Before I got diagnosed with ADHD. Going into the office could be pretty overwhelming. I remember one time at a previous company, I came in to the office and after about 5 hours I just got so overwhelmed, I had a panic attack. At the time I had no idea what was going on, even though I had had panic attacks before. Every one of them is different and my body hadn’t felt like that before.

Now I am medicated for ADHD and I have been in to the office a few times and it’s all good. I still have the occasional blip, but it happens in different ways.

One of those blips happened at a conference I was at and helping to organise, this weekend just gone.

It was the East of England Power Platform Summit. I had my wife and daughters with me, this was the first time I had taken them to something like this. I was very proud that they were there. Seeing me present.

My first session was about using AI for those people who have ADHD. They were there for that. Then I took them back as I thought my second session, a panel on men’s mental health, might have been not the right thing for them to listen and watch.

The session was amazing. However I talked about a subject which I often have found hard to speak about without getting emotional.

That was about my Dad.

The majority of times I have spoken about my Dad it has usually ended with me in tears.

But not this time. This time, I think, due to the ADHD medication, I was able to compartmentalise my feelings right then in that moment. It then manifested in a different way.

I decided to look after myself and go back to my wife and daughters. Usually, I wouldn’t have done this, I would have just gone with it, stayed out. Ended up masking how I was truly feeling and then deal with the aftermath the next day.

But I didn’t. I took the time to process it right then and there and decided to leave.

The fact that I’m not even saying sorry to the people who were at the conference for leaving them (we are a pretty tight knit community of people), is massive.

I might bring up my Dad in another post. But that’s it for now.

The stairs are behind me. Let's see how today goes.

#mensmentalhealth

Dad gets a different response