Shaparak Khorsandi does not need an introduction, but despite that, I'm gonna do one anyway. An incredible comedian, first performing in 1997, debuting in Edinburgh in two regularly on stage, radio, on television with Shapi Talk, live at the Apollo, and reality shows like I'm a Celebrity. And enormously important to us is that she has well, she is ADHD, and earlier this year published her autobiography, Scatterbrain, How I Finally Got Off the ADHD Roller Coaster and Became the Owner of a Very Tidy Sock Draw. I've read the book. I recommend it at all. It's honest, insightful, funny, sad. I enjoyed it, and some parts, frankly, were searingly familiar. Welcome. Welcome. And thank you for being here. Thank you for having me.

Thank you for having me. Yeah. So a lot of people have written to me to say how familiar parts of my book are, which is incredible to me because I was I was so quiet for so long about things that I thought was so weird about me and finding out that so many other people had felt the same was very freeing and also sad because you kinda think what could have been if you had known earlier, but there we are. We're here now. Yeah. Well, look, this is.

You're you're I'm absolutely amongst friends here, and I think you sharing your story is a big deal. And I think the candor and the reason I wrote searingly familiar because at some parts certainly were a bit painful. And I think the clarity with which you write just brings some things that made me think about some things in my past, which I just yeah. It's it hurts. It's good hurt. Like, it's Yeah. Right. We've a kickoff question. Otherwise, we'll just chitchat. Like, two ADHD is chitchatting happening. So we start with, like, one of the big one, like, one of the big ones, which is what's your diagnosis story?

My diagnosis story well, it's not linear. It's not something that happened over a few weeks or even a few years. I always knew there was something that wasn't right or wasn't working or there was just something and I couldn't even verbalize it, but I knew that I found it difficult to do what other people seem to find very easy to do. Just simple things like everything from knowing where where my purse is at any given moment or knowing how to have a conversation that was in any way going to be difficult. So without so I knew that I cried easily. I knew that I lost my temper with my family or my my partners quickly. I knew that I couldn't concentrate on schoolwork. I knew that I had this deep secret of binge eating.

And I knew that I couldn't always control my drinking. So I went to a myriad of different therapists over the years and support groups and PTSD was diagnosed and, elements of trauma and I got support and help for bulimia, but still there was despite knowing facts about all these things, I still felt rudderless and out of control a great deal of the time. And then I started to learn more about ADHD, and then I took part in a Radio four documentary about decluttering, and they asked me to prepare a decluttering, diary, and they sent me all this bump and and all the machinery that I needed to do this before the recording. And when they came around, they saw that I hadn't opened any of it. And.

The professional declutter that they brought round looked around my house and really quietly said to me, are you ADHD? And that was quite a big deal for me because no one had ever guessed so quickly and said it out loud. And we started to talk about it, and I started to understand that my inability to organize my paperwork, or do my admin wasn't because I I was just deliberately trying to scupper my life or annoy everyone. It was because I can't, and I can I can tidy up for five hours and it'd still be a mess? So then, in lockdown, after a particular incident with a box of milk tray being thrown against the wall by me, I, went on the, you know, the counseling and psychotherapy website.

Forgive me, I can't remember what it's called, the acronym. But I I typed in adult ADHD. I found my therapist who understood me and after, some intense psychotherapy, we both agreed that it was time to get the official diagnosis, so I can get the medication. So in a nutshell, that that is my diagnosis story. But I was I self diagnosed long before my psychotherapist diagnosed me and that was before a psychiatrist diagnosed me.

What was the tipping point with the milk tray?

Oh, it was just a lot of anxiety in lockdown and feeling terrified every time I left the house. This was in lockdown one when no one was vaccinated, and we weren't really sure if, you know, how it would affect children. And I have had two young children, and I'm the only parent of my daughter. And I just had this just this horror that if I die she'll be an orphan, you know, she'll be and and I bought this milk tray when there was no other chocolate in the shop and I felt like a real hunter gatherer steering my ship. And the like, I I you know, I've always been a single parent, but I never felt like a single parent in that. I always had my mom and dad, all my neighbors were in and out my house, army.

