Why RSD is Sabotaging Your Friendships (and What To Do About It)

 Welcome to the Outsmart, A DHD podcast. I'm your host, Jamie Catino, board certified occupational therapist. Two-time Ted Speaker, A DHD coach, A DHD, advocate and Reality Show, contestant. Now let's talk about A DH. D.

  Hello, my beautiful friends. How the fuck are you doing today? I am super excited. This is like a, not a part two, but it relates to the topic that I talked about last time. We're still on the RSD train, rejection sensitive dysphoria, but we're gonna talk about how it affects your friendships specifically.

If you didn't listen to the last week's episode, don't worry. You don't have to. To understand this episode. Rejection sensitive dysphoria. What is it? It's commonly associated with people with A DHD and. What they know about it so far is suspecting that it's pretty much caused by how the A DHD brain works.

Not everybody with A DHD has RSD, but it's very common for people with A DHD to have RSD. So rejection sensitive dysphoria is the feeling of this visceral response to perceived rejection, underlined, perceived 17,000 times in your head. It doesn't have to be actual rejection. It can be 'cause most likely, if you are feeling or if you are being actually rejected, you're gonna feel it.

But this is all about perceived rejection. Think about when you don't get a text back from your friend when you suspect that they've already seen it. Or maybe they red signals are on and you have seen that they have read it and they haven't responded to you, and you're thinking, okay, it's because they hate me.

Even though you have absolutely no reason to think that they do. And you have this gut wrenching, it feels just like a, just a punch to the stomach. When I have RSD, my face can get hot. My whole body is even a little bit of a dissociated feeling or over overcoming feeling.

It's. It feels just completely out of control and it can come out of nowhere with perceived rejection. So that is what RSD is. And let's talk about how it can affect your friendships because it, abso fucking lly can affect your friendships, especially if you don't know what's going on. Okay. Because RSD is really great at making you think that how you're feeling is totally based off of the.

Actuality of reality. And not to say that your reality isn't happening. It is happening. It's very real. It's very what's what you're feeling is very real. But there are other things going on that you may not see, and you might jump to conclusions because of RSD. So let's talk about it how RSD can affect your friendships.

A lot of times you can assume that they're mad at you and respond defensively or don't respond to them at all. So in the case of someone reaching out to you and. They say something to you. It's really hard to understand what somebody means over text.

Sometimes it's hard to understand what someone means if you, even if you're talking on the phone. Especially for those of us who are very literal, who might not understand humor or have a hard time understanding it, or not knowing if they're mad at you or if they're snippy because they didn't sleep very well.

It can make you respond to them very defensively, even if they are not mad at you.

And if you respond defensively to someone who's not mad at you, think about how you would feel if you're reaching out to somebody and. They assume that you're mad at them, so they respond to you really pissed off. You're gonna probably respond to them pissed off, and then it turns into a pissed off nightmare.

So that's one thing that can happen with friendships. It can make you distance yourself from people who you could potentially have friendships with RSD is often mistaken for social anxiety because it can make somebody become very isolated. Before really understanding what RSD is and having a more regulated nervous system.

Someone shitting on a post of mine on social media could send me into an absolute spiral. A friend texting me something that just seems slightly off could send me into a spiral. I did not open myself really to new friendships or acquaintances or connections for a while. I stayed to myself, and I do keep a relatively small circle now.

I have very few people that I talk to regularly because of energy and otherwise, but I'm talking about pretty much keeping yourself from human interaction because it could result in this deep feeling of rejection that hurts more than words can describe. So it can become very isolating. You might keep yourself from going out and doing things with friends that you really enjoy.

You might distance yourself from hobbies from different places, from just going out in public. Another thing that can happen is in search of trying to avoid any sort of rejection, you might find yourself saying yes to things that you don't have the time for. A friend invites you to do something and you just don't have the energy, but you can't fathom saying no, because what are they gonna think of you?

