Total Health in Midlife Episode #199: Navigating Adult ADHD w/ Xena Jones

When I’m stressed, when I’m anxious, when I’m worried, when I’ve got all these things on my mind. And I’m like, I don’t have time for walking. It makes a world of difference because I tell you like, I’m always like, I don’t have time for that. But I feel so much better, and I come back with more energy, with a clearer head, feeling less stressed, right?

Like I’m not only am I increasing dopamine, serotonin, norepinephrine, all of these good chemicals. But I’m also regulating my emotions and helping with all of these difficult things that are going on in my life. And also showing myself, ‘Hey, I matter, and I’m important, and I’m allowed to go for a walk.’ Like I’m allowed to have some time for me, it makes such a difference in doing so.

Welcome to Total Health and Midlife, the podcast for women embracing the pivotal transformation from the daily grind to the dawn of a new chapter. I’m Elizabeth, your host and fellow traveler on this journey.

As a Life and Health Coach, I am intimately familiar with the changes and challenges we face during this stage. Shifting careers, changing relationships, our new bodies, and redefining goals and needs as we start to look to the future and ask, what do I want?

In this podcast, we’ll explore physical, mental, and emotional wellness, offering insights and strategies to achieve optimal health through these transformative years.

Yes, it’s totally possible.

Join me in this amazing journey of body, mind, and spirit, where we’re not just improving our health, but transforming our entire lives.

Hey, everyone. Welcome to the Total Health in Midlife podcast. I am Elizabeth Sherman, and I am so incredibly excited for my podcast guest today. So, let me ask. Have you ever felt like your brain is on a roller coaster? Like one minute you’re laser focused and then the next you’re like, ‘wait a minute. What was I saying? What’s the word for that thing?’

If this sounds familiar, you are going to want to stick around and listen to what Xena Jones has to say. I have Xena with me today and let me tell you that she is a total rock star when it comes to ADHD. And you might recognize her because she podcast a number of times before. She’s not just a coach and a specialist, she is also the host of the ‘Navigating Adult ADHD podcast.’

And get this, she’s also living with ADHD herself. Talk about insider knowledge. Now, you might be thinking, ‘ADHD, isn’t that just for kids?’ But it’s not. And that’s exactly why we need to talk about it. So, here’s what you’re going to learn today.

One is why so many women are getting diagnosed with ADHD in midlife. If that’s you or someone that you know, know that you’re not alone. Number two, how ADHD might be messing with your friendships without you even realizing it. And then, number three, you’re going to learn some simple tricks to boost your brain’s feel good chemicals.

Yes, please sign me up.

So, whether you’ve got an ADHD diagnosis, you’re wondering if you might have it, or you just want to understand your wonderfully weird brain better, this episode is for you. So, let’s get started with Xena Jones. Xena, welcome to the show.

Elizabeth: Welcome Xena Jones to the Total Health in Midlife podcast. You are my very first three-peat guest.

Xena: Three-peat?

Elizabeth: I know. And what I think is amazing is that like I wouldn’t have had you on as a third time guest because I don’t even think I have people on most of the time as repeat guest. But what we’re going to talk about is so super important and relevant that I had to have you on a third time.

Xena: My gosh, I feel so special right now. Thank you. I hope I live up to the expectation of a third time guest. I’m here for it.

Elizabeth: Well, and so, last time we talked, you’ve actually kind of pivoted a little bit in your business. So, let’s start there. Introduce yourself, explain what you do and how you’ve pivoted from what you were doing before to now.

Xena: Yeah. So, I’m Xena and I’m an ADHD coach, and I live here in New Zealand. So, if anyone listening is like, ‘what is that accent?’ It is Kiwi. I live in New Zealand, Papamoa beach. When I was last on the podcast, I was working specifically with women. I started my niche, like way back, I think I’ve been coaching about coming up 10 years. But like I started with solo female travelers.

Then, I pivoted to women doing like brave and courageous things, which was very much where I was when I was last on your podcast. And now, I work specifically with adults who have ADHD. Not exclusively with women, but mainly with women, because I know so much about women and ADHD.

And this came about because it’s so funny, like I was coaching so many people with different forms of neurodiversity. I was like, Oh, I’m so much like that. I do that. I do that. Right? And I was helping these people, and then eventually it kind of clicked, oh, maybe you have ADHD too. And I was like, Oh. So, I went and got diagnosed and just so many things fell into place.

And it was like, well, that’s why you’re working with all of these people, because you understand your brain pretty well. And it was kind of like the missing piece for me because having got diagnosed with ADHD myself, I’ve now gone on to understand the differences in how the ADHD brain works compared to a neurotypical brain.

And understand things like dopamine and serotonin and norepinephrine and the different brain chemicals that we have less of. And how we can do things that have a huge impact on our ability to function or adult, quite well in society. So, Yeah. that’s where I’m at, helping adults with ADHD.

Elizabeth: Okay.

