's
Speaker 2: kind of, you know, inappropriate. You shouldn't be saying that,
Speaker 2: And I was like, well, I didn't know that that
Speaker 2: was rude. Like I'm not saying that they should have
Speaker 2: got an A or and a star. I'm just saying
Speaker 2: that I'm upset with myself and not being able to
Speaker 2: read those social cues is like a key sign of
Speaker 2: autism as well. But instead it was like, oh, no,
Speaker 2: she's just rude, she's just a bit, she's just whatever.
Speaker 2: Like I think so much of it is closely tied
Speaker 2: to misogyny unfortunately, but yeah, I think looking back, there's
Speaker 2: like so many things where it is like, yeah, what
Speaker 2: the heck, Like it was literally like I might as
Speaker 2: well have had a neon sign flashing above my head.
Speaker 2: That was like this girl is autistic, But no one
Speaker 2: like ever kind of considered that that was what was
Speaker 2: going on.
Speaker 1: It's so interesting you point to misogyny and how I
Speaker 1: think one of the deepest problems in how we approach neurodivergence,
Speaker 1: particularly ADHD and autism, is that the entire diagnoses criteria
Speaker 1: is built around the behavior of boys and the behavior
Speaker 1: of men. And we know that culturally those two you know,
Speaker 1: binaries that society often sees. They're raised different, they are
Speaker 1: taught differently as to how to behave their personalities, their
Speaker 1: temperaments are different. But when you have this kind of
Speaker 1: systematic bias and the healthcare system, it's no wonder that
Speaker 1: people such as yourself slip through and it's kind of
Speaker 1: a tragedy. And I know you're like, the things that
Speaker 1: you've done now is so amazing, But what if you
Speaker 1: had had the opportunity to start at that earlier, What
Speaker 1: if you had had that opportunity to actually get the
Speaker 1: help you need, not experience so much self blame and
Speaker 1: negative self belief when you were three, when you attend
Speaker 1: when you were fifteen, Like, I'm sure that's really rough.
Speaker 1: So I think you've kind of already touched on it.
Speaker 1: But why do you think so many women in particular
Speaker 1: struggle to receive a diagnosis, have their symptoms recognized, and
Speaker 1: kind of alongside that, why is it always that they
Speaker 1: get the anxiety diagnosis first before people consider other options,
Speaker 1: other potential things going on.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think like you kind of nailed it really
Speaker 2: well there, that the diagnostic criteria is just not set
Speaker 2: up to account for the experiences of women, the experiences
Speaker 2: of people marginalized for their gender, the experiences of people
Speaker 2: of color. They're based on basically, like the easy way
Speaker 2: to explain it is like the only people that these
Speaker 2: psychologists were basing the research on was like the young
Speaker 2: middle class white boys whose parents could have thought basically,
Speaker 2: if they had a young boy that wasn't behaving in
Speaker 2: the way that they wanted him to, they would pay
Speaker 2: to take him to this private psychiatrist. And then they
Speaker 2: were the people that the research was based on. So
Speaker 2: anyone outside of that, their experiences are just not accounted
Speaker 2: for in the diagnostic criteria. So I think one example,
Speaker 2: like for me, this is a question that I had
Speaker 2: to answer as a twenty four year old woman trying
Speaker 2: to get diagnosed, and the question is, like, you know, say,
Speaker 2: if this is like a highly highly true, a bit true,
Speaker 2: not true, or slightly true, whatever, And it's like I
Speaker 2: collect information about categories of things, for example, types of birds,
Speaker 2: types of planes, types of car, types of plants or something.
Speaker 2: So me reading that question, I'm like, well, no, I
Speaker 2: don't collect information about any of those type of things.
Speaker 2: And then like the more research you do, it's like, well, yeah,
Speaker 2: that's because I'm not an eight.
Speaker 3: Year old boy. I'm a twenty four year old woman.
Speaker 2: Like I collect information about I don't know, if I
Speaker 2: like a certain band, I will listen to their albums
Speaker 2: over and over and over again. If I like a
Speaker 2: certain fashion creator, I will like constantly be checking to
Speaker 2: see if they've uploaded new content because I want to
Speaker 2: see what's going on. Or if I like a certain
Speaker 2: clothes brand, then I will like be obsessed with when
Speaker 2: the new drops are coming out and checking the website
Speaker 2: and like wanting everything to do. Like I do still
Speaker 2: do the same thing of like having these really strong
Speaker 2: interests that I become like obsessed with, but they're just
Speaker 2: not birds, cars, trains, or planes, because they're very like
Speaker 2: stereotypically like young boy interests. And I think that's like
Speaker 2: a really good example of like just how much the
Speaker 2: diagnostic criteria is not designed, Like it's like you could
Speaker 2: sit there as a fully like one autistic person and
Speaker 2: still get a really like low score on these tests
Speaker 2: that they're doing, just because the questions don't explain your experience.
Speaker 2: And there's other ones where it's like would you prefer
Speaker 2: to go to a museum or to a party? And obviously, well,
Speaker 2: I guess the correct answer is like they think that
Speaker 2: you'd rather go to a museum as an autistic person,
Speaker 2: And it's like, well, it kind of depends on on
Speaker 2: the museum, Like am I going to Yeah, Like it's
Speaker 2: like am I going? Like what sort of party is it?
Speaker 2: Am I going with friends? Am I going with strangers?
Speaker 2: Like it's like that question does not in any way
Speaker 2: kind of explain whether I'm autistic or not. And I
Speaker 2: think it's the same like with ADHD as well that
Speaker 2: like I think it's like this like ditsy blonde stereotype
Speaker 2: is one that I speak about in the book quite
Speaker 2: a lot, which I think is the reason why a
Speaker 2: lot of girls go undiagnosed, because I mean, previously it
Speaker 2: was kind of said that a lot more girls would
Speaker 2: have like the inattentive type of ADHD, which is the
Speaker 2: more like forgetfulness and struggling to concentrate and doodling and
Speaker 2: rather than the hyperactive type, which is more like outwardly visible.
