Childhood Trauma & ADHD w/ Kristen Carder
Adult Child
Andrea
4.9 • 1.8K Ratings
🗓️ 17 May 2023
⏱️ 69 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Is it ADHD, complex PTSD or both? Distinguishing between the two can be challenging for several reasons:
- Overlapping symptoms: Both ADHD and PTSD share some common symptoms, such as difficulties with concentration, impulsivity, irritability, and restlessness. These overlapping symptoms can make it difficult to differentiate between the two conditions based solely on observed behaviors.
- Co-occurring conditions: ADHD and PTSD can coexist in the same individual. It is not uncommon for someone with PTSD to also have ADHD or vice versa. The presence of multiple conditions can complicate the diagnostic process and make it harder to attribute specific symptoms to one disorder.
- Trauma-related factors: Traumatic experiences, which are central to PTSD, can also impact attention, cognitive functioning, and emotional regulation. The cognitive and emotional effects of trauma can resemble symptoms of ADHD, leading to misinterpretation or misdiagnosis.
- Developmental considerations: Both ADHD and PTSD can have onset during childhood or adolescence. Some symptoms associated with ADHD, such as inattention and hyperactivity, can be mistakenly attributed to trauma-related difficulties in concentration and arousal regulation.
In today's episode I am joined by Kirsten Carder, the host of the I Have ADHD podcast. She helps adults with ADHD create the life that they’ve always wanted in her coaching program, Focused. She has been living life with ADHD and accomplishing everything she set her mind to, and now she’s dedicating her life to helping other adults with ADHD do the same thing.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Her podcast is much like a crawfish boil, raw, hot, messy, spicy, salty, nourishing, and satisfying. |
| 0:07.0 | My name is Andrea, and this is Adult Child. |
| 0:11.0 | Welcome back to Adult Child, where we take a deep dive into the impact of growing up in a dysfunctional family. |
| 0:33.0 | Ahoj might dear, dear shit shows. |
| 0:36.0 | For any new listeners, I'm Andrea, I am the queen of the shit show. |
| 0:41.0 | So today we are diving deep with Kristen Carter, so she is the host of the podcast I have ADHD, and I, as I share, just recently diagnosed with mild ADHD. |
| 0:54.0 | So the million dollar question here for a shit shows is, is it ADHD, or is it complex PTSD? |
| 1:02.0 | And it can be really difficult to differentiate between the two, because there are so many overlapping symptoms. |
| 1:10.0 | But I think that in time, it will be revealed if it's also ADHD. |
| 1:16.0 | So take Patrick T. Han, for example. |
| 1:19.0 | He exhibited signs of, he talked about this when he was on the podcast. |
| 1:22.0 | He exhibited 80 HD characteristics, but as he healed, as he worked through his trauma, those characteristics went away. |
| 1:33.0 | And then take me, for example, I've done a lot of work on myself. |
| 1:38.0 | I've worked through a lot of my trauma, and yet I still have these certain things going on as far as organization, and procrastination, and time management, and all of that shit, which kind of gives an indicator that perhaps there's more going on here. |
| 1:55.0 | It's similar to when we get sober. |
| 1:58.0 | So many people go into rehab and get diagnosed with bipolar or other mental illnesses, and you really can't tell what's actually going on with someone until they get some sobriety under their belt. |
| 2:13.0 | You really can't make a clear diagnosis until things have settled a bit, and I think that that's probably the case here too, with ADHD and complex PTSD. |
| 2:25.0 | I think that the ADHD versus complex PTSD is a more important conversation as it relates to kids. |
| 2:34.0 | So is these symptoms, these ADHD symptoms that this kid is exhibiting, is this actually ADHD, or is this them acting out of traumatic stress? |
| 2:47.0 | Is this hyperactivity, or is this hypervigilance? Is this, you know, inattention and daydreaming, or is this dissociation? |
| 3:00.0 | Is this impulsivity, or is this a child having a trauma response? |
| 3:06.0 | A child being misdiagnosed with ADHD when it actually is PTSD will have grave ramifications on the rest of their life, whereas if it is identified early on that this is trauma while the child's brain is still developing, |
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