Latest / ADHD with Confidence | Overcome Anxiety & Self-Doubt, Christian ADHD Coach, ADHD in Women / 160 // Neurodivergence in Friendships, with Caroline Maguire

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160 // Neurodivergence in Friendships, with Caroline Maguire · ADHD with Confidence | Overcome Anxiety & Self-Doubt, Christian ADHD Coach, ADHD in Women

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Hey friends, welcome to the ADHD with Confidence podcast. I am joined today
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by author, mom, and social coach for ADHD, Caroline McGuire. Caroline, welcome.
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Thank you so much for having me. Thanks for being here. Can you start us off
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by telling us a little bit about your journey with ADHD and neurodivergence,
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both personally as well as professionally?
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Sure. So I grew up in a pretty rural place, Cape Cod, which is the subject of
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Hollywood movies, But in the winter, when everybody's gone, it's a it's a pretty
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rural place, especially in the 80s.
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And when I was 12, we moved to Boston and I failed like every single math test of seventh grade.
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My mom had been up to school many, many times when I was a kid saying like,
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there's something wrong. I'm really worried. She's like so verbal,
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but she doesn't read all these different things.
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And they were like, no, no, no. I had my hearing checked a lot and my eyesight.
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I had so many eye tests as a kid and a lot of Gen Xers will co-sign that,
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that they were like tested for those things.
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And when I was 12, my parents took me, but the math teacher was like,
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this kid is trying so hard. There's no reason she should be failing.
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Like she's coming for extra help, whatever.
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So he actually suggested that they have me get a neuropsych and I did.
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And so I was diagnosed with ADHD, dyslexia, a spatial relations learning disability,
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which really just means I cannot parallel park for love nor money.
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And but they said to my parents that I was a girl.
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And so I would outgrow my ADHD and it wouldn't be a problem but to remediate
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the learning disabilities.
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So my parents like super dutifully like sacrifice. They weren't affluent people
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and they got me tutors and helped me with my learning disabilities because I
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was pretty late being diagnosed with with those things. But.
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They didn't do anything with the ADHD because they were literally told I was a girl not to.
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And my mom would occasionally, like when she'd come in and see my room,
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which was definitely a horror show in high school, she would be like,
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I wonder like when you're going to outgrow this.
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And then when I was 25, I sat in a ballroom and I worked for Johnson & Johnson
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at the time and they were launching a drug called Concerta.
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And I have to give it to them. They really train you well.
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Like they bring in Russell Barkley, all these people. I remember he was there
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and they they educate you on the, you know, whatever disease state, so to speak.
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And I sat in this ballroom and I was like, everything they're saying about ADHD
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is me. And I was really struggling at the time. I had always been told like
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I wasn't a school person, but I'd be a work person. And I loved working. I always worked.
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But I wasn't I wasn't finding success at Johnson & Johnson. I was like holding
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onto my job by my teeth. And I was like, I ran upstairs during a break and I
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called my mom and I said, mom, don't I have that ADHD thing?
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And she was like, yes, but they told us you'd outgrow it. And we've been waiting.
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And so I went and I got, I went to a psychiatrist, I got tested and I was really lucky.
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The psychiatrist I went to actually acted more like an ADHD coach and she started working with me.
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I would go every week and just helping me because I was like,
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you know, kind of the stereotype, like running out of gas on the side of the
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road, you know, you know, really struggling with, with keeping things up.
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You know, I would be like vacuuming, writing a paper and making soup at the
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same time. And the soup would burn.
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I'd never finished vacuuming and the paper wouldn't get written. So I.
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That was really when I discovered it and like started this journey.
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So what you had said there about them saying that you would grow out of it,
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how do you think that affected your journey?
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How would it have been different knowing all along that, you know,
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it would be important to look for strategies and and learn how to celebrate
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and work with your brain instead of assuming that it would eventually change?
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I think it would have been different. Like, I tend to take the view,
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I feel this way about the bullying, too. Like, I was bullied. I had a horrendous time.
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It was pretty bad, you know, not to say, like, oh, I'm the champion of,
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like, I've had the worst situation, but it was pretty bad.
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I don't even tell some of the stories because they would be too triggering for people.
