I’m writing this blog for two reasons - firstly to give some personal reflections on working at Tenovus Cancer Care as an adult with undiagnosed attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Secondly, to share some information about the staff neurodiversity network launched in late 2025.
Ultimately by sharing a personal account as well as information about the network, I hope this blog will help to illustrate one of many different ways of thinking and working. It’s not representative of everyone with ADHD, and many of the traits overlap with other neurodiverse conditions, as well as being symptomatic of more temporary conditions that all of us go through at points like periods of exhaustion or stress, ‘baby brain’, and the menopause! Hopefully, by raising awareness and celebrating difference, we can understand different ways of working and thinking a bit better and help to create a positive working environment for everyone.
If you want to know more about neurodiversity, please come along to the awareness session on Thursday 25th March 2026, and if you’d like to join the staff network please drop the people team a message!
A note on Adult ADHD and what it’s like to work with it….
It’s estimated that 2.5 to 4% of adults in the UK have ADHD, which is lifelong neurodevelopmental condition, yet diagnosis rates are far lower. Perhaps only around 20% of adults with ADHD have actually been diagnosed, though figures vary widely. That’s worth stating up front, given recent media claims that ADHD is somehow being over-diagnosed.
ADHD has only been formally recognised as a condition that adults can have since 2008, which raises an obvious question: what was supposed to happen to all those diagnosed children once they turned 18 (or those who weren’t diagnosed and were dismissed simply as “naughty”)? And what about everyone else who didn’t present in this way?
For many, ADHD isn’t something we’ve long understood about ourselves, let alone received much, if any, support for. This lack of support means it might be hard to support your colleagues with ADHD because, especially those who are late or un-diagnosed, we have spent most of our lives unconsciously masking, likely not knowing that we are wired slightly differently, and assuming that everyone else experiences the world the same way.
So how do I experience the world?
At any given moment, I’m probably juggling several simultaneous but unrelated trains of thought, a couple of competing earworms, and a continual sense of “What have I forgotten?” This relentless mental noise and constant state of low-level anxiety left me wondering, for most of my life: why is this so hard, and how does everyone else make it look so easy? I can go from feeling like I’m absolutely smashing it, to feeling like a complete failure of a professional/human being in the space of 15 minutes, then back again just as quickly. A big part of this I think comes from feeling things more intensely than other people seem to, and paying attention to EVERYTHING ALL THE TIME. (In medical terms, deficit implies a difference, unfortunately in common parlance it means ‘lack of’. I don’t have a lack of attention, quite the opposite).
I think the best metaphor for ADHD I’ve heard is that it feels like you’re living your life in “hard mode”. Like someone is chucking all the banana skins under you in Mario Kart. Whilst this makes life difficult in many ways, I’ve also become pretty adept at spinning many plates, and finding ways to manage my work, so things don’t get dropped and I have the MOST supportive boss and immediate team who (thank goodness) seems to ‘get it’.
And how does it impact me in work?
You might get emails from me at strange hours, when I’ve found myself gripped by the fear that I’ve missed something and jumped back online to finish it, or because I’m trying to catch up after my brain has simply refused to let me work effectively for part of the day. Or perhaps because I’ve just got really into something and not noticed how late it is.
You might see me struggle to take turns in meetings, or find that I occasionally miss a key point when I’ve got distracted by an email or Teams notification. You might find me struggling to prioritise tasks, as to me they are all priority. You might also find that I will say yes to anything, without first asking myself – do I have time to do this? Time is probably my biggest enemy, not only because I find it hard to assess how long a task will take, but also because I struggle to prioritise appropriately. I might put something off for weeks which I then complete in ten minutes, then start something which I think will take ten minutes but actually sucks me in for 3 hours when I emerge starving, busting for the loo, and with a sore hip from sitting down too long. (This is that magical state of ‘hyperfocus’ you might have heard of, in which concentration can be miraculously laser focused and complete, earworms and competing thoughts temporarily absent!). Sadly, we can’t intentionally switch this on (or off!).
