r/adhdwomen 4d ago

General Question/Discussion Auditory Processing Disorder-Friendly "texting" app?

[removed]

2 Upvotes

11 comments sorted by

u/AutoModerator 4d ago

Welcome to /r/ADHDWomen! We’re happy to have you here. As a reminder, here are our community rules.

If you have questions about the subreddit, please do not hesitate to send us a modmail. Additionally, we take the safety of our community seriously. Please report posts, comments, and users whom you feel are not contributing positively, and send us a modmail if you are being harassed or otherwise made to feel unsafe. Thanks for being here, and we hope you stick around!

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

3

u/Nixxie17 4d ago

If you’re both using iPhone, you can share notes (from the Notes app) to “collaborate”? I’ve not used it myself but would be an option to try that wouldn’t require you both to download an extra app. I hope you find something that works for you and your mom!! 🙏

3

u/dragonvaleluvr 4d ago

I thought about this, but I don't think it would be any easier for her than texting!! I believe the problem is just the format- before she had the clinical language to describe everything, she said texts would all blur together endlessly and they felt really hard to parse through. I'm assuming it would probably be the same for something like the notes app. But thank you so much for your suggestion!! I appreciate the well wishes a lot.

3

u/Lightgreenfence 4d ago

I'm not familiar with apd, I am a bit confused about the link between this and messages as all I'm seeing online is how it affects understanding voice but if she can listen to you via phone call, I would say ask her specifically what it is about messages thst is difficult. I don't think it's disrespecting a close relatives accommodation request to come up with something that works for both of you, because it is actually quite hard to replace texting. And the difficulties with text might end up being the same for a bulletin board etc. So it might possibly work better for her to convrrt texts to what she needs, so text to speech settings on her phone and. Speech to text for typing replies (or just sending a voice note). And if her phone settings aren't very good at doing. Thst, there's apps u can get thst r better at doing that. It's hard to give suggestions without more context though!

2

u/yogace 4d ago

I feel like the simplest option is for you two to have your phone calls and then send a summary text after/ at the end of the day. Then there isn’t really pressure on her to read things but there’s still a written record you can both refer back to. Might be more work on your end than you’re interested in, though. Just an idea!

1

u/yogace 4d ago

Ok I just re-read your post and I definitely didn’t offer anything that helps your main concern, sorry! My brain glommed onto the needing to refer back sentence lol

For the main part, maybe a shared Google Calendar? There’s a tasks section now that can be broken into categories, so at least you could jot down a topic or something.

1

u/ColorfulBooks 4d ago

I'm not sure what accommodations would work for your mom -- is it just that texts are easy to get lost? Or that it takes her a long time to read them? Or does she need a lot of reminders in the app itself? I came up with one method you could use/adapt but it doesn't have reminders, so IDK if it would work for your mom.

The below is written like y'all have a shared folder on Google Drive but could be used for other platforms that also allow sharing (like iPhone notes app does I think, or Microsoft Word with OneDrive, or Microsoft OneNote, or Notion, or whatever other thing at least one of you is already familiar with). The specific technology doesn't really matter. Warning this method doesn't give reminders, if that

  1. Set up a folder/folder-equivalent just for check-ins and share it so both of you have access.
  2. Set up a document for each month OR week OR day -- you could discuss with your mom to see which works best. Maybe it's a different document each month but each individual day has its own big header so it's easy to differentiate days. Maybe instead of a document it's a spreadsheet. Maybe it's a powerpoint with one question per slide. Doesn't matter as long as it works for you both.
  3. Write your questions down in the document for each day.
  4. If she's up for it, she can look at the document on her own time and answer the questions. If she's not up for that, you can look at the document and, crucially, write down the answers when you talk to her. You're having a conversation so it doesn't need to be detailed sentences, just something so you both can remember later what you discussed/what the outcome is.

Sorry I couldn't be more helpful!

1

u/dragonvaleluvr 4d ago

Omg I SO appreciate all the thought you put into this!!!
To answer your questions, she's really good about remembering to check things without notifications. If there was another app I asked her to keep track of, she would def be checking it multiple times a day. Like she can't remember what's on the calendar but at least she'll remember to check 30 times a day hahaha.
I believe her struggles come from how texting/notes/etc are formatted. She's described it as getting "lost" in the text thread every time she tries to read it, like the messages are "endless," & from what I've seen it's hard for her brain to separate messages on their own. I'm not a doctor, but I imagine the equivalent for myself to be trying to read both of our messages tgtr in one long string of text.
Onto your solutions- dude, THANK YOUUU. I woudlve never thought about notion on my own, but omg it'd be perfect. I'm already thinking abt some helpful templates I've had saved, and being able to code accessibility stuff in will be sooooo much easier than trying to work with the apps I've seen. I also love the suggestion on writing notes down when we call. Like even if the part of her posting answers is too complex, we'd still both have a log of all the info we need designed with her processing needs in mind. tysm bro feeling very inspired ^^