Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (3:13)

It's perfect if you're not in the

Kristen Carter (3:15)

mood for a full hour long listen

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (3:18)

because let's be real, some of us

Kristen Carter (3:20)

ADHDers just don't have the patience for all of that.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (3:24)

But if you are a die hard

Kristen Carter (3:25)

listener, think of this as your mid week pick me up.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (3:28)

It's Thursday y'.

Kristen Carter (3:29)

All. Friday is right around the corner. If you love this clip, check out the show notes for a link to the full episode. And remember my friend, drink your water,

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (3:39)

take your meds, grab a snack.

Kristen Carter (3:42)

Now let's get rolling.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (3:44)

Okay, so this kind of ties in a little bit, I think. So I have a family member who has been diagnosed as autistic. But they don't look autistic. It's kind of like I don't think people would, they would be really surprised. And actually they heard from doctors and teachers repeatedly like, oh no, you're fine. It's a little quirky. There's nothing going on here. Until finally a clinician was willing to dig a little deeper and diagnosed with autism. They don't look autistic. You've said that you don't look autistic or you get that, right? So what is that even like? Can you just rage about that for a minute?

Autistic Guest or Expert (4:29)

Well, I could, I think.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (4:30)

Come on, like, what does that even freaking mean?

Autistic Guest or Expert (4:34)

Considering who I am and what I do? Nobody has had the guts to say that to my face in several years.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (4:39)

Good.

Autistic Guest or Expert (4:41)

It was. I don't know that I could even tell you the last time someone has told that to me in person. Like I have a memory of somebody telling me that. But I was in high school.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (4:49)

Sure.

Autistic Guest or Expert (4:50)

I had disclosed my diagnosis to a friend from church. And I do remember her saying, well, you don't look like you have autism. And I do remember at that time saying, cause when I was in high school, I actually had a service dog. And I remember my response to that being, well, great, the dog is doing their job. Nothing terrible is happening with me because I have the dog. And I remember the friend being like, oh yeah, that makes sense. Accepting that explanation and moving on. But no one has had the guts to say that to me in recent years.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (5:15)

What should someone say if they do get that?

Autistic Guest or Expert (5:18)

I don't know. Online, people talk about. And I think this is more wishful thinking than actual real life because everyone's more bold online. Right. But, you know, a lot of responses, people like to imagine them saying is, you know, oh, you don't look autistic. Well, you don't look like an idiot. But yet here we are. I don't know that anybody should say that. I don't know that that's like lending itself to bridge building necessarily. But you might think that I, when

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (5:42)

I imagine that scenario, I. I imagine a response of like, what an interesting thing to say. What is it? What do you think it means to look autistic? You know, and kind of like putting it back on the other person? Because, like, yeah, don't.

Autistic Guest or Expert (5:58)

Yeah, they would squirm. Nobody would know how to quantify that.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (6:01)

Right. Because it's not quantifiable. It's not something that should even be.

Kristen Carter (6:07)

Yeah.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (6:07)

That. That makes me upset. And it's similar to. Or it feels similar in my body. You can tell me what you think it feels similar to. Like, well, everybody's adhd. Like, everybody's a little adhd. It's just like. I mean, really, like, again, what an interesting thing to say.

Autistic Guest or Expert (6:27)

Yeah. I've always had a hard time with. And this is similar to that, not the same statement, but the idea that autism is an invisible disability. I've talked a lot before about how just because you don't know where something is doesn't mean it's invisible. Like, if you lose your car keys, no one's like, oh, my God, my car keys turned invisible. You just don't know where to look. That doesn't make them invisible. You're not a trained clinician. You don't know where to look for the. My areas of strength and weakness. So obviously you wouldn't see it. But just because you don't see it doesn't make it invisible. You just don't know where to look.

Kristen Carter (6:59)

Guys, that was.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (7:03)

Did you think that up in your own brain?

Autistic Guest or Expert (7:05)

Yeah.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (7:05)

Yeah.

Autistic Guest or Expert (7:06)

That's good. That's why I'm not very easy to live with.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (7:08)

Why do you perceive yourself as being hard to live with?

Autistic Guest or Expert (7:11)

I don't know. I'm needy, I'm wanty. I like to be in control. Although I will say, and this is a thing that I've kind of thought of recently is like, if I make social plans with a friend or a Roommate or whatever. Like, I want to pick where we go. I want to pick how we get there. I want to pick the roads we take on the way to go there. I want to pick when we eat, where we eat, how we eat, where we sit. I would like to pick all of those things, and I would like you to just cooperate with my instructions. And so, like, I think a lot of people hear that, and they're like, oh, my God, she's controlling. I could never live with that. However, in my personal experience, I find that lots of people do not like to choose. The burden of choice is a lot for them, and I have very strong opinions. And so if you don't care, I do. So let's do it my way. And I've not yet come in contact with someone who also has strong opinions, and I also have the ability to negotiate. So if someone does care about something, negotiation and compromise are very important. And it is something that I've worked hard to be good at, so I am capable of that. But generally, I like to be the one that gets to pick.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (8:10)

I agree with you that I think a lot of people don't feel like being in charge. And there's an insecurity on, like, if I choose, what if they don't like it? Do you not have that insecurity? Mm.

Autistic Guest or Expert (8:22)

I don't know. I feel like for the people I hang out with, my circle is pretty small, so I'm relatively good at predicting their specific preferences.

Kristen Carter (8:29)

Sure.

Autistic Guest or Expert (8:30)

So I have a pretty good idea of whether or not they will or won't like it.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (8:33)

How did you learn to negotiate?

Talkspace Testimonial Speaker (8:36)

Mm.

Autistic Guest or Expert (8:36)

I've always had a strong language ability. I was speaking at the age of 8 months and stop.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (8:44)

How?

Autistic Guest or Expert (8:45)

I don't know. My mom has stories of that. Like, when I was in the grocery store, I would just, like, talk to people and freak them out because, like, someone that small shouldn't be producing intelligible speech. But I was.

Kristen Carter (8:54)

Wow.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (8:56)

So I've had three kids. None of them spoke close to eight months. And that would freak me out. That would.

Kristen Carter (9:04)

That.

Autistic Guest or Expert (9:04)

Apparently, it freaked out a lot of people who.

Kristen Carter (9:06)

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Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (9:37)

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Talkspace Testimonial Speaker (10:11)

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Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (11:10)

Okay, so you're saying you relied on your language skills to, to learn to negotiate.

Autistic Guest or Expert (11:16)

Yeah. And I'm the oldest, I have two siblings and so you know, it was necessary.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (11:23)

What's it like being an oldest child for you? It is that like a role that feels doable because you do like to be in charge and you do like to kind of set the, set the rules. I'm sure it's different now that you're

Autistic Guest or Expert (11:36)

all like as a kid. Yes.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (11:37)

In adults. But like as a kid.

Autistic Guest or Expert (11:39)

As a kid that was important. Yeah. I really enjoyed the fact that I because I'm four years older than my sister and I'm nine years older than my brother. Oh, I'm the oldest by quite a bit. And so I had a really great time Being the only one who knew how to operate the TV remote, and despite having the capacity to teach others to do that, I would not kept that information secret.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (11:59)

What were your favorite shows?

Autistic Guest or Expert (12:02)

The usual. Spongebob. Anything on Animal Planet. I was big into Animal Planet.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (12:06)

Aw, that's really cute. I saw a reel of yours. I think I saw it in real time. Like, it wasn't one that I had gone down the rabbit hole to find. I'm pretty sure I saw it in real time where you talked about the different ways that autistic folks show that they're trying to connect with people.

Kristen Carter (12:32)

Do you remember?

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (12:32)

Do you know what real I'm talking about?

Kristen Carter (12:33)

Okay.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (12:35)

And that was such an aha and meaningful moment for me as someone who has autistic people in her life that I really care about and really love and realizing that some of the ways that especially one of those people in particular try to connect with me, but me not understanding that it was a

Kristen Carter (13:00)

bid for connection, that was such a

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (13:03)

meaningful experience for me. So I want to say thank you for that reel and just the education that you put out there. It's really important. I know it's uncomfortable to get compliments, but I'm like, person to person. This is really meaningful, and I appreciate you doing that. Can you talk about that a little bit? So one of the ways that my autistic person bids for connection is they say, I'm tired.

Kristen Carter (13:31)

I had no idea.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (13:33)

And eventually I asked them,

Kristen Carter (13:37)

why are you telling me?

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (13:41)

Because I would say, oh, you're tired?

Kristen Carter (13:43)

Did you get enough sleep?

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (13:44)

Do you want to lay down? Da, da, da. And they'd be like, I'm just telling you that I'm tired. I'm like, I don't understand. And then I said, are you just trying to get some validation here and connect?

Kristen Carter (13:57)

And they said, yes.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (13:58)

And I was like, oh. And so now it's my favorite thing when they say, that's cute. It's so cute. Now it's my favorite thing when they say I'm tired. I'm like, oh, honey, tell me everything. Or if they don't want to talk, I'm just like, I know it's really hard. Your life is. Your life is so hard.

Autistic Guest or Expert (14:19)

I love that.

Rebel.com Advertiser (14:19)

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Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (14:20)

It's so cute, but I would. It's just making that bridge of like, oh, this is what's going on here was so important for me. Can you. You don't have to go through the reel or anything, but, like, what are some of the ways that maybe we can be on the lookout for bids for connection from our autistic friends and family.

Autistic Guest or Expert (14:44)

I think sometimes those bids can be a little out of context at times, especially when someone is autistic. Right. Context can be hard for us. And so when something is repetitive and it's out of context and it maybe kind of grabs your attention a little bit, maybe it annoys you a little bit, maybe it confuses you a little bit, but you're seeing it a lot. It might be a bid for connection, it might not be. It might be something else, but it's possible. That's within the realm of possibilities to consider. If you're wondering, why do they keep doing this, why they keep bringing this up? I don't understand what's going on. It might be that that's exactly how

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (15:20)

it was for us. That's exactly how it was where I. I would get to the point of frustration because it was like, it was clear that they didn't want me to solve the problem for them. And then I'm just like, I don't know why you're telling me this. Like, why are you saying this? And so it. Because it was repetitive, it was out of context, and it was kind of random. Like what was going on here? So that's so, so, so helpful. What are the things, I think that you said, like handing you things that you are, like handing you your keys or handing you your water bottle. Am I remembering it right?

Autistic Guest or Expert (15:57)

Yeah, there's two that kind of flip flop, because you know what I'm talking about. Yeah. So I did one on ways that autistic people show love, and then I did one on ways that autistic people ask for connection. And technically, in my mind, those two things. You're mixing the two. Yeah, they're very similar. Okay, I used a little bit different.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (16:16)

Affection and love are different.

Autistic Guest or Expert (16:17)

Yeah, a little. Yeah.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (16:18)

Yeah. Okay.

Autistic Guest or Expert (16:20)

So one's expressing affection, the other is seeking affection. They are similar. Mm.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (16:26)

Okay, can you walk me through it? Can you walk me through the differences between expressing affection and seeking affection? It's very interesting.

Autistic Guest or Expert (16:33)

I think one you're trying to give and the other you're trying to receive.

Kristen Carter (16:36)

I see what you're saying.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (16:38)

Okay, so when they're handing you, for example, someone's handing you something that you use often, that's giving affection.

Autistic Guest or Expert (16:46)

Yeah, like this goes with you. You seem like you need this a lot. So you don't have it. Here, let me give it to you.

Kristen Carter (16:50)

Sweet.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (16:51)

Yep, that makes sense. And then something like, I'm tired, I'm tired, I'm tired. That's seeking affection.

Autistic Guest or Expert (16:56)

Like, I want you to give love to me. I need something from you.

Kristen Carter (17:00)

Yes.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (17:01)

And it was so clear that they wanted something, which is why I was getting frustrated. Cause I'm like, I don't know what you. I can tell you want something. I don't know what it is. So to figure that out was really, really helpful.

Autistic Guest or Expert (17:14)

I think sometimes, I would say, I think lots of times actually, the autistic person, even if they do possess the language to answer the question, what do you want out of this? I think a lot of times it's still hard to internally pinpoint that and bring it up. So even if they are someone who is language abled, even if you can ask them what do you want out of this, they still might not be able to tell you because they might not recognize that in themselves.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (17:35)

Yeah. And that actually that question was kind of a point of frustration because the response was like, I don't know, I'm just telling you I'm tired.

Autistic Guest or Expert (17:44)

Right.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (17:45)

But when I was able to name.

Autistic Guest or Expert (17:47)

Right.

Kristen Carter (17:47)

Are you just.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (17:48)

Do you just want me to give you some validation here and tell you that you're a good person? And they were like, yes, that, like,

Autistic Guest or Expert (17:54)

that's the thing that I want.

Guest or Co-host (possibly a friend or family member of Kristen) (17:55)

That's what I want. And I'm like, oh, okay, that makes sense.

Kristen Carter (18:06)

Thanks for listening to this bite sized episode of the I have ADHD podcast. If you enjoyed this clip, you'll find a link to the full episode in the show notes. And don't Forget to visit ihaveadhd.com for tons of adult ADHD support. All right, my friends, I had a great time with you today and I cannot wait to talk to you again next week. Bye Bye.

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