Speaker 2: I guess so that was kind of an idea of like, well,
Speaker 2: they're presenting a different type of ADHD which isn't as
Speaker 2: outwardly visible. But I think we've kind of moved on
Speaker 2: from that as well, to be like, maybe they're not
Speaker 2: presenting any differently, like the experiences that they have on
Speaker 2: any differently, they're just socialized in a different way. Like
Speaker 2: I'm hyperve I have combined ADHD, which means I'm both
Speaker 2: hyperactive and inattentive, but my hyperactivity is very much internal,
Speaker 2: like my brain is like a million miles an hour
Speaker 2: all of the time. So it wasn't ever at school
Speaker 2: that I was like rocking backwards and forwards on my chair,
Speaker 2: like causing chaos, Like the teachers were like finding me
Speaker 2: annoying all of this stuff because girls are told to
Speaker 2: behave to be quiet, whereas boys it's like, oh, boys
Speaker 2: will be boys, like they're allowed to be a bit
Speaker 2: more chaotic, and girls are very much socialized to fit
Speaker 2: in to be well behaved, to be polite, to be sensible,
Speaker 2: to be like so much more mature, I guess, like typically,
Speaker 2: So I think it's like a combination of the fact that,
Speaker 2: like one, we're not getting diagnosed at a young age
Speaker 2: because the diagnostic criteria aren't accounting for how we show up.
Speaker 2: And then secondly, because we're not like learning that we're
Speaker 2: different at a young age, we're then being socialized in
Speaker 2: the way that kind of this patriarchal system socializes all
Speaker 2: of like women and people marginalize for their gender. So
Speaker 2: by the time, like by the time we get any older,
Speaker 2: we're not showing any differences because we've learned how to
Speaker 2: mask them and cover them up, Like my mum. We
Speaker 2: have like a lot of conversations where it is obviously
Speaker 2: that thing of like the grief I guess of getting
Speaker 2: diagnosed later in life, where it's like what could have been,
Speaker 2: Like I had to drop out of school, I had
Speaker 2: to decline my offers, like I've had to quit jobs,
Speaker 2: all of this stuff, and I'm like, that wouldn't have
Speaker 2: happened if I'd have been diagnosed early. And like we've
Speaker 2: had the conversation with my mum where my mum has
Speaker 2: been like, but when I was fifteen was when I
Speaker 2: first got referred to the mental health services in the UK,
Speaker 2: And at that point they wouldn't have been able to Like,
Speaker 2: I'm like, how could they not have seen like I
Speaker 2: was seeing a psychiatrist every week? Like how like how
Speaker 2: could they have not noticed that that was what was
Speaker 2: going on for me? And it's like, well, by that point,
Speaker 2: they wouldn't have been able to see it in you
Speaker 2: because you were doing such a good job of covering
Speaker 2: it up. Like by that time, you'd have like you
Speaker 2: were in high school, you'd learned that you had to
Speaker 2: fit in, you had to make friends, you had to survive,
Speaker 2: so you weren't showing any differences for them to pick
Speaker 2: up on.
Speaker 3: All that they were being able to visibly.
Speaker 2: See was the fact that you were having these like
Speaker 2: meltdowns and shut downs and becoming overwhelmed because it was
Speaker 2: almost like you were keeping it all in for such
Speaker 2: a long time that then it had all just like
Speaker 2: burst out in these like intense things that would look
Speaker 2: a lot like pan attacks, because it was just that
Speaker 2: I like would become so overwhelmed, I won't be able
Speaker 2: to speak, I would be crying I'd be overwhelmed, and
Speaker 2: it's like, well, that's all that they had to work
Speaker 2: with because they couldn't see all of that that you
Speaker 2: were holding it in, like containing it.
Speaker 3: Most of the time.
Speaker 2: They just saw these kind of like volcano eruptions of
Speaker 2: when it came out. So yeah, I think it's a
Speaker 2: really it all like ties into it as well, and
Speaker 2: it's like equally as well.
Speaker 3: The more that.
Speaker 2: The diagnostic criteria only account for the experiences of these
Speaker 2: like young white CIS boys, the more that they're the
Speaker 2: only people that do get diagnosed. So it's like they're
Speaker 2: the only people that are going about life with a diagnosis. Yeah,
Speaker 2: So then it's like that kind of reinforces it of
Speaker 2: like they're the only people, like the only people that
Speaker 2: you would meet I guess that would know that they
Speaker 2: were autistic, and ADHD is those people. So then in
Speaker 2: your head you're like, oh, well, everyone that I've met
Speaker 2: that's autistic is a young white boy, so maybe it's
Speaker 2: just young white boys. And it kind of goes like
Speaker 2: it goes on for such a long time, Like now
Speaker 2: I think we're seeing a wave of like, yeah, people
Speaker 2: in their twenties, thirties, forties getting a diagnosis and realizing
Speaker 2: for themselves and you know, whether that's medical diagnosis or
Speaker 2: self diagnosing or all of these things, like, but they're
Speaker 2: realizing later in life. And I think that's amazing that
Speaker 2: we're like catching all of these people that were missed.
Speaker 2: But I still don't know if we're getting any better
Speaker 2: at picking up the girls like the Elliot three in
Speaker 2: the Like, I don't. Yeah, I still it's almost like
Speaker 2: it's like, yeah, it's amazing that we're finding out now,
Speaker 2: but we we need to fix it so we don't
Speaker 2: have to find out, like the next group of people
Speaker 2: don't have to find out in their twenties they find
Speaker 2: out at the same time.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a really like tricky one.
Speaker 2: I think to fix without they basically just need to
Speaker 2: like redo the whole research and the whole diagnostic criteria.
Speaker 1: I guess it honestly sounds like that and also like
Speaker 1: to avoid that grief that you spoke about. But from
Speaker 1: what you've said, it's like, yeah, it doesn't account for
Speaker 1: differences and gender, in sex, in ethnicity, in really anything.
Speaker 1: And then it also sounds like they kind of haven't
Speaker 1: adapted it for like a new generation that has a
Speaker 1: new and vironment like social media, like technology, and something
Speaker 1: you said really stood out for me there. It was,
Speaker 1: you know, going online and following a certain influencer or
Speaker 1: following a certain fashion company. That is a whole new
Speaker 1: way of kind of processing our environment and how symptoms
Speaker 1: might show up. And I think that that profile that
Speaker 1: we spoke about is only going to be exacerbated if
Speaker 1: you don't have those nuances, not just for different groups,
Speaker 1: but for different generations that are also growing up more
Speaker 1: aware of it. The final thing that I that I
Speaker 1: think is actually really interesting if you've ever spent much
Speaker 1: time looking into neurodivergence ADHD, autism, but autism in particular,
Speaker 1: the idea of masking is really fascinating. And your book
Speaker 1: is Unmasked, fabulous title, big shout out to that, But
Speaker 1: can you explain what that means? Because I think that
Speaker 1: a lot of the time, and this is one of
Speaker 1: my biggest pet peeves with discussions in the mental health
Speaker 1: CAMUT is that terms that actually have a real clinical
Speaker 1: and personal meaning for people get adapted to mean something
Speaker 1: a lot more colloquial and a lot more every day.
