E12 – Conflict

Julie and Jel Discuss

Julie Legg and Jel Legg discuss ADHD, conflict and confrontation – why, when and how we are likely to react in certain situations.

They delve into the complexities of conflict and confrontation through the lens of ADHD, explore how traits like impulsivity and emotional intensity influence reactions, the challenges of managing conflict, and strategies for resolution. By highlighting the value of staying reflective and channeling energy into meaningful causes, they offer practical insights into navigating and even harnessing conflict for positive outcomes.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

  • ADHD and Conflict Dynamics: ADHD traits like impulsivity, intense emotions, and dopamine regulation issues can exacerbate conflict situations. Responses often default to “fight” or “flight” instincts, with Julie and Jel sharing contrasting reactions—Julie preferring avoidance, Jel leaning toward verbal confrontation.

  • Understanding Conflict Triggers: Conflict can escalate when low dopamine levels or repeated provocations occur. ADHDers may struggle with patience and emotional regulation, making resolution challenging.

  • Debate vs. Conflict: While debates can be stimulating and constructive for ADHDers, they may turn into conflicts if emotions are introduced or one party becomes inflexible. Staying calm and focusing on the exchange of ideas helps maintain balance.

  • Third Option – Staying Present: Beyond fight or flight, staying present and reflective can help de-escalate conflict. Recognizing when someone is projecting their stress rather than addressing the issue directly is a valuable skill.

  • Strategies for Resolution: Quick resolution of small irritations can prevent larger blowups. The “gray rock” technique—remaining neutral and unengaged—can help defuse situations without escalating emotions.

  • Harnessing Conflict Positively: While conflict is unavoidable in life, ADHDers may excel in causes or movements requiring persistence and hyperfocus. Turning passion into purposeful action can channel confrontation into positive outcomes.

LINKS

TRANSCRIPT

JULIE: I’m Julie Legg, author of The Missing Piece and diagnosed with ADHD at 52.

JEL: And I’m Jel Legg diagnosed at 55.

JULIE: Welcome to ADHDifference. Today we’ll be talking about conflict and confrontation. But before we do, I just thought we should recap. If you’re new or just started following this series, we are a married couple, are both diagnosed with ADHD in our 50s, and unmedicated. And the idea of the podcast is to be able to talk candidly about our experiences; how ADHD has impacted our lives, and hope that you may resonate with some of those things and not feel so alone with that regard. From time to time, we’ll have little strategies too that may be of assistance but here we go. Conflict. Conflict and confrontation is a normal thing, believe it or not, however with ADHD it brings with it the likes of anger and impulsivity and some intense emotions.

JEL: Yes. So, for me with confrontation, for both of us, we do everything we can to avoid confrontation. It’s not a good space for either of us to go into. For myself, everything about ADHD always comes back to dopamine. Where are my dopamine levels at? Do I need dopamine? Do I have enough where I’m quite calm and able to just deal with this situation, or are my dopamine levels low? And they’re going up and down constantly, all the time. They’re not very well balanced. It’s almost the definition of ADHD. So, when conflict comes along the first thing that comes to mind is fight or flight. When that kicks in there’s this stuff going on in your brain that you’ve got no control of, adrenaline gets produced. And adrenaline, I’m told, is linked through dopa to dopamine? Am I right on that?

JULIE: Yes. Adrenaline and dopamine have the same dopa molecule so that’s a relationship there.

JEL: So, catch me at the wrong time, or catch us at the wrong time, let’s be plural, our dopamine levels are low, the adrenaline kicks in, you’d think okay so that’s now raised the dopamine, we’re a little bit more calmer and balanced. But it’s not always necessarily that way It’s almost like, with dopamine it’s not just a question of constantly balancing it. Sometimes it comes in a rush and then you want more, and more, and more. And so, there’s a danger of falling into the fight scenario where the argument … you just let go, absolutely go for it and almost, I wouldn’t say enjoy it, but this part of our brain saying more, more and more. Yeah, just keep doing this. Or, there’s the flight side which is probably generally the best thing to do in which case we’re pretty fast at getting out of a situation and walking away and brutally and harshly if needed.