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But I tend to see it as everything led up to this point, right?
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Like if I didn't have that experience, then I wouldn't understand when people
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come to me and they're 40, 50, 60 getting diagnosed or even 15, 16. Right.
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I think it did affect me. I think it didn't affect my self-esteem as much as,
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I think the bullying affected my self-esteem.
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But I definitely think that it did affect me.
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I think that based on the student I was in graduate school after I discovered
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after I had medication and intervention like I would have been a better student I would have.
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I would have worked less hard like I worked so hard to stay you know in the
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top classes and stuff and I I feel like I because I was constantly like,
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ironing you know making soup and writing a paper at the same time yeah,
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but I definitely think the biggest impact on me was that I just didn't know
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how to achieve what I wanted to achieve.
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And once I learned of my diagnosis, and I know this is such a common experience,
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then I was like, okay, interest is key. I have to be interested.
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I need this. I need this dopamine thing. Like, I think I just,
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I was constantly like putting out fires and trying like so many people listening.
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So, so part of it was that maybe had you have known and had,
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like you said, medication interventions earlier on, maybe academically,
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you may have had an easier time.
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But what you're saying is that you may have missed out on that level of understanding
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that now you can bring to clients, to people that you work with,
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that level of understanding and compassion and empathy for them.
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Yeah. And I think part of the reason I'm not bitter or angry about this is I
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don't think most girls, especially in the 1980s and early 90s,
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were not getting diagnosed, right?
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To give context, Ned Hallowell's Driven to Distraction came out when I was in college.
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And what's interesting is he did give a speech because he's actually from Cape Cod too.
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And he did give a speech at the high school in my town. And my mom went and,
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And she did think this is my kid, but she also didn't understand,
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like so many parents, the impact of ADHD.
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So she didn't like come back to me and say, you know, you need to read this book.
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You need to get on this. You know, she and also I was never in trouble,
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whereas I have, you know, relatives, cousins who, you know, they really struggle
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with the behavioral aspect.
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And I didn't, which is, I know, very par for the course for a girl.
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So I think that's also context. Like, as adults facing that,
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I don't think the people who didn't know ADHD would have raised that flag as
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much because I was never in the principal's office, right?
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And I was still getting pretty good grades, right?
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Right. So, yeah, it's tough. I I I know so many people grieve and feel so upset
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and I totally validate them.
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And maybe it's because I've had since I was 25 to process this,
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that I'm not like more angry about it.
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Yeah, I do think that is a beautiful perspective, though, to be able to look at,
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things we've experienced, challenges, difficulties, maybe things that we would
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or wouldn't have changed, but to be able to look at those and grow and learn
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from them. I think that's a really important skill to have.
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I do want to get into talking today. So I read your book, The Friendship Skills
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for Neurodivergent Adults, and I will link that below as well.
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But I wanted you to tell us a little bit about what inspired you to write this book.
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You know, I have always thought about writing a book for adults,
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but when I went into the publishing world, when I sold my first book,
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Why I Will Know and Play With Me, which was for parents helping their kids,
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the publishing world was so different.
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And they were basically like, you can't use diagnostic labels.
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You can say executive function, but no one's going to buy a book that is about
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ADHD and autism and stuff.
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That's a niche book, right? That's not a major publisher book,
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you know, other than Ned Halliwell, who seems to have this magic potion where
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he writes them and people buy them on a national level.
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And so I, they had, we had talked about me writing an adult book way back in
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2019, but like they had so many restrictions in the publishing world.
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Like they wanted this, they wanted that, they didn't want this.
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And I was like, no, I'm not writing that book. That book is like too watered down.
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And then, you know, as I went around promoting Wild Nome play with me.
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I was lucky. It was just before the pandemic. I got to see real people.
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And everybody in every ballroom, every news station was like,
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we need a book for adults.
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Like, I am a parent, but I can't help my kid because I don't know how to make friends.
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And then I did some work with Jessica McCabe for her book.
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And as she was writing her book, she just kept being like, we need an adult
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book. We need an adult book. We need an adult book.
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And then because of the explosion in diagnostic rates, as well as Jessica McCabe's
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book doing well, other people's books doing well, the publishing world suddenly,
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discovered us and said, oh, you guys are a market.