Speaker 1: So for people who've maybe heard that term don't know
Speaker 1: what it means, what does it mean to mask? What
Speaker 1: does it mean to unmask? I guess as well.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so masking put very kind of simply is covering
Speaker 2: up your neurodivergent traits to appear more neurotypical.
Speaker 3: So it was typically and like.
Speaker 2: First used by the autistic community, so basically covering up
Speaker 2: your artistic traits to appear realistic or non autistic. But
Speaker 2: I guess it's kind of yeah, spread out to be
Speaker 2: used more widely by the neurodivergent community. But I guess
Speaker 2: the important thing is to say, like, it's not a
Speaker 2: choice a lot of the time, like it's a safety
Speaker 2: thing of like I have grown up learning that I
Speaker 2: have to behave a certain way to be accepted, to
Speaker 2: avoid being ostracized, like to get through situations like And
Speaker 2: I think, yeah, it's both. It's both conscious behavior and
Speaker 2: like subconscious or unconscious behaviors. So it can be things
Speaker 2: that are super simple, like for example, as an artistic person,
Speaker 2: I struggle with eye contact. Like eye contact to me
Speaker 2: just it feels like I'm literally you're starring into my soul.
Speaker 3: Like it feels so uncomfortable.
Speaker 2: But when I was growing up, I was told you
Speaker 2: have to look at people in the eye when you're
Speaker 2: speaking to them, like, that's a polite thing to do,
Speaker 2: Like look at me when I'm talking to you, show
Speaker 2: me that you're listening to me. All of these things.
Speaker 2: So I just learned, Okay, that's the right thing to
Speaker 2: do talking to people.
Speaker 3: So I would just.
Speaker 2: Force myself to do that, and that's just the way
Speaker 2: that I learned to behave even though that's not a
Speaker 2: natural thing for me at all. But I almost didn't
Speaker 2: know at that point that it wasn't a natural thing
Speaker 2: for me because I didn't know that I was autistic.
Speaker 2: So it was like, oh, everyone must find it. There's uncomfortable,
Speaker 2: and everyone must just force themselves to do it because
Speaker 2: it's polite.
Speaker 3: So I've got to do that as well.
Speaker 2: So it can be like things as simple as that
Speaker 2: all the way through to things like the things that
Speaker 2: you're talking about. So we kind of touched on, like before,
Speaker 2: the special interest autistic people have where you'd have like
Speaker 2: one topic that you like a ride and die for,
Speaker 2: basically like you're obsessed with this topic, you love it,
Speaker 2: you are so interested in it, but you might have
Speaker 2: learned that if you talk about it all the time,
Speaker 2: then people are like God, can we talk about something else, please,
Speaker 2: like or not this again, Like so you've learned to
Speaker 2: do the small talk that other people do, or you've
Speaker 2: learned that I don't know at high school, like when
Speaker 2: you're a teenager, like oh, it's it was supposed to
Speaker 2: talk about the boys that we fancy, and we're supposed
Speaker 2: to talk about the clothes that we wear. So I'll
Speaker 2: talk about those things instead because that people like me
Speaker 2: if I talk about those things and like yeah, it's
Speaker 2: like a whole range of experiences and it's something that
Speaker 2: is so I guess ingrained as well. Like for me,
Speaker 2: I guess I thought when I got my diagnosis that
Speaker 2: I was like woho, Like I'm on mask now, like
Speaker 2: I can be myself, Like I've learned that I'm adehg.
Speaker 2: I've learned that I'm autistic, Like here we go, Like
Speaker 2: I can be myself, but still like to this day,
Speaker 2: I'm masks so so heavily, like now I'm I'm masking.
Speaker 2: Probably I'm like speaking in a way like my natural
Speaker 2: tone of voice is quite like blunt and quite monotonous.
Speaker 2: Whereas I've learned that that's not well received by It's
Speaker 2: not easy for people to listen to it's not easy
Speaker 2: to get my point across. So I've kind of learned
Speaker 2: to speak in a more up and down way, in
Speaker 2: a more bubbly way. But it's not meming. I've not
Speaker 2: go on this call and been like I need to
Speaker 2: you know, come on, Ellie, let's like, let's put our
Speaker 2: best accent on and talk in this certain way. It's
Speaker 2: just a natural thing that when I talk to people
Speaker 2: it comes out like this now because it's so ingrained
Speaker 2: in the way that I am. And I think, yeah,
Speaker 2: that's something that I underestimated so much of like how
Speaker 2: difficult it would be to unmask? Like I think I
Speaker 2: was like, you know, I've got the answers now, like
Speaker 2: here we go, like let's be ourselves. And it's like, actually, no,
Speaker 2: Like it's it's so I don't even know who's under there, really,
Speaker 2: because I've spent my whole life being ye some like
Speaker 2: being someone else and copying the people around me and
Speaker 2: doing what I've been told to do, and it's like
Speaker 2: I don't even know how to be.
Speaker 3: Like it's so it's so much easier to slip into
Speaker 3: this car that has.
Speaker 2: Been so defined and you've had twenty four years of
Speaker 2: practicing this character to then actually being yourself, which is
Speaker 2: like your real self, is so much more like I
Speaker 2: don't know how to explain this, Like there's no black
Speaker 2: and white, really, it's very much more gray areas. It's
Speaker 2: very nuanced, it's very flowing, like we're all kind of fluid,
Speaker 2: Whereas that character was clearly defined, like this is what
Speaker 2: Ellie likes, this is what Elle doesn't like, this is
Speaker 2: how Ellie behaves, this is how Ellie doesn't behave. So
Speaker 2: it's so much easier to fall into that, like you've
Speaker 2: got the rules of how to behave, whereas if you're
Speaker 2: trying to actually I guess it's the same for everybody.
Speaker 2: When you're trying to be yourself, it's you don't know
Speaker 2: exactly what that looks like, but I think it's the
Speaker 2: same thought unmasking of like I know that I naturally
Speaker 2: speak in a certain way when I'm around other people,
Speaker 2: but how do I like, I don't know how I
Speaker 2: speak naturally because I don't speak to myself when I'm
Speaker 2: at home on my own, do I Like? That's when
Speaker 2: I'm the most unnasty is when I'm at home on
Speaker 2: my own, not being perceived by other people not interacting
Speaker 2: with other people, but then I'm not having conversations then
Speaker 2: because I'm on my own. So it's like, how do
Speaker 2: I even get to know that kind of thing? But yeah,
Speaker 2: it's I guess it's it. That's the kind of a
Speaker 2: very long explanation, but basically covering up your your neurodivergent
Speaker 2: traits to appear neurotypical, and a lot of the time
Speaker 2: it's like done without realizing or done for safety or
Speaker 2: And I think it's like important to point out as
Speaker 2: well that like I'm quite lucky that I'm able to
Speaker 2: unmask in certain ways because I'm very like non threatening.
