Alex Partridge: ADHD, Alcoholism & Anxiety

Wureeay LADS LADS LADS! ;) Mr LADBible himself; The wonderful Alex Partridge of ADHD Chatter shares his ADHD ‘safari’ in this very special episode.

Alex began his podcast to help others not feel as broken as he did prior to ADHD Diagnosis just 1.5 years ago. I loved being a guest on ADHD Chatter as much as I loved this podswap!
Alex has been sober 2 years after battling alcoholism. A commonly co-occurring condition of ADHD; a compulsion he suffered  in a bid to help him cope with the severe anxiety he developed from masking his physical hyperactivity.
‘Spike’ is an inspiration and an absolute LEGEND! THANK YOU SO MUCH ALEX!

I‘m so grateful and excited to have Alex and a whole host of other legends join me for the LAST Alien Nation Show in Brighton Sat 20th July! Where an ADHD Seminar meets Bingo, Karaoke and Cabaret and ADHD Adults meet each other! TICKETS HERE
Find out more about ADHDAF Live Events: HERE
If you're nervous to attend solo, you can sign up for the Welcome Party to be met at the door and sat with others in the same boat: HERE

TRIGGER WARNING: Contains swearing and mentions of: alcoholism, criminality, addiction, self harm, suicide, relationship struggles, anxiety, depression, premature death, education struggles, shame

If you are in need of support YOU ARE NOT ALONE! There is immediate help out there so please REACH OUT

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Thank you to Sessionz for editing and jingle and an enormous THANK YOU to the Planet ADHDAF Community Members for keeping this Podcast going for over 2 YEARS so that other literally like-minded legends can benefit from these crucial conversations (also making this the longest job I've ever had!) xx

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SELF DIAGNOSIS IS VALID & ADHD IS REAL.
Big love
Laura

Transcript

I think a lot of the bad things I've ever done have been a result of impulse, but also all of the good things. I would never have started businesses if I didn't just take that leap in the early stage and just start. And I didn't. Without that lack of risk perception. Yeah. I didn't. I jumped off a cliff and learned to fly on my way down.

Literally. Yeah. I didn't jump on the cliff, but you know, I had no idea how to do a lot of things, but I just impulsively started and I was confident in the process that I would learn as I was going. And I think that's really important. I think that's  a strength for a lot of people with ADHD is that sort of lack of awareness, which I think can be a strength in the risk of what might come if you just take that first step towards.

a business, a relationship, whatever it is, a lot of people don't do that. And if you trust the process to know that once you take that first step, then things will fall into place. If you are taking a step on a landscape that's adjusting and you're able to maintain your interest in it. So yeah, anything that's impulsive, you know, impulsivity has got me into huge trouble financially.

I had bailiffs turning up at my door many times when I was younger through various decisions, like credit cards, up to my eyeballs in them. You know, I do a lot of things that a lot of people say that I'm crazy to do, you know, that they don't always work, but I certainly try a lot of stuff. And, you know, it's like throwing 10 darts at a darts board.

One of them might hit the bullseye. And that's what's happened. But I think I wouldn't have done anything if I didn't have that sort of fearlessness within me. You'll likely recognise the voice of the wonderful Alex Partridge from his podcast, ADHD Chatter. This is the second interview I've had with this legend because we did a pod swap.

If you've not already heard Alex interviewing moi, I'll share the link in the blurb of this episode. But now, let's I'll leave you with this role reversal and interview with Mr. Lad Bible himself. Whee! Lads, lads, lads! 

So blatantly obvious, the late Discovery diagnosed us in treatment at 38 for severe combined type ADHD in 2022. Not only improved, but genuinely.  Life, which I have since dedicated to fighting for change amidst the global ADHD crisis. As the acronym suggests, I swear like a sailor, and each episode will contain sensitive subject matter, so please always read the description before diving in, where you will also find a link to resources for support.

These crucial conversations with experts by lived experience are shared to inform, validate, shame, eradicate, and unite the ADHD community with a fair few laughs along the way. I've been labeled too much all my life, but finally I celebrate my too muchness and use my justice sensitivity to let the world know that ADHD presents differently in each individual.

Self diagnosis is valid and that ADHD is not a trend. ADHD is real. And I want all ADHDers of all genders to know you are not alone. The leopard is a symbol of Aberdeen, Scotland, where this podcast began. It also symbolizes bravery, the reclaiming of power, and I'm a total hun. So leopard printners become the uniform of the ADHD AF community, uniting to support each other and push for change, which together we can make happen.

We are the leopard. Print. Army. Army. Hear  us raw.  I'm Laura and I am A-D-H-D-A-F-D.  Your name please, Alex Partridge. Pronouns. He him. Age 35. Location. I'm in Brighton, south Coast in England.  Occupation. Gosh, um, entrepreneur slash podcast host, I guess. And author. Favourite film? Ooh, um, I love Braveheart and Titanic.

Ah, classics. Favourite animal? I'd have to say dog, yeah. Always had dogs. And I've got a lovely five year old French bulldog now, called Milo. Absolutely dogs. Dopamine dresser or calming neutrals?  I wear the same thing every day, Laura. I was going to say, you have a uniform, right? Well, yeah, no, I wear a white t shirt.

I have three white t shirts and this denim jacket. Denim jacket if I'm doing something casual. And I have a suit jacket if I'm doing something smarter. But yeah, I find the whole process of deciding what to wear very overwhelming. And I generally find it's just more efficient if I wear the same thing every day.

Same. Yeah, I hear you. My husband's the same. He pretty much wears the same thing every day. He's got his uniform. And I just have sequins or rags. I'm really extreme. So I don't ever buy anything normal. And then I'm like, have to go to the shop and I don't have anything to wear apart from pajamas and a book or a ball gown, something like that.

So childhood nickname. I don't have a childhood nickname. I was called Spike at university because I had bleach blonde hair then and it was all very wild and surfer ish like and I used to come out my dorm room with like my dressing gown on, cup of tea in one hand, fag in the other. And I look like Spike from Notting Hill.

Oh, I love it. My housemates used to say, Spike's stuck. And they still call me Spike. That's their group of friends.  Oh, I love it. Okay. What city in the world are you most like?  Probably Paris. Because it's very emotional. But also incredibly chaotic.  I don't know if you've ever driven in Paris. Like, it's just the most chaotic thing ever.

Especially that Arc de Triomphe roundabout. That's like the epicentre of Paris. The chaosness and that represents my life. So yeah, Paris, because of the emotional, incredibly emotional, but also incredibly chaotic.  Oh, I love it. I'm actually going to Paris next week.  Planning, love it or loathe it? I loathe it.

