Tips from an ADHD Coach: How to share your ADHD diagnosis with others

Have you had a bad experience talking about your ADHD with friends or family? Or, are you worried about sharing your ADHD diagnosis with friends and family, out of fear of how they would react? 

This week on Tips from an ADHD Coach, Jaye talks about sharing our ADHD diagnoses with the people we love and what we can do to make those conversations go better. 

We love hearing from our listeners! Email us at adhdcoachtips@understood.org.

• What to do when someone doubts your ADHD diagnosis

• I’m letting go of the shame I felt about my ADHD and learning disabilities

(00:42) Kirby’s quote

(02:51) Unfortunately, it’s common to have a bad experience when sharing that you have ADHD

(05:36) Questions to ask yourself before having this conversation

(06:59) Setting time aside for this conversation, or asking for their full attention, not just a passing chat

(07:58) Front-loading our expectations for their response

(12:06) Work through the raw emotions of a diagnosis before having these conversations by doing some practice runs

(13:13) You don’t have to share your ADHD with someone if you don’t think they’ll respond well

(15:00) Recap

Jaye: Have you had a bad experience talking about your ADHD with friends and family? Or are you worried about sharing your ADHD diagnosis with friends and family out of fear of how they would react?

This is "Tips from an ADHD Coach," and I'm your coach, Jaye Lin. Today we're talking about sharing our ADHD diagnoses with the people we love, and what we can do to make those conversations go better. We're gonna hear from Kirby, who shared with us a bad experience she had when she tried to have a conversation with her parents about her ADHD diagnosis in adulthood.

Kirby: My two younger siblings were diagnosed when they were kids and I was overlooked. I was already older and I wasn't showing the stereotypical signs of ADD, ADHD, you know, the hyperactivity and whatnot. But as an adult, it definitely became apparent. So, I got this diagnosis and I wanted to try to have a conversation with my parent about this now as an adult. It was just kind of in passing and I decided to bring it up that, you know, "I'm in school now, getting a master's, I'm back in school and I've been having a really hard time so I started to see a specialist and I have an ADHD diagnosis."

I definitely hold some resentment toward my parents about this and so I was a little anxious talking to this parent about this topic. When I tried to say this to them, they just really dismissed it and I felt kind of gaslit. And they said, "Well, we never had to worry about you," which was kind of the story for most of my childhood. I was the one that they didn't have to worry about, but there was just so much going on that was ignored and overlooked. And I do wish that that was different because although I was the oldest and although I was the responsible one, I needed parents, you know, I needed people who cared about me. I needed attention.

And I was trying to share with them that there's a lot more study and research out there now about ADHD, especially in women and how it does get overlooked, and the signs are much different, and there's a spectrum. I was just trying to have a conversation with them as a fellow adult, and it was disappointing, and it definitely sent me back into, you know, the little childhood traumatic response that I can't trust this person, I am not gonna be believed by this person. And it was very sad, and I really just wish that they had heard me.

Jaye: Kirby's experience did not have a happy ending. It sounds like her parents got defensive and what they said to her did not make her feel heard or supported. It brought up a lot of negative feelings she had throughout her childhood of feeling overlooked, uncared for, unable to trust her parents with what she was sharing. Ultimately, this conversation about her ADHD damaged her feelings of connection with her parents, and that's a shame. Unfortunately, this is a common experience for many of us with ADHD. I've heard similar stories of negative experiences that clients, friends, and support group members have had after sharing their ADHD diagnoses with the people around them, and I've noticed a lot of common patterns.

First off, Kirby says that this conversation was in passing. It didn't seem like she was prepared for what she wanted to say or how she wanted it to say it. This was a major life event that probably shook up every aspect of her life and her self-identity, and it makes sense that she would want to share that with the people she loves. But did she know what she wants to get out of that conversation before she started it? That's something I ask all of my clients who are approaching conversations.

A lot of the time, the answers will be like what Kirby said. She said she just wanted to have a conversation about ADHD with her parents as fellow adults. A common initial answer to that question is, "I just want them to know what's going on in my life." But when I ask them if they would be OK with certain hypothetical responses, the answer is usually, "No." No, they wouldn't be OK with it if their loved ones think they don't actually have ADHD because they're so smart or high achieving. No, it wouldn't be OK if their loved ones responded with sympathy about their ADHD diagnosis. No, would be OK if loved ones defended themselves saying it's not their fault because they didn't know.

