March 18, 2025 • 10 mins
Keeshia Pettit joined us to talk about her ADHD diagnosis and the challenges many adults, particularly women, experience with late diagnosis. Symptoms are often mistaken for anxiety or depression, leading to years without proper support or treatment.
Corey Oates has his own struggles with ADHD and he opens up about his decision to stop medication and how it affects his daily life.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
We are joined by Keisha Pettitt, who is the host
of a Yeah, brand new podcast Cloud, a life Uncut
production all about ADHD and being diagnosed late which you were, Keisha,
diagnosed late in life.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Yeah, I was twenty nine when I officially got my diagnosis.
And it's the kind of thing where like, I've looked
back on a lot of my life and as a
part of the diagnosis, you have to go through things
like your school reports and talk, you know, talk about
your experiences as a kid. Diagnostically it's before the age
of twelve, and it's kind of become this thing where
(00:38):
I've realized like, oh, this has existed across you know,
my whole life, but we didn't really know that it
kind of had symptoms like this, We didn't really know
that that's what it was. And at the age of
twenty nine, kind of coming to that realization that like
light bulb moment of oh the whole time like it
was ADHD. That makes so much sense now.
Speaker 3 (00:58):
Obviously I've got it. I've known my whole life. My
attention span was very short.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
You know.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
That's actually like a pretty good giveaways. You know, straight away,
like you just zone out, you just don't listen.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
So the kids sitting around you in school also suffered. Yeah,
but from your distraction straight away.
Speaker 4 (01:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:17):
Right, But then I went off this medication when I
was a bit older. I said a moment in Mint
so Kisha why twenty nine?
Speaker 2 (01:25):
Yeah, Yeah, I think what Corey was just saying in
the sense of for a lot of little boys, like
they predominantly.
Speaker 4 (01:33):
Have the hyperactive type of ADHD.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
So that you know, inability to sit still, that kind
of restlessness, and it sounds Corey like you found a
really good way to kind of channel that into sport.
Speaker 4 (01:43):
You know, you made it work to you.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
But for a lot of women, particularly in little girls,
we have more of the inattentive side of ADHD, So
that would be more of the like off with the fairies,
you know, inability to kind of have that hyperactivity come out.
It's more hyperactivity internally. And so a lot of us
were diagnosed with anxiety conditions, and that is exactly what
(02:06):
happened to me in twenty nineteen. I was diagnosed with
anxiety and I think, you know, coming to the diagnosis
of ADHD and unpacking the difference between the way that
it can look in little boys and little girls. Like,
our understandings of what ADHD is and the way that
it will show up in different people has really evolved.
Speaker 5 (02:25):
Right, So tell me what was happening in your head. Like,
if you're saying there's this anxiety, you're saying it's more internal.
Like as a little girl, it threw puberty into becoming
a woman. How were you dealing with this for yourself?
Speaker 2 (02:40):
So some of the symptoms that I displayed, the main
one that I didn't know was associated with ADHD is
the inability to regulate your emotions. So I had this
really like heightened response to rejection or criticism and kind
of this inability to regulate the way that I was feeling.
You know, the current understandings of what causes ADHD you
mostly have to do with the way that we process dopamine.
Speaker 4 (03:02):
And so that's kind of like your motivation chemical.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
And going back and looking at my previous experiences and
things like masking behavior, things like just trying to fit
in in the group and do what everyone wanted from
me because my behavior was criticized a lot as a kid.
They're the types of symptoms that I exhibited a lot of.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
I mean, Corey mentioned medication as a kid. What happens
when you're twenty nine and you're diagnosed, Do they put
you straight on a pill or what happens?
Speaker 4 (03:29):
For me?
Speaker 2 (03:30):
Medication was an incredibly amazing experience. I think I got
quite lucky and I got you know, the right type,
right dose pretty quickly, and it really alleviated a lot
of the burden that I felt like I was experiencing
from ADHD. And it has been a particularly positive situation
(03:50):
for me. And that's not the case for everybody, like
you know, obviously that will differ depending on the person.