I loathe it. I've realised that it has to be done with my business. There's things that I do now which I used to hold a lot of shame about in terms of how I organise my life. The conventional ways just don't work for me. I can't use digital calendars. I can't use anything electric. Anything that goes behind a screen, anything that goes in my pocket doesn't work.

Now I have to use big visual printout, hard copy calendars, whiteboards, all of that kind of stuff. And I have to write stuff down as soon as it comes into my sphere of consciousness. If someone says, can you do something? Are you free next Friday? I have to write it down. I've learned that write it down immediately, then something else will come along and gets my attention and that thing will just cease to exist.

And I'll forget to turn up to that meeting or that to event. So I just have to write stuff down immediately in a big visual way. And I actually quite enjoy it now. Probably about five years ago, before I even knew I had ADHD, I subconsciously, that was just one of the things that I started to do because I realized that I was just not compatible with most traditional ways of staying organized.

They didn't work for me.  That's super interesting. So do you not have the kind of ADHD that sabotages and says, Oh, I'll just remember that this time. Do you do that? I'm like, oh, oh, I would write it down, but I'll remember, I won't forget. Nope, I forgot.  Yes, my phone still goes off at least twice a week, and I feel bad about it from someone who says, you know, the meeting's started, Alex.

or where are you? And I'm just, I get the text and that my stomach just fills with anxiety because I've forgotten a meeting and I've let someone down and someone waiting in a meeting room for me or on a zoom call and I'm not there. So 100 percent it happens every week. My way to stay organized is not perfect.

It's helped. It's much better than it was That's free five years ago, when I was just using all of the standard ways to stay organized. Google calendars, a digital diary. But none of them worked. So now I would say I keep 60, 70 percent of appointments. Whereas before it was less than 10%, and everything was chaos behind the scenes.

Now. There's some. Yeah. structure and I honour a lot more meetings and I don't let as many people down. That's fantastic, you've found your system. What is your ADHD diagnosis status?  So I was diagnosed about a year and a half ago with ADHD.  Okay, and did you, did you know before that that you were, was it a diagnosis you were seeking or did it sort of come out of the blue? 

Yeah, so my partner  and I always  had a back and forth whenever something happened, and I would say, get really frustrated and quite upset sometimes, and ADHD was a word that I was using, an expression I was using, probably two, three years prior to seeking the assessment.  Just the obvious things, you know, turning up late, forgetting appointments.

That was really where most of the chaos was, you know, I was trying to run businesses, trying to function in a way that I deep down knew that I was capable of doing, but for whatever reason, and I didn't know why.  Things were falling apart just through my inability to keep my organization on track. I was just getting so  filled with shame.

It was almost daily, like the texts, the emails saying, Alex, like, is everything okay? Where are you? And it would be again, it's like, I've forgotten something else. Why can't I remember  a basic thing? Like. A 10 AM zoom call with Sarah, like, why can I not remember that? And I've forgotten it, let her down.

Things aren't progressing at the speed that I want them to, because I can't remember the basic things of, of running a business, which is turning up to a meeting. Um, so yeah, I was, I, and then I was almost identifying as having ADHD, probably two, three years prior to the diagnosis. And then the tipping point for me was I, I really got this incredible excitement about starting a podcast, a business podcast, and I impossibly bought.

I didn't even know it was impulsive at the time. This is the thing. Like I just was leaning and acting on the excitement and I bought all of the cameras. I turned my bedroom downstairs into a state of the art podcast studio. And I wanted to make a business podcast called walk away. Why is that? I hired a producer, a director.

I did all the branding. I bought all of the equipment in about, and I did all of this in about six hours. I booked all of the guests, some of them quite high profile. And then the postman delivered the stuff three days later, and I had no interest in doing this podcast anymore. And I was there, almost like fighting back the tears, signing for all this expensive equipment, knowing I had to now send an email to all of these people saying, I'm really sorry, the podcast is no longer available.

And I lied. I said, it's going in a new direction. I don't think you'll be a good fit anymore, but it was a lie because the podcast wasn't going in any direction. I had lost interest in it. I was looking at this mountain of cardboard boxes from Amazon, just dumbfounded at the contrast between the excitement I had at 3am three nights ago to now looking at this pile of Amazon boxes in my room downstairs, stood there in the dark, almost fighting back tears, thinking, What the hell is going on?

And that really was the moment where I thought, let's get assessed. Like the producer who I hired said, when did you get your ADHD diagnosis? And I looked at him and said, what? I didn't tell him that I had been suspecting it for a while, but I, he said, well, this, to me, it could be a lot of other things, but this to me, like, looks like it could be that classic boom and bust ADHD and then lose interest.

And that was what started the process. And I got assessed in the six months after that.  Gosh, that is amazing. I'm not laughing at you. I'm only laughing because you've got to. Like, that's why I do the most ADHD thing, because it's one of those where when you don't know what's going on, like, it's so ridiculous.

You get in this situation and you're just like, how did I get here?  This doesn't make any sense and how could I even explain it to anybody because it's so ridiculous, you know, but yeah, it's good that you suspected it at least that would have been something  and self diagnosis is valid so, but it's fantastic that you got your diagnosis.

So we'll come back to that in a minute. So what age was that? Sorry. So that was I was 34 when I got diagnosed.  And the process, was it easy or traumatic?  I mean, I have to say that I was incredibly lucky and I went private. So what was difficult for me was probably what a lot of people would really want.

You know, I was assessed and diagnosed within about three months, which I know is incredibly privileged and very rare. So I can't, I don't really want to sit here and say it was difficult because I know many people are waiting years and years and years. It was a flashback to a lot of the earlier anxiety in my life when I did the questionnaires.

And.  Anxiety has always been the key symptom, if that's the right word for me. Anxiety has plagued me really my whole life. I remember when I had my first anxiety attack, when I was six years old, sat in the back of a classroom and the teacher pointed at me and said, Alex, do you know the answer to that question?

Completely interrupted, like a fantastic internal daydream staring out of the window  and. In that moment, all of the other kids turned around and looked at me. All of the attention was suddenly on me. And I remember feeling my palms going sweaty. I went bright red, my heart was going and I jumped up and ran out of the classroom.

And I found someone in the corridor and I said, please help me. Please call an ambulance. I'm having a heart attack. And I remember the paramedic about half an hour later, looking at me and just reassuring me that I wasn't having a heart attack and that I was having an anxiety attack at six years old.

That's the first time the word anxiety was mentioned to me. When I was 16, I got misdiagnosed with Generalized Anxiety Disorder, put on anti anxiety medication, beta blockers. My parents didn't know why they were chasing me around the garden because I was refusing to go to school. I was so terrified.  to go back to that environment. 