Speaker 2: I guess, like I'm a small white woman. I you know,
Speaker 2: I have got pretty privilege. I'm like quite slim, I'm
Speaker 2: quite small, Whereas like a six foot five black man
Speaker 2: can't do that in the same way that I can,
Speaker 2: because where I'm stood outside rocking backwards and forwards, feeling
Speaker 2: stressed out, and that's like, oh, look at this poor
Speaker 2: young lady who's having a difficult time, Whereas if a
Speaker 2: black man does the same thing, it's like he's getting aggressive,
Speaker 2: he's been dangerous, like that could be like, you know,
Speaker 2: that could be a I risk for his safety.
Speaker 3: It could it could end up.
Speaker 2: In him being in prison, it could end up it
Speaker 2: getting really like dangerous situations. So unmasking is like a
Speaker 2: necessary thing for us to do to be able to
Speaker 2: be healthy because it is so draining, like do it
Speaker 2: like covering yourself up all of the time without realizing.
Speaker 2: But it's also a huge privilege to be able to
Speaker 2: do that as well, because it can be like perceived
Speaker 2: in different ways for different people depending on what you
Speaker 2: look like. It can you know, be yeah, like even
Speaker 2: even me sometimes, like I've had times where I've been
Speaker 2: super tired and I've had loads going on, so I've
Speaker 2: been more in mass and I've kind of spoken more
Speaker 2: bluntly to people without realizing just that I'm kind of
Speaker 2: my tank is so empty that i don't have it
Speaker 2: in me to like cover it up anymore. And people
Speaker 2: have been like, you know, you're being rude, like why
Speaker 2: are you being off with me? And I'm like, I'm
Speaker 2: not being off with you. I'm just like all I've
Speaker 2: got in me to do right now is communicate in
Speaker 2: the most concise and like natural way, Whereas that can
Speaker 2: like be end up in people thinking you're behaving a
Speaker 2: certain way, And yeah, I think it's a it's like
Speaker 2: a it's both like the thing that I guess a
Speaker 2: lot of people are aiming for being able to unmask,
Speaker 2: but it's also comes with like dangers for certain people,
Speaker 2: and it comes with being misunderstood and like maybe being
Speaker 2: kind of yeah, yeah, misunderstood.
Speaker 1: A discriminated against. Yeah, I think that's the thing. Like,
Speaker 1: that's so interesting. When you said that, I was like,
Speaker 1: I actually had never thought about that before. I've never
Speaker 1: thought about that, And I think it's such an interesting thing,
Speaker 1: once again, an argument to retire the profile of like
Speaker 1: we it's it's so linked to not just misogyny, like
Speaker 1: we've spoken about like racism, like prejudice in so many
Speaker 1: in so many like intricate ways. And I think also
Speaker 1: because we as a society have really been taught from
Speaker 1: a young age how you are supposed to act, which
Speaker 1: has contributed to the masking. Right, there is a I think,
Speaker 1: very defined formula of like correctness and politeness that people
Speaker 1: are taught from a very young age. That also means
Speaker 1: that not only have you kind of forced yourself to
Speaker 1: take upon what sounds like a character, what sounds like
Speaker 1: a persona no wonder you don't know who's underneath that
Speaker 1: you've been method acting for twenty four years, like method
Speaker 1: acting to like an A plus standard, like to the
Speaker 1: point where doctors couldn't even see through it. Like that's
Speaker 1: kind of like insane, that that's just that's it, like
Speaker 1: so hard for me to even comprehend how exhausting that
Speaker 1: must be.
Speaker 3: But I think it.
Speaker 1: Also from what I'm hearing from you, comes from this
Speaker 1: idea that we actually don't know a lot as a
Speaker 1: general population about what this looks like because of how
Speaker 1: we've been taught to say it. So that kind of
Speaker 1: leads to my next question, which is, like, what are
Speaker 1: some of the elements of neurodivergence that you think there
Speaker 1: needs to be more conversations around that is excluded from
Speaker 1: the narrative that is maybe less comfortable to speak about
Speaker 1: or people are less informed about, not because it's rare,
Speaker 1: just because we aren't having conversations about it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think think so.
Speaker 2: In the book, I have like chapter the first couple
Speaker 2: of chapters are where I go through like the kind
Speaker 2: of scientific basics of like what actually is ADHD, what
Speaker 2: actually is autism? And what is the diagnostic criteria that
Speaker 2: a doctor will go through to decide if you have
Speaker 2: it or not. But then the next chapter after that
Speaker 2: is like translating those traits to how they show up
Speaker 2: in real life, because I think that's where the education
Speaker 2: is missing in society of like we understand to a
Speaker 2: certain level the traits like on paper, but we don't
Speaker 2: understand how that translates to real life experience, especially in
Speaker 2: people that aren't the young white boys. So, like, one
Speaker 2: example is literal thinking is I think one that we
Speaker 2: all know that autistic people are literal thinkers, but the
Speaker 2: way that we've been told of that is like that
Speaker 2: they don't understand jokes or we don't understand sarcasm, or
Speaker 2: we don't understand like sayings you know where it's like
Speaker 2: I don't know break a leg and stuff like that,
Speaker 2: And they're the examples that are given on like the
Speaker 2: medical website and stuff like that. But actually, literal thinking
Speaker 2: and literal processing for me means that I take words
Speaker 2: as gospel. Like if someone tells me something, I will
Speaker 2: believe it because they've told me it, so I take
Speaker 2: it very literally that it must be true. So even
Speaker 2: if you know someone when I was younger, my parents
Speaker 2: couldn't say McDonald's out loud because if they said, like, oh, maybe, well,
Speaker 2: you know, if you're good, maybe we'll get a McDonald's
Speaker 2: on the way home, I'd be like, but you said
Speaker 2: if I was good, we could have McDonald's, and I've
Speaker 2: been good, so we need to go and get McDonald's,
Speaker 2: you know, Like I would take it very like literally
Speaker 2: what they said, but also like it goes the other
Speaker 2: way of like if you haven't told me something, I
Speaker 2: won't know it to be true because I'm a very
Speaker 2: literal person. So whereas other people might assume that something's
Speaker 2: like going on in the background, or like that someone
Speaker 2: else has got something going on, for example, or that
Speaker 2: things are happening. If you don't tell me something, then
Speaker 2: I don't know it. So like for example, like recently,
Speaker 2: my dad's had quite a lot going on at work,
Speaker 2: and like the rest, like my mum will be like,
Speaker 2: you know, if he's stressed at home, it's because he's
Speaker 2: got a lot going on at work.
