E23 – Impulsivity

Julie and Jel Discuss

Julie Legg and Jel Legg chat about ADHD and Impulsivity – an ADHD trait that is interconnected with many others such as impatience, risk taking, and interrupting.       

They delve into the role of impulsivity in ADHD, sharing personal experiences and insights on how it shapes their daily lives. They explore how impulsive actions—often driven by a need for dopamine—can impact finances, relationships, and decision-making. Through examples ranging from impulsive purchases to hasty reactions at work, they highlight the challenges of managing impulsivity and share practical strategies, like taking a moment to pause and creating “game plans,” to help channel these impulses more positively.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

  • Definition and Traits: Impulsivity is acting without thinking about the consequences, a distinct behavior from spontaneity, which allows more time for reflection. Impulsivity often appears as impatience, risk-taking, interrupting, and quick reactions​.

  • Examples of Impulsive Actions: They share personal examples of impulsive decisions, from minor actions (like breaking an item by not pausing to think) to major life choices, such as quitting jobs or making big purchases without adequate planning​.

  • Dopamine Drive: Impulsivity in ADHD is often driven by a need for dopamine, with impulsive actions providing a rush—whether through quick purchases, emotional responses, or risky behaviors​.

  • Financial and Emotional Consequences: Impulsive shopping can lead to debt, while hasty reactions in relationships or at work can cause conflicts. Impulsivity also influences behaviors like road rage, gambling, and risky driving decisions​.

  • Strategies to Curb Impulsivity: To manage impulsivity, they suggest techniques like taking a moment to pause, creating “game plans,” and setting boundaries for commitments. Slowing down can help counter impulsive tendencies and prevent regret​.

  • Long-Term Impacts and Overcoming Challenges: Years of impulsive actions can lead to guilt and avoidance of decision-making. They note that strategies like following safety routines can help manage impulsivity in high-risk situations​.

  • Impulsivity as a Core ADHD Trait: Julie and Jel reflect on impulsivity as a central part of ADHD, affecting daily actions and decisions, while acknowledging that learned strategies can help them channel impulsive energy more positively​.

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. In today’s episode we’ll be talking about ADHD and impulsivity. Impulsivity, really, is an action that is taken without thinking of the repercussions and the consequences. It is different from spontaneity however, that’s a little bit more planned out even though it may feel that it’s impulsive at the time, but there is a difference. We’ll talk about that shortly. But impulsivity actually ties in with a whole bunch of other ADHD traits including impatience, and risk-taking, and interrupting, blurting out, and a bunch of others all tied in together.

JEL: Yes, impulsivity. I think being impulsive is something that I do every day, have done all my life, and expect to continue to do for the rest of my life. Impulsivity – it can be in the smallest silliest things or it can be in massive things, like life-changing things. Perhaps starting with the small things, where I tend to curse myself the most is if I’m trying to fix something, a small item, and instead of thinking it through and just stopping for a second and looking at the implications of the next step, I’ll do something and I’ll break it. And, at that point I know it’s proper broken and I can’t fix it and I’m really stuffed now, and then I curse myself. And it’s always that impatience that drives that impulsivity with me, or not thinking. Perhaps it isn’t. Impatience feels like what’s driving it even, but it’s not thinking. It’s not thinking to the next step. It’s not lacking an ability to understand what the consequences are. It’s just some part of my brain just does it. It just does it.

JULIE: And why do we do things impulsively?

JEL: I think I feel like my brain’s disconnected from the reality of what’s in front of me and it makes some kind of judgment or gamble that “Oh it will probably work. It’s like magic. If I do this it’s magic and it will fix it,” even though I jolly well know it isn’t going to fix it. It’s that drive for dopamine, you know, isn’t it? Yeah, yeah. It’s possible that just, if I do this and it’s the magic fairy dust then turns it into something and I get the dopamine hit. But it’s like “Yeah,” you know, “The gods were with me,” but it doesn’t work like that. And that can be on tiny things – fixing a hose pipe, or fixing a sprinkler head, or something really silly. And then it can work its way up all through stages to a part of a car engine, to right up to a relationship, or a job. [Absolutely.] I’ve definitely done the boss talks to me in a certain way and I just stop and think “That’s unfair. That’s unjust. I don’t think that’s appropriate.” And I’ll say something that means I’m walking out the door 5 minutes later, by resignation usually. Yes. That’s happened at least twice in my career where I could have just thought it through and been reasonable, taken that loss or that one on the chin, but and then that’s it, I’m walking out the door and I’m now unemployed. It’s a big one.