Xena: Did I answer your question?

Elizabeth: Yeah. We’re going to have a lot of that in this call.

Xena: There is going to be so much.

Elizabeth: Okay. And so, like, I remember when cause we were, I don’t want to say working together, but we were in close contact when you were initially diagnosed. And you really focused on, I’m going through perimenopause, and I have ADHD. And I feel like you went down this for lack of a better word, rabbit hole.

But really got involved in why so many women get diagnosed with ADHD at this time in their lives. And I am so curious about that because I have not been able to find any research on it, but yet, it’s so incredibly prevalent.

Xena: Yeah. So, the majority of women, according to the research that we currently have, and to be honest, like there is stuff all research, but there is more being done now because now we know that ADHD impacts women and men equally, right? And women are often referred to as a lost generation because it’s only now that we’re getting that recognition and that support.

So, women are typically diagnosed around ages 36 to 38. That’s when the majority of women are diagnosed and then I see a lot of women who are later even like into their 40s. Okay. And the reason for that is because hormones begin to change. From age 35 onwards, typically, hormones slowly begin to change as we gradually enter into perimenopause. For some of us, myself included, that happens quicker than for other people, right?

So, that is why there are so many women now getting diagnosed, because when our hormones begin to change, our dopamine levels drop quite dramatically or they fluctuate quite a lot, and that makes functioning harder. It makes just doing everyday tasks and things that we used to be able to do so much harder.

And it also makes masking our ADHD, which means kind of hiding it and pretending to be able to do all of the things and cope and manage. It makes that harder. And then we start to realize maybe there’s actually something else going on here. Maybe there’s a reason why all of these things are such a struggle. And that’s when we go, actually, hey, it’s ADHD.

Elizabeth: I identify as someone who has ADHD. I know that as a child, I think the inattentive type where I was considered a daydreamer, I couldn’t focus. When I was in middle school, my parents brought me to get tested and they diagnosed me with dyslexia.

But dyslexia never resonated with me. I was like, I don’t see words differently or backwards or anything like that. But like I would have trouble reading, for example, a couple paragraphs and retaining that information. I think mostly because I was bored and whatever.

And now, I haven’t gotten a formal diagnosis. However, I think that with all of the information about ADHD in women, it’s become more prevalent. And so, are you saying that the women who are being diagnosed in later in life already had ADHD. But it’s just becoming more severe because of the hormonal response.

Xena: Yes, 100%. That’s exactly what I’m saying. So, they already had ADHD, right? And now, it is becoming more severe. Their symptoms are ramping up and it’s becoming way harder to manage, to function, to cope, to do all of those things. But when you speak to the part about like likely having had inattentive ADHD, which is very much like, you know, we get the report cards that say away with the fairies. And you know, we’re the daydreamers and that like you say, like trying to read a book and retain.

If it’s not of interest to us, if we’re bored doing that, then that’s like an almost impossible task. But because we weren’t presenting like those hyperactive little boys who couldn’t sit still, always getting in trouble. Because we didn’t look like that, we flew under the radar. Right? Because everybody back then thought that that’s what ADHD looked like. That hyperactive little boy at school can’t sit still, disrupts everybody.

But in actual fact, there are a couple of different types of ADHD. There is the you know, can’t sit still, hyperactive type, but there’s also the inattentive, busy mind, right? Instead of a busy body. So, those were so much harder to pick up whereas now it’s getting better, but I still think that there are a lot of girls and women who are still going undiagnosed or misdiagnosed, which is very common. Like you talk about being diagnosed with dyslexia, which you never really felt fit.

You know, I’ve had clients who have been diagnosed with bipolar. You know, anxiety and depression, which is common for people with ADHD as well. But always feeling like there’s something missing. So, misdiagnosis in women has been huge throughout the years.

Elizabeth: Yeah. Well, isn’t that just appropriate for like everything, right?

Xena: Yeah. Oh, it’s wild. Yeah.

Elizabeth: Okay. So, let’s talk about then some of the ways that some of the women who are listening today might resonate and understand that they might have ADHD.

Xena: So, in terms of like some of the symptoms that they may see. Is that what you’re meaning? Yeah. Okay. If we’re talking about like the inattentive type, right? So, we’ve got the inattentive, and then we’ve got the hyperactive, and then we’ve got a combined type. Which is a combination of the two, which is where I fit in, for example.

So, when we talk about the inattentive, often inattentive in women shows up as being highly anxious. Having a lot of anxiety, having a very busy mind. So, there’s a lot of overthinking and ruminating, being unable to switch off, which is going to impact your sleep. So, you’re going to have challenges with sleep, no doubt because your brain won’t switch off.

It will also be like you talked about with the struggling to retain information. If one of the common symptoms of ADHD is emotional dysregulation. And I see this a lot in women where if they have been in a situation and it’s been really difficult for them. And there’s this emotion, the strong emotion. It could be they felt ashamed, or they felt rejected, or criticized, or something.