Speaker 3: But I'm like, but.
Speaker 2: If he doesn't tell me, you know, other people might
Speaker 2: be able to think, oh, he's acting different, maybe something's
Speaker 2: causing him to act different, whereas I'm like, but if
Speaker 2: you don't tell me that you've got a lot going
Speaker 2: on at work, I don't know that you've got a
Speaker 2: lot going on at work. So I'm thinking, why is
Speaker 2: my dad not talking to me? Or why is my
Speaker 2: dad seeming stress? Like what's going on? Like I'm trying
Speaker 2: to solve that problem, but I don't have the information
Speaker 2: because no one has said, your dad's got a lot
Speaker 2: on his plate at the moment. So it's that like,
Speaker 2: you know, people think, oh, yeah, I understand the autistic
Speaker 2: people literal thinkers, but it's like, okay, no, but you
Speaker 2: think that I can't understand sarcasm, But actually it's that
Speaker 2: I can only process the world with the information that
Speaker 2: I am like physically given, like in black and white basically.
Speaker 2: So I think that's like, yeah, people don't understand how
Speaker 2: the traits actually show up in real life. So I
Speaker 2: think that's like a big one that I have tried
Speaker 2: to kind of go through each trait and that way
Speaker 2: of being like, Okay, this is what you know, what
Speaker 2: we think it is, and this is how it actually
Speaker 2: shows up for people. And then I think another really
Speaker 2: big one, especially with ADHD, is RSD, which is rejection
Speaker 2: sensitive dysphoria, and it's basically like real bad emotional dysregulation,
Speaker 2: and it's like this basically very extreme response in response
Speaker 2: to kind of perceived or real rejection. So if you
Speaker 2: think that someone's upset with you, or you think that
Speaker 2: you're being rejected, or you think that you haven't done
Speaker 2: a good job or anything is like pointing you in
Speaker 2: the direction of some sort of perceived rejection, then it's
Speaker 2: like a full body like it feels like the world
Speaker 2: is closing in on you because you've just been rejected
Speaker 2: in that way. And I think that's I think that's
Speaker 2: a big one as to why so many women don't
Speaker 2: get diagnosed or they do throw the young sciety card
Speaker 2: or the depression card, because all they're seeing again is
Speaker 2: these like extreme emotional reactions and they're like hormones, anxiety
Speaker 2: or like all of these things.
Speaker 1: Or BPD as well, Like, yeah, that would be another
Speaker 1: one where I'm like, so that sluts in.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So I actually yeah, when I so, before I
Speaker 2: got to my actual diagnosis, when I kind of got
Speaker 2: to the point where I was like, anxiety is not
Speaker 2: quite right, but I didn't have the answers yet. I
Speaker 2: actually went through there was like a couple of months
Speaker 2: where I was convinced that I had BPD. I was like,
Speaker 2: I started researching online and that was the first thing
Speaker 2: that came up, like you know, mood swings going from
Speaker 2: being really high to being really low, like kind of
Speaker 2: irrational behavior and like when someone's leaving, like you know,
Speaker 2: having abandonment issues. And I was like, that's me. I
Speaker 2: was like, all of these things are me. I've found
Speaker 2: the answer, like I've got BPD. And I was like
Speaker 2: literally going to my doctors. I was like, I need
Speaker 2: to be referred for a BPD assessment, like I've got BPD,
Speaker 2: Like I found the answer, this is it. And they're like, no, Elliott,
Speaker 2: it's not, like that's not you. And I was I
Speaker 2: was like, no, but it is. It is, and like,
Speaker 2: I mean, I guess it isn't, but yeah, the experiences,
Speaker 2: Like I read those traits and I was like, that's me.
Speaker 3: That's me, that's me, that's me. But yeah, yeah exactly.
Speaker 2: And I think what makes it even more I was
Speaker 2: actually having this conversation with a friend yesterday. What makes
Speaker 2: it even more difficult is that things like BPD and
Speaker 2: CPTSD are caused by trauma and growing up as an
Speaker 2: undiagnosed autistic person or undiagnosed person with ADHD that is
Speaker 2: trauma in itself. You're you're masking all the time, You're
Speaker 2: living in a world that's not designed for you. You're constantly misunderstood,
Speaker 2: You're constantly told that what you're like, if you're yourself,
Speaker 2: it's wrong. You're constantly told that you're lazy, or that
Speaker 2: you're sensitive or all of these things. Like growing up
Speaker 2: as an undiagnosed you're ad divergent person is trauma. And
Speaker 2: these other conditions that are so similar in their experiences
Speaker 2: are caused by trauma. So it's like, how the heck
Speaker 2: are you supposed to disentangle? Like it's so common for
Speaker 2: people to have a combination of all of these things.
Speaker 2: Like I am almost certain that I've got CPTSD because
Speaker 2: just the things that happened in my teenage years and
Speaker 2: the way that I respond now to things that happen
Speaker 2: versus like it's I'm not just dealing with the thing
Speaker 2: that's happening, I'm dealing with all of the stuff that
Speaker 2: happened when I was undiagnosed, but that the actual experience
Speaker 2: it like it'd be really difficult for me to get
Speaker 2: diagnosed with CPTSD because they could probably explain away all
Speaker 2: of the experiences that I was having through ADHD emotional dysregulation,
Speaker 2: protecting sensitive dysphoria, through autism, like being hypervigilant. That's again
Speaker 2: like I'm autistic, so I have Yeah, I'm autistic, so
Speaker 2: i pick up on things really easily, and I'm really
Speaker 2: sensitive to sound, and I'm really sensitive to change, and
Speaker 2: I like to have a routine and all of those
Speaker 2: things also our behaviors that people with CPTSD would show
Speaker 2: because it's hypervigilance, it's protecting yourself, it's all of those
Speaker 2: Like it is just a minefield of like over laugh
Speaker 2: and complication, and I think, yeah, that's a really kind
Speaker 2: of big, big thing that a lot of people face
Speaker 2: of like what is going on here? And a lot
Speaker 2: of the time it's probably a bit of a combination
Speaker 2: of everything.