JULIE: And I think that’s … so I will talk about the difference between impulsivity and spontaneity because there is a slight difference. And I had to get my head around it because I’ve always thought that I was a spontaneous person. But, when you sort of go through down a little pathway and check if it was impulsivity or spontaneity, there is a difference. For example, if I decided I’m going to go bungee jumping this morning, right now, I’ve got to get in my car. I’ve got to go and find the bungee jumping place. I’ve got to hand over some money. There’ll probably be a bit of a health and safety talk, then I’ll leap and I’ll have an amazing dopamine boost or adrenaline rush. That takes some time, and some thought, and some action with a sequence. So, at any point in time I could go I don’t know if I really want to do this, or the weather looks a bit rubbish, or I’ve got no petrol in the car. But impulsivity is just instant action or reaction that you don’t have time to think of the consequences. And you mentioned work Jel and I think a lot of situations – interrupting, over talking, oversharing, trying to make things right, confrontation, conflict. It all can happen so quickly and you don’t have time to ponder it when you’re in that moment. And often it can lead to all sorts of issues including resigning. [Yes.] And it has, you know, it’s been in the paper too about ADHDers who will resign, and then think about it, and then go back and say “Can I have … can I have my job back? I was a bit impulsive.” And in some instances, the answer is “No, we accept your resignation, that’s it.” So, it can have some quite big ramifications.

JEL: Yeah, on more everyday situations when I was at work, ie: when I worked amongst people, which I’ve avoided for 20 years. I’ve worked remotely which have solved a lot of problems. It would be just the response, usually an emotional response to someone saying something and then the filter is just not there. And so, not having that filter and just saying what comes in my mind straight away, is an absolute honest truth. It’s my truth. It may not be the truth of the situation but it’s my truth. And so that really is an impulsive response and it’s not measured, and it’s not considered of how that’s going to impact the other person or the situation, usually adversely. At the same time, it can make for, it can make us quite funny people. You know, I like to encourage people to laugh and if I can get people laughing that’s great for them, great for me. It’s just, you know, the dopamine hit you get from laughing is really good and it’s just good all-around for your health.

JULIE: You’re really good at those one-liners. [The fast one-liners]. They just … they trigger out and either land amongst [yeah] ears ready to laugh or often stony silence.

JEL: Yeah, my kind of humour tends to be delivering something that’s the … I try to work out what someone’s thinking and it’s, and it might be a wee outrageous statement, but I try to imagine what they’re thinking and put/take the words out of their mind and put them into my mouth. And so, it reflects back on them. And you can see in their face, in that split second “Yeah, that’s exactly what I was thinking.” [“Did he say that?”] We’ll laugh. So, it can work really well and you can … I see comedians do this a lot, particularly with a really responsive audience, that there is an impulsivity that comes into their routine. And, if they’re really nailing it and they just, you could say they can feel and measure the audience but I think they’re on a tight rope without a safety net. I think they’re right on the edge until suddenly they can say something and it goes flat. Oops, got to recover. But everyday conversation can be like that. I repeatedly will say something without necessarily remembering the other person has a certain sensitivity to that subject. And, then it doesn’t land and you think “Ahh, I could have thought that through a bit more and premeditated that by a wee ramble.” I still have something to say but I want, if I preamble it with a consideration to their thoughts, and will you accept what I’m about to say, you know.  So, impulsivity literally is what’s coming out of your mouth all the time, let alone moving on to the big actions. And I can think of one big action that’s a classic. [Go]. So, we … we’re looking … we owned a house. I guess that’s fortunate whatever, however you look at it, or we’ve worked hard to own a house. A market was such that we thought we’d buy a rental, a wee investment. And so we went to look at one and decided to buy it very quickly without getting a builder’s report or any real background looking into it. Is it a flood zone? Or all those sorts of things. We just thought, yep. Fell in love with it. So, as we’re just driving around the corner, we saw another one and thought “Well, we’ll have that one too.”

JULIE: They were both, they were both entry level and yeah.