Anxiety has always been the Achilles heel. It's always been, you know, I had an anxiety attack two weeks ago. I still have them on a monthly basis now. I think I hide them really well, which is probably not the best thing to do, but anxiety has been what took me to medical care originally. And then you realize, was it just me hiding all of this hyperactivity that was causing that anxiety?

And I look back, and I think I am quite naturally a physically hyperactive person, but I think for various reasons that I don't really understand, and I'd love to explore with a therapist why I feel like I can't show that hyperactivity, why I can't show that physical hyperactivity. Because in some situations it comes out, from around certain people, from meeting someone new.

I can be very physically hyperactive, I can be very fun, very, if I'm around a certain different group of people who know me well, I can almost clam up and feel like that's misbehaving. You have to, yeah. And I suddenly, it goes all in, all in my head, and that's when the anxiety can really spiral for me. 

Gosh, it's really got me. I was like, so, so little to be going through there. That's, um, that's really awful. And I guess, you know, it's so interesting. Obviously, predominantly, I end up talking mostly to women on this podcast and we kind of go through this whole idea of stereotypes being one of the main barriers to why ADHD was missed until later in life.

Why do you think it was missed in you? Because you were the right gender for the stereotype. So what do you think it was that, that led you to being misdiagnosed? I mean, the fact that you were even in a doctor's surgery with these problems, it just makes you wonder why more questions weren't asked, you know? 

I never fitted the stereotype of what I genuinely think many, most people, even doctors thought it was back then. Yeah. I just never, ever was physically hyperactive. I was always just keeping it internalized, terrified to fidget, terrified to let me be my real self, because I thought that was, you know, naughty and that I would get told off.

And as a result of that, it caused me incredible internalized anxiety. And as soon as I realized alcohol was a thing, and that actually was the thing that quietened that, that's when I started drinking on my own again, never with people, you know, I think I wouldn't take me back to when I was about 17 and I really started just isolating myself, knowing that alcohol was the only thing that quietened that anxiety and that's when really things started going bad.

You know, there's lots of stories here. The main one, really, that took me into AA meetings was when I was about 17, and the anxiety was so much. And I knew that the only thing, or I thought the only thing, that would soothe that was, was vodka. And there was one particular day that I woke up in a hospital, absolutely no idea how I got there.

And the nurse looked at me and said two members of the public had found me in an alleyway the night before at about 3am in the morning with a bottle of vodka clutching it like it was my whole world.  They tried to help me and I staggered away and I fell, hit my head on the wall apparently and they called an ambulance.

And I remember as the nurse was telling me this, I just remember this. overwhelming feeling of shame and anxiety. Primarily because that was my real self in a way, that 16, 17 year old in that alleyway, allowed to be quite physically hyperactive, doing what he wanted, and then getting caught. And I felt this overwhelming feeling of anxiety.

And I knew in that moment, the only thing that would, would cure that anxiety was more alcohol. So I actually tried to stand up and leave the hospital and I ignored the nurse. And she sort of said to me, Alex, where are you going? As I left the hospital and I tried to make my way over to the petrol station where I knew there was more alcohol. 

But the police have been called, and before I knew it, I was in the back of a police car. They were reading my rights to me, and my parents had been called, and I remember seeing my mum and dad looking at me through the window of the police car, with this look of absolute fear and desperation in their eyes.

Absolutely no idea what was wrong with me, no idea how to help me. And that really was my rock bottom and what took me into alcohol AA meetings.  And that's probably when I look back the first also time when I started hearing ADHD mentioned because, you know, there's a whole nother conversation, but the link between ADHD and addiction is huge.

And I started hearing ADHD and AA meetings at 17 years old, but absolutely no interest in understanding what it meant or was. I thought my primary issue was, was alcoholism. And now you can look back through the lens of ADHD and think, wow, okay. That was me coping with the anxiety that the ADHD was causing me because I've been masking so hard. 

I'm not allowed to be my real true self. I want to be physically hyperactive. I want to move. I want to fidget. I want to do all these things, but I can't because that's naughty. Well, that's what I thought. So I contained it. And all that hyperactivity found its way to my head, which was torture.  It took me to hospital, how I was dealing with it.

Yeah, because that's the thing is like, how you actually are is inherently wrong. And you're not enough and you have to be something else.  It's so awful. I'm so sorry that you went through that. Are you still going to AA? Do you go to AA now? Not so much. I'm very connected with members. I have a WhatsApp group.

I have many close friends who are my inner circle, who I speak to, one particular person every day. And you know, that keeps me grounded, keeps me reminded of my requirement to stay in that world. I'm very aware that I am like other people who, I have a drink, I cannot stop drinking. It initiates this compulsion where I can't stop and the horse bolts and I have no idea how that night is going to end.

What I know from experience, it most likely ended me in hospital after three days. No sleep. Binge. And I just lose control. And I just, I'm just running away from the real world. And it's scary because a lot of people do really, really, really scary things when they're in that state. And it's terrifying to know how one of those binges could end.

So that's why I have to stay grounded and stay connected to that world of recovery. Because it's my foundation that everything else is built on. If that wobbles, my relationship, everything that I have, my podcast.  Everything that I'm doing will fall apart. If that first foundation of, oh, I can't have a drink wobbles, everything else will collapse. 

It's so funny, isn't it? Because it feels like it's precariously perched, like it's on a knife edge, but actually, you know, you can see it there, how, how fragile it could be, how everything that you've built your life and all that you have just sits on this ledge almost, but actually when you look at it the other way.

It isn't at all because you have control, you know what you need to do to keep yourself in the right place to not take those risks and that's really, really amazing, really amazing. How long have you been sober? About  a couple of years now. Yeah.  It's an ongoing process, you know, and it's that fear of what will happen at the end of one of those binges.

And that's, that's a really powerful force when, if you do have a wobble and you have a moment, what will happen if I just say, Oh, you know what? Let's just go for it.  In that moment, that might sound like a good idea, but from experience, you have absolutely no idea where that moment will end. It could end in hospital, most likely.

It could end in some really, really scary places, which I think I need a trigger warning to say. You know, so it's very, very scary. It really unlocks a demon inside of some of us, particularly me, that is capable of doing some really self sabotaging, really life threatening stuff. So it's always good to keep yourself reminded of that and how everything, everything, my relationships, everything is fundamentally based on the fact that if that lower level foundation wobbles, then everything will collapse around it. 

It's a call so close to my heart. My dad's in AA. He's a recovering alcoholic. And um, I've told a few stories at the live shows about the ridiculous situations that I've. Ended up in with alcohol and it's never been as extreme as that, but it has always plagued me and frightened me because for my dad, it's been as extreme as, as you are describing.

It's funny because I was brought up as the child of somebody in AA, but then when I found out about ADHD and he quite clearly has ADHD, which he's never been diagnosed for, it did kind of reframe it all a bit more for me. It's the two that go together that make sense, rather than a lot of the shame and guilt that he has carried or has had put on him in his lifetime for the decisions that he made, intoxicated or in order to go and drink or whatever, actually through the lens that I now have of ADHD and what a commonly co occurring condition alcoholism is, it does really reframe things.

Do you feel that way?  Yeah, massively. Massively. Absolutely. It so much makes sense. And I also think the denial is really powerful and it gets a lot of people. A lot of people don't accept that they are an alcoholic. You have to go to a really dark place, I think, a lot of the time to really have that realization.

And I think that denial can creep back over time. And that's why it's so important to stay connected to that why and that understanding of your past and what has happened in the past and why you can't drink and how life can be amazing without drink. I think, you know, back to my early stages when I was really struggling with denial and I always said to myself, I'm not an alcoholic.

Of course, I'm not an alcoholic. I can drink like a gentleman. I can go out and have a drink. Go home and go to bed like everyone else seems to be able to do. And I remember locking myself in my flat with two beers and thinking, I'm going to test this. I'm going to drink these two and go to bed. And I did this about five times, five, six times, Laura, every single time I woke up the next morning.

with about seven empty cans, an empty bottle of wine and sometimes other stuff on the end of my bed and I would just wake up in the morning and look at it and burst into tears and it took five or six of those tests to realize that I have no control once I have a sip.  Yeah. So what about your anxiety?

How do you manage that? Cause I guess the funny thing is, I really relate to what you're saying about needing the alcohol to medicate, to help you with the anxiety. But obviously, as we know, that is fuel to the fire, especially, you know, not just the repercussions, but even the physical feelings in the body.

If you wake up the next day, hung over, you're double anxious, you know, it's, it's making it worse. You're literally making it worse.  So what now? Like, how do you manage your anxiety? I've been very aware of it, and knowing that it's not going to control me.  That's been quite empowering, to try and silence it.

You know, I'm not going to say there's certain things I do that has made it go away, because that's a lie. I had an anxiety attack two weeks ago. I do exercise a lot. I know that that's quite an obvious one, but I walk my dog every day. I really am intentional about getting out as early as I can with my dog.

I find just connecting with nature, getting out for an hour in the morning, going barefoot in the grass, all these kinds of stuff really, really helps to set the day off on a good foundation. that lowers the chance of that anxiety creeping up later in the day. Or if it does come later in the day, it mitigates it and lowers the chance of it being really, really bad.

Lowering my use of social media, which is very hard when I work on that playground, but I'm very intentional about not looking at my phone first thing in the morning. I think I said this on the podcast, you know, you wouldn't let a hundred people into your bedroom first thing in the morning. So why let them into your mind?

And I'm very intentional about not automatically reaching over to my bedside table and going on Instagram. As soon as I open my eyes, I think a lot of people, in fact, I think most people do that. I think it's just been conditioned and didn't do it. I'm feeling personally victimized by this conversation now, Alex. 

But yeah, I mean, you know, simple things like that. All of these things are easier said than done. I wish I could say, oh, just get out for an hour every day. Don't look at your phone. It's Social media is addictive in itself. It's difficult. Not everyone's able to just get outside and go for a walk. And if you are able, then we don't always have the motivation.

So none of these things are absolutes all the time. And I think, you know, when I do look at my phone first thing in the morning, when I, if I only go for a 10 minute dog walk instead of an hour one, you know, I, I don't beat myself up for it and I don't give myself too much of a hard time and really also trying to stay connected with, you My core friendship group, which is incredibly small, really is probably two or three people, really try and be more intentional about communicating with them, which is incredibly hard, whether it's ADHD related or not, but I could tend to get in the habit of forgetting people exist if I don't have like them immediately in front of me.

And I can, I've often in the past lost a lot of friends that way because I've met someone really bonded with them, had a great time. Spent two or three months going out for dinner, playing football, whatsapping, and then suddenly they're not giving me joy anymore. It sounds really harsh, but I just lose the motivation to communicate with them and they drop off out of my life and it's on to the next one.

And then it's gone to the next friend. Then it's on to the next friend. And it's like a merry go round of friendships, which ends up leaving me feeling very. lonely. So now I'm very intentional about maintaining the friendships that I do have, because I do really value them. You know, I'm thinking of three people, and they really probably know me better than anyone.

And we don't speak all the time. That's the nice thing about it. We don't speak every day. Once, once a month or two months ago, I go to Jim's house and we have a great night playing Xbox together all night. We don't need to speak every day because we kind of understand each other. He's quite similar to me.

Yeah. So it's funny, isn't it? But like, on the Alien Nation tour, I talk about that novelty in relationships and how I do think that that is really heartbreaking. Because at your core, you know, if you connect with somebody, you connect with them, but you also can't help it if that novelty comes along and trips you up.

I know for me in relationships, probably the biggest problem is time blindness. So it will be the, yes, I've forgotten to reply to that message. And in my head, I'm like, I must reply to that. I must reply to that. for months. That's the weirdest thing. It's not just the time blindness of not knowing how long it's been since I've spoken to somebody.

It's also how long I will tell myself I'm going to do that thing today and not realizing I've literally been repeating it to myself for months. So yeah, then the time just slips away and people slip away. I do think it's really sad. So yeah, I think it's really lovely that you do that. How about medication?

Are you on meds?  No, I've never taken ADHD medication. If I'm honest, I think I've asked this question a lot. And I think the reason is, is because I've always worked in a way that enables me to, ever since I was at university, and now at the podcast, I'm in a very privileged position of being able to work.

when I want and dictate how I work in a way that accommodates how my brain works. Yes. But you know, take as many breaks as I want. I'm able to go out and have a meeting whilst I walk in the grass. I'm able to go to bed and wake up whenever I like. And I realize most people can't do that. I think if I had to work in an office nine to five, I think it would be a very different situation and I would be gravitated towards ADHD medication.

I drink far too much coffee and I think that is me self medicating my ADHD and I need to be really careful because it does cause me a lot of anxiety if I go over. Yeah. It's difficult to always tell when that is. Um, but no, to answer your question, I haven't. But under different circumstances, I think I would be drawn towards them.

I very intentional with the landscapes that I work on and out of all the businesses I've ever started, and there's about 50, most of them have failed. There's been Unilad, Labbible, and now the ADHD chat podcast. So you're talking less than probably about two or three percent of the businesses that I've started have worked and I realize the ones that have worked are the ones that are settled landscapes that are constantly changing and constantly maintaining that level of novelty.

And I think for me, structuring my life around creating and maintaining that level of novelty has been fundamental in me maintaining my consistency in the three businesses that have succeeded and that hasn't been conscious. I didn't know when I started Unilad and Ladbible that it was on a landscape that was going to be great for my brain because Every day, there's a new change to the platforms.

Sometimes it's a whole new platform to obsess over and figure out how it works. Even within the platforms that currently exist, there's an algorithm change. Now don't even talk to me about the algorithm, Alex. I can't cope. I just want to cry. I don't understand. Just take my money. Just help me.  Terrible.

But no, you're absolutely right. And it's a really interesting point as well. It's like you've literally hacked into the novelty in order to maintain consistency. That's fantastic. I think so. I've started a pizza business when I was at university. I started a website where you come and order presents for your loved ones.

If you can't think of what presents to buy them, I've started 45, nearly 50 businesses that have failed and I can pinpoint exactly the point that  was roughly about two or three weeks after starting them. Nothing had changed. It was just maintaining or growing the same type of thing, like the podcast that I described earlier and other businesses in the past.

And I remember that day waking up and just thinking, I can't do this anymore. I don't have any motivation and abandoning it. And then moving on to the next thing. And the only ones that have stuck are the ones that have that sea of novelty. Again, the social media changes all the time. The podcast is every week, it's a new person to  assess over and dive into their life and do all the research.

And I love meeting them in London. We met when you came up to the studio. I loved it. If it was a static business, and I think that's where so many ADHD entrepreneurs slip up is they start businesses in a very static landscape, or if you have to do that, they don't find ways to keep their business novelty.

They think their business stays static. I think that could be quite fatal for, for entrepreneurs. For many people, um,  brain similar to mine, because the boredom kicks in, you end up getting distracted by something. You get pulled away from the stuff that needs to be done in order to take the business to the next level.

I think gamifying businesses is really, really effective. You know, give tasks a point system. Sending that email gives you two points. filling in that invoice. God hate invoices. But if you give yourself a reward for doing it, you know, things like that can actually get you over the line and get rid of that task avoidance, or at least minimize it to the point where you can start.

I mean, there's loads of things, you know, that can help to gamify and to, you know, Keep that fun factor within a business. A hundred percent, but what about the other side of the coin? Because I mean, obviously your platform is absolutely enormous, but for me, like, and I've really suffered with anxiety all of my life.

Luckily, my ADHD medication helps a lot with it. It's not gone, but it, It does help. And like, from my end, I am a bit afraid of social media. I'm trying to unpack it. I just had a really good coaching session with Megan Burke. She's amazing. But does that not feed your anxiety? And the other question, there's kind of two questions at once.

is you've said that you've started all these different businesses. How has that failure not heightened your anxiety? Like how have you managed to get on and do something else and not just lie down and feel like a failure or like, Oh my God, everybody's looking at me and I feel anxious.  I think business failures for me are the same as romantic or friendship failures in the past.

And it sounds quite sad, but in the moment I can be intensely sad and upset and feel like a failure about that business failing, but I move on incredibly quickly.  It's almost like I'm constantly living in the now and what's in front of me. And yes, that business failed, but within a very short period of time, it's in the past and therefore it almost ceases to exist for me.

So I don't dwell on failure now or not now. Yeah. But the, the, the lessons come with me because with each one, there's like a slight change to my subconscious. in terms of, okay, why did that fail? And I think maybe that was actually why I subconsciously realised that I did much better on businesses that were placed on a landscape that was changing, and wasn't static.

What was your second question? So it was about anxiety, like, with being so public facing, like your face is all over the place, do you not feel anxious about that, about people's judgements, trolls, nasty comments, any of that stuff?  Not really. Rejection has always been crippling for me. You know, I look back and it's absolutely the reason why so many relationships have failed.

I wish I could go back to previous situations with the knowledge I have now of ADHD and almost screaming at the past and thinking, don't say that, like you're just  calm down. I think I would look at things very objectively. I think if someone criticizes or comment or says something to me on social media, it doesn't have the same effect unless I know that it's based in truth. 

So if I'm having a bad day and I make a bit of content because I feel like I have to and I'm in a rush and I know it's not as good as it could be and someone says, that's a bit of shit, you know, that really hits me because I know it's true. Yeah. Objectively, I know that there's a lot of trolls out there, and I know that there's a lot of hate, um, particularly when you get, like you'll know, slightly high numbers, you're just going to get people that don't want to see that, and they say nasty things.

And I think just from working in social media for 20 years, I objectively can look at that and say that that's telling me more about them than it is about me. And it's only really if I know that what they're saying is based in some truth, then it can really hit me and, you know, those closest to me, my partner who sees the behind the scenes can say, you know, okay, he was really affected by that.

And if there's a couple of comments saying the same thing, Alex can really withdraw and go in on himself and almost just go on the sofa for two or three hours and get really, really. intensely emotional about that criticism. But, you know, maybe I need to be more vocal about sharing that because I don't share it.

So people don't see the behind the scenes  contrast. But yeah, if there's a comment that's objectively based in truth, then it can really trigger that intense emotion within me. And when that happens, I just have to step away from the computer, go for a walk, lie down and it passes. Yeah. I tell you what it is.

I expose myself to that. That's the side effect of feeling like I have to do something in business, probably because there's a deep feeling of insecurity and not feeling good enough. It's why I've always pushed on to the next thing, because for whatever reason, and I don't know, I feel inadequate and I feel like I have something to prove.

For me, I've isolated where I have the highest chance of doing that, which I think is building stuff on social media. Because I've tried other things and it's fallen apart. I know that the highest chance I have of proving myself and showing to whoever that I'm not worthless.  is on social media. And I know that the side effect of aiming for that is that I'm going to expose myself to some criticism.

So it's kind of like a cost that I've accepted of putting myself in that arena.  You're doing amazing. You've done amazing. Do you think that that will always stay with you or can you objectively sit there and go, I proved my fucking point. very much. No, I guess that, you know, the imposter syndrome is real, really real.

Like I still honestly feel worthless. And it's very difficult for people close to me to understand because they show me the numbers on the screen and like, look, you've got X amount of, and you've got all this. And I don't see it. I don't see it like that. And it's always, it's why I get terrified. And when I get asked to talk on stage on the topic of social media and building podcasts and all that kind of stuff, absolutely feel underqualified. 

I don't think there's anything I can do that's going to fill that hole of feeling inadequate. And I think actually that's the driving force that pushes me every day to do what I do. If I'm honest with myself, and maybe this is not correct information, but I think if I was healed in the sense that I suddenly don't feel inadequate, I would be scared that I would stop turning up to work because I would feel I don't have that motivation that  pushes me to work in such an unhealthy way. 

I am up every morning and I can't sit and relax and watch a film with my partner because I'm compelled to work to prove something to someone that probably happened years ago and I think it's incredibly unhealthy and I wouldn't wish anyone to experience the anxiety that I get when I'm just trying to relax.

I can't go to the cinema, I can't go out for dinner, I can't have a conversation with a friend without being riddled with anxiety and a compulsion to work because I feel like I need to prove myself for something and I don't know what it is and I feel like if that disappeared I would lose that drive.

So it's a very tricky thing to navigate. I think there is a deep insecurity that drives a lot of people that seem to be doing stuff that would contradict them feeling like they haven't done anything because I can objectively look at the numbers and say yeah okay that's kind of cool but at the same time I can't sit on the sofa and watch a film because I feel like a failure and I feel like it's never gonna it's never gonna be enough there's not a number that you're gonna hit you're gonna be like great okay I've done it now I'm fine it's not gonna happen.

It's funny though, I do really, really relate with the something to prove and I think it is such a good driving force, but now I'm, I'm definitely in the trenches with you of not being able to switch off and just feeling like I have to work, I have to work, I have to do it now, I've got to keep going. It's, it's a lot to deal with.

But I mean, the real driving force, obviously behind the work that we're doing is to raise awareness about ADHD. but definitely also even in a teeny tiny way to be part of that push for change, right? So if you could change the current NHS ADHD diagnostic process as it stands because we know that it's broken, not just wave a magic wand and be like, Oh, there are no waiting lists.

You're a brilliant ideas person. Give me a brilliant idea. If it wasn't that they were so underfunded and understaffed and they couldn't do anything and they were stretched. If you could be like, right. This is how we're going to fix it. We're going to make sure that everyone gets seen and, and screened and assessed.

What would you do?  Yeah. Oh gosh. I mean, it's an uphill battle, isn't it? Ultimately you want, you need to make change at a governmental level and convince the people who are voting for the government to want there to be an increase in spend in screening services. Politicians make change when the people that are voting for them want them to take action.

That's the fundamental of politics and how change is made and, you know, lobbying, rallying, getting, changing public opinion is a slow process and that's why we're doing what we're doing because it is working. You know, I was in parliament a couple of weeks ago watching the Newer Diversity in Schools Bill being read out.

Will it make a change? I don't know at this stage, but it's a sign that it's coming into the sphere of consciousness of politicians and to hear ADHD, neurodiversity, autism even be read out. in the House of Commons in that context is a clear sign that the work that we're all doing is making a change, but it's just about doing more.

Got to make politicians feel scared that if they don't make changes to legislation, they're going to get voted out of office.  That's how change is made. So you've got to change the opinion of the people who are voting. That can be done by a number of ways. I think the work that we're doing in creating social media content is one, recognizing that actually undiagnosed neurodivergence  can lead to, if we're honest, Issues with the criminal justice system, you know, that's a huge bill to the taxpayer, which could be brought down if there was earlier screening, you know, people who are living with the type of brain, and they don't know that they're living with that type of brain, they can easily.

get in trouble with the law. I said earlier, I've been in the back of a police car. Um, I couldn't control my impulses that day. I ran past a policeman and I was put in handcuffs because of the impulse. I didn't understand why so many kids get in trouble. So many adults, the stats of prisoners in prisons who have undiagnosed ADHD.

It's shocking. You know, it's enough. I think the official statistic is 25 percent of prisoners have undiagnosed ADHD. People on the ground working in the prison suspect it's actually as high as 85%. It's very different, by the way, of saying everyone with ADHD has a high chance of committing it. That's not what I'm saying.

I'm saying within the people who have committed, there's a high concentration of ADHD amongst them. those people. So yeah, there's an argument, huge argument to say early screening in schools, letting people have that awareness, letting people put systems in place earlier on in life before they offend.

There's a financial argument for the taxpayer there, but just generally. Yeah, this is, this is it. Because if you look at the statistics of, you know, how dangerous it can be to have ADHD, If that doesn't matter, and all that matters is money, then look at the money. If you don't care about the lives that could be saved, look at the money.

And that's the bit that I don't quite understand. I'm like, well, surely they want to save a load of money.  But it's just that rejigging, isn't it? Of where you invest and what could be saved. But yeah. Actual lives is the fact of it and whether that means in, in loss of life, in premature death, in suicide, the statistics are bleak or just in destroyed and damaged lives, you know, and ending up incarcerated exactly like you said, but what about us later in life folks?

So most people who listen to this podcast are predominantly female and loads of them are on a waiting list. How do we, what could we do to make the waiting list not up to 10 years Because we've got people to stop this happening again, but what do we do with what we've got right now, this whole diagnosis crisis that we're in? 

You've got to up the funding, you've got to, A, you've got to attack the problem of source, which is up the funding, which is through the things I just mentioned, but also offering some support to the people who are on the list. And I think you've said before, self diagnosis is valid, I think it's incredibly empowering to recognize that you are living with a neurodivergence.

Obviously you need a diagnosis for some support. The treatment and support, yeah. But I think having an awareness, you can save so many lives, I genuinely believe. I have a friend who isn't diagnosed, is on a waiting list for three or four years, but she has got immensely just more happy because she has self diagnosed, and she knows that there's a reason why.

Why she struggles in certain situations, but also why she's able to do other things that other people struggle with. She just felt so different and confused before, and she didn't know, and that made her feel really anxious. She's not diagnosed, she's waiting. She's desperate for a diagnosis because she wants to try a medication.

But just the basic awareness of what's going on in her head has actually saved her a huge amount of happiness, a huge amount of negative emotions.  Exactly, exactly that. Cause all we all need is connection in some form and to feel so isolated is so, so dangerous when there is community and nobody's alone in their struggles.

Absolutely. What would you say is your greatest ADHD struggle? Like it presents differently in all of us. What is the number one? Do you think that still you really struggle with?  I think it's definitely rejection, and for me that's always been my Achilles heel, sort of standing side by side with anxiety.

In relationships it's been fatal in the past, really really fatal. So many times I've reacted disproportionately to a comment that's been made to me by a partner and ultimately it's ended up over time in the breakup.  I'm incredibly sensitive to it now. The smallest things can set me off and it can really set, ruin the trajectory of my day.

You know, I was on the train to London to film a podcast the other week and I got an email from somebody and they didn't put a kiss. I can't remember what it was. They didn't put an emoji. They just said thanks at the end of the email. And it's so bizarre, it really scared me, you know, and I almost, I composed a reply saying, is everything okay if I upset you, but I stopped myself from sending it because I thought that now I know what's going on, that person didn't mean anything by that, but in my head it was like they're attacking me, I offended them.

