[0:00]Hello, Dopamine. This week I have deep-dived Reddit to find the 20 most common ways that ADHD people find dopamine. I'm gonna ask Rocks which 20 she does and we'd love to know yours too. Welcome to The Late Bloomers Podcast where we are getting our lives together. Eventually. Brought to you by our gorgeous sponsor, the wonderful Loop Earplugs. Oh my good God, I'm worried, because I've seen you elbows deep in a Reddit hole for the last couple of days. It's a good platform, isn't it? Like to to research and stuff. Reddit is the place I trust the most on the Internet, because it's it's real people. Yeah. You must actually, that should be one of my 20. Reddit holes, but um, right, so I'm gonna be steering the ship, so to speak on this episode. Um, I do need you, I'm gonna have my watch out actually. I do need you to keep it quite punctual. Because there's 20 things, so we're talking less than 2 minutes per thing. Okay. Is that okay? So I'm just gonna I'm just gonna smash through these. So are we kind of counting how many of these 20 I do? Yeah. And then also maybe Late Bloomer's listeners let us know in the comments how many you get basically. Yeah, so I'm gonna say what they are. If you need clarity as to what they are and what I'm talking about, please ask, but I'm sure most of them will make complete sense to you. You all right, there, you need to take a call? I just turned my phone off. So. Right, can I can I continue? Yeah. Um, right, number one, new personality hobbies. So getting a new hobby and it becoming your entire personality. Would that count if I became obsessed with making resin bought all of the gear, industrial grade, started an Etsy shop, called House of Resin and just bought the domain name and decided to dedicate my life and your life to resin. That would be one, yeah, and you know what, stuff like that used to used to surprise me, it used to be a big thing, but this that's just one example of many. Yeah. Um, yeah. Isn't it? So, whatever you start getting. Pottery painting phase, that was lovely. You just go pottery painting every weekend. Surprisingly expensive, though, pottery painting, I would say. Resin was also expensive. Oh my God, Resin. Soap making, bracelet making, hobbies. Does that also include getting into different types of working out? Are they hobbies or is it more I would say so. Yeah. Yeah, we've had the hot yoga phase, the Pilates phase, the running phase. The rollerblading phase. Oh the. Luckily that personality didn't last long. I bought us really nice in-line skates and we were going rollerblading around our estate. God, what did the neighbours think? Anyway, that's a big yes from me. Okay. Number two, research spirals. Mm. Yeah, I mean, big tick from me. You do this at the expense of what you're researching as well. So if we like are going on holiday, or looking for a house, whatever it is, you will research every single hotel that's even possible to stay in. And you'll do it for so long that you're like completely forget the idea and be overwhelmed and be like, no, I'm not going now. So when I go into research mode, I start with one focus, which let's say I'm booking a hotel. I need to look at every single hotel that I could possibly stay in.
[3:49]Read it, research it, see all the pictures to then make a short list to then make a decision. But what happens is, obviously, I read I'm trying to do it perfect, so I read everything, so I burn myself out, but also my memory is bad, so by the time I've done it all, I've forgotten, so then just end up in a loop. So I have to go back to the beginning. When I research when we're going out for dinner, what vacuum cleaner to buy, like like anything lets me fall into a research hole of which it can be hard to come out of, but I do understand why it's chasing dopamine, because for the first hour it can be quite pleasurable. I understand why you would research the vacuums because of all the vacuuming that you do in the house. Number three. Uh, wait, one more question about that. It's just popped into my mind actually, so talk about hotel stays and the level of research that you would do to stay there. It must hit you so hard if the hotel then turns out to be not as nice as what you thought. Like for me, it's like, ah, bad luck, took a swing and missed, like I spent 5 minutes on it. But if you spend 3 hours researching for a hotel and you get there and it's not what you had in your head, that must be tragic. I mean, I have made us move hotels before. Yeah, yeah. Because I've gotten there and a dopamine reason why I've booked it, let's say there's a a warm pool with a bar outside and it's closed or the jacuzzi doesn't work. It's like a knife to the heart for me. Yeah. It doesn't land great. Number three, little treats.
