The Laura Dowling Experience17 Juli 2025

Reclaiming Intimacy: ADHD, Sexual Trauma and the Right to Pleasure with Dr Natasha Langan #128

Dr Natasha Langan, a chartered clinical psychologist and accredited psychosexual therapist, explores how childhood sexual abuse impacts intimacy, and how ADHD in women can increase vulnerability to traumatic relationships and sexual exploitation.

• Women with ADHD face higher rates of sexual victimization, unplanned pregnancies, and relationship dissatisfaction
• Trauma includes both major events (sexual assault) and smaller experiences that accumulate over time (public humiliation, feeling "different")
• Shame plays a central role in both ADHD and sexual trauma, creating beliefs that "something is wrong with me"
• Compassion-focused therapy helps address shame by understanding our "tricky brains" that evolved for survival, not happiness
• Vaginismus involves involuntary pelvic floor muscle spasms making penetration painful or impossible
• Women's pain has historically been dismissed by healthcare providers, creating barriers to proper treatment
• Sexual healing requires broadening ideas about what constitutes sex beyond penetration
• A multidisciplinary approach combining physiotherapy, psychology, and sometimes medical care is most effective
• Sexual health is a fundamental human right that includes pleasure, not just prevention of STIs or pregnancy

Thanks for listening! You can watch the full episode on YouTube here. Don’t forget to follow The Laura Dowling Experience podcast on Instagram @lauradowlingexperience for updates and more information. You can also follow our host, Laura Dowling, @fabulouspharmacist for more insights and tips. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe and leave a review—it really helps us out! Stay tuned for more great conversations.

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Half the Population Aren't Getting Enough of These Essential Nutrients with Dr Dan McCartney #190

Dr Dan McCartney, dietitian, lecturer in Human Nutrition and Dietetics and Programme Director of the Human Nutrition and Dietetics programme at TU Dublin and Trinity College Dublin, joins Laura to dis...

8 Okt 1h 9min

Bitesize Moment: "It Has No Boundaries." — Dr Denis O'Driscoll on Addiction and Recovery

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, Dr Denis O'Driscoll, pharmacist working in the HSE addiction services gives a straight, compassionate answer on how har...

6 Okt 6min

Ireland Has 60 Vegetable Growers Left with Kenneth Keavey #189

Kenneth Keavey has a PhD in chemistry and spent his early career in pharma and biotech. He now grows organic vegetables on twenty-five acres outside Galway, and he's the first to point out the irony: ...

1 Okt 56min

Bitesize Moment: "It Makes My Heart Happy." — Prof Robert Kelly on Real Work-Life Balance

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, Prof Robert Kelly admits he lost his own balance after a TED Talk and book launch, then shares the pillars-of-life exer...

29 Sep 6min

Bitesize Moment: "Self Care Is Now Care of Self." — Siobhan Murray on Beating Burnout

In this bitesize moment pulled from the Laura Dowling Experience back catalogue, Siobhan Murray, psychotherapist and burnout strategist explains why she has banned the phrase self care, and shares the...

25 Sep 16min

Most People Don't Need Surgery for Haemorrhoids with Dr Cillian Keogh #188

Laura is joined by Dr Cillian Keogh, a GP and co-founder of Dublin City Clinic, for a frank and surprisingly funny conversation about haemorrhoids — what they actually are, who gets them, and why almo...

24 Sep 38min

From Moving One Toe to 6 Million Steps with Fergus Farrell #187

In this episode, former Connacht rugby player Fergus Farrell tells Laura what happened after he lifted a metal bench in his own yard in October 2018 — and severed his spinal cord by ninety per cent.He...

17 Sep 36min

World Bodhrán Champion on Music, Belonging and Motherhood with Aimée Farrell-Courtney #186

Aimée Farrell-Courtney was six years old when she saw three girls playing the bodhrán in her school yard, the sun behind them and the sound going round the walls. She went home and announced she wante...

10 Sep 1h 4min