JULIE: And that’s interesting because as a couple, we experience and share so many things but when it comes to conflict Jel is the fighter and I am the flighter with that regard. So, we can share some very different responses to a conflict or confrontational situation. But I just wanted to step in there Jel, because I know you love debating and for you, debating a conversation, quite a rigorous discussion can turn into conflict or it can stay at this debate level that provides stimulation and also increases your dopamine levels. So, tell me, at what point does it stop being a debate and starts to become a conflict?

JEL: When the person I’m debating with gives no quarter and has no ability to be flexible in their thinking. There’s, I believe the expression is “war is the last word in politics” so when debating, for me, it’s not to beat the other person, it’s not to win the argument, it is to discuss something and develop an understanding from two different perspectives and hopefully both walk away learning something. Because you don’t get to know stuff about stuff, and a lot of stuff sometimes, without debating with people over the years and learning. And if you can’t modify your opinion, and grow and learn from that, then you’re a bit one-sided you’re not really a rounded person. So, I love debating. I love fast intense debating and, with the right person, I can debate for ages and they can have a completely opposite opinion to me, it’s irrelevant. But I can see from their side and if they can see from my side then we don’t get into that conflict situation.

JULIE: Now this might be completely a bad comparison, I’m particularly good at giving bad comparisons, but we’ll try this one. Could it be like being in a boxing ring, a friendly boxing ring, where both opponents are jab jab jab jab and it’s going away, going along nicely, and then maybe one of the opponents says “Nah, I’m not playing anymore,” and maybe says something personal and it becomes no longer a sport. It becomes something a little different, you know what I mean. It’s … you’ve got … no it’s no longer a debate anymore it’s actually changed the, you know, the tone has changed and that I think is where potentially the conflict can start.

JEL: Well yeah, I mean boxing Queensbury rules and all that, you know, like martial arts which I was involved with for a number of years. There are strict rules and if you stick to the strict rules the competition the fight’s fair. So yeah, perhaps in a conflict situation, it’s a good point, because if someone comes at me with something which is a potentially conflict situation of criticism, or request of something I’ve done wrong, I’m absolutely fine with it, provided it’s delivered in a very measured and reasoned way. Once they attach some emotion to it, an unreasonable emotion, unnecessary emotion, then it triggers an emotional response in me. So, I’m trying to think from the ADHD perspective, always coming back to basics, we are diverse, different, so we probably statistically have a different, on the whole, a different response to conflict perhaps to people who have a more measured approach. I mean there’s so many aspects to this. We were talking earlier and I was thinking about the people I’ve met in life who are so calm and they just don’t get into big arguments. They’re the people that make great diplomats or negotiators. They’re so calm. They just seem to be able to walk through things with such ease. Now, that doesn’t mean that we fire off at every moment. We’re not … you don’t have to walk on eggshells around us. We’re not always about to launch into a full-blown war with you. It just … it depends on how that conflict is, the framework of that conflict I think, how it’s framed. Talk about in your situation flighting because you are a flighter.

JULIE: I am. So, I don’t like conflict, I … even talking about the word to be honest sends shivers up my spine. I run as fast as I can but that’s not always practical, and when one is in a situation dealing with confrontation, for me, pretty much I will try and defend myself. And by that, I will interrupt the other person if I feel that they’ve understood me or they’re going off on completely the wrong track. I want to interrupt them and get them, you know, set them straight. Now that can be seen as not a good thing in a conflict situation. So, a response might be “Wait until I finish talking,” which again makes me squirm because if I don’t say something immediately, I might forget and it could be a very important piece of the conversation that I’ve missed. Also, I’m fighting against my gut instinct which is to fix the problem very quickly because I know that the result of this conflict is I’m going to feel bad ultimately, not saying what I wanted to say, getting my words jumbled up, not being able to talk eloquently. In this situation I will call ‘frightening’, but I mean that my brain becomes frightened, not the whole of me but, you know what I mean, I get that scary feeling in my head. Or I’ll try to explain and even overshare which could actually make the conflict worse. So, all these things that I naturally do with my ADHD kind of adds extra fuel to the fire, so I end up either bursting into tears which completely derails the confrontation and I feel that I’ve lost it by not being able to control my emotions, or I’ll get really angry which again more fuel on the fire again. So, it’s like almost anything I do in a conflict situation doesn’t seem to work so I flight and I retreat. And I’m not saying all strategies are good ones and this obviously is not a good strategy because I can remove myself from the situation thus feeling safe but then I haven’t got to say what I wanted to say. And I feel unheard, and misunderstood, and at times that feeling that I’ve been bullied. That’s my perception, that’s not necessarily the case. But to go back and, for days and days, think about what I could have said if I was brave enough. How I could have reacted differently and days later I might come up with a killer response that I never got to say. And even if I was to write it all in an email and send it to that person saying “Right, I’ve got my thoughts together now,” it’s a week later and it’s almost bringing up old, you know, old wounds, exactly. So, I know my flight, well it keeps me safe. I know that it actually doesn’t ultimately work well for me but that was me in my flighting. Tell us about your fight reaction. And when we say fight, we don’t mean physical, we mean verbal.

