In today's episode of Health Stuff to Know, Dr. Puja continues her look at Mental Health. Today, we've got some important health & wellness tips for your mental health.
Dr. Puja also provides a very interesting summary of why ADHD and hearing have a very strong connection. This is Health Stuff TO Know.
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Transcript: Dr. Puja:
Can you hear me now? Good. Can you hear me now is one of the biggest hallmarks of ADHD, so if you're one of those persons that has a hard time understanding a conversation or comprehending a conversation, I've got a tip for you.
So now being able to fully understand a conversation is a huge sign of ADHD. People with ADHD usually have poor working memory. It's working memory that's responsible for you to hold on to tiny little pieces of information as you're having a conversation.
So when you're talking to somebody about a very boring subject, like if you're talking to somebody about budgeting, guess what's happening? Your brain is actually zoning out on those tiny little pieces of information. So the person that you're talking to is going to pick up cues that you're not paying attention to them.
So guess what? They're going to think that you're not really paying attention to them. So, yeah, can you hear me now? This becomes a huge thing. So to deal with this, can you hear me now, syndrome? We're going to have to do a couple of things.
first, we're going to talk to your health care team to see if you need medicines. And second, we're going to get a handle on this anxiety. This anxiety that you feel I want you to understand is a big thing.
The ADHD brain actually is feeling this anxiety because it's reflecting back on moments when you've forgotten things in conversations, so your brain's actually panicking. So it's important to understand this. The ADHD brain actually feels a lot of anxiety because it's reflecting back on things that you've forgotten in past conversations.
So instead of paying attention to the tiny details of the conversation, you're actually paying attention to your past errors of where you didn't know what was going on. So, yeah, this sucks. You get put into a feedback loop of where you're trying to pay attention, but then you're paying attention to the fact that you've forgotten things before
and you just then don't pay attention to things. All right, real quick. four ways for you to pay attention to a conversation. first, to overcome this anxiety, you're going to visualize a conversation before you have it. And second, visualize a conversation like you're watching a movie.
So don't pay attention to the words that you're saying. Actually, just visualize watching yourself, talking to this other person. And that's really going to help you stay present in the moment. And the third thing is to tell the person that you're talking to to speak a little bit clearly.
I mean, there are going to be your colleagues, they're going to be your friends. So it's OK to tell them, Hey, I have ADHD, please speak a little bit clearly. So, yeah, they're going to ask you, Well, what does that mean?
That means you're going to talk to your friend, talk to your colleague, and you're going to say, Hey, talk to me directly. Don't talk to me by using a lot of tangents. You're going to tell them, Don't fly this plane around.
Stick to the key points and talk about the key points. So, yeah, guys, part of ADHD is actually having and taking the responsibility of telling other people.