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And I know that sounds really crass, but it's the truth. And I think people
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should know it because I think it's important for them to know,
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too, why it's important to support these books.
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And so my imprint that I'm with that's about inclusion and diversity literally
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was formed when I got the book, like just before I got the book deal.
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And what was great was suddenly the publishing world was like,
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you can write a book. You can have diagnostic labels in the title.
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You can write it very much for this population.
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In the top two publishing houses in America and it will sell.
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And so that was part of why this took so long, was literally,
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I think the ADHD community coming together and sharing other books helped the publishing world learn,
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So I've always wanted to do this, but I just didn't want to do some watered down version.
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I knew it had to be a certain way.
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Do you know what I mean? And I was like unwilling to do what they wanted me
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to do in 2019. I was like, that's not a book any of us want to read.
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And even as you say that, you know, I really appreciated your book and it felt
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like, and I'm sure you've had other people say this before, but it felt like
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you're reading my mind and you know exactly what I'm experiencing,
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you know, and this is very timely for me.
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I've been having troubles lately with, you know, how do I maintain friendships?
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How do I build new friendships? And there was certain aspects in this book that.
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I had never read anywhere else.
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I'd never heard anyone else talk about, you know, even how typically in a friendship,
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with a new friendship, like you said, you feel that zing, that kind of connection,
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that chemistry with a new friend, you hit it off and you feel so good.
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And it feels like, okay, we should be best friends we should be talking all
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the time you know and I used to I used to explain this because I've noticed
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the pattern as we do neurodivergent adults we notice patterns,
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and I would notice the pattern of I would describe a new friendship that I had
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as this sudden burst of flame you know like gas on the fire just this huge flame,
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but then it would be extinguished quite quickly and I understood back then the
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concept of the fact that it probably would be better to kindle this slowly,
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but I didn't understand how that was part of my neurodivergent brain.
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And at the time I wasn't diagnosed. And so reading this was so incredibly helpful.
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So thank you for not writing the watered down version, for writing the version
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that we actually needed.
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Because it has, it has been so helpful. And I do recommend it to anyone who,
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wants to learn more about building friendships.
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A question that I have for you, I think sometimes those of us with ADHD.
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Friendships can feel too hard. We can struggle with rejection sensitivity.
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We have a history of friendships not working out.
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And sometimes we don't understand why. Or, you know, for me,
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it's something I've been struggling with recently is, you know,
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why does nobody invite me to stuff? Like, why is this happening or why is that
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happening? And it's hard to know what's real and what's perceived.
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And, you know, and some of that. So what I wanted to ask you was,
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how important is it to have friendships in our life? Is it worth the effort and the risk?
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So first, I want to say thank you so much for validating my entire life.
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I will be taking it with me all day long and probably for the next week.
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I am so glad it resonated with you. And I know about the burst of flame,
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by the way, because I absolutely have experienced that. I mean,
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I tell this story often and it's not it's a totally true story.
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Like I would rush into friendships.
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And there was one time when I went to coffee with someone and in the middle
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of coffee, I was like, oh, you're a toxic racist and I'm here at coffee with
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you. Like, oh, my God, I got to get out of here.
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Right. And so, like, I've been there, right?
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I've been there where I rushed in or I felt that, you know, thing.
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And I do think as someone who didn't have friends, you know,
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and was brought up in the age of 80s movies, you know, I definitely thought
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that friendship would always be this incredibly close bond,
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you know, sisterhood of the traveling pants, right?
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And that it would be like a rom-com, you know, and I definitely so I've definitely
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been there. Right. And that's part of this.
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I think friendship can be hard. And we I definitely want to talk about the rejection
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and the perceived rejection. And I don't want anyone to think that I'm gaslighting
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them because like there are times we are rejected.
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Right. Like, but I'll tell you that I think it's worth it.
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And it's not just like, oh, it's good for your mental health.
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You know, 85 year Harvard study shows that it's the key to happiness.
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It's worth it because otherwise, I think we leave with the message that there's
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something terribly wrong with us and we can't have what everyone else has.
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And I think we do things differently. I think we friend differently.
