3 Realistic ways to improve speaking skills with ADHD

I have had lots of troubles throughout my life in turning my thoughts into words and in the right order, rhythm and pace.

There seems to be a disconnect between the hyperactive mind and the hypoactive mouth that seems to be a gap that is unabridged particularly in neurodiverse people.

Even though this is an annoying struggle we have, there are ways to overcome this (and quite simple ones too).

Taking medication to help your mind match your mouth.

Disclaimer: only take prescription medications with a prescription from a licensed medical professional!

• Drug (who can benefit), personal rating
• Modafinil (Anyone) 5/10
• Methylphenidate (ADHD, ASD) 8.5/10
• Amphetamine based medication (ADHD, ASD) 9/10
• SSRI (Anyone) 7/10
• Diazepam (extreme anxiety) 6/10
• Propranolol (Physical anxiety) 7/10
• Caffeine 6.5/10

1. Let’s start with the stimulants; Methylphenidate, Amphetamines and the pseudo-stimulant Modafinil. Stimulants have the effect of being able to organise an ADHD mind, they allow the brain to wrangle thoughts together and order them. This organisation allows you to form a coherent point and execute it without Presque Vu. I will add there is definitely a parabolic dose response curve, in that there is a “sweet spot” – if you overdo it then you may be too stimulated to focus on one concept. 
2. SSRI Medications allow long term relief for anxiety symptoms – anxiety is a very big factor in how well you can organise your thoughts. These medications can take a few weeks to work but they are really great for both physical and mental anxiety symptoms. Thereby making you less likely to trip over your words in times of stress.
3. Diazepam will help in times of panic but for day to day use it is highly habit forming and will reduce your cognitive ability.
4. Propranolol is great for presentation nerves – it is a beta blocker. Beta blockers block beta receptors which are adrenaline receptors. You may have mental anxiety but you won’t start getting palpitations and the shakes. NB: Asthmatics cannot take this family of medications (Beta-blockers).
5. Caffeine is so ubiquitous that I don’t think I need to explain why this is beneficial to help improve your cognitive performance.

Non-Pharmaceutical Methods:

Understandably, if you don’t want to take a drug to enhance your verbal fluency then there are things you can practise. However, If you do have ADHD then your brain has developed to be disorganised by default – a chaotic mind is a dysfluent one.

Tip 1)  Pick a role model – Is there any famous person that you like the sound of? One of the main reasons the person sounds as good as they are at talking is because they enunciate, inflect, and pause in all of the right places to make your brain tingle. This is why rehearsed speech and/or acted lines sound much better than some monotone stuttering.

Tip 2) Slow down – your brain has to load the next sentence like a computer loads a YouTube video bar, if you play the video on 1.5x speed you’re going to hit a buffer much more quickly than a video played at its original speed, or even given a few seconds to pause before pressing play. This goes doubly true if you have a tendency to overthink or go off on tangential thought tracks mid sentence. Case study: – Elon Musk, just go and watch one of his interviews. This is an example (in my opinion) of a thought frenzy being decoded and then fragmentally spoken, much like a buffering YouTube video with an internet signal too slow to allow a fluid and regular pacing.

To take this analogy one step further – the video quality may drop to compromise for the buffering. Although this makes the video play at a “correct” speed and pacing, the image is often unclear and does the “original” an injustice. Waffling at high speed is much less appealing to the listener than slow, deliberate, concise points – because you’ve chewed the food for them – so to speak (no pun intended).

Tip 3) Vocabulary – The best way to increase your vocabulary is reading books. Words are remixes of the alphabet and conversations are remixes of the dictionary. Now, I find reading really tedious and almost strenuous – I do it anyway to help train my comprehension and spelling skill tree. I get 95% of my books in the form of audiobooks. I find that my listening comprehension is much more attuned than my reading comprehension. In another post I talk more deeply on this and the pros vs cons of different media for learning.

If you want to increase your word-fetching ability, then you must expose yourself to as many words as possible and in context – dictionary learning is quite tedious and unfun. Also, human conversations are context based, therefore, it makes sense for you to learn how to use the words in context. This usually carries over into your language first as regurgitating phrases with the word in it, then comes the familiarity of the word which will then find its way creeping into territory it hasn’t been before, almost like a freestyle version.

Quick Disclaimer:- 

There are people with more complicated issues with speech disfluencies – mainly Aphasia. This is a condition that can cause you to confuse words, speak in a broken manner and just downright forget words. 

Now, there is overlap with symptoms, but In my experience the speech difficulties in ADHD, ASD, Anxiety and Depression are a sort of “pseudo” aphasic disorder.

For these people who these tips may not be enough for, I recommend seeing a speech-language therapist because I do not have the experience to speak with any authority. And I am sure you would not welcome the unwarranted advice.

Just like an anxious person doesn’t appreciate it when people with no experience with anxiety (yes, these people exist!) tell them to “just stop worrying”.

Conclusion

There is nothing wrong with having a speech disorder or broken speech/brain fog etc etc, my intention here is to help people as much as I can who are perhaps in a similar position to me – wanting to express myself much more truly.

You could argue in a philosophical way that the truest self is the raw self, however, I would counter argue that skills augment talent, if you want to reveal your own greatness then you must learn the necessary skills to utilise it.