Why Neurodivergent People Over-Explain
“I Don’t Know Why I’m Explaining So Much…”
Have you ever walked away from a conversation feeling like you just gave a TED Talk when all you meant to say was no, thank you? You explained your preference. Then you added a caveat. Then you shared a personal story to soften the message. And before you knew it, you weren’t just communicating—you were performing a justification monologue.
If this sounds familiar, you're not alone. For many neurodivergent people, especially those with autism, ADHD, or trauma backgrounds, over-explaining isn’t just a quirk. It’s a deeply embedded pattern tied to self-protection, masking, and unmet needs for safety and belonging.
What Does Over-Explaining Look Like?
Over-explaining can show up in subtle and not-so-subtle ways:
Offering excessive justification for small decisions ("I just thought we could go to this restaurant because I know you like it, but if not it’s totally okay, I was just thinking...")
Apologizing for your needs, preferences, or emotions
Clarifying and re-clarifying points, even when no one is asking for it
Anticipating criticism and preemptively explaining yourself to avoid misunderstanding
Replaying conversations in your head later, wishing you'd just said it more “normally”
On the outside, it can look like insecurity or perfectionism. But underneath, it’s often a response to chronic invalidation, social rejection, or being misunderstood.
Why Do Neurodivergent People Over-Explain?
Let’s dig into some of the core reasons this happens, especially for autistic and ADHD individuals:
1. Masking: Learning to Seem “Palatable”
Many neurodivergent folks learn early that their natural way of speaking, feeling, or behaving is “too much,” “too blunt,” “too weird,” or “too intense.” So they start masking—shaping their personality into something more socially acceptable.
Over-explaining becomes a way to preemptively manage how others perceive you. It’s a constant attempt to soften, clarify, or translate your true self into something digestible.
It’s not about being dishonest, it’s about survival, and neurodivergent women in particular learn from a young age how to mask to “not be a problem”. It’s neurodivergence seeking a way to “be okay” to others. Hyperverbalism or over-explaining can be one way someone who is neurodiverget tries to be accepted more.
2. Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria (RSD) and Fear of Being Misunderstood
If you struggle with sensitivity to being rejected it may actually be something called Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria (RSD). Especially common among those with ADHD or AuDHD, RSD can make even minor criticism feel unbearable. Over-explaining becomes a shield. If you say enough, explain it well enough, maybe you won’t get rejected.
But of course, the irony is that the more we try to control how we’re perceived, the more disconnected we often feel. It can be a vicious negative feedback loop in which we’re trying to present in a likable way, we’re using our spoons to perform the “right” way, we’re overthinking our speech and messaging as we over-explain, and then the person still doesn’t connect with what we’re saying— it can feel like both rejection and a deflating attempt at connecting.
Moreover, the attempt at trying not to be rejected and overexplaining to achieve acceptance can simply leave us feeling emotionally dysregulated and drained.
3. People-Pleasing and Fawning Responses
So many neurodivergent people also have trauma. When neurodivergent traits intersect with trauma, fawning (a lesser-known trauma response) can show up in place of fight, flight, or freeze. Fawning means appeasing others to stay safe. Over-explaining becomes one way to do that. So you make yourself agreeable, likable, and safe by over-explaining and fawning.
You’re not aiming to be too much, too talkative, or dramatic even. You’re trying to avoid harm in the way you’ve learned how. Fawning is a learned trauma response that may feel safest to engage in for some neurodivergent folks. Over-explaining can be a part of that fawning behavior.
4. Auditory Processing + Communication Mismatch
Some autistic folks over-explain because they’ve learned their communication style isn’t well-received. Maybe you speak in details instead of big-picture summaries. Maybe you need to circle back to make sure the person really “got it.” Neurodivergent folks constantly get cues and feedback that their way of communicating isn’t the “right way.” Sometimes our over-explaining just has to do with a real-time trouble shooting of what can get a message across.
So for some folks, they’re not trying to fawn or avoid rejection, but they’re genuinely throwing paint at the walls seeing what connects and sticks for others. Neurotypical people can be very confusing to communicate with. Often due to unspoken social rules like when a neurotypical person asks “How are you?” They don’t actually want an authentic check in, they want to hear back “good,” — something quick that falls into superficial small talk. The unspoken rules neurotypicals have for communication can leave neurodivergent individuals genuinely confused and trying many different ways to convey a point.
5. Internalized Ableism + Gaslighting
Many neurodivergent people have been told explicitly or subtly that their perceptions aren’t trustworthy. “You're overreacting.” “That’s not what they meant.” “You’re being too sensitive.” So, you learn to question yourself. To over-justify in the hopes that maybe this time, someone will believe you. This is a very neurodivergent specific experience because so many neurodivergent people are gaslit by neurotypicals that there is a “normal” and that they’re the ones disrupting the unspoken social contract.