They're probably gonna drop you as a friend just everyone else has in your past. No one likes you unless you're doing for everybody else, but you want connection, so just keep doing everything for everybody else and put yourself in the back burner that might be circling around in your head. I know that there were so many times where I avoided responding to a text message because someone's invited me to do something and I just did not have the energy.

I did not wanna say no, and in my head, if I said no, I'm gonna lose them as a friend Q. Trauma from the past of friends dropping me when I couldn't be their everything. RSD is hard because you also have experiences likely from your past where you have been rejected, and

that makes it really hard to put yourself in situations. Having this brain, having this nervous system, especially when you're already dysregulated, regulated, RSD is going to be worse if you are incredibly dysregulated. Think about it, it's already hard to process information. When you have a DHD add in a really dysregulated nervous system, you're gonna have absolutely zero time between when something happens and when you respond to it.

The more regulated your nervous system is, the more space that there is between what happens and your response to it. If you are dysregulated, you're likely gonna go right to the worst case scenario. That's not logical, much quicker. That has nothing to do with you being a good or a bad person. It has to do with how supported you are and helping your nervous system be regulated.

We're gonna talk about that in a moment. I have a story that happened to me just recently. I have a friend of mine who I'm in a book club with her and I joined it so that we could spend more time together. She's a friend of mine, she's been a friend, a really like one of my best friends since undergrad and I had to miss this last meeting, the book club meeting and.

I felt panicked telling her, I'm so sorry, I won't be able to make it. And told her, I know that you have never, ever made me feel bad for saying no to you. And for some reason I still feel panicked saying no, because people have dropped me in the past if I couldn't be incredibly selfless for them.

And she was really supportive and just

comforted me saying listen, like I know you're going through a lot. You don't need to worry about it at all. I'm always here for you. And she even sent the sweetest message today saying Hey, I hope you're doing good. If I could be there, I would give you a big bowl of ice cream. 'cause she knows that's like my comfort food.

And just be there with you. It was so incredibly sweet and my brain did not think she would respond like that when I was feeling rejection sensitive dysphoria just here's the thing. I felt RSD before even telling her that I wouldn't be able to make it.

You might find yourself not posting on social media because you feel like people are not going to like you or that post or coming shit on your post RSD can start to take place before the action even happens. It often does, so if you're feeling like you're crazy because you're having a reaction before the thing even happens, you're not crazy.

It's very normal for those of us with a DHD to have experiences like this. Now having a dysregulated nervous system and RSD can turn you into a people pleaser. And one of those ways this can manifest with friends is being the one to pay for everything. This is something that I struggled with in the past.

I didn't wanna say no to anybody for anything ever, even when I was at my most poor. In undergrad with a maxed out credit card, didn't know how I was going to feed myself or pay for rent. I would still pay for friends. If we went out to a meal, I would not tell them that my account is about 2 cents away from being overdrafted.

I just paid feeling like it was the right thing for me to do, which wasn't, it was very harmful for me financially. So this is another behavior that can happen as a result of RSD. Again, it doesn't mean you're a bad person. It means that you haven't had support for your brain. This is really emotionally hard.

It's something that I think needs to be talked about more in the A DHD community. There is talk about RSD, but I think how it affects every single part of your life needs to be talked about more. In order to be a happy, healthy human being, you likely need at least one close connection. Humans are not wired to be completely isolated, and I say this as someone who is very introverted and fucking loves their alone time.

Nobody is meant to be completely alone and that social isolation, it is such a lonely place to be I don't want you to feel like this. Not to this extent, since RSD is not caused by, they don't know if there's, if trauma plays any part in it, but from what they know, it looks like it's just based off of how the A DHD brain is wired.

So you can't get rid of it completely, but you can. Make it happen less and less intensely. So let's talk about how the fuck to do that. One thing you can do is be honest with that person that you're feeling RSD with. Just like me, with that friend, I told her, Hey, I am feeling like you're gonna be really pissed off at me for this, but I just can't, I don't have the energy.

