Wow :) you’re the only one to engage with my post and not the throwaway bit at the end when I randomly thought about dentists.

So I can easily describe to you how my behaviour became less masked using the “golden retriever” analogy. My energy has often been described by close friends as being “golden retriever” like, a bit like Dug, the dog from UP. Kinda goofy and positive and bouncy. Before I knew about ADHD I used to keep that fairly hidden except to friends. Now that I know why I behave like that I can be a lot more me, a lot more of the time. I’m a much happier person for it too.

My leading theory at the moment is that now I feel the world understands and accepts ADHD a lot more, I’m not only dropping the masks I show the world but possibly also the unconscious masking of my behaviour from myself.

I’m still trying to understand the ins and outs of it though hence the question in here. I just wish I hadn’t got distracted and added the random thought about dentists. It seems to have triggered a few people. Probably dentists 🤣

Thanks for sharing, that was really interesting :)

In the last few months I joined a business networking group that was initially meant to be a group to help us all grow our businesses. Within a couple of meetings it basically turned into an ADHD support group though. There’s no business involved really because it’s such an amazing experience just being in a room with 15-20 people who all share the same ways of talking and looking at the world. I always leave those meetings with a huge grin on my face. The only problem is that it’s really disorganised (I mean of course it is…) So you’re never really sure if the people running it will overcome their executive dysfunction and organise the next one hehe

Oh I definitely have a whole bunch of that!

Yes, very possibly!

For me it’s coffee + environment. If I’m just at home chilling then the effect of drinking coffee is very mild. If I’m at a business networking event, for example, it can really trigger my hyper behaviours. I get extremely enthusiastic, creative and happy.

By the way, one of these business networking meetings I go to is exclusively for business owners with ADHD and I can’t tell you how much fun that is!

It’s basically 15 people happily talking over each other and not taking it personally and 5 or 6 who didn’t turn up because they thought it was another day. We have one neurotypical person there to try and tether the ballons that we are down into some sort of coherent group but it is wonderfully chaotic :)