I also say yes too easily because of two fun characteristics of ADHD – one is RSD or Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria. This is basically your brain telling you everyone hates you/is mad at you/you’re letting people down all the time. The other kind of boils down to the fact that you get a bigger dopamine hit doing something for someone else than for yourself, mostly because that other person will probably thank you, and you’ll get a warm fuzzy feeling and temporary relief from RSD. Knowing this CAN help you rationalise what you do and don’t say yes to, but not always….
I am great at doing many things at once, until I’m not, and I get a migraine or hit a wall of paralysis (don’t count my tabs…). I get “lost” at my desk several times a day. You know that feeling where you walk into a room and wonder what you’re doing there? This happens to me every time I task switch. Why am I in this folder? Who did I open this email window to contact? Like someone who’s had too much to drink trying to remember where their rambling anecdote started, I frequently have to backtrack to remind myself exactly what I was doing – the thread of which I have lost in the 2 seconds it took me to open my emails. Doing this again and again can make me feel pretty stupid, so there’s a fun sense of shame accompanying the rest of the mental noise, which can make it even harder to ask for help.
Sounds familiar… any tips?
I manage some of this through little life hacks I’ve found or been told about over the years – for example, you might not see me fidgeting or distracted in meetings because I usually have a lump of blue tack which I’m constantly squidging offscreen to stop that temptation to multitask, fidget, or wander off (mentally or physically).
I note-take in most meetings to force my brain to stay ‘in the room’. I use “do not disturb” functions on Teams and have turned off the noise and envelope notifications on Outlook, to stop notifications coming in when they’re likely to distract me. Blocking out generous amounts of time in my diary to achieve discreet tasks and learning from past misestimations both help, sometimes, but some form of time-blindness will catch me out at least once a week. I also have lists. So many lists.
Finally, I have two mantras which often help me:
Finish the job you are doing. I literally have to say this to myself 5 or 6 times a day, particularly when someone asks me something and the inability to say ‘not right now’ rears its head.
It’ll get done. Not as helpful as the first, but useful to remind myself (especially when things aren’t entirely in my control and are held up in other busy inboxes) that we will get there…. Eventually.
Our Staff Neurodiversity Network
Happily, the supportive attitude I’ve experienced with my line manager and immediate colleagues can be found across the charity - and we launched our Staff Neurodiversity Network in late 2025. The group was instigated and led by people who have diagnosed or suspected Neurodiverse conditions, including Autism, ADHD, Tourette’s, Dyspraxia, and Dyslexia, as well as various combinations of these.
We’ve created a really supportive group who meet online every 4 to 6 weeks and chat about our own lived experiences of neurodiversity, in a way which doesn’t need the additional framing to explain why such and such a scenario is causing an issue – it’s like our SwU choirs and how they can provide the space in which people understand what it’s like to be, for example, living life after cancer or bereaved by cancer, without always having to give the context.
The group has two functions, there’s the support function mentioned above (which was the main reason we started), that shared understanding born from the shared experience of being in the world which often feels like it’s not set up for you. The second function came about because we are all passionate about raising awareness and understanding of neurodiversity and wanted to help support others and increase awareness throughout the charity, so we were really pleased to be asked to contribute to the organisation’s developing neurodiversity awareness and inclusion work. We have fed extensively into the Neurodiversity policy, with our feedback being well received and thoughtfully acted upon. We are also feeding into plans for rolling out neurodiversity training, which will start with retail but also to head office staff, who may be managing, working with or experiencing life as a neurodiverse person.
We’re also working on some resources to be used across the organisation to help highlight some of the key issues and offer some strategies which can help to support staff, whether they are living with neurodiversity themselves or want to better support colleagues and volunteers who are. So watch this space 😊
One of the members of the network said, of this recent work:
