ADHD + The Legal Profession
And why we'll be talking about it at Friday's Authentic Legal Professional Summit!
The Authentic Legal Professional Summit returns on Friday November 15! This year’s topic is neurodivergence.
It’s free. It’s virtual. And it’s for everyone in the legal profession.
Learn more and register here.
Context
With the return of The Authentic Legal Professional Summit on Friday, I figured it was time to bring back an article I wrote last year.
The Summit is all about telling other people’s stories. Which means I may as well share part of mine in advance!
—
My Story - ADHD Version (Abridged, and with fewer tangents than I’d like)
I think I’ve been diagnosed with ADHD 3 times in my life, though it might be more.
There was the first time as a kid. Then there was the time 6 or so years ago. And then there was the time a few months ago (that’s the power of free healthcare).
But to be honest, I didn’t really realize I had ADHD until 2020. Which sounds pretty ridiculous, but let me explain.
It’s one thing to be told you have ADHD. It’s another thing to understand the implications.
And I didn’t understand the implications because… well so few people actually understand the implications.
Including the doctors that diagnosed me and never explained any coping strategies or the implications.
Instead, it took going down a rabbit hole one evening and discovering JDHD, which is for lawyers with ADHD. A weekend of podcast binging later, and I was starting to understand my reality. Hundreds of hours of reading on Reddit + Twitter + the Internet followed, and it was only then that I really got it.
All the stuff I had been blamed for as a kid. All the stuff I had internalized. There was finally a reason for it.
The reality was - I had built up some really f*cking good coping mechanisms. That’s how I was able to be crush undergrad, be top of my class in 1st year law school, and be a successful BigLaw lawyer - all while unmedicated.
I mean - didn’t everyone have to set an alarm to remember to brush their teeth or shower. Or to make sure they didn’t miss an upcoming call?
And didn’t everyone need to write things down, so that they didn’t forget what someone had just told them?
And didn’t everyone have procrastination challenges, even on things they wanted to do?
Apparently not (or at least not to that degree). My wife still doesn’t comprehend any of these things - she’s finally realized that I’m not making things up, but she’s lucky enough not to ‘get’ it.
I find it somewhat hilarious that the things I find the toughest are things that others find the simplest - and that the things that others find challenging I find so simple.
Complex legal work - no problem.
Remembering what someone told me 1 minute ago - yikes.
Building an ADHD Friendly Legal Practice
If there’s an ADHD friendly legal practice, it’s probably mine. I sometimes joke to colleagues that it’s 1pm and I’ve already done work for 16 clients that day (and I’m not joking to be clear).
That’s a great thing - if I have to just do 1 thing all day, or if every day was the same, I’d be miserable.
Ever wonder how someone makes the ridiculous decision to be a lawyer and co-run a law firm and run a training company and run a legal conference and launch a legal award and launch a law school and launch whatever else I’ve committed to. ADHD - that’s how.
It’s where you completely underestimate how long things will take - despite being in a profession where you literally have to track every minute of your day (ironically, I’m very good at estimating how long things will take me to do for clients; I am terrible however at remembering that when I budget my time, I have to do things like make food and eat and go the bathroom).
But I’m really fortunate in that I get to juggle multiple ‘projects’ - each of which has seemingly indefinite paths to go down.
Of course, the real challenge is fighting the ADHD urges to chase shiny objects and overcommit to things and do other suboptimal things due to my lack of executive function.
That’s been a huge work in progress on my end - and I think I’ve finally stumbled onto some sustainable systems that work for me, despite how my brain is wired.
Though with ADHD, sustainable is the key word. Because the ADHD brain doesn’t form and stick to habits in traditional ways (good luck following most of the advice in Atomic Habits if you have ADHD - it all sounds good in theory, but in reality…).
What I’ve Seen in the Profession
I’ve seen a lot of people with ADHD struggling. I’ve seen a lot of people who have kids with ADHD struggling with their kids.
Surprise - this sh*t is genetic. So if your kids have it, you probably do too! That’s how so many people these days (including people I work with closely) seem to have discovered that they have ADHD.
In any event - if the average person knows so little about ADHD, then you can imagine the average person at law firms (where we’re decades behind on diversity) knows even less.
Which means we’re failing to support our colleagues who have ADHD. Which means we can’t be proactive in understanding how to help them.
And where I suspect we’ll continue to see people with ADHD and other neurodivergences leave the profession in higher-than-average numbers, all without realizing it’s happening.
I work with tons of neurodivergent people these days, and the fact that I understand how to support them (from 3+ decades of lived experience and way too much self-learning) is a huge help.
Unfortunately, I don’t think most people with ADHD who work in the legal profession receive the same level of support - nor do they have a chance to leverage their greatest assets!
Real Talk from Real People
Join us on November 15 from 9:00am-5pm EST real talk all about ADHD and other neurodivergences.
Can our speakers with ADHD stick to their allocated timeslots? We’re going to find out in real time, though as the host, the real question is whether I can stick to the schedule!
If you have ADHD, join us.
If you don’t have ADHD, join us to better understand the realities of your peers whose lives are impacted by ADHD.
See you there - you can register for free at http://authenticlegalprofessional.com/