The Faster Than Normal Podcast: ADD | ADHD | Health

Katie's motto is "stop being a weenie", which speaks perfectly to her belief that anything can be accomplished with a little bravery. Katie had a lucrative - but unsatisfying career - in Sales and Marketing for years. Until one day she walked out to build the life and career she really wanted. She went on to get her training in Executive Coaching and Leadership Development at the Co-Active Training Institute in San Rafael, California. Now, she's a Certified Professional Co-Active Coach and an Associate Certified Coach with the International Coaching Federation. Katie built her successful business helping mission-driven entrepreneurs get out of overwhelm and into six-figure incomes - all while doing meaningful work that they love. Now Katie spends her time between Philadelphia and Cape Cod. She loves travel, her goofy dog Luna, and celebrating her clients' wins with good champagne. Katie shares her advice on how to find a good coach, tips and tricks she uses that you may never have heard about, and the importance of time management, among other goodness, enjoy!

In this episode Peter and Katie discuss:

00:40 - Thank you so much for listening and for subscribing!

01:22 - Intro and welcome Katie McManus

3:05 - You've been through it. What do you do for clients who come to you saying they are just a complete screw-up?

03:53 - Upon hearing a new client's story…

04:48 - Treasuring the benefits

05:04 - the ADHD brain is always working

06:15 - On not using neurotypical advice

06:40 - We with ADHD do not have a built-in electric water heater; we have to pump-up the good hot water for ourselves. [Which explains getting up at 4AM today].

08:01: How listing every single activity can in itself bring a sense of accomplishment/a dopamine hit Ref: Canva App

08:40 - What are some of the other tips and tricks you've learned over the years?

08:43 - How to do time management when you've got something at 2pm and it's already noon

10:24 - What about scheduling weekend blocks of time?

11:33 - Neon colored index cards and an elliptical machine anyone?

12:15 - What would you say to someone who wants to work with a coach, but doesn't necessarily know that it's it's right for them?

13:44 - How can people find more about you? Web: https://www.katiemcmanus.com/

Socials: @katie.the.coach on INSTA @katie.mcmanus.leadership on Facebook and @katiemcmanusleadership on LinkedIN

14:00 - Guys, as always thanks so much for subscribing! Do you have a cool friend with a great story? We'd love to hear. I'm www.petershankman.com and you can reach out anytime via email at [email protected] or @petershankman on all of the socials. You can also find us at @FasterNormal on all of the socials. It really helps when you drop us a review on iTunes and of course, subscribe to the podcast if you haven't already! As you know, the more reviews we get, the more people we can reach. Help us to show the world that ADHD is a gift, not a curse!

14:37 - Faster Than Normal Podcast info & credits

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TRANSCRIPT via Descript and then corrected.. somewhat:

[00:00:37] Peter: Yo yo everybody what's going on. My name is Peter Shankman. This is Faster Than Normal. I'm gonna save you guys. I'm going to save you the usual spiel I give every day because today or every episode because today, my daughter went back to school and, and my daughter who sleeps in till noon, if I let her every day was up at 4:15 in the morning. Oh. Which is even before I get up this morning. And so I had my entire bike ride and everything else about an hour earlier than normal while talking to her and explaining to her that it doesn't matter that she doesn't know who's gonna be in her class because I'm sure she'll make tons of friends. And I was rewarded by bringing her to school and saying, so are you all set and realizing that she had already left to join her a bunch of friends. So feeling really loved this morning. It's. Good. Good place to be. So with that being said, meet Katie McManus. She's going to provide me the love that my daughter didn't give me. Um, Katie is a business strategist and coach, um, with a great motto or motto is stop being a weenie, which I love that. I, I say it, uh, I say it stop being a dumb ass, but it's sort of the same premise. It's like stop, stop worrying so much. Show a little bravery and get the hell out there. Jump out the plane already. She used to work in sales and marketing. Hated it. And she went on to get her training, executive coaching and leadership development and coactive training Institute in San California. She's a professional, proactive coach and associate certified coach, the international coaching Federation, all these things I didn't notice. OK. She built her successful business, helping mission driven entrepreneurs, get outta overwhelm and into six figure incomes while doing meaningful work that they love, she spends her time between Philadelphia and Cape Cod, which is just weird. Uh, she loves travel, which is cool. She has a goofy dog named Luna, which is cool, and she likes celebrating client wins with good champagne. So I'll take those and that's, that's a good enough reason to have you on Katie. Welcome.

[00:02:18] Katie: Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited to be here. Although the bar to be here to show you enough, love to make up for your daughter. That's pretty high.

[00:02:26] Peter: I was gonna say you got your work cut out for you. So let's get started. um, I fully expect to be loved the next, next, uh, next few months. So next few minutes. So, I mean, I, I, you know, this is a podcast for people with ADHD and then, and sort of sort of neurodiversity and things like. And so they've spent the majority of their lives. Most of our listeners spent the majority of our lives at least I have, um, you know, hearing that we're broken. Right. And hearing that, that, that it doesn't matter what we're gonna do, cause chances are gonna screw it up. Cause that's just what we are. And so, you know, you, you, you come from, you have that background, you understand sort of where that comes from. Um, you know, what do you, what are you doing? What, how are you working with clients who come to you and say, yeah, I'm just complete screw-up?

[00:03:05] Katie: Yeah. Um, well, it's interesting cuz I think there's a difference of when you are you're diagnosed. Cuz I was diagnosed when I was a kid. Right. And I lived in California and um, my parents actually sent me to a, a special school. They sent me to a Waldorf, um, which I don't know if you're familiar with Waldorf. It's kinda like summer camp all year long. Um, and they like neglect to teach you things like math. Uh, so I didn't learn like math until I was about six years old, but I don't know. I, I was able to integrate it into my workflow from a really early stage. Um, I actually didn't realize that. If, when you get diagnosed later, you have this stigma attached to you because you've spent so much of your life feeling like a fuck up and not knowing why. And I'm sorry. I, I hope we're allowed to swear here,

[00:03:52] Peter: here. Go for it by all means.

[00:03:53] Katie: Okay, great. So, um, when I'm working with my clients, it's, it's really interesting. Um, You know, they are coming to me freaking out about, oh, I fucked this up again. I screwed this up again. I'm getting this done late again. And on one side, it's like, okay, well, let's kind of deconstruct that story that you have, that you're screwing everything up all the time and that things are supposed to be done by a certain point. right. And then on the other side, like, you know, , you know, why not just make that part of your process? Why not just design that with your clients from the get, go that, Hey, I have ADHD and sometimes, uh, I'll send you emails the last minute. And if you need something from me before then just ping me for it.

[00:04:38] Peter: And I think that, that framing the disabilities as a benefit. Yeah. Right. Is something that, that not enough people do. And again, not enough people do it because they've been told all their lives. It's not a benefit. It's a curse. Right. You know, you are broken. And so I think that that's a, it's a good answer. I think though it takes, it takes a lot of work to get there. Um, it's, it's hard to believe. that you have something good. Um, when, when you come from this world where it's not, yeah.

[00:05:03] Katie: You know, I have, I have this one lawyer, um, client and he's brilliant, absolutely brilliant. He has ADHD. And I can't tell you how many times he tells me that he came up with this incredible idea to win a case in the final hour because he procrastinated.

[00:05:20] Peter: You know, like no, a lot of us do that

[00:05:21] Katie: . Right. But procrastination, when we think of procrastination, like, yes, we're not writing the paper. Yes. We're not doing the project. Yes. We're not doing the thing. It doesn't mean we're not working on it though. I don't know about how your process is, but I know when I'm procrastinating, I'm cleaning my house. I'm sewing a costume for Halloween in three months, I'm taking my dog for a walk. My brain is churning on that project. Right? It's it's trying things out. It's creating arguments for this. It's getting organized. I I'm not physically actually working on it. You wouldn't, I wouldn't be able to hand you anything that I've done on it, but I've already done the work in my head by the time I go and put pen to paper, if I'm writing.

[00:06:03] Peter: Right. I mean, I think a lot of that also is the fact that, you know, because we work differently, right. We do that in such a way where, you know, it might look like we're doing absolutely nothing. We're surfing the web, we're doing whatever, but there's, there's a, a candle that's lit back there and it is burning.

[00:06:15] Katie: Right. Right. I think also we, we make the mistake of trying to take neurotypical advice on productivity and that's something that actually hurts us more than it helps us. You know, I don't know if you're familiar with that saying like eat the frog first thing in the morning. No, of course. Yeah. I'm sorry. I don't have enough dopamine, first thing in the morning to get self water. Right. I have to. Well, and that's right.

[00:06:37] Peter: Yeah. It's funny. It's funny because that, the whole premise behind that, you know, when people think of praise being up as early as I do, uh, to exercise it's because of exactly that, that is my version of. Yep. Right. I'm getting, I don't, I, you know, everyone, like, you know, do you think I really wanna get on the goddamn bike at four 30 in the morning and ride for an hour? No, wanna sleep. How's wrong with you. Yeah. Right. But you don't, you don't do that. Yeah. Because you know, what has to happen,

[00:06:59] Katie: right. Right. It's like, it's kind of funny, you know, we think of neurotypical people, it's almost like they have an electric water heater right next to their shower, you know? And when, when someone with ADHD or who is neurodiverse, it's like the water heaters down in the basement, were on the third floor. Right. Like we just gonna have to prime the pump. We have to like get all the cold water out before we can really tackle that big thing.

[00:07:20] Peter: Wow. That's a great way of looking at it. Right. That's I love that. I'm I'm blatantly gonna steal that. That's a great way of looking at that. No, it's, it's really true. That, that concept of priming the pump- you. Uh, people wake up, you know, I remember that I always thought for years that I was in high school, that I was awesome. Um, at first period, no matter what first period was, and it turns out first period was always English. Yeah. Or social studies, the two things I always loved. Yeah. Right. The senior year it was math. Well, I'm screwed. you know, all of a sudden my, my first period class, not a good thing. Mm-hmm right. So it's that it's that, you know, that premise of it? No, it comes down to the fact that, that I was getting my dopamine for the rest of the day from the first grade class that I enjoyed, right?

[00:08:00] Katie: No, a hundred percent for, for me. I actually went into Canva and I created a list of all the things I usually like to get done in the morning from drinking my coffee, to take my dog for a walk, to exercising, to meditating, to showering, to brushing my teeth. And I find the days where I actually cross those things off as I do them, not in any particular order, um, are days that I am far more productive later. Because I've given myself credit for all the little things that I've done and I'm able to feel a little more productive and it really does get that, that dopamine dripping, which helps me get more stuff done.

[00:08:36] Peter: Yeah, no question about it. So tell me some of, some, some of the other secrets and tricks that you've learned over the years.

[00:08:41] Katie: Oh, man. Um, I mean, time management is a big thing for me. Um, I had a really hard time with a coach I had a while ago who I, I stopped working with pretty quickly, um, The neurotypical way of organizing a day is like do 30 minutes of this and then do 30 minutes of that. I'm sorry, that just doesn't work for me. Um, if I'm going to start working on something, I know I'm gonna get into hyperfocus and I need like a good chunk of time to be in hyperfocus because there have been too many instances where I've gotten really sucked in on a project I'm really into it. And then I missed three appointments. Right. Right. So I get this time anxiety. I can't even get into hyperfocus these days if I have something two hours from now. Right. Because I know like I'm just gonna constantly check the clock and like, I'm worried about the interruption.

[00:09:33] Peter: So, what do you, so, so, so,

[00:09:35] Katie: so what I do is I honestly, like, I, I tell my, my business manager and my, my assistant, like, you're not allowed to, like, these are my blocks for creative time and they're five hour blocks. And the amount of work that I can get done in a good five hour block is unheard of . Yeah. But I wouldn't be able to do that if I were just plugging in an hour a day, right. The same amount of time, but the way it's organized, just my brain just can't get into it in just an hour.

[00:10:01] Peter: Oh, because the end of the day, you need to give yourself, you know, cause if you're okay, I have a meeting at two. Well now it's 11. All I gotta remember. And 12 o'clock and start thinking of one. O'clock exactly. And so, so you're not giving it the full capacity? No, I, I do the same thing. I block off, I block off creative days, right? Uh, no, one's allowed to schedule stuff with me on certain days of the week and that's just, that's just me to have, have a good time and create my, whatever I'm creating.

[00:10:17] Katie: Yeah, totally. Um, I also , I don't know, like weekends are really hard for. Weekends. I, I don't know. I have this expectation that I'm productive all week and on the weekends, I have to be productive in my personal life. Like I have to clean and I have to do all these things. Um, for the longest time I would just sit in terror of like, I'm a failure, I'm screwing this up. Like I'm not getting everything done for hours on Saturday morning until I actually started prescribing a Disney movie to myself every, every weekend morning mm-hmm . And it's like, there's a point at which. I don't know, there's this, this active resting thing that happens when you're, when you're watching something, that's not a lot of work to watch. Right. Where you get kinda not bored, but you're like, I'm done with this now. I've had my rest. Now I get to go do something. Right. But for, for me, like I have to be for me to turn my brain off it. There has to be a story going on.

[00:11:13] Peter: Right. No makes perfect sense. And I think that's really interesting cause you know, a lot of growing up for me, at least it was, um, my I'd always wanted, I always wanted to be listening to music when I was studying. My parents would always say, no, it can't do that. Can't do that. Can't focus when you're doin gthat. Well, it turns out obviously, you know, now that, that would've actually been perfect. Right. That would've incredibly, incredibly beneficial.

[00:11:32] Katie: Yeah. Did you ever use like neon colored, uh, index cards for studying? Oh yeah. Yeah. Oh. Any trip, love that stuff. I actually got like a little mini elliptical and I'd be with, up with my geography book in front of me. I'd have a map, I'd have my index cards and I'd just be like pumping away on this little mini elliptical.

[00:11:52] Peter: That's funny. That's funny, but no, it is, you know, again, it's what works and we didn't know .God, when I was a kid, I probably would've, I would've benefited so much from having like a, you know, a treadmill desk or anything, any of those things, they just didn't, they just weren't there. Right. I have no question about it.

[00:12:04] Katie: Or like talk to text, you know, you walk and talk and you're just like figuring out your paper. And even if it's messy, you get to go back and edit it later, but you get all the thoughts out.

[00:12:13] Peter: Yep. What would you say? Um, at the end of the day to someone who's who's, you know, wants to work with a coach, but doesn't necessarily know that it's it's right for them or, you know, they, they feel things like that.

[00:12:24] Katie: I mean, honestly, there are so many coaches out there that aren't gonna be a good fit for you. I would say, just go and contact a bunch of them and have, have a discovery call. Just see if they're, if you even like the person, right. Because that's half the battle, cuz you're gonna be spending a lot of time with this person. You have to trust them. You have to know that they're on your side. Um, Like the only way to figure, figure out if you wanna do something or not is to explore it and get the information that you need. Um, and that's what I, I always invite people. Like, if you're curious about working with me, just book up call, I'm not a high pressure sales person at all. I come from sales. It doesn't mean that I utilize all the gross tricks that they teach there. Um, but it's really ..Know what it is that you wanna accomplish through coaching. Really really important, cuz otherwise it's, it's really hard for a coach to support you when you're not even sure what you wanna get out of it.

[00:13:17] Peter: Um, no, I understand.

[00:13:18] Katie: And, and yeah, like find someone who, you know, you're gonna be able to be honest with, so not someone that you're trying to impress all the time, because you think they're cool. Um, and someone who you, you enjoy actually talking things through with.

[00:13:37] Peter: That makes perfect sense. Yeah. I love it. I love it. Very cool. Well, I appreciate you guys taking the time. This was, this was a lot of fun. Katie McManus business transcripts. How can people find you?

[00:13:46] Katie: Uh, they can find me at my website at www dot Katie. K a T I E. McManis cm, a ns.com. Um, and on Instagram at Katie dot the dot coach.

[00:14:00] Peter: Very cool. I will have people reach out. We'll put in in with the show notes. Thank you so much for taking the time. We appreciate it.

[00:14:05] Katie: Thank you so much for having me. This is so much fun and I, I hope you feel so much love. I'm sending it to you right now. You're channeling it through your daughter and all that.

[00:14:14] Peter: That was great. I'm trying my best. Gonna go pick her up, you know, hopefully she's a good first day and, and things go well. So all good. Guys. Thanks for listening to Faster Than Normal. We'll be here again next week with another episode, if you liked, you heard leave us a review uh, stick around fun stuff coming every single week this entire year. It's a new year. It's a new Dawn. It's a new day. The summer's over. Welcome back. We'll see you guys soon.

Credits: You've been listening to the Faster Than Normal podcast. We're available on iTunes, Stitcher and Google play and of course at www.FasterThanNormal.com I'm your host, Peter Shankman and you can find me at shankman.com and @petershankman on all of the socials. If you like what you've heard, why not head over to your favorite podcast platform of choice and leave us a review, come more people who leave positive reviews, the more the podcast has shown, and the more people we can help understand that ADHD is a gift, not a curse. Opening and closing themes were composed and produced by Steven Byrom who also produces this podcast, and the opening introduction was recorded by Bernie Wagenblast. Thank you so much for listening. We'll see you next week!

A few fun facts about our guest today, Shawn Malloy:

48yr old Father of 2, a little trouble being 'present' sometimes.Married 17yrs to a very tolerant and patient wife Meghan.Undergraduate degree in Biochemistry (after starting as a music major) from California State University, Long Beach (study abroad semester in Nottingham, England). 21 years at current employer, Biogen, 12 roles in 8 groups over 21 years. Hobbies: parkour (6 stitches), rock climbing (sprained knee), mountain biking (sprained ankle, lots of scars), and trail running, Yoga, meditation, swimming, racing midlife crisis Camaro, guitar building from scratch. "Poor student" all the way from kindergarten through high school – a few flashes of brilliance caught by the odd teacher throughout. Dangerous teenager and mid-20s kid. 25 jobs by the age of 27 and only fired once. Still struggles with honing in on 1 passion. In his own words: "I've always preferred breadth to depth but I know that if I gave my full attention to one of my passions, I'd conquer the world. As with most ADD folks, I tend to be my own worst enemy in that regard. But anytime I've given something full attention I've had wild success – the guitar is one of my favorite examples. I had a desire to build a guitar for a while, a passion for artistic endeavors, creating things, and woodworking, and a goal of finishing it before Christmas as a gift for my dad. The end result was a beautiful piece of functional art, and it was the first time I ever saw my father cry". Today we're talking mostly about Neurodiversity in the workplace.

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In this episode Peter and Shawn discuss:

00:40 - Thank you so much for listening and for subscribing!

01:01 - Intro and welcome Shawn Malloy

03:36 - You had 25 jobs by the age of 27. Let's talk about how you're not bored now, finally.

