Timmy: Neurospicy reformer and craftsman

In this episode Banu and Georgie chats with Timmy Long, who previously hosted the Long Back Podcast. Timmy opens up about his experiences growing up facing challenges with learning differences and a tough environment. He talks about how understanding himself better later in life helped change his perspective and gave him tools to cope. The conversation explores themes of struggle, growth, and resilience, showing how hard work and self-awareness can lead to new possibilities. It’s an honest look at overcoming obstacles and finding strength in unexpected places. 

Transcript

 

, Timmy Long It is so nice to have you back.

, We, we've missed your, we've missed your voice. , And for anyone listening, Timmy had, , two podcasts. The first one was, was the, the two Norris, , which is named after a place in North Cork. , Anyone who lives in North Cork City would be known as Nori.

And, , and then, , Timmy went on to a different, uh, podcast called The Long Way Back, and Timmy's had a hell of a journey in life, um, and he's such a, a fantastic person to speak to because not only does he have the ability to express himself very well, but he also has a very lived experience of what it's like to have dyslexia, what it's like to have a DHD, , what it's like to experience life when it all goes horribly wrong and when it all goes beautifully well as well.

, But with a lot of hard work. I think from what I, when knowing Timmy, it was all about the hard work that you put into it. To get to a better place. Mm-hmm. , So I mean, it is just, and this season, , in, Therapod Therapod podcast this season, bannu, who's been, , interviewing, mainly interviewing people who have a lived experience.

So they have autism or they have a DHD or they have dyslexia or what have you. , But I think it's really important, um, to hear the good stuff and the bad stuff, because that's the reality. Yeah, yeah. Of course. Yeah. Yeah. , And Timmy, I I would love to start with a positive. . I, I would love to start with, and then, and then I think from this we'll hear a lot more about what went on in your life, but, , what for you really helped to get you back on the path?

To get things better. Was it the diagnosis of dyslexia? Was it having therapy? Was it, um, getting diagnosed with a DHD? What would, would you say would be the biggest turning point? Well, firstly with the dyslexia was the diagnosis and just the understanding that I was just misunderstood, you know? And from that diagnosis, then I was able to understand that my kind of pattern of thinking that there was something wrong with my brain or I was different from everybody else, or I was just a stupid person had changed because I know looked into what it is to be dyslexic.

And the way I was thinking and feeling was quite normal in relation to all the characteristics of somebody who is. Dyslexic. And it kind of dropped that core belief that I gained all my life through, firstly with the primary education and then the secondary education that there was, there was something wrong with me, you know?

And that I was just tick and stupid and, you know, and, um, all that just vanished the minute I had the assessment come back stating that I was dyslexic and, and how old were you, Timmy? Fuck. Well, am I now I'm 44. I think I was about 36 or seven maybe. Yes. Could possibly more. I'd say Georgie. It was a 20. No, I was, geez,, I was about 37, I think I was in, in third level, third level education.

And, like I, I'd always question it. Like I, I, I went into the after prison and, , getting the basics in prison of learning to read and write and doing the equivalent of the junior in Ireland through a defeat Act level three. In level four, I was able to, , I was able to go onto a, a further education course on, on the outside, which was a PHTech level four.

It was a four, five and six I'd done. And, , I did struggle with a lot of the, the academic stuff really struggled badly, you know, but I had such a drive within me to just keep going and, and to, and to just make something of myself. I. That I kept doing, but I also always picked the, the courses that were practical, like furniture rest restoration or, , AutoCAD, which was, , a bit practical on the computer, but wasn't always sitting in front of a book and stuff like that.

And then when I went down to third level education, I picked a course called Wood Technology with Business, which was carpentry and joinery, but with some business modules within that. And it wasn't until my third year that I crossed over from that module in, in, in third level into, , construction management degree.

And it was about then that I'd really kind of looked at. Myself and said I need to probably get something done here. I'd never really made an effort to get it checked out. Before that. I'd often kind of mentioned it to my wife, Nicole, or to somebody or to a teacher in the prison that like, what's wrong with me?

Like, why can't they just understand stuff like other people or read like other people, you know? Even to this day, even with my vocabulary after getting better and my sense of words a little bit better, my comprehension of words is still a bit difficult. And, and even the other day somebody mentioned a word and, and I just did not know what they were saying, and everybody around me was after fully comprehending what was after being said.

It was like I was just sitting there and saying, what do I do? Like in the, I just just done nothing. Whereas before I would've went into my head and left and forgot the whole, the rest of the conversation, right? And, and tried to understand the word that I was stuck on. I just kind of just left it off and, and, and kept going forward.

So you got better coping strategies,, and that coping strategy, the, the most important one that I have today is in understanding that, do you know what, who really cares if I can understand the word or not? Mm-hmm. And that includes me, you know? And, and if it's a word that I need to, to understand, I, I, I'll ask somebody to break it down, you know, break the word down into a language that I can understand or a similar, a similar word that I can understand.

Like, how do you explain to somebody what empathy is? Especially for me early on, I didn't even know what emotions were. And empathy is is something that you have to understand your kind of inner connection with yourself as well, and with other people to be able to understand and, and concept. Like, it was just really difficult for me to understand words, you know?

Uh, our emphasis was another one. I must have sat down, I'd say, for about three months trying to understand what emphasis meant, you know? And I, and, and sometimes words can become a block. Like it's, it's,, I have a, a word that drives me nuts. , Yes. But, but, , for somebody who's dyslexic, then Georgie,, based on their, their, their own kinda academic journey, like if we get stuck in a word, I.

It, it's, it's not just being stuck in a word. We go into that belief system where we start criticizing ourselves that we're not good enough, we're not smart enough, we shouldn't be here. You know? Yeah. You tick, you're stupid. That's what goes on in my head. It's not, it's not out. It's, it's all that, and that just stems from my, my early childhood going through the education system where we were just ma misunderstood academically.

Um, and I,, it wasn't until later on in life I, I, I really understood that stuff. But all that, all that, um, viewing of, of myself is gone. All those kind of behaviors that were ingrained into me. And the mentality that was ingrained to me from back then is, isn't there, but it can pop up still if I don't put it, doesn't have the effect that I would years ago.

'cause it would've put a standstill to everything that was going on for me at that moment. Whereas now I just move forward and just allow it to just be whatever it is. And I was just thinking like, what a lot of work you must have done to get from there to here now where you can say, actually it just flows off me.

, Because even looking at, you know, like late thirties is, is is late in terms of, you know, a lot of the personalities already set. There's a lot of learning that you've already done. So undoing all that learning must have been such monumental inu. If, if you would come across me when I was 32 years of age, which is now 12 years ago.

We wouldn't have been able to have a conversation because number one, I would've felt like a child. Okay? And number two, I wouldn't, I wouldn't have been able to understand you because I came from a place where we had sorting words and certain vocabulary where everybody around me was pretty much the same.

People who didn't, who weren't educated, who didn't go to school. And we learned a language on the street, you know, and we different words for different things. We didn't understand emotions and everything that goes with that a lot. The only two kind of things that I understood back then were happy and sad, and I've often said this to you, Georgie, before.

I was basically happy when I was either thinking about getting stunned and drunk or whatever, and kind of sad then when I was coming down off drink or drunk Yeah. If I didn't have it. But then I had to, like, one of the, the biggest things for me getting into early recovery was learning the language of, of emotions and being able to put something on how I was feeling a word.

And for me to be able to do something like that, I had to learn. I had to be, I had to learn. And, and that meant for me to sit down and learn the, the, the word, the, the actual, the emotions of, um, when I say the emotions of, I mean the words of say, I didn't even know what anxiety was. I didn't know what stress was.

I didn't know what. The real meaning of anger was I didn't know what upset was. I didn't know what excitement was. I had to sit down and, and when I got the vocabulary, I, I learned these words, you know? Um, and that was, that was a big Did someone help you, did someone help you to learn those To me? No. What?

Not really. Georgie. Not really, because people would try to explain it to me, but because I couldn't understand what they were saying, I had to learn it myself. I had to be able to, I had to feel it mm-hmm. In a moment and, and kinda look back at the meaning of something. And aha, something would just kind of clicked in for me and I'd, I'd say, ah, gee, that's, that's what it is to be excitement.

And uh, and, and I remember when I learned what excitement was for the first time, it was, I had to, had to look back into my childhood. When I was young and the excitement that you'd feel, do you know, the night before Santi would call Christmas Eve and like just that excitement. I'd lost all this stuff, you know, in, in my, kind of my youth and, and my adult life.

And, and that brought me back then. And then I'd learned what excitement was and, and all these different things and like, and even anxiety because of, because of the different things that would've went down in my early childhood and my, my issues in school and with education and stuff. My, I, I was, I was completely knocked outta homeostasis.

My, my body was not ever balanced chemically, you know, I was always in fight or flight, always consistently. And so how is somebody supposed to know what anxiety is, are are stresses or nervous? 'cause And I'd hear people, Jesus, I feel very anxious and I'd look at. What is anxiety or what is, what's nerves and you know, because I never ever knew, but I didn't also understand that I lived in this state of being as a human being.

I lived there because I was always in fight or flight. I was always on edge, you know, waiting for something to happen, you know? And um, and would you say that a lot of people around you were all also like that? 'cause there was, you know, of course a lot of people around you were taking drugs, were drinking, were in a constant state of, so, you know, you were sort of behaving like each other.

Well, the, do you ever hear the, the, the motto as like, you know, it's, it's like monkey see, monkey do. Mm-hmm. You know, and, and that's, that's what I say, like, if you have a child growing up, I, in an environment where they're watching gambling, drinking, and drugging mm-hmm. All their life, it's like what they're gonna see they wanna do.

And that's how it was for us. You know, everybody that was surrounded in my circle fitted the same energy as me because we were all probably, we, most of us probably had a DHD. Most of us had issues with education because that was my circle of friends. Yeah. And that's how you click, you know, none of my friends were fellows that finished school.

None of them probably got through their youth and their young adult life without going to prison. Are, are. Becoming addicted to alcohol or drugs are, are one of the other addictions that they're like gambling and, and other stuff. Um, and that's, that was the only company I felt comfortable in. I remember I'd met a, a guy that we used to drink in drug with in our late teens, in our early twenties inside in the gym.