And in lockdown, I was like, it's just me and I've got to carry these two little children, safely across this thing that no one knows what it is. And I bought this milk tray and I brought it home and my children had a minor squabble. They've got a big age gap. They they have a five and a half year age gap, so they don't have big to dos. They just went, no, this way. No, that way. No, do it this way. And I just grabbed it, ripped it open, and held it at the wall. And I've got two dogs. Right? So then my children are just scrambling to pick up the chocolate before the dogs get to it, and I'm a mess of sobs and crying and shouting and, tantruming. I was having a tantrum, and then I text a neighbor that lives, behind me.

And I said, I've gone mad. Can you keep an eye? And I left my house and my slippers, and my next one my neighbor came and she sat in my front garden to keep, you know, because you couldn't come in the house. And she wrote me a text message and as I was marching to a friend's house and she text me and she she just wrote, you're not alone. And it was amazing, and I went to this friend's house and I sat in my friend's front garden for a while, and she gave me some shoes to walk home in. And I got home and I said to my children, mommy is feeling poorly in my head, and I'm really sorry. What I did was not acceptable. I'm really sorry. It wasn't anyone's fault. It wasn't your fault. And I went on the Internet, and I went on the British counseling.

Therapy site thing, and I put adult ADHD. And I also started to read a magazine called, attitude. Because one of the people I walk my dogs with in lockdown, they started speaking to me about their daughter being ADHD and I was like, wow. Okay. This is amazing that parents are openly talking about this and and and they were saying that, oh, know, and everything they said about her daughter just sounded like me. So it it was a lots lots and lots of little clues that I was finally awake to hearing that led me to finally but but really, it was getting the help was because I thought my kids are on their own with me in lockdown, you know, before I could I could procrastinate about getting help for ADHD.

Because, you know, my kids lived in a village and when that was gone and this doesn't negate the PTSD and the trauma, by the way, because that still exists side by side with ADHD for me. But the ADHD is the thing, is the umbrella that I feel that I sit under more than any other because now I am able to have difficult conversations without crying or without losing my temper. I am able to make really sensible choices for myself in terms of everything from when I'm gonna eat, how much I'm gonna do in a day, or, you know, what or in relationships. So I feel I'm in safe hands.

That's a well, thank you for for sharing that, and it's a it's a big story. I that the bit you talked about, though, obviously, it's something happening that causing real desire for change. But but that bit you talked about before where you learn more about ADHD, you talked about meeting your neighbor and recognizing it in yourself. When we're asked, like, why do you think there's more people coming forward for a diagnosis? It's just it's two reasons. It's one, because they couldn't before, because it wasn't recognized or you didn't, and because people are talking about it. And suddenly when people talk about ADHD and why some what you're doing is so important, people go, wait, what? Like Yeah. What? Yeah. Recognize it, and it just.

You know, we don't talk about how our brains work, how it is inside. We don't have those conversations.

No. We didn't have the language for it. We didn't we didn't have we didn't know that it wasn't in our own hands. So when people say, you know, people are coming forward and saying that they might have ADHD, those are people who for years will have been trying and thinking, I'll do a to do list and as of tomorrow and in in in so many other walks of my life, I'm so capable display intelligence and so it must be my own failing that I'm not able to pay my bills on time. I'm not able to open my post. I'm not able to keep my, temper when I'm being confronted with. I'm not able to, just do these things that other people seem to find so easy. So I'm gonna try I'm gonna try and as they keep trying and failing, their self esteem has eroded.

And so it's, as my therapist said, it's it's it's not ADHD itself that that harms you or damages your mental health. It's not knowing that you have it, and then when you know you have it, now that doesn't mean you now think that every mistake you made can be attributed to it because your moral framework doesn't change, you know. Mhmm. It's it's just the relief of being able to confidently say to people, it's gonna take me three reads before this passage absorbs in my mind, you know. You're gonna have to I I'm so confident now about saying you're gonna have to say the first half of your sentence your question again. I had a book event yesterday and I was like, this is the first half of your question because I was still thinking about.

You know, whereas before, I would just yes. The first half was.