04:25 - "An ADD brain is like having a Ferrari engine with bicycle brakes"

04:55 - ADD can really be a blessing if you're in the right environment or you've put yourself in the right environment

05:55 - Growing at work under good, or ideal managing

06:55 - What happens when you get a dud for a manager at work?

08:05 - About Human Resources

09:40 - About recognizing talent and knowing how to utilize it in it's best possible ways

10:22 - Trust = Commitment

10:54 - On Managers and management

13:19 - On how purposeful planning is so important

15:00 - What do you tell the up and coming manager about how to manage folks with neurodiverse brains?

15:47 - "You don't manage to the role. You manage to the person".

17:47 - On the power of diversity

18:42 - What is the one thing you've learned about your brain, that you wish you would've learned earlier in life?

19:12 - This bit right HERE on Imposter Syndrome and permitting your neurodiversity to work

20:00 - How can people find more about you? LinkedIN profile page is here: linkedin.com/in/shawn-malloy-3636696

20:22 - Guys, as always thanks so much for subscribing! Do you have a cool friend with a great story? We'd love to hear. I'm www.petershankman.com and you can reach out anytime via email at [email protected] or @petershankman on all of the socials. You can also find us at @FasterNormal on all of the socials. It really helps when you drop us a review on iTunes and of course, subscribe to the podcast if you haven't already! As you know, the more reviews we get, the more people we can reach. Help us to show the world that ADHD is a gift, not a curse!

Faster Than Normal Podcast info & credits

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TRANSCRIPT via Descript and then corrected.. somewhat:

[00:00:37] Peter: Hello, everyone. Welcome to another episode of Faster Than Normal my name is Peter Shankman. I am thrilled to have you here today. It's great to be here. Its a gorgeous day outside its approaching the end of August as we're recording this. Couple more weeks to labor day, I am about to get outta here and take my daughter out for a week to Tenerife. If you don't know where that is, all need to know it's off the coast of Spain and it is the largest has the largest water park in the world. So you could make the argument I'm going to the largest water park in the world and taking my daughter with me. So it doesn't seem weird. Anyway, thrilled to have you for another episode!

We have a guy named Shawn Malloy on the podcast. Shawn is different than some of our guests, but also very much the same as all of our guests. 48 year old father to 12 year old boy Killion, 10 year old girl, Anna. He loves his kids to death has trouble being present sometimes .Sounds familiar, born and raised settled north of Boston, Massachusetts married 17 years to a lovely tolerant and patient wife named Megan. Here's the cool part undergraduate degree biochem okay, so abroad in England, 21 years, the past 21 years, he has worked at a company called Biogen, which is how I met him when I gave a keynote to Biogen about a month or so ago, 12 roles in eight groups over 21 years, loves adrenaline sports .Sounds, familiar, parkour, rock climbing, mountain biking. I love that he puts all this stuff in his bio and includes the number of stitches and injuries he got with each one, which I think is just so ADHD for all of us. He races a car. He has a midlife crisis Camaro on track. He built a guitar from scratch. Don't we all with that? Anyway, his story is like all of ours. He was a poor student. He was a dangerous teen, he, hit his stride stride in college. Let's talk to Shawn and figure out what turned him into what he's doing today. Shawn, welcome to Faster Than Normal man.

[00:02:37] Shawn: Thank you very much, Peter. Um, your talk at Biogen was definitely it hit home. Um, I was an adult diagnosed #ADHD or #ADD um, survivor, I guess you could say. Uh, and my teen years is definitely a survival story to some extent, um, But, yeah. Thanks for, thanks for having me on this is, uh, I'm looking forward to a fun conversation.

[00:03:00] Peter: At the end of the day, we make it through, we survive it. Somehow we move on, you know, we become adults. I joke that, um, you know, I turned 50 a couple of weeks ago, but didn't really hit me until yesterday. When I had a wall unit delivered. I now own a wall unit in my living room, which is. What kind of bullshit is that right? That's how, you know, you're getting all that, a goddamn wall unit. You know, I used to just hang my TV on the wall, right? No, not I have a wall unit cause you know, I need storage. What is that? Right. Welcome to middle age.

[00:03:30] Shawn: Adulting. Um, it's horrible.

[00:03:32] Peter: Yeah. So let's talk about ADHD. You had 25 jobs by the age of 27. You were only fired once you got bored, super fast, right? Biogen, you found a place that never let you get bored. Yes. Um, okay, so let's talk about that. Cause not everyone has the fortune to not always, you know, not everyone has a job where they don't always get bored.

[00:03:56] Shawn: It it's been, honestly, it's been pretty amazing. Um, I think Biogen's been a place that. If you're performing reasonably well, you don't even have to be a top performer, but you're performing reasonably well. They'll let you try different stuff out. And I've moved from jobs that were somewhat adjacencies to jobs where I, I didn't know what I was doing. Um, And much to my surprise, each time I would be at 80% of my peers within a couple of months. And I attribute that to that ADD brain. Right. You've got this #Ferrari engine with bicycle brakes. Um, I. I was always able to assimilate information really quickly, put the pieces together, learn really fast, and it started to be intrinsically rewarded, rewarding. You talk about that dopamine hit, but the success profile that Biogen let me build over the years, just continued to add confidence to me as a person. Um, but also to the power of ADD. Like once I found out that I had ADD it started to click that this really can be a blessing if you're in the right environment or you've put yourself in the right environment.

[00:05:02] Peter: Well, and that's sort of one of the, sort of the unexpected gifts of, or ADHD that we, we figure out, right? No one can tell you that, right? No one can say, oh, trust me. It's gonna be, you know, you don't believe it. It has to happen. And it has to show up naturally, but once it does. It's sort of that way of call, like, wow, I'm in a position. I, I, I have this job where I have ability to not only do my job great, but then I can create things within my job that give me that dopamine hit that, let me work harder and let work more and let do better. So it's almost like selfing, prophecy.

[00:05:33] Shawn: Yeah. Yeah. And in my time here, right, I've had 21 years. You can imagine I've had a lot of managers in that time. I've really only had two duds. And those were the times where there was such rigidity placed on me. And what I was allowed to do that I really did actually flounder. I, I was not good at the job, or I just couldn't get engaged with the job. And those were really hard and it got me to a point. You know, rather than looking for the ideal job, I look for the ideal manager and just make sure that the work's gonna be interesting.

[00:06:04] Peter: That's an interesting point. Instead of finding the, the, looking for the ideal job, you look for the ideal manager. And I think a lot of that actually resonates because I remember, you know, the few jobs I've had, right? I, I, I, I worked for America online, back in the nineties. That was the last job I ever had. The only job I ever had. And I had a great manager who let me, who understood, like do your job, you know, do it whichever way works for you, but get it done. And, and that. I think for me, you know, for my first job, having that as a first job was a bit of a, a problem because, uh, I just assumed every job was like that right. I went to my second job and, and, and it totally was not. And, you know, there were 8:00 AM meetings. There were check-ins and like, you know, I quit in two weeks. So having that ability to find that, or to have a boss or to have a, a manager. Who understands how you work and let you, lets you go the way you want I think it's key. You sort of honed in on that and you said it, you only had two sort of duds. What happens when you get a dud though? How do you, how do you sort of handle yourself? Because it's not, you know, if you can't be yourself, if you're not allowed to do the things you want, be the way you want. It's difficult.

[00:07:06] Shawn: It's very difficult and it, the problem that was just, it continued to get worse is I didn't stop being myself. I don't think that that's in the, a add profile is the ability to not be impulsive and not be yourself. Right. Um, that's so one of the things that defines us, so the relationship just deteriorated from not good to really bad. But what I did have was this long history of performance with a lot of people, I had a big network, so I was able to work through my network to find the next opportunity. Um, and really that was the only way out. I was not working my way out of this, this problem with the manager that was the dud or the managers that were duds, it just wasn't gonna work. Uh, one of the managers was removed, so they were a dud for everybody, not just me. The other one was the manager who was highly regarded and really was a brilliant man, but it was not a good personality match between how I needed to be functioning and how he wanted me to be functioning. And that one, the one where I network.

[00:08:04] Peter: That's interesting point. That's interesting point because you know, it's not all the time that, you know, remember there are a lot of times where you you're sitting there and you're going okay. It's not that the, the boss, isn't a good boss. He's not a good boss for me. Yes. Right. And how do you, how do you sort of explain that, you know, to, to the powers that be when they don't understand what he, not a good boss for you, he's a boss, you know, you deal with it. Well, it doesn't work that way all the time.

[00:08:31] Shawn: No, it really doesn't. And you're very right. HR is almost always gonna side with the boss and they did, um, they didn't fully get it, but I wasn't in a unique position. This was, you know, maybe 15 years deep into my career here. I had built this legacy of everywhere I went, I did excellent. So it wasn't like, they just thought all of a sudden I'm not doing my job, but it was not a pleasant experience trying to, to escape if you will. I, there were a lot of things up against me, but I don't, I think there are gonna be a lot of people that don't have that benefit.

[00:09:00] Peter: Well, that's the thing that brings up a really interesting point is that, is that every, you know, for as long as you're in a job, whether it's 15 years or 15 days, you know, your goal is to create a, a sort of, uh, security blanket around yourself where people look at you and go, yeah, he's a really good worker, or he's a really, you know, smart employee or whatever and so if something's not working. Right. Let's not be that quick to blame him. Let's see what the issue and, and that doesn't necessarily happen all the time because companies aren't trained to think that way.

[00:09:35] Shawn: Not very often. No, I've what I got to know when I became a supervisor, is that there are very few people who don't want to do a good job. I would say it's bordering on none. Nobody wants to come in and be known as the crappy employee. Um, there's usually a barrier in their way, and it's whether it's a barrier in how the job is functioning or the training, or in my case, if you having a person with a ADD or some other, um, I don't wanna call it a disability, a different ability, a different brain, right. Um, you've gotta find ways to get them to be their best, cuz if you can find that for them; man, will they run through brick walls? Like if you're the person who discovers what that person's talent is after they've been, um, pushed down their whole life, what a connection seriously. Um, and had many of those over my career.

[00:10:22] Peter: That's really a key point also, because if you are a manager and you're able to bring that out, Your in your employee. Right. And, and, you know, not only bring that out, but, but appreciate it as opposed to try and push it back down, you know, these employees will go to the end of the Earth for you. And I don't think enough managers- don'ts that, that. They don't realize the level of commitment that someone with a different brain will give you. If you give them that level of trust.

[00:10:54] Shawn: Oh, you I've seen it too many times to not believe it's true. Peter. You're, you're dead right. And. The not only that, right? The work side of things, but that personal connection that you get that personal, just watching somebody light up because they've been discovered for what they bring to the table. The, the trouble with managers is very few of them receive good formal training. It's kinda like when you're parenting, right. You become a parent. And then all of a sudden you've gotta figure out how to raise a human being. Um, when you're a manager, most of them are thrown to the, the, the job because they were good at a job, but not necessarily good at managing right. The good ones over time, come to realize that you manage the individual, you don't manage to manage your role. You manage to the people that you have in front of you. And, and that does get to you're managing to every individual difference. You're bringing out the bright spots and trying to minimize the deficits and it's not easy. It really isn't. So I don't, I don't fault always the managers who aren't good at it because it, it does take a, a really dedicated person to be able to do that. And you also have to have the bandwidth to do it. A lot of managers are given a day job as well as a manager role. So there's gotta be some patience for the manager as well.

[00:12:04] Peter: Isn't that, um, what you said earlier that, that, you know, most managers aren't born into, into the concept of managing they're they're they're become, they become managers cause they were given a job which isn't necessarily a manager job. Isn't that the Peter principle, the Peter principle is, is the object that basically states that every worker will rise to his or her highest level of incompetence. Yes right in that, in that you, you, you, you hire someone and they're good at their job, so you promote them and they're good at the next job, so you promote them again and they're good at the following job. So you promote them again. Then they're not good. If finally reach a point where they're not good. Well, you don't demote. But you don't promote them again. Right. So they sit there. Right. And they, it that's how bureaucracy happens.

[00:12:43] Shawn: yes. Yeah. It, it plays itself out over and over again in corporate America. For sure. I, I don't really have a good solution for it. Right. But I, I think, I don't know if there is one there really,

[00:12:55] Peter: I think we can make a lot, you and I can make a lot of money, but you figure one out.

[00:12:58] Shawn: No question. Yeah. I would agree. Um, I took a few notes as I was thinking about this podcast and, and the things I wanted to be able to convey. And we've talked about a, a great one, right? I think understanding how to navigate your career with ADD is important. But one of the things that I've I've learned throughout the years is, um, purposeful planning. As a person with ADD and activation energy. And I think they do relate to how I've navigated my career over time at Biogen. It wasn't just that I bounced around from job to job because I'm a ADD; I did all along have plans. Um, and for me, it's similar to the guitar that I built. Right. I had a, I finally had something that I could leverage my artistic capability, my engineering capability. I had a goal around it. Timing. And step by step of how to approach it. And I've, I've approached my career much the same way. And when I first started supervising people, I was in the manufacturing element of Biogen, very small little world. Okay. Very small little world. Right. But you feel like it's all there is because you're in the science, you're actually making the drug. But as I was developing people, all, I really knew how to develop them for were manufacturing roles. So I wanted to get out and see the broader thing that is biotech. I wanted to hop into some individual contributor roles, learn what different roles did so that as I came back to a management role, I'd understand how to develop people. Like when I saw somebody's passion to speak to what we were getting to before, when I noticed somebody's niche, I didn't necessarily know what to do with it other than maybe a small part in manufacturing, but now that I've come full circle with all this knowledge of all these roles, when I see somebody who's got a particular passion, I know where that fits in the organization. I know how to put them in a role that's gonna get them into that flow state. And that's good for people with a ADD that's good for people in life in general, but it all came because I had a plan that as a manager, I wanted to be able to develop people better, to be able to do that. I had to understand

[00:14:53] Peter: that brings up a great point. What do you tell, you know, if you had to. Sort of hammer that down in 10 words. What do you tell the up and coming manager about, I mean, managing in general, but obviously managing people with neuro diverse brains, right. Because you know, , you certainly do not learn this in school.

[00:15:11] Shawn: No, I think it's the first question I ask my people, um, when I meet them is- what is your passion? Where does time disappear for you? And then I'm gonna do my best to find the aspects of the current role that you're in and whatever future roles you wanna point yourself towards where that passion can come to bear as often as possible. Every job is gonna have crap you don't wanna do, sorry. It's work. Yeah. But the more that you can leverage those points of passion. The more you're gonna enjoy your work. The more you're gonna succeed. And the more you're just gonna really shine. And that's, that's what I would tell managers is you don't manage to the role you manage to the person.

[00:15:51] Peter: Ooh, I like that.

[00:15:52] Shawn: If you wanna get the most out of the people that are around you, find out what drives them. Where does time disappear for them? You'll be surprised, right? You may hate analytics. You may hate looking at data, but I've had people under me who that is their passion. Mm-hmm they love working in a spreadsheet. They love seeing the story that comes out. When you start looking at the data and the numbers. If you have somebody who hates that, don't put them in a role that that's their main function. Find the person that that is their passion and oh, you're. Get such better work outta them, and you're gonna get better dedication, better loyalty. And you'll have people coming to you for jobs because they wanna work for you because you get it. You get how to place them in success.

[00:16:35] Peter: You bring an interesting point because I think a lot of people, whether you're manager or not, you know, we tend to gravitate towards the stuff that we're good at the stuff we like. Right. I mean, you know, let's. As we're as we're growing up and we're in school when we're undiagnosed with a neurodiverse brain, um, it's no surprise that we gravitate towards the stuff we're really good at, right. For me it was, it was English or it was, you know, it was social studies or whatever it wasn't math. Right. And so math would be horrible. So I would avoid math as much as possible. I think as adults, when we're in job roles, we sort of keep that uh, in the back of our heads and we don't really let that go away. So that, so that, that, you know, we tend to gravitate sorts of stuff we like to do and try to avoid the stuff we don't. And so, because of that, I think, you know, we look at our, our, our sort of employees when we're in a managerial role and we put them in the same boat, but what we have to sort of understand is that, that we might have employees who love the very stuff that we hate, like love. Yes. The very stuff that we hate. And we have to sort of, I guess, embrace that. For them. Right. And let them under, you know, Hey, you, you have that math kick. Great. Go do math. you know, I, I, I look at along lines of, I, my assistant is awesome at the stuff I'm terrible at. She doesn't let me schedule stuff in my calendar because I screw it up, but she's great at it. She loves that stuff. And so it's that, it's that giving over that ability for her to do that.

[00:18:08] Shawn: It's the power of diversity, right? We're talking about neurodiverse brain, but the power of diversity is everywhere in life. It's everywhere in work. And if you can work with people who are different than you, you're gonna be so much better off because everybody can bring a different strength to bear. Yeah. The hard part is a hundred percent. Different personalities that are there. Cause that can be a little weird. We are humans at the end of the day and sometimes we get a little quirky on the personality side.

[00:18:32] Peter: I think. We could do nine and a half hours on managing personalities. So I'm not even gonna start with that. but I will, I will end it with this. I'll ask you this. What is the one thing you've learned about your brain, whether it's, you know, in a professional setting or personal setting with your wife or your kids that you wish learned earlier?

[00:18:54] Shawn: That is a great question. I think you had mentioned it it's that the imposter syndrome, um, that it's very real, that it exists, but it really isn't true 90% of the time. The ADD brain, you are so good at so many things, and you can see the big picture better than so many other people. You're gonna be your own harshest critic. Yeah, that does not mean that you are not still better than 80 or 90% of the people who are doing the same thing. It means you're not 80 to 90% as good as you wanna be, or, you know, you could be, but stretching that extra mile may not be worth the effort. Your, your good enough is gonna be better than most people's best. So don't let imposter syndrome beat you down.

[00:19:46] Peter: I love that.

[00:19:46] Shawn: Don't fall prey to it. Have faith that what you're doing is probably better than the majority of the people around you.

[00:19:53] Peter: That's that's a phenomenal, uh, a phenomenal line. That's that's awesome. I love that. I love that. Awesome. Well, listen, I cannot thank you enough for taking the time, Shawn really appreciate it. I'm so glad we connected, uh, at the Biogen talk.

Guys, Shawn Malloy , uh, how can people find you? How can they, how can they, uh, learn more about you? LinkedIN profile page is here: linkedin.com/in/shawn-malloy-3636696

[00:20:11] Shawn: Uh, LinkedIN I am on LinkedIn. It's Shawn S H a w N M a L L O Y. Uh, and you'll find me as employed by Biogen. That's probably the cleanest and simplest way to find me.