I was probably about 23, 24 at the time, and I didn't know that he was, after giving up alcohol and drugs and I didn't see him around for a while. And I turned around to the guy that was training with me in the gym and I said, I'm, there's something wrong with him.

, The only thing he was after doing was give up drugs because my circle of people, like if you were somebody who didn't drink or take drugs in the same way that we did, you weren't normal. Yeah. And that, and that was it. And every single one of us needed alcohol or drugs and to be able to cope within the environment that we were living in, you know, because we were consistently stressed.

And, and was it expected that you, you would end up in prison? Did you, did you think Ah, well part of the, part of my journey will be prison of Jo. Like when you grow up in an area like I did, and you're looking at your father, your uncle, your neighbors, the guys that you look up to within the air, the, the area and, and, and the, the estates and stuff going to prison.

Like, what are you going? So it's nor it's normalized really. It's normalized. Like if I grew up in an Arab area, Nu okay. Where I have solicitors and doctors and teachers and guards within that vicinity. You know, going on to become whatever they may be. I'm going say, I'm gonna look at these and I'm gonna be aspired by a doctor or, or whatever.

'cause I'm gonna see the doctor pulling up in his brand new car and, and I'm gonna say, I want to be a doctor or a teacher pulling up his brand new car or a guard or whatever it may be. Yeah. But we were looking at guys who were involved in criminality and drugs. Right. Uneducated men, you know, with women and women and, and jewelry and good clothes hanging off 'em, you know, that was attractive to us because, like, we grew up in poverty.

I grew up in a really, like my, my family home, we were very poor. You know, we, we weren't even classified as working class growing up because nobody worked in the house. My mother, we lived on whatever we could get, whatever was handed down to us we could get off any charities within the area and stuff.

And that was the life we grew up in, you know? , And you know what? I would not change one single bit of it any part of my life,, for the, for, for the good reason of the amount of strength and just ability to get through tough times that has given me within my life today. Mm. And it's something I'm very proud of my upbringing, something my, the people within my, I'm very proud of you.

You can't say you are proud of what they do, but I'm proud of some of the people in the area from what they've came from and where they are now. Yeah. Not including my own family. You know, I've, I've two younger brothers as well who were heroin addicts and they were on the streets living in tents and living in squats and stuff.

And the two of 'em know work for themselves. They drive a car, they drive their own work vans, you know, they're able to provide for themselves. They're able to save, they're able to get things done that they're never, ever could have done before. Because everything that they'd done involved either alcohol or drugs or criminality, no.

They live an honest life, you know? And, um, it's, \ amazing that we can now bring up wronging children and, and show them what's right and what's not, and what's wrong, and show 'em how to process emotions, how to deal with stuff that's going on in their lives, you know, and you don't always get it right.

Who does? We, we do our best. We mess up, but we sometimes learn from, from that, you know, me takes me a few times before I actually learn. And my wife and my daughter probably tell you that my son. But, um, my intention is always good. Yeah. You know, my intention is always good and, um, it's a different life to the life I grew up in, in poverty, you know, and, and, and I'm able to provide for my children and it's no disrespect to my own order or father.

'cause they've only done the best that they could as well, you know? And, um, so you channeled your, your skills. So, so somewhere along the line you realized that your skills were carpentry, working, craftsmanship, and then you, you had a. You had a realization that you were dyslexic, uh, in order to get through the kind of qualifications and things like that.

And you thought, I, from a young, young age, even in, um, primary and secondary, the only things I ever enjoyed were practical. Yeah. Like pee running in the yard, kicking football, playing sport, you know, both primary and secondary woodwork and secondary art and secondary and pee, you know, they were, and sometimes a bit of science because you're making things in science and blowing else else.

I've done my absolute best to miss those classes, you know, , in primary school I would've spent a lot of my time inside in the assembly hall, writing lines or, or at the back of the class looking out the window. I could not sit still, I couldn't face, I didn't understand what was going on for me and I didn't have anybody really to turn to and talk to at that time.

And I suppose like in school then, would you have been labeled as, you know, behaving badly or hard to deal with or you know, bold and is that kind of the label that they'd have slapped on you? And to say that that's, now he's always like that. Well, if you look back at the times, like we're talking about the eighties and the early nineties, banu, most definitely, you know, because our teachers and headmasters and stuff back then hadn't a clue what they were dealing with in, in classrooms.

They were just trying to teach 30 or 40 students, but in classrooms as best they could. Little did they know like that, there could have been 15 of 'em inside in the class with dyslexia and A DHD, because remember, know the area we came from. And you're probably going to get a lot more of these things within this area than you probably will in another area.

That's true. So definitely, definitely. And sometimes it wouldn't have, may been being a teacher telling you that you were stupid at tick because I, I can honestly say I can't remember a teacher telling me I was stupid or tick, you know, I can at home, you know, I can at home, but not in the classroom, but by their actions, you know, not maybe understanding back then, but by their actions being put at the back of the class, being put outside the class, you know, being put up to the assembly, being suspended, you know, and me just in primary school, going on the hub, going on the hub, missing school and going away using fuck.