Yeah. No. I I so so for radio, like, I I did so for I do do some radio interviews. And I said to the interviewer, look, if you ask a really long question, I'm gonna be able to remember the last bit, and I'll answer that. But like, otherwise, I I will just I won't have track at the the start of it. And so she said, well, you want should I just ask you short questions? I was like, okay. Yeah. That sounds great. Oh my god. What a mistake. Because it was just like a machine gun. Oh, man. What have I done to myself? It's it's like, let's go back to the the amble. Like, so at least I have a break. It was yeah. I felt very on the spot. It was like learning, like, what are the.

Tools and like what what works and those kind of situations as a part of the art. Actually, my second question, which you've started to answer, which is like, you know, how has being diagnosed affected your life?

In it's given me great peace. It's given me answers. It's given me confidence. And I have to stress that that wasn't just the diagnosis with the psychotherapist because by then I absolutely knew. But just, I'm a big fan of self diagnosis. If you read and if you get the information, you will learn to understand yourself and your brain and you will know what applies to you, and then you can start to support yourself. There is so much information out there to support yourself like even terms like overwhelm. Overwhelm. I didn't know I was being overwhelmed. I didn't know. I just thought that I was bad at time management, and I am bad at time management, but that's not to say that I shouldn't have planned, you know, a day trip away.

With my kids the the morning after I'd had a big party. You know, of course, that was gonna be an overwhelming thing or doing, like, saying yes to six big things in one day. So, it changed the way I took on work and took on commitments. It also gave me a relief of, saying no to a lot of social things. It took away my FOMO, and I don't have anxiety anymore. I don't have anxiety anymore the way I used to live with it permanently, the way I live with my thumb. I didn't know it was something that could ever be separate to me. I didn't know. And someone told me that phrase, just as a dog doesn't know it's a dog. And I think that really applies to the anxiety that I had I had. And in terms of my health, I, I'm no longer.

Locked in a cycle of binge eating. If I don't take my pill and if I don't go or if I don't go for a run when I haven't taken my pill, I start to just be this magnetic pull towards food and that is not there anymore. That's that's the the biggest thing I think and also I give myself a break. For years and years, I gave myself such a hard time because I can't read non fiction. I read novels Mhmm. But I could not read non fiction. And now I'm like, audiobooks. Oh my gosh. I have I have whole life has changed because there's a whole world of books available to me now that didn't exist before because novels, you know, mess with my my emotions. They paint pictures and they take me somewhere.

But non fiction doesn't and it just felt like, you know, the teacher from Charlie Brown. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. In my ears, as I'm, you know, running or going for a walk or, you know, straightening my hair, it's brilliant. Right. And Scatterbrain is available on audiobook. I think you It is. It is available on audiobook by me, no less. Well, congrats on on doing doing that. Reading your own book and going through it all again.

You tweeted recently, I I love I'm ADHD rather than I have ADHD. And personally, I think we should lose the d. The world is disordered, not us.

Yeah. Absolutely. Because to say that you have it implies that it's something that can be cured other than rather than something that's an intrinsic part of you, and I it's so much a part of who I am. And and because sure enough, like, there's some things that I don't excel in. I'm not a good organizer, but if you need plans changed last minute, I'm the person to call on. If you need your kid, like, babysat at a moment's notice, I'm the mom that you call on because I can accommodate anything new at any moment. I can change I don't mind about changing plans. Like, sometimes we'll go, oh, we can't do that because we've arranged to go swimming. Well, I right. This is.

And and all of that is our priorities as well, but I I I find it fascinating like this one mom that I know, her daughter couldn't make couldn't make the school disco because they'd already arranged a swimming class. And and she's like, oh, what a shame. What a shame. She can't make it because of the swim class. And what really made was interesting for me was how her plans were set in stone, whereas mine are completely movable, and I don't think of the consequences, which is like the money you lose if you cancel a swimming lesson. And things like that, which I'm not saying is a good thing, by the way. I'm I'm I'm not saying that my method is better than her method, but it's just the difference between people. So ADHD is a difference.

In my opinion, and not a not a, disorder. And the world and our education system needs to bend to the fact that not all of us fit in the same box when it comes to learning.

You're talking, like, eloquently on your on your school experience. And in your in your book, you talked about school. You said if these smart people can't see there's a problem here, and there is a reason I can't do these things, then I must be the problem. I am there for a bleeping bleep hole. No no swear in teaching YouTube algorithms. The and you then wrote you then why do I take off my reading glasses to read? I really should not do that. You then wrote, every day of my life at school was blighted by the anxiety of work I hadn't finished and tasks I did not understand because I hadn't been listening.