[00:20:22] Peter: Awesome guys. We've been visiting with Shawn Malloy and you've been listening to Faster Than Normal. My name is Peter Shankman as always. We love that you're here. And if you had a second right now, go and leave us a review. I cannot tell you how those reviews help our uh, podcast growth, the more reviews the more it helps the website and the podcast is seen. It is really incredible, and we're able to help more and more people understand that ADHD is a gift, ADD is a gift, Any form of neurodiversity is a gift, not a curse! We will see you again next week with a brand new interview and a brand new episode. We appreciate you listening, and we appreciate all our guests, including Shawn, thank you so much Shawn for taking the time. Guys, thank you for listening. We will see you next week. My name is Peter Shankman. And remember the ADHD and all forms of neurodiversity is probably the best thing that ever happened to you. We will see you next week. Stay safe. Talk to you soon.

Credits: You've been listening to the Faster Than Normal podcast. We're available on iTunes, Stitcher and Google play and of course at www.FasterThanNormal.com I'm your host, Peter Shankman and you can find me at shankman.com and @petershankman on all of the socials. If you like what you've heard, why not head over to your favorite podcast platform of choice and leave us a review, come more people who leave positive reviews, the more the podcast has shown, and the more people we can help understand that ADHD is a gift, not a curse. Opening and closing themes were composed and produced by Steven Byrom who also produces this podcast, and the opening introduction was recorded by Bernie Wagenblast. Thank you so much for listening. We'll see you next week!

Skye Rapson is an academic and coach with over seven years of experience working in adult education. Skye has studied in various fields, including Psychology, Sociology, and Public Health, and is now a Doctoral Candidate in Population Health. She was diagnosed with ADHD at the start of her doctorate. Since then, Skye has dedicated her time to researching and disseminating ADHD studies, founding Unconventional Organisation in 2020 to provide ADHD adults and managers with strengths-based, neurodiverse-friendly ADHD coaching and workshops. We're learning about how and why she began, today. Enjoy!

In this episode Peter and Skye discuss:

00:40 - Thank you so much for listening and for subscribing!

01:01 - Intro and welcome Skye Rapson! Ref: Interview with Sally Willbanks, founder of ND Renegade [actually based in Australia]

01:57 - So you were diagnosed at the beginning of your PhD program?

03:00 - What changed and maybe made more sense after your diagnosis?

03:39 - Ref: Interview with Rachel Cotton, another PhD student w/ ADHD

04:00 - How did your priorities shift?

04:27 - What Skye found of from her peer group at university

05:55 - Let's talk about your "Unconventional Organization" Ref: Her podcast: Unconventional Organisation with Skye Rapson and her coaching service: https://www.unconventionalorganisation.com

06:54 - What kinds of trends did you find when you started conversing with other neurodiverse folks?

07:42 - On changing the way we get things accomplished

08:40 - What would you now tell your 15-year-old self?

09:03 - How can people find more about you? Web: https://www.unconventionalorganisation.com Socials: @unconventionalorganisation on INSTA and Facebook

09:24 - Guys, as always thanks so much for subscribing! Do you have a cool friend with a great story? We'd love to hear. I'm www.petershankman.com and you can reach out anytime via email at [email protected] or @petershankman on all of the socials. You can also find us at @FasterNormal on all of the socials. It really helps when you drop us a review on iTunes and of course, subscribe to the podcast if you haven't already! As you know, the more reviews we get, the more people we can reach. Help us to show the world that ADHD is a gift, not a curse!

09:58 - Faster Than Normal Podcast info & credits

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TRANSCRIPT via Descript and then corrected.. somewhat:

[00:00:37] Peter: Hey everyone, Peter. Shankman welcome. The episode of Faster Than Normal today is a PhD. We seem to be doing a lot of doctoral candidates lately. I don't know why doctoral candidates seem to get diagnosed, but maybe cuz they're smart enough to know that something's not, uh, normal, like other people. And they're like, Hey, let's figure that out. But either way we get another one here. Her name is Skye Rapson and Skye's an academic coach with over seven years of experience working at adult education, she has studied in various fields, including psychology, sociology. and public health and is now a doctoral candidate in population health in New Zealand. So we are a long way from home today. She was diagnosed with ADHD at the start of her doctorate. And since then, she's dedicated time to researching and disseminating ADHD studies, founding unconventional organization in 2020 to provide ADHD, adults and managers with strength based neurodiverse friendly ADHD, coaching and workshop. Skye, welcome.

[00:01:35] Skye: Hi. Yeah. Great to be here.

[00:01:37] Peter: Good to have you here. So ADHD, you know, it, it's interesting. We had, we have there's someone else from New Zealand who we've had on the podcast. Um, she runs, uh, oh God, what's the name, but neuro neuro it's line of t-shirts neuro… Oh, I'm spacing on it now. I have one of them. It's awesome. Awesome shirt. I'll remember it, but, and we'll put it in the liner notes, but yeah. Um, long way from home. So good to have you, you were diagnosed at the beginning of your PhD, uh, beginning of your doctoral research. Yeah.

[00:02:04] Skye: Yeah, no, I was diagnosed. I actually thought I had, um, dyslexia. I went in, um, postmasters. Um, so I'd done my masters and. It was good, but it was tough. And, um, right at the end, I thought I should probably go and see if I, if I might have dyslexia. I know it, you know, it's something that my family have talked about potentially having. Um, and I came out, um, several weeks later with an ADHD. Uh, you know, you probably have ADHD and a couple of other things as well.

[00:02:30] Peter: So you were surprised you were surprised at that.

[00:02:32] Skye: Yeah, it, it made a lot of sense. I mean, you wrote out, read out all the different things I'd studied, you know, tell me you have ADHD without telling me you have ADHD. I kept getting to the end of a degree and being like, well, you know, this might not be for me. I think I need to switch to a totally different area and learn a totally different subject. Um, and so, um, you know, in hindsight it made a lot of sense and I learned about ADHD, but I hadn't put the pieces together in, in. Fit my life.

[00:02:58] Peter: Amazing. What, tell me about what it was sort of like sort of the wake up call once you were diagnosed, what sort of started to make sense?

[00:03:05] Skye: Yeah. So in terms of what made sense, I, I really focused on understanding why I was burning out because what I was experiencing was a period, you know, up until that point, I'd done a year generally at a time, you know? And so I would, I would study something really intensely for a year, work on it, stay up all night, you know, do weekends. And then I would burn out and I would need a break. And then I would be like, well, I guess maybe this isn't the subject for me and I'd come back and I would do something else. And that was very much how my ADHD was, was manifesting.

[00:03:39] Peter: Now I believe that we had a, another PhD on the podcast named Rachel Cotton. She was one of our first interviews and she always talked about how, uh, she thought it was perfectly normal to live on, you know, uh, 14 caffeine tablets away. Yeah. , you know, um, But no I get that. So, so talk about, um, after you got diagnosed and, and things sort of changing, what, how did your priority shift?

[00:04:01] Skye: Yeah, so, so one of the first things I actually did was I, um, I created a community in my university of other people who were postgraduate, um, who were also neuro diverse. I had worked in adult education for a really long time. Um, I'd done a lot of tutoring in universities and I'd sort of told myself when I started the PhD, I'm not gonna do that. Cuz you know, I, I tended to take on too many classes and it was distracting from actually doing the writing. Um, and then when I found out I had ADHD, I was like, oh, but like, you know, one group won't hurt. And so I started I started a group and um, and started connecting with people and learning as much as possible, not just from the research, which. You know, later on writing about, but the very first thing I started to do was to talk to other people. Who'd had those same experiences.

[00:04:48] Peter: And what did you find out?

[00:04:49] Skye: I found out that people were kind of frustrated with the university system, um, in terms of, you know, how it fit and how it worked with how they worked. And I think that was really, um, really helpful for me because it meant I didn't spend too long sitting in that space of feeling like it was just me, which so many people with ADHD, I know had that feeling because I immediately was launched into the space of, oh, we're all experiencing these struggles.

[00:05:15] Peter: And it was sort of one of those lessons. I remember sort of the same thing when I finally got diagnosed, everything started to make sense. Part of me was pissed off because, you know, I, I, I I'd spent so much energy. Mm-hmm over the course of my life fighting things that, that, you know, swimming upstream when I didn't really have mm-hmm I'd just gone with the flow. It would've been that much easier.

[00:05:31] Skye: Yeah. Yeah, no, it's definitely, it's definitely, um, a tough thing. And, you know, there was a little bit. Sadness as well. I think to look back on my more was at that point, my twenties, um, and realize that, yeah, it had just been a different, if I'd known a slightly different way of working, it wasn't that it had to be hugely different, but just some adjustments, it could have been so much easier.

[00:05:55] Peter: So let's talk about, uh, unconventional organization. Tell me about it.

[00:05:58] Skye: Yeah. So, um, I started on unconventional organization in 2020, um, after I'd, you know, worked with the universities, I started working with schools and then when, uh, COVID hit and we all had to go back to our homes. I was looking for an opportunity to keep doing what I really loved to do, which is connect with people and work with people. Um, and I found ADHD coaching. And so I started doing that alongside at that point, um, writing articles. Cause I really wanted to learn more if I was gonna do this kind of space properly, I wanted to learn about the research. And so I, um, started writing articles and challenging myself to put them up every week as a way of, of, you know, keeping myself accountable for that. And, um, those two things sort of ballooned into, into what we have now with, um, you know, people who are training to become coaches with us, um, who also have ADHD. And then also having that, um, that research space as well.

[00:06:51] Peter: And what did you, so tell me what, one of the interesting things I always, I always ask, what did you find when you started conversing with other people and being like, Hey, we share the same brain. Right? What kind of trends did you, did you find?

[00:07:02] Skye: I found that people were working a lot harder than people realize people with ADHD. I, I found that a lot of the people that I spoke to would come to me and they'd say, I'm not getting enough done. I need to, you know, and even the people that, you know, the coaches would often come to us as well. And, you know, say I haven't been, I haven't been achieving at the level that I want to, and then I'd ask them what they're doing, because that's part of coaching. We get very specific about what your day looks like and people were spending a lot of time trying to work. And, and in that way they were expending a lot of energy. It just wasn't necessarily, um, giving them the outcome that they were looking for.

[00:07:40] Peter: Right. And one of the things you learn is that, is that it's sort of a self limiting, uh, prophecy, because you wind up expending all this energy. You're not getting the results. So you try harder and it's still the same thing. Right. So you, so you, you're going down this rabbit hole and you can't win.

[00:07:53] Skye: Yeah, no, exactly. And then, and then the worst part, you know, at least for us was that people would say, oh, well then I don't deserve to have a break. I don't deserve to have fun. And so we'd end up in this sort of self-fulfilling cycle of just, you know, not getting the dopamine, working hard, feeling like you don't deserve to get a break. So you definitely don't get the Domine and you're continuing to keep trying.

[00:08:13] Peter: Right. And so I guess one of the best lessons there is change the way you try.

[00:08:18] Skye: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Yeah. And, and it's about, you know, we think about it in terms of experimentation. We often say, you know, if something doesn't work or it doesn't work for you, we just keep, we just keep adapting it. We just, we just check it out and go. That's interesting, that doesn't work. And then, you know, in, in the case of working with the coach, you come back and you say, Hey, that doesn't work for me. And they go, that's fine. Like we can adjust it.

[00:08:41] Peter: Right. What would you have told your 15 year old self, if you knew, if you knew that and what you know now?

[00:08:46] Skye: That's a really good question. I think I would tell my 15 year old self. It's not about finding the perfect career. It's about finding the perfect environment.

[00:08:56] Peter: Oh good. Oh, I like that a lot. That's a great quote, great quote. Oh, I like, yeah. I really, really love that. Yeah. Um, Skye, how can people find more about you? How can they get,

[00:09:05] Skye: yeah, you can find us, um, at, [Web: https://www.unconventionalorganisation.com Socials: @unconventionalorganisation on INSTA and Facebook ] um, unconventionalorganization.com, uh, with a Z or with an S depending on which country you're from. Um, we also have, um, a lot of articles about different strategies you can use on the website as well as. And then ADHD coaching as well.

[00:09:22] Peter: Awesome. Well, I love this sky. Thank you so much for taking the time. I appreciate it all the way from New Zealand. What time is it over there?

[00:09:27] Skye: Um, it is 5:40 AM .

[00:09:30] Peter: Okay. So either time to get up, or time to go to bed; I'm gonna assume time to get up.

[00:09:32] Skye: Time to get up!

[00:09:34] Peter: Skye, thanks for taking the time guys. Thanks for listening. You know, the drill, uh, fasternormal.com. Leave a, uh, review anywhere you like iTune, stitcher or Google play, whatever I'm at Peter Shankman, we're faster, normal on Twitter, faster than normal on Instagram, everywhere. And we'll be back next week with another interview of someone just as awesome because of that is what we do. We will see you soon. Thanks for listening

Credits: You've been listening to the Faster Than Normal podcast. We're available on iTunes, Stitcher and Google play and of course at www.FasterThanNormal.com I'm your host, Peter Shankman and you can find me at shankman.com and @petershankman on all of the socials. If you like what you've heard, why not head over to your favorite podcast platform of choice and leave us a review, come more people who leave positive reviews, the more the podcast has shown, and the more people we can help understand that ADHD is a gift, not a curse. Opening and closing themes were composed and produced by Steven Byrom who also produces this podcast, and the opening introduction was recorded by Bernie Wagenblast. Thank you so much for listening. We'll see you next week!

Gökçen Şahin, M.Sc., who successfully completed her master's degree in Genetics, has just registered for the PhD program to start her education this fall. Technological advances in the field of genetics in the last 20 years have brought with it a large pile of data waiting to be made sense of. Gökçen will do her PhD in bioinformatics in order to learn how to draw meaningful conclusions from these data and to find solutions for this purpose. Gökçen, who loves to learn new things and is curious, developed a machine learning model in her thesis that can predict the muscle heteroplasmy ratio of patients with given demographic features, family history, and clinical table caused by a mitochondrial DNA point mutation causing mitochondrial diseases. She made these by learning everything herself. She reviewed more than 450 publications fastidiously and worked with doctors to generate her data. Gokcen, who wants to improve herself in this field, wants to have a solid foundation. Therefore, she decided to take her education in this field. Gökçen actually qualified to enter another PhD program last year for the same purpose and started her education. During this period, she was diagnosed with ADHD in December and in January, she learned that she is autistic. While the diagnoses were a great shock at first, she shared her diagnoses with her supervisor in order to pass this period in a healthy way. Afterwards, she was exposed to various mobbing by this supervisor. The severity of mobbing had increased over time. And in February, she was fired by him from the PhD program in an e-mail. Not long after, her ex-boyfriend's family, who learned that she is autistic and ADHDer, did not want them to get married, and they broke up after a 2-year relationship, which was a first for Gökçen. She had many reasons to lose hope. But the opposite happened. The diagnoses resulted in her accepting herself. She faced many challenges throughout her life and she saw that the challenges she experienced was the result of not being accepted as she was. Realizing this, she wanted to go on further and apply for a new program, but she also had fears. She explained everything to her new supervisor before application. And she was encouraged by new supervisor to apply for the program. Now she's telling people that "Being autistic and ADHD is part of the diversity in nature and being able to live as ourselves, to be free of masks is what we have a right to do. The only thing that can hinder this view is when we begin to look at ourselves as people who do not accept us as we are. When we come back from this mistake, we start living a healthy life. Because not being able to be what we are, not being accepted is ignoring us and it hurts. Nobody has the right to this. We are a part of nature, just like everything else." This is a great one- enjoy!

In this episode Peter and Gökçen discuss:

00:40 - Thank you so much for listening and for subscribing!

00:50 - Apologies for the near horrid audio- Peter is still in a hotel.

00:56 - Intro and welcome Gökçen Şahin!

02:45 - Your story is incredible; and it's frustrating professors would still be so ignorant!

03:21 - So you said that you wrote something out that you wanted to share with us, feel free!

03:35 - On being accepted for PhD programs

04:03 - On the first meeting with her supervisor/professor

04:51 - On the 2nd meeting with her supervisor

05:50 - What happened next?

08:16 - A little while later…

08:45 - Studying about ADHD

10:00 - On being diagnosed by a child psychologist and then given meds

10:19 - Her professor's reaction

11:05 - Back to the psychologist

11:51 - On being made a study and the discovery of Autism

13:00 - Amazing. A couple of questions…

13:15 - The fallout and heartbreak

14:00 - Did you go back to your former professor?

15:05 - What types of things that you used to think were negatives, do you now understand to be positives?

15:56 - Fun fact: Your subconscious mind controls about 80percent of what you think; be mindful in your self-talk/inner dialogue.

16:24 - On being happy inside and being kind to yourself!

17:44 - What advice would you give to someone who has been told that they are broken?

17:55 - THIS PART. RIGHT HERE.

19:56 - What happened with her new supervisor?

21:30 - How can people find more about you? @GKCNSHN on Twitter

21:30 - Guys, as always thanks so much for subscribing! Do you have a cool friend with a great story? We'd love to hear. I'm www.petershankman.com and you can reach out anytime via email at [email protected] or @petershankman on all of the socials. You can also find us at @FasterNormal on all of the socials. It really helps when you drop us a review on iTunes and of course, subscribe to the podcast if you haven't already! As you know, the more reviews we get, the more people we can reach. Help us to show the world that ADHD is a gift, not a curse!

21:40 - Faster Than Normal Podcast info & credits

—

TRANSCRIPT via Descript and then corrected.. somewhat:

[00:00:40] Hey guys, Peter, Shankman welcome to another episode of Faster Than Normal. Unfortunately, again, I'm still recording from a hotel. Uh, we should be back in my apartment within a week or so, but oh my God, has it been not fun? Anyway, I do wanna talk about something fun today. I have an amazing story here I was on Twitter and someone tagged me in a post and said, you've gotta read what's going on here. And I was introduced to a one whose name. Uh I'm I'm despite my best efforts, I'm probably gonna screw up and I wanna say it's Gokcen shine and I'm pretty, I'm sure I'm relatively close there, but lemme tell you something about Gokcen was in a. PhD program. And, uh, she was doing her PhD in bioinformatics in order to learn how to draw meaningful conclusions from data and find solutions. She was, she loved new things; she's very curious. She discovered a machine learning model and her thesis that could predict the muscle hetero PLAs ratio of patients with given demographic features basically stuff way beyond my pay grade. Right. She's dealing with Mitocondrial DNA, uh, point mutation. I mean, incredible stuff. So what happens. She gets into another PhD program and gets diagnosed with ADHD in January. She learns that she has ADHD and learns that she's autistic. And while this diagnosis works a great shock to her, she shared a diagnosis with a supervisor, and guess what happened with her supervisor? Her supervisor fired her from her PhD program via email! Okay. That's like breaking up with someone over a text message, not cool! Okay. And then after that, her ex-boyfriend's family or her boyfriend at the time who learned that she was a autistic and ADHD, did not want them to get married and they broke up a over a 2 year relationship. Unbelievable. But despite having many reasons to lose hope the opposite happened and the diagnosis resulted in G accepting herself and saw these challenges for what they were through her life, realizing that she applied for a new program. Got in. And now she tells everyone that being autistic and ADHD is part of the diversity in nature. And being able to live as ourselves to be free of masks is what we have a right to do. I am so excited to talk to you. Thank you so much for being here today Gokcen.