JEL: Yeah okay, so I avoid it as much as anything, so in a way I am flighting because I’m avoiding the fighting. But when it comes down to the crunch, I’m far more likely to fight. Now I could spend the next 5 minutes talking about that but I think what’s really important is how do we avoid that fight or flight … as ADHDers because we do have a huge response. Jules will run and then spend days still replaying that entire conflict situation, which is a high cost. It’s a high price to pay. When I go to a fight situation I go in for the jugular. I take what’s in front of me, what someone’s saying, I say “Fine,” boom boom demolish that now I’m going to demolish you because you’re the messenger. What’s behind that? None of that’s good. None of it’s healthy. No, it’s not. So, the … what we’ve tried to work out how to avoid this and the first thing I think is to look at the person who is picking the fight with you, has got something to say, is you’ve got to very correctly work out are they actually, do they have a really good reasonable point that what I’ve said or done is wrong? And we should be mature enough, even with ADHD, to say “Okay fair enough. I shouldn’t have said that. I do apologize,” and that’s the end of it. Most of the time I find people coming at me with conflict, it is not actually about me they’re looking for a punch bag. They’re projecting. They may be under a lot of stress. They’ve just had enough about something and I’ve just said “Could you possibly …” bam, and I’ve hit them just at the wrong time and they then offload onto me. And the better we are recognizing when someone is projecting and being unreasonable, the more we can just step back which is neither fighting or flighting. It’s staying in that space and just being the punch bag almost, but switching off. So, we have another great episode all about masking and so we can almost put a mask on and go “Okay, I’ve got my defense on now. You go for it,” and you’re not really hitting any, causing any damage here, I’m just hearing it will come from you. So most of the time that’s what you can do, if do really get into a fight situation. Sometimes you can’t avoid it though.

JULIE: I know. It’s lovely though to know that there is that third option and it’s the middle option. It’s not fighting nor flighting, it’s staying. And part of this Jel, you were talking about you know, for a moment thinking about a projection, are they are they projecting something which tells us more about them than it does about what we’re actually having a conflict over. And it’s almost this reflective listening, just for a moment, just to work out what actually is the problem. Is it, ask … me? Is it them? Is it the topic? And to just pause and often I think in my head just the word ‘interesting’ and that second or two of saying ‘interesting’ in my head is enough to go “What is this actually all about? Is it really about that petty conflict or is it something completely different?”

JEL: So, when the fight situation does occur; two triggers. One, someone can say something absolutely insulting and outrageous, completely out of the blue, that can trigger if it catches me at the wrong time, not always but that can trigger. The one that’s really hard, the one that is so difficult is when someone says something for the sixth time, or the seventh time over a long period of time of catching up with them. It may last over months, a couple of years sometimes, and suddenly you think “I’ve been masking all this time. I should have dealt with that earlier I when you first said it. I should have said ‘oh you know that’s not right’ and now it’s built up and up and up and I’ve let it go and now I’m going to respond to it.” That’s the fatal one. That’s the fight one where the relationship generally gets ended at that point. That’s the point when I dive in and go for it and they look at me as if to say “Where did this come from? What’s your problem?” It’s actually, well it is my problem because I’ve been masking, but all along it’s actually your misdemeanors or misbehavior that’s led to this.

