Laura Mears-Reynolds, founder of ADHDAF and an award-winning community organizer, joins Cate to talk about online communication, building connection, and staying in touch when you have ADHD. They dig into rejection sensitive dysphoria and miscommunication, object permanence with people, time blindness in relationships — and why online community can be genuinely life-saving. Plus: the great voice memo debate, and why your calendar reminder system for friends is not sociopathic.
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Episode transcript
Cate Osborn: Hi everybody and welcome back to "Sorry, I Missed This," the show where we talk about all things ADHD and its relationship to sex, intimacy, communication, friendship, and more. As always, it is me, your host, Cate Osborn.
In this episode, I sit down with Laura Mears-Reynolds, who is a fabulous event organizer, community organizer, and charity organizer based in the UK. We sit down to talk about the importance of community both offline and online.
Growing up, I did not have very many friends. I struggled to fit in socially. I would always put my foot in my mouth, I would impulsively say things, I would interrupt, and I would do all of those classic quintessential ADHD kid things. But I did not understand that I had ADHD.
All that I understood was that I really struggled to get along with my peers and to build community was really difficult for me. As I grew older and as I learned more about myself and my brain, I started realizing just how much better I felt when I was around people who understood me, who shared my interests, who shared my passions, who shared the ways of being that made me feel the most authentically me.
That is why I am so excited to welcome you to this episode. Laura has done this on a scale that is hard to fathom if you are not familiar with her work. She puts together these incredible events that are centered around ADHD acceptance and talking about the struggles and frustrations of living with ADHD in a positive and sometimes truly hilarious format.
She has been nominated and won several awards for her community organizing and the impact that "ADHD AF," the charity, has had on the ADHD and mental health community as a whole. So, I am super excited to welcome you to this episode all about community with Laura Mears-Reynolds. Hi, Laura! I am so glad to have you back on the show. This is great.
Laura Mears-Reynolds: I am so excited to be back on. Actually, to be honest, it is an absolute calamity. I am really on brand today. I literally broke the microphone stand before we started. I am holding this, so God help us all.
Cate: That is so funny. I am so sorry your microphone stand broke, but that is kind of funny.
Laura: It is very funny and it is absolutely standard.
Cate: I want to kind of chat about the differences between online communication and how ADHD as a concept can kind of help, can kind of hinder online communication — but then the same way in person — because there are challenges in both sides of the coin. First off, talk to me a little bit about how out of sight, out of mind shows up in your relationships, especially around online communication.
Laura: Honestly, online communication is the bane of my existence. I am either doing the thing when you mentally reply to something but don't, losing things in amongst new messages, you know, literally just keep forgetting or thinking every day, "I'm going to reply to that person. I'm going to arrange that thing."
Then time blindness kicks in and just not realizing whatsoever that days and then weeks have passed. So, in that respect, I find online communication incredibly challenging. But more so, I really struggle with RSD.
Cate: Okay.
Laura: I personally feel that with online communication, there is so much room for interpretation in tone, in meaning. There is just so much room for crossed wires and miscommunication. So my preference is always to, well, preferably be in a room with somebody, but at least look in their eyes is my preference.
But obviously we know that ADHD presents differently in every single individual alongside any mixture of co-occurring conditions. Which means that for some of us, the exact opposite is true. You know, they can say, "Well, actually, online is like — what does it matter what anybody says to me? It's in person that's scary." And I am the complete opposite.
Cate: Yeah, I am wondering if you have the same experience as me, which is where I oftentimes apply rejection sensitivity to non-communication. Like if the group chat is a little slow today, do you ever get that sense of, "It must be my fault. I'm clearly the person who ruined the group chat for everybody." Is that anything you have?
Laura: God no, no! That does not sound like something I would do. That is crazy! No, I absolutely hate WhatsApp group chats. I find it so RSD-inducing when people are kind of talking to each other and then I say something and if people don't respond —
Cate: And then nobody responds! Oh, it is the worst! You are like, "Oh, well, I am just the worst person to ever live."
05:00 How online communication and rejection sensitivity affect their relationships.
Laura: But the funniest still is the interpretation of even how we communicate, even in terms of emojis. To some people, they stick a thumbs-up emoji on something to say, "Yep, right, I've heard you." I think that is passive-aggressive. I am like, "What have I done?"
Cate: Or like the period versus exclamation point debate. That is the one where I feel silly. I am like, "I guess the friendship is over. I guess I ruined everything." And it is so silly.
Laura: I do know for a fact that some people with ADHD far prefer communicating via written message, predominantly from my experience, people who have a lot of sensory overstimulation issues, social anxiety. There are lots of reasons why that would be the case.
But when I came to starting the tours for the podcast, I had so many people message me saying, "I don't know anybody in the area. I'm going to have to come on my own." So I set up these welcome parties to welcome people at the door.
