[1:04] Welcome back. This is episode 7. And in this episode, we're navigating the world of the twice exceptional. I'm excited to bring back Tamara Rosier as my special guest today. And we're going to be navigating this tricky subject of intelligence, being smart and ADHD. Some people call this twice exceptional.
[1:27] And Tamara is an expert in this. And it's really, really interesting. And it's a tricky subject because talking about intelligence, makes me feel uncomfortable and you probably will tell that in this episode, talking about that. But that's what the Smart ADHD podcast is all about really.
[1:46] So without me gibbering on anymore, let's get on with the episode right now.
[1:50] Welcome back to the show. Tamara. It's great to have you back on the show. Today we're going to be talking about navigating the world of the twice exceptional. This is what this podcast is about and in a recent session with you, Tamara, you mentioned the whole phrase of twice exceptional.
[2:08] I, I hadn't come across it before. So I'd love to hear from you. What does it mean? What does twice exceptional mean and what does it mean to be twice exceptional, specifically smart with ADHD?
[2:20] Tamara: Yeah. So twice exceptional is usually used to describe students. But now, that we're understanding the role of ADHD and adult ADHD, we're really understanding we can be twice exceptional throughout life. And twice exceptional in 2e for short. Two in the letter E.
[2:40] It's used to describe some kind of giftedness. And this giftedness could be problem solving. It could be even athletic. Could be some kind of very unique kind of gift. And, this is what makes it two, some kind of learning disability. And in which case we're talking ADHD, dyscalculia, dysgraphia, dyslexia, things like that. it's ADHD plus something. And that's 2e.
[3:08] Ian: That makes sense. Obviously different countries in the world are going to call this different things. and this might be more of a North American thing. I don't know, but. What we're going to be talking about in this episode, and actually generally this podcast, is what it's like to have ADHD and being smart as well at the same time.
[3:25] I think I'm right in saying, Tamara, you correct me on this, that most people with ADHD have some other kind of condition, whether it could be ADHD and anxiety, or there's those kinds of things. But, we're talking about intelligence here, aren't we?
[3:39] Tamara: So 2e refers to talented and that something else, right? That learning disability, something else. So that's what we call 2e. So in your case, we're talking 2e specifically ADHD, plus you've got this mad firepower in your brain. That's like wild horses. Sometimes you can't really control it. And that's what your podcast is exploring.
[4:05] Ian: It sounds great in a way, like somebody said to me recently, They were diagnosed with ADHD and I think they were focusing on all the positives. And another condition they had was all the negatives. And, at first glance, like being twice exceptional sounds, sounds great. But let's look at some of cons about being Smart ADHD. One thing that we've been looking a lot about is the difficulty in actually getting diagnosed in the first place, because sometimes you don't even know you have ADHD because you've built up all these strategies. I got diagnosed at age, I don't know how old I was 47, something like that. So It took me a while to work that out. So what are your thoughts some of the cons specifically when it comes to that?
[4:49] Tamara: Yeah, I hope I'm not stepping out of line when I do this, but, Ian, your entire family is 2e, right? So you are incredibly talented and gifted, talented musically and very intelligent, and you have ADHD. And you married someone who is beautiful, smart, and has ADHD. And then guess what? You guys made these incredibly intelligent children who also have ADHD.
[5:17] And so you see this in your house. Your kids are high performing, but it's difficult for them to be high performing. And so they hide things behind walls, And you might see, a child, increase their anxiety to try to manage their cognitive load. So getting diagnosed if you're 2e, when you go into a practitioner, they say, I don't know what's wrong with you. You're doing fine in school. You're doing well. You're in the upper level. I don't know what you have to complain about. And the 2e catch here is how are you succeeding so well? What is it taking for you to do this?
[5:57] I worked with a parent yesterday whose child is also 2e, and she's in all these high academic courses. She's an athlete. She's at a private school and she comes from home from school and she wants 2 hours in her bedroom just not doing anything. And her dad, who has ADHD, completely understands this. Because he's oh yeah, my brain's tired. It needs downtime. The mom, who doesn't have ADHD, is come on, let's, do something. Aren't your friends doing something? You should go out with friends. But see, this ADHD child used all her energy at school to try to pretend to be normal. So the first problem is we show up as normal, but what we're doing to pretend to be normal is extraordinarily exhausting.