JEL: Entry level and they were yeah but still the point is we now can say within about 30 minutes we bought two houses. Wouldn’t say sight unseen, because we did look in them, a quick look around. “Yeah, that will do.” But to buy two massive purchases like that within 30 minutes, the agent couldn’t believe it as she trundled us back to the office to sign these two forms. And we just thought it was like buying a pair of shoes. Now this … But we’re not that daft. We do understand property but that’s a hugely … the first one was I think driven by reason. The second one I would say the impulsive one. JULIE: Now, that scenario is a massive one and a massive financial commitment. And gosh, didn’t we know about that, because there was a whole lot of mortgage to pay in months to come for that. But it also can happen in things like retail therapy, we nicely call it, where you’re in a shop and you just feel in a good mood, and the dopamine’s running, and you try something on and love it. “I’ll have two of those. Not only, I’ll get some shoes to match,” and all of a sudden, the intention was to go out to buy a shirt, and you come out with a whole outfit, and a handbag. And it felt great spending money but that impulsivity can lead to credit card debt and a whole lot of ADHDers can get into financial trouble. Not only with impulsivity about not buying what’s on the ‘must have’ list but the likes of gambling, or spending money on concert tickets that are well out of your financial range. “Oh, just chuck it on the credit card.” It can come quite unstuck after that and I know that can addictions based on impulsivity can also be an issue.

JEL: But back to buying a house – one spontaneously? No there’s a little bit of planning and we had intention. The second one was definitely impulsive. That’s not unique to us. I have lost count of how many times I’ve read of situations where someone has made a similar decision – buying a rundown chateau or a house somewhere and it’s an emotional decision. They don’t think through the work involved; the cost involved. They literally go “Ohh I’ve fallen in love with it and boom, within 20 minutes I was buying it. I’ve made an offer and signing the forms.” It happens more than you think. Or, it could be an old car that needs restoring or a car that’s been restored. “It’s so beautiful. I’ve always wanted one of those in red. Yep, I’ll buy it. Finance? No problem.” Boom, without thinking through the implications and the costs and everything going forward. I’m not suggesting everyone that has done that has ADHD but, for someone with an ADHD brain, the danger is there. From the pair of shoes, right up to a house, and it’s not to be underestimated because it’s driven by an emotional process. When you let your emotions make a decision, you’re in the danger zone. That, it’s not to say we’re not capable of sleeping on ideas and sitting and rationally going through lists of pros and cons. We can do all of that but the impulsivity is never far away is it?

JULIE: And maybe that’s part of the learning. We’re looking at relocating, for example. And, unlike our previous example, we’ve got a list of pros and cons. And we will mull over it for days and days and days and think and look. And we’re not even a position to buy right now but we’re doing lots of homework. And, maybe a learning from our impulsive purchase some years back, we’ve learned from that going “Actually that wasn’t very wise at all,” and we were very lucky to have managed to sort of get out of that situation. We sold them over time, once we decided to do them up and we …

JEL: Just thinking about the last family home. You utterly fell in love with it because it had beautiful mature gardens with cabbages growing and some trees, fruit trees. [But the house was falling apart.] A complete wreck. Absolute wreck. And we didn’t get a builder’s report. We just knew it was a bit of a mess and, you know. I know. Then it got to the point, once we were in it, that we had to start renovating it. And, in New Zealand that means stripping it down to the bare frame, which is like living in a shed.

JULIE: And not only that, it was sold by auction. [Oh yes]. And so we went in there going with the price that would like to buy it, the price that no no the red line price. Well, we went above that.

JEL: Yeah. My advice to ADHDers is never buy a house through an auction. Because you have your absolute upper limit, and then you’ll go another 1, 2, 3,000 on top.

JULIE: Or get someone else to bid for you. You can get real estate agents to bid on your behalf and they will know your upper level, and they’ll stick to it because, you know, you’re asking them to do a job for them. But yeah, it … that is definitely impulsive.

JEL: And then just to say, that one was a fascinating one because most people … we ended up, knowing it was going to need some renovating, well it was an entire renovation. So, we did a whole load of work to it over 18 months or so, spent a lot of money to be honest, and then suddenly decided “We need to move to the country.” Now that was not impulsive, we’d always planned to move to the country. That’s … so the impulsive part of it I guess was “Well let’s do it now. Why are we waiting another few years?” So, we put it on the market with paint brushes still sat on … it wasn’t finished. [I know.] So, yeah, we were lucky there. Now look, just to bring that back, we’re know … appreciate a lot of people listening to this aren’t perhaps in the position to buy and sell houses, but the same process applies when you’re on eBay, or in New Zealand it’s Trade Me, where you’re bidding for something that might cost $100-$150. That’s what it’s worth say, and now you’ve gone to $170-$180 and you’re getting it. It’s like being on the pokeys. What, we’ve got the gambling machines, that impulsivity just to keep going. Is it impulsive? I think it is a form of impulsivity. Your dopamine needs to be, you’re going “I’m going to win this,” and perhaps you didn’t even need it in the first place or it wasn’t the right thing for you. Or, you just go “Ahh, I remember that.” Perhaps you’re older, perhaps you remember having a Nintendo game boy or something. “I’m going to buy one,” and suddenly you’re $200 down buying some old game console because you made that decision 5 minutes earlier that you’re going to have one.

