Shadowing Practice: World Leading Physician View On ADHD: Gabor Mate - Learn English Speaking with Video
Creating lesson...
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There's no proof whatsoever that medications help anybody heal from ADHD.
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Financial stress on the parents translates into physiological stress in the children.
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Poor kids are much more likely to be diagnosed with ADHD.
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I'm telling you, if your friend's got ADHD, I can tell you hate the stress to relieve you for your life.
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One of the really interesting things I wanted to talk to you about is ADHD.
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I've had a few of my friends in my close friendship circle diagnosed with ADHD recently.
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And then I looked into some of the statistics around ADHD.
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I found this statistic that said in the 1980s, one in 20 US children were diagnosed with ADHD.
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Today, the number is roughly one in nine.
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And just generally, you know, around me, it feels like, and this could just be because of my own little narrow circle, or it could be because of a wider thing happening in society.
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It feels like there's been an increase in diagnosis of mental illness and things like ADHD and the causes...
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When I spoke to my friend about what he believed the cause of his ADHD was, was and he's posted this on linkedin
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and talks about it very publicly now um it seemed to
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point to he seemed to believe it was relating to some kind of genetic or heritable um factor yeah now
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The issue that I've sort of been contending with myself
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and why I spoke to Johan Hari about this and others about this is if I am to accept that, then I feel like I'm accepting that...
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We're being born...
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somewhat broken.
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And this is almost what Johan Hari talked about in the early stages of his teenage years, where he was made to believe that there was this chemical imbalance in his brain, and therefore he was born broken,
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and here's the medication to solve it.
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so but i don't want i don't believe
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that i don't i don't personally believe that we're we're born broken well um anybody interested in the subject
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might do what I think Johan actually did is to read my book on ADHD, it's called Scattered Minds.
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And I was diagnosed within my 50s and so were a couple of my kids.
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But I never bought into the idea that this is a genetic disease or that it's a disease at all, genetic or otherwise.
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Now, as for the rising number of...
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people being diagnosed with it, there could be two reasons at least.
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One is we're better at diagnosis, so before we wouldn't have noticed it but now we are.
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Or genuinely there's more people who are having trouble in certain ways such as with attention and impulse control and so on.
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But either way, the fact is that many more children are being diagnosed and medicated.
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for this condition, particularly in the US, but also increasingly here in the UK as well, and in China and elsewhere.
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As I said earlier, if we...
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The fact is, here's the actual reality.
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Nobody's ever found a gene for ADHD.
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Nobody has ever found a gene that says, "If you have this gene, you're going to have ADHD." No such gene has ever been found.
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No group of genes has ever been found that says, "If you're going to have this gene, you're going to have this condition." Nor ever will be.
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And no such gene or group of genes have ever been found that if you don't have these genes, you will not have the condition.
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Now there are some diseases that are genetic, one runs in my family, muscular dystrophy.
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If you have the gene you're going to have the disease.
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My mother had it, my aunt had it.
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That's the genetic condition and if you have the gene you'll have the disease.
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I think.
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Very rare.
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Those kind of diseases.
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I No...
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There are some genes that the more of them you have...
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the more likely you are to have any number of mental health diagnoses, ADHD, depression, anxiety, even psychosis, bipolar illness.
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But there's no group of genes or set of genes or gene that themselves determine any one condition.
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As a matter of fact, you can have those same genes and not have any condition whatsoever.
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So something is being passed on but it's not any kind of condition that's being passed on.
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What's being passed on is sensitivity and the more sensitive you are, the more you're going to feel whatever's going on in the environment.
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So you take the same sensitive care with these genes that confer greater sensitivity out of them, and sensitive means...
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to feel from the Latin word to feel sincere.
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The more sensitive you are, the more you're going to feel.
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The more you feel, the more bad stuff happens, the more pain you're going to be in.
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and the more compensating you're going to have to do.
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At the same time with those same genes, if you treat it well and you grow up in a healthy environment, you'd just be creative and happy and joyful and a leader
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or an artist or a shaman or a very creative CEO or whatever you're going to be.