[00:02:41] Gokcen: Uh, thank you so much for inviting me, Peter,

[00:02:44] Peter: uh, an amazing, an amazing story. I, I, I, I, I remember reading it on Twitter and just being blown away that, that, that, you know, of, of all things, professors could still be that, uh, closed mind truly, truly just incredible.

[00:02:58] Gokcen: Actually leaving it was very hard, but eventually I just, uh, get something at you get new thing at you then .Right now I'm totally okay.

[00:03:10] Peter: Yeah. I mean, it sounds like, it sounds like you took this, you know, as, as, as difficult as it was, you saw this as an opportunity and, and, you know, used it to your, to your advantage.

[00:03:20] Gokcen: Sure, sure.

[00:03:21] Peter: So, so you said that you wrote something out that you wanted to share with us, feel free.

[00:03:25] Gokcen: Yes. Okay. Uh, you can just, uh, cut me if I exceed the time.

[00:03:29] Peter: really not a problem. Go ahead. Okay, go ahead.

[00:03:32] Gokcen: Uh, just let me mention about myself a bit. I completed my master on genetics in 2021. I am accepted to PhD program and I will, uh, start my education in the field of bioformatics and system biology in this semester. I was actually accepted to PhD program last year, too. Uh, three acceptance. Actually, I got three acceptance last year from three different universities. In the one that I choose I was fired after six months by my supervisor. Uh, I met with him on 6th of July, 2021. In the meeting I mentioned about my background, about my thesis, about my current knowledge in this field and I, um, What I want to do, et cetera. And he spoke very positively about my answers. Uh, and he said, a few people at your level can answer these questions so well, you know why you did what you did. Um, so I said to him that I didn't get any education on this topic. I. In my thesis, uh, I just did something learning on internet, et cetera, but I didn't get any, um, base education on this topic so I need someone to guide me. I'm looking for, um, my master and he said, okay.

In the second meeting, uh, he wanted me to prepare a project, uh, based on my performance. I will get a chance to apply. I finished my project and email, but he was kind of person that don't answer emails. Meanwhile, I was accepted by two other universities. I dunno why, but I see him as someone that I can trust, but I was totally wrong. Anyway, uh, I sent so many emails to myself, to him. Eventually he wrote something like this. Uh, you are a person who tries to do a given test properly. Is determined by technically needs to move forward. However, I think it will not cause any problems with study. So then I, I applied, accepted government accepted me, a university accepted me in the interview. Supervisor accepted me. So, um, let's start .

Our courses was removed. Uh, however, I went to Institute for a journal club and was going meet with my friends, uh, my team friends. Uh, we were supposed to meet with each other. I expected that they will introduce themselves. Ask my name, myth[?] With me, ask about my background, et cetera. Just some friendly talking, but it didn't happen. They were really cold people. After journal club I went our teams room supervisor came too. Uh, he started to talk with his students. They got along very well in a kind of manner that I don't have any idea. Supervisor, um, open potato chips package. He offered to everyone in the room. I politely said that I didn't want, um, he asked why; I said that I have a high intolerance to lactose and I cannot eat packaged foods. Then very interestingly, he got very closer to my ear, very closer and started to eat potato chips there. It was not nice at all, but I thought that probably this was how they make jokes. Um, because I can't understand jokes most of the time. And I. even can't understand why they are made. Um, while he was eating chips. I, he wanted me to ask a question to him. I asked, uh, why he put advanced statistics in the first term while introductory statistics in the second term, he started to laugh again and with his students and said, oh, did I really do this? Oh my God. And last lovely. Um, In the period of this course choice he didn't say anything to me. Um, so these two courses actually was his own courses, but he didn't warn me. He accepted my course choices and not surprisingly, I couldn't succeed because I was almost your own statistics. And this course what was advanced, I said to him, I wish you would inform me at the beginning, but I will, uh, I said that I will fail in this course and take first of all the introductory course and take this course again later. He said, OK.

Uh, one day he called me to his room, uh, take a white paper in front of him, asked me, do you know this topic. I said, no, he wrote the paper. Do you know, this topic. I said, no; he wrote the paper. Uh, he wrote so many topics that I didn't know about. And he said, okay, go and study them. You should be ready because you are here to do my job. I will do my job. Uh, you will do my job, then I will be able to look something else. Um, I didn't like this attitude at all. I didn't study, I couldn't study what he gave me because this is not the way that I can study. Uh, But eventually he started to get angry with me. Uh, these times I was wondering so much about ADHD, uh, because my psychologist thought that I have. She was, um, nervous because uh, she also got a diagnosis for a while ago and she told me about the common traits that we share. And then I started to study so deeply on ADHD in a kind of manner that hyperfocus . I was collecting my traits to tell all of them to my psychiatrist. Uh, the hospital that I'm going is a medical hospital of Istanbul for, of medicine of Istanbul university. So doctors are working there with rotation, for education. Each doctor see patients for just one month. Uh, when I went to hospital for ADHD evauation , this was maybe the only chance that I have got in my whole life because doctor was a child psychiatrist She evaluated me. It was the 24th of December 2021 I diagnosed with ADHD . Gave me a drug after this session. She said she wanted to see again, very soon. I thought that she will probably ask me whether the drugs work or not.

I told, um, my diagnosis to my supervisor, I was waiting some understanding, but instead he said that, um, a man without hands cannot be a Shoemaker and no matter how much he wants. But if he works hard, he can become a marathon runner. Maybe he [you] should try another sector. I. Trying to explain that ADHD is not a kind of attention deficit, actually. It's a problem of regularizing of pay attention wherever we can focus, whatever we do more than neurotypicals. But he didn't seem to understand at all. And maybe didn't listen at all. Um, it was 12th of January. I went to a hospital again, I told my psychiatrist that, um, about this, uh, supervisor's unpleasant behavior. And she told me to relax because she said no one had right to kick me out of the schools. I informed her about the effect of drug. Then she asked me tons of questions I didn't understand because these questions was not related with medicine or ADHD. After this session she just said that she wanted to invite me to their department community meeting with the justification of I was their patient for long and she wanted, uh, her professor also evaluate me. Then I said, okay, but this wasn't seem normal to me after going home. I checked each, each question and still didn't understand and what is them about? I Google check [unintelligible] five, watch videos, one thing, but I got shocked.

Me? Autism? Is that possible? Then the face to face community meeting the professor who is the head of the psychiatric department of the hospital, and almost all psychs of the hospital was there approximately 20, 30 doctors. And this time professor asked me so many questions and all of them evaluated. I shared my bad language too, because I sit to someone, uh, after the meeting, my own psych took me her room and explained that I'm autistic. Uh, it was 26th of January this year. Uh, so, and my age is 29. It's surprising.

[00:12:55] Peter: So, uh, it it's, let me, let me interrupt just, just for a minute, because I, I, I am, I am grateful to you for telling your story. I have, I have a couple of questions that I, I think my audience would wanna know are on the answer to as well. What, what did you, when you were told by your professor that a Shoemaker cannot make shoes, if he doesn't have hands, how did that make you feel?

[00:13:15] Gokcen: Terrible because you feel like you don't have an ability to think, have an ability, don't have an ability to do something. Uh, you don't have a brain. You cannot think, you cannot be a scientist. Uh, these are, these are incredibly bad things. And, uh, you know what happens in after he said all this to me, I started to cry very deeply and he just look at me with a cold face and it was really horrible.

[00:13:54] Peter: When you let's fast forward to when you were accepted into your new program? Um, I'm I was curious, you didn't mention this. Did you at all, at any point, go back to this professor and tell him that you were, that you made into this new program?

[00:14:08] Gokcen: Uh, no, I didn't. I didn't.

[00:14:11] Peter: Do you have any desire to do that?

[00:14:14] Gokcen: Uh, actually, I have a really big desire to tell him, um, in a, in maybe I know government education department or something. I really don't want to see him again anymore.

[00:14:30] Peter: Right. I understand that. It just seems to me that, that I think there's, you know, for what he's done and had the way he did it, uh, there should be some consequences for him. Um, you know, that's a, obviously a bigger story, but I do think that that's something you shouldn't, shouldn't just let go.

[00:14:45] Gokcen: Um, and I will tell, um, more about what he did. Actually. There is so much bad things too, and it's coming.

[00:14:55] Peter: Well, let's focus. Let's focus on the positives for a second. So let's fast forward to the point where you were accepted into the new program. Yes. What have you noticed? What have you noticed about yourself since your diagnosis? What types of things that you used to think were negatives are, do you now understand to be positives and things like that?

[00:15:14] Gokcen: Uh, could you repeat the question again, please?

[00:15:17] Peter: Um, now that you're diagnosed, you know, for instance, I'll give you an example. My, uh, my ability to, to multitask I realize is a, is a positive, but when I was in school, uh, it was framed as not being able to pay attention. And so I thought it was a negative. Yes. Right. Once I was diagnosed with ADHD, I realized that it could be a positive. So I'm, I'm curious as to what sort of things that, that you might have thought of as bad things, um, have you since maybe sort of rethought of as possibly good things now that you understand sort of where your, how your brain works.

[00:15:53] Gokcen: Um, actually, there are lots of things like that until to the diagnosis I always thought that I am weird because everybody in your environment say that you are weird. And when they say until that age, when everybody say this, eventually you also believe them. Um, but I actually, without thinking them, I was already happy in my inside. I couldn't show it to the people, but I was happy too inside because I was, um, I love, uh, in, in a way that what makes me Gokcen and everything. Every trait of autism or ADHD, give me that they are my traits and this is, these are my parts. And I love myself. Uh, but after diagnosis, I can say it loudly that I love myself.

[00:16:54] Peter: I think that that in itself is an amazing story right there. The fact that you've been able to; understanding sort of how your brain works has allowed you to be kinder to yourself, right?

[00:17:04] Gokcen: Sure. Because I able to make this master thesis, which is very, uh, hard actually in that time, I didn't know any knowledge about machine learning and I apply and even I created my own data set. Uh, examining more than, uh, 450 articles. This was a huge job. And needs a really strong attention. So this is why ADHD is my superpower and autism, my superpower. Um, yes.

[00:17:44] Peter: What would you tell, what would you tell students or people who were in your position who might have been told that they were broken as well? What would you, what advice would you give to them?

[00:17:55] Gokcen: Um, the thing that really saved my life is, um, just accept yourself as you are, because you are incredible, whatever other people say. Um, And be always kind. This is for everyone. Uh, as Robin Williams said, this, the quote that I love so much: Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know, nothing about. Be kind, always. Because until the time of the diagnosis, I had so many tons of psychological problems. I even stay one month in mental health hospital, like a prison. I suicide twice, uh, heavy drugs. Therapies, tons of therapies. None of them worked. Everybody thought that you are not normal. You just want, don't want to be alive. But, um, but this is not true. Because if you can discover yourself, this is a gift, not a curse. Yeah. And after diagnosing all of the psychological problems just gone away. And I just right now use just one drug and this is for, to, to make it gradually decrease. Uh, and very soon that I will give up all the medicines I will take none of them.

[00:19:26] Peter: That is wonderful. What a great, what a great story. I love that, you know, when I saw your original tweet, I was sort of blown away about how anyone could be that sort of close-minded, um, especially in education where you're supposed to have an open mind, you're supposed to, uh, embrace that. But, um, it seems to me Gokcen that you've definitely come out on top of this, that you have, you have come out the winner in this story, and I hope that you keep writing and I hope that you keep tweeting and keep sharing your story with the world because you're an inspiration.

[00:19:54] Gokcen: Thank you so much. Uh, what happened lastly, I wanna share with you. I told my new supervisor about a bit about my situation, and she said; uh, you have had a bad experience, but, uh, don't be discouraged. I'm sure that, uh, you will be much more happier in here. Uh, there are bad peoples in the world, but fortunately they're good ones too. I am grateful to her. Uh, but when I said that I'm grateful she to accepted me, she said that I didn't do anything. You deserve it. We evaluated you as we did to all students. And you deserve it. This is so precious because people pity you uh, about your autism about your ADHD, and this is especially so in my country. But my dear supervisor treated me like she tries to everyone and she didn't show sympathy because I'm autistic. She said I was accepted because I deserved; this is so precious.

[00:21:00] Peter: I love that. I love that. What a wonderful story. Gokcen, Thank you so much for taking the time. My pleasure. Give us your, give us your Twitter account so people can follow you.

[00:21:09] Gokcen: Uh, sure. Um, my, my, uh, name with, uh, letters, uh, G K C N S H N. This is my Twitter. Thank you so much.

[00:21:21] Peter: This. Awesome. Thank, thank you so much for taking the time. We're definitely gonna have you back in several months to talk about, to give us an update on what's going on.

[00:21:28] Gokcen: Thank you so much. You can.

[00:21:30] Peter: All right guys, as always, thanks for listening to fast than normal. We will see you next week with a brand new episode. Hopefully I'll be back in my office and not in our hotel room and we will talk to you soon. Stay safe, stay well.

Credits: You've been listening to the Faster Than Normal podcast. We're available on iTunes, Stitcher and Google play and of course at www.FasterThanNormal.com I'm your host, Peter Shankman and you can find me at shankman.com and @petershankman on all of the socials. If you like what you've heard, why not head over to your favorite podcast platform of choice and leave us a review, come more people who leave positive reviews, the more the podcast has shown, and the more people we can help understand that ADHD is a gift, not a curse. Opening and closing themes were composed and produced by Steven Byrom who also produces this podcast, and the opening introduction was recorded by Bernie Wagenblast. Thank you so much for listening. We'll see you next week!

Ashley Brown teaches Coastal Kayaking, Stand Up Paddleboarding, and Instructor Development at the College of Charleston. She has developed these paddlesports courses over the past decade to include Sustainability Literacy and a First Year Experience course with a Biology class. Learning about sustainability and sharing it with the students led Ashley to start a Masters of Art at Prescott College in Outdoor Education Leadership. She only has a few more classes before she finishes her degree. Ashley shares her passion for teaching kayaking at all levels and challenging people to test their limits while learning and having a ton of fun. She has been developing a curriculum in Kayaking, SUP, and Instructor Development at the College of Charleston, where Ashley serves as an Adjunct Professor. Ashley is the recipient of the American Canoe Association 2019 Excellence in Instruction Award. This award is presented annually to an ACA member for outstanding contributions to paddlesports education and instruction. She earned the prestigious Level 5 American Canoe Association Advanced Open Water Coastal Kayaking Instructor Certification and is also an ACA Level 4 Kayak Instructor Trainer, Canoe Instructor, and L2 Standup Paddleboard Instructor. Ashley serves as a member of the executive committee of the Safety, Education, and Instruction Committee for the American Canoe Association. She loves to travel and has gone from Canada to Mexico and beyond, sharing her talent and knowledge with clubs, groups, schools, outfitters, events, and symposiums. Residing in Charleston, SC, she enjoys welcoming guests from all over the world to paddle in Charleston's beautiful waterways. One of her favorite venues is the "Edge of America", the Atlantic Ocean off Folly Beach. She provides paddlers an opportunity to have an exciting experience and widen their perspectives. Today we're talking about how and why she got diagnosed, how an ADHD/ADD brain can often serve as a prerequisite, and what being buoyant may do for the ADHD in you! Enjoy!

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In this episode Peter and Ashley discuss:

00:45 - Thank you so much for listening and for subscribing!

00:50 - Apologies for the near horrid audio- Peter is in a tourist-filled lobby today.

01:05 - Intro and welcome Ashley Brown!

01:53 - When were you first diagnosed and how did it happen?

03:00 - What was the first big change you felt after your diagnosis?

03:56 - What inspired you to seek out aquatic sports & activities; and to teach them?

05:33 - Do you experience sort of a rebirth every time you go kayaking; like I do when skydiving or running?

06:00 - On the good kind of exhaustion and a completely focused flow.

07:18 - How does scanning a wave, being outdoors and on the water help your ADHD?

08:56 - I had never thought of ADHD/ADD as a requirement for something! For what else could ADHD possibly be a prerequisite?

09:40 - On the importance of physical movement!

11:30 - How can people find more about you? [Ashley isn't a public figure but you can check into her courses via Web: www.wavepaddler.com and on their Facebook page here]

12:34 - Guys, as always thanks so much for subscribing! Do you have a cool friend with a great story? We'd love to hear. I'm www.petershankman.com and you can reach out anytime via email at [email protected] or @petershankman on all of the socials. You can also find us at @FasterNormal on all of the socials. It really helps when you drop us a review on iTunes and of course, subscribe to the podcast if you haven't already! As you know, the more reviews we get, the more people we can reach. Help us to show the world that ADHD is a gift, not a curse!

19:08 - Faster Than Normal Podcast info & credits

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TRANSCRIPT via Descript and then corrected.. somewhat:

[00:00:38] Peter Shankman good morning. I am coming to you today from the lounge at a Hilton in Midtown Manhattan because, uh, my apartment was supposed to be finished two weeks ago for all my renovations and it's not, and I am living the Dylan McKay life here in New York Hilton in Midtown. For those not old enough to understand what the Dylan McKee lifestyle is? Well, look it up. Your parents knew. Anyway, welcome to another episode Faster Than Normal. Uh, I apologize in advance for all the background noise. Ashley Brown is joining us today. Ashley, get this we're going outdoors today, even though I'm sitting in a lounge in mid Manhattan, we're going outdoors. The great big ocean. to the coast. We're gonna talk to Ashley Brown who teaches coastal kayaking standup paddle boarding and instructed development of the college of Charleston. She's ADHD. She's developed these paddle sports courses over the past decade to include sustainability literacy and her first year experience course to the biology class. This is a very, very cool stuff. She got diagnosed when her kid did, as we hear so much about .Ashley, welcome to Faster Than Normal. Let's talk about some outdoors and how it relates to ADHD.

[00:01:39] Ashley: Hi! Hi, thank you so much for having me. And, um, I am really excited to talk to you. I've enjoyed listening to your podcast and I have to admit I'm a bit nervous. I hope that I hope this goes well.

[00:01:51] Peter: . You're gonna be, you're gonna be fine. Don't worry about it. So tell me when you tell me when you first got diagnosed and how did it happen?