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I definitely think my life just as a life looks different than typical people, right?
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You know, I think they would come in here and be like, why so many stickies?
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Like, why do you have a card above your thermostat letting you know how to work
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the thermostat? Isn't it obvious?
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No people, it's not obvious. I forget every time and then I mess it up.
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But I definitely think that I don't want people to settle.
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I don't want people to say, you know, I don't want people to say I can't go
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for that bigger job because I can't go have a job interview because I blurt
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and interrupt and I can't have a conversation.
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If we need skills, I want us to be able to build skills, but in a neuro-friendly way, right?
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And if we want something, and just as a person who's super intense and a very intense person,
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I want people to be able to have what they want because I know I've felt that
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burning desire for things and then thought, well, I can't have that because
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of who I am. And I don't want people to feel that.
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Because otherwise, what's the point of the diagnosis? Right?
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Like, I want people to be able to have, whether it's an online friend,
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a virtual friend, a friend in your town, I want them to be able to,
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to have that life that they want.
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Absolutely yeah I'm glad you
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touched on the the settling part that was actually another question I had
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was that concept of you know I will take what I can get or you know this person
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will tolerate me and and that negative inner dialogue that we've
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had for so long of I'm so lucky this person wants to spend time with me even
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if for us it's not life-giving it's maybe not what we're hoping for from friendship
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and and I feel like you address that,
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so well in the book is talking about the fact that we can create those friendships
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we can foster that connection that we so deeply crave even at the very beginning
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of the book I think it was the,
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the opening line there's nothing worse than feeling misunderstood that was I
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was hooked I was like that's it I love this book.
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Oh thank you so much there is nothing worse there is nothing worse and and I
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do feel like if you encounter people who understand ADHD,
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autism, neurodiversity, right?
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They tend to be just so much easier to converse with, you know?
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Like I was listening to this podcast and I had the realization that the reason
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I love this podcast, and I'm like one of those people, I'm like a member of
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like 12,000 true crime Patreons.
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And my friend Chris is always like, maybe you're listening to too much crude
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crime because I was like super paranoid. We went to this hotel for a conference and I was like,
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I was like super paranoid about something. And he was like, maybe there's too much true crime.
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But I was listening to this one podcaster and I was like, I really love her
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so much. And then I realized that she's a special ed mom. Like her kid is in special ed.
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And like, you know, everybody in her and in the other person who podcasts with her family is like ADHD.
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And I was like, oh, that's why I like them so much, because they really had
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such a such also less black and white perspective on things.
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Like maybe this person had bad intentions, but maybe they had good intentions
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and they just mess up a lot.
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And so I do appreciate that. And I do think we're misunderstood.
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I also think it's not about having a million people. It's about having the right people.
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And I hate that word tolerate because there is nothing worse than the feeling
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that we are being tolerated.
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It is so lonely in a crowd. We're like, I'm here, and I feel worse than if I had stayed at home.
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Yeah, that loneliness when you're surrounded by other people.
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You see other people that look like they're connected to each other.
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You question, why can't I feel that? Yeah, it is such a devastating feeling. I want to ask within...
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That statement of there's nothing worse than feeling misunderstood.
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So you had talked about finding friendships,
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where sometimes similarities, sometimes, like you said, it doesn't mean that
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you have to be in only friendships with other people who are also neurodivergent.
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But a question that I have is, are there ways that we can help others to understand
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us better? So I'm saying an example of, say, with a spouse who is not neurodivergent.
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People who, so when you're talking about friendships you know you can make new
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friends you can find new people and and and some of them understand you really
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easily without a lot of effort and some of them don't how can we help the people
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who don't understand us very well to understand us better.
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I'm so glad you asked this question. So one of the things that I talk about
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is a called a communisplation.
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So this is an explanation of your perspective on things and your needs.
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And you don't have to use diagnostic labels. So if you want to use it in the
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workplace and you're like, in my workplace, I can't say that I have ADHD.
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I can't say I'm autistic. Like, don't, right?
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You know your place best, but you explain things. So, you know,
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I'm an anxious person. I need to know where we're going, you know,
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because it's really hard for me otherwise.
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I am a person who plans everything ahead. I, you know, I don't mean to fall
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off the radar and never get together with you.