Anything I could get my hands on. Like we started, for us it was, it was always about petrol, gas, nail varnish, tip X, anything that we could, we could get Yeah. High, you know, and, and, and that's how it was., But these things, sometimes it is not, it's not even somebody telling you that you're stupid or there's something wrong with Jay or tick as, as, as we say here in Ireland that you're tick.

Um, which I think is a horrible word to call anybody. Um, not really. It's, it's the actions of you than being like kids, kids emotionally feel stuff. And we, we, we think that they don't, but they can feel it and they can feel emotions and they can sense stuff. And if you are doing something that's treating them in a different way to 10 other kids in the classroom.

They're not gonna say anything, but they're gonna feel something. They're gonna feel different. They're gonna, they know, feel like they don't fit in. They're gonna feel like they're being secluded from the rest of the classroom, and that's where the damage is. Mm-hmm. That's the damage, that's can, that can be caused.

But no, it is, thankfully, we've more of an understanding of, of, um, how to deal with children who have additional needs, who have, it is a lot, it is a lot better. It is a lot better, but it really, really differs in schools, in, in my, in my view. You know, like the, I've seen some great practice.

Going back to your childhood and the kind of environment that you grew up in, I'm thinking of the opportunities that weren't available to that section of people compared to, you know, someone else who went to the south side or, you know, as you said, if there were more doctors and lawyers in one area, like the opportunities that are provided to kids like that was quite different to the opportunities that, um, you know, you might have in the north side in some of the areas.

There is, is that, yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But like if you drive up here where I live, um, you'll see vans upon Vans and Vans. I, I have actually worked in that area, uh, through my job and it was one of the catchment areas that we call. So I, I definitely know what you're saying. Um, and yeah.

Yeah. And what I mean by vans, they're workmen's vans, workmen working. And what I understand, when I see a work van, I see a man who loves working with his hands. And a lot of us, we just, a lot of us are practical workers, but no van who may have to say this, like, I know carpenters, electricians, and plumbers will get more than doctors these days.

A hundred percent. Yeah. And that's the reality of it. 20, 30 years ago, that would not have been the situation. But today, like it is, you can't get a trades man. I. Like if you ring a tradesman, you, you're gonna be waving for weeks, weeks and weeks. And, and that is how it is, you know? Um, so I think the important thing really for children and, and schools and the people who are in, in their offices who don't know nothing about what goes on for children inside in schools and what affects 'em and, and, and where they sh what really works for them, um, shouldn't be there firstly.

And people who do understand like yourselves should be actually giving advice to these people, and it should be taken. Right? If I was in charge of this country in the morning, I would change everything starting at the beginning of a child's life, and that would be preschool. I'd have people in preschools who are, I'd have psych psychologists in, in preschool who are taught about kids, what kids need for, for good development.

What, what things could be, what activities could be done with, , the children to, to help them improve their own kind of self-esteem, their confidence, you know, and I also ensure the people that are working within these places are in a good place as well, because as I said earlier, children can sense stuff as well, you know?

Oh, yeah. , And then we'd have, you'd, you'd, you'd move on to schools and you'd look at children then when they move on to schools. And it would take a very short time to find out. The strengths and weaknesses of, of children. Okay. And I think the minute you find out the strength of a child, if they like the practical stuff over the academic stuff, start focusing on that and start doing things that will, they'll enjoy.

Some people are gonna like it, but, , focus on their, their strong points, you know, instead of, instead of giving 'em stuff that they really have no interest in, you know? Did you watch adolescents I by any time I did. , There's something that struck me about the school. I wonder, did you pick that up as well?

Because everyone in that school seemed so disconnected. The kids did, did you pick up? So did the teachers Yes, yes. All of them. The teachers seemed absolutely stressed outta their minds full affair. They were full affair. They were stressed through their minds. And it was like, it's, it looked a lot more like, , a kind of a discipline school than an academic school.

It was like they were just there to tell the kids how to behave and what to do. Well, it wasn't effective. Definitely wasn't effective. And Georgie, the reality of it is, like I, I looked at that and, and, and I tried to look at some of the schools we have here in Ireland. And um, when I was younger and I was in secondary school, I can honestly say we were just as mad or if worse than, than those kids.

But not every class was like that. Because we were in one U of A, B, C, D, E, F. That was my class. Oh, they don't do that anymore, do they though? They don't. Yeah, but they do discreetly. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's, it's done a little bit discreetly though, you know, and that's, and that's just to tick a box, I think.

, What I think what I, I, and working with young people, like, I find, you know, even here, like young people, such a disconnect with what they're learning. It doesn't have any meaning to them and to the words that they know.

Because they have access to all this, this too much information from the internet, from TikTok, whatever else they're looking at. And there's a disconnect between what they're being taught and there's no connection with it. And then. You know, it's like two different worlds and they're just serving their time in school.

Okay. We spend the six hours every day in school, and then we come back. We just serve time and that's it. , And maybe it was always like that. I don't know. , Yeah, not when I was growing up. Like I, I, I've, I've alleged inside now he's 13 and he's found the, he, he's found the phone and he is, and like I would consistently be on his back over the phone and his screen time and I'd be saying it to him.

I said, please, like, try to understand. I'd take the phone and then I'd give him back the phone after a day or two and I'd, I, I'd have a conversation with them, what I'd be saying. Do you understand the strength that this little device has over you? Like you basically nearly started crying when I took it, and then for the last two days you were just mopping around the place depressed because you didn't have it.