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So the genes don't determine, they make you more sensitive to their environment.
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Now, if you go back to what I said about the tuning out, it's simply a defense.
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So the more sensitive you are, and the stress in the environment, the more you're gonna feel the stress, the more you're gonna need to escape from it by tuning out.
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So, you didn't inherit ADHD, you inherited a sensitivity that makes it more likely,
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under stressful circumstances, that you revert to tuning out when your brain is developing.
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which by the way is an organ that develops physiologically under the impact of the emotional environment.
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So, if there's a lot of stress in a child's life, and what I'm saying is in this society, is that more and more parents are stressed, not because they don't love their kids,
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not because they're not doing their very utmost to provide for them, but because they're more stressed for all kinds of social, political, economic reasons.
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I mean, if you look at inflation in Britain, which is a high risk right now, more people are going to be stressed.
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financially.
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Financial stress on the parents translates into physiological stress in the children.
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Those children may want to tune out because it's too much to be in the present.
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Some of them will be diagnosed with ADHD.
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They didn't inherit anything in terms of a disease, they're just reacting to the environment.
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So if we're diagnosing more and more kids these days, I think it's because the parenting environment has become much more stressed.
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And that's backed up in this book where you mentioned that study of 65 ,000 parents and their children with ADHD, right?
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- You say-- - There's more trauma in their lives.
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- Yeah, so the children, they do a study with 65 ,000.
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- I forget, you're better than I am.
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- It was 65 ,000.
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I read it three hours ago.
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- You made notes, I did.
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Yeah, but many thousands of kids, yeah.
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- So, 'cause I found that to be really, really sort of, supportive of what you just said, where, okay, saying this from memory,
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but a study of 65 ,000 children and their parents, and they found
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that those parents who had more adverse effects ...traumatic events in
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their lives.. ended up having having a higher chance of having a child
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that had adhd well look
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if you look at um the united states at least poor kids
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and kids of
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so -called color are much more likely to be diagnosed with adhd interesting no why would
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that be the case because they're living with so much more stress Men as well, right?
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Men as well?
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Adults you mean?
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Men, yeah.
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So I read that more men or more boys are diagnosed.
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Yeah, more men are diagnosed partly because in men the symptom of hyperactivity seems to be there more often.
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So when a kid is sitting in school and the cancer is still, that's obvious.
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The teacher will notice it.
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The girl who's kind of dreamy and tunes out, kind of fades away at the back of the class, she doesn't create any problems.
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So they don't...
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that's one of the reasons. But also...
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Funny to say, but young boys, infant boys are more sensitive to environmental pressure than girls are. For some strange reason.
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So they're more likely to be affected by these factors.
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seeing a boy like that in the class, that's fidgety, that has a poor attention span, bad response to stress.
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we medicate.
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What is the impact of that approach to treatment?
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Medicating super early.
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I used to when I worked with a physician, I would certainly prescribe medication sometimes.
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It's a question of who's prescribing it and with what intention.
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If I understand that the real problem in this child is not that there's anything intrinsically wrong with the child, but that they were developed in a stressed environment.
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And those stresses are still acting on them.
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And one of the stresses is the parents don't understand the kids' behaviors.
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and they tend to react rather harshly.
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than if I can help the parent understand the sensitive nature of their child.
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which also means that when positive changes occur in the environment, the kid will be very responsive to that as well.
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If the parents can create a positive, accepting, understanding atmosphere in the home, and work on their own stresses, so they don't unconsciously pass them on to their kids,
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that kid will change very quickly.
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And I say, well, if in the short term the child wants the medication to function better, and no child should be forced to take medication,
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and medication are never the final answer, at the very most they're a stop gap.
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There's no proof whatsoever that medications help anybody heal from ADHD.
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They simply suppress symptoms which may be helpful in the short term, but for God's sake, go to work on the long -term development of that child.
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And what does that mean?
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Create the conditions in which healthy development takes place.
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That child will do very, very well.
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If you think the problem is a disease that you're just going to medicate away the symptoms of, What about for adults?
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I'm thinking of my friend there.