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I struggle to keep up with things, right? And allowing people to have greater
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insight into our intentions, right?
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So that they can maybe meet us halfway. Some people won't meet you halfway.
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And my question about that is, are they your people?
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Right? Listen, there are people who also can't, right?
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If they have things going on in their lives, they have their own stuff, maybe they can't.
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But I just find that the people who are my people, and who are my clients people,
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they will meet us halfway, or they will try, you know, if I'm like,
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I need things to be on autopilot, I need things to be scheduled to constantly,
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move around this book club or whatever.
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It doesn't work for me if they're if they're my people, I would argue that they do try.
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If they're not, then they're like, why can't you? And I'm like,
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oh, that's a red flag. You're not my people, right? Because you don't get that.
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No, I can't. It doesn't work out.
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That important piece, them taking what you say at face value and understanding
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that even though their reality is different, what you're explaining to them
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is, in fact, true, whether they've experienced it or not.
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Yeah. And I feel like we also feel really bad about that, right?
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We feel really bad about that because of childhood, because we were made to feel really bad.
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And maybe I'm just like, you know, so deep into this that I,
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but I feel like other people have other stuff.
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We have this stuff, but like other people have other stuff, right?
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Like everybody has stuff. And the question is, is this person wanting to be
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your friend and willing to meet you halfway?
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A lot of emerging research in like the past six years shows that the biggest
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struggle in friendship for neurodivergent people is actually this mismatched
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communication and mismatched expectations.
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It's the fact that typical people don't know about us, so they don't know about
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stuff, so they don't understand why we do the things.
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Why would you overshare, right? Like, it's not a good idea. Don't do it, right?
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But that if we explain to them, you know, kind of our perspective,
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our communication, that they are more willing and will meet us halfway and are
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more accepting, but that we're kind of baffling to them.
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Like, why don't you meet those social norms? Like, everyone knows that they
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are what they are. Or, you know, making...
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Superficial conversation. You know, when we jump from the superficial to the
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really deep and skip all those steps, we're baffling to them.
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They're like, why are you doing that? That's not how it works. You know?
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Sure it is. Sure it is.
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I mean, I want to ask them, how do you tolerate the absolute mind numbing boredom
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of some of these things? It's superficial stuff. Why bother talking?
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Right but but like truly I think some of it is like
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you know then they're just like well I don't I don't know what to do with this
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person and are there people who then are not accommodating and like we're we
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are not the right fit for them and whatever we do really irks them sure but they're not our people,
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right so just to clarify would you say that the first piece in that is understanding
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ourselves understanding,
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how we do communicate some of these things that to us seem typical other people
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might not understand that piece of understanding ourselves really well so that
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we can self-advocate but also so that like you said we can,
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commune commune explain it communis plane I don't know if I could say that communis
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plane because even the other day I was at the I work at,
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I've met some really great people, some really interesting people,
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and I try to be aware of—sorry, the one girl who works there,
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she calls me the conversation hijacker.
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She promised that it was not in a bad way. She just says I talk to all sorts of different people.
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I try to be aware of, you know, if they're talking about something that's not
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able to be joined in on. But there was a son and his mom, so the son was an
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adult. And we got talking and when ADHD came up, I could see his demeanor completely change.
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And he thinks his mom has it. So his mom and I, you know, hit it off.
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I could feel that, you know, that zing.
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But the son had a lot of misconceptions about ADHD.
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And he asked things like, you know, how do people pay attention long enough
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to your podcast if they have ADHD?
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And there was just these really sad misunderstandings. And so I took a few minutes
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and I just explained a little bit more about what ADHD actually entails and
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what it is and what it isn't.
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And it was hard in the moment to not feel kind of angry and frustrated at some
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of his assumptions and his comments that he made.
25:56
But I think just that important piece of knowing ourselves well enough that
26:00
we are confident who we are, and then taking that time when we have the opportunity,
26:06
like you said, to communisplain to other people to help educate them.
26:12
I agree. And I have a good example of this. There's been a very,
26:16
very tragic accident where the person, the perpetrator claimed POTS,
26:22
which is a neurological condition.