Maybe that broad, low-expectations approach is because many of us have felt guilt and shame around taking up too much space or being too particular in what we want from situations and others. Maybe it's also because there can be a lot of anxiety around having these conversations, like what Kirby mentioned, and it might be easier not to think about it. But we usually have expectations and goals for the conversation even if we don't acknowledge them ahead of time. It will just be less likely for us to meet them. But if we look at common ADHD sharing pitfalls and do some prep work before having these conversations, we're much more likely to get what we want and need from these conversations.

There are a few ways we can prepare for ADHD sharing conversations, and they all start with asking ourselves questions. I suggest doing this with an ADHD coach, therapist, trusted friend, partner, et cetera, or by journaling. Write down your answers as you come up with them, so you don't have to use a lot of brain power to recall it all later.

The first is the question I mentioned earlier. What do you want to get out of the conversation? Or as a rephrase, what change do you wanna see happen after having this conversation with them? Do you want to feel more trust in sharing things with them, do you want them to understand you better, do you want to be more compassionate about the challenges you've had your whole life, do you want them to say they're sorry?

Be honest with yourself. It's completely OK to want any and all of these things. If you have anxiety about the conversation, what response are you afraid of them having? Are you worried that you won't be believed? Are you worried that they will say that you're just lazy or undisciplined? Are you worried they will make it all about them? Are you worried that they will now think you're unreliable or flaky? Are you worrying they will be dismissive? It's important to be honest about this too. It's also important for us to identify not only what the ideal responses would be, but what realistic responses would be given the situation and what we know about them.

After answering those questions, we can craft the conversation for getting more of the things we want and less of the thing we don't want. I'll start with Kirby's experience. She wanted to feel heard, cared for, and maybe validation that despite her challenges not being so obvious, she has always been deserving of care and attention. But she brought this conversation up in passing, which is not always the environment that demands focus, care, and attention from others. If we want to feel heard when we're discussing this, we can signal that expectation by scheduling a meeting specifically to talk about it.

Or even instead of it being completely in passing, we can deliberately pause the current conversation and say, "I have to share with you something important. Would you be able to pause doing the dishes" —or whatever they're doing — "and sit down for this conversation with me?" This signals to them what type of attention we want to get from them.

Speaking of signals, I find that most of the time, people don't respond the way we want them to, because they don't actually know how we want them to respond. Usually by the time these conversations happen, we've gone through a lot of research about ADHD, explored how we feel about it a little bit, and started connecting the dots.

So, it's really common for us to share just what Kirby did, that we've been having a hard time lately and got an ADHD diagnosis. Period. Usually, they don't have any idea about how we feel about our ADHD. All of that internal context we have is not getting communicated. So, when people respond with things like, "You can't have ADHD. You're so on top of everything. You're too smart," or "This is just something new moms go through." Even though it feels invalidating to us, they might think it's the right thing to say. It might not even be their actual stance. It might just be what they think we want them to say to us.

What we can do is front load our hopes for the conversation so they can have a better signal for how we would like them to respond. So, if we don't want them to respond with invalidating comments before it's their turn, we can say something like, "I know that a lot of my struggles haven't looked obvious, but they felt pretty devastating to me, and I'm really hoping that getting this diagnosis and treatment will allow me to live a happier, more fulfilling life." I mean, it's always possible for someone to be a jerk and respond with invalidating comments, but it would be more of a purposeful statement and not an accidental wrong thing to say by someone who is well-meaning.

We can do this front loading for a lot of the wants and fears for the conversation I mentioned earlier. If we want them to be more compassionate about our challenges and we're worried that they might just think we're lazy and not hard enough on ourselves, maybe we can share an experience we've had where we tried so hard, wanted to do something so badly and shamed ourselves into oblivion, then found ourselves anxious, ashamed, and still unable to move forward. We can talk about how on the outside, it always looked like we didn't care. And maybe we convinced ourselves we didn't care because that felt less painful. But we do, we care a lot. We always wanted to do better. We wanted to make them proud.

I know that vulnerability is a hard emotion to display around other people, but if we want more compassion and understanding from others, vulnerability can be so powerful. Front loading our hopes for the conversation works best when we phrase what we're going to say like they're people we love whose support is important to us and who we believe will support us. Every person I've known has had many moments when they felt like they were bad parents, friends, partners, et cetera. Feeling inadequate when confronted with shortcomings can often lead people to insist that they did everything they could, which can feel really invalidating for us.