JULIE: Yeah, it’s that, you’re right, emotional attachment and it kind of gets a bit do-wacky. [It’s the emotions drive the decision.] It’s not quite, it’s not quite rational at that point in time.

JEL: I’m convinced, sorry, actually I’m just going to wrap that up. I’m convinced, we need the dopamine hit. The impulsivity is a great way of getting a dopamine hit. The emotions then come into it – good ones, bad ones, doesn’t matter. Romantic ones, absolutely doesn’t want … They drive it. We want the dopamine, impulsivity. That’s the impulsivity. Bam! Let’s go for it.

JULIE: Another one that affects some people, a small minority but they’re the same, shoplifting. It’s that … I wouldn’t know to be honest, but one of the ladies in the book volunteered that she had been shoplifting. It was just she found it easy, she found it a buzz, and she found it quite addictive if I recall, until she was caught and then she went “Right, okay. I understand the consequences now,” because when there are no consequences you just put it on repeat really, don’t you? And that could be said for many many bad habits when there’s no consequences. You just keep going for it. The other thing I want to talk about was impulsivity whilst driving. You’ve got … impatience kicks in, distraction kicks in, swerving, erratic driving, road age. All of those things can be put down to impulsivity as well.

JEL: Oh yeah, especially overtaking. Overtaking in the wrong place because, you know, again it’s an emotional thing. You start with the emotion as “I’m late or I’m going slower than I want to go,” and so then you, the moment you decide to do an overtake, maybe an impulsive decision without thinking through things. I was a shocker for that when I was younger and got away on several occasions when perhaps a split second the other way I wouldn’t have done. But what actually cured me, funnily enough, was going on a long trip where a friend of mine was driving and he was driving at about, you know, 20-30 mph which is about 40 or 50km, over the speed limit all the time, and I just got really scared as a passenger. So, I could sort of … I wasn’t in control, so my brain wasn’t driving the impulsive actions on the road, or I wasn’t getting a dopamine hit from it because I wasn’t the one with a steering wheel. So I just gave him, I sort of teared into him, and said “Look, we’ll only …” I worked out we’d get there about 15 minutes, 10 minutes quicker on this very long journey but this, “Can you just back off?” And I taught myself through that and that stayed for years, the amount. And so, terribly wonderful what a clever halo and that, but I do tend to drive a lot more cautiously now. I don’t say I’m perfect and still don’t. I don’t take the overtakes anymore but maybe that’s just a wisdom and age thing but I will overtake. Of course, I will if the truck’s slow but you just, you’ve got to learn techniques. You have to because your life depends on it and you need to recognize this impulsivity really can threaten your life at times.

JULIE: Okay, and it can with being accident prone. I don’t know, even shooing away a wasp and then knocking over a Ming vase, and but you know, whatever one looks like, I’ve never seen on myself. But you know what I mean, it’s just impulsivity. Now it can be used in a crisis really well to dive in and pull someone from the burning vehicle as much as it can for getting into danger or hazardous situations. But you can also be impulsive in over- committing and saying yes. [Yes.] “Come to a barbecue next Saturday.” Yes, okay. “And then can you come around a bit earlier with your trailer because I just need to unpack.” Yep, yep, yep. And, before you know it, impulsivity because at that point in time that sounds perfect, but the consequences are you going to give away your Saturday. You’ve probably double-booked yourself. You’re going to run out of energy and you’re going to feel at the end of the weekend that you haven’t achieved anything for yourself personally.

JEL: Why is that? It’s because I’d say, most of us are people-pleasers. We particularly, I don’t know if this is a real ADHD thing but I like to be a people-pleaser. I like to get that buzz back from someone. Yes. That “Well done. Good job.” It’s that validation you get back from someone, say “Hey, nice job.” So, when you’re invited to that barbecue or when someone says “Could you … you don’t think you could help with this? And get this done by the end of the day, it’d be so awesome.” Yep, no problem. I’ll do that. “Oh, you’re a lifesaver. Thank you so much.” So, I’ve got my dopamine hit straight away. It’s like I’ve made them happy. Yeah, I count. I’m important. I add value. And then suddenly all those ‘yeses’ are a big jumble in a pile and it’s like “How am I going to do all this?” So that impulsive response to that request, you didn’t stop and think it through, and “I’d love to help you but realistically that isn’t going to happen. I’d love to come Saturday but realistically I’m juggling a couple of things. How about I do my best and let you know closer to the time?” And so, you’ve got time to think about that.