26:25
I don't know that much about it, but I do have people in my orbit who have POTS,
26:31
and they have the same thing as we do.
26:33
Like people have all these misconceptions, epilepsy.
26:37
One of my clients was just telling me the other day that like so many people
26:42
do not really understand epilepsy.
26:44
And they're like, oh, well, like, how are you even like going a day without
26:48
a seizure? And she's like, that's not the kind of epilepsy I have.
26:51
Right. And that there are all these different types of epilepsy and different levels of epilepsy.
26:57
And I think that we feel so alone and there's so much stigma and And there is
27:04
genuinely so much misinformation, right,
27:07
that we feel like it's just us and we feel that sort of burning in your cheeks
27:13
when somebody doesn't know.
27:15
But my experience is also that is not to diminish that in any way,
27:19
but is to say, I think people with POTS, I think people with epilepsy,
27:23
I think there's a lot of situations, allergies, right?
27:27
Like my son's having a little 12th birthday party and one of his very best friends
27:32
he is now girls and boys as friends which is cute.
27:36
Has a gluten-free thing. And I just wrote the dad and I was like,
27:40
hey, I heard from my daughter that if we get pizza from this one place,
27:43
we can get her a gluten-free pizza because he was going to bring the kids pizza and her cake.
27:49
And I was like, that's so sad. I can get the pizza from a place where she can
27:53
have a gluten-free pizza.
27:55
And the dad was so grateful. And it was so sad to me.
27:59
And he was like, wow, no one ever does this for her.
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And I was like, no one ever does this for her. It's like there's three pizza
28:07
shops within like a trifecta and you just go to the one that's gluten-free.
28:12
Like it's not really, I'm not doing God's work here, right? Like I'm walking
28:16
across the street to pizza A versus pizza B.
28:21
And I feel like it's just because we've been so maligned and so misunderstood.
28:29
But I do feel like it's worth doing that education. I have moments I don't feel
28:34
like it either, by the way, for those listening who are like,
28:36
I have moments in the coffee shop where I don't want to do it.
28:39
I have those moments, too.
28:41
And I get that it's tiring, but I just feel like the way forward is that education
28:47
piece, you know, because I think people.
28:52
I think they just don't know. And I blame the media here.
28:56
I think the media perpetrates so many myths and just, I don't know,
29:02
allows this, you know, like the New York Times with their article about the
29:06
medication that was completely wrong, like two years ago.
29:10
Like, why did you let that go out? You know, so I feel like we are particularly
29:15
stigmatized, But I do think those moments of education are the way forward.
29:20
I just, it is draining at times. Absolutely.
29:24
And even what you're saying about, that's an interesting example when you say,
29:29
gluten-free, half of my husband's family has celiac disease.
29:32
And so that's been one that I've learned so much about.
29:35
But there are, I do, I hear misconceptions about something like that,
29:39
that for them, you know, could make them quite sick.
29:42
And so understanding that, yes, we feel alone sometimes, but that understanding
29:47
that other people are going through things and they might feel alone or misunderstood
29:52
in that and that we aren't,
29:54
we aren't the only ones that feel misunderstood, I think can be helpful.
29:57
What would you say as far as, so, you know, that father who said,
30:02
you know, thank you for doing this. Nobody ever does this.
30:05
What do you think are important skills in order for us to all understand each
30:11
other better? What kind of posture, what do we need to do to understand each other better?
30:16
I think we need to be curious, which is a coaching skill, and just look at what's going on for people.
30:22
I think we need to be less judgmental and less black and white thinking just as a society, right?
30:29
And have perspective taking, right? Like perspective taking is to look at this
30:35
and say, you know, I don't know.
30:38
And also know this is a self-awareness thing, right? And most people don't have
30:42
great self-awareness. We always worry we don't have great self-awareness,
30:45
but most people in society don't have great self-awareness. And this is like
30:48
a proven fact. This isn't like a Caroline fact.
30:52
I feel like most people don't know what they don't know.
30:55
And that's, I mean, that show Undercover Boss is like one of my favorite things
30:58
because that's like the whole thing, right? The bosses just don't know.
31:03
And I feel like most people don't know. And instead of saying.
31:08
They go based on these like really black and white thinkings.