I got some personal shit going on right now. I wish I could. The thing is. The better and the healthier that person is, the better friend that they are to you, the less likely they are going to need any sort of explanation from you. But the more likely they are going to not weaponize that reaction. To you.

Now, this is where you're gonna find out who your friends are. If you're honest in saying, Hey, I can't, or setting a boundary, and they respond in a shitty way, it means that they don't respect you. They don't respect your boundaries. They're looking out for themselves above everybody else. Somebody who is healthy, who really cares about you, wants you to say.

When you can't do something, when it's not gonna be in your best interest, they want to know that. 'cause none of us are mind readers. We would love to be, it would make things a lot easier, but we're not. So be honest with that person. If it's if it's someone that you can trust. Another thing you can do is ask for an objective opinion.

I do this with my coach all of the time. Someone says something to me on social media, I'll say, Hey, this is coming across in this way. Or if I see something specific in a text message, or if someone's inquiring about my services and there's a few different interpretations of it, I'll send it to my coach.

I know we're talking about friends, but the, I feel it more so in business versus friendships at this point in my life. So ask for an objective opinion if you're having a text conversation with somebody and. They say something to you and you're not quite sure if they're outright at rejecting you ask for an opinion, have a third person look at it.

Hey, how do you interpret this? They don't have emotions attached to the situation, so they're gonna be able to see it a lot more objectively. If you don't have a friend that you wanna share it with, ask Chad GPT, Hey, how do you interpret this? And it'll give you a much more objective opinion.

Chat. GPT has been really great for giving objective opinions. And aside from those things, it is time to really focus on nervous system regulation because. You can't put a bandaid on nervous system regulation. Those other suggestions that I give you, they're going to be less effective if you are feeling completely fucking dysregulated. I think there's this misconception that nervous system regulation happens when your life isn't chaotic, but that is not the case at all.

I work with a lot of very busy people I work with a franchise owner who works six days a week in a freaking franchise while having to run the entire place. I've worked with social workers, mental health therapists. I've worked with people who have very demanding, exhausting lives, and they have been able to reach a level of nervousness and regulation that was far greater than before working with me.

Nervous system regulation. Boils down to doing things on a daily basis that help you to be, feel more regulated and accommodate yourself in ways that doesn't send your nervous system into a panic on a daily basis. How to do that from person to person differs. It's very different from just taking deep breaths.

It's very different from the surface level. Advice of. Just go on a mental health walk That's not gonna Regulate your fucking nervous system. It's very specific to who you are as a person, and for this reason, a lot of times it takes hiring somebody who can help you to figure out how to regulate your nervous system with your life demands.

A really good coach is gonna look at what you are struggling with and figure out how to make those things easier and more regulated for you. How to ask for support, how to accommodate yourself on a daily basis. So if you are in that boat where RSD is really affecting your friendships, it's likely affecting your career.

I can guarantee you that it is. I can almost guarantee that it's affecting every part of your life and it can be debilitating. You can lose friendships over RSD, you can lose jobs. It is horrible and you deserve to have that help. So if this resonates with you, schedule a free consult with me.

This is something that I typically do normally, people re will reach out to me either via email or via. Dms and know that they wanna work with me there. I have not done a consult call with a coaching client in a long time, but I was thinking, when I was looking for a therapist, I wanted to meet them.

I wanted to see them face to face, hear their voice, get a good read on their vibe. 'cause you can only know so much about somebody on paper. In the show notes, there's gonna be a link to schedule a consult with me where we can talk about what's going on in your life and help to create a plan that's gonna help to regulate your nervous system so that your friendships and your career doesn't go in the fucking trash over something that could have been prevented.

All right, my friends. I hope this was helpful. Can you do me a giant favor? Can you rate this podcast? I never ask you to do that because I forget about it myself, but reading the podcast can be really helpful in helping other people to find this free resource as well. All right, I'll talk to you next time, my friends.

Bye now.

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It would mean the world to me. Thanks, my friend. Until next time.