Justin Baldoni was diagnosed with ADHD earlier this year.
Justin Baldoni has been diagnosed with ADHD
The 'It Ends With Us' actor-and-director spent many years of his life feeling he "was behind" and not like other people, so feels relieved that he has officially been told he has attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder.
Speaking on Elizabeth Day's 'How to Fail' podcast, he said: “I was diagnosed officially at 40, which means this year, I turned 40 early in January.
“This is after probably four years of my therapist telling me it might be a good idea to go and get an actual diagnosis, pushing me in that direction because a common theme in my therapy sessions was this feeling of just not being enough...
“... What I realised is that I've lived the majority of my life feeling like I had a deficit, that I was behind, that I wasn't like everybody else.”
Justin recalled how he had been told he was "out of control,” "disruptive" and “didn't pay attention” when he was younger, and even had “parent-teacher conferences being suspended.”
He added: “I don't really have any positive memories of school. Reading was always very tough.
“I remember at a very young age, having to reread and reread and reread pages over again, because I would read and then I would forget what I read, and that continued over the course of my life.
“There were subjects that I excelled in because I was very interested in them.”
Though the 'Jane the Virgin' star was left feeling "stupid", he said his parents "didn't want" him to feel he "had a disability" so opted out of getting him tested or onto medication from a "young age", which he agreed with.
He said: “Not wanting me to be doped up on something and ADHD back then wasn't really understood.
"It was a deficit. You were broken and I think they didn't want to raise me feeling broken and ironically, because nobody was there to talk to me about it, nobody held space for me. I felt broken.”
Looking back on himself since his diagnosis, Justin has a lot more "compassion" for himself.
He said: “[The diagnosis] gave me so much compassion for myself and I am able to hold that little boy who had nobody, who felt like he was the odd one out that he couldn't learn the way everyone else could.
“That he couldn't function, that he couldn't regulate his emotions, that he couldn't sit still.
“I'm able to hold him and let him know that it wasn't his fault and I get to remind him that all that the way that your brain works, all of those things that you hate about yourself are going to be the things that allow you to be successful one day, that allow you to flourish and succeed."