And I, and I, I tried to kind of open up his mind a little bit, but then recently, within the last six months, I just absolutely stopped and I gave him an opportunity to notice himself because my relationship between me, him, him, us, , was starting to kind of deteriorate. 'cause I was consistently given out to him over the phone, spending too much on the phone and, and flicking on the phone and whatever.

And I just said one day I just said, look, listen, I'm not gonna give out over the phone anymore. You can do what you like because you're gonna have to find out yourself the effects that this. Thing is having a new, but we didn't have that when we were kids, so we had to find something else to, to be the show over.

Yeah, absolutely. And I, and I, I actually want to make a point about this, is that, you know, b was talking about, you know, have we always had this problem with, with the, the meaning? Like you, there's a disconnect when you don't find meaning. It's like trying to learn, trying to learn a new word unless you understand the meaning of it and the purpose of it.

There were plenty of kids who didn't wanna be in school, um, who they didn't connect to school. There was no meaning for them. But what they had was they had, uh, a lot of par, a lot of the parents.

Weren't that interested in education either, so they would keep the kids home. There was a huge amount of absent absence and lack of attendance, but those kids were usually doing things like working on the market stall, , going around with their dad in the van, you know, doing a bit of work for them and they were earning like cash in hand even at eight, eight years old, nine years old.

And they were learning from people, from talking from now, I'm not saying it was necessarily great 'cause you know, there's obviously a lot of dodgy stuff going on. But they learnt to have conversations and to question. And the problem we've got with our online society of kids is they don't question. Now, I'm, I'm, I'm generalizing.

It's not, it's not fair to say they don't, they don't. All, all of them don't question. But there is a huge lack of critical thinking, um, in this generation because they're scrolling and scrolling and, and, and taking information, and they just take it for fact. Take a fact. Oh, right. All right. And so when I go into schools and my sister's charity, we are constantly saying, guys, you need to question everything.

You see, there is so much evidence that people don't question, and they're, and they're, and they're just accepting, this is real. This is for real. All that stuff that, you know, on, on that program, adolescence, the whole manosphere thing. You know, , these, there's, if you've got role models on TikTok and YouTube saying all these things, you just think, well, they're an adult.

They're,, they must be telling some kind of truth. Also, they're really concepts that are quite complex. And then when you give it to 12 year olds, 13 year olds, 14, like, they don't really understand all of it. So they're just gonna take the bits that make some sense to them and then they're going to, I dunno, act out.

. Yes, yes. Yeah. Um, I know it's, it's more complex than we, than we can talk about now, but I was just really interested to kind of even get your views on, , you know, that show what, what they were trying to say. There's, there's a book, and I mentioned this to you before, Georgie, there's a book by a guy called Johan Harry.

He's called Stolen Focus. I think the way he describes the effect of social media on, on children and adults is probably. One of the best I've ever seen. You know, he's showing how all these big companies like Google, meta, you know, everything, all businesses as well. Yeah. Have these, the best of the best in psychology and psychiatry, working within teams in their offices, creating ways and methods to drag people in and, and, and getting formals ready and looking at people's, what people like on, on, on these platforms.

And just feeding 'em more and more and more and more. You know, he speaks about this in the book. Mm. And it opened my eyes. No, I was never somebody that enjoyed social media, if any, if, if I'm gonna be brutally honest. I can't stand social media. I, I, I have no interest in it whatsoever. , I go that way when, when, when it's something that, and that was probably one of the biggest reasons that I, I, I discontinued, working on, on, on the podcast, you know, took a break.

Because social media can be a big point of it, part of it. And, um, but he explains it really well. And I, and, and I've often, often thought to myself, going forward, will it always be like this? Will phones always have the impact that they're having now? Because they're absolutely robbing us of our attention span, our focus of what we really should be enjoying in life, which is nature.

Family, animals, you know, the real things that are here right now. You know, the things that give us some emotion, real sense of emotional kind of, uh, interaction instead of the dopamine hits that we're getting from the likes and the follows and, and, and the videos that we're watching. You know? , I dunno.

I, I don't, I really, really don't know. I think, I think governments have a massive part to play in it where they need to start bringing some forms of, , policies and stuff to change. Well, it's to holding the big corporations account. Yeah. Like, you know, it is not okay to be, , creating these. You know, uh, I, you know, the images even on the screens that look like sweeties look like treasure, and this aic like the gambling that comes from the, the, the gaming on the, it's just, uh, like it's terrible what they're doing.

And, and yet they get so many let offs from, from governments. Not just the Irish government. Like just, yeah. It's, it's a, well, I tell you a good one, you know, on the ones of, of, of like, like Meta, you have this Zuckerberg fella and you have some of these other platform owners like Basos, all these guys, none of their children are left mobile phones, none of them because they understand the impact of, of, of the phone and their children, you know, and he and that guy, Han Harry speaks about all this in the book.

Yeah. You know, it's, it's, it's very interesting. But as parents then. Yeah. All we want is a bit of peace when we have a young child that wants attention. That's the truth, you know? And the first thing you want do, and this is very evil, we're all guilty of it. There's not one adult on the planet, not guilty of it.

