Inside Our ADHD Minds is a follow-up, of sorts, to Chris Packham’s memorable 2023 documentary, Inside Our Autistic Minds. In that earlier film, the wildlife and nature presenter used his own experience of neurodiversity to help other people explore and demonstrate the impact of autism on their lives, for the benefit of their family, friends and a wider TV audience. Inside Our ADHD Minds uses the same formula – Packham walks through woodland as he explains something important, anecdotes about his own life, informative chats with experts, and art therapy in the form of expressive short films – to dig deeper into the condition, and, in the following episode, dyslexia.
The result is a beautiful and revelatory programme which feels educational without being didactic; Packham rejects the name “attention deficit hyperactivity disorder”, for example, explaining that it is not a deficit of attention, but a struggle to regulate it. The documentary takes a two-pronged approach. Packham interviews experts, who deliver the framework of information. One suggests that having ADHD is like having six televisions in your brain, blaring at the same time, and trying to watch them all at once, and explains that people with ADHD have lower dopamine levels and an increased risk of anxiety and depression. Another expert talks about how boys and girls often present ADHD symptoms differently at school, and how diagnoses were heavily gendered until shockingly recently, which might be why it is more common for women to receive a diagnosis at a later age.