[00:01:56] Ashley: Um, my daughter was in around third grade and, um, she had hit like unbelievable benchmarks in, in, in intelligence as a, as a little kid, you know, when they do those, pull you out, testing things to put 'em in gifted and talented and stuff. And then suddenly she couldn't read, you know, she wasn't reading, uh, at her, at her pace had had had just stopped. So we discovered that she had dyslexia and, uh, ADHD, and, uh, as we are moving through all those, those categories, I'm going, yep. That's me. That's me. That's me. And of course, this is something that, um, I, I understand a lot of adults have had that experience. So, so I got diagnosed when she got diagnosed and, uh, same thing, dyslexia, ADHD, and, uh, it's, it's interesting to hit it at, you know, 40 versus eight, you know, so

[00:02:55] Peter: I was gonna say, so you lived your life, not knowing anything about it, sort of similar to the way I did. I didn't get diagnosed in my late thirties and, um, what was the, what was sort of the first cha big changes that you saw in yourself once you, once you got that diagnosis?

[00:03:06] Ashley: Um, changes in myself, I guess, I guess maybe just like forgiving myself for being me, I don't know. Um, like suddenly.

[00:03:20] Peter: That's actually a, that's a pretty huge answer. A pretty huge answer. Cause a lot of people don't realize that I, I went through the same thing.

[00:03:25] Ashley: Yeah, no, I, uh, I always just, you know, why can't you do your taxes on time? Why can't, why do you have to work at a de at a critical deadline? Like, why can't you do this ahead of time? Like, um, so many of. So many other things that ADHD, people struggle with. Like, um, and I, I guess I cut myself a little more slack, not enough, not, not enough, but a lot more slack than I used to. Like now I have a reason, you know?

[00:03:53] Peter: Well, we'll never cut ourselves enough slack that's for darn sure. But, okay. So tell me about how outdoors, how did you, first of all, how'd you get started in, in the classes of paddle boarding and kayak and all that, all that stuff outdoors. And what prompted you to say, Hey, there should be, there should be a school or classes.

[00:04:07] Ashley: Well, um, so it, the, all the school and the classes are there it's, um, I didn't create that, but I just brought it in a different venue. So, um, I, um, I was, I, my first career was an artist and an art teacher and I was, uh, teaching. and it, it just, it just, you know, it, it's a pretty punishing, um, field. Uh, and I, I, I never was super successful with it. And then teaching children and then having children, it was just so many children and so much mess in my life that I, uh, I had a neighbor who said, Hey, you should come kayaking. And I went kayaking with a bunch of adults who I didn't have to clean up after. And I was like, ah, I can do this. And I, um, I just made some, made some major changes and I really went. Uh, full force into kayaking and stand and, uh, and then loved it. And I live in a place I live in Charleston, South Carolina, and, um, there is nothing but water around here. So there's so many places to explore and so many, uh, dynamic environments to, uh, get to know. So, um, I shifted from teaching, uh, children to taking people on kayak tours and all this stuff. And then, um, I met an instructor with the College of Charleston and, and. Uh, opened up some doors to me and I, I ended up with a full-time job teaching, uh, paddle sports at, uh, college level.

[00:05:31] Peter: I'm gonna go into a limb and say that paddle boarding or paddle sports or anything like that is similar for the brain as skydiving or running is for me. Would that be correct? Are you, is it a rebirth for you every time you do.

[00:05:42] Ashley: Rebirth. Hmm. I don't know. I don't know, rebirth and it, and it, and it is exciting and fun. And particularly when you do surf, so I'm guessing that skydiving and, and actually hearing that crashing wave behind you kind of stuff is this is similar.

[00:05:57] Peter: Tell me how you feel when you're done. You come back to land.

[00:05:59] Ashley: The good exhaustion. Just space, that's it? Yeah. That's yeah. Um, so, and, and when I, when I bring people into it, I love their, uh, reaction to it. And I love the layering cuz. And I think that this is one of the things that I was that I wrote to you and the reason I wanted to, to talk to you, and I think that the layering of, of understanding the environment and watching the student and understanding where the student is is, has it. It it's that flow, right? Where you, where your brain is working on all the levels in the environment you're in. This is, this is probably the only thing I've ever done, where I wasn't also having a conversation with, you know, somebody from a year ago and writing a grocery list, you know, at all three going on at the same time. So, so it is the only place where my entire, where all of my attention is, is layered into there. So, so I love that. And then that puts me in that good exhaustion.

[00:06:56] Peter: Well, there's a level of focus there, right? I mean, you absolutely, you have no choice. You have to look at what you're doing. You have to focus on what you're doing. You have to pay attention to what you're doing. You can't do a hundred of those things. It's the same thing with skydiving and, and for people with ADHD, we don't often realize that we realize that is the, the level at which we thrive!

[00:07:11] Ashley: Right. Exactly. Exactly. It's um, it is definitely the level where you thrive.

[00:07:18] Peter: Tell me about, um, how it helps, how doing that helps your ADHD. Tell me about, uh, sort of how your brain reacts to that kinda stuff to, to being outdoors, to being on the water, to, to scanning the wave.

[00:07:29] Ashley: Okay. Um, so, so I came in to ADHD later, I did not understand the dopamine thing. Um, Prior to it, but now I understand and I, and I seek the, and I identify the things that give me that pleasure, that dopamine rush. So sometimes you're bored out of your mind of course, but then when you, when you can find the things that are giving you pleasure, like the, like moving very quickly through the water or looking at a reflection of a surface and, and, um, and so seeking those things has, or, or, you know, seeking that experience through somebody else's experience. So I'm watching, I'm watching 20 year olds figure out how to make their body work in a new way and how to make a boat, move, move through waves and stuff in a, in a, um, in a, something that they're not familiar with. It is, it is exciting in, and then that really does feed the, um, that dopamine receptor, I suppose. And, um, gives me a pleasure that, that, uh, I don't know that I, that I, I guess I had is with an art with art, but I had gotten so done with it with art. But anyway, um.

[00:08:40] Peter: That's a good answer. I wanna read something that you wrote in, in your email to me, you said, I think that or ADHD is practically a requirement for outdoor educators. They problem solve on the go keep people safe while putting them in intentionally risky situations and manage their expectations to keep it engaging, but not scary. You know, I've never thought of it that way. ADHD is a requirement for something, right. We always look at it as a gift and, and, and something beneficial. I've never thought it as a requirement. I wonder what other things a ADD could be a requirement for? What do you think?

[00:09:08] Ashley: Um, gosh, I don't know. Um, the, the it's back to that multi layering thing, it's, it's, it's seeing some body and their process and a situation that needs your undivided attention as well. So probably teaching someone to skydive or teaching someone to do other things that are risky. Um, Ropes courses. Those are, yeah, those,

[00:09:32] Peter: I mean, I think, I think along the lines that, that, you know, one of the things about ADD & ADHD is we have that incredible power to hyper focus. Right. Right. When we want to focus on something, we are there 100%. And I don't think that a lot of, a lot of people, without ADHD, really understand how that works. And so I think in that regard, it's probably very beneficial for us. Um,

[00:09:50] Ashley: you know, and also the busy bodiness like the, the physical, um, Busyness is, is, uh, is key. So I think a lot of people that, that engage in that, like that come to an outdoor education experience and enjoy it, but don't want to be in it constantly. They need to think while sitting still or being still. And I, and I, I don't know how you are, but I never stop moving so it's a, it's a perfect thing for me to, to keep moving, to keep thinking. I,

[00:10:22] Peter: I think it's the same it's same reason. Yeah. It makes perfect sense. It's the same reason that, you know, my, my parents always told me as a kid, no listening to music while you're studying, but it turns out that listening to music is actually the best possible thing. Someone like us could do. No question about.

[00:10:33] Ashley: Absolutely. And like, um, um, teaching kids. Well, my own children. Teaching kids like the multiplication tables or reading stories out loud or whatever, when they were tiny. If they, it, my, my little one was jumping around the whole time and, and I, and I would go, you know, what did I just say? And she could repeat it, back like just like word for word. But if I, you know, she just couldn't sit still to do that. So. No question. And, and I related to that, so I didn't try to get her to sit still. I went to Catholic school and I was required to sit still. So ,

[00:11:09] Peter: I went to school in the seventies and I was, yeah, in the seventies, it was sort of the same way. And lemme tell you something that didn't work really well for me either. No. And that was a public school too.

[00:11:17] Ashley: Not a big fan of the sitting still

[00:11:20] Peter: Ashley, how could people find out more? How can they find you? Do you have an Instagram, you have things where people could find your great, you sent me some great photos of paddle boarding and all that stuff. The places people could find this stuff?

[00:11:28] Ashley: Um, so I have a website wave paddler.com and, um, I am, I, I actually am not I'm, I'm not a public personality in the, in this, in the way that you are. I don't have something that I'm trying to convey to people. [Ashley isn't a public figure but you can check into her courses via Web: www.wavepaddler.com and on their Facebook page here] Um, I just loved your show and I wanted to talk with you. And, uh, and, um, I don't know. I really do appreciate my ADHD!

[00:11:51] Peter: Good enough. Yeah. As you should, we're trying to change the world. Not everyone has to be a celebrity and everyone has to be, uh, famous. We could be like, you know, regular normal people, just, just doing the best they can with the tools that they've been given. Ashley Brown. Thank you so much for sticking around and coming on the show and, uh, stay on the water and keep having fun!

[00:12:07] Ashley: Thank you. You too! Come and paddle with me sometime.

[00:12:09] Peter: Most certainly will. Guys, as always, we've been listening the fast than normal. Sorry again about the background. Apparently every loud person, who's a tourist in New York happens to be in this lounge right at this very moment. But I'm hoping that the next time we talk, I'll be back in my apartment where it's much quieter. We will see you next week. If you like what you heard, leave us a review in any of the stations, any of the places you download your podcasts. My name is Peter Shankman @PeterShankman all the socials. And thank you for listening. We'll see you next week. ADHD is a gift not a curse.

Credits: You've been listening to the Faster Than Normal podcast. We're available on iTunes, Stitcher and Google play and of course at www.FasterThanNormal.com I'm your host, Peter Shankman and you can find me at shankman.com and @petershankman on all of the socials. If you like what you've heard, why not head over to your favorite podcast platform of choice and leave us a review, come more people who leave positive reviews, the more the podcast has shown, and the more people we can help understand that ADHD is a gift, not a curse. Opening and closing themes were composed and produced by Steven Byrom who also produces this podcast, and the opening introduction was recorded by Bernie Wagenblast. Thank you so much for listening. We'll see you next week!

André Brisson, P. Eng., is the host of The Impulsive Thinker Podcast, the podcast for the high-achieving ADHD entrepreneur. Andre owns an entrepreneurial consulting engineering company and recently started Tactical Breakthroughs where he is developing the ADHDTransformation Journey program. Diagnosed late in life with severe ADHD and mild Asperger's(ASD), the mechanisms and systems he created to overcome his undiagnosed ADHD havehelped him succeed. He credits his undiagnosed ADHD as key to his success and a factor in restricting success. Since discovering how to turn his ADHD into a strength, people havesought him out for help with using their ADHD as a strength to drive success. André Brisson has a special ability is devouring and learning complex information and simplifying for others to solve complex problems. Like most entrepreneurs, André has started multiple companies, the two of which failed for various reasons. Learning from those failures, André now operates three very successful companies, including a self-managing entrepreneurial engineering firm specializing in niche markets that require unique training, experience, and impulsive instinct to try new things. Enjoy!

In this episode Peter and Andre discuss:

00:45 - Thank you so much for listening and for subscribing!

00:48 - Welcome Andre Brisson!

02:40 - What is your success key for imparting complex information to the neurotypical? Ref: Ringette

04:15 - Simplifying the complex

05:06 - On the differences between informing and teaching

05:30 - When did you get diagnosed and what brought all that about?

06:02 - On inventing a "character" for yourself to be perceived as "not abnormal".

07:00 - On then importance of being unique

07:45 - You said you were beginning to scare your kids- can you go into details on that? Ref: emotional dysregulation

09:55 - Have you ever bought anything strictly on impulse? Tell us in the comments! ;-)

11:00 - Parenting with ADHD/mild Asperger's prior to a diagnosis

12:20 - So when you got diagnosed, what was the treatment plan? Ref: DBT, CBT Executive Function What is Time Blindness?

13:36 - On learning your strengths and maintaining, managing and delegating what's not best for you. Aka Peter's "life rules"

15:15 - A bit more on delegating and staying in the lane, on the road.

16:38 - How can people find more about you? Email: [email protected]

André Brisson

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/andre.brisson.1447/

LinkedIN: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrebrisson/

Twitter: @fatrol

Website: www.andreb.ca

Objective Engineering Inc.

Website: www.objectiveeng.ca

Tactical Breakthroughs

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TacticalBTs

LinkedIN: https://www.linkedin.com/company/tactical-breakthroughs/

Twitter: @tacticalbts

Website: www.tacticalbts.com

The Impulsive Thinker Podcast

Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/impulsivethinkerpodcast

LinkedIN: https://www.linkedin.com/company/impulsive-thinker-podcast/

Twitter: @impulsivthinker

Website: www.theimpulsivethinker.com

16:51 - Andre, thank you so much! Ref: Faster Than Normal the book!

17:75 - Thank you. Guys, as always thanks so much for subscribing! Do you have a cool friend with a great story? We'd love to hear. I'm www.petershankman.com and you can reach out anytime via email at [email protected] or @petershankman on all of the socials. You can also find us at @FasterNormal on all of the socials. It really helps when you drop us a review on iTunes and of course, subscribe to the podcast if you haven't already! As you know, the more reviews we get, the more people we can reach. Help us to show the world that ADHD is a gift, not a curse!

19:08 - Faster Than Normal Podcast info & credits

—

TRANSCRIPT via Descript and then corrected.. somewhat:

[00:00:38] Hey everyone, Peter. Shankman welcome to the episode of Faster Than Normal. I'm thrilled that you're here. It is great to have you again, we have a fun guest today. I'm gonna start with his tagline because his tagline pretty much says everything ;it's simplifying your complexities, which I think is just the best description I've ever heard of someone who works with people with A D D ADHD, people who are. ADHD. I love that. It's just so clear. Andre, Brisson and I, I screwed it up. I tried my was really hard to get. That was good. Was good's the host of the Impulsive Thinker podcast, very similar to FTN. Podcast for high achieving ADHD entrepreneurs. He owns an entrepreneur consulting engineering company, and recently started another company called Tactical Breakthroughs where he's developing an ADHD transformation journey program. He was diagnosed later in life with severe ADHD and mild Asperger's and the mechanisms and systems he created much like the stuff I did to overcome his undiagnosed ADHD have helped him succeed and he credits his undiagnosed as a key to his success and a factor in restricting success as well. So that's ING to discover, um, Since discovering how to turn his ADHD into a strength people have out for help using their ADHD as well.\ You talk in your bio about how you have special ability for taking complex information and simplifying for others and first thought, when I heard that was something that happened with me. And I think my mom, like five years ago when she got a new iPhone and she was having a problem doing like four things. And so I just went over there. The their, my parents' apartment. And I'm like, here, gimme the phone done. Dun dun dun. She's like, great, but I didn't learn how to do it. Right. Right. And I realized I'm terrible at taking complex information that I understand and teaching people how to understand it. I just want to do it and get it done. That's an ADHD thing. So let's, let's start there. What is, what is your sort of success key there where you actually have the ability and the, the patience or whatever it is to take that information and simplify it down so other people can learn it as opposed to just doing it for them.

[00:02:55] Andre: Well, the, to me, that's the key difference is I don't do it for them. I've always helped people understand, break down something complex into simple steps or layman terms so that they can act on it. And then they can think about it differently to act on it at a future time. Um, like for example, and on in Canada here, we have Ringette. It's a, it's a, it's a sport on ice for women. So basically they got a rubber ring with a spear, their stick. And I, I referee then I was in an evaluator and, uh, an officially evaluator. So what I actually did was I always asked them what's. The rule, like usually you guys say this occurred, this occurred that I call it right or not. So I go by and says, what's the rule. The rule says this. And then we break down the steps of what occurred and apply the actual rule to those steps. So I step it out for people so that they can understand it. And if you don't understand the first way, I tackle it at a different angle until they get it. And what I'm trying to teach them is stepping out the thought process to come with their own conclusions, with the facts that they know they already had. And didn't realize it. Okay.

[00:04:04] Peter: That makes sense. Yeah, it does. It does. It's interesting. Cause that, that takes patience and, and that's one of the few things that most people with ADHD simply don't have anywhere near half of.

[00:04:15] Andre: Mm-hmm yeah. The thing is a lot of times I can simplify that complex information. So someone understands it and so that they can act on it and I can make it real. So usually I, I I'm able to connect something that's in their life or someone else's life or mine. And that's what I do a lot on the podcast is this is a snare that happened. It kind of happened to me. And then people, once you make it real people seem to click with it better.

[00:04:39] Peter: Yeah. Makes sense. And, and yeah, I mean, that's, that's a, a, you know, my keynote speaking trait, you tell stories that people have people who relate to and all of a sudden, it's not some guy on stage talking about something foreign, it's something. Oh yeah. I get that.

[00:04:51] Andre: Yeah. I. I had a chat today with two different people. We, I kind of, I blurted this out and I thought it was pretty smart now to think about it now, but I think there's a difference between informing to understand versus educating, to teach. So if, and for me, I was talking about advocacy as you know, I, I stopped educating people. I just tried to inform people so they can understand adult ADHD and the differences.

[00:05:17] Peter: That makes a lot of sense. I think that also the more informed they are, the more they feel like they can have a handle on it, as opposed to. I guess educating. Yeah. Yeah. They might not necessarily get, no. That makes sense. Tell us about, um, your background. You said you were late, you were late, uh, diagnosed how late?

[00:05:36] Andre: Uh, about four years ago when I was 44. Oh, wow. Um, and then that was a, that was all because of a life Tempest. As I've been calling had three perfect storms collide at once. Um, got into a bad business partnership. I got bored with my first company once it got successful. So I S sabatoged that. Things weren't going well at home. And my Sy symptoms overtook me and controlled me for a couple of years to the point where my kids are just looking at me scared. And I said, I gotta get help. Huh. And got the diagnosis. I went actually to get the diagnosis to prove it wasn't ADHD. Cause I thought there was something worse, wrong with me. Because that diagnosis, like it was too simple of a solution to explain my last 44 years and develop a character that I became so I can fit in and not be looked as abnormal. And then, so I got really good at playing this character. Now I'm learning how to be me and to differentiate the two, because it almost became, you know, I almost, I brainwashed myself to believe that that was the person I was or shouldn't be.

[00:06:38] Peter: No, I get that. I mean, it's, it's, you know, fitting in and not being, uh, you know, and not sort of ever really fitting in with the crowd or with, with, uh, any group in, in school, you know, and that takes a toll. I don't think, I think we're just starting to realize what kind of toll that takes on people, um, and how much, uh, that that's re you know, those early forming, forming years are really responsible for sort of right. The kinda stuff you deal with.