[6:45] Ian: That makes sense. And I think we were joking about this the other day. I suddenly realized why I need afternoon naps. It's funny listening to you say that, I think this is partly an ADHD thing, and partly being British, like a cultural thing. But like I was slightly embarrassed, actually very embarrassed and squirming there when you were talking about intelligence and the family.
[7:04] Tamara: I saw that.
[7:05] Ian: Of course, because, because you're intuitive but it's something that I've had to work on. I remember, as a, singer, I was a professional singer and afterwards people would come up to me and say, Oh, Ian, that was the most beautiful singing. Thank you so much. And I was always like, oh, yeah, it wasn't like great.
[7:21] It was, I didn't quite say that, but I was internally thinking that. And I had to really practice to say, thank you so much. I'm glad you enjoyed it. But that took so much effort. And, I, do think it's partly a cultural thing, but I wonder why is it difficult sometimes for smart ADHD people to even think that they are smart? Because I still, hearing you say that, I think, who's she talking about?
[7:44] Tamara: It's funny., Ian, because I saw you squirm and I'm like, oh dear. Okay. Okay. We could just retake this whole thing if I stepped overboard. But I do understand. I don't consider myself 2e. I consider myself a hard worker and I'm not being falsely humble. I really don't. I think I'm pretty average intelligence and I've, I get feedback that I'm not.
[8:07] And by the way, don't go out and take an IQ test. I don't think people should know their IQ. Just trust yourself that you're good at problem solving and you can figure things out.
[8:18] But here's why smart people like you and me, we squirm, right? So if someone comes up to me and says, your book, Tamara has really helped me.
[8:30] I had to practice to say, I am so grateful that it has meant something to you. Do you hear the deflection in there? Yeah,
[8:41] Ian: yeah,
[8:42] Tamara: I'm thrilled that it's meant something to them. But in my mind, I'm like, I could have done so much better. So you hear the little perfectionist. So a lot of 2e people have perfectionism that we deal with, and it's chronic. And the reason we have perfectionism is we don't have that modulating part of our brain. So we're like, we have to do it perfectly. So if someone says, Ian, you sung it beautifully.
[9:07] Your brain scans, boop, Nope, I didn't. There's this one little part. I could have done it slightly differently. So there's that. The other thing is a lot of us motivate ourselves with so much shame and self loathing that what we produce can't possibly be good. There's a line from Sound of Music, The idea is good things don't come from bad things. And so the reverse is true in our brains. So it's like no, I'm not, because I'm always a screw up. And we're, that shame, that kind of negative self dialogue. By the way, a lot of my 2e clients have that in spades.
[9:47] So that's why you can't accept a compliment. And I'm sorry I made you squirm. I, didn't mean to.
[9:53] Ian: No, it's good. It's good practice. It's good practice because it's something that, we have to learn. And it, also reminds me of I was starting to worry like, are ADHD people narcissists and it's, not that it's, I think we can become self absorbed.
[10:08] It's not even, I don't know whether it's self obsessed or self absorbed. if somebody comes to you and says to you, Tamara that book has changed my life, and then you're immediately thinking, Oh, no, It's a really bad book or whatever you're thinking in your mind, you're immediately thinking about yourself and not the person who's saying that. And so like, how do we do that? How is it? Is it just a case of practicing?
[10:32] Tamara: So first of all, Ian, you bring up a very important thing. ADHD people can look like we're egocentric. We are not narcissistic. Our society tends to throw around narcissism. Narcissism is a thing. It's diagnosable. It's different just from being egocentric. In a previous podcast, I explained how the ADHD brain works. We don't have access to our prefrontal cortex, and so our limbic system has to take over. Our limbic system, and I'm oversimplifying this for those of you who are true neurologists out there, the limbic system is concerned about how is this affecting me? Am I in danger? Do I need to run? Do I need to fight?
[11:12] What do I need to do? And so because we view everything through that, if someone says, Ian, that was beautiful. Your limbic center goes, Okay, but if I say thank you, I might be in danger because then they're going to think I think this, that I might be perfect or that I think I'm perfect or, and so we do all this mental math around a simple compliment.
[11:40] Oh, by the way, the other thing I've been practicing is thank you when someone compliments me, just it, just say thank you and shut up. But many of us try to show empathy, but it looks self centered, when we're showing empathy. And, we can talk about that later, but, ADHD people, because of how our brains do filter things, can look egocentric.
[12:02] Ian: That's fascinating. And this is why I like to spend time with friends who do things the way I would like to. So I remember a friend of mine, who's written a lot of books. He's very prolific. He's very well known in the marketing space. And he'd just written his last book and he said, Ian, I think that was the best book I've ever written and I looked at him, I thought, he's being sarcastic, he must be. But no, he was being serious. He was being serious. I was about to laugh. And thought, you know what? Why? Why can't you say that if you, truly believe that?
[12:36] Tamara: OK, so I can tell you why, when you're 2e, because, those of you who are listening can't see my hands what I'm going to do, but I'm raising my hand up really high and say, if you're this smart, you'd be this smart. Now there's a hand beneath mine. you show up as less smart. In other words, you have to be way smarter to look more average when you have ADHD.
[12:57] So we understand that gap. And so we're working so hard just to show up as normal. And even though we're probably above normal. We're working hard just to be normal, remember to do those basic daily things. And that's exhausting for us.
[13:15] And so we don't want to put ourselves often out there as primary examples, because we know how hard we work. We know how exhausted.
[13:25] I've worked with some great people who are just, good, emotionally healthy people. they don't brag. And, it's interesting to me because they'll just say something casually, oh yeah, that, that ended up being my best book. And I just want to go, wow, how did you do that? Tell me more!
[13:44] Ian: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. it's like this kind of weird superpower. I, yeah. It's like a, this mysterious, mystical thing.
[13:53] Tamara: But this person isn't bragging. So let me talk to you about the difference between my writing and, I have a friend who writes a lot of books. He's brilliant. He writes books on ADHD, but doesn't have ADHD. And so someone had us both, on a podcast and said, So, I was just fascinated, what's your writing process? And he said, well, I don't know. I just sit down and write. And I just imagined him at his computer going, boop, and just writing. Nope. Not for Tamara. And she's like, what's your writing process? I'm like, okay. And I, Ian, this is a bit graphic, okay?
[14:33] It's like I sit down, and I look at a full meal, and I eat a full meal. And that's me doing all the research, right? But then I have to throw up this meal after I've digested it. And I have to pick out the pieces of carrots and try to put it all back together on a page. And I'm sorry if that's too graphic.
[14:56] Maybe I did something culturally insensitive here, but, it's such, writing is such a gross process for me. It takes so much work. And it's not a comfortable thing. I have a problem. I'm always like, who am I to write this? I shouldn't be writing this. So and so should be writing this.
[15:14] So all that mental stuff. And then there's just sequencing it, making choices, fighting my ADHD, all that comes in. Whereas my colleague just sits at his computer, do, Again, I apologize for the violent metaphor.
[15:33] Ian: Well, we're going to have to put an R rating on this podcast, thanks but...
[15:36] Tamara: Ha, ha, ha.,
[15:38] Ian: It's okay. I should probably do an episode in the future on how people with ADHD approach different tasks. Because I found this when presenting a talk at a conference. I put so much effort into the slides. it will take me months to put this all together. And that's, you've mentioned perfectionism. There's definitely elements of that.
[15:56] I want to ask you about overwhelm and burnout, because I think you've mentioned that it's a lot harder for us to do certain tasks.
[16:05] And we've also got that perfectionism going on.
[16:07] Tamara: Yeah.
[16:07] Ian: Burnout is perhaps an overused word, but there have been a couple of times in my life where I've either reached burnout or I've got come close to that and it's not pleasant and it has health complications and all this kind of stuff.
[16:20] And there was at least a couple of years after I did my final recital, and just had to do a dissertation and I was pretty much wiped out for two or three years after that. And I'm pretty sure it was because I was pushing myself and pushing myself. So what are your thoughts on, overwhelm and burnout?
[16:36] Tamara: So when you're 2e, you have this burden, because everyone in your life has said, "Oh, you have so much potential". "Oh, you are so smart. You have so much potential. You're gonna go places." And the ADHD person hears that as a burden. And really, people are telling you that as a blessing, but we hear it as a well, what is my potential?
[17:00] And by the way, we have divergent brains that are like, it's limitless! And so we go through life with this. Is this my potential? Is this my potential? And it's this kind of burden that we're carrying. So one of the reasons we have burnout is we're exhausted, but we also have this, am I doing what I should be doing? Is this enough? Is this reaching my potential? Remember, we do things with emotional energy. The person who doesn't have ADHD has an imaginary button in their prefrontal cortex, you just push it, and it's, under it has the label of just do it. And so they push the button, and they do it. For you and I, we're like method actors, going around going, what's my motivation?
[17:50] And we're like, okay, great, self hatred today, awesome, we're gonna do it. Or, I'm mad at so and so, so that's going to help me. Or, I have anxiety, that will help me. So we're going through grabbing emotions. what happens with that is all that activity takes up cortisol in our body. It's very expensive.
[18:13] And it keeps us in a sympathetic nervous state, nervous system state. There's two kinds of system states, parasympathetic and sympathetic. The parasympathetic is the rest and digest allows your body to heal. The sympathetic keeps you on guard for any, danger coming.
[18:35] Those of us with ADHD, who are 2e tend to try to accomplish things in that sympathetic nervous state. Well, burnout happens when our body, we're writing checks our body can't cash. And so now we're exhausted. And I see this in students every day.
[18:53] So remember that daughter I was talking about who wants two hours each day? She's going through many little burnouts. this day was so exhausting, I need two hours just to read a book, do something at my phone, just relax. And she started to put herself back in the parasympathetic state. So, just to let you know, also, this is very important to talk about because higher IQ is associated with depression and anxiety and other, mental challenges. So when you add ADHD to the mix, the likelihood of anxiety and depression skyrockets.
[19:33] Ian: We've talked about the difficulty in getting diagnosed in the first place because it looks like you've got everything together. There's the potential of burnout and overwhelm and, anxiety, depression. Learning some of those bad tools, which we've talked about before, but you've mentioned perfectionism, as well. And I think on a previous podcast, you were talking about imposter syndrome as well. Just before we go on to the positives, are there any things we've missed out?
[20:00] Tamara: No, I, think we've bumped people out sufficiently. Yeah.
[20:03] Ian: I'm glad. I'm glad. I just wanted to check. not trying to be a perfectionist
[20:07] Tamara: ha anything, ha! ha I know, during this conversation, don't you feel like we're revealing too much of ourselves? As I'm talking, I'm like, oh, I hope no one really connects us that I do this.
[20:18] Ian: Yeah, I hope this, I want this podcast to do well, but I don't at the same time,
[20:25] Tamara: Right?
[20:25] Ian: yeah, and that is an interesting thing, actually, because when it comes to, again, coming to my presentations at conferences, I've wanted lots of people to come, but I've also not wanted lots of people to come at the same time.
[20:40] What's going on in our heads? So we've talked about the negatives, but there are some pros in being smart and ADHD. And ultimately, I want this podcast to be a bundle of hope because there is hope. There's a lot of hope. And there are strategies and one of the things that I've noticed about myself is, I love, and I'm actually, I'm going to be very uncharacteristically British here.
[21:05] Tamara: I'm here for it!
[21:07] Ian: And say that I'm really good at problem solving, and I love it, I love problem solving, and there's the whole divergent thinking, creativity, sometimes I think hyper focus can be a good thing, but I'm not convinced. So anyway, there's a few things there. I'm chucking at you, Tamara. So what are your thoughts on the pros of being twice exceptional?
[21:28] Tamara: Okay, there are many. But the reason we talked about the negative ones first is, it's like a label warning. We really do need to make people aware, not just to bum everyone out, but to say, it's great that you're 2e. It's great that you're gifted. But it comes with a cost. And every strength does come with a cost. And it's important to understand that so we can address those things.
[21:53] But, onward to the positive. You mentioned a couple. Divergent thinking. Do you know there's actually courses teaching people how to think divergently? I think those are hilarious because ADHD people need not apply. Because this is our favorite way of thinking.
[22:12] Convergent thinking is when you take, all the information, Sherlock Holmes does this and comes up with one right answer. . Divergent thinking is when you take one idea and you blow it into 50 million pieces and then connect those pieces. Right?
[22:29] When I was talking about my writing, it was a divergent thing. Like it's, how do I put these pieces together? I can't figure this out. Whereas my colleague wrote convergently, sequentially from an outline. Can you get that? so divergent thinking helps us see possibilities. And think outside the box.
[22:52] And so sometimes, guys, we can look like geniuses. We might be in a meeting where we just go, what about this? And everyone turns to us and goes, That's amazing! How did you even think that? And you smile to yourself like, ha I don't know where I parked, where my car keys are, or, if I brought a lunch today, but wow, I could think that idea.
[23:16] Divergent thinking does help us. And by the way, inventors are divergent thinkers. Yeah, how do we solve this problem? So you said problem solving. One of great things about being 2e is you are addicted to solving problems. And you love it because it gives us this dopamine rush.
[23:37] So our brains now become problem solving, seeking brains. We're just looking, What's a problem for me to solve?
[23:43] I've worked with one young child. He was 10 years old, or I think he was even little bit younger. But let's just say he's 10. He took an IQ test because he was having a full psych eval, and he did poorly. And fortunately there was a psychologist who could interpret the results. He skipped the first three sections that were easy on the IQ test, but he nailed the last two sections that were more difficult. That's my people right there. And when the psychologist asked him like, Hey buddy, what's going on here?
[24:17] He's I thought that was really boring. And you knew I knew that. So I'm just going to do this part.
[24:22] So we tend to be incredibly curious and this is what I love most about 2e people. We are the most curious people on earth and we're just like, huh, I wonder how that works. Huh? Tell me about that? Oh!
[24:38] And one time I was at dinner and, a friend of mine had just gotten, chickens. And I have chickens now, but this is several years ago. I didn't even think I would have chickens. And she's talking about her chickens. And I asked all these questions like, Oh, now what kind of chickens did you get?
[24:57] Why did you get those chickens? And how do they relate to your ducks? She also had ducks. I'm like, this is fascinating. And the other person having dinner with us stopped and said, why are you so interested in chickens? And I'm like, I'm interested in everything. that's right.
[25:16] Ian: yeah,
[25:16] Tamara: Now, that's not really true. I'm not interested in sports. So when people talk to me about sports, I'm like, not interested, but most everything else. I'm just curious. And I used to be a professor university and I used to love lunch times because I would try to sit with people from different disciplines and those biologists talking about tree frogs, they were fascinating. Man, are they passionate about tree frogs and I could just sit and listen to them because I love hearing that. It's my curiosity, right? And you have curiosity, don't you?
[25:51] Ian: Yeah, absolutely. And it's funny that the successes that I've had in my career have always been when I've followed my curiosity. That's always when I've done my best work. And when I follow what I'm supposed to do and what other people have said, that's been almost like my biggest failures.
[26:06] So I've realized that should be my strategy to follow my curiosity. It's a bit of a weird one, but seems to work for me. And I guess with a lot of ADHDers.
[26:14] Tamara: Yeah, this is the takeaway. This is the big takeaway from today's show, guys. Sorry. Maybe you had another Ian, but I'm naming it.
[26:21] Follow your curiosity because your brain is this problem seeking brain. You're curious. And when you follow your curiosity, your passion is going to go with it.
[26:34] Your emotions are going to go with it. now there's times when we have to say, okay, I'm done being curious about this subject. I want to move on. you still have to finish that dissertation. So yeah.
[26:47] Ian: That's always the problem, isn't it? Finishing.
[26:49] Tamara: But, use your curiosity as a guide to guide you to the next thing, Use it because that's how your brain's wired. Your brain's huh, I wonder what, this does when this happens. And this is, when I coach younger people, I always try to poke at their curiosity. what are you really curious about? And what do you really want to know? and I get them to feed themselves intellectually.
[27:18] And I think, there's a lot of adults trying to do the next thing. And I would say what are you curious about?
[27:25] Ian: There you go. That is the takeaway from this episode. And I'm realizing this about this podcast Tamara, because I could probably go on talking about this with you for the next half an hour. But we I am trying to keep them short and sweet. So we will have to come back to this for future episodes.
[27:40] There's other things that I wanted to ask you about the hyperfocus and perfectionism, but we've, got time in the future to do that. you need to check out Tamara's book, Your Brain's Not Broken. I've even got it here, if you're watching. You've also got a, another book coming out about family. Just remind us about that.
[27:57] Tamara: Yes, it's called you me and our ADHD family and it talks about you know We're living together. We all have ADHD or some of us do some of us don't how do we live and love together?
[28:09] Ian: And if you don't have ADHD, you will probably know people who have ADHD. So it's good to have that understanding as well. To know how other people's brains work as well. thank you, Tamara. It's been great to have you back on the show and look forward to seeing you in the future episode.
[28:24] Tamara: I so appreciate talking with you.
[28:26]
