You know that thing people say? That well-meaning, kindly-delivered, absolutely-said-with-good-intentions thing? The one that somehow manages to be both sweet and completely wrong at the same time?

Yeah. We're going there.

This week's episode is about a single sentence. One sentence that keeps coming up since the autism diagnosis. And why - despite the best intentions behind it - it needs to be gently, firmly, lovingly retired.

Buckle up. It's a short one. But it might just change how you respond next time someone tells you about their diagnosis.

The podcast with the unspeakable name. Back again. Apparently. (Much to my surprise)

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Anything but ADHD

Fresh off an autism diagnosis, Mark sits down with his therapist — and is immediately asked if he's ever been tested for ADHD. His response? An emphatic, visceral, slightly panicked no.

Not those letters. Anything but those letters.

In this episode, Mark unpacks why a word he claims to hate feels so uncomfortably, inarguably, almost insultingly accurate. From the time that folds in on itself, to the four hundred abandoned projects, to the scissors — the scissors that are somewhere in a normal-sized house, and they are winning — he traces the shape of a brain he's spent nearly fifty years apologising for.

But this isn't really about ADHD. It's about shame. About what happens when you've been told your whole life that the way your brain works is just a personality failing — and then someone hands you a diagnosis that says: you were never failing. You were always trying harder than everyone else. That just wasn't the problem.

That, as Mark would say, is a lot to sit with.

Funny, uncomfortably honest, and occasionally derailed by a fact about duck accents — this is the episode for anyone who has ever stood in a kitchen for eleven minutes wondering why they went in.

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This episode contains a LOT of strong language. I use this language authentically to describe my experience, not to be shocking or offensive. If you're shocked or offended, I apologise to you - this was my experience. Using authentic language is an important part of my self expression, not masking, telling it like it is for me. I hope you understand.

If you've ever wondered whether you're autistic or just difficult, this episode is for you. Late-diagnosed autistic adults often carry years of shame before anyone gives them a framework for their experience - and even after diagnosis, the doubt doesn't simply disappear.

In this episode, we explore what it feels like to suspect you're fundamentally flawed rather than neurologically different, what shifts after an autism diagnosis, and why so many people spend decades blaming themselves for a mismatch they never created. Honest, personal, and at times darkly funny - because sometimes the most important conversations start with a joke between friends.

And just when you think the story's over… a therapist asks one question that opens a whole new chapter.