When they experience that, they will often shut down and it will impact their entire day. It could impact weeks. It will eat away at them for a long period of time. They will likely withdraw. There’ll be heaps of like I talked about ruminating and overthinking and just kind of shutting down and going internal and withdrawing from people. I see a lot of that as well.

So, the inattentive type is much harder to spot because it’s very busy mind. When we talk about the combination, I think I’ll skip that and go to the hyperactive. So, hyperactive is like, you see me right now, like I’m fidgeting with something. I know people won’t be able to see that but like, you know, you’re constantly needing to move.

You’re unable to sit still. You have to constantly be doing something, right. You will struggle a lot with being bored. If you’re not interested in something, you can’t do it, or you will really struggle to do it. And that can fall across both categories.

But hyperactive typically is considered like that really busy, can’t sit still, always doing something. There’s a lot of like because there’s such a variety of symptoms. But things like, starting to struggle to start tasks or struggling to finish them, right? You would likely identify as either being lazy or having a huge problem with procrastination, right?

It can be messy and disorganized, but it can also be in women, especially when we’re masking. It can be at the opposite end of the scale where we clean to hide anything or we have to stay busy, so we clean to the extreme, right? Like I’ve seen that. In women it’s often very perfectionist, right?

There’s a lot of perfectionist tendencies. And it’s not necessarily in the people sometimes identify like Barbie is the perfectionist, you know, perfect life, perfect house, perfect everything. No. It’ll be things like, ‘I have to get it right. I need to do it right. If I don’t do it right, I’m not going to do it.’ Right?

Like it’ll show up like that or it’s not good enough yet. So, I can’t put this work forward or I can’t show this to anyone, right? It’s not there yet. So, it’s those sneaky little perfectionist ways. It’s a lot of people pleasing because we’re so afraid of other people criticizing and rejecting us. That’s an RSD thing. Rejection, Sensitivity, Dysphoria which we can go into.

But it’s like a terrible fear of being rejected and criticized, which often leads to a lot of people pleasing, which also is one of the ways in which we can mask our symptoms. Gosh, there’s another one that comes to mind. Yeah, perfecting, people pleasing, and very much trying to perform and tick boxes. So, trying to sort of fit into society and do what we see everybody else doing. Kind of focusing on getting the approval of everybody else.

So, when we talk about symptoms there’s such a variety, like I think I could talk about them all day. But those are some of the ones I think really stand out for women.

Elizabeth: Yeah. Well, and I think that as I was hearing you talk, I resonate with a lot of those. And as far as the masking goes, like I am highly organized. But I think that those are just systems that I put in place to again, hide, how my brain actually works. And so like, I’m really, I don’t want to say rigid. Well, maybe I’m rigid about my to do list and my routines because I have a really hard time when I get out of routine of getting things done.

Xena: And I think that kind of speaks to our all or nothing piece because we’re very all or nothing, right? We’re very comfortable in the extremes, all or nothing. We’re not comfortable in the in between, in the gray there. So, we know that routine does work really well for us. And often, we approach it very much like, I’m all routine or as soon as I skip a day, like that’s it, life’s over. Right.

We’re very ‘ high highs, low lows,’ even in the emotional sense. Right. When life is good, life is great. But when I have a bad day, my whole life is terrible. Right. We’re very in the extremes, like speaking from experience.

But when you talk about like how you’ve created these systems in these routines that is one of the ways that you’ve learned to work with your brain because that supports you in having the life that you want.

So, I think that that’s a great thing. There are always things in our life, you know, when I start working with someone, and they’ll say, ‘Oh my God, am I just masking everything?’ It’s like, no! Like you’ve actually created systems and things that work for you. And it’s about discovering what’s working for you and what’s not. Right? And let’s amplify the things that are working for you and understand why they work.

Elizabeth: Yeah. You know, you just gave me a piece right there. Like I have employees. So, I have a private chef. I also have a housekeeper, which I love.

Xena: You have a private chef? I’m coming to visit you.

Elizabeth: Yes, please. Yeah, it’s amazing and I appreciate them. But at the same time, I really dislike having people in my home because they disrupt these systems and things that I have going on. Like, I don’t feel like I have control over everything because I don’t know where everything is right now. Like, I don’t know how much milk I have right now.

Xena: Yes.

Elizabeth: And that drives me crazy.

Xena: Yeah. And that’s often what I see in women is we like to have that control, cause if we don’t know what’s happening. right? And this is just very common for people with ADHD. If we have a picture of what’s happening, if we know what’s happening. And then, somebody like last minute changes that. We can have a very big reaction to that.

That seemingly doesn’t warrant the fact that we’ve just run out of milk, no big deal. But for us, it’s like, no, it feels like a really big deal. We have that intense emotional reaction to that. Because in our brain, we had planned for this, but that hasn’t eventuated. And now, my brain has to change to this scenario, right? And it requires a lot of our executive functions.