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He's in his 30s and he got the diagnosis of ADHD in his 30s.
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He's been given this medication, which he presumably has to take for life.
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He's told me the medication has helped him focus.
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Has helped him focus.
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Has helped him focus.
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It's been a game changer, Steve.
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Yeah, yeah.
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I've taken medication myself, ADHD, and it helped me focus.
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It helped me write my first book.
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I didn't take it for this one.
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As a matter of fact, more recently when I was beginning to write the medication, I thought maybe I would take a bit of stimulant like I used to
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and just to see if it helps me write the book better.
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All it did is give me side effects.
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My brain has changed.
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I don't need it anymore.
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So I would say to your friend, if the medication is helping you right now, and it's not causing you side effects, I got nothing against it. And...
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you might want to give it a break every weekend.
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You might want to use it for when you're having to work or having to really concentrate, but it's up to you if it helps you function.
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take it but go to work on the traumas and stresses that are driving your ADHD going back to your childhood
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and you know I may say in my book on ADHD, Scattered Minds does outline some ways to do that.
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You might find that you don't need the medication so much anymore or not at all perhaps.
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Number one, number two, even if you do, your life will be so much fuller and so much less stressed,
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if you deal with the underlying factors than if you simply medicate the symptom.
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Like I'm telling you, if your friend's got ADHD, I can tell you he had to stress early for years.
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and his parents were stressed.
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So deal with that.
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Deal with what conditions are you creating now in your life that create more stress for you.
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Yeah.
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Are you taking care of your body?
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Are you exercising?
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Are you eating well?
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Do you get out there in nature?
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Nature has a sign of harmony to it which actually calms the mind.
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So, are you doing all these things?
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If you're not, all you're doing is medicating a symptom.
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If you are taking the medication specifically to help you focus, but you're working on these other issues,
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You'll have a much fuller life and you may find you don't need the medication after all.
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If you love the Dariova CEO brand and you watch this channel, please do me a huge favour, become part of the 15 % of the viewers on this channel that have hit the subscribe button.
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Real-Life Conversations About ADHD: A Learning Opportunity
The video features a thoughtful dialogue between individuals discussing ADHD, blending personal anecdotes, statistics, and expert insights. This natural exchange mirrors how people talk about complex topics in everyday life—making it ideal for practicing English comprehension and speaking. The conversational flow, with its pauses, reflections, and shifts in focus, provides a realistic context to learn how to express ideas clearly and engage in meaningful discussions.
Useful Chunks & Collocations to Master
- "Financial stress translates into physiological stress": This phrase shows how to connect abstract concepts (stress) across different areas (financial, physiological). It’s a powerful way to explain cause and effect.
- "Contending with myself": Means struggling to reconcile conflicting thoughts. Use it to describe internal debates, e.g., "I’m contending with whether to take the job."
- "Bought into the idea": To accept or believe something, often reluctantly. Example: "She never bought into the myth that success equals wealth."
- "Rising number of people being diagnosed": A common collocation for discussing trends in health or society. Useful for talking about statistics or social changes.
Your Shadowing Challenge: Practice "Shadow Speech" Now
Shadowing technique—repeating speech aloud immediately after hearing it—is a proven way to improve fluency and pronunciation. For this task, pick a 30-second segment of the video where the speaker discusses the rise in ADHD diagnoses. Play the clip, pause, and repeat each sentence, mimicking the tone, pace, and stress. Focus on matching the natural rhythm of phrases like "one in nine" or "genetic or heritable factor." This "shadow speak" exercise trains your brain to process and reproduce English quickly, making you more comfortable in real conversations. To level up, try "shadowspeak" with a friend: take turns shadowing the dialogue and discuss what you learned. Learning English with YouTube videos like this one turns passive watching into active practice—perfect for building confidence in speaking.
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Conditional sentences if + clause, will/would + verb — a condition and its result | if you have the gene you'll have · if you do, your life will be |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | has ever found · has ever been found · have ever been found |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | be diagnosed · were diagnosed · being born |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | people who are · Britain, which is |
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.