JULIE: So that’s a really good solution for impulsivity. Is solution the right word? I don’t know. [Game plan, I don’t know.] A game plan, exactly. To pause and/or even to say “I’ll get back to you. I’ll check my diary, I’ll get back to you,” and then just allow that time for the word yes not to come straight out of your mouth.

JEL: So, what you’re still doing then is you’re looking at that person in the face saying they want you to say yes. They really want you to say yes to this, and so you don’t take away their hope and say “No, oh no no I don’t think I could.” It’s still … the odds are you could do that job for them. You could go to the barbecue but you just got to give them lots of “Oh thank you so much for asking me. Well, that’s … oh wow that sounds awesome. Thank you so much, really appreciate the invite,” sorry, and then you just sort of buy yourself a bit of time and then the decision you make is not an impulsive one. It may in most cases be the same decision. Boom, I’m at the barbecue, but it’s not impulsive.

JULIE: Agreed. The other thing too with a, especially diagnosed as adults with ADHD, a lot of one’s lifetime can, is, undiagnosed but you still have those impulsive challenges, moments, throughout your whole life and some of them can end badly. And so, after a lifetime of impulsivity gone wrong a lot of people actually sort of internally go into their shell and become indecisive. They don’t want to make a decision because “Every decision I make is a bad one.” That is not the truth of course, that’s not the truth, but you can tell it can be quite overwhelming after lots of impulsive times ending badly and so that indecisiveness and lacking in confidence, can certainly appear in adults. So, if you were to say, are you impulsive? “No no no no no no. I wouldn’t dare. I don’t trust myself, it’s almost like the anti-ADHD trait but that’s likely to have come from a lifetime of not having strategies and bearing the brunt of some guilt and shame that can come from some impulsive actions.

JEL: It reminded me I guess, I’ve often have the nickname in more than one circle being Mr Health and Safety. And, I’m not one of those people that is obsessed with health and safety in the sense of in the workplace all the time, you know. It’s not my job, otherwise I would be a health and safety officer or something that would of, I would have made a career out of if I was really interested. I just brought it into my world on many levels because it is a great defence mechanism for me to avoid … to stop impulsivity having negative outcomes. Especially if I’m using power tools, or climbing scaffolding, or going on the road roof all sorts of situations which I jolly well know can have some very adverse outcomes which I seriously don’t want, you know. So it is that stop and think for a second and if it slows everything down … please don’t for a moment think I don’t still have all the things I said. I still will break things, or have an accident, or cut myself stupidly, and do dumb things, but it’s we can’t avoid doing those things entirely with or without ADHD, but it is just slowing down and putting in place these simple things, you know. Because every time I’ve injured myself the consequences, even if it’s just you cut your finger, or bash it with a hammer, and you’ve got a big job to do, suddenly that job now really takes a lot longer because you’ve got half a hand you’re not using. It really hurts. So, it’s that feedback loop. You do have to teach yourself and oddly enough, health and safety, we all hate it, we all sort of “Warning! This hot water tap contains hot water. May burn.” Obviously, but there are lessons in that, almost. Just it’s teaching you to stop and think for a second even though it’s stating the bleeding obvious.

JULIE: I think that’s key isn’t it. It’s just a moment to pause, which, I don’t know, hinders the impulsivity side of things. It slows it down and then, for a moment, just to consider those repercussions and consequences. And again, that’s the difference between impulsivity and spontaneity.

JEL: I do think, well I do think ADHD has been part of the human condition forever, and as you researched in the book it’s been identified for at least 200 years, and I do love lots of sayings and things that come from our previous generation and even two generations back. But I recall lots of things my father would say which aren’t part of our common sayings these days, and one of them was more speed no, is it ‘more haste, less speed’? Yes. And actually, that’s what this is all about, more haste, more impatience, less progress. So, it is encapsulated in this old saying you hear as a kid, well I certainly did, and that comes down through the generations. It’s simple. Just slow down and you’ll go faster because that yeah that (what’s the word) impulsivity will lead to a disaster and it will slow you down. So, it’s yeah, it’s counterintuitive in some ways but it’s true. But impulsivity, yeah, wrapping up really is I would say, one of those absolute cornerstones of ADHD. It’s a driver of every minute of every day yeah and one we really need to be aware of [yes] but we can do something about.

JULIE: Maybe we just need to put the reins on it and just slow it down a little. Thanks for listening. That’s ADHD and impulsivity.

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