I believe that you'll hand them the form with the cartoon or the game and, and to keep 'em just for a bit of a breeder for yourself. And there's nothing wrong with that. But when you have a child on a device for 12 hours in a day, or looking at a screen for 12 hours in a day without any form of Im kind of relationship with an adult or another child or an animal even, um, that's going to create massive issues for that child later on in life.

You know? And adults are equally, adults are equally in this, where they're also on, listen, nu right? If you had to look at the numbers of children, okay. Who still haven't left their rooms, St. Coville. You will be absolutely amazed. There's children still living in their bedrooms since Covid. Okay. God, it's just terrible.

And this is five years down the line, you know? And I say this to you because it's something that has impacted my own family, you know? And it's still, it's still happening. Still happening. Yeah. Covid has impacted children in a way we will probably never know or realize, you know? And I can see it in my own home.

And it's tough. It's really, really tough. And a lot of parents are out there at the moment and they're just playing that waiting game and they're praying that maybe something will change down the line with the child. You know? Something will change that. They'll go out a little bit more. They'll find friends, you know, they'll go out to school or they'll go to college or they get a job and some children have.

But there are still a lot of children still locked in the room and who knows what they're at inside the room? No. Oh God. Don't, don't, don't send dread, dread into me know, because you dare knock at their door or give out to 'em. And it's like, it's, it's, it's tough. And there's a lot of parents out there struggling and they, they, they have a, a real serious worry for their child's wellbeing over this stuff.

You know, nobody's talking about this. Nobody is talking about the children of Covid and the youth. You know, like you, you, you, we spoke about your own young LA there and, and him getting a job. And I think that was fantastic. It broke the cycle. It broke that little pattern that they had the room. It it did.

But also, and I think about it, but when I think about it, it was only because I knew someone who will take him because he's only 15. Like there's not a lot of opportunities then for young people to go out and have that experience. It's only because I knew who that person was that we could get that opportunity for against opportunities.

A lot of these children are afraid to have any form of relationship with an adult because they have never experienced this because they've been locked away for so long and they're full of fear. They're social anxiety, they can't even be around people. They can't even get on buses. They get anxious and they're living in anxiety and, and, and, and George is probably sitting there and she understands, well, I'm coming from this stuff 'cause she knows my family on a personal level and, and some of the people we're talking about here.

And I am sure a lot of people that are going to listen to this can absolutely relate to this, you know, and, and, and how, my question is how are, what can we do? How, uh, is it just going be a last era of children? Is it going be a last generation of children from that era? Are they just going, are they just gonna be left there and fend further themselves?

We're lucky. We grew up in an area where we were in the streets and we, we got by in, we, we were sociable and, and, and things like covid. Yeah. We were locked away from a bit, a lot of people went to drinking drugs because they, they weren't working and they didn't know what to do their time.

But a lot of us were fine. We're, we're, we're, we're, we're good. We were able to manage our lives, we're back into our routines. I think it's also good communication skills. We, you know, before we all became quite on online, we had the ability and social, social media originally was really created for communication and for sharing ideas and positivity.

And then it became this sort of drug. , Of addiction and, and, and like, when you see kids, , you know, like looking at where we, we were like, you had to make phone calls. You had to, you had these little bursts of, challenges that you got through them. Like you were anxious, but then you did it and then you felt better.

But I think for now, kids, like, especially if you, you were just talking with those covid, , tweens and teenagers, like if you looked at the kids that went from primary to secondary and covid hit that time, they didn't have that flare of anxiety. When you go into secondary school, face something new, new lockers, new school, new kids, they didn't have that challenge.

Which they would've met it and then they'd have felt okay with it and then gone to the next challenge. So they didn't have that build to for, you know, with different challenges. , Like even when I look at my own, like to make a phone call is such an issue, so I'm not calling them. I'll text them or I'll dm.

Oh good. I'll dm,

yeah. There's, I mean, we can't answer the phone because they don't know how to interact. Yeah. And the feeling that they get from the phone ringing is like, oh, course they aware. Not able. Well, interestingly, I find I've always, I'm a, I'm a talker as you know, um, but, and I, I leave voice messages. Um, uh, that's kind of my, my best way of communicating.

But I do find it it much better to have a conversation when you can see them. And you can hear their voice. Um, I like, I love this, I love this 'cause I can see facial expressions and hear intonation and, you know, see what, where, which room you're in. Whereas I find it harder on a, on a, on a phone. But I think having, do you know why that is?

In, in my opinion, Georgie, because when you are looking at someone and you're, you're, you, you can see what their facial expression is and their voices and it just, it, it makes everything more solid. It makes everything much more, interactive and, and, and trustworthy and, and just in general. Like, it's just, it's just how we were made to be.

Yeah. We need to interact in that way. But if you get a text message off somebody, you can't take it face value. For example, if I get a text off you and you tell me, blah, blah, blah, whatever it may be, like, I'm, I'm gonna say it to you like, you know me, right? Yeah. You know, I did like ever doing Zoom podcasts.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's not my thing. I have to have people in front of me sitting there. I need to feel 'em, I need to, I need to be there with 'em in their presence. They probably need somebody to be there with 'em. , And I love that. And it's the same with with, with relationships. If it's business or whatever.