[00:07:03] Andre: And then I was overlooked because I was doing well in school. Like I'm also gifted. Um, and so since you're successful and you're doing well in school, you can't have it. You're just not doing what you're supposed to. You're not trying to hard enough for, you know, stop being unique. That was my favorite word. You're too unique to be part of this and I've always fought the right to be unique. And I always thought we should all, we're all different. I understood why we were always trained to say we're everyone's alike, but we're not. We're all unique.

[00:07:35] Peter: So what, when you get, I'm curious, you mentioned something, you said, um, you said you had symptoms that were starting to, uh, that were starting to scare your kids. Ex can you go into detail on that?

[00:07:47] Andre: Oh, emotional dysregulation times 2 million. Um, it didn't take much to spark me off. And then all I would do was I'd just be screaming at them for something silly. And when I started being cognizant of a screaming at them, for being silly, my brain was actually saying, Hey buddy, you're overreacting here. You should stop. And then I got the other part of my brain going, eh, forget it. Let's keep going. I'm already into it. Um, so when I saw those look in their eyes, it gave me a. It scared me cuz I saw myself. Um, there when I was a child and that's when I said no, no more, no more. So I went and got help. So the emotional dysregulation definitely took over, um, and enforced, uh, and then my impulsivity and the no filter uh, aspect of my brain having no filter, just my impulsivity, my ver my words would just come out and I just started not caring anymore. And that's when I said that, that, that the symptoms took over, um, impulsive bias, impulsive business partnerships, knowing that it was not going to be good. Um, and for me, I realized with time, since my diagnosis, I have a fear of being idle and when I get bored, that's when I could become dangerous. And that's when, so my physical hyperactivity, even at, as an adult kicks in, if I'm bored and then what happened was with my other company, once the startup phase was done and we're successful in maintaining success and having good gradual growth, I was bored. The, the entertainment, the interest was gone. So I created chaos. Impulsively trying this, trying that in muscle dysregulation, continuing. Um, and, and then just going on with the inattention, not caring, I had a really great point and it just escaped me. It'll come back to that's yeah.

[00:09:46] Peter: I mean, that's that happens all the time. You, you go down the route, press rabbit, home, like, wait, my original point was like five feet away from that. Yeah. Um, I think that probably, I think every episode

[00:09:55] Andre: and the impulsivity of buying stuff. You know, spending sling money, losing cash flow, all that type of stuff. That was it.

[00:10:03] Peter: It's interesting. I've never, I, I, I, I understand that. And I get that. I I'm fortunate. I don't think it ever, I never went down that rabbit hole too much, but I've certainly made impulse. I mean, you know, mm-hmm, virtually everything I've ever bought in my life has been impulse by, I, I do you wind up doing research on the product you bought after you bought it?

[00:10:22] Andre: um, No. I usually do all the research ahead of time. So I know what I'm buying is good is just deciding to do it. Like the one was, Hey, we got a bunch of cash in the bank account. Um, I've been looking at building a server. This is quite a few years ago getting a server for the office. We got a big team, so I'm just gonna blow 40 grand right now, rather on a finance plan. Um, cuz at the same time I didn't care. Um, which was part of it, which was the interest part. Um, but the other thing too Peter. I think that I think a lot of people are getting diagnosed later in life. And for me, I never realized this about two years ago was. It really started to take control. My symptoms. When I had kids, when they disrupted my, my rhythm at home, my routine at home, that was my calm down time. When I got home, I could rejuvenate and now having being stuck, cuz you're scheduled being disrupted all the time. Cuz kids just want to be with you. They just wanna last minute try different things and no, no, I like, I just sat down, I'm ready to do a bunch of stuff and now you're disrupting me. So that's when I think it started to steamroll the effects of these symptoms.

[00:11:35] Peter: I totally totally get that. It's it's a, having a kid. I got diagnosed before I had my daughter, but it was Def it's definitely a, um, you know, you sort of, you get this vibe where it's like, okay, uh, dinner's over, you know, I have an hour till I have to put her to bed, I'm gonna, you know, I'm gonna sit down and breathe and just whatever. And then it's like, dad play with me. And of course I, I will, but it took a while to sort of, uh, be able to focus entirely. Right, right. And

[00:12:01] Andre: not oh, huge. You know? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then you feel shitty as a, as a parent, cuz you can't give your full attention or you're always thinking, how can I get outta this? I , how can go back to what I was doing exactly. Cause I need to get that done. I gotta get it done. What's going on? Right?

[00:12:14] Peter: No question about it. So when, so when you got diagnosed, what, what was the, uh, what was the treatment plan? Was it medication? Was it, .

[00:12:22] Andre: We, uh, tried medication, uh, I think I'm part of that 20% that doesn't work well. Um, but I think the, some of the medication I was on at that time, I needed it just to settle and almost had stopped my brain for a while so I can just catch my breath and take everything in. And then, um, Slowly got off of it. Um, but for me, the big thing is I just hyper-focused for a good year and a half on learning everything I could about ADHD interesting and simplifying it. And that's why I tell people like educating yourself the effects and then is huge. And then I was part of therapy group therapy. Now I'm just finishing up my dialectal behavioral therapy. I've done cognitive behavioral therapy, ah, even the group therapy on how to have fun. But it was a neurotypical direction, but anyways, um, a lot of talking with similar people helped. And then for me to simplify ADHD down to, I think it's its core, it's an executive functioning dysfunction and time blindness. Those two affects the, the, the, the DSM symptoms of inattention hyperactivity, impulsivity, and inattention. Um, that made a lot of sense to me. And then at the same time, shortly before my ADHD diagnosis, I got diagnosed with type two diabetes. And that's when I realized I can't get rid of it. Like I diabetes, I can't get rid of it. Nothing I can do can cure it, but I can manage it and extend my life. And that's what I saw with ADHD. .Manage the symptoms so I can work well. And I had a mantra my whole time for a long time saying your strengths can become your weaknesses. And when I put that together with my ADHD symptoms, as long as I can manage my symptoms, That's how, why I succeed as an entrepreneur and those are my strengths, but if I let them go be overutilized or underutilized and then become my strengths. And that's when I say ADHD can become a disorder, is when they're impeding your day to day.

[00:14:23] Peter: I agree. I, I think it's another way of saying, you're saying the same thing that I say a different way, which is, you know, you have to have. These life rules that you can't deviate from because you know, you, your brain works a certain way. And so you put these right pro processes into place that allow you to utilize it to your best ability. Mm-hmm . And if you, if you deviate from that, you're gonna go off the road.

[00:14:42] Andre: Right. And, and then the other thing I discovered too, so for, I don't know, I can't do math. I'm an engineer. I need a calculator here. Um, so about a good 20 years, all I did was read all the self-help books. I've taken almost every assessment out there to identify strengths, but my therapist actually said you were doing all that to find out what was wrong with you to concentrate on what's not good enough to build on. So with my diagnosis, I took there's three good tools that I use that really identifies my talents and strengths. And. Take those. And I help people with these assessments too, to understand what's your unique strength and talent. So if we could just stay in those abilities, Then it's easy to hyperfocus and you're having a lot of fun and you're not, and don't waste your time on things you're not good at and you don't like doing that. So as an entrepreneur, it's handy, you, you got staff, you can have people, you delegate a lot of those, but I help people understand what their unique talents and strengths are, where they should be spending their time, where they can get a lot of energy and enjoyment every day, be creative and then have a team around you that just take care of the stuff you don't like.

[00:15:50] Peter: That's a hundred percent given you, have you have someone or people to do the stuff that you're terrible at? I mean, that's, you know, for 14 years now, I've had, I've had my assistant, it's a game changer.

[00:16:00] Andre: Yep. Like we got a minimal limited brain mental brain, uh, energy, right. Every day. And I think ADHD, we just have a really good ability to effectively use it to run all day, or we have a really great efficient way to inefficiently use our mental energy and at the end of the day, it, so if we're starting to do things we don't like to do all day, then we're really, really burnt out at the end of the day. But if we can stay in that lane, man, you can do that seven days straight and not get, get tired.

[00:16:29] Peter: It's a great way to put it. It's a great way to close too. I wanna keep us to our 20 minute mark. Uh, tell us how people could find you?

[00:16:36] Andre: Uh, you can find me at, uh, Andre, Andre, b.ca I'll take anyone's email. Um, but you can find me on LinkedIn. Our tactical bts.com is another source.

[00:16:47] Peter: We'll put all the, all the, all your links that you gave us. We'll put 'em in the, uh, in the podcast notes. Andre, thank you so much for taking the time. This was really, really informative. We're definitely gonna have you back, uh, at some point in the near future.

[00:16:57] Andre: Well, I appreciate you having me, Peter. And, um, like I said, like, I don't think I said this, but, uh, yet till now, um, you're Faster Than Normal book. I actually bought it five years ago, thinking it was one how I can work faster. then I bought it again, uh, and read it. And then I found the other book, but I think I really liked your aspect too, that, you know, it's not a disorder. It's our, it's a, it's a very unique ability of doing things and to not thinking as a negative. And, and make it work. And I really, a lot of stuff in there I re not reflected it hit me. I can, I understand exactly what was in there. And it was also comforting to know what I created in the past. Unknowingly. I was on the right track. So I thought it was a really good book and I do recommend it to a lot of people.

[00:17:45] Peter: Thank you, man. That's a really, really kind of you. Guys as always, Faster Than Normal, We wanna hear what you're thinking. We wanna hear of any guests you might wanna hear from, shoot us a, a email [email protected]. We're on all the socials. You know, our, our handles by now. Thank you for listening. We will see again next week with another guest, we appreciate you and know that ADHD and all forms of neurodiversity are gifts, not curses! We'll see you next week!

[00:19:08]Credits: You've been listening to the Faster Than Normal podcast. We're available on iTunes, Stitcher and Google play and of course at www.FasterThanNormal.com I'm your host, Peter Shankman and you can find me at shankman.com and @petershankman on all of the socials. If you like what you've heard, why not head over to your favorite podcast platform of choice and leave us a review, come more people who leave positive reviews, the more the podcast has shown, and the more people we can help understand that ADHD is a gift, not a curse. Opening and closing themes were composed and produced by Steven Byrom who also produces this podcast, and the opening introduction was recorded by Bernie Wagenblast. Thank you so much for listening. We'll see you next week!

Gili Malinsky is a lead work reporter at CNBC where she covers labor and employment law, U.S. work trends, and mental health. She has contributed to outlets including The New York Times, NBC News, MTV News, the Village Voice, and many others. She's also a playwright, having written a parody of the D.A.R.E. program called "The Drugstoppers" and, most recently, written and performed a monologue called "This is My First ADHD Support Group" at the New York Theater Festival. The monologue is loosely based on her experience getting let go and fired many times before discovering she has ADHD. She's planning to expand it into a full-length play also touching on anxiety and depression. Gili is an Aquarius, thank you for asking. This is another good and fun one, enjoy!

In this episode Peter and Gili discuss:

00:45 - Thank you so much for listening and for subscribing!

00:46 - Live again from the flop house…

01:21 - Welcome Gili Malinsky!

02:22 - Welcome fellow BU Alumn! When did you get diagnosed?

03:06 - Our stories are a little similar; what was it like for you growing up?

05:01 - What if we had known we had ADHD during college?

05:28 - Would Peter change anything about his life prior to his ADHD diagnosis?

06:16 - Would Gili change anything? How about her work experiences?

08:21 - Gili's first ADHD epiphany about work, (via therapy)

09:20 - On finding her condition actually has a name; not alone in this!

09:45 - A note on self-forgiveness

10:38 - Peter's "leftover pizza concept"

11:44 - Once diagnosed, what changed, what were you able to do, how do you keep on track?

13:30: Ref: Books! Smart But Stuck -Thomas E. Brown and Driven To Distraction -Edward M. Hallowell [Dr. Hallowell was Peter's first ever guest on FTN, you can hear his interview HERE!]

13:55 Ref: Peak Mind -Amishi Jha

14:36 -How do you handle deadlines?

15:49 - Talk about Imposter Syndrome?

16:55 - How can people find more about you?

On the Web: https://www.cnbc.com/gili-malinsky-bio/

Socials: @Malinskid on Twitter & INSTA

17:42 - Thank you. Guys, as always thanks so much for subscribing! Do you have a cool friend with a great story? We'd love to hear. I'm www.petershankman.com and you can reach out anytime via email at [email protected] or @petershankman on all of the socials. You can also find us at @FasterNormal on all of the socials. It really helps when you drop us a review on iTunes and of course, subscribe to the podcast if you haven't already! As you know, the more reviews we get, the more people we can reach. Help us to show the world that ADHD is a gift, not a curse!

19:08 - Faster Than Normal Podcast info & credits

TRANSCRIPT via Descript and then corrected.. somewhat:

[00:00:36] Peter: Peter Shankman yo, yo, what's up everyone. Peter Shankman here from Faster Than Normal . Another episode. I am thrilled to have you with me. I am doing this again from the flop house. Reason I began started telling you about the flop house with my apartment. I had the massive water issue and, and it's finally being renovated. Uh, so I, in New York, you can't just move your stuff to another room. You actually have to move it out of your apartment. So a bunch of men came and they packed up everything I owned ever in my life, and they took it to some storage unit in Queens. I threw an air tag into a couple of boxes and I, I, I look at the air tag and remember, like, I used to have a Peloton and I used to have a bed and I used to have all this stuff. And now I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm on a couch in a one bedroom down in . Battery park city. And it's, it's a little odd. Either way life goes on as, as does Faster Than Normal!

Welcome to the stage today, Gili and I probably, I probably just pronounced that wrong, even though she told me 10 seconds ago ahead pronounce so welcome to a ADD, Malinsky who is a lead. Did I pronounce it wrong? Gili Malinsky is a lead work reporter at CNBC. All right, so we're talking about some business press today. She covers labor and employment law, US work trends and . Mental health. She contributes to outlets, including New York times, NBC news, MTV, the Village Voice, and many others. She's also a playwright. She's written the parody of the dare program, which I love because D.A.R.E did more to introduce me to drugs than ever keep me off of it. And that's called The Drugstoppers . And most recently she wrote and performed a monologue called This Is My First ADHD support group at the New York Theater Festival. I love that the monologue is based loose on her experience, getting, let, go and fired many times before discovering she had ADHD welcome to my world. She's planning to expand into a full length play. Also touching an anxiety and depression. Love that. And I love that she puts . She ends her bio with Gili's an Aquarius. Thank you for asking. welcome to FTN you're awesome. I love you already.

[00:02:19] Gili: Oh, thank you so much. Yaaaay!

[00:02:22] Peter: So I just also share with both Terriers, you went to Boston University, you graduated mm-hmm um, uh, 94 0 4, 14 years after me. Yeah. So, whatever . So you went to BU when did you get diagnosed? You get diagnosed at school or after school? After school?

[00:02:36] Gili: No, I got diagnosed when I was 33. So I got diagnosed three years ago in that 2019. Yeah.

[00:02:41] Peter: That was about the same age as me. Um, yeah. Wow. But what was it like for you? Cause for me, everyone listened to this podcast knows I, I was. Had the social acuity of a turnip and, and, you know, barely passed by the skin of my teeth. I mean, I was at BU in the college and general studies with literally a D plus average until I got into, uh, college communications where it's like, oh, I Al I have to do is write? Okay. Here. And, you know, went to A's, but it was, it was brutal. I was on academic probation for like four years. How did you, what, what was your story like growing up? Tell us.

[00:03:07] Gili: Sure. So I, uh, I'm the listed three grew up just that's out of Boston in a town called Newton. My brother was diagnosed with ADHD when he was pretty young. I think he was like, it must have been when he was in middle school. Um, so it was sort of always like in the background as just. Something that we knew was in the family, but I, I didn't really get too deep into it. I don't think that he and I even really talked about it until the last few years. And, um, I was always like a, you know, pretty good student was always genuinely interested in school, kind of a big nerd, really liked learning things and was always really engaged, um, by what we were doing. So. I think, and, and I learned fast, you know, even if I wasn't necessarily always paying attention, like it just, I had a good enough brain to soak up the information and I was super engaged, uh, that I just like did pretty well in school. At BU I think, I mean, definitely the stakes got higher. There was a lot more work to do. I, I don't think that, um, The concept of working harder, really computed for me. Whereas like I did pretty again, I did pretty well in high school and I think that like I did all my assignments and stuff. I mean, there were certainly things that I did very, very last minute, which, you know, our people know all about. Um, but, um, at school at when I got to BU I think like suddenly they were like really piling on the work and I, how to get myself to do like. More work to be more planned about doing the work to not leave everything to the last second, I think was really beyond me. And then I was so far, you know, so far away from my diagnosis, but it certainly wouldn't have occurred to me that something was, you know, quote unquote wrong at that point. So I think I, I was like to be honest again, because I was genuinely interested in everything and, um, you know, curious to learn, I, I. Probably like a A's, B's some C's it wasn't as good as in high school, but it was, I wasn't a terrible student. I, I could have done better though. Like had I known, had I known, um, I definitely could have done better, but, uh,

[00:04:55] Peter: I think that's the that's isn't isn't that though the, the catch phrase of anyone, with ADHD early lives I could done better. Had I known.

[00:05:01] Gili: Yeah, totally. And I it's so interesting because like now having reported on ADHD and adults with it, like I've, I've heard of this, this thing of sort of, um, the depression that the diagnosis sets on, because there's this looking back and thinking like how much better you could have done, how much more you could have achieved off until this point? I will say I did not experience that personally, but yes. Thinking back, like I know I could have done better.

[00:05:24] Peter: Um, you know, it's interesting. Go ahead. Go ahead. No, no, no, please. Yeah. What's interesting about that is I was, I was about to comment that neither have, I, I haven't either. Um, I am very much of the belief and look, maybe this is just something I've been telling myself to, to, to, to, you know, get through it. But I am of the belief that. All the crap that I had to put up with in high school, in college, almost failing out, having very few friends, being that awkward. I am a, I, I, everyone says, what would you go back and change? I wouldn't change a thing. Yeah. Cause I'm like the believe that everything that, that I got everything, I survived, everything. I learned how to do everything that brought me to this moment to is, is what got me to where I am right now. All that. I mean, it was a nightmare. I wouldn't wish some of those days coming home and just crying myself sleep from weeks on end. I wouldn't wish that on anyone, but yeah, I, I believed that I wouldn't be anywhere near whatever level of success I've reached in my life had it not been for ADHD.