But yeah, I got really lucky in that sense, and
I'm still medicated to this day. I am also trying
to work on, like the other things that I can
be doing to help.
Speaker 1 (04:03):
Why did you stop, Corey, Why did you stop medicating?
Speaker 3 (04:07):
The boarding school? Yeah, and mum, and that just didn't
really like what you used to do to me, so
like id it just dule me down? Like yeah, completely
a different person. So yeah, when I went to boarding school,
they you know, I didn't want to do it, and
they didn't and they were happy for me not to
do it. And then it was Yeah, honestly, it would
(04:27):
have been five years ago that I obviously I just
couldn't get out of this low, and you know, I
went and see any guy and yeah, that.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
Was it was.
Speaker 3 (04:39):
It was a part of obviously.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Adie h.
Speaker 3 (04:42):
When you get low, you usually can't get out, and
they were a depression. Yeah. Yeah, it's just you just
feel like just helpless, like you just don't feel good
and you've got no motivation. Whereas every day I normally
would get up like sweet, I'm just going to go
do twenty things out pointless.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
But yeah, I'm going to go doing a huge list.
Speaker 3 (05:03):
I'd just be over. I'll just be NonStop until I
hit the bed, you know.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
And that was you too, Keisha, kind kind of you know,
I think that what Corey is referring to it often
has to do with this like the way that we
processed dopamine differently, and there are some studies that say
that we have naturally less dopamine and certain parts of
our brain and or it's processed differently, whatever it is.
(05:28):
But that like that lull of being enable to actually
get motivation to do anything is really really really common,
and it's definitely something I experienced. And again I thought
that I had depression for a really long time. I
was diagnosed with depression and anxiety.
Speaker 3 (05:45):
When I went obviously and see my psychiatrist and all that,
it was easy for me, but I still had to
jump through a lot of hoops. It was easy for
me because I got diagnosed a kid. They did say
for people that are actually over a certain age, it's
it's it's a lot harder because we won't diagnosed as
a kid. So some people just go to use it
to obviously try and help them function better and all
(06:07):
that sort of stuff. But I just wanted to was
it a pretty hard process or long process for you
with the diagnosis sort of thing?
Speaker 4 (06:15):
Yeah, I mean quite ironically. So the first step was
that you get a referral from.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
Your GP and at the time, the weightlist I live
in Sydney now the weight list was so long that
my referral expired before I was able to get into
see a psychiatrist and the woh my goodness. So it
can be really really challenging. It's also quite expensive. Like
this is all private psychiatry. There are ways to go
(06:39):
through the public system, and it does vary based on
the state that you're in, but it is a particularly
expensive process. And I think that you know, you have
to acknowledge the privilege in that I could have forward
private care. But a lot of people are not in
that position. They have priorities that are much greater than
you know working out whether they do or don't have ADHD.
Speaker 3 (07:00):
It's not always as easy as you think to get
the diagnosis.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
It sounds like it's a spectrum too, like there's lots
of different levels.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Peace. Yeah, yeah, there's three different types. So there's your hyperactive,
you're inattentive, and then the combined, which is the first
two put together and as a part of the diagnosive Corey,
you wouldn't have had to do this on your second
one because you were diagnosed.
Speaker 4 (07:20):
As a kid.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
But like I said, you have to prove that you
have had the condition from before you were twelve.
Speaker 4 (07:26):
So for a lot of people.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
For me, I got my mum to fill out quite
a lot of paperwork and I mean like it took
her a couple of hours to fill out, and I
was lucky enough to have some old school reports at
her house, so I use those in my diagnostic process.
But not everyone has that, like you know, whether they
don't have a relationship with their parents, especially with something
like ADHD. You know a lot of people are quite
(07:49):
dismissive of it being a real thing. You know, they
all kind of say, like, well, we live in a
world now where everyone's distracted, you know, everyone thinks they've
got ADHD, but it's just normal, you know, and a
lot of you know, our parents' generation can.
Speaker 4 (08:01):
Be like that.
Speaker 5 (08:02):
So, Kisha, what is your advice then, because there would
be people listening to this going, I think my child might,
I might. I mean, is there a hereditary component if
you or your partner has been diagnosed, are you more
likely for your children to be diagnosed?