JULIE: And that would come as quite a surprise to them because they might think “Well I’ve been doing that for years and you haven’t had a problem with it, why now?” you know. “Did you get out of bed the wrong way?” which would rark you up big time I’m sure. But you’re right, it’s … and so in the ideal world we would try and hone and perfect our communication skills. Really I think it comes down to nipping things into the bud, being … [In the bud.] In the bud! Oh, I have a cold if you haven’t worked it all out and so my fuzzy ADHD brain has just got slightly fuzzier, so there you go. But communicating over small things as they happen it doesn’t have to be conflict at all. But Jel as you said, once they build up and up and up and up, the smallest thing could actually have an explosive result.

JEL: And sometimes that’s absolutely necessary we can’t avoid that. Yeah, yeah, yeah it has to be done. I don’t think anyone reasonably can go through their life, their adult life, not having a major conflict at some point.

JULIE: And as I started this off, yeah, conflict is normal. It’s a normal part of life and you can’t avoid it throughout your life.

JEL: What I want to say too is a lot of you are thinking “Yeah okay,” how can I put this … lots of lots of people will say “Just be more patient if someone’s upset you. You need patience, like listen to what they have to say. Listen carefully don’t react.” Well, that’s the one thing we don’t have is patience, so it is really hard. We don’t have the magic silver bullet here, you know you guys. There isn’t … strategies work in some situations for some people, some of the time. So, there’s two halves to this conflict. You’ve got someone coming at you bringing conflict to your door, so as we’ve just saying it’s like I think one of the strategies there is to try to work out, are they dumping on you? Are they projecting at you/on you and is it really you that’s caused this? But there is the other half to the conflict which is when we create the conflict and this is just as likely, if not more likely. When our dopamine levels are low, we’re impatient, we’re edgy, right on the edge of aggressiveness, that can kick in very quickly. We can snap. We can be unreasonable. We can be unkind. We need that dopamine and it can come from food, it can come from medication if you’re on it, it can come from alcohol, cigarettes, drugs, whatever the sources.

JULIE: You’re talking about negative sources, there are positive sources too.

JEL: Okay, positive sources: go for a run, you know, punch a bag. I don’t know. Play some loud music. Go get some fresh air, whatever but we’re all human. And for the record, we’re not drug users, but you know there are plenty of people that find their sources however it needs to be, to calm them down. So, we probably kickstart a lot more conflict than conflict comes up at us. I think that’s reasonable to say. I mean, I could start an argument with anyone, at any moment, any point of the day if I wished. And I can feel my brain go “Yeah, just say something. Oh, don’t put up with that.” Walking in the supermarket, someone gets in my way or was too slow, I … you know, but in that split second, I could say “Have you got no consideration for other people? Get out of the way.” That’s not very nice. That starts an argument and that’s not good. So, my brain lives with this all the time … sometimes I’m calm, I’m calm a lot too, and it’s really weird. There’s no one size fits all. Someone can approach me having had an argument with a third party and they’re so upset but I can be, and I think we both can be, extraordinarily good at just calming them down and just taking rational reasonable view and say “Well I don’t think, you know, it’s as bad as you think.” So we, I think that comes up in some of your research. We can be quite good mediators if we need to be. Yes …and good in a crisis?

JULIE: Oh correct, absolutely. Absolutely, very good mediators. But in that situation where someone comes in with bad energy because of a third party, they’re not necessarily having conflict with you. You’re almost solving or helping to address their personal situation but I think yeah, when it becomes personal, that’s quite a tricky one. Where there’s a will there’s a way and if it’s a major issue, just like any major challenge in your life, seeking help and assistance on that is a great thing to do.

JEL: Yeah, but it’s not easy. There’s … conflict is the one thing I really think is not easy. Can’t even pretend it is because I think we can just, we can start conflict so easily I .. you know, when I, when we started talking about this I was thinking more about the conflict that comes at us, but now I’m thinking about the conflict we start. Yes. And that’s, yeah … we’re lucky in that, in this marriage we’re we don’t argue. We can have a little snappy moment, just a word or a misunderstanding. But if you’re wondering, if you’re in an ADHD relationship or marriage, every marriage is unique, if you’re wondering about ours we don’t go into that full-blown argument state. We just don’t because neither of us would really really have the ability then to walk, well we do walk away, but if we go into the fight situation we will fight. And we don’t, and we haven’t, and I’m not sure/recall we have a really really fought, but it would be destructive and damaging. And we’d probably end up getting to a certain point we just look at each other and laugh and go “What the heck are we doing here? This is ridiculous.” We would almost become like two other people, alter egos having a fight. It would be our dopamine-lacking brain that’s now getting fed dopamine through adrenaline and it wouldn’t be Jules and it wouldn’t be me. It would be two other monsters fighting.