So, from a brain based perspective, it makes a lot of sense as to why we sort of struggle with this. But to other people outwardly, they’re like, ‘it’s not that big of a deal, why is there a problem?’

Yeah, very common. Like we talk about like task switching, going between tasks can be quite difficult, but also having that last minute changes, and last minute interruptions like that can be a very difficult one for people with ADHD. Yeah.

Elizabeth: Well, and so to make the pivot to conversation just a little bit to focus on health, like where we see that task switching come into play is like, if you have plans to go out to a restaurant. And you’re already thinking about what I’m going to eat at the restaurant. And then, for whatever reason, the restaurant doesn’t have a reservation for you, or they’re closed, or something happens, and you have to punt and go someplace else.

That can be a big deal for many of us because we’re like, well, I can’t have what I was going to have. So, therefore I may as well just eat the entire pizza.

Xena: Throw it out the window. Right?

Elizabeth: Exactly.

Xena: Yeah, I’d planned for this. I can’t do that. So, nah, I’m out. Yeah. Yeah. It’s very much like that checking out, and that kind of cause we can also be quite rebellious, but we can turn that towards ourselves and our goals, right? We rebel against ourselves and our goals. Yeah. So, that’s definitely when we can see that, that showing up. Yeah, for sure.

Elizabeth: And then, let’s talk about the dopamine cause I wanted to go back to that because dopamine is a feel good chemical. And we get it from starches and sugars. Yeah?

Xena: We get it from a lot of sources.

Elizabeth: Well, yes, social media.

Xena: Yeah. I love talking about dopamine. Like you might have to stop me if we go down this track cause I get very passionate. But when we talk about dopamine, it’s also really important to identify that we have two different sources of dopamine. So, we’ve got our fast dopamine, and then we’ve got our slow dopamine.

So, fast dopamine would be, if I was to scroll on my phone for 20 minutes, right? Effectively, I’m getting dopamine, but I’m spiking it. So, I’m getting it really quick. I often tell people like, if you would imagine I had a lemon and I chop a lemon in half. When I’m on my phone scrolling for 20 minutes, effectively, I’ve got half of my lemon and I’ve just squeezed all of the juice out. Squeezed it all out.

As soon as I get off my phone, there’s no juice left in my lemon. There’s nothing left to squeeze. I can try really hard, there’s nothing, right? What happens? My dopamine drops.

Then, we’ve got slow release dopamine, which would be like if I went for a walk, I’ve got some walking tracks, I’m out in nature, and I just do that for 20 minutes, right? I’ve just literally done it this morning. Go for a walk for 20 minutes out in nature. That would be like I get my other half of the lemon, and I hold it up, and I just slowly squeeze it, ‘drip, drip, drip.’

I’m getting dopamine slowly dripped throughout my 20 minute walk. But when I get back, I’m still releasing the dopamine. I’m still getting the drips for a while afterwards, okay? So, when we talk about the two different sources, the fast and the slow release. Fast release is stuff like sugar.

So, if we eat sugar, if we eat fast foods, any processed foods, it’s going to spike our dopamine really, really, really high. It would also be like the scrolling, the binge watching Netflix. Anything that doesn’t require effort is fast dopamine. Things that do require effort, fall into the slow category, the slow release category. Okay.

Elizabeth: Things that we enjoy doing, but that we have to work towards.

Xena: Yes, 100%. Yeah, it could be just like a hobby. If you enjoy knitting and you’re knitting that requires effort. It can be going for a walk. It’d be out in nature, right? Getting sunlight can actually help with producing dopamine. Cold water therapy is amazing. Huge studies on that, like cold water therapy is crazy for dopamine release.

But anything that requires effort, like working on your goals. It can even be if there is a video game that you’re playing, but it requires a lot of technical effort, and it’s quite difficult and you really have to like, think about it, that can even do it in the correct scenario, right?

The two different sources which I think is so important to understand because if we were to rewind like 400, 000 years back in like the cave. Dopamine back then was something that we got from you know hunting for food, foraging for berries, building shelter like raising our families, all of that sort of thing and all of that required effort

Today, dopamine is everywhere. We are saturated in dopamine. We do not like, I can pick up my phone, I can scroll it, order a pizza while I watch TV, sip a glass of wine, and snack on some lollies. Right? Like, I don’t have to move to get dopamine. Unfortunately, that is not so great for somebody with ADHD when we’re low on dopamine and we already are seeking it.

We’re constantly seeking dopamine to make up for what we don’t have and because dopamine helps us with motivation. We need a certain amount of dopamine in our system to be able to have enough motivation to be able to do things, but it also contributes to feelings of satisfaction and wellbeing in our life. And we talk about it being a feel good chemical, but it typically is more associated with pleasure.

Serotonin is another one which we also have a little bit less off. But that is definitely more of like a mood and a feel good one as well. Which is another one to be mindful of if you have ADHD.

There’s one other thing I think is really important when we talk about dopamine to understand. When our estrogen levels drop, our estrogen helps with the production of dopamine, right?

So, when our estrogen levels drop, we end up producing less dopamine. Which means that we have a lower mood, more tendency to procrastinate. It’s more difficult to get things done because we’ve got less drive, less effort. It’s like, we’ve got less fuel in the tank.

So, I think that that’s just really important for women to understand that when we do have those hormonal fluctuations, when we go through perimenopause. That if we’re experiencing those symptoms, it’s because we’re getting less dopamine.

If we can focus on increasing our slow release dopamine sources, the things that require effort, or if you think of it like more of the natural sources for dopamine. If we can increase those and even just tip the scales more in that direction, it will help hugely with how we feel, how much motivation we have, how much drive we’ve got, all of that. And we can actually slowly increase the amount of dopamine we’ve got in the tank over time.

I think that that’s just something that’s so helpful for people to understand because it often feels like we’ve got no control over it, but we do. We do have some control over that. So, yeah, I just wanted to mention that.

Elizabeth: Well, and as you were talking, I was just thinking about all of the other things that are happening to women in midlife. There are so many changes. Your children are getting older, they’re starting to become more independent. Many are moving away, you’re changing your relationship with your primary partner. Your body is changing physically, not to mention the hormones, which we’re talking about right now.

And then, we’re also changing our female friendships. Right? Because we no longer have friendships out of convenience that were just there because we have our kids and their parents are now our friends. And then, our careers are starting to change. And as well, our parents are starting to need us more, right?

So, there’s this huge crunch that’s happening for women in midlife and then to also have the estrogen drop. But also have the dopamine drop where it feels like I just can’t move through quicksand. Like it just is so much coming at women at the same time.

Xena: Oh yeah, 100%. Like it can be really, really difficult because like you say, there are so many different layers to it. Like so many different things happening at the same time. And I would just emphasize that that is why that focus on that slow release dopamine, which also helps often with the production of serotonin. When we’re talking about just things like sunlight, and getting out in nature, and exercise, and that sort of thing.

When we keep a focus on that or just even increase, just turn up the dial ever so slightly on that. That can help so much with our mood, with our stress because a lot of these things like, I walk every day, right? I just walk, it’s not particularly fast. I just walk every day, but that is hugely supportive for emotional regulation, right?

So, when I’m stressed, when I’m anxious, when I’m worried, when I’ve got all these things on my mind. And I’m like, I don’t have time for walking. It makes a world of difference because I tell you like, I’m always like, I don’t have time for that. But I feel so much better, and I come back with more energy, with a clearer head, feeling less stressed, right?

Like I’m not only am I increasing dopamine, serotonin, norepinephrine, all of these good chemicals. But I’m also regulating my emotions and helping with all of these difficult things that are going on in my life. And also showing myself, ‘Hey, I matter, and I’m important, and I’m allowed to go for a walk.’ Like I’m allowed to have some time for me, it makes such a difference in doing so.

Elizabeth: Well, and what you’re talking about really is self-care that’s outside of like eating vegetables and grueling workouts. So, how do you take care of yourself without feeling like it’s a burden. And I think that for many women, we struggle with the self-care piece because our time is going to everyone else. And so, your comment right there about, ‘I don’t have time’ is really super important.

Xena: Yeah. And I think that we are the first thing to drop off our priority list. We are. Right? Like we’re the first thing to go, Oh no, no, no, no. I don’t have to do that, but I need to. I have to do this thing for all these other people. And I often see when that’s happening when we’re dropping off our priority list is there’s often a lot of people pleasing happening. There’s a lot of sort of saying, ‘yes to things I don’t really want to say yes to.’

There’s a lot of like perfectionism kind of coming into play. Like, the house has to be perfect because somebody’s coming over kind of a thing. Right?

But also, Oh gosh, there was a third one that was so good. I love that. Like a pure ADHD moment. Like it’s just completely gone from my brain. Oh my gosh.

Elizabeth: It’ll come back.

Xena: No, there was a third one and it was great. And that was, here we go. If I ever, but this, here’s the funny thing, like this happens to me all the time, right? If context, I’m 38, right? But it happens to me all the time where I forget what I was saying mid-sentence. I forget the question I will, you know, that happens all the time.

And with the people I’m coaching, like, they’re like, Oh, okay. Yeah. That happens to me too. Like we were normalizing it. I think people often associate that with later. Whereas I’m seeing this, like people in their early thirties, right? Even younger sometimes are doing this all the time. And it’s because our working memory can’t always hold the sticky note, it falls off the wall, right? So, here we go. We just got to throw that in there.

Elizabeth: Yeah, I forget words all the time. Like I’ll be talking, and I just forget word.

Xena: Yeah, I forgot the word for grapefruit, and I was at the supermarket and I’m buying grapefruit, right? I had gone there to buy them because I just really wanted grapefruit and I’m buying grapefruit and I’ve got them at the self-checkout and they’re there and they’re on the way scale. And you’ve got to put like that you’ve got to start typing the name of the fruit and I’m just staring at the screen like, ‘oh shit,’ I’ve forgot nothing.

And eventually, like the person who helps you on the self-checkout she like wanders over to me and she’s like, ‘are you all right?’ And I’m like, ‘I have no idea what this is called.’ And she’s like, ‘it’s a grapefruit.’ And I was like, ‘thank you.’

And I’ve been talking about it. I walked to the supermarket with my partner, and I was like telling him how excited I was to be buying grapefruit. I knew the word, right? Got there, great. Nothing. I’m staring at the fruit. Nothing.

Elizabeth: Yeah. Okay.

Xena: Fantastic.

Elizabeth: Thank you for normalizing that. I appreciate it. Yeah. Going back to something that we were just talking about which was all of the things that are happening in women’s lives. And one of those is finding new friendships because I think that as women in midlife, we really are looking for a deeper kind of friendship than what one of my friends calls ‘chardonnay and artichoke dip conversations.’

Xena: I like that.

Elizabeth: Right? I’m on a bunch of different women’s groups on Facebook. And one thing that I see a lot of is conflict between women feeling like their friends aren’t putting in the effort or feeling like they don’t know where to find other female friendships or feeling left out. And so, as we were talking before today, we were talking about how ADHD might impact our friendships and our ability to reach out to friends.

Xena: It’s interesting because as you were saying that it’s reminding me of how when I went for my ADHD assessment, this was a few years back now. And I saw the psychiatrist and she was asking me about female friendships. She was like, have you struggled with friendships throughout your life? Have you lost friends? Have you had difficulty? And I kind of had to sit with that for a minute and I was like, ‘yeah, actually I have.’ Right. I have had difficulty with friendships.

For example, like my high school best friend stopped talking to me the day after her wedding. No idea why. Like the day after her wedding, I was a maid of honor at her wedding. Stopped talking to me. No idea why. Have never spoken to her since. And this has actually happened on a couple of occasions where I’ve had very close friendships that have just ended very abruptly.

And so, I was very interested in why she had asked that question. And I went and did a lot of research on it. And it is very common for people with ADHD, more so women to struggle with friendships. And there is a variety of factors for that. But as you were talking about like the conflict, the feeling left out, or feeling like your friends are not necessarily matching the effort that you put in.

So, the being out of sight, out of mind is definitely one element, right? We are very out of sight, out of mind. So, at the moment, I have a bunch of craft supplies in this wardrobe over here. You can’t see it, right? But I’ve got a wardrobe and I’ve got all these painting supplies cause I got hyper fixated on painting with fluoro paints. Okay.

And when I had those sitting on the ground of like in my office here, I would use them all the time. And I would like think about them. But as soon as I put them in the cupboard, I haven’t touched them for like a year. Out of sight, out of mind. I completely forget.

But we’re like that with people in our life as well, right? For example, my brother, I couldn’t tell you the last time I text him or called him. But if we need something, we will. Right? Or he’ll come visit at Christmas. Great. But it’s just so out of sight, out of mind. And it doesn’t mean I don’t care about him and think about him sometimes.

But again, out of sight, out of mind. If it’s not in my calendar or in front of me, I don’t often think about it. So, a lot of people in our lives interpret that as, well, they don’t care, or they’re not interested in hanging out, or they don’t make an effort, therefore. Right? And the irony of this because people with ADHD are very paradoxical, right? There’s a lot of contradictions in ADHD.

We experience something called RSD, which is Rejection, Sensitivity, Dysphoria, which means we are highly sensitive to real or perceived rejection, criticism, failure, or I’ll often say, attack, like feeling attacked as well falls into that category. And in some situation where we think that has happened, we can often lash out, be very external, or we can go internal and just shut down completely.

So, for example, if a friend has not reached out to us, right? A friend hasn’t reached out and maybe we sent them a message and they hadn’t replied. We will often take that as a form of rejection as a failure, as something very personal, and we will shut down. And we will withdraw from that person rather than having a conversation, we just go through this process, shut down and withdraw from that person.

And in doing so, we create more distance, and have less friendships, or less connection with people, or less time spent with people because of that. So, RSD is a huge element in female friendships, as well as the being very out of sight, out of mind. So, those are two big things.

Elizabeth: Yeah, it makes total sense because if someone hasn’t texted me back, I’m not going to go out and text her again for her to reject me a second time. Right?

Xena: Right. Yeah. Imagine that. But here’s the funny thing. All the time, I do this all the time. I will read a message and I go, ‘okay, right. I need to reply to that.’ But at the moment I’m like, I don’t think I have time, or I don’t know what to say just yet. So, I will screenshot it. This is my system. I screenshot the message to remind me to text her a message back later. Because if I don’t, I know if I don’t screenshot it, I won’t see it there to think to reply. So, I screenshot it.

But then, I got like a whole bunch of screenshots throughout the day, and I just missed that one. Like I’ve got thousands of these things, right? So, I missed that one and I don’t text back. But I had wanted to text back, and I care about my friend. But I forgot, and my system has failed me to help me keep it in sight, right?

And then, like you say, we interpret that as, well, I don’t want to text her again because obviously, she hasn’t texted me back cause she doesn’t want to, or maybe I offended her, we don’t know. Right? But we attach some meaning to that. That’s not so good. And then, we’re like, Oh, I’ll just leave it.

Elizabeth: Well, it’s funny, just before we got on to record, I got a message from a friend of mine. She texted me and she was like, ‘why did you ghost me?’ And I was like, Oh my God, I totally did not mean to. What I do is I leave the messages as unread. So that, that reminds me, she asked me to do something. And I was like, ‘I didn’t, I just left the messages unread because I wanted to do that thing that you told me to and I didn’t want to forget.’

Xena: Yeah.

Elizabeth: And she interpreted that like as me ghosting her, but I just had time to do the thing that she wanted me to do for her.

Xena: Right. And that’s like, that’s your system is leave it unread, right? Like sometimes I’ll use that system too, right? Leave it unread. And then, I’ll come back cause no doubt there’s going to be something I need to do, something I need to action, something I need to think about, whatever, right? Like it’s going to require a certain amount of mental, emotional, physical, or energy for this thing, so I’m not going to do it just yet. Right?

Elizabeth: Yeah.

Xena: But then, somebody else interprets that as you’ve ghosted me. It’s like, ‘no, I just hadn’t got to it yet. But notice how like when that sort of thing happens, that can impact our friendships when it’s not talked about. Right? It’s like, hey, ‘ I thought you’d ghosted me.’ And you’re like, ‘ have I done something wrong?’ If we have that conversation, great. But if we don’t, that’s when those friendships start to kind of slowly come apart.

Elizabeth: Yeah. Okay, you were going to say something else after the RSD.

Xena: Yeah. There’s one other thing I think I like to tell people, which is with women and men do this too, right? Like people with ADHD, we often relate through story. So, we’re highly empathetic. So, when somebody tells us something, we will often share a similar story to show that we understand, to empathize, and to demonstrate, to try and connect, right? To demonstrate our understanding and our empathy. That can often be misinterpreted.

So, for example, one of my clients was at her gym and she was chatting with another gym girl who she’d got a bit friendly with. And this girl hadn’t been there recently. And the girl said to her, ‘Hey, I had a concussion, recently.’ And like, I’ve struggled with being able to focus and pay attention and things like this.

And so, my client said to her, ‘Oh my gosh, I’d so get that. It’s really difficult.’ Like I have ADHD and I really struggle with like focus and attention. And I know how some days are worse than others, et cetera. And this woman just looked at her and went, ‘that’s not the same thing.’

And then, they like shut the conversation down. And that was kind of it, right? Like their budding friendship was over. And it’s so sad because our intention in that moment is to connect, to demonstrate that, ‘Hey, like I kind of understand where you’re at and I’ve experienced something similar. And I just want to empathize.’ Like I get how hard that is.

Our intent is beautiful and sometimes it’s misinterpreted as you’re hijacking or you’re trying to make it about you or whatever. And that’s not our intent. And sometimes when we get really excited, like we’ll interrupt or we’ll like, we don’t want to forget what we’re saying. So, we’re just like, we don’t even get the pause button. So, we say it.

And that again can be interpreted as you’re being rude. You’re interrupting me. You don’t care. Like those things can be misread, especially by people who are neurotypical, not so much by other ADHDers. Because we are all doing it to each other, and it just gets very excitable. So, that’s another thing that can just impact our ability to connect and maintain relationships. Yeah.

Elizabeth: Yeah. So then, what’s the, I don’t want to say cure, but is it just figuring out ways of dealing with your neurodivergent brain? Like what you’re talking about with the messages.

Xena: Yeah, I think it’s really important that you understand how your brain works. So, if you have ADHD and these are things that you do and that you struggle with. When you understand how and why you work the way you work, you stop beating yourself up for it. You can apply more compassion and curiosity to the way that you work. But also, when you have that understanding, you can then sort of work in ways that can support you.

So, for example, like if you’re out of sight, out of mind, and you do want to focus on female friendships. Do we put reminders in your calendar? For me, it’s as simple as I literally have a list of my friends. Because if I don’t have, I know it sounds silly, right? I remember at school having like a good books and a bad books and I would write names of people in them. Right? Like when I was like six.

But now, I like have a list of my friends and I will look at that list. And I will make sure that I like reach out to those people and connect with them because if I don’t have their names written down, I literally forget.

These are people I like to have coffee with. These are people I like to spend time with. These are the people I like to hang out with or reach out to. And I will put reminders in my calendar as well, because without that visual cue, I don’t remember.