Yeah. And and the sad thing about that when I hear that is I loved history. I really enjoyed learning history, and I failed my GCSE in history because I couldn't keep up with the schoolwork and I didn't know how to tell anyone that when I sit down to do this, my mind just goes to my bookshelf and pulls out all my books on gorillas and Asterix books and gerbil care. And I read those instead, and hours and hours go by, and I still haven't learned about the corn laws. And it's not because I don't enjoy learning about the coal the corn laws, but I don't know how to stay focused on it because left to my own devices, I don't know how to to work. And you know what really saved me with my education was.

I did make friends with the clever kids, the the the and really sort of the ones that were doing very well. I've I've always been drawn to geeks and nerds. Right? So I had a friend at my, a level college and she was really studious and her mom had a house in the countryside and she said, I'm gonna go there to revise. Come with me. And I thought we're gonna go there and muck around. But we went there and she had a study plan and we got up at a certain time, we did a certain amount of work, and then we took the dogs for a walk, and then we did some more work, and then we had lunch, and then we always stopped at this certain time for the whole week every single day. And so I was forced to work there because we were in her mom's conservatory.

They lived in the country, I was surrounded by nature and tweeting birds and, a couple of beautiful dogs asleep at our feet and I could work. And I spoke to a psychiatrist recently who said that there's a word for that when when you have a oh, can't remember what it was. It's not a bodyguard, but it was a chaperone. So it was something like that where where you have to do a task and so you have someone chaperone you and I realized that I do that now. So I got a parking fine because I hadn't registered my oh, so boring, my, I hadn't I hadn't renewed my resident's parking. So I had a parking fine. So I went to my neighbor's house who understands me and understands I have ADHD, and I sat at her computer.

And I did it with her next to me. And I paid my fine and I renewed my, thingy, and that's how I have to do things.

And it's also called body doubling. I can That's it. Body doubling, not bodyguarding. Actually, thought chaperoning was quite nice as well. It was a there is some chaperoning in it. But and I think that's a great story, and it's it's important. Yeah. And and that I've even read the book. I think you you talk about, like, that's the reason you got the a levels you did. Yeah.

Yeah. And and I passed my a levels and went to university and I got an a. I got an a for English a level. I had never got an a before in my life. I still regret not doing English degree, but that doesn't that doesn't matter. But I didn't know the term body doubling when I was writing my book. I hadn't come across it yet. And if if I had a teacher or a parent who had, you know, I'm not blaming them because it was the eighties. They didn't know that, okay, you need a body double to work. So how can we do that for you and help you? Because I had plenty of friends who who would have been who were very supportive of me. I had a a best friend who I completely relied on in my sprawling.

Secondary school. I went to a massive comprehensive school with all different buildings and some departments you had to cross a bridge, and and she would make sure I would and I was in all different classes to her because she was in all the high bands and I was in the low bands, but she would do a little recce and make sure that she knew where I had to be and she was my she was my chaperone to my classes. And it's something she did from the age 12, 11, 12, didn't think about. None of the teachers knew that's that's what she was doing, but she was doing a job of a of the adults because she was a kid and she understood her friend. Whereas, yeah, just write me off as dipstick. Now.

You you bumped into an old school teacher, mister Houlihan, and you blurted out. That school me up. Yeah. And his response to that was to invite you to tea.

He yeah. He did and he didn't seem surprised. And I I bumped into my old teacher from secondary school, randomly at a restaurant on the Isle Of Wight and he turned around and he went, Shaparak, do you remember me? And I immediately said his name and I immediately said that school messed me up. And he said, I know. Would you like to meet for a cup of tea? And the I know was really interesting because he had con been contacted by other people as well, most notably, Steve McQueen, the film maker and artist who was in a couple years above me and was dyslexic. And.

And that that was an interesting thing because I I didn't know Steve McQueen was in the class above me. That's how big the school was. You shouldn't know people unless they're in your year. But I I read a few interviews with him where he talked about falling through the net and being ignored at school and being written off and it really resonated with me. And I looked him up and he went to my school, I was like, yep, because I completely recognized what he described. So I went for a cup of tea with my well, if I'm honest, it was a pint of lager, not of tea. He talked to me about what the framework of the school was like back then. I'm quite protective of him because he still works in the industry, in the education industry, and.