Speaker 4 (08:17):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (08:18):
So I had a psychiatrist on the podcast, doctor Kieran Kennedy,
and he said that if you have a first degree relative,
you are nine times more likely.
Speaker 4 (08:25):
To get ADHD.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
So there is about a sixty percent genetic component to it.
And there was another bit of research from twenty ten
and it estimated that children with undiagnosed ADHD will experience
twenty thousand more criticisms about their behater by the age
of ten.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
So awful, twenty thousand.
Speaker 4 (08:46):
Yeah, by ten.
Speaker 2 (08:47):
So my advice to people if they think that their
kid might have ADHD, or even if they themselves are
like looking into a diagnosis process. It has a lot
to do with unpacking this narrative that we have created
about ourselves. You know, you think about that amount of
criticism and how much that would extend into your sense
of who you are.
Speaker 4 (09:09):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
So whenever I kind of have those conversations with people now,
especially when they're asking about the kids, I'm like, it's
just important for you to understand the different way that
their brain works, so that you can be more aware
of whether you're criticizing a naughty kid or whether you're
criticizing them for something that is just the way that
they're naturally wired. We all seem to be very forgetful.
(09:32):
We have this thing called time blindness, where you're not
really aware of how long you've been doing something for.
We can interrupt, we can elate to things.
Speaker 3 (09:43):
I can honestly sorry, you are spot onm Like my
out was bought. Yeah, I don't say I hated moscool
as in like in class, I didn't want to be
I didn't want to go I just because of that reason,
Like I always got in trouble, got picked on for
being you know that kid. I just I didn't like it.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
I didn't.
Speaker 3 (10:04):
I had the worst experience in school, my only outward sport.
I tried hard to not be at school as much
as I possibly could because of how I felt about
going to every classroom. I just I didn't want to
be there. So that's why it's a great point, like
you'd rather find out.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
One of great way to find out if you want
to just test the waters is to check out this
podcast cloud. It's a ten part mini series podcast that
that Keisha is hosting and it's available on the iHeartRadio
app or where you get your podcasts. Thanks he for
joining us, Keisha.
Speaker 4 (10:36):
Thank you guys. Thank
We are joined by Keisha Pettitt, who is the host
of a Yeah, brand new podcast Cloud, a life Uncut
production all about ADHD and being diagnosed late which you were, Keisha,
diagnosed late in life.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Yeah, I was twenty nine when I officially got my diagnosis.
And it's the kind of thing where like, I've looked
back on a lot of my life and as a
part of the diagnosis, you have to go through things
like your school reports and talk, you know, talk about
your experiences as a kid. Diagnostically it's before the age
of twelve, and it's kind of become this thing where
(00:38):
I've realized like, oh, this has existed across you know,
my whole life, but we didn't really know that it
kind of had symptoms like this, We didn't really know
that that's what it was. And at the age of
twenty nine, kind of coming to that realization that like
light bulb moment of oh the whole time like it
was ADHD. That makes so much sense now.
Speaker 3 (00:58):
Obviously I've got it. I've known my whole life. My
attention span was very short.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
You know.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
That's actually like a pretty good giveaways. You know, straight away,
like you just zone out, you just don't listen.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
So the kids sitting around you in school also suffered. Yeah,
but from your distraction straight away.
Speaker 4 (01:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:17):
Right, But then I went off this medication when I
was a bit older. I said a moment in Mint
so Kisha why twenty nine?
Speaker 2 (01:25):
Yeah, Yeah, I think what Corey was just saying in
the sense of for a lot of little boys, like
they predominantly.
Speaker 4 (01:33):
Have the hyperactive type of ADHD.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
So that you know, inability to sit still, that kind
of restlessness, and it sounds Corey like you found a
really good way to kind of channel that into sport.
Speaker 4 (01:43):
You know, you made it work to you.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
But for a lot of women, particularly in little girls,
we have more of the inattentive side of ADHD, So
that would be more of the like off with the fairies,
you know, inability to kind of have that hyperactivity come out.