Also, I’ve had conversations with friends where I have explained, ‘Hey, I’m really out of sight, out of mind. Sometimes I will read a message and not reply. And I just want you to understand that that doesn’t mean anything about you.

And that’s been really helpful to have those conversations and for those friends to know that. And sometimes that friend will send a message a couple of times before I actually reply. And they don’t take it as she doesn’t want to spend time with me or she doesn’t care or anything like that cause now they understand how I work. And not everyone’s going to get it, but I have liked being able to kind of communicate that to a certain friends just so that they understand.

Elizabeth: Yeah. I think that that’s actually wise and important. Like, I think about my husband, and I will also reach out to people. And they’re just some people who aren’t good at reaching out and saying, ‘Hey, do you want to get together?’ But they always say, yes. Right?

Xena: Yeah. I have friends like that too, right? Like I’m shocking at reaching out to people to arrange that. But every time certain people reach out like, ‘Hey, do you want to go on a girls weekend? Do you want to go out for dinner?’ And I’m always like, ‘yes, I would love to see you. I would love to do that.’

So, I also think we’re very quick to make it mean something negative. Right? Like, Oh, they don’t reach out to us to arrange dinner. So, therefore maybe they don’t really like being friends or they feel like they have to. No.

Elizabeth: Yeah. Well, and I think that that goes back to the rejection sensitivity. Right?

Xena: Yeah.

Elizabeth: That every time I ask, do you want to go out with me? I expose myself, my vulnerability to being rejected. Even if you say, yes, every single time. I still have to make the effort and put myself out there.

Xena: I’m Putting myself out there, and it could be a no. Right? And that’s scary.

Elizabeth: Yeah. That they’re just being nice to me.

Xena: Our brain is so good at making up stories, right? Yeah. But understanding things like, how your brain works, but especially the RSD. Understanding what the RSD is and how that shows up and it gives you the ability to go, hang on a minute, is this an RSD response? Could this mean something else? Could it just mean that that person’s busy? Could it just mean that they forgot? Because I forget all the time to reply. Could it just be something as simple as that?

Elizabeth: Yeah.

Xena: And having that awareness helps us to kind of question the meaning that we might attach in that scenario. Yeah.

Elizabeth: Ugh, thank you for being on the podcast, again.

Xena: A third time. I feel so special. Thank you.

Elizabeth: So, you have a new podcast. Are these the conversations that you have on your podcast?

Xena: Yes. So, I talk about ADHD all day, every day. So, my podcast is ‘Navigating Adult ADHD.’ And yeah, I talk about everything ADHD from understanding your ADHD to understanding RSD, emotional dysregulation. Self-worth is a big one. A lot of us struggle with self-worth issues. How to work with your brain. All the things. Dopamine is something I love to talk about. Talk about dopamine, serotonin, all the different things.

One thing that I talk about a lot is how we’re wired for interest. So, you talked earlier about like struggling when you’re bored. That’s because we have an interest based nervous system. So, if something doesn’t interest us, we will often put it off, avoid it, procrastinate it. It’ll be a real struggle. It’ll just be very mentally draining.

But knowing that we are interest based, there are a lot of things that we can do to make things more interesting. And to think outside the box for ways in which we can do tasks in a more interesting way. So, yeah, that’s something I’m fascinated with. I talk about that over there as well. So, yeah, Navigating Adult ADHD. That’s where you’ll find me.

Elizabeth: And where else can they find you?

Xena: My website is XenaJones.com and Xena is spelled with an X and then over on Instagram is also just navigating adult ADHD.

Elizabeth: Yeah. Amazing. Thank you for being here today. I appreciate you.

Xena: Oh, thank you. It was such a pleasure. I love chatting with you. So, thank you for having me.

Wow. That was such an incredible episode. I hope you enjoyed it as much as Xena and I enjoyed talking with you. Thank you for hanging out with me and Xena today. And I don’t know about you, but like she dropped so many amazing things. Let me do a quick recap of what we learned today.

First, ADHD isn’t just a kid thing. Tons of women are getting diagnosed with it in midlife. Second, your ADHD brain might be messing with your friendships. But don’t worry, there are ways to deal with it. And then third, there are simple tricks to boost those feel good brain chemicals like dopamine. And who doesn’t want that?

Now, if you’re sitting there thinking, Holy wow, this sounds just like me or someone I know. Do them a favor, share this episode. Seriously, it could be a game changer for them. And hey, if you’re ready to take charge of your health, I’ve got your back. Maybe you’re tired of your health getting in the way of living your best life, or maybe you just want to feel better in your own skin. Whatever it is, I can help.

Coaching could just be what you need to kick those health goals into high gear. So, if you’re curious, reach out to me. Let’s chat about how we can get you feeling awesome. Thank you again for tuning in. Until next time, have an amazing week, everyone. I’ll talk to you next time. Bye-bye.

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