When they feel like we're making accusations, blaming them, or calling them bad friends, partners, or family members, they're much more likely to get defensive, dismissive, and combative. And funny enough, we humans are more likely to say we're sorry when we don't feel like we're being accused. So, saying, "I'm not blaming you. You didn't know," is more likely to get us an apology than saying, "You didn't notice the signs," or even what Kirby said, that she felt ignored and overlooked. If we approach the conversation like we are on the same team, they are much more likely to respond like they are on our team.

Front loading our expectations might nudge the conversation toward more positive outcomes, but it's not a magic spell. Even though it can feel like our ADHD diagnoses have allowed us to feel compassion, hope, and other positive emotions toward ourselves, we can't be certain that they will feel the same way after we share with them. But by managing our expectations and preparing for better outcomes, it's possible for us to get more positive responses from them and also feel better about how we approach the conversation.

Two more things we can do to have more positive ADHD conversations: Work through the wide range of emotions we experience after having an ADHD diagnosis before having these conversations. I mentioned that people are more likely to respond badly if they feel like we're casting blame or calling them bad people. When all these emotions feel raw, especially when we feel like we've been cheated in life, it's really easy for those words to come out like accusations, then really easy for those conversations to go badly. Talk through your emotions around the diagnosis, preferably with a mental health professional, so that you can approach these conversations with more intention.

Also, do some practice runs. Almost all of my clients say they know what they wanna say already, so we don't need to practice. I ask them to say it out loud. It'll only take a few minutes. Without fail, there will be something or a few things they say where they stop and say, "No, that came out wrong." Practice runs can help us identify when things might sound accusatory and make it more likely for words to come out the way we intend them to.

And one last thing, you don't have to share your ADHD with someone if you don't think they will respond well to it. If they have a track record of dismissing feelings, shifting blame, or making it about themselves, it's possible that you won't get what you want from the conversation.

The same thing goes if you aren't able to identify what you wanna get out of the conversation or if you're not yet able to talk about your ADHD without getting mad or blaming them in practice rounds. There is no obligation for you to share this with them and especially not right away. I didn't share my ADHD diagnosis with my parents until about six months afterward. I didn't want them to react like I was blaming them for all of my past struggles. As Taiwanese American immigrants, I doubted they even knew what ADHD was and years before they had dismissed me when I shared I was taking SSRIs for anxiety and told me I just needed to go hiking more. I could tell that it was still too raw for me to talk to them about it, and I couldn't see any good outcomes.

After about six months, they asked me what I was going back to school for, and I answered ADHD coaching. As predicted, they didn't know what it was, so I said,"It's what I have. I got my diagnosis in November and I've been getting treatment for it since then." I braced for the worst, but after a long pause, my dad said, "We were wondering what changed. You've been so happy, relaxed, and energetic. This is wonderful." I've always wondered if the conversation would have gone differently if I shared my diagnosis with them immediately when I was anxious, emotional, and burned out. Probably, but I guess I'll never know.

We can have negative experiences when we share our ADHD diagnoses with the people we love, especially when we aren't clear about what we wanna get out of the conversation and when we don't prepare. But if we explore what change we want to see after we have the conversation and what possible negative responses we are afraid of, we can better prepare for more positive conversations. We can front-load and phrase what we say to make it clear what response we're hoping to get from them, which allows them to avoid saying the wrong thing because they don't know what response is right, and we can deliver what we say like we're on the same team without using accusations or blame, which tends to get more positive responses.

This is easier to do when we've talked through our big emotions about the diagnosis with a mental health provider and do practice runs to ensure the words come out the way we intend them to. And if we aren't able to identify what we want to get out of the conversation, or we don't think we will get what we want from the conversation, we don't need to share our ADHD with them, at least not right away. With this preparation and intention, it's much more likely for us to have positive conversations around our ADHD with the people we love.

You've been listening to "Tips from an ADHD Coach" on the Understood Podcast Network. You can check out our show notes to find links to anything mentioned in the show and more resources. This show is brought to you by Understood.org. Understood is a non-profit organization dedicated to empowering people with learning and thinking differences like ADHD and dyslexia. If you want to help us continue this work, donate at Understood.org/give.

"Tips from an ADHD Coach" is produced by Jessamine Molli and Margie DeSantis. Jesse DeMartino edits the show. Video is produced Calvin Knie. Our theme music was written by Justin D. Wright. Samiah Adams is our supervising producer, Briana Berry is our production director, and Neil Drumming is our editorial director. For Understood.org, our executive directors are Laura Key, Scott Cocchiere, and Seth Melnick. And I'm your host, Jaye Lin. Thanks for listening.