JULIE: Yeah, yeah. It’s crazy isn’t it.

JEL: So we don’t do it. Yeah, that sometimes leaves unresolved conflict in that moment but what we’re very good at doing then is going away and coming back 5 minutes, or an hour later, and sitting down and go “Right. I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” and then we can go from there and resolve that. Those same words can be said.

JULIE: That’s correct and the other tricky scenario I guess it’s when you have conflict in a long-term relationship, whether it’s a family member, or a long-term acquaintance, or workmate, where you can’t just walk away and never have to address that again. That does take again, a lot of communication and sensibility.

JEL: Yeah, back to what I’m just describing, how we will deal with conflict in our marriage, we have a vested interest in staying married. We love each other very much and so that gives us a framework in which to not go into the fight situation. Back off knowing there’s no underlying ill intent. This isn’t the end of the relationship. Come back, address it calmly, move on very quickly. When you’re having conflict with a work colleague, or someone that you’re not in a close relationship with, you don’t have that to fall back on. So you really are left thinking “Is this the end of my working relationship with that person? Can I not work with them anymore?” If you’re just dating and you’re early into a relationship, well that’s blown it then, they’re not the right person for me. So there’s all sorts of scenarios where you can’t move forward with the tools we’ve just described in a marriage so you … part of it is looking at the value of that relationship. If that relationship really matters you’ve just got to dig deep and find a way to make it keep going. If it doesn’t matter then don’t sweat that. Don’t let it define you. Walk away or say what you got to say. I’ve done what I got to say now I’m walking away with your head up high. I mean you do have to assess that quite quickly, don’t you.

JULIE: Yeah but I think in the absence of strategy, you know, we can rely on our gut instincts to be honest. We’ve made it through to adulthood, we’re in our 50s as we’ve said. It hasn’t been through chance. We’ve followed our gut instinct and I think don’t second guess that. Try and refine it if you can, if you have the time to mull over new ways of doing things but actually our gut instinct is probably right. And if we should leave a conflict situation for our mental well-being or physical well-being, you know, that’s probably the right thing to do.

JEL: Also, as we sort of draw towards the end, I’m reminded of the expression, you know, some people are just … they want, they’re drawn to the fight. They love to get stuck in and again, I’m not meaning physical, I’m thinking of certain people in arenas like politics and so on. They just love to rise to the debate and the … and often gets into a fight, really. I wonder whether that’s an aspect of people with ADHD who see that debate, which/what we will call a fight when it gets a bit further beyond a debate, whether that’s something that just is satisfying their dopamine needs. Whether they feed off that. Just an idea to think about. It’s not … some people are very good at fighting and they can make a career out of it and it doesn’t always have to be damaging and destructive to everyone else. It can lead to, I mean, if you need to move forward … say you’re part of a civil rights movement, or a change for good in something. You do need to really fight and you will have to fight for that change, and it may be that’s some area that you’re really well suited to with ADHD, when you have this hyperfocus. There’s another one, back into the hyperfocus of ADHD, and you’re determined you’re going to make this change. It’s going to take some time and along the way you’re going to have to fight for it. So perhaps not always seeing confrontation which, if you go in prepared and you know what you’re fighting for and it’s a good set of values, whatever … a cause, a rebel with a cause, rather than a rebel without a cause, then perhaps that’s an aspect that we’re rather good at.

JULIE: No, that’s really interesting because I think from the perspective of it’s almost you put a weighting, as in … ‘Weighting’ not ‘waiting’ for something, yeah weighting as in valuable, not valuable, where it is on the scale. Because if it’s worth fighting for, conflict, you will you will stay there to the bitter end to defend that. Whether it’s your family, or yourself, or your property, or whatever the conflict is.

JEL: But the principle is what I’m talking about, that’s a defensive thing, fighting for your property or family is generally a defensive thing, but if you’re on a front foot, a fighting fight, for a cause I rather I suspect we’ be rather good at it.

JULIE: Yeah, I agree. Interesting. Very interesting. Well, there you go folks. Thank you for listening. This episode was all about conflict and confrontation.

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