A lot of things he said about the school were really I mean, I saw it as a child, but you don't know how to call things out as a child. And it turns out neither could the adults in the eighties. But my point is that he said to me that you didn't fail at school because of your ADHD or because your parents were immigrants or because you're dyslexic, you failed because you were failed. We failed you, and I'd like to apologize to you for that. And that was amazing for me. That was really beautiful what he did for me that day because it's not because of ADHD that anyone fails in their education. It's because they're not given the support that is required. And, you know, we don't have the resources yet in state schools.

To truly support each and every neurodivergent child, each and every child with special educational needs. And this is a failing of our system, and this is a failing of funding, and this is a failing of our values. So it's important to speak out about this without blame because teachers do a bloody good job. Right? A really good job, with the resources that they have. But it's so important to make governments understand that we are losing brilliant people and we are letting children down by still implementing this one size fits all system. Yeah. In state schools.

Yeah. I know. Yeah. There are huge issues around the understanding within schools and the tools and the the resource is not only sort of just simple financial, but in terms of what to do and what are the things that make a difference.

Yeah, that needs that needs a chance. Also, something that can happen, so a kid like me with ADHD at my school, if I hadn't had the parental framework that I do, you know, my my parents were very supportive and they expected me to do well. And they they, you know, they they cared about me, they cared about who I was hanging out with, They cared about, my well-being, to the best of their ability and with with the knowledge that they had in the in the eighties. If I was a child with ADHD from parents who were not able to support me emotionally as well, perhaps parents who were so bogged down with their own issues, perhaps parents who were, addicts or in prison or if I myself was had been in the care system. Right? That child with ADHD.

Is in danger, is in real danger, and our prisons are full of people who did not have the privilege of love that I had that weren't able to navigate the system, in the way that I did eventually, and they end up in circumstances and in friendship groups that take them to a world that, you know, causes them real pain and harm and yeah.

A it's huge issue. People who have failed by education then finding themselves going down bad paths and and Yeah. Is that it is that that object failure. You talked about your your child, and I wanted to bring up some some of the parts in your book. You you you partly so people can can can hear it. Whenever teachers pulled me up on not doing homework or not paying attention, I filled up with shame. The shame built a tower of anxiety inside me and made itself at home. Neither was going anywhere for a long, long time. And you also wrote every every bright spark I had has been snuffed out because all my energy has gone into desperately trying to remain invisible, unnoticed, because I am full of shame, full of fear.

Because I cannot be myself here. Myself is not acceptable here. And and you wrote a poem. I'll ask you on how it all makes you feel, but you wrote a poem. This is when you were a child that you asked to write it. Soppy is a word to describe me. Human, I am not. Absolutely barmy, perfectly gone to pot, aggravating in every way, rubbish at everything. Annoying, you could say. Cuffuffing, I often make.

That's sad, isn't it? You know, because I'm I'm trying to be funny in it. But those that was when we had to do acrostic poems, is that what they're called? When they when the first letter spells out your name.

I had not noticed. Like, okay.

And I remember my daughter wrote a similar one with her name and it was all positive stuff about herself. You know, she's 10 years old and she'll go, I'm so slay. And it's all it's all positive. Like, she'll say she's, oh, she's bad at football. I'm bad at football, but she's going to football club to get better at football, you know, and she might never be very good at football, but she's merrily goes to football club knowing that she's not very good at football and seems like a really little thing, but the very fact that she is comfortable enough in her body to just run around and do sport and play, is so different to the way I was as a kid. And.

I guess the one thing I'm really grateful for is my awareness of what school was like to me for me, and I have been so on it with my children at school. I need to know that they are content there, and something that changed for me at school was my dad event because I was bullied as well, and my my I told my dad eventually that I was being picked on and how horrible it made me feel. And that's the only time I ever shared anything like that with my dad about school, and he said that, he gave me some 10p pieces and goes, just always keep these in your school bag. Anytime you wanna leave.