But it was so strange to me that there is this event, like sold-out huge event, all of these people in this one area and they don't know each other. They are not connected to each other. And actually, for the most part, are all going through this experience of late diagnosis. So it was like, "Right, we've got to link these people up. It's really important."
Cate: Something that I find really frustrating is that I have lived many, many lives. As a person with ADHD, I have had a weird number of jobs and all of the jobs were incredibly different because I am interested in so many different things.
So I have my theater friends, I have my "the time that I worked a very corporate job" friends, I have friends in all of these different categories. All of those friends are scattered all over the world, not even the US, just the world. So for me, online messaging communication is the way that I stay in touch with my friends. That is how I am able to maintain those relationships because I cannot just casually fly to London to see my friends, alas.
Laura: Alas.
Cate: I get so frustrated because there is this idea that online community is somehow second rate, that it is a less emotionally true type of engagement in relationships. So as somebody who literally does both, I was wondering, can you talk about that, like this second — class friendship idea?
Laura: With bells on, I really can. So, the online community started off as people chatting on Discord and I would do the occasional Zoom, like just catch up, people chatting, whatever, and it was growing and growing.
Obviously body doubling is a thing, that brain magic of coming together to get things done. It was sort of January time, so the days were dark here in the UK and nobody wanted to get out of bed. Everyone was sick and fed up, suffering from common co-occurring seasonal affective disorder, all the rest of it. It was like, "Okay, we're going to set up body doubling to start at 7:00 AM every single morning."
Everybody who is there can set their intentions on Zoom — some with their camera and mic on, some with their camera closed just typing in the type box, whatever works for them. Set an intention, set a timer, come back, check in, see what we have done.
So in January, we just had the third anniversary of that group. That group is a lot more than morning body doubling. We talked about it, I ended up pressing record when we had the celebratory, "Here we are three years on," and the impact that those interpersonal relationships had had was genuinely not just life-changing, but some said life-saving.
10:00 The life-changing impact of body doubling and the challenges of time blindness.
Laura: I had one lady who nearly lost her job as a nurse because she could not get in on time. There was — as we know — there was always a calamity, a missing pair of glasses, the bus that was missed, all of the little things. She was on a disciplinary from work. They were going to sack her.
She credits the morning body doubling crew for getting her into work every morning. She has not only kept her job, she has now been promoted and she has been in her job another year or so.
There are much more emotional, even more emotional stories than that, but really truly, they have connected on this really personal level even those that are not waking up and looking into each other's eyes on the weekday mornings. Even just on Discord, it is that sense of community.
All the people that have struggled to be taken seriously by their doctors, to have a community of people there that are like, "Well actually, this is what I found out and this is what happened with me, and have you tried speaking about this?" Really as a community, supporting each other.
It is a bit of a joke in the community that when people do meet up, they just go, "Alright!" as if they saw them yesterday. Because literally, they'd be like, "Oh no, hang on, sorry, you're from the other side of the world. I've literally never met you before. Give you a hug." That is how close they are. It is incredible.
Cate: I see the same exact thing in my communities. We have had a couple of marriages — people have met in the community and they've got married. There's babies that wouldn't exist if it weren't for my goofy Discord and Twitch streams. That is weird to think about.
I started doing this work because I felt alone. I felt like I was the only person who felt like this. There is this undervaluing of the online community and this second-class friendship idea. But then when you look at so many people with ADHD, when you look at the population of people who are living with ADHD, so many of us have grown up feeling broken and strange and like there is something fundamentally wrong with us.
So it makes to me perfect and precise sense that there would then be a need for that community. The community that comes out of it is a group of people who fundamentally understand you and they see you because they have been there.
Like even this episode, we were joking around about periods and exclamation points and stuff — but you say that to a group of people who have never had that experience and they look at you like you have grown two heads.
But I also think that it is very funny that it is also true that due to a combination of things like executive functioning and rejection sensitivity and time blindness and all of that, it can be much more challenging for the ADHD individual to participate in those online communities just by the sake of forgetting that they exist because you put your phone down or whatever.
Laura: Exactly, exactly! Or missing an inbox or whatever. There are so many ways that we can miscommunicate. But I think as ever, like everything, it always comes down to that real self-inventory and my most hated word: boundaries.
The one that trips me up every time because, for example, when I was really stressed and desperately trying to keep up with all these messages, I eventually for the sake of my mental health and actually getting any sleep, managed to put a holding message. The guilt hit me up at night, but I did it.
It was a case of just making sure that I can look to make sure if anybody needs to be signposted anywhere else or whatever, but actually not leaping on every single one and saying, "Oh hi!" because there is no time.
I think if we can look at what is best for our unique presentation, then we can decide if we are more online, more in person, and what our boundaries are around that to keep us safe. Because I do find even with in-person events, there does have to be boundaries there.