31:11
Like everybody who's gluten-free has just decided to be gluten-free and they've
31:15
like just decided to do this instead of like, I like you have friends with celiac
31:20
and I know they get so sick.
31:22
I know that they were sick their entire lives until in their 40s.
31:26
They were diagnosed with this. I'm like, oh my God, it's terrible.
31:30
I just think people, we, I try to give people grace and pause and take perspective
31:38
because I want the same for me.
31:40
Do I always get the same? No, no.
31:44
I mean, I've had plenty of people judging me and I am the mother of two neurodivergent kids.
31:49
And I believe me, I have been there on the playground where people do not understand, you know.
31:56
But I also do think that if we are going to find a path forward in friendship,
32:03
one of the best things we can do is to do the work,
32:08
to understand ourselves and then to do some of the work to figure out what fills our social cup.
32:14
Not what everyone said to you when you were in high school and middle school
32:17
and elementary school, like, what do you want?
32:20
And who are your people? And I have all that in the book. I have tons of exercises
32:24
around this because I think that if we understand ourselves,
32:29
we have such a better chance of moving forward.
32:33
Absolutely. Yeah. And you do a great job of going through that thoroughly in
32:37
the book that we obviously can't cover all in one conversation.
32:42
I wanted to ask, so for somebody who.
32:45
Is struggling with friendships, but really wants to make them work,
32:49
what would you give them as kind of a starting point?
32:54
I would start by looking at who are your people, right? What are the interests you have?
33:03
And like to do a little self-diagnosis, and this is in the book,
33:07
they can just follow the exercises of like, what's fun for you? What do you enjoy?
33:13
Because if you try to make friends around interest, you already have a language,
33:19
and you already have common ground to talk about things and to nurture the friendship.
33:26
So I would say also, you know, if you want, you can skip to the last chapter.
33:32
The second to last chapter is on troubleshooting.
33:35
And I put that chapter there so that if people were on this journey and things
33:39
weren't going right, when I'm not there, they can sort of diagnose what's going wrong.
33:44
But if you were like, well, I have friends, but I don't really want to make
33:48
new friends, go to that chapter and figure out like what's missing.
33:53
Because I think a lot of times we have people, but they're not necessarily people
34:02
who share the same interests as us.
34:05
And therefore the connection is weaker because interest is so important to us and and,
34:14
you know i have a chapter on how do you know if someone will be a good friend
34:17
because a lot of times we're tolerating stuff and we're so afraid to let go
34:22
of people and i get it i totally get it i've been there i talk about it in the book.
34:29
A lot of times the people who we're sort of holding on to aren't treating us very well.
34:36
And so there's red flags. So I want people to read that chapter.
34:39
I want people to look at the red flags and say, I deserve to be treated well.
34:44
Yeah, something that you just said that I didn't quite pick up when I was reading the book.
34:49
I read about, you know, finding other people that like have similar interests,
34:54
like doing the same things.
34:56
But I didn't really think about the fact that as an ADHD brain,
35:02
I am motivated by interest based things.
35:05
And it's something that I've been I've been this is sorry, this is a big aha
35:08
moment for me. That's okay. I love it.
35:11
I've been struggling lately with feeling guilty because when I'm thinking about
35:16
fostering new friendships or even attempting to.
35:20
I feel this kind of tug of war of, but I want to do something interesting,
35:24
but I don't know if that person likes that.
35:26
So maybe I'm not a good friend if I don't just go hang out with that person
35:31
or feeling like, you know, it's too hard to find people that like doing the same things as me.
35:36
I haven't been able to find them. So it felt like I needed to give up that interest,
35:42
those interest-based activities that,
35:45
in favor of finding friendship. And so that, I love it that you just said that
35:48
is that, no, it's actually going to make it stickier.
35:51
It's going to make it stronger when you can find people that are interested
35:55
in the same things as you. Because it felt like I had to choose doing something
35:58
I actually want to do or hanging out with somebody.
36:02
I'm so glad you put it that way because I think a lot of people feel that way.
36:05
So this is like such a good realization. I also think we have to think outside the box, right?
36:12
So I had, I'll have a quick story. I had a group that I was going into every
36:16
month and they were doing a bunch of executive function stuff.