And I, I took that feeling into my podcast recording and I could feel I wasn't regulated. I wasn't, my brain wasn't working because I was focusing on this intense feeling of anxiety, a bit of rage, a bit of sadness, but I couldn't stop. Kind of wounded, like. Yeah, yeah, because it is, it's really shit daydreams and that's what I have to keep telling myself with the RSD and it does help because like you say, I don't know that it will ever go,  but now that you know what it is, you can look at it objectively and go, is it real though?

Is it real? And where's the evidence? And then you know that it is. You can identify that it's RSD, but it doesn't necessarily make those feelings go away because exactly like you said, once you've experienced it, it can hang about for a bit, you've still got all of this feeling inside you that has to dissipate somehow.

But yeah, I'm really with you there. I very, very much relate. It's only a year ago that you got diagnosed, did you say? Is that right?  About a year and a half ago. Yeah, year and a half. Okay. So obviously, um, a diagnosis later in life has been likened to Elizabeth Kubler Ross's grief cycle, but I mean, it's not cyclical.

It's not linear. It comes and goes. It's more like a roller coaster. And I often feel like we kind of circle back or something can trigger us and pull us back. If it was like that grief cycle, where would you say you are up to on it today? Because it could be different tomorrow. But do you feel that you're at complete acceptance of it?

Or do you feel some of the other emotions?  I definitely feel like I've accepted it, but I still get intense emotions and intense episodes of frustration and anger at why it wasn't picked up earlier and how things could have been different in the past. You know, I wish I could go back to the little six year old me in that corridor, having that anxiety attack and sort of put my arms around myself and say that you're not broken and that everything's going to be okay.

There's a reason why this is going on. I definitely feel a lot of guilt over.  Behaviors that I've done in the past, which I associate with, with not having an awareness of how my brain works. And it's too late to go back and say, sorry to those people because it just wouldn't make sense. So that's something I ruminate over quite a lot.

Like that conversation, that row, that thing I said when I was.  after that perceived comment that an ex said, you know, and that intense hurt that I know that I caused them because I think that always lingers with the person on the receiving end a lot more because you are capable of saying I'm certainly are some horrendously horrible things when I  get When I think that I'm being attacked, when I think that I'm being criticized, there's a lot of guilt harboring there.

And I think I really have to manage that and put that in context because that can actually lead me to drink sometimes. Yeah. It's so interesting, isn't it? So do you think that part of this prove mode, the thing that you've got to prove, has some of that fueled your fight in the ADHD world? Because you're trying to say, you know, on some level to those people, to that teacher, if they're still with us, to anybody in the past, like, look, this is what I have, this is what it is, this is what it looks like.

So alongside raising awareness and helping others, you're sort of going, see, at the same time, is there a level of that, do you think?  Yeah, I think so. It's probably more doing it for my younger self who didn't understand what was going on. You know, I feel like I've got, a lifetime of knowledge that I need to make up for, so I'm speaking to as many people as I can, trying to learn as much as I can about this topic in a short space of time, to make up for the 34 years of not knowing what was going on.

I now have to make up for that and also be aware that how many other people, how many other little six year old boys and girls are sitting in that classroom, daydreaming, staring out of a window,  riddled with anxiety, afraid, If they're going to get called out, it's for them. It's for all of them who, you know, I have a responsibility of someone who has this awareness now and has this experience of self to pass that down to the next generation.

You know, I think my skill set is taking information and making it widely accessible on social media, which is where the youngsters are. This is where the  young boys and girls are. So I genuinely feel like it's a responsibility of mine to make content and to make it as widely shared as possible. So that little six year old boy or girl sees it and they might, that might just be the thing that tips them over the edge. 

Google what is ADHD and you know, if that's, if that opens up a door of a little bit of awareness and that makes them understand why they act in a certain way in certain situations that there's nothing wrong with that and there's nothing wrong with them and they're not broken. So that's, I think my subconscious driving force is to hope somebody, a little version of me or you sees it and it just makes their life a little bit easier because I don't think anyone deserves to grow up feeling like they're broken.

No, a hundred percent. I just remembered RuPaul. So I love RuPaul. The wise prophet RuPaul said that we should all have a picture of our younger self, like us as a child, as a screensaver on our phone.  And so when you're feeling wounded or you're in fight or flight or anything like that, You can talk directly to your younger self and be that support.

Cause you know, you're like tending to your inner child. And I'm telling you this because when I edit this podcast, I will listen to this back because I can't tell you how many times I've remembered and forgotten to do that.  What would you like the world to know about ADHD? If you could bust a misconception, a big one that everyone should know.

Yeah, I think ADHD doesn't always mean that you're physically hyperactive. I think so many people still think that it's the naughty boy and it's so individualistic. It can present incredibly differently from one person to the next. Yes, there are commonalities in traits, but how it can present is incredibly individualistic.

I think so many people go through their whole lives thinking that they can't have ADHD because they don't fit the criteria of what the stereotype suggests it is, but it could be so different. You know, that hyperactivity can be internalized like it was for me a lot of the time. It can be anxiety, it can be imposter syndrome, it can be rage in the face of rejection, but it can also be an intense hyperfocus and creativity and problem solving and pattern recognition and loads of.

abilities that if you understand how your brain works and you put systems in place to help you lean into those, it can be a great strength. But it's often the stereotype that stops people identifying with it. So I think realizing that it's such a broad and vast condition and to not necessarily pigeonhole it into just the naughty little boys. 

Do you know, I just have to say I really love what you're saying because that is exactly my ethos. Like that is the thing I want to shout from the rooftops is if you can accept that you have it, then you can do the self inventory. You can look at the very specific and unique way that ADHD presents in you.

And when you can do that and you can accept that you definitely have it and that the same things are going to trip you up again and again and again, that's when you can put systems in place to support yourself. And that is how you can thrive. You know, if you kick against the fact that you're always going to struggle to keep a digital calendar, you know, the next planner is going to be the one.

That's the one that's going to work. If you accept that actually this doesn't work for me, put systems in place like your paper systems, and you've already accepted that you have it. So if it does go awry, you can show yourself that compassion. It's everything, isn't it?  What would you like the listeners to know?

So if you could give them something specific, a pearl to treasure.  I think in any situation, it's always whether you're in a pub and there's a group of people, or you're in a meeting at work,  to not always let the person with the loudest voice dictate the direction of conversation, or dictate the outcome of the problem that's trying to be solved.

I think with me and my experience, and I think a lot of other people I've spoken to, quite often the best ideas can be trapped inside anxious minds. And sometimes in social situations, the person could be sat at the desk. Tapping their foot, biting their fingernails, incredibly anxious. And that's actually getting in the way of their ability to think creatively and to contribute to the group.

I think recognizing that that is a real thing. And if you are a business owner or you are chairing a meeting, if you have time to allow a grace period of people to go away from the meeting half an hour a day, depending on how urgent the decision needs to be made, that's And allow people to submit ideas and solutions to the problem in a safe way.

