The Joy of ADHD Communication

I am writing this following an ADHD style conversation mentioned here

There are many nuances to communication, and 8 billion plus personal cognitive styles on the planet. Still there are some 'typical' judgements and expectations around communication that ADHDers often are seen as a 'problem' in relation to.

Here are some from my own ADHD perspective <3

Firstly, we don't consider that we interrupt each other - or consider it rude.

What we do experience though is that both talkers can sometimes ‘take turns’ and sometimes both speak simultaneously - listening and processing in rounds of reflection and points as the conversation fluidly and organically moves onwards, and/or outwards.

Interestingly I can be considered to have an auditory processing disorder during 'typical' turn-taking conversations (my process of hearing and understanding what I have just been told or asked, is often slow, and frequently creates a need for repetition and is effortful) but I don't experience this in ADHD(?) style communication.

This doubly interests me because I can feel a similar process of focus, and inability to focus and 'sense make', in other situations involving sound and lack of sound.

• When working, in order to maintain my focus I use birdsong / repetitive music / soundscapes to give my brain input of sound on one 'channel' that then helps me then think clearly on another 'channel'

• When listening to information on podcasts or videos I can focus and understand it better if I play it at 1.75 or double speed - (which saves my brain from jumping to another 'channel' and cease being able to focus on the words) - co-incidentally this aligns with the amount of information that would be processed in simultaneous speaking (hearing my own voice) and listening to another, without 'turn taking'.

Perhaps the comfortableness of this simultaneous speak, hear, and respond pattern could be linked to the way ADHD appears to suit VUCA situations, and historically, perhaps dangerous or hunting situations as hunter gatherers - If all brains were better at only ‘turn-taking’, communication, information and response time could be lost, at a detriment to our chances of success and survival.

Secondly, when one of us shares an experience or truth that we have noticed, if the other one of us has a shared experience or concept we will affirm with some form of recognition words, and then often immediately share one of our own experiences which evidence those words; that we have either:

• genuine lived experience empathy, or

• understood and can illustrate the same concept

In this 'response storytelling' we are also demonstrating, and strengthening the 'alignment' of our brain activity. Creating oxytocin, supporting health and extra bonding for both of us as humans, and helping us check that we are moving forward in alignment to the next phase/phrase.

All that links interestingly to both the third point and fourth point.

Thirdly, in the ADHD communication this form of self-share reflection is received without negative judgement or the interpretation that this process shifts attention away from the original speaker (and 'makes it about the responder’) This is partly because this communication style is supported by something that some neurodivergent communities have recently spent time learning about and discussing:

Judging from our discussions in community groups, ADHDers and many other neurodivergent individuals do not wait to be invited to speak about themselves or their own experience in a conversation - and we are shocked that others 'wait' to be invited to do this. We feel safe to take up space within the conversation when it is flowing in a neurodivergent friendly manner.

The impact of this feeling of freedom and safety/and impulse to go with the flow means that when a neurodivergent individual replies to a shared experience with their own shared experience the conversation can easily and naturally flow back to the original speaker without further effort or invitation.

Whereas the impact of this conversational style with someone who does not comfortably flow back and forth - trusting that they can jump in and speak at the same time as the other speaker, be heard and still listen - is that the conversation will often switch sides, get stuck, and then be perceived as intentionally becoming one-sided and 'all about' that ADHDer.

This particular situation is often further deepened when the other person's communication style will mean that as they feel it rude to just begin to speak about themselves, in any future pause they will also then ask me another question about me - that I often feel it 'rude' to not answer!

This 'all about the ADHDer' situation also aligns unfortunately with another aspect of what I perceive as natural ADHD style communication: That in the pause following speaking (or simultaneously speaking and listening) the ADHD brain is often re/processing all the information that was just shared.

So this re-processing 'pause' often has a triple-whammy effect:

• that the pause will be longer than many people are comfortable with (resulting in them asking the next question - which would be about/to the ‘ADHDer’ and not themself)

• that the processing will still be about the previous piece of conversation and its associative links in cognition, so therefore the next thing said will likely be on the same subject or another personally linked subject

• the pause will frequently not be long enough for this processing to subside and our natural curiosity begin to rise and move toward the other person in the conversation before they get too uncomfortable in the silence and ask us something else, again causing us to not ask them a question about them.

And all this brings us to our 'fourthly'.

Jack interestingly noted that when he was first surrounded by  ADHD style communication with several ADHDers involved he found it confusing as everyone seemed to be disagreeing with each other and enthusiastically happy about it.

I suspect this is because we are just as likely to affirm, or additionally affirm, that we understand an experience or concept by illustratively testing it with an example of an opposite concept or experience. One which either obviously fails to disprove the original concept or experience - thereby reaffirming it - or expands and invites further reflection on the original concept or experience.

This point in particular can create confusion in style-mis-matched conversations when an ADHD/neurodivergent brain can be so quick to mentally process affirmation and agreement with a speaker and then proceeds to run a disprove test and shares that 'opposite' thought process.

For some people this article may have been a tricky and effortful read.

Not unlike the tricky-ness and effortfulness that I am usually experiencing in conversations that do not match my communication style.

And why it is such a joy, relief, reset, refresh, and nourishment to my tired brain when I get to both sink into and float effortlessly through a wonderful ADHD to ADHD style conversation.