36:19
And then I would come in and talk about friendship.
36:21
And it was great because I could run this material by them. Sometimes they'd
36:24
be like, we have no idea what you're talking about, Caroline.
36:27
You need to explain it differently. Like it was great.
36:29
And one of the women like dutifully did like everything I suggested.
36:33
I was like, join two or three activities that are high interest, blah, blah, blah, blah.
36:38
And she wasn't really finding her people and then she went to this thing for
36:44
like her very specific interest and it was like to do with photography had something
36:48
to do with like birds and bird watching it was like very specific
36:52
but it was like an hour and a half from her house and she had the greatest day
36:57
you know those days where you just instantly click with people
37:00
you talk to them you have a great day and then after she was still texting getting
37:05
on zoom facetiming these people, keeping connected with them.
37:09
They were like, hey, there's another one of these things like here, want to go?
37:14
And she had not experienced that before. So she was like, I'm invited, you know?
37:18
And we talked about it and she said, but it's not in my town. It's not in my area.
37:24
And I sort of said, you have to make a choice, right? Would you rather have that day.
37:31
And go once a month, an hour and a half away, and then have the rest be virtual?
37:35
Or would you rather have what you have in your town? And instantly she said, I'd rather travel.
37:41
And so that to me is part of this friendship dilemma, is that I think sometimes
37:47
we get very stuck on, I want that kind of zing, that kind of connection,
37:52
but I want it to be like in my town.
37:54
I want these people who I've been around for 30 years to convert into interesting people that I enjoy.
38:01
And I just don't think that always happens, right? And I think it also depends
38:05
where you live. If you live in London, there's a bigger opportunity for you to find those people.
38:10
I live in a small place, right? So I don't always find the people,
38:16
you know, who love all the things I love.
38:19
I think that we too often discount virtual friendship. I know people want people
38:25
in their town, but I also think,
38:29
expand your, your horizon and look at what are the things I want?
38:34
And then what are the opportunities? And then where do I find the environment
38:40
works for me and the people work for me?
38:43
Um, so that's just my little story of like, I think sometimes you can have it,
38:49
but maybe, maybe you can have it in your town, but sometimes you can't,
38:52
you have to have it six towns over. And that, to me, okay.
38:57
Yeah, I think that was something else that I learned from the book was,
39:01
yeah, broadening where you're looking for those friendships,
39:04
where you're looking for that connection.
39:06
And I think that was encouraging because in the places that I go right now,
39:11
I don't typically find people who,
39:14
I feel like have the same interests or even are as extroverted I could spend
39:18
all day every day with people in conversation and I feel like often for a lot of the people that I know,
39:25
they have said that they're introverts and that you know they they prefer having
39:29
some of that time alone so I think that is an important,
39:32
aspect to it as well as being able to look online find communities based on
39:38
interest and then finding your people within that.
39:42
All right, before we go, where can my listeners go to find out more about you,
39:47
the work that you're doing, and about your book?
39:50
So if they go to author Caroline M, all of my social media flows from that. I'm on Instagram a lot.
39:58
I have a YouTube channel. I make videos about all these topics.
40:02
I make deep videos. I don't make like superficial videos.
40:06
And Friendship Skills for Neurodiversion Adults is available in audiobook,
40:10
by the way, because I know we all love audiobooks.
40:14
And it's anywhere books are sold. And there are, you know, sometimes discounts
40:20
on Amazon if, you know, I like people to support local, but sometimes we need the thing.
40:26
And if you don't have it in your library, by the way, go request it.
40:31
If you don't want to buy a book, that also really helps. But it also is necessary
40:36
because I found out through this whole process, libraries don't just like buy
40:39
every book that comes out.
40:41
You basically have to like request it and then they will will get it.
40:47
And that probably helps as well like you said earlier with bringing in more
40:51
books like this and and showing that there is that need and that demand for
40:56
this type of this type of book absolutely,
40:59
all right well thank you so much for sharing with us thank you for writing this
41:02
book it's been very helpful i'm going to look back at it several times i'm sure
41:07
and thank you for taking the time to be with us here today Thank you for having me. I had a great time.