You call me, because there was a call box at the school, you call me, you walk out the gate and I will come pick you up. I'll go and talk to the teachers and I'll take you home. You never have to stay there a minute longer than you, want to. And that was that was a a really that was his way of of helping and it really was useful. He didn't delve any more deeply into why because he didn't know that he could, you know. People thought, you know, we just did not know about mental health then. We just thought only psychiatrists know about mental health. We didn't know that we can learn about stuff. And anyway, my point is with both of my kids, I've always said to them, if you get up one morning.

And you do not want to go to school, if you have any kind of feeling in your body that, like, makes you smart about going into school or seeing someone at the school, you tell me and you don't have to go that day. You don't have to go. And not once not once has either of them pulled me up on that or taken me up on that. Because school was horrible, secondary school. It was just a long day of mad anxiety until that sweet hometown bell was rang. I was scared of the other pupils. I saw daily violence. I didn't have the respite of being in the top classes with the with the kids who did do their work and didn't, you know, throw things at my head. And what why one of my ways of masking, which I wasn't even sure about, was my accent. So.

I went to school, and to not get picked on, you had to drop your middle class accent if you had one. And I had one because I I spoke Farsi at home, and for other reasons, I thought if I speak posh, it will sort of balance out my parents' foreignness, which I've found is quite a common thing. I was talking to Mirrah Sayal about this once. Quite a common thing for kids of first generation parents do. It's like, I'm going to speak like this and explain that I'm sorry about my father, but it there was there was no there wasn't a no donkey sign in the swimming pool, which is the joke I used to do. Anyway, but at secondary school where everyone was really fighty and the middle class accented kids were, like, really picked on.

I thought, oh, I I can't I I have to go posh because I'd rather get my head kicked in than be in trouble with teachers and be be marked as a troublemaker kid or a kid that needs to be in the learning support group. And so I learned to say, I'm so sorry. I wasn't able to do my homework, miss, because we had relatives over for dinner last night, and it's our custom to help our mother with the dinner, which is nonsense. But they'd go, okay. No problem. So I would I would sort of have the facade of being one of the kids that was from a, you know, middle class family who got their work done, but I was not. I was very similar to the kids that went off and set off fire alarms, but I knew that if I was put in the same bunch as them.

I would have no prayer Yeah. Ever.

You've talked you've talked a lot about sort of about compassion for people with ADHD, and you've you've mentioned how when you first talked about ADHD on Twitter, when you've wrote the book, how many people have reached out. What do you what do you think and what do you say to the people who say ADHD doesn't exist?

I you know what? What I say to them is it's not my responsibility to tell you that the sky is blue or the earth is round. It just isn't my responsibility. They're not the people that I want to communicate with, and that's not what teachers believe. It's not what the people in the mental health profession believe, and, it's really damaging if it's what the parents of a child with ADHD believes, but I've not yet to come across a parent who said that about their child. So I don't engage with that. It's what they Probably good strategy. I'm not for those people. Yeah. Because there's there's something, you know, people get snooze. Like, I have had, like, a a young relative of mine. He was 24.

He said, oh, not not about me, but about his own generation. He said, everyone's got something. Oh, god. Yeah. They they wanna feel special about having ADHD. And I said to him, that's a different thing. If someone has made their entire TikTok output or their Instagram output output about them having ADHD and they know about it, and that's what that that's just something someone doing their own thing. You can't be prejudiced about the entirety of people who have ADHD because a TikToker irritates you. You know, I think that there are people who.

Are on TikTok and Instagram and they talk about it and it's really helpful to one another and some people do make it their identity or their, but come on, won't we I think young people are just trying to find out who they are. Right? And I think a lot of us would do well to remember what it was like being 20, ourselves and and not be judge judgmental of that and other 20 year olds judge each other and I just put it down to like you're young people, you're all working at your own thing, figuring out your own tribes. That's not the conversation.

I think yeah. Thank you. And that's, I guess, a good yeah. It's a good it's a nice point to remember that other people are going through things and trying to support them. Something you've done, you've talked adequately about medication. And I think genuinely one of the best descriptions, if not the best description, you wrote, I'm on medication now for ADHD. I take an amphetamine that wakes up the sleepy part of my brain, the one that organizes the rest of it. I'm not cured. There's no cure for ADHD. I still procrastinate. I know all the lyrics of all Meghan Trainor's songs. Most recently, I turned up at a month a month early to a friend's book launch, a week early to my own gig. But I'm better preempting my mistakes and behaviors.

