EPISODE 11: Understanding Communication Through My ADHD Lens

In this episode of The Workplace Podcast, I’m starting a new series by stepping back and sharing my own experience with communication at work — through the lens of living with ADD.

We’ve talked about communication and feedback before. This time, the conversation is different.

Instead of tips or scripts, this episode focuses on what communication feels like for me — why certain conversations linger, why feedback can hit harder than expected, and why vague or incomplete communication can feel heavier than it probably was meant to be.

This episode isn’t medical or clinical advice. It’s simply my lived experience — the patterns I’ve noticed, the moments I’ve replayed, and the mindset shifts that helped me stop turning communication inward and start understanding what was actually happening.

If you’ve ever walked away from a conversation feeling unsettled, replayed a meeting in your head, or struggled to separate intent from impact, this episode will likely resonate.

We’re setting the foundation for a series designed to slow communication down, create clarity, and make workplace conversations feel more manageable — one layer at a time.

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Transcript

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Welcome back to the Workplace Podcast, brought to you by Workplace 101 Hub, where we talk about the things no one teaches, but everyone expects you to know. If you've been listening for a while, you might be thinking, we've talked about communication before, and we've talked about feedback before. And you'd be right. But this episode is different. This time I'm not starting with tips or techniques. I'm starting with my own experience, because for a long time I couldn't figure out why certain conversations stayed with me longer than they seemed to stay with other people. Why I'd replay meetings in my head, why feedback wasn't meant to be harsh but still felt heavy. Why a simple comment could throw me off for the rest of the day. I live with ADD, and over time, through work, relationships, and a lot of self-reflection, I've learned that communication doesn't land the same way for me as it seems to for others. Before we go any further, I want to be clear. This episode is not about medical advice, it's not clinical, and it's not meant to diagnose or label anyone. This is simply me sharing what I've noticed about how I experience communication at work and what I wish someone would have explained to me much earlier. If any of this resonates with you, you are welcome here. If parts of it don't, that's okay too. One thing I've learned about myself is that I don't do well with one big overloaded explanation. I've sat through plenty of training sessions where everything was technically covered, but nothing really stuck. What works better for me is slowing things down, breaking things apart, letting one idea settle before moving on to the next. And that's why this is a series, not a one-off episode. Each episode focuses on one layer of communication or feedback, not because it's complicated, but because I've learned I need time to process things before I can actually use them. If you're someone who listens while driving, this is meant to meet you there. No pressure to take notes, no pressure to remember everything. Just listen and notice what feels familiar. Here's the foundation I want to start with. Because this realization changed everything for me. For a long time I thought communication was mostly about words. What someone said, what I said back, end of story. But that's not how it works, at least not for me. When I'm in a workplace conversation, I'm not just hearing words. I'm noticing tone, I'm noticing timing, I'm noticing who's saying it and what our relationship is. I'm noticing what isn't being said, and often all that hits me at once. I've had plenty of moments where I left a conversation knowing exactly what was said, but feeling unsettled anyway. Like my body picked up something before my brain could explain it. My chest feels tight, my stomach is dropping, my thoughts jump ahead to outcomes that were never stated. For me, the emotional reaction usually shows up before the logic does. By the time I get to, okay, what were they actually saying? My system has already reacted. And when communication is vague, when there's no context or framing, I've noticed my brain doesn't like sitting in that unknown space. It will fill in the gaps. Not because I'm being dramatic, not because I'm unprofessional, but because I want clarity. Learning this about myself helped me to stop asking, what's wrong with me? And start asking, what's actually happening here? One belief I used to struggle with and still catch myself slipping into is the idea that if someone didn't mean something a certain way, it shouldn't land that way. But I've learned that intent and impact don't live in the same space. When someone speaks to me, they know what they meant. I just don't have access to that internal context. I only have what shows up the words, the tone, the timing, and the setting. And when something lands harder than expected, confusion starts. I find myself asking, why did that hit me so hard? Am I reading too much into this? Or did I misunderstand, or did something just not land well? That internal back and forth can spiral quickly, not because I'm insecure, but because I'm trying to reconcile what I felt with what I'm being told was intended. Understanding that impact matters, even when the intent was good. This helped me stop turning those moments inward. It didn't mean blaming anyone, it meant giving myself permission to slow down in the moment. Over time, I've started noticing patterns in how I respond to communication. Sometimes I notice tone before content, and once I latch on to it, it can be hard to unhear. Sometimes when context is missing, my brain fills it in, usually with the worst case scenarios. Sometimes silence feels louder than words. A delayed response or a vague message can take up more mental space than a clear one ever would. Sometimes I replay conversations, not to punish myself, but because I'm trying to understand them better. And sometimes neutral feedback feels more personal than it was probably meant to be. Seeing these as patterns, not flaws, gave me something important. A pause. And that pause changed how I show up. Let me give you a real example. I get a message that says, let's talk. That's it. No context, no topic, no time frame. On paper, that message is neutral. But inside, oh, my brain starts working. What is this about? Did I miss something? Is this feedback? A mistake? None of that came from the message. It came from the gap. I've learned that a lot of the stress I feel around communication doesn't come from what was said, it comes from what wasn't. Recognizing that difference has helped me calm myself instead of spiraling. Here's the biggest mindset shift for me. Communication isn't one moment, it's a system. One comment doesn't define me, one piece of feedback isn't a verdict, and one conversation rarely tells the whole story. When I started looking at communication this way, everything felt less high stake. I stopped treating every interaction like it carried a hidden meaning about my worth or competence. Instead, I started asking, is this part of a pattern? What information is this giving me? What do I know versus what am I assuming? That shift didn't make communication easy, but it did make it manageable. If nothing else sticks today, let these three things land. First, communication is more than words. If something feels off, it's often because something in the system isn't clear, not because you failed to understand. Second, processing differences aren't weaknesses. Just because communication hits you harder does not mean you're less capable. Third, awareness gives you options. Once you recognize what's happening, you get a pause, and that pause changes everything. This episode isn't about changing how your brain works, it's about understanding it so you can work with it. In the next episode, I'm going to build on this and talk about how people process communication differently and why that same message can land in very different ways. If today felt validating, that's a good sign. If it felt eye-opening, even better. We're not rushing this, we're building it one layer at a time. I'll leave you with this. I'm not bad at communication, I'm not too sensitive, and I'm not behind. I've just had to learn the rules that were never really clearly explained. And that's what this series is here to do. We'll keep building together one conversation at a time. I'll see you in the next episode.