It's more hyperactivity internally. And so a lot of us
were diagnosed with anxiety conditions, and that is exactly what
(02:06):
happened to me in twenty nineteen. I was diagnosed with
anxiety and I think, you know, coming to the diagnosis
of ADHD and unpacking the difference between the way that
it can look in little boys and little girls. Like,
our understandings of what ADHD is and the way that
it will show up in different people has really evolved.
Speaker 5 (02:25):
Right, So tell me what was happening in your head. Like,
if you're saying there's this anxiety, you're saying it's more internal.
Like as a little girl, it threw puberty into becoming
a woman. How were you dealing with this for yourself?
Speaker 2 (02:40):
So some of the symptoms that I displayed, the main
one that I didn't know was associated with ADHD is
the inability to regulate your emotions. So I had this
really like heightened response to rejection or criticism and kind
of this inability to regulate the way that I was feeling.
You know, the current understandings of what causes ADHD you
mostly have to do with the way that we process dopamine.
Speaker 4 (03:02):
And so that's kind of like your motivation chemical.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
And going back and looking at my previous experiences and
things like masking behavior, things like just trying to fit
in in the group and do what everyone wanted from
me because my behavior was criticized a lot as a kid.
They're the types of symptoms that I exhibited a lot of.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
I mean, Corey mentioned medication as a kid. What happens
when you're twenty nine and you're diagnosed, Do they put
you straight on a pill or what happens?
Speaker 4 (03:29):
For me?
Speaker 2 (03:30):
Medication was an incredibly amazing experience. I think I got
quite lucky and I got you know, the right type,
right dose pretty quickly, and it really alleviated a lot
of the burden that I felt like I was experiencing
from ADHD. And it has been a particularly positive situation
(03:50):
for me. And that's not the case for everybody, like
you know, obviously that will differ depending on the person.
But yeah, I got really lucky in that sense, and
I'm still medicated to this day. I am also trying
to work on, like the other things that I can
be doing to help.
Speaker 1 (04:03):
Why did you stop, Corey, Why did you stop medicating?
Speaker 3 (04:07):
The boarding school? Yeah, and mum, and that just didn't
really like what you used to do to me, so
like id it just dule me down? Like yeah, completely
a different person. So yeah, when I went to boarding school,
they you know, I didn't want to do it, and
they didn't and they were happy for me not to
do it. And then it was Yeah, honestly, it would
(04:27):
have been five years ago that I obviously I just
couldn't get out of this low, and you know, I
went and see any guy and yeah, that.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
Was it was.
Speaker 3 (04:39):
It was a part of obviously.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Adie h.
Speaker 3 (04:42):
When you get low, you usually can't get out, and
they were a depression. Yeah. Yeah, it's just you just
feel like just helpless, like you just don't feel good
and you've got no motivation. Whereas every day I normally
would get up like sweet, I'm just going to go
do twenty things out pointless.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
But yeah, I'm going to go doing a huge list.
Speaker 3 (05:03):
I'd just be over. I'll just be NonStop until I
hit the bed, you know.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
And that was you too, Keisha, kind kind of you know,
I think that what Corey is referring to it often
has to do with this like the way that we
processed dopamine differently, and there are some studies that say
that we have naturally less dopamine and certain parts of
our brain and or it's processed differently, whatever it is.
(05:28):
But that like that lull of being enable to actually
get motivation to do anything is really really really common,
and it's definitely something I experienced. And again I thought
that I had depression for a really long time. I
was diagnosed with depression and anxiety.
Speaker 3 (05:45):
When I went obviously and see my psychiatrist and all that,
it was easy for me, but I still had to
jump through a lot of hoops. It was easy for
me because I got diagnosed a kid. They did say
for people that are actually over a certain age, it's
it's it's a lot harder because we won't diagnosed as
a kid. So some people just go to use it
to obviously try and help them function better and all
(06:07):
that sort of stuff. But I just wanted to was
it a pretty hard process or long process for you
with the diagnosis sort of thing?