So these things happen less often than they do. What's your what's your relationship with a d ADHD medication now?

It's not the be all, end all, and it has been really, really important in taking away a lot of my compulsions to eat and to to overeat, I should say. It's good to have a compulsion to eat, to overeat and to binge drink, and I know when bedtime is. I never used to know when bedtime is. I there aren't like, if I'm if I have a gig, if I have a stand up comedy gig that evening, I cannot take a pill anywhere near my stage time because I need my brain the way it is to be the performer that I know I can be on stage. If I am affected by medication on stage, I'm too chilled out and I don't I don't crave the the gig, the the laughs as much. If you see what I mean, I'm I'm a lot more slower.

And I don't think that that works for me. And for me, stand up works when I'm thinking on my feet, off the calf. So that's really important to me, but it really helps me to get stuff done, just boring household stuff done. Sometimes I give myself a break from the medication because sometimes I feel like I miss that fizzing excitement about little things, because it can make it because it's amphetamine and so it kind of if you have amphetamine and you don't have ADHD, it makes you wired, but if you have amphetamine and you don't have whatever the other way around, it balances you out and I quite enjoy being kind of wild sometimes, but it's not always convenient. If I lived in the countryside, I don't think I would take it at all.

I think that living in the city and, having a life as busy as mine is at the moment, I take it. Don't think I'll take it when when my kids are grown. I don't think I'll take it when I'm my workload is less intense. Yeah. I think that hugging trees is it's a mistake to mock. Not hugging trees, I will always hug a decently shaped tree, and it gives me it's just breathing, like, just learning about the science of breathing, why it's important. It's not it's not just a spiritual thing that people think, oh, if you're into meditation and all that, it's a spiritual thing. It's it's it's a scientific thing. It's not just sort of.

It's not a hippie ish thing to do. There's so much in my own generation, there's so much stigma. There was always so much stigma about stuff like that. If someone told me when I was, like, 19 that they meditate, I I think they've joined a cult, you know. Yeah. I found real kudos. I thought it was like I thought I was being a real punk by staying up all night and doing all these mad things and that's just the way I am and then crashing and not considering that the consequences of that moment of Yeah. Indulgence means that I now feel like I hate myself. And that cause and effect didn't stop me doing these things, and that's why so many addicts we're finding are have ADHD, are ADHD, and.

You gotta know you have it. You gotta know that that's part of it if that is that part of it. And and it doesn't mean it negates your trauma or not because of your life experiences, of course it is. That helps you look after yourself better.

It's when I've looked at some of the addiction research, I looked at someone on gambling recently, and it showed well, that research indicated that the propensity for gambling was the same between ADHD population and non ADHD population, but the proportion who were in the very negatively impacted was much higher in the ADHD group. So propensity saying, likelihood to be in the dam in massively damaging to life category, much higher. And I that I read it. Was like, that makes a lot of sense to me. Like Yeah.

That does. That does. And and a gambling addiction is like bulimia, a quiet addiction. And Until it isn't. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's quite until it isn't. Exactly. And and if, you know, all all addictions thing is if it's like alcoholism, it's so public and you can mask it by just like, oh, being like, you know, the life and soul or whatever. It's anyway.

You talked about it. You said a comedian fellow comedian sat you down and said, think you have an issue with drink. And Yeah. And you were like, if a fellow comedian is saying this to me, then this must be serious. Absolutely.

That was a big deal. When he said that to me, I was like and and he wasn't a close friend. He was someone that had, just been hanging out with me, and he didn't say it in the moment. He said it the next day. He said, can I come down and see? We were staying in a hotel in, Melbourne. Can I come down and see you? And I was like, sure. And he wanted to talk about that, and I was kind of floored by his ability to talk. Tell me that, and it and it didn't let me stop, but it did make me feel seen. You know? I wasn't ready to stop then because whatever you but it it it was certainly a little, stepping stone to recovering from some really damaging behavior. And it was so wonderful that he didn't write me off, you know, as a as a drunk or annoying.