[00:06:16] Gili: Totally. Yeah. That resonates so much. Uh, yeah. And which I, and that actually like brings me to, um, the sort of work world, which is really where I started getting into trouble. Um, because I also yeah. Went through a lot of hardship when I came to that. So, so yeah, I think, um, went to school for journalism, kind of always knew that that the very least I wanted to start my career as a writer there. Um, you know, don't see an end insight right now, really love being a journalist, but, um, yes, I've definitely been dabbling with other things, but, um, I started, you know, I was like freelancing for a lot of these publications. Some of them you read in my bio and then, um, started getting staff, writing gigs at, you know, major media outlets. Um, and I kept fucking up, like, so, you know, I, uh, was just getting super overwhelmed. They were giving me these like very straightforward tasks and it was just like, my brain could not handle them. It could not organize them, you know, could not help me like do them in methodical ways. It would. So much information all at once. And like, all I could do was just sit in my computer and stare at my email or look at YouTube. Like it was just, it was so, too much, too much all at once. Um, you know, I would miss a lot of deadlines and, uh, you know, I would like prefer to do the easier tasks and the harder ones that were really like the crux of the job anyway. Um, and so, um, I ended up getting let go. You know, and it's, oh, there's, you know, you get, let go for lots of reasons, but, but certainly like looking back, I know that that played into it, um, because I can see the fuckups that I made along the way, you know, this happened time and time again. And like you said, like it, you know, It's really heartbreaking. I think like we live in this very individualistic society that tells us if something like that happens, it's only your fault. Um, you know, and if it keeps happening then, like, what is the, what is the conclusion that I can come to? Like other than that I'm a fuck up myself, you know, that something is deeply broken and wrong with me. Yeah. Um, and so, yeah, it was very miserable. I was broke, um, and I felt like an idiot and I, I, I hated myself. Um, and then I think after the, I don't remember what, how many times this happened before I finally, uh, was talking to my therapist and was telling her that I have this like motivation thing at work, or like four or five months into a job. Like I just lose all motivation and it's I want the job. I always want the job, but I'm just like sitting there. Like trying to force myself, trying to, will myself to do the work. And like, everything is slower. And I I'm like going home and reading productivity hack articles and like nothing works. Um, and she was like, you know, that could be ADHD. Like, have you been tested for that? Uh, and I said, no, uh, I haven't, my brother has it. Uh, but no, I that's. That's something that it, you know, I've gotten tested for. Um, and I did. And lo and behold, I have it.

[00:09:03] Peter: nice to put a name to everything that you've experienced

[00:09:05] Gili: Well, that's the thing, is that like, for me having a name, like even before I was officially diagnosed just that morning when she said that I might have it, like I cried the rest of the morning because it was. Oh like, yes, exactly. This has a name. If this is what it is, it has a name. Um, I'm not crazy. There is something about me because you know, you can see the people around you are functioning differently, that they're processing information differently from you and that you just can't get yourself to work in the same way. And suddenly it was like, oh, I'm not crazy. Like, there really is something in my brain that is making it difficult for me to, to perform in the, you know, in the same way that they are. And also like maybe I can actually forgive myself. Like that was the big thing for me. I think like it was less looking back and being really upset at everything you could have done and more like, oh, like maybe I don't have to have this growing anger inside of me, this growing self hatred. And I can kind of just start to let that go.

[00:10:02] Peter: It's funny. I, I, I, I, I try to, I make light of that. Sometimes I make light of the fact that what you said specifically about how you are, uh, you know, other people do things and don't seem to have the same problems that you do, and you're watching them do these things. And I think that I've always had that and it's always been frustra, even knowing what I have and knowing that the things I do. Work. Right. Like, you know, I get up at four in the morning to exercise before my day mm-hmm so I have the Dopamine I needed, but every once in, so while I'm like, God damn it, why do I have to do that? Why do people do, why can people sleep in until six or seven, then just go to work and be on. And, you know, but I always make a joke out of it. I talk about, you know, I call it the leftover pizza concept that, that, that. Other people, they work a full day. They come home. They, I don't wanna cook 'em so they order a pizza. They eat order pizza. They have two slices. They put the rest of in the fridge. That's leftover pizza. Yeah. Never had leftover pizza in my fucking life. that's that's that's not a thing. I order a pizza. I eat the pizza. Yeah. And you know, for me, it's the same thing with alcohol, right. So I'm very aware. I quit for several years. I'm very aware of how I drank. I mm-hmm, maybe, maybe a few times a year in very specific conditions with very specific people. Um, because it's not one. Right. And so every once in a while I get a little frustrated, you know, how come they get to do this in I and I don't. Mm. Um, but then I think about it, I'm like, well, they also don't have the faster brain goodness. Right. They, you know, they haven't started and sold three companies by 40. They haven't mm-hmm , you know, done things like that. So, so, so, so ya try to find the benefit, but yeah, every once in a while, it's, it's very, very frustrating, but let's talk for a second because. Once you got diagnosed, right? Mm-hmm I I'm sure that you've been putting things into play. Same way. I did. Same way. Almost everyone does. You've been putting things into play subconsciously to allow yourself to get through, to, to work, to get on deadline and things like that. Once you got diagnosed here, you are on a high pressure job with deadlines mm-hmm um, once you got diagnosed, what changed and what were you able to do? Cuz obviously you're you let's see CNBC, they haven't fired you today and said, you're, you know, you can't do this. So tell us about the kind of things I think this will interest the audience. Tell us about the kinda things you put into play. What are your tips and tricks to make sure you don't go down the wrong road. I mean, for Christ sake, you have to do, you know, half your job is research, right? Mm-hmm half your job is there's a, how do you not wind up eight hours later on Wikipedia looking up Roman sewage canals, having nothing to do with your original story.

[00:12:10] Gili: Wow. That was that's like Tuesday. No, um, no, totally. um, no, no, no, totally. \Um, so yeah, it's a great question. I mean, for me, I think the biggest thing was I just started learning about it immediately and like equipping myself with knowledge. And so I started reading. I read, um, there's one called smart, but stuck. Um, which I read and then, uh, driven to distraction is another one I read recently. And one thing that these things did for that these books did for me is by, is like, I, I was reading stories of other people who have this neurological disorder as well, and seeing myself in them and feeling again, like less alone and more okay. Um, and so I think. Again, that, that anger and that self hatred that I think in and of itself was a distraction kind of started to dissipate and created space for me to be able to focus better. Um, but that was the first thing is I just kind of started learning about what this is. Um, I think I kind of messed around a little bit with Adderall. Like I was like trying, I tried a little bit, but, but I think, you know, I was. The psychiatrist I said, said I have mild ADHD, you know, whatever that means. So, so I don't know if it was because the Adderall doses that I tried, like didn't really work for me or whatever it was, but I decided that I was gonna just try to make do without them, without that, you know, without medication mm-hmm . Um, but, um, yeah, I mean, so have always worked out but have started, um, but started doing it first thing in the morning. Um, I, I was, yeah, I was like, have always kind of messed around with doing it sometimes throughout the day, but that has always been part of my routine. Um, and definitely find that that's an amazing release first thing in the morning. Um, I, as of the last six months, I've also been doing some mindfulness meditation for like 12 minutes when I first wake up, I read, um, this book called peak mind, um, by, um, a researcher and professor in Miami at university of Miami. I mean, Amishi Jha and she, the whole book is about the attention system in the brain. Um, you know, and she touches on ADHD and of course, like there's no real fix for this brain, but there are, there are methods to, um, sharpen, I guess, some components of it. What meditation for me has helped with has just been, um, to have a growing awareness of where my mind is. And so maybe I can't stop it from going, you know, in a trillion directions, basically every 30 seconds. But at the very least I have more of an awareness of where it is and I. I can reel it back to what it needs to be doing. Like that's just something that, you know, that's a skill that has really helped me.

[00:14:35] Peter: No question. What do you, um, how are, how do you handle deadlines?

[00:14:39] Gili: It's yeah, also such a great question. Cause I have them every day. Part of it is the, you know, the, so I actually got hired at CNBC about four months after I got diagnosed. Um, and so at that point I had already sort of started the process of like learning what this isn't. How do I work with the brain that I have, um, It just worked out that I was in a really supportive system. And so my, you know, shout out to Kelly Grant, Esther Bloom, um, Jenna Goudreau , these are my editors and now Hannah Howard, they're, they're very, um, supportive. They're very open. They're very welcoming, you know, and. You know, having that external motivation is extremely helpful in, and getting me to continue to be motivated to get my work done. But I think what happened by nature too, is like the longer you do something, the better at it, you get. Right? And so I have learned, you know, by being in this environment where I'm super supported. To do my job very quickly, you know, to be a better writer to say, this is good enough, you know? Good enough is, that's what I have. So yeah. Good enough is super helpful for deadlines. Um, cause it's easy to be a perfectionist, like what you want is to give them the best, but it doesn't matter. Good enough is like that will just have to suffice. Um, yeah. I don't know. Does that answer? I can think of other things.

[00:15:49] Peter: Yeah. Perfectly last, last question. Yeah. Talk about imposter syndrome.

[00:15:53] Gili: No.

Imposter syndrome, you talk about, about syndrome, huh? imposter syndrome. Um,

[00:15:59] Peter: Hmm. Do you have it, does it affect you? How do you do? Hmm,

[00:16:03] Gili: I mean, sure. Of course. Like I see lots of people around me, you know, at a level of success that I would love that I would love to be at. Um, but. I, you know, I have been blessed with a very big ego

[00:16:16] Peter: Haaah! Spectacular!

[00:16:20] Gili: No, I think, um, I think to be honest with you, like, um, yeah, I, I come from a very supportive environment. My parents are, are super loving and supportive. And so I think that I do have some level of like self confidence. Um, That has really helped, like push me through, even in the moments where I was really failing. Um, I mean, I, I get jealous of people. Of course I do, but, but I somehow I think my Ambi, my ambition, um, you know, and just my, like my hunger to, to, to create, um, has just, you know, pushed me through even whatever insecurities I might have had.

[00:16:54] Peter: Awesome. I love it. I love it. Yeah. Wow. This has been amazing. Um, how could people find you tell, tell us where you are, uh, Gil, where, where you go, what your Instagrams are, uh, whatever, your favorite type of pizza, whatever.

[00:17:07] Gili: Oh, favorite type of pizza? Uh, well, I. I mean, I like French fries better than pizza. I will just say I'm a French fries person, even more than a pizza person. So you'll

[00:17:13] Peter: and we're done here guys. Thanks for listening. It's been a pleasure. We'll talk.

[00:17:18] Gili: sorry. I like pizza, but French fries would like too much ketchup. That's my go to junk food. I love it. I love it. People can find me on Twitter and Instagram, um, at Molin kids. So M a L I N S K I D. That's my handle.

[00:17:33] Peter: Yeah, a L L I I'm. I'm just putting it in for the M a L I M

[00:17:37] Gili: M a L I N. S K I D so my last name is Malinski gotcha. And my, yeah, my handles in Alinski. Yeah. I, I post like all my articles and all my stuff on this, so

[00:17:46] Peter: very cool. Guys what a pleasure. Thank you so much. I really appreciate you taking the time. This was a great interview. Um, thank you. It gives people hope. I mean, I, I remember, um, My, you know, again, being a diagnosed I remember in college, I had a photo photojournalism professor who told me that I'd never make it. I should probably go to something boring like accounting. Said I'd never make it as a journalist. And, uh, when, when I was the first ever, uh, digital journalist to cover the democratic Republican conventions in 1996, I photocopied my press pass, uh, and sent him, sent it to him and said, kind of doing terribly .Hope you're well. That was a nice, that was a nice feeling.

[00:18:21] Gili: Um, a nice little FU.

[00:18:22] Peter: Indeed really. You probably know the journal, the professor too. Isn't comp. Really appreciate you being here. We will have you back. Most definitely. This was a pleasure. We'll definitely have you back.

[00:18:32] Gili: Thank you so much. This was delightful. Thank you. I really appreciate it. Peter.

[00:18:35] Peter: Awesome stuff. Most definitely

[00:19:08]Credits: You've been listening to the Faster Than Normal podcast. We're available on iTunes, Stitcher and Google play and of course at www.FasterThanNormal.com I'm your host, Peter Shankman and you can find me at shankman.com and @petershankman on all of the socials. If you like what you've heard, why not head over to your favorite podcast platform of choice and leave us a review, come more people who leave positive reviews, the more the podcast has shown, and the more people we can help understand that ADHD is a gift, not a curse. Opening and closing themes were composed and produced by Steven Byrom who also produces this podcast, and the opening introduction was recorded by Bernie Wagenblast. Thank you so much for listening. We'll see you next week!

Today we're catching up with Peter en route to Northern Italy where he and his girlfriend Gabriella have recently spent a few days away. We're allowed a candid peek into their serious relationship, and of course how ADHD plays it's part too. This is a good and fun one, enjoy! [Editors note]: It is not lost on their sound engineer that G&P are so 'in the moment' that the windows of their vehicle remain down during the entirety of this recording. We'd like to say thank you for excusing the wind tunnel background ;-)

In this episode Peter and Gabriella discuss:

00:45 - Thank you so much for listening and for subscribing!

01:00 - Welcome to my wonderful girlfriend Gabriella Ribeiro!

01:44 - So why don't you tell us where we are, where we're heading, and what we just survived?

02:15 - Would you say it's more the journey or the destination?

04:00 - Why do you think my brain is doing what it's doing since we've been together; the good and the bad?

05:20 - The ADHD trouble w/ wanting the grandest of the very best, always for those you love

06:00 - We hate making mistakes and we assimilate to our surroundings in funny ways..

08:00 - When you have ADHD you're your own worst critic, but by waaay much more than most.

09:00 - You can scroll to hear Gabriella's episode about Iceland's Evolving Seven Wonders here! Ref: Gabby's photo @theexplorateur on INSTA

10:54 - So, [jokingly], is there anything good about dating someone with ADHD?

11:31 - A little about dopamine hits

12:00 - There is no accurate nor perfect matchmaking system for those of us with ADHD

13:33 - Some honest, important information for you about relationships, dear listener.

15:04 - One of Gabriella's greatest, if not most important moments with Peter

15:54 - One of the problems with ADHD that we're trying really, really hard to change is…

17:00 - How not to break-up in the Frankfurt airport

17:40 - A short story on 'using your words'

19:26 - Gabby, what advice do you have for anyone listening to this podcast who's dating or about to date some with ADHD?

20:45 - How can people find more about you?

On the Web: The X8 Podcast also https://www.gabbyribeiro.com/about

Socials: @theexplorateur on INSTA and Twitter and aka Explorateur Journeys on FB

Buy her book "I'm Just Saying...: Real advice for real girls in a real world. From a real Mom" on Amazon

21:15 - Where are we going anyway? En route to Monterosso

21:16 - On trust

21:41 - Thank you! Guys, as always, we are here for you and we love the responses and the notes that we get from you so please continue to do that! Tell us who you want to hear on the podcast, we'd love to know. Leave us a review on any of the places you get your podcasts, and if you ever need our help I'm www.petershankman.com and you can reach out anytime via [email protected] or @petershankman on all of the socials. You can also find us at @FasterNormal on all of the socials. It really helps when you drop us a review on iTunes and of course, subscribe to the podcast if you haven't already! As you know, the more reviews we get, the more people we can reach. Help us to show the world that ADHD is a gift, not a curse!

22:27 - Faster Than Normal Podcast info & credits

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TRANSCRIPT via Descript and then corrected.. somewhat:

Hello everyone Peter Shankman and welcome to another episode of Faster Than Normal. This one is interesting. I am recording this live from, um, a car, uh, in, uh, just outside Milan Italy, where I landed about feels like about three hours ago cause we. Uh, for two hours through immigration? No, it wasn't two hours felt like it, but, um, I wanted to have, I, I wanted this interview for a while. This is gonna be an interview with me and my wonderful girlfriend, Gabriella Ribeiro um, Gabby and I have been together now about three years. And, um, I don't know why I have no idea why she, why she continues to, to, to, to stay with me. Um, but she has, she has watched and, and, and in some cases, been a victim of my ADHD for the longest time and, um, I'm very fortunate that she's still here, but I thought it'd be interesting to talk to her and ask her no holds barred, sort of what it's like to, um, uh, love someone with the level of, of, of ADHD that I have. So Gabby welcome.

[00:01:42] Gabriella: Thank you. Good to be here.

[00:01:44] Peter: So why don't you tell us where we are and, and where we're heading and, and what we just survived?

[00:01:49] Gabriella: Oh, we survived a minor line, but to you, it was a big deal. And I understand

[00:01:53] Peter: it wasn't a minor line. It wasn't, it wasn't so much, that was a line. It was a line that kept, uh, we we'd be waiting in line. And then for some reason, 20 people would pass us cuz they were directed by someone else to go there. That's the part that frustrated me.

[00:02:07] Gabriella: I understand that, but we pushed our way through. So actually we're going hiking for two days in Italy and that's kind of what we do, you know, we, we go on these short trips and that I think is, is what helps ground you. To talk about ADHD? I think that's one of the core things that I notice about you is that even though we're always on the move, you feel most grounded when we are actually are en route.

[00:02:26] Peter: I think a lot of that has to do with, well, the airplane, obviously being on a plane, you know, the, the, the place where you're most confined is really the most freeing for a lot of people. I think the, one of the things that you and I have in common is that we both enjoy the journey. The journey is the destination. As much as the destination is. You know, eight hours on a flight to, to Italy for two days of hiking. Most people think it's crazy, but it's perfect for us. It, it keeps us, uh, not only grounded, but it, it, it resets us. It resets us, resets our brain. Now that being said, travel, uh, is a huge part of your life. It's what you do for a living as well. Um, but it's also, you know, a huge part of what we do and we, how much we enjoy it and, and really, um, embrace, uh, the world as our playground. For lack of a better word. Now, there are times I think, and she's she has, she's laughing her ass off about this, but there are times when, when, um, for whatever reason, the, the, uh, travel goes awry or we wind up in certain situations. And I think one of the things that I've learned most from you is I don't have to control everything. You know, everyone I've traveled with previously, I, I was in charge, right. I was telling where we're going here, we're going this, we're doing that. And what I've learned is that when you're with someone who actually also knows what they're doing, it's okay to relinquish control. And I, I love that you're just, you're just it hysterics over here, cuz I'm sure you're thinking of many of those stories. So, so, you know, sh shared not only some of the funny stories, but also, um, sort of why you think my brain works the way it does when, when I sort of in the past have had that need to sort of take control for good or for bad.