When you are told your whole life that you are too much, that you’re overthinking it, that it’s simply “not that serious,” it makes you reflect even further, analyzing every angle, even looking deeply at where you could be wrong. The thing is, this only makes ND individuals see the larger picture that much more— in so, they have that much more to communicate when something is being discussed or taken into question. However, neurotypicals have the privilege of not being questioned as much on their natural ways of being. So when there’s a miscommunication or impasse, they also don’t assume to the same degree that ND’s do, that they need to revisit their side of things, because it’s not a pervasive pattern of being questioned.
This dynamic speaks to the interplay of complex trauma, neurodiverse individuals, and how existing in a world not built for you can be a defeating cycle of “getting it wrong” and feeling chronically like an alien or misunderstood.
Why This Pattern Hurts (Even When It Seems Harmless)
On the surface, over-explaining can look polite or thorough. But internally, it can:
Drain your energy
Reinforce shame about your natural instincts
Create distance in relationships (especially when you don’t feel safe being direct)
Make it hard to feel secure in your own reality
It’s a way of relating that costs you—often more than you realize. For many of us ND individuals, we don’t realize how much of our own emotional energy we’re using at attempting to be understood, until it’s too late and we’ve reached total burnout or dysregulation.
How to Start Unlearning Over-Explaining (If You Want To)
First things first: you don’t need to stop over-explaining if it feels right for you! But if you want to dial back compensating for others, mindfully experimenting with saying less can potentially foster trust within yourself more, and deepen connection with others. This isn’t about silencing yourself or becoming blunt. It’s about trusting that your truth is valid, even when it’s not fully explained. Some starting points to consider:
Notice the Urge
We can’t modify anything without awareness. So the first step is simply noticing how you speak while you’re speaking. You do this with gentle and neutral curiosity, like a scientist observing. Instead of judging yourself, try to pause and notice: What am I afraid will happen if I don’t explain? Notice if there are specific people you over-explain with, or even contexts or environments you notice yourself doing it more in. Is it a specific topic? Let all of this tracking yield neutral data points.
Reflect upon the data points and consider where and how you can begin experimenting saying less. Do you fully trust a friend and want to begin saying less with them? Or do you feel radical on not conforming to the neurotypical standard in your workplace? Listen to yourself and let it be an experiment.
2. Practice Saying Less
It may feel extremely difficult at first, but try saying just what’s needed. “I can’t make it tonight.” No apology. No backstory. Let the discomfort pass. The more you experiment with saying less the more comfortable you get with it. After a while, you may even notice the times when people don’t seem fazed at all. Maybe you begin to see you didn’t need to over-explain so much. But perhaps, other people and circumstances prove more difficult when you don’t explain. It’s not necessarily your cue to go back to over-explaining, but a data point about those people or situations for you to decide how you want to show up in.
3. Use Scripts for Self-Advocacy
It can be a good idea to brainstorm and rehears certain sentiments that you typically tend to over-explain. Practice ways of expressing needs without over-justifying:
“That doesn’t work for me right now.”
“I need a little more time to think about that.”
“I’m not sure, but I’ll let you know.”
Having these rehearsed and handy allows you to whip them out at the right time with more ease and confidence.
4. Surround Yourself with People Who Get It
When you feel safe, you don’t need to defend your every move. Find (or build) relationships where you’re not constantly explaining your existence. There is something to be said about the data points you yield from people who respond poorly when you don’t over-explain. In some instances it may be worthwhile to even share that you’re practicing not over-explaining yourself so that the shift doesn’t seem to jarring. But if you realize that some people only liked you if you fawned and over-explained, it may be the right choice to mindfully stick around the people that don’t require that.
5. Work With a Therapist Who Gets Neurodivergence
Over-explaining isn’t something you have to fix; you are not wrong for doing it. But it can be tiresome, and it can also subconsciously perpetuate to ourselves that we have to explain so much just to be understood. — You do not need to over-explain yourself to be understood by the right people.
Working with a therapist who is empathetic towards neurodivergent traits like over-explaining can help you not only feel safe and understood, but supported in how you want to move forward. Healing doesn’t require performing, it requires being witnessed. You deserve that much and so much more.
Final Thoughts: You Don’t Owe the World a Dissertation
If you’re anything like me, you’re used to talking a lot, and over-explaining. Sometimes it’s simply a stim for me to talk, other times it is most certainly a lack of trust that I’ll be understood. — You deserve to be understood without a PowerPoint. To take up space without a disclaimer. To speak your truth, even if it’s messy, brief, or imperfect.
Over-explaining might have once been your armor. But your authenticity is what will ultimately connect you to the people and life you truly want.