[5:29]This is I feel like my whole life is a negotiation for if you do X, you get Y as a treat. I mean with you, it's a negotiation, for me, I just get myself the little treats, like when I go to London on my own, I'm just like, oh, I used to matcha latte, little donut, little new bag, little new ring, just, yeah. Wait, you have donuts when you go to London? Like like occasionally, not when I'm like on a diet. You never suggest donuts when I'm with you. Because it's me, little treats when I'm alone. That's how I like keep myself going through the day, darling. So that's a yes. Yeah, it's another year. Wow, I'm like 100% so far. Three out of three. Um number four, music obsessions. I mean my entire life has been dedicated to music. Maybe that's not what it means. Maybe it means like As a consumer, listening. Oh. As a consumer. Do you like lock in on one particular track or one particular band? I mean, you when from my experience, when you get to a new band or whatever, not only do you like listen to their songs, you'll know all of the law, all of the fandom, or everything about their whole history, where they've come from, everything. I'm very grateful that Sleep Token I'm not releasing music at the moment, have just released an instrumental album, that's okay, that didn't like trigger the same obsession in me. But that got that got pretty deep. Yeah. That was like all of the merch, all of the law, Discord, Reddit, going to the shows, playing it all the time, trying to get you into sleep token, which never quite. I need to it's simple for me. I need to like the music. How can you not like it? That's it. I don't care about anything else. How can you not like sleep token? Sensory stuff for me, I don't like it. Anyway, moving on. Number five, doom scrolling. If I had a full-time job, it would be doom scrolling. My screen time is criminal. I doom scroll. Yeah, go on, share it. What your screen time is. Are you going to have a look now? No, I don't want to like I turn my phone off, so. It's it's like 9 hours. 9 hours a day. You know, my job is also kind of on the phone, people. So you're working all this time? Probably working like an hour a day, so I'm getting 8 hours. So like my full-time job is doom scrolling. It's horrendous, I'm ashamed of it.
[8:21]But it's also something I enjoy, like and I'm doing a lot of doom scrolling on Twitter now. Right. So do so do you, like I'm I'm just going to challenge you. I'm happy to be wrong, right? But with doom scrolling. I, if I think about you when you're like really calm and at peace and stuff and like walking in nature or or doing something away from the phone, you can be really happy.
[8:50]Doom scrolling, does it actually bring you joy to that extent, like that much of it? Never ever, ever, like it doesn't bring joy, but it does regulate stress and sadness. So if I've had like a really busy day, I love nothing more than getting on the sofa, cozy blanket and have a little catch up on Twitter. It just makes me feel like calm and and cozy. So anyway, big yes. Okay. So we're five out of five so far. You're doing well, babe. 100% in this test so far. Um, oh my God, I don't even know. Online shopping and impulse buys. Hmm. Oh, yeah, I do that a lot. Um, I love shopping. I love filling a basket. Sometimes I don't even press buy, babe, I'll fill a whole basket and it'll go up to like 500 pounds and I know I can't buy it.
[10:27]But just the filling of the basket and the imagining brings me loads of dopamine, like I sometimes do that, but then sometimes I will need a product. Um, and if I need it, I gotta buy it, I gotta have next day delivery. And and do you have the same level of um, research when it comes to buying a product? Like if you need it, like So that's really interesting. If it's skin care, I can, I can go on like deep dives. on skin care, but I'm also very easily manipulated, so if I see something going viral on TikTok shop, I'll just be like, need it, want it now, have to have it. Yeah, you that's really interesting. So with a hotel, you will look objectively at all the stuff inside inside the hotel, whereas with skin care and stuff like that, you can be a bit of a a bit of a sucker for marketing, kind of. Yeah, I don't impulse book, but I do impulse buy. I like that. Your slogan. Um number seven, last minute panic. How does this give you dopamine? I don't know if that's correct. Someone in the comments please let us know, is that for dopamine? I've always understood it as the reason I leave things last minute is a way to self-medicate my own stimulate, my own stimulant, via adrenaline and panic, which then helps me to get up from earlier mentioned doom scroll and actually clean or do the thing. I've always been like a last minute queen. I don't know if that's chasing dopamine, maybe it is, maybe there's a little dopamine high coming from leaving things to the last minute. Well, what about like, because you would typically get to a stage where, um, you've left it so last minute that it's it feels probably impossible to achieve, and then is there dopamine when you achieve it? Interesting. Yes, if I've left it so late that I'm gonna miss my train, but then I managed to like run so quick that I make another connecting flight and use my brainpower and Google Maps to kind of find a plan B that gets me there, I'm feeling pretty good, so, and Let's give that a yes. Something that comes to mind as well, it was your driving theory test. So you waited until the morning of your test before before like researching it and you achieved it, you like passed it. Because you spent 4 hours reading the Highway Code. I focused in it. Um, okay, so seven out of seven. Um, number eight, productive procrastination. Yeah, I always do this, the only time you'll find me cleaning is when I'm avoiding another task. I kind of see it as
[13:06]and you you use this with me, so if somebody needs to empty the dishwasher and somebody needs to fold the laundry, you'll offer me up both, knowing that I'll choose the dishwasher the easier one. Yeah. So I can seem to work when I'm avoiding other work. Yeah. Um, does it give me dopamine? Yeah, probably the avoidance of a horrible task would be, so that's another tick. One of the I remember when we first you ever before we knew about ADHD, you actually explained described yourself as you always do things, as long as it's not what you're meant to be doing. And I didn't really understand that until until living with you. Number nine, fantasy self-planning. So this is, yeah, I guess, well, you you go on. The fact that I'm gonna lose 20 pounds in 4 weeks and go to hot yoga five times a week. For the next 10 years. Or run a marathon or swim the channel. It it is like fantasizing. Is it like a fantasy version of you like this perfect version of you that's like doing all this stuff and is organized and finally gets clean and Yeah, but I can see why there would be dopamine in that. It's like jumping into a fantasy of your own of your own life. The the only problem with it is, obviously it comes with when you don't do any of this stuff. It's like maybe adds to a bit of shame and stuff, later down the line. Yeah, I think now I know, I'm gonna fantasize a level of success and perfection that I will never reach, it'll feel good in the moment. I know I'm never gonna do it. When I was younger I used to make all these commitments and then fail and that led to that shame spiral, but now I'm just like, yeah, it's not gonna happen, but it's nice to think about. Yeah, big yes. Okay, number 10, I'm saying yes to this one before I've even said it, so don't even think about any other answer. Um home improvements. Yeah. What's your favorite thing to do at the moment? Go to home scents and buy things for the house that we don't need. Yeah. I love redecorating, buying art, new cushions.
[15:28]Don't even get me started. New cushions, candles everywhere. It it could be as simple as that, a candle, all the way up to repainting a room. Yeah. I love it. I love just escaping into the fantasy of living in the perfect house. Again, I'll never achieve it, but I like to think about it. The cushions were one for me. We you you were insistent on having lovely nice cushions and the dog used to eat them. Brilliant. At least it was Home Sense. Right, before I go into a number 11, we're going to have a quick word from our sponsors. We have the most amazing sponsor here at Late Bloomers and that is the amazing Loop Earplugs. Loop Earplugs are so important in mine and Rich's day-to-day life. Whenever we leave the house, whether that is going to the pub for dinner or going to Tesco shopping, or I'm dragging him to a sleep token concert.
[16:28]This is what helps us leave the house. If you're neurodivergent, there's a high chance that you have sensory sensitivities, and that can mean that your brain has trouble focusing on the right sounds, you can take in everything in your environment, and you can actually be triggered by loud noise. So if you've ever been, for example, shopping and loads of people have been talking and it's made you overstimulated and a bit stressed, this is what you need. We have 20% off for all of our listeners and our own website with Loop. It's in the show notes and you can also find it at the link in our bio, and you're gonna find all of our favorite products. There's the Loop Quiet if you're taking a cheeky little nap at home and you just want to reduce the noise in the background. There's the Loop Engage, which is amazing if you're going out for dinner or going shopping, and the Loop Experience if you are being dragged to a rock concert so you can hear the music and protect your ears. Number 11. Oh dear. Aesthetic fun. What's that then? Well, you having half blue hair could be an example of this. Oh, my nails, my glow in the dark star nails with Yeah, tortoise shell and stars. Oh, all of my little dopamine tattoos, my ear tattoos, all my fingers. Oh, right. So like people doing like little things to their own bodies. I do notice in our followers, who are obviously highly neurodivergent, there is a way higher proportion of like dyed hair and bright colored clothing. Yeah, especially if you go to one of your gigs. There there is you are not really seeing much natural hair color in that audience. Also piercings, tattoos. That's so so we're all out here just going and getting little things on our body for dopamine to try and make it through another day. I love it. Yeah. So Another yes. Okay. 13. Fake productivity. Would that be, for example, vibe coding yourself an entire desktop organization system to stay on top of everything that you need to do every day, color-coded with timers and alarms, and then never actually using it? That could be one example. I mean a simpler example would be you buying a notebook, because that's gonna make you productive and then never using it. So that's just like an upgrade, that's the new notebook, isn't it? Building an app to achieve the same thing for you to never use. It's the new notebook. Yeah, I don't know why. Planning to do work is so much more fun than doing the work and you trick yourself. If you're doing like a color-coded to-do list or like this elaborate like cleaning schedule, really what you're doing is you're avoiding the work by thinking about talking about and planning the work. Yeah. Yeah, it's another yes. I have just my my mind has just tripped out because I went from 11 aesthetic fun to 13 fake productivity. So this is going to be a 19 point which I'm finding very difficult to sit with at the moment, but it's okay. I'll find you 20 by the end of this episode. Don't worry. Okay, fine. Um, right, next, number 13, um, arguments. Yeah. I wouldn't say arguments for you. I know you love a good debate. Maybe you used to like our. Yeah, I think if I go back to pre-therapy me. You know, when at our wedding, so I had a best man at our wedding, Matt, I've known him for over 20 years. And he was doing his speech and he was talking about like me when I was young, and me at uni, and me and my 20s, and he was like, she's so feisty, she can be so angry, she loves to get in a fight. And there were sort of a few people sort of looking around like, what? Because modern me has chilled out, but when I was younger, I was known for getting in screaming matches over politics, getting in bar fights if somebody was offensive to one of my friends, or I heard something racist or homophobic, like I would get in, I would get in fist fights. I've seen videos about this on the Internet, actually, that there's a lot of dopamine in arguing, so Yeah, it kind of it well, is it the dopamine? You you just you feel like you're doing the right thing, it makes you alive. Obviously, in today's context, I imagine a lot of people do that online. So if you kind of see injustice and then you get into arguments with people online and that's kind of bringing it's kind of like a sick, twisted dopamine, it engages because it enrages. I don't know if it feels good, but you certainly feel alive by kind of arguing your point, being right, getting into it with some idiot stranger. I would say that's that is dopamine. Yeah, I don't I don't do that anymore. I'm just like, you hate me, awesome. Like, move on, baby. Yeah. Anyway, that's a yes. Okay. I think we know where this is going, don't we? Um, number 14, crushes and limerence. Yeah. Do you want to say more than that? So my entire life I thought I was just falling in love with people, I wasn't. I was just experiencing limerence, which is basically a total obsession with someone that is based in fantasy, not reality. It takes over your every thought, it's your first thought in the morning, you think about it throughout the day, you change what you wear, how you act, where you go. It's very kind of soul crushing and weird actually, but I was like that my entire life. So how do you not do that anymore? Because presumably you're not sitting there thinking. No, well, I went through it in 6 years ago, like when we were first together. Yeah. Um, so I'd had a pattern of it my entire life, and then I'd been celibate for 18 months, because I was like, I can't keep messing up every relationship I have. It's not cute anymore, I'm in my mid-30s. So put myself on the bench, started therapy and then I was like, oh, cool, like, I'm fixed. And met you and then it happened again and at the time, it was self-destroying because I was like, are you kidding? Um, but now I know. Here's the thing with all this stuff. The minute you know and you have awareness, you can just be like, oh, right, it's limerence. No need to think I'm in love, or blow up a relationship, just move on, it will pass. It's no different to a new hobby, and I think sometimes it can get people in trouble, people could end up cheating or leaving a relationship, it's like, whoa. No. Like, this will pass too, just like the resin, just like the soap making, it's it's no different. Um, so yeah, I just have that awareness, so it doesn't really happen. Also years and years of therapy, I think does help in that area. Yeah, okay. Um, number 17, hyperfixations.
[24:20]Yeah. I mean, I am a walking hyperfixation. Um, they do What's your latest one? Do you know? It's been the same for years now. I know what it is. It's it's psychoanalytics. Yeah. So psychoanalysis, it's the type of therapy that I'm in and I'm completely obsessional and obsessed about it and I read texts that are meant for clinicians and I download like academic articles that I shouldn't be reading, I speak to my therapist about it and we unpack what that means about me. Yeah. Um, and there's some interesting stuff in there, but yeah, that's been there for years, I love it. I can always go on a deep dive. I can always talk about it. I have to try not to. I've learned to stop speaking to you and Sarah about it because you're not interested. And like that's a skill I've had to develop, just because I'm hyperfixated, doesn't mean you are, like you with the garden at the moment. Yeah. You know, I'm maybe not as interested in the the lawn and the Yeah. I'm quite happy with that, I don't I don't mind that, though. Yeah, that's that's a big yes from me. Okay, number 18, binging. So this could be food, drink, TV shows. Yeah, I mean, I binge drinking, used to binge drugs, binge food, binge TV shows, binge doom scrolling, like I'm a big binger. And it what happens to me is, and I
[28:00]I don't even want to try and fight it anymore, I'm 41, so it's like this is how it works. It's all or nothing. Yeah. So I'm like, binge, binge, binge, binge. Let's say food, make myself a sick, horrible, I'm bloated, I've got no energy, I'm like, right, I'm done. Then I'll boom, the pendulum will swing the other way, and I'm on like a super strict low carb diet and going to CrossFit 3 times a week. Yeah.
[28:26]Like there is no there's no balance, there's no in between. I remember when we were first together, uh, we binge watched a TV show until like 5 in the morning. Yeah. I've done that. How to get away with murder was the TV show, do you remember it? It was so good. But we were watching it back to back throughout the day. Yeah, all day long. We had a binge day. Yeah. You can't do binging anymore, because we watch TV at night and you're asleep before the end of the episode that's currently on. That might be an age thing, maybe. I think that's age, because I used to be able to stay up so late, but now I I do drift off. But yeah, I understand simple as you could get a bag of Haribo sweets, I can't moderate that. No. I'm going back and back and gobbling and eating until they're all gone. Until they're all gone. Until it's all gone, and yes, there is dopamine in that, so big tick from me. Yeah, okay. Number 19, and then we're over to you for number 20, um, starting new projects. I kind of feel like you said that you did you really get these from Reddit, are other people struggling with this because It feels slightly personal attacking that like every single one has been a yeah, like I'm not accusing you of anything. I you accuse away, these are this is on Reddit. Hm, okay. Um, just in case there was any doubt that you do in fact have ADHD, babe. I don't think there's. Okay. Starting new projects is the way to get dopamine.
[30:08]I mean, I just feel like ironic sitting here in The Late Bloomers podcast studio that was started a year and a half ago. And then we've got the W Bodily, Body Doubling app that was started 2 and a half years ago, and then our ADHD love videos that was started 4 years ago, 5 years ago was the resin business. Hm. Um, what different path we could have been on, if that had taken off? If we'd been like resin influencers, that was my dream. I really, really believed we were going to be like the next big thing in resin. You would have got bored of it so quickly. You, but then I would have just started the soap making. That's the thing it's, and by the way, this is such a toxic trait of ADHD that nobody ever talks about. One of our favorite ways to avoid the actual work of a new project, is just to start a new project. Hm. And by the way, it only works temporarily, so like in the planning of it, the imagining, the fantasy, you feel great, you're avoiding the real work, you're living in full fantasy land, incredible. But then that becomes real work and then you've just got two things. Like, can we just for a second, like, I love my life, I love you, I love the work we do. It's so good, but can we just take a second to look at what I have done? Music career. Songwriting career, online ADHD educator, app developer, all books written, author, podcaster, like I need to be stopped. Right, you heard it here first, ladies and gents, she needs to be stopped. So the next bright idea, I'm gonna remind you of that statement, when you want to start something new. Sure. Number 20 is getting dopamine from oversharing/gossiping/trauma bonding. Because that's not what it is. trauma gossiping, like if I'm with someone that's on my level and I can tell that they're like, you know, I'm songwriting and somebody like walks in late and flustered and they're like, oh my God, sorry. And I'm like, mmm, one of us. And then how are we going to like, bond and go from like 0 to hero really quick, get into the family trauma. It's what made you a quite a good songwriter when you were working with artists, weren't you? Because you would get into the crux of their lives within 5 minutes. Yeah, I think so. I think so. Because I I don't want to do small talk. I want to do big talk, what's going on in your family, what disorders have you got, what are we dealing with, like what are the long-term patterns need to resolve. Um, so yeah, I love that, so look, I'm I'm 20 for 20. 100%. I would absolutely love to know in the comments, are any of you 20 for 20? Do I need to speak to someone additional, because that's maybe feel Don't start something new, babe. Crazy. Do you know what's crazy? Tell me.
[33:32]About every single one of those things. So we're saying it's chasing dopamine, right? They've also, they're all a bit of a fantasy. Hm. They're all avoiding reality, this grand plan to avoid your work, this fantasy new business to avoid the actual business that you need. to work on, this new hobby that's going to be all the answers to your prayers but you're gonna get bored of it. Limerence, the fantasy. It's almost like people with ADHD have difficulty living in the mundane real world. So we're always escaping into fantasy. Yeah. Living in the clouds, babe. Living in the clouds. I was always called that. Um my Lord, okay. Thank you so much for tuning in. Let us know, how many did you get? This has been The Late Bloomers podcast, and if you've loved it, liked it, give us a follow, subscribe, like, share, all of that jazz, and we will hopefully see you next week.