It could be an email or a WhatsApp, because I think from my experience, as I said, the best ideas are often trapped inside anxious minds. And if you leave time for people to go away, think, activate their brain in a not overstimulating environment, then that's often where the best outcomes come from. 

That's wonderful. I love that. Thank you so much for sharing that. Ciao. In trying to up the dopamine levels, right, we've all got those faulty dopamine receptors, I'm trying to track the glimmers. So a glimmer is like a microjoy in a day. What's your glimmer of today or this week or recently that you would like to share? 

My glimmer has to be walking my dog absolutely love it. I find just cuddling animals incredibly therapeutic. Yeah. It really grounds me. My biggest thing this week was actually realizing that I should stop buying fresh fruit and veg or fresh veg. It, it was a real glimmer, was go . Love the word glimmer. You know?

It was a real moment. Yeah. Of realizing how much easier life is going to be when I buy frozen chopped veg instead of buying fresh broccolis because I always just use a little bit of it and then it goes moldy in the back of the fridge. Whereas if I buy frozen pre chopped vegetables, I can use it as I need it and not waste any.

That was a great moment that made me smile at the supermarket. I swear to God I live off sweet corn.  Oh, I love that. So you're like Eureka! Life is going to be simpler. That's good. And you're still going to get the virgin. It's very, very good. What song best describes your ADHD?  Oh gosh, I wish I'd remembered to read the questions before the interview.

There were a lot of questions, I'm sorry. I'm too enthusiastic for my own good and I want to know everything. Yeah, take a minute because it's a good one. I haven't actually thought about mine for a little while because I think it could be changeable. But at the time, this question actually came from a community member.

And at the time I said, satisfaction by the stones. It's like I can't quite get there and people are telling me things and I don't quite get it. I don't understand what everybody else is doing. I can't get no satisfaction.  This might sound awful, but just me trying to think of my feet, probably because I love Blink 182.

I've always loved Blink 182. And I think they've got one particular song called What's My Name Again. Um,  slightly to what's your name again, because I can't ever remember names, but also they have a great song called I miss you. And there's a really emotional line in it where they just say, I'm sorry. And I'm just trying to think of me almost, you know, just to say sorry to my younger self for not realizing earlier what was going on.

So rather a song, probably a band, because I think there's probably loads of lines in Blink 182 songs that would relate to, to sort of my life and how, you know, funny ones, but also quite not so funny ones.  Yeah, no, that's brilliant. Thank you for sharing that. Okay, last one. What is the most ADHD thing you've done this week or ever?

Ever? Gosh, um, probably ever. When I was 18, I walked past a car showroom selling minis and it had a blue mini convertible in the window. I fell in love with it. I want that car. I didn't have any money. How can I get that car? I went to Debenhams, bought a store card, credit card, which I needed to get the thousand pounds from to get that car.

By the mini on finance agreement because I needed a thousand pound deposit did it. Then let me drive away with it. But I then realized I had to pay 350 a month to pay for the car. So I then got a job at a nightclub in a hotel and a pub simultaneously. So I was driving from three jobs. I didn't even get time to enjoy the car.

And then by the time I, like six weeks later, I stopped loving the car because my interest in it had disappeared, but I was still working three jobs to pay for it. So I sold it about a year later and that was when I was 18. No idea what I was dealing with with my brain, but that was like my first major financial cock up as a result of just not being able to control those impulses.

That's so good. I mean, at least you had the car to get from A to B if you wanted a job. 

I hope you enjoyed listening to that natter, or rather chatter I should say, as much as I enjoyed recording it. I'm super grateful to Alex for sharing so candidly and for all of his support. He's not just had my squeaky rambles on his platform, he also attended the London Alien Nation show, which by the way will forever be one of the best nights of my entire life.

But he's also speaking at the grand finale of the last ever tour. He'll be joining me and a load of ADHDF podcast legends at Comedia Brighton on Saturday the 20th of July at 5pm. So get in there quick to grab the remaining tickets to see this very special last show via the link in the blurb of this episode.

So these shows have been, and this last one will be, where an ADHD seminar meets. Bingo, karaoke and cabaret and ADHD adults meet each other. If you're attending solo, just let me know. And the welcome party will greet you at the door and seat you with other literally like minded legends for peer support adults, only all genders and neurotypes welcome self diagnosis is valid.

And although you're welcome to come as you are leopard print slash alien raveware is highly encouraged. All of the very special guests, myself and my alter ego, RSD2, very much look forward to meeting you there for the last ridiculous hurrah. So, I haven't actually got an Auditory Processing Corner this week because I've barely seen or spoken to anyone in a week.

Truthfully, I'm not even sure that I've left the house in a week because I am in full lockdown. Flackstock mode. Myself and my bestie Steph of all the discos have teamed up to create ADHD AF Emporium and we are hosting our own tent at this very special festival in honor of Caroline Flack raising mental health awareness and funds for the Samaritans.

Mind the Charlie Walker Trust and Choose Love Charities. We'll be selling handmade festival fashion and accessories from neurodivergent makers and small creative businesses alongside a full day lineup of ADHD AF podcast guests alongside all sorts of festival ridiculousness and tunes from Her House DJ Collective.

So yeah. 22nd of July at Englefield House in Reading. I could not be more excited, but the clock is ticking. But seriously, we are totally,  totally honoured. And speaking of honoured, it was an absolute honour to be nominated for Positive Role Model for Disability in the National Diversity Awards. I seriously cannot say thank you enough to Donna Donny Good for nominating me and to everyone.

Your nominations are truly so overwhelmingly kind and I will cherish them forever, seriously. But let's be honest, Positive Role Model is not only something I've never been called before, it wasn't ever gonna stick, was it?  Um, but I'll tell you who it has stuck to. Ah Alex, so massive congratulations to this week's guest for getting shortlisted.

You so deserve it and I'll be rooting for you. Go on lad! And finally, the most ADHD thing I've done this week is once again completely forgotten to take Mama Roo's advice and put that pic of my younger self as my screensaver. I honestly forgot about it again until I listened back to this interview, so hopefully I do it in a minute or it is literally never going to happen.

So let's see if it's there in next week's episode. Big love and gratitude to all of you for listening. I can't tell you how much I appreciate your support. If you've enjoyed this episode, please help me get it in the ears of others who might also benefit by sharing it on socials, in support groups, by hitting those stars or writing a review.

All of these little things help raise ADHD awareness and let other Ailey Huns know that they're not alone. And if you fancy a chinwag with yours truly and a whole host of literally like minded legends, we'd love to meet you in real life at the Brighton show or chat online in the peer support community.

Planet ADHD AF. Leopard Print Army!