Or a liability when you go out. I think that's a really ghastly thing that we can do to people who display poor mental health. Mhmm. You bet, Sinead O'Connor, the way she chose to, you know, talk on social media when she was going through really difficult times and she was marked as this is not someone that we should be listening to, and then she passes away, and then we realize that we had this absolute incredible ball of artistic integrity and intelligence and compassion. And in her lifetime, by so many in the media, she was written off because she had mental health issues. And, yeah, so many people who are addicted have ADHD and act out because they don't know. We get labeled as a problem.

Yes. Like and the but, you know, that sort of quiet just judgmentalness of and then shutting out can be very, very damaging. I'm very aware of time. I've got two two last questions. I have a traditional end question, and then I just the penultimate question was, you are about to start a course.

I am.

Tell us a bit about that.

Well, I had been thinking of doing a master's for a a long time because I wanted to make amends for my disappointment in my education first time around and I wanted to study again. And then with my ADHD diagnosis and the heaps of psychotherapy that I have myself and I'm having, I actually got drawn into the world of psychotherapy. I thought I never want to leave this world. It is, so supportive and I see the the change for good that it gives to people, so I I changed my mind. I was gonna do, English, literature masters, but I'm now gonna study to be a psych to train to be a psychotherapist, myself and my modality will be Gestalt psychotherapy. I love all all the modalities are fascinating, but that's the one that I'm gonna concentrate on.

And for me, it is getting it's a massive gift to myself. It's a chance of being the geek that I always felt that, I was born to be and, it has I'm a stand up comic because I love connecting with with people from all walks of life. No matter what their experience is, however different their experiences are to mine, as a stand up comic, you learn to build a a common ground with people, right, share a world with people. And that is my same interest and excitement in psychotherapy is is no matter who it is that sat in front of you with empathy and acceptance, you can, and a humanistic approach. It's never a I am the expert and you are the patient approach for me, and you can really support people and find find light, in in.

Life that that's that's been buried, and I and that is for me what comedy is, and that's also what I love about, studying psychotherapy and and the practice the idea of practicing it excites me tremendously.

One wonderful thing. And, yeah, wonderful. You're you're taking that pursuit and going for it. Right. Last the last question. So this is I have a traditional last question. In respect of your ADHD, what's the best impact it's had, and what's the worst impact it's had? If we do worst first, so we end on best and then on the high note.

The worst is the grief. The worst is knowing that there was so many painful, damaging things that could have been avoided and the not achieving what I feel I could have achieved in my education and in my career. That's the worst thing. The best thing is if someone's angry with me now, I don't cry and I don't lose my own temper. I'm able to see anger as a breakdown in someone else's system. And I understand now that someone who's angry needs empathy and not punishment in that moment because they're fearful and they've lost control. So that's made a really big difference in how I confront conflicts. And also, I know when to stop drinking, and I know when a meal has ended and when the next one's gonna begin. Being free of binge eating.

And binge drinking has been the most incredible change of my life. And now that I'm no longer masking, the absolute probably the best best thing is my connections are deeper with people and more real and more nourishing and the icing of the cake best thing that I will cherish forever is both my children independently of each other mentioning to me, you never shout anymore.

Oh, wow. I think that's a wonderful note. And and I oh, it's so quiet. I couldn't this that is just lovely. Thank you so much. You're amazing. Thank you so much for doing this. That's my You're on a I'm just trying to work out how to say you're you're an amazing ADHD. You're an incredible ADHD. Like, your book's incredible. Obviously, everyone, you should I really highly recommend reading it or listening to it. It is it's it's extraordinary. It's the the candor and the brightness it brings is wonderful. Thank you again. Have yeah. Just thank you so much. Thank you for doing this. Thank you for being you.

My pleasure. I feel like I am me, finally. I feel I am. It feels really fun to be me because for a long time, I I wasn't. So, thank you for having me. It's it's such a pleasure for me to be able to talk to other people with ADHD as well. I never dreamed that such a thing was possible. Just this interview and this chat that we've had, I I never dreamed that that I would be able to connect to people like this and with people like this and be so honest. I was always just so locked away in in compliance outwardly and then rage and anger privately. So it's it's really beautiful and thank you for all your efforts to to get support out there and conversations out there and more power to your elbow, which is my new favorite expression.

Oh, thank you. Thank you.