Speaker 1: So interesting as well, because it's only been recently that
Speaker 1: people can actually get more than one diagnosis, like it
Speaker 1: used to be like here, you have bipologus order, you
Speaker 1: have borderline personality disorder, you have autism. There's your box,
Speaker 1: sit in it now, And I think you point to
Speaker 1: a really interesting point that a lot of people don't understand,
Speaker 1: which is that your experience with mental illness can actually
Speaker 1: create further mental illness and actually can be a trigger
Speaker 1: for things like complex post traumatic stress disorder. I think
Speaker 1: we often think about that in particular. It's really a
Speaker 1: really like that you brought that in. We think about
Speaker 1: trauma in the sense of something really really terrible, external,
Speaker 1: violent happening to you. But trauma is just like the
Speaker 1: disruption of security and peace and you know, safety that
Speaker 1: is as simple as it is, and that can come
Speaker 1: from so many different things, including like an experience of
Speaker 1: growing up in as you said, a world that is
Speaker 1: not designed for you. That is so traumatic, and it's
Speaker 1: not just one of it. It's a continuous cumulation of stress,
Speaker 1: of anxiety, of as you said, masking. So I'm glad
Speaker 1: that you brought that up, and I think it literally
Speaker 1: leads into this next thing, which is if I'm sure,
Speaker 1: I'm so sure that there is probably someone listening to
Speaker 1: this right now who is like, holy shit, why is
Speaker 1: this describing me? I thought I had VPD. Everyone told
Speaker 1: me I had anxiety. I was said rude things when
Speaker 1: I was a teenager without realizing it, without even consciously knowing.
Speaker 1: So what would your advice be to someone who thinks
Speaker 1: that they have ADHD they have autism in the same
Speaker 1: position you now that they're an adult in their twenties.
Speaker 1: Like you said, there's going to be so many more
Speaker 1: people who are coming through in the next few decades
Speaker 1: who could have received a diagnosis at three, nine, ten,
Speaker 1: but aren't going to do so until they're twenty. What's
Speaker 1: your advice as someone who kind of lived that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's a really really tricky one now
Speaker 2: because because of the fact that so many more people
Speaker 2: are realizing, it means that services and support just aren't there.
Speaker 2: Like the waiting lists to get an actual diagnosis are
Speaker 2: so long, it's so tricky to get diagnosed. And also
Speaker 2: the medical professionals are kind of a lot of the
Speaker 2: time behind us in our understanding. Like they were trained, however,
Speaker 2: many years ago, when they were at university or whatever
Speaker 2: it might be, they were taught the stereotypical diagnostic criteria.
Speaker 2: They were taught that it was more common in CIS
Speaker 2: boys than it was in anybody else. You know, they
Speaker 2: maybe don't have the understanding to be able to see
Speaker 2: your experiences and see them for what they are even
Speaker 2: if that's if you're even kind of lucky enough to
Speaker 2: get in the room with somebody, Like now, waiting lists
Speaker 2: are really long, like private assessments are really expensive. Like
Speaker 2: it's a really tricky time at the moment because it's
Speaker 2: like so many people are having these realizations and then
Speaker 2: they can't really go away and do anything with that.
Speaker 2: So I would say, like my first point is like
Speaker 2: that self diagnosis is completely valid and is kind of
Speaker 2: necessary in the current world that.
Speaker 3: We live in.
Speaker 2: I think with ADHD it's slightly different because medication can
Speaker 2: be helpful, and obviously you would need to see and
Speaker 2: have a medical diagnosis and see a professional for that.
Speaker 2: But other than that, like you are the expert of
Speaker 2: your own experiences. If you're going through all of this information,
Speaker 2: if you're doing all of these online tests and you're
Speaker 2: seeing that, yeah, this is right for me, this is
Speaker 2: who I am, then you can tell you can give
Speaker 2: yourself that ance that you don't need to have like
Speaker 2: a green tick of approval from a medical professional, because
Speaker 2: it's just.
Speaker 3: You know, in an ideal world, yes.
Speaker 2: We would all be able to go and see a
Speaker 2: psychiatrist and get those answers, but we don't live in
Speaker 2: an ideal world. We live in a world where it's
Speaker 2: impossible to do that for a lot of people at
Speaker 2: the moment, and it's a privilege to be able to
Speaker 2: do that. So like, firstly, yeah, that's completely a valid
Speaker 2: thing to do, and also like remembering that it's not
Speaker 2: a piece of paper from a doctor that changes your life.
Speaker 2: It's changing your life that changes your life. So it's like, I,
Speaker 2: you know, anyone can change the way that they're working.
Speaker 2: They can work more flexibly, they can give themselves more rest,
Speaker 2: they can honor their sensory needs more, they can wear
Speaker 2: ear defenders when they're in noisy venues, they can buy
Speaker 2: planners that will help them manage their time better. They
Speaker 2: can you know, all of these things that are the
Speaker 2: reason that my life is so much better now. Anyone
Speaker 2: can do it.
Speaker 1: Does need a.
Speaker 2: Doctor to go, Yes you are autistic. Yes you have
Speaker 2: ADHD for you to be able to do those things.
Speaker 2: So I think it's really you know, the narrative at
Speaker 2: the moment that like, oh, everyone's self diagnosing and you
Speaker 2: have to you know, you don't know, but you do know,
Speaker 2: like you can do that for yourself. And I would
Speaker 2: say the main thing as well. That helped me in
Speaker 2: terms of like validation and actually understanding and feeling comfortable
Speaker 2: in knowing that that was what was going on for
Speaker 2: me was looking like searching out the experiences of other
Speaker 2: people that had similar lived experience to mine. So, like
Speaker 2: we were saying, when I was reading through the diagnostic criteria,
Speaker 2: there were some things where I was like, hmm, you know,
Speaker 2: maybe that's me, but it doesn't one hundred percent sound
Speaker 2: like me. But then I would go onto social media
Speaker 2: and I would find another twenty twenty something year old
Speaker 2: woman talking about her experience of that thing, and I'd
Speaker 2: be like, oh, yeah, that's just like me.
Speaker 3: I do that, I'm exactly the.
Speaker 2: Same as that because obviously if we're both the same age,
Speaker 2: the same gender, and we have similar interests, then the
Speaker 2: way that our traits show up are going to be
Speaker 2: more similar as well. So I think that's a really
Speaker 2: helpful thing to do. You know, if you're a woman,
Speaker 2: look for the experiences of women. If you're a person
Speaker 2: of color, look for the experiences of people of color.
