Alex Partridge

It's not every day I get to speak to somebody who coined one of the most used, recognisable, yet, I think, painful acronyms in ADHD history.

ADHD royalty.

I truly believe you are.

I was saying just before we started, I got my diagnosis two and a half years ago, and your work was one of the first I dived into.

So on a personal note, thank you ever so much.

Let's start off, Bill, with a simple but probably not an easy question about rejection sensitivity dysphoria, and I'll refer to it as RSD from this point on.

And then perhaps we'll build up to some more advanced and specific details about RSD.

But to start with, what is RSD and how is it experienced?

You've perfectly described the debilitating feeling that comes with RSD, and I think everyone listening or watching will relate to that.

When I see someone who has dedicated so much of their career towards a particular topic, I always question and wonder where that passion and motivation comes from.

Why did you coin the phrase RSD?

Where did that interest start for you?

Bill, do you think that following on from that, are people with ADHD, are they born more sensitive to rejection or is it a consequence of exposure to nasty comments?

The answer is yes.

Can it be a lonely experience, Bill?

Because if you're exposed to 20,000 extra negative comments, I suppose you quickly understand or realise that the problem to that solution, the solution to that problem is to change who you are.

and to hide the version of you that is getting all of those negative criticisms.

Absolutely.

So if there is a disconnect over time, therefore, after perhaps years of masking between the version of you that is being presented to the world and the version of you that's hiding inside, can that make that inner version of you quite lonely?

Oh, exceedingly lonely.