[00:04:08] Gabriella: Well, I think you've allowed yourself, like, you know, to, to enjoy and to be happy. I think, you know, and that's, that's a huge part and I think you've allowed, you've seen what can happen when somebody, when you trust somebody, maybe that's what it is. Maybe you trust me, maybe you trust, I don't know, expertise in, in what I do for a living, that kind of thing, but that's a huge thing. And I think that, you know, maybe it's part of your ADHD, but I don't think you trust easily. I think it takes a while. It took a while maybe for us to, and I think when you start to see things unfold the right way and you actually let yourself enjoy them, even if you didn't control them, you start to see things in a different way. That's what I think. But I think also one of the things I love most about you is that you always want things to be perfect for me. And sometimes things just, it, it's not even that they will be perfect for me, but in your eyes, they're not the perfect that you envision, whether we're getting lost in an airport or you're leading me out of security and back in, cause you're insisting, you know, one way and I actually know the other, but I don't fight with you. I just kind of let you do your thing. But I, I think it's, I think that's part of, of the way that your head works is that, you know, you, you have this design in your head and you want it to be like that, but you want it to be like that for me, most importantly, which is amazing, but I think it's, um, you know, sometimes. Have to just let things be, you know, there's air perfect.

[00:05:24] Peter: There's definitely an ADHD factor there in that we do. When you have ADHD, you want the grandest of grand, right? You want that, you know, and that, and that's one of the biggest problems is, is, you know, a random Tuesday could be the most incredible experience you've ever had when someone, you know, something shows up at your home or whatever, but it, it also. Um, it, it, you have to fight that sort of how to let other people take control sometimes .The incident she's referring to, we were in Frankfurt airport and, um, I was totally sure I knew the way to get to the lounge, uh, waiting for our connection. And it turns out I took us out of security. Then we had another 45 minute, wait to get back into security. And then I was just angry, but the irony was, I was angry at myself, right. I was angry at myself because I screwed up and I made the mistake and I hate that. Right. And, and of course I took it out on you. Um, but you know, it was one of those that was a learning moment for me. Like today we spent 45 minutes in line trying to get through immigration. And I just didn't say anything. I let you control it. I let you direct it. And we were there and eventually I wound up cursing at a cop, I think, in, in Italian, but, or Spanish, Spanish, whatever. Japanese, but that's one of the interesting things is also is that when you do travel with someone who's ADHD, they wanna immerse themselves in every aspect of where they are. Um, but their brains don't work as fast. So it is not uncommon to to see me go into a country and start speaking a completely different language than what is in the country. True.

[00:06:48] Gabriella: Uh, true. And I think it's, it's part of like, I think you wanna impress me, you know, so you've got like a. A few like core words that you use no matter where we go, like in Iceland, you'll say Ola , you know, and that's, that's perfectly fine. But I think one of the, you know, I would say, you know, you said you wanted like no holds barred. One of the most frustrating things I think is when you get something wrong and we all do right. Cuz I get things wrong all the time, but you get really mad at me when you get something wrong. And I you've said that that's an ADHD thing. I don't know. I think we, you know, it's, it's been a, I. wouldn't say a challenge, but you know, it's something I've had to understand about you. I've had to come to understand. And I think it's, it's okay. You know, we all deal with it in different ways, but I noticed that that is a recurring, recurring thing.

[00:07:33] Peter: Like I've been working on it.

[00:07:34] Gabriella: You have been, that's what I'm saying, you know, you definitely have, but I do see, you know, it's, I, I see yourself frustration and something that is, is totally okay. On my side.

[00:07:46] Peter: One of the interesting things, I mean, there's a reason for that .When you're, when you are ADHD, you know, you do, like you said earlier, you're doing everything to be perfect. And when things aren't perfect because of something I've done, right. Because of a mistake I've made, I am my own worst critic by everyone is, but when you're heavy ADHD, you're your own worst critic by a fact of a million. Right. So you're sitting there and I'm like, okay. The one thing I had to do, I managed to screw up and I've ruined the whole, in my mind, the whole vacation's ruined,

[00:08:09] Gabriella: but it's really not.

[00:08:11] Peter: I, well, it's obviously not, but you know, in my mind, I didn't get this one thing right, now we have to wait 45 minutes to go through security again, I'm the worst. I'm terrible. She's gonna leave me. This whole thing. Right. And, and, and I think to. compensate or to make up for that. I just get angry. And, and unfortunately the person I direct the anger at is, is the person closest to me, which would be you. Um, it's obviously not, I'm obviously not angry at you for my mistake, you know, , I do remember thinking, uh, as we're waiting online to go back into security and in Frankfurt a couple years ago, I'm like, why didn't she stop me? This is totally her fault. Why didn't she stop? Totally. And, and the thing was you tried to, but then I'm like, no, I know where we're going. So you didn't really have a choice in the matter. Um, you know, and it's, I think it's also the, the, there is that aspect of wanting to impress the person that you love. Um, and when it doesn't work for whatever reason. Um, you, you, you, you, the ADHD sort of takes over, um, I'm remembering Iceland. Um, we had a chance to see the Northern lights you have understand in Iceland, they wake you up at one in the morning with like some alarm, like, like, like the Nazi's are coming to like steal the silver and, and, and you, they wake you up in the middle of the night and, and you have to rush out, get your clothes on, rush outside to see the Northern lights which prolly only last for like 12 seconds. And so I, I brought all my camera gear and everything like that, and I go outside and I, I can't get, I get nothing. I get absolutely just black images of, of black skies, nothing. Gab Pulls out our iPhone, like click and gets this, this like national geographic quality photo. I was so pissed it sucked. Tell, tell me how I handled it.

[00:09:42] Gabriella: You didn't handle it well, but it's okay. You know, I, I know you now. But again, you, you got really mad at me. You said, oh Gab, how nice, lovely shot on your iPhone 12? Or like, something like that. I don't know what the snarky voice and that's okay. Cuz, but I think also part of maybe it's the ADHD, but I think I've been seeing you definitely change on this is that sometimes you just have to get away from the phone. You know, use the phone a lot. I, I know that that's also part of, of being with you. You're on the phone a lot. Um, a lot of, you know, looking down, I think sometimes you have to let go of things and just enjoy, you know, like we did that. We went to South Africa speaking to travel and you were so in the moment and it was wonderful. You put down the phone, you were stopping taking pictures and watching lions and things like that. Sometimes you have to not always capture it, you know? So I think some of our best moments happen totally off of social media.

[00:10:36] Peter: What's something that... And by the way, I went out a couple hours later and tried to get their Northern lights again and totally failed again. Um,

[00:10:44] Gabriella: oh, and it got mad at me again. Yeah.

[00:10:46] Peter: what, you know, everyone's listening to this, like my God, why is she with him? And I, so, so that being said, tell, say, say a good thing about dating someone with ADHD.

[00:10:54] Gabriella: You asked, I just told you, I think you are so attentive. You want the world for me, you support me. You will give me opportunities. And I think that what I love about you is that you're just so creative. And I, I grew up with a prankster dad, right? So you spend your days. . Like either pranking me or, you know, you, you won't let one single day go by without making me smile or laugh. You send me things you think of me. And I think that's, that's maybe that's part of your focus too, is I love that you are so much focused on the relationship and you want it to work. And I, I love that about you.

[00:11:31] Peter: Well, there's part of, part of ADHD is, is the constant quest for dopamine, right? And, and getting you to laugh or anyone to laugh and specifically the person you love; getting them to laugh is a dopamine hit. I'll get. dopamine and serotonin adrenaline out of that. And so, so as much as I enjoy doing it for you, cause I know you enjoy it. It's, it's a rush for me as well. Um, you know, the, the, one of the first things I remember one of the first pranks I ever played on you is I put, I put a roach on your suitcase. Yeah. Uh, at the airport. I don't know where we're going, but mal uh, Maldives, I put a, I put a roach your on your suitcase and, and I just re you know, you don't realize it's such a high, right. Watching you, no.

[00:12:10] Gabriella: oh yeah.. It's total high.

[00:12:11] Peter: You, you hated it. But, you know,

[00:12:12] Gabriella: I loved, I loved it actually. And I said, Peter, you make me lose my shit every day. and that is, I would say one of the main reasons why I'm with you.

[00:12:21] Peter: I mean, it's, it's not easy dating someone with ADHD without question and look, I mean, at the end of the day, your ADHD can only, only be blamed for so much. You have to take control of, of, of what you're doing. And I think I've, I've, I've been working on doing that. You know, my social acuity was never as strong to begin with, so I I've learned a lot, uh, from you and with you, but there's definitely, um, I couldn't, I don't think I could be with someone who couldn't accept a practical joke or something like that, just simply for the, the chemical high that gives me. Right. Makes me a better person. I mean, I, I prank you. I'm cracking up for the next six hours. And, and I'm the happiest person in the world, which is what you want. You wanna be with someone like that. So you definitely, you know, when you're looking to see who you're gonna date and your ADHD, think about the person who will understand, uh, the way your brain works and understand that, you know, they're not putting a roach in your bag or a rub. It was a rubber Roach, by the way, I should mention that not putting a rubber Roach in your bag to, uh, to annoy you or to bother you, but because they know if, if they. can make you\ laugh that's, that's happiness for them as well. It's, it's no different than when I was a kid and I would, I would speak out in class and make the kids laugh and, you know, get in trouble for it. I was trying to get dopamine to learn.

[00:13:33] Gabriella: I think when you date someone with ADHD, you also have to embrace that. There's certain things that, that they need to do. And you've always told me this, I need this. I need X in order to do Y and you've always been very straight up in the, you know, and since the beginning, I need to exercise in order to feel okay to get on a plane. I need to have a half hour to myself playing a game before I can go out to dinner or, you know, whatever it is and you have structure. And I think it's important that to have a, a partner, I would say, you know, from my vantage point and what you need to, to allow that, you know, and not to make too many demands on things and just say, okay, you know, yes, I know he needs this, or yes, we're we're out, but he needs to step away from a crowd for a half an hour. That's okay. You know, and I think, um, it's understanding all of that and embracing it that helps make a relationship successful.

[00:14:24] Peter: Think, I mean, I, I like to think there's, you know, the, the, the positives outweigh the negatives in that regard. Um,

[00:14:31] Gabriella: Absolutely!

[00:14:31] Peter: That, you know, we have, when we're together, we do have a blast, we have fun and, and we do support each other. I've always wanted a partner who would support me and who I could support as well. Um, you know, in life that's super couple as it were, um, that I think we are. Um, but yeah, I mean, I don't, I don't necessarily wish, uh, me on anyone. I think that know . I think that, that, you know, it takes a special person to understand someone with, with the kind of brain that, that, that faster than normal people have.

[00:15:04] Gabriella: Well, one of my greatest moments with you and I'll show I'm gonna out you. Cause it was just so beautiful is that you, we were, I think we were in London. We went to go see a musical. We went to go see Back to The Future to and something happened where I think you, you, you took my watch charger overnight and I really needed to charge my watch, but you took it and you tried to convince me that my watch was already charged, which it wasn't, but you needed your watch chargeed, so that's fine. And then you sort of got on your knees the next day and said, why are you with me? I'm I'm ridiculous. I'm I'm this, like, you were beating yourself up so much, but to me it was just like, we share things. So it was, it was okay, but you, you always are questioning. And I, I, you know, just me to you, I wish that you wouldn't because to me, I think you're perfect and we're perfect. And we, we find our quirks. I think we find the, the beauty in our quirks. I have them too.

[00:15:54] Peter: One of the problems with ADHD is, and I'm hoping this is one of the things I'm trying to change with the podcast, with the book and everything and my activism is that, um, people with ADHD are told they're broken for years for their entire life. And it's when you come across someone who doesn't see you as broken, but sees you as, um, special and not like short but special, but special. Like, you know, as in, as in wow, this, this guy is really amazing. Um, it's hard to believe that. Right. And, and you're sure that every day you're gonna do something, you know, that is going to, they're just gonna be like, this is ridiculous. He's not special. He's a moron. What the hell am I with him for? Right. And, and despite your protestations, no, I I'm having fun with you. I'm enjoy that. It's, it's hard to, um, sometimes it's very hard to believe that, Or to allow yourself to believe that. And, and that's one of things, you know, the constant, my, my, my, my constant, why are you with me type thing, isn't like a, a ploy for sympathy or a ploy for, for a compliment. But rather it's, it's a real question, you know, it's, it's like, you know,

[00:16:59] Gabriella: I saw that, that day. I know

[00:17:00] Peter: you've seen it many times. I mean, you've seen it, uh, you know, when we were waiting. To go back at the airport after I took us outta security, stuff like that, you know, it's like my God, why? And of course, because I'm mad at myself, cuz I know this is the moment you're totally gonna leave me. Right.

[00:17:13] Gabriella: I Yeah, in the middle of the Frankfurt airport,

[00:17:14] Peter: I wanted getting mad at you. Yes. Right? The, the classic favorite airport story ends with us finally getting back in and going to the lounge. And we had just gotten off a, a red eye flight to, to Europe. So we're waiting for a connection and we go to the lounge and, and they have showers and the, the woman looks at us. And she was so angry. She goes, do you want a, a suite, a shower suite for the both of you? And I go, I want my own suite . I took my own shower suite because I was so angry at myself and couldn't, and couldn't, uh, I had a, had a friend once who, who worked with, um, uh, high functioning, autistic children and like very young, like 2, 3, 4 years old. And her job was, she spent an entire year in school with them, trying to teach them to explain how they feel instead of hitting, instead of getting angry. And she tells this great story about, um, towards the end of the year, a kid was obviously upset and obviously angry at something. And she spent like five minutes saying, okay, Andrew, use your words, use your words. How do you feel? How . Are you feeling? What is the, what is the action that you're feeling right now? And he looked at her and he got really red in the face and he goes, I'm happy. right. And it's, it's literally how I feel. Sometimes it's like, I mean, like I'm so angry and I'm so happy that you're still with me.

[00:18:19] Gabriella: That is so you, but I think one of the things you don't notice so much about yourself is how, just how funny you make everything. And I think I'm just so I'm grateful because I that's, the person I needed is that every single thing is funny, no matter what, like we always find the humor and things. And I, I, I don't, I don't think that's an ADHD thing, um, necessarily, but I think, um, you know, I think the world should know if they haven't noticed that about you already.

[00:18:45] Peter: It definitely comes from.

[00:18:46] Gabriella: You make everything fun.

[00:18:47] Peter: It definitely comes from our families and our, you know, I mean, my dad was, was all about using humor to deflect everything growing up and, and, and so was, I, you know, it's

[00:18:54] Gabriella: no, but you embrace it now. It's not as much of a deflection I, that I, I love when you, like, we were just laughing in this car right now until we were crying. Cuz you know, we rolled up and we're in Italy. So you should, you know, the driver's here and you should say chow and Peter goes Ola!! Like with the, with. The biggest sense of pride. Like the barrel chested, Ola, you know,

[00:19:11] Peter: but that's, that's classic. That's classic me, like, okay, I'm in Italy, let's for some reason speak Spanish and you know, but on the flip side, I once convinced you that I understood Japanese and got you going for like 20 minutes. Um, and you were totally convinced. I, I understood Japanese. So in the end, um, what do you want people are, who, who listen to this podcast? A lot of them are in relationships with people at ADHD and they, they they're frustrated. They don't understand, you know, why is this happening? What, what advice would you give someone who's who is either dating or about to date someone they with ADHD you're about take that plunge. What would you say to them?

[00:19:42] Gabriella: You have to open your mind and you have to talk, like, I think one of the things that saves us is that we talk about everything good or bad. And I think you have to be willing just, just like, you know, none, none of us are perfect. Right. And we all have, you have things that you have to adapt to about me that you necessarily don't like what you deal with. Um, you know, and I think that it's, it's a question of not getting so frustrated because what you think the person is doing is on the surface this is not what you believe it to be. Like. There are so many times where I see Peter frustrated, for example, and I immediately think it's me, he's got a problem with me. He's doing something, you know, whatever. And I think it's the understanding that you have to wrap your head around. It's not always about you and in a relationship that's really important. So you have to get to the core and also figure out what it is that helps them get through the day and embrace it, allow it, um, I hate that word, but you know what I mean? It just to let it be, yeah. And not get. so worried all the time that it's, that it's a reflection on you because that person needs to do that in order to be the best them for you.

[00:20:44] Peter: Definitely. How can people find you? Cause you have actually a really interesting life apart from me, uh, even more so, even more interesting than, than just when you're with me. So how can people find you? What's your, what do you wanna get me Instagram or what.

[[ On the Web: The X8 Podcast also https://www.gabbyribeiro.com/about

Socials: @theexplorateur on INSTA and Twitter

Buy her book "I'm Just Saying...: Real advice for real girls in a real world. From a real mom" on Amazon ]]

[00:20:54] Gabriella: Sure. I'm the @theexplorateur on Instagram um, I do a little bit of everything in tourism, but I,

[00:20:59] Peter: we host a podcast together as well.

[00:21:01] Gabriella: We do! Called the X8 and we'll be back in the fall with that.

[00:21:03] Peter: So that's a travel and a podcast where we travel around the world to beautiful locations and, and, and report on them. But awesome. Gabby, thank you so much. I mean, what the hell is she, you gonna do? We're in a car at 9:30' in the morning in the middle of Italy , trying, you know, driving to where are we going?

[00:21:15] Gabriella: uh, we're going to Monterosso

[00:21:16] Peter: Awesome! That's the other weird thing is that I have never been in a relationship before where I don't sometimes know, I don't know where we're going. Like there are two types people in the world. There's people who like plan everything out. And the people who wake up in the morning go, oh, what's the name of the hotel? Or, you know what airline? And, and it's, it's very strange to, to, to, to relinquish that control, but I'm starting to enjoy it. I'm starting to, I'm starting to like it. And, uh, at the end of the day, I'm I still have the, I still have the control over the airline. So that's, that's my thing. She can, Gabby can handle all the hotels.

Guys thank you for listening, Gab thank you for taking the time to do this. Um, I'm at Peter, Shankman all the socials. As you guys know, we're at faster normal, um, you can file Instagram, Twitter everywhere. If you like what you hear, uh, drop us a review. If you have guests that you think might benefit from being on the podcast, let us know. We have a big shout out to Steven Byrom, our producer, who is gonna be so angry at me because I'm just recording the string in an iPhone 20 minutes of car sound. He's gonna have to delete, uh, he's gonna, he's gonna be, he's gonna be it's he's it's not gonna be good. He's gonna need therapy from this stuff! Steven, we love you. Thank you. [Love you too man! Hope this was at least legible!] Opening, uh, words performed by Bernie Bernie Wagenblast. Opening and closing theme composed by Steven Byrom, [he says thank you too], and we will see you guys next week with another interview. Thank you so much for listening. Stay safe. Stay well

Credits: You've been listening to the Faster Than Normal podcast. We're available on iTunes, Stitcher and Google play and of course at www.FasterThanNormal.com I'm your host, Peter Shankman and you can find me at shankman.com and @petershankman on all of the socials. If you like what you've heard, why not head over to your favorite podcast platform of choice