How to Recover After a Social Faux Pas
Social faux pas happen when you have ADHD. You may miss social cues about how someone feels or read their face incorrectly and miss their intention when they speak. That momentary misstep may leave you feeling like you have fallen off the edge of the earth, causing you to shut down, apologize too much, or relive the mistake for days.
For most people, reading body language and facial expressions are skills they practice. No one is perfect, and no one reads everyone’s facial expressions right every time. An ADHD brain, however, can cause other behaviors that lead a person to miss the clues that indicate how to best proceed in a given situation.
It’s hard to say what causes people with complex internal environments to miss clues about what another person is feeling. And really, it doesn’t matter why it happened.
When you realize you made a misstep, you want to know what to do next. You can analyze “why” it happened later.
Here are five steps to help you recover after you make a social blunder.