Speaker 2: If you're a mother, looks for the experiences of other mothers,
Speaker 2: Like look for people who have similar like a wider
Speaker 2: range of similar experience to yours than the way that
Speaker 2: their trade show up is probably more likely to going
Speaker 2: to be more similar to yours as well. So I
Speaker 2: think that's a really helpful that for me, that was
Speaker 2: like what kind of tipped me over the edge from hmm,
Speaker 2: maybe maybe I should look into these things to Yeah,
Speaker 2: I'm confident that this is what's going on for me
Speaker 2: was seeing other people who were similar to me talking
Speaker 2: about their experiences because they were obviously a lot more
Speaker 2: similar to mine.
Speaker 3: So I would say.
Speaker 2: That that is like the best, the best thing that
Speaker 2: I could recommend. It's like a far from ideal situation
Speaker 2: because it's like I obviously would love for everybody to
Speaker 2: be able to get the actual answers and the support
Speaker 2: that they need and the medication that they need for
Speaker 2: ADHD if they choose to do that, but it's a
Speaker 2: tricky time at the moment where these services are just overloaded.
Speaker 2: So I think just like knowing like that it's okay
Speaker 2: to self diagnose that it's okay to put these things
Speaker 2: in place for yourself without someone telling you that you're
Speaker 2: allowed to do that, and then also seeking out the
Speaker 2: experience and even like connecting with other neurodivergent people where
Speaker 2: you can like for me, obviously, I'm kind of very
Speaker 2: public about it. It's my job to talk about it online.
Speaker 2: But the friends I have made through doing that and
Speaker 2: having autistic friends ADHD friends has literally been the best
Speaker 2: thing that has ever happened to me in my entire life.
Speaker 2: Like I've always had such a hard I've had such
Speaker 2: a hard time with friendships, Like school was awful for me,
Speaker 2: Like I think I massively underestimate it actually, where it's
Speaker 2: been one of those things where I've just had to
Speaker 2: survive it. So I just I'm like, we don't talk
Speaker 2: about school, we don't think about it, like I dropped
Speaker 2: out of school. I had I was bullied awfully, Like
Speaker 2: I just had an awful time, And I guess I
Speaker 2: just kind of got used to the fact that, Okay,
Speaker 2: maybe I'm never gonna find their friendship group, maybe I'm
Speaker 2: never gonna fit in anywhere, because it just doesn't seem
Speaker 2: to have happened up to now, Whereas now I'm like,
Speaker 2: oh no, I actually can find people that I relate to,
Speaker 2: where I was just not finding the right people. So
Speaker 2: I think if you can join communities, I have another
Speaker 2: Instagram account called We Are Unmasked, which is a community
Speaker 2: for your divergent people, and we try and set up event.
Speaker 2: It's kind of on the back burner at the moment
Speaker 2: because I've been writing a book and stuff, but yeah,
Speaker 2: hopefully we'll be doing more like online events and things
Speaker 2: like that, and even just looking through the comments, you'll
Speaker 2: be able to find people who are in a similar
Speaker 2: position to you. And I think finding those friendships is
Speaker 2: like a huge thing that you can do for validation
Speaker 2: as well.
Speaker 1: One hundred percent. I honestly love that, not just I
Speaker 1: obviously don't have ADHD or autism, but like even from
Speaker 1: my perspective, if you can relate to that, like the
Speaker 1: best is yet to come, Like you're not going to
Speaker 1: find your people in a high school of six hundred people,
Speaker 1: Like maybe you will, but the world is so much
Speaker 1: bigger and broader and wider than that you have no
Speaker 1: idea what's coming, and not in an anxious sense, in
Speaker 1: like the most beautiful sense. And also I really like
Speaker 1: that point because I think in the cycle the point
Speaker 1: you made earlier, like the psychology community, there is a
Speaker 1: big fuss around like ADHD is so overdiagnosed. Everyone's on
Speaker 1: you know, Riddlin or adderall whatever. And I'm like, okay, great,
Speaker 1: are you their doctor? No, So you have no opinion
Speaker 1: on this. Literally, you're someone on the internet who has
Speaker 1: made their mind up around what this does and doesn't
Speaker 1: look look like. And I think that is so insulting.
Speaker 1: And it's additionally the thing of like I always think
Speaker 1: about the comparison to depression. You can know you're depressed
Speaker 1: without a doctor telling you, and you can do things
Speaker 1: in your life to mitigate that. What is to say
Speaker 1: that you can't do that for other things as well?
Speaker 1: And obviously medication comes into it. You might need a
Speaker 1: helping hand in that sense, but it doesn't mean that
Speaker 1: you have to wait until someone goes Yeah, you're like
Speaker 1: approved for a diagnosis to be making the changes that
Speaker 1: you think are going to benefit your life. So I
Speaker 1: think that's such a beautiful message. One final question but
Speaker 1: I would love for you to answer, is you've just
Speaker 1: released a book. I know we've talked about it so much,
Speaker 1: and I honestly hearing your story of being like I
Speaker 1: had to drop out of high school. I was bullied.
Speaker 1: I never for what I was going to get that far.
Speaker 1: That's and here you are now is like honestly quite emotional.
Speaker 1: So what would you tell that person, that kind of
Speaker 1: younger version of you who was really struggling for answers?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think a big one is like focus on
Speaker 2: the people that love you rather.
Speaker 3: Than the ones that don't.
Speaker 2: So I think, like, especially through high school, I think like,
Speaker 2: obviously I didn't know that I was asking. I didn't
Speaker 2: know that was autistic. Was that I had ADHD, but
Speaker 2: I always had it was almost like an internal thing
Speaker 2: where I always tried to become friends with the popular people.
Speaker 2: I think it was like this innate need to fit in,
Speaker 2: this innate need to be liked, to be approved of,
Speaker 2: like to be validated, that I would always like try
Speaker 2: and be friends with the popular group and it would
Speaker 2: always end badly for me, like I had so many time.
