Hi guys, I'm back for my sixth audio in the trauma and ADHD series. Today I want to talk about trauma, ADHD and its impact on relationships more specifically. Whilst relationships and intimacy are covered in various different other courses that you can access through Stimuli, I wanted to just spend a little bit of time talking about how trauma, specifically, can impact on a relationship.

We talked about one of the many different ways and nuanced reasons why people with ADHD are perhaps more susceptible to experiencing psychological trauma and, that can play out in relationships in many different ways. For example, a classic kind of ADHD type presentation might be more of a people pleasing presentation where one tends to subjugate their own needs.

And it's heavily focused on pleasing their partner for fear of criticism, fear of any kind of retribution. And what that might mean is they subjugate their needs. They might continuously pour into other people's cups and perhaps not verbalize or be assertive enough about their own needs. Over time, there's a strong likelihood that's going to create a trap in relationships, an interrelational trap where we are perhaps more perfectly caring and but at some point one is going to need to be perfectly cared for. And, of course, if we set a precedent where we make our needs not feel important in a relationship, at some point that's going to start tapping into some core pain of ours maybe the dismissed, overlooked, or rejected child. So that's very important to address, really. And to think about, it's very important to find a way to be able to be more assertive, to develop boundaries which are healthy. And if you can't do that through reading and learning, there's also, of course, the option of therapy.

Cognitive Analytical Therapy can be very good, or CAT as it's known, can be very good for interrelational problems. And that's an attachment based psychological therapy, and if you particularly have trouble in this area, it's something I would recommend you look into a bit more. Another thing I think on this topic is important to address is the matter of criticism.

If one with ADHD is supposedly going to experience 20, 000 more negative messages and critical messages by the age of 10 than a neurotypical, then we might become defended in a different way to the more passive, people pleasing way. And that might lead us to being more critical of our partner. That would stand to reason, wouldn't it?

If that’s become the norm in how one communicates in relationships in your family from your parent or caregivers for example then yeah, we might be more critical and of course that might then lead to cycles of shame or guilt, which depending on how you how your brain has developed and how your coping mechanisms and defence mechanisms have developed, that might cause us to be more defensive, or it might cause us to engage in more maybe unhelpful behaviors or destructive behaviors for the relationship.

Then of course, we also need to consider RSD a bit further. Some people learn to manage RSD by rejecting others before they get hurt themselves. That might be another thing that might impact on a relationship. This, or a tendency perhaps to shut down, to dissociate, or to guard our, or protect our emotions and our feelings.

To form a shell around ourselves. To not let people get too close. All of these things can cause... difficulties in relationships, can't they? And any sort of couples therapist will tell you that one of the most important factors in a relationship growing and lasting the distance is how the couple engages with conflict.

Does conflict enable that couple to talk and grow, or does it just become something that just continues to slowly erode the relationship? So those things are factors, and of course depending on your experiences of your environment and other people in the world around you growing up, how we learn to defend and protect ourselves interrelationally as adults.

There are obviously the standard sort of ADHD type related issues which can affect relationships. I know it drives my wife crazy that I have to ask the same question repeatedly where the basic information just seems to seep out of my ears, fallout of my brain somehow. I can be really irritating, I suppose is the best word to use when it comes to having conversations with my wife and she's trying to tell me something and I think I already know the answer or what she's going to say. Trying to stop myself from anchoring in that conversation and jumping in can be very difficult and yeah, my wife has the patience of a saint when it comes to that.

Obviously, there's mood swings, ADHD and trauma can affect our emotional regulation and Yeah, we might be more moody or irritable. And how the partner deals with that really is important too, isn't it? Because it's not just one person in a relationship and all of their parts of their personality There's two people and how those parts interact with the partners parts of their personality. It's - we're not particularly designed for long term relationships and that's because there's so many triggers and nuances to our personalities.

I think we need to talk a bit more about dissociation, you know one can zone out with trauma and be more shut down more guarded impenetrable, partner might feel pushed out, or deterred from seeking to connect with us in some way. And then, of course, we might have trust issues which cause us to be more suspicious.

Particularly if you, if your attachment expectation is to be rejected or to be pushed away where there's going to be an insecurity there, isn't there? So I think it's really important to consider all of these factors and how it plays out in your relationship. Obviously, if it's an ongoing and serious issue, we would, we at Stimuli would recommend that you seek some therapy for that or even couples therapy.

I think the best advice I can give anyone is to learn and understand how your brain affects you and those around you and your family. Do your best to try and resolve those issues. And of course, communicate openly in your relationship. Find a way to laugh about some of these sort of nuances and subtleties to your personality. These quirks. And and also educate your partner. That's extremely important too so that they can perhaps be more understanding to your condition.