If somebody looking for work, I'd say, yeah, I'll call along. I have a chat with Jan. We'll be able to, and it's, I think that kind of interaction is, is very important because you need to feel people, you need to know who they are. You need to kind of get, get adjusted of, of, of what the relationship is and where the relationship can go.

Um, but I think we're gonna see less and less of that going forward in life. Yeah. You know, I think it's gonna be a lot more communication online, text messages. Um, I dunno, which worries me because that, that we let we, if we go right back to the beginning when we first started talking and you were talking about empathy.

It worries me that we've, we're gonna have this, uh, block, um, when it comes to people being able to empathize with other people, being able to feel, , you know, what other people are feeling they're, and they are sort of trying to connect whether they know or not, , your brains can synchronize, but it's through that sort of physical presence and the talking and the, and the touching and the, and the, and the, you know, perhaps doing the same thing at the same time, you know?

I dunno. And it's energy, Georgie energy. If we give off an energy and if the energy that we're giving off is probably uneasy or doesn't feel right, like for example, if you have something going on for you and I meet you, right? I can feel it straight. I know something not feel, and you might want to tell me, but I'm going to be sitting there and I saying, he always catches you always here and there's something wrong.

You amazing. Are you all right there? He, I mean, oh, you know, and then vice versa, you could tell it's me and, and some, some things it might be nothing wrong. It might be just somebody may be really tired, but some things that might be the conversation that's needed to have. Maybe the reason that they're tired and maybe they need to look after themselves a little bit more.

And that's the importance of the interaction that. We're actually losing that kind of social interaction. And even just, just being with people without feeling anxious, you know, their company are sitting with another human being and being able to sit in silence with 'em without feeling anxious or feeling the need that you have to talk.

And I know know that's an ego thing too, but sometimes they're like, we all feel like we have to say something when we're sitting next to people in company. And sometimes, because like my wife and Nicole, she can't sit for two minutes. We're talking and, um, she'll turn around to me if I'm sitting with people, if we're out or if we're in company with other people, I'll just sit there.

I have nothing gone through my brain. I'll just sit there in the, and I just look around and whatever absorbing. Well, she turn around, she'd said, look, stop being weird and talk. And I'd say. About what do you know? And she'd say, let's just say something. But I'd say, look, I have nothing to say. Like, and say, you can't shut, you can't even shut up.

You won't give anyone a word talk. So there's no binding me talking. Now they, but I won't say something and I unless say, feel the need that or the conversation is something a little interesting. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. But yeah. And that, that for me is, is, is, is perfect. Like, and, and have I felt uncomfortable in the past in, in, with people that I'm in company with?

Of course. Have I felt the need to, to talk when I feel that uncomfortableness, yes. But like, and I grew up in an area where, where, where there was no social media. So you can imagine how, how the people, children of today are feeling like when they, they're in Incomp and they have the floor. Yeah. Like I, look you go, any of the colleges are.

And you go into the assembly hall, the lunch hall, you will find it very, very hard to pick the amount of people on your one hand that are not on their phones. I know. And I know. And that's it. And, and I've sometimes just sat there when I've been in college, just sit, sat there and just, just looked at that and just looked at the, the different interactions with people on the phones.

Like I could be sitting here and you could be four places down there and they're texting each other. I know. I wanted to ask one thing about the A DHD and, and so for example, if, if anyone was listening to this and they have dyslexic with A DHD, um, and they're, and they're wondering how the hell did Timmy, , how did he support his, his A DHD brain in all of this?

Like, how is it that you run, you run a construction company, , you are a successful carpenter. You have, you are married with two kids, you have been to prison twice. Of number of, number of times. Yeah. Yeah. You, you know, you've had millions of projects, charity, you've d like you've done so much. So how do you manage your A DHD to now?

The way I manage, it's just knowing that I have it, you knowing that it's just a part of me knowing that it's not something that dictates how I live my life anymore. Knowing that, um, anything that I do going forward won't be affected by my area a HD because I'm doing something with my hands. So how did you get to that point?

Um, by, by just becoming, uh, understand, just by just understanding that the academic world is not, for me, sitting in an office is not for me. You know, being on a building site, going to people's homes and businesses and, and, and. Fitting stuff for them. Kitchens, our wardrobes, our roofs, our floors, our doors.

That's where I get my enjoyment. That's how I get through my day. If I had to sit down in an office in a computer for two hours during the day, I'd probably have to get up at least six or seven times. Oh, at least. And would you, would you find the, um, the aspects of a, of running a business, like, you know, keeping the books or the accounts, you know, the boring stuff, would that bother you or are you okay with that?

It, it did bother me in the past, Manu, but because I'm a business owner now, the reality of it is, it's part of being a business owner and it has to be done. I know a lot of people with A DHD who are business owners and they're up to their eyeballs in AC accounting, uh, paperwork, uh, invoicing, do you know, receipts and all this, and.

It creates massive issues in their life. Whereas I know that if I don't organize this stuff, no, or tomorrow down the line, it's going to upset my life. So I get it done and I have a routine of doing it now, but I've set up systems in place to be able to make it easier than it would've been before. You know?