Speaker 2: I can literally could probably point to like ten different
Speaker 2: times in my life where I've sat down with my
Speaker 2: mum and she's been like, Ellie, why do you always
Speaker 2: try to be friends with like the loud girls, the
Speaker 2: popular girls, Like they're not like you, like you're you're soft,
Speaker 2: you're gentle, Like it's it doesn't end well for you,
Speaker 2: like why? And it was almost like I think like
Speaker 2: all kind of women and people marginalized for the gender
Speaker 2: that have gone through high school know that feeling of
Speaker 2: like it's a rock and a hard place, Like it's
Speaker 2: like the plastics Inminger, Like if you're friends with them,
Speaker 2: then it's life as hell, but if you're not friends
Speaker 2: with them, then it's even worse. So I think it
Speaker 2: was that thing of like I would always try to
Speaker 2: be liked by everybody and by the popular people, whereas actually,
Speaker 2: if I'd have got there on my first day in
Speaker 2: year seven and gone, I actually really like maths, I
Speaker 2: actually really like puzzles. I you know, maybe I should
Speaker 2: make some friends that maybe other people are gonna call
Speaker 2: us weird. Maybe we're not gonna have the nicest time either,
Speaker 2: but I'm at least gonna have these three solid friends
Speaker 2: that we all love each other for our weirdness and
Speaker 2: our geekiness and our strangeness and all of whatever it
Speaker 2: might be like that would have been. It still wouldn't
Speaker 2: have been easy, right, because no one has a nice
Speaker 2: time at high school, especially if you're like different in
Speaker 2: any way. But at least I would have had like
Speaker 2: the like that solid group of friends that would have
Speaker 2: loved me for me whereas I was still like focused
Speaker 2: on making everybody like me or trying to fit in
Speaker 2: with the popular people that I kind of denied myself
Speaker 2: the opportunity to make friends that might not have been
Speaker 2: as popular, but they would have been friends. So I
Speaker 2: think that would be my thing of like focus on
Speaker 2: finding people that love you for you rather than being
Speaker 2: like it's that thing of like, don't be everyone's cup
Speaker 2: of tea, be like someone's shot of whiskey, or I
Speaker 2: don't know whatever the saying is of like basically.
Speaker 1: I never heard that, but I love that. I'm gonna slide.
Speaker 3: I don't even know if that's right. We've made it
Speaker 3: up now it's we'll go with it.
Speaker 2: But yeah, kind of that thing of like trying to
Speaker 2: focus on finding a place rather than being like mass liked,
Speaker 2: I think would have been a good one for me
Speaker 2: to know. And I think almost like I think it's
Speaker 2: one of those things where it's like it's a worse
Speaker 2: thing that someone can say to you at the time,
Speaker 2: but over time you realize that it's so true of
Speaker 2: just like trusting the process, Like I genuinely thought that
Speaker 2: because I didn't go to union, because I dropped out
Speaker 2: of school, like that was it. I was never going
Speaker 2: to get anywhere in life, Like I was going to
Speaker 2: be miserable. I was going to do low paid jobs.
Speaker 2: I was never going to be successful. I was going
Speaker 2: to be overworked. Like when actually, you know, I've been
Speaker 2: really lucky. I'm really grateful for what's happened. But I've
Speaker 2: not needed a degree for any of this, Like I've
Speaker 2: not needed high school.
Speaker 3: Qualifications for any of this.
Speaker 2: It has all worked out in the end, and like
Speaker 2: maybe it could have worked out a lot sooner. But
Speaker 2: I think just like trusting that you don't have to
Speaker 2: do things the way that everyone else is doing them,
Speaker 2: Like you can do what it's better that you drop
Speaker 2: out and you're still healthy and you're well, you're working
Speaker 2: on becoming healthy again, and you're looking after yourself and
Speaker 2: you're being gentle with yourself. Then forcing yourself to do
Speaker 2: things because you think that you should do them and
Speaker 2: you think that's the only way that you're going to
Speaker 2: achieve anything, and all of that stuff, and I guess, yeah,
Speaker 2: reading like the Path and redefining what success is I
Speaker 2: think was because I think, yeah, at school, there's so
Speaker 2: much pressure of like you have to be the top
Speaker 2: grade student, you have to go to UNI, you have
Speaker 2: to get a good job you have, and that doesn't
Speaker 2: work for everybody, Like life happens, and also that life
Speaker 2: is not the life that everyone wants. So I think
Speaker 2: if someone would have been like, it's okay if you're
Speaker 2: not top of the class, it's okay if you don't
Speaker 2: go to UNI, that would have been a really helpful
Speaker 2: thing for me to know as well.
Speaker 1: Hmmm, I'll trust the process. I love that also totally true,
Speaker 1: Like it's there is such a different path than the
Speaker 1: jobs that we might be working in like twenty years
Speaker 1: probably don't exist. Yet what you and I are doing
Speaker 1: did not exist twenty years ago. Like maybe what I'm doing,
Speaker 1: like technically podcast did exist, but not to this level.
Speaker 1: Like the world is evolving, and I think that's so important.
Speaker 1: Something I always think is like I'm most grateful for
Speaker 1: the things that I wanted and didn't get, Like I'm
Speaker 1: so grateful for the things that I like begged for
Speaker 1: that I thought were going to make me happy, like
Speaker 1: that internship that like, you know, university entry that boyfriend
Speaker 1: and I didn't get them, And at the time, I
Speaker 1: was like, I'm so miserable that this is the end
Speaker 1: of my life and everything I know. I hate saying
Speaker 1: everything happens for a reason, because I don't think it does.
Speaker 1: But there are some things that happen for you, not
Speaker 1: to you. I think that's like, yeah, a beautiful way
Speaker 1: to end things. So I want to say thank you
Speaker 1: so much for coming on, thank you for being one
Speaker 1: of our guests for this like wonderful December holiday series.
Speaker 1: It's just like such a beautiful perspective, one that I
Speaker 1: think more people need to hear. And I'm so so
Speaker 1: thankful that you were able to make time to talk
Speaker 1: to us.
Speaker 2: Yeah, thank you so much for having me. It's been
Speaker 2: so nice to have a very nice, wholesome chat to
Speaker 2: start the day for me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and to end the day for me. Look at that.
Speaker 1: It's like a beautiful bookmark for our days. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: put all of Ellie's links in the description here. Please
Speaker 1: go and buy her book if you if you resonated
Speaker 1: with any of this, if you have a friend, a
Speaker 1: family member who this sounds like them, buy it for them.
Speaker 1: It's Christmas time, why the fuck not? You know, Share
Speaker 1: the joy around, share the information around, and as always,
Speaker 1: if you enjoyed this episode, please feel free to leave
Speaker 1: a five star review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you're
Speaker 1: listening right now, Share it with a friend if you
Speaker 1: think they'd like it, and if you have any further
Speaker 1: questions comments. If you have an opinion on this episode
Speaker 1: or an episode suggestion, please feel free to follow us
Speaker 1: at that Psychology podcast and we'll see you again later
Speaker 1: this week.