The events that I do, we do have areas to take some time out, some kind of chill — out zones. We can have people meet you — there is lots of things that we can do to try and accommodate all of our needs, but it does come down to personal preference.
15:00 Systems for maintaining friendships and managing digital communication.
Cate: How do you think asynchronous communication also impacts? Because that is for me, that is a big one — this idea of, "I don't have to respond to this right away because the expectation is that it's a text message, I can take my time to respond." And then it's been two months and the guilt and the shame and the, "I guess I'm just never going to speak to that person ever again. That's goodbye 10-year-long friendship, it's been real." Does this happen to you?
Laura: Yes, which is why I do instantly respond. But it is so frustrating because I don't want to do that because I think it leaves me in this state of urgency, which I know is bad for the nervous system.
But similarly, if I don't, then those messages do get missed. I do very regularly go through my phone and even though I think I have actioned something straight away, there will be ones that I have missed. I am constantly flagging things and putting things everywhere and then you be like, "Ugh."
So people are like, "Well don't distract yourself, give yourself a chance, put your phone on something mode and just get on with your work." It's like, "No, I have to act straight away or it could be gone forever genuinely."
Cate: What is the longest that you have ever gone not responding to a message and then you had to do the, "Sorry it took me so long to respond to this"?
Laura: The longest ever? God, that is so hard. When I did the "Too Much" tour several years ago now, I talked about a time that I had an order — I used to make hats — and I kept forgetting to do it and it ended up being three and a half years.
Cate: Whoa! I think my longest was honestly about two years. It was a giveaway. I had given away a thing online and I just kept forgetting to mail it and kept forgetting to mail it. Then I finally mailed it or I reached out because I was like, "I'm so sorry, I definitely thought I had done this, but then I didn't."
The lady was clearly really upset, which she had every right to be. She was like, "Don't even worry about it. I don't even want it anymore." I was just like, "Oh, I messed that up." And that felt really bad.
Laura: Oh no!
Cate: It is just so interesting because it is like we struggle with estimating how long something is going to take, we struggle with feeling in our bodies how much time has gone by. So when you combine those two things, it is like, "What do you mean that it has suddenly been six months?" because we don't feel the passage of time in the same way.
In the studies that they talk about, they will have a person with ADHD sit there for like five minutes and be like, "Okay, when is five minutes happening?" Consistently we are always either a little bit long or a little bit short. It is just always — there is never like that, "Nailed five minutes." I can't, I don't —
Laura: I honestly don't think I could do it.
Cate: Yeah, I couldn't do it. I have tried it!
Laura: Honestly!
Cate: Because I am the same way, right? I am constantly in like go-mode. I am constantly responding to messages. I am constantly — if I don't respond right now, I am going to forget or whatever.
So my therapist was like, "Hey, have you considered maybe resting?" and I was like, "For the week!" But so she was like, "Set a 15-minute, 30-minute timer and just don't do anything. Purposefully just sit, just lay in bed, just rest." And I was like, "Great."
I am laying there in bed and it is like, "Surely it must have been half an hour. Surely it must have been half an hour. It had — this — the timer is going to go off any minute. The timer is going to go off any minute."
Then it starts being like, "Well did I forget to set the timer? What if I forgot to set the timer? I think that maybe I forgot to set the timer. I should look at my phone and just make sure that I set the timer for the 30 minutes so I can make sure that I get the 30-minute rest." And it had been — I am not even kidding you — like nine minutes. It had been nine minutes and I was convinced and I was like, "Oh my God."
Laura: I still think that is a win! I don't know if I could do nine minutes.
Cate: You have to try it! It is the weirdest thing. That is such an interesting experiment because it really made me aware of how bad I am at estimating how much time has passed and I was like, "Ah, suddenly a lot more about my relationships and a lot of other things just makes sense."
Laura: The other thing that I think is really, really — I mean we talked about it in a way with replying to messages — but I know for myself and a lot of people that I have spoken to that some of us have object permanence with people.
Cate: Yep. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
Laura: So you can literally forget people exist, but even people that you love, which is gut-wrenching, which makes you feel like a terrible person. But really it is that real out of sight, out of mind. It is mad, it really is.
But I do wonder for myself — this is — if part of why I am constantly in touch with a squillion people is a little bit like the theory of putting out all of the kitchen utensils so that you can see where everything is. You know what I mean?
That is what I do is I know where everything is. It is sort of in sight even though I could still misplace it then. I think that that is my kind of urgency and constant communication, at least with nearest and dearest, is because of that. Because it is like if I drop you, I might not remember to pick you back up again.
Cate: Oh, I am — yeah, 100 percent.
Laura: Which makes me feel dreadful.
Cate: I developed a system. I developed a real system around that and I have calendar reminders set up. I have calendar reminders to be like, "Hey, this person is very important to you. You should message them just check in, like make sure."
I tell people that and people who do not have ADHD go, "What are you, some kind of sociopath? You have to have a list of your friends?" And they get really shitty about it. This idea of like if you actually cared about your friends, of course you would remember them. If you actually liked this person, you wouldn't have to write yourself a note.
And I'm like, "No, but I do. But I do." And that is like a real and true and authentic and the way that I maintain my friendships is by like, "Okay, it's like the second Tuesday of the month I'm going to reach out to this friend."
Laura: I might try this. This is a great thing.
Cate: It really does. There's a couple of apps that a couple of ADHDers have built for that purpose of like, "Hey, text your friend" or whatever.
That is like one of the biggest things for me is that I have lost so many meaningful relationships in my life because of my ADHD. Then to get criticism or judgment because of the way that I utilize online communication and I utilize modern technology like text messages and all of that stuff — it is like, "That is one of the only areas where I'm like, 'How dare you?'"
You have no idea how hard it is for me to exist in this brain, in this body constantly and I solved my own problem to maintain relationships and that is what you are going to come at me for? Like, oh it makes me so angry.
Laura: 100 percent because the point is you have reached the promised land, so to speak, of acceptance, right? You're saying, "I accept that I cannot try this thing away. These issues that I have that are uniquely how ADHD presents in me are going to keep tripping me up forever."
So it is my responsibility to put systems in place to best support myself with these struggles that I accept are not my fault, but they are my responsibility. And so for then for somebody to be like, "Oh my God, that's disgraceful." Well, it is just ableism. It is ignorance and ableism.
20:00 A look at voice memos and the value of ADHD self-acceptance.
Cate: So let me ask you: knowing that there is this really strange like Dr. Jekyll Mr. Hyde situation with like — online communication helps you stay in touch with your friends and gives you community and all of this stuff, and it is challenging to participate in but it can also just be a distraction — it can be the thing that you are doing instead of the thing that you are supposed to be doing. So how do you navigate that? How do you make those decisions around focusing and when do you put the phone down, when do you not check the message? How do you navigate that in your own life?
Laura: Badly! Badly! No, really! I think that is the thing is like I have always said with the podcast — like the disclaimer — I am not a doctor, therapist, coach. I am not trained or even emotionally equipped to offer advice or support. That remains true.
So I think there is an element to how I live my life that is still very day-by-day. You know, I will just get in a routine. I finally found the motivation — well, I don't know, motivation — finally forced myself back in the gym for the last sort of 10 days or something.
I did not go today and I know that I might forget that the gym exists tomorrow. So every time I try to put structure in place of "don't look at your phone till this time" or "don't do this," it is genuinely every day is a new day, particularly with those fluctuating hormones making my symptoms better or worse.
Cate: Yeah. All right, Laura, I have one last hard-hitting journalism question for you before you go. Voice memos — discuss.
Laura: I am really guilty for sending mini podcasts.
Cate: No, I love a voice memo. I love a voice memo.
Laura: I love it! I kind of hate it when people send me really long ones because I am busy and I don't have time. So ironically, I have started pressing transcribe so I can like be glancing at it while I am doing something else.
But sending it and vocalizing my thoughts is best for me. And it also — I do have auditory processing disorder — so if I can listen to the thing multiple times, then I can take a minute to process and react appropriately.
I don't have to deal with the horrible, "Why did they only send me a thumbs up when I sent stars and rainbows and hearts and people leaping in the air for the message?" and they're like, "Yeah, love." So it is kind of best of both for me. So I actually love them, but I understand for some people they are like, "Laura, will you stop sending me podcasts, please?"
Cate: I am solidly team voice memo. I love it, it just makes me feel close to people and it's like you can do it asynchronously. Laura, thank you so much for being here again. We love you. You are so amazing, you are so cool.
Laura: Thank you for letting me just be this chaotic with my broken microphone and being late, really hot and sweaty, and taking us off course multiple times. ADHD AF!
Cate: Thank you for listening. Anything mentioned in the episode will be linked in the show notes with more resources. Have a question, comment, burning story you'd like to share? Email us at sorryimissedthis@understood.org.
This show is brought to you by Understood.org. Understood.org is a nonprofit 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.
"Sorry, I Missed This" is produced by Jessamin Molly and edited by Jesse DiMartino. Video is produced by Calvin Knie. Our theme music was written by Justin D. Wright. Production support provided by Andrew Rector. Briana Berry is our production director. Neil Drumming is our editorial director.
From Understood.org, our executive directors are Laura Key, Scott Cocchiere, and Jordan Davidson. And I am your host, Cate Olson. Thank you so much for listening and I will see you again soon.
Please hold, I think someone just crashed their truck into a tree outside of my house. Hold on! Oh my God!
Host
Cate Osborn
(@catieosaurus) is a certified sex educator, and mental health advocate. She is currently one of the foremost influencers on ADHD.