But that takes time. That and, and discipline and a lot of discipline. Yeah. It discipline because I, I'm not the kind guy that wants to, to come out here. I want to be in home, sitting in front of the fire, blazing with the dog up on top of the coach and my wife and my children around me, and watching something on the television instead of being out here, having to scroll through emails, having to send invoices, sort out all my receipts for all the months.

So what I do is I do 'em when they need to be done. And that's it. You know, I find the time to do it, and I do it instead of stacking them up. Before I used to stack it up and I used to create a lot of anxiety in my life. Mm-hmm. Now I just get over the feeling that I have that, that it's, God, it's, it's, it's horrible feeling just knowing that you have to do something and it creates stress or anxiety if you, but I've kind of gotten past that area of my life and I just, I just do it.

Mm. And I've built a routine of it, so it's, it's, it's getting easier, you know? Um, whereas before it was ge you know, this, it was a really difficult, difficult I do, and it's interesting because you've gone from, um, needing the diagnosis because of curiosity and questioning, constantly questioning, getting the diagnosis, which was in itself was extraordinarily stressful.

And time consuming and very costly. Then it was, it was do I take medication? Do I not take medication? And, and I, from what I have understand it is such a personal experience because medication works definitely for some people. Definitely not for some other people. Yeah. Um, you know, my husband for example, he will take medication for anxiety, but not a DHD medication.

Uh, 'cause it made him feel really funny. Whereas my friend's husband takes it and it changed, transformed his life. He totally transformed feel different, you see. Totally. And it really important that people understand that well, but people have to understand as well, there's a process to taking medication, okay?

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. There's different medications, there's different, you have different medications, okay? . But then on top of that, you've different, um. What's the word I'm looking for? Different loads of medication. Like you have 18 dose, uh, yeah, different grades. So like for, in order for somebody to find the right medication and find the right balance of that medication, it could take, it could take a year because I remember trial and error there.

Oh, like bannu, it could , who's in addiction, who ha, who's a recovering addict and I'm getting the taste of mm-hmm. Drinking more coffee, drinking Kansas stimulant, uh, drinks like Monster and, and Red Bull and stuff to get more of a kick going.

Massively open medication, like large quantities of medication. , I. And like it was, and I started to kind of lose myself a little bit. I remember that. I remember that time. And I remember you saying, I'd be like, you right, Timmy? And, and you would be just like, yeah, I didn't, I I don't, yeah. I'm not feeling, I don't feel great.

Like I don't, sometimes it makes, makes somebody who's, who has already got a DHD more anxious. Yes, you will. Yes. I was more anxious, especially in social kind of settings where people, I would really feel uneasy and it would affect me massively. . But then I, I also started knowing this then I was a lot more efficient.

I was able to get a lot more stuff during, during the day. Doing the paperwork and admin side of things was a little bit easier than normally been. But then because I was in recovery, I had to be very, very careful and I had to kind of step away from it. And when I stepped away from it, I was able to leave my body, kind of go back to balance.

And it was at that point then I completely accepted my diagnosis of somebody who had a DHD. And I had understood that this is what I need to be and this is what I need to do. And the rest of the stuff that I'm trying to do all the time will never happen because mm-hmm. This is where I'm comfortable and that's working with my hands, meeting people, doing stuff, having my own time when I need to be, because I'm my own boss when you're HD.

And it, and I'm doing what I like doing, which is working with my hands. And it's, it's, it's, I have no issues. And doing it successfully. Yeah, doing it very successfully. But I know, you know, we're very busy. Um, and I'm very clear and you seem so ba, you seem so, um, balanced and, and stable and, uh, Dr. Like, you know where you're going.

You know where you're going. I did Georgie and there was a period of my life last year where I got stuck. Yeah. I was stuck in what I wanted to do with my life and it took me at least three to four months to make a decision based on what I wanted to do, that I wanted to work with the Irish prison service that I wanted to do, uh, some other job.

And I just finally came to the conclusion that. If I had to sit in an office for eight days or for, for eight hours a day, five days a week, I would completely go insane. And I was, I lent towards working for myself. Uh, while I was always doing my own thing. I lent towards just going back out into the construction area because while I was doing the podcast, the con, the construction had kind of drifted away a little bit 'cause we were so busy going here and there and everywhere and it kind of, I was moving away from the construction and then I made a decision this, that's stop everything and do what I enjoy doing.

Now I have more time at home. As I said earlier, I come home. I went home, I sit down. I have nowhere to be. I go to the gym with my wife. I go to yoga, Pilates. We do a bit of spinning. We go for a walk with the dog. These were things that I could not do before I was in. Had a quick bite to eat, shower out the door, didn't go home till half nine, 10 o'clock, and none of that.

That's like I, I, I'm in a great place, but it's after. Take me a lot of hard work to get here. Yeah. A lot of tough roads, a lot of difficulty, a lot of times sitting with myself where I'm kind of lost not knowing where I'm going, you know? But I have to look at what worked for me and what didn't, you know?

And I went with it and made that decision and that was tough. Making the decision that's good for you, not what's good for other people. Because I was a people pleaser as well. Not wanting to keep everybody happy and, um, no, still people please in different ways, you know, but, um, today I'm much more control of my own life than I was before, you know?

Yeah. It's an incredible good to hear that. Thank you podcast.