Speaker 4 (06:15):
Yeah, I mean quite ironically. So the first step was
that you get a referral from.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
Your GP and at the time, the weightlist I live
in Sydney now the weight list was so long that
my referral expired before I was able to get into
see a psychiatrist and the woh my goodness. So it
can be really really challenging. It's also quite expensive. Like
this is all private psychiatry. There are ways to go
(06:39):
through the public system, and it does vary based on
the state that you're in, but it is a particularly
expensive process. And I think that you know, you have
to acknowledge the privilege in that I could have forward
private care. But a lot of people are not in
that position. They have priorities that are much greater than
you know working out whether they do or don't have ADHD.
Speaker 3 (07:00):
It's not always as easy as you think to get
the diagnosis.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
It sounds like it's a spectrum too, like there's lots
of different levels.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Peace. Yeah, yeah, there's three different types. So there's your hyperactive,
you're inattentive, and then the combined, which is the first
two put together and as a part of the diagnosive Corey,
you wouldn't have had to do this on your second
one because you were diagnosed.
Speaker 4 (07:20):
As a kid.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
But like I said, you have to prove that you
have had the condition from before you were twelve.
Speaker 4 (07:26):
So for a lot of people.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
For me, I got my mum to fill out quite
a lot of paperwork and I mean like it took
her a couple of hours to fill out, and I
was lucky enough to have some old school reports at
her house, so I use those in my diagnostic process.
But not everyone has that, like you know, whether they
don't have a relationship with their parents, especially with something
like ADHD. You know a lot of people are quite
(07:49):
dismissive of it being a real thing. You know, they
all kind of say, like, well, we live in a
world now where everyone's distracted, you know, everyone thinks they've
got ADHD, but it's just normal, you know, and a
lot of you know, our parents' generation can.
Speaker 4 (08:01):
Be like that.
Speaker 5 (08:02):
So, Kisha, what is your advice then, because there would
be people listening to this going, I think my child might,
I might. I mean, is there a hereditary component if
you or your partner has been diagnosed, are you more
likely for your children to be diagnosed?
Speaker 4 (08:17):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (08:18):
So I had a psychiatrist on the podcast, doctor Kieran Kennedy,
and he said that if you have a first degree relative,
you are nine times more likely.
Speaker 4 (08:25):
To get ADHD.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
So there is about a sixty percent genetic component to it.
And there was another bit of research from twenty ten
and it estimated that children with undiagnosed ADHD will experience
twenty thousand more criticisms about their behater by the age
of ten.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
So awful, twenty thousand.
Speaker 4 (08:46):
Yeah, by ten.
Speaker 2 (08:47):
So my advice to people if they think that their
kid might have ADHD, or even if they themselves are
like looking into a diagnosis process. It has a lot
to do with unpacking this narrative that we have created
about ourselves. You know, you think about that amount of
criticism and how much that would extend into your sense
of who you are.
Speaker 4 (09:09):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
So whenever I kind of have those conversations with people now,
especially when they're asking about the kids, I'm like, it's
just important for you to understand the different way that
their brain works, so that you can be more aware
of whether you're criticizing a naughty kid or whether you're
criticizing them for something that is just the way that
they're naturally wired. We all seem to be very forgetful.
(09:32):
We have this thing called time blindness, where you're not
really aware of how long you've been doing something for.
We can interrupt, we can elate to things.
Speaker 3 (09:43):
I can honestly sorry, you are spot onm Like my
out was bought. Yeah, I don't say I hated moscool
as in like in class, I didn't want to be
I didn't want to go I just because of that reason,
Like I always got in trouble, got picked on for
being you know that kid. I just I didn't like it.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
I didn't.
Speaker 3 (10:04):
I had the worst experience in school, my only outward sport.
I tried hard to not be at school as much
as I possibly could because of how I felt about
going to every classroom. I just I didn't want to
be there. So that's why it's a great point, like
you'd rather find out.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
One of great way to find out if you want
to just test the waters is to check out this
podcast cloud. It's a ten part mini series podcast that
that Keisha is hosting and it's available on the iHeartRadio
app or where you get your podcasts. Thanks he for
joining us, Keisha.
Speaker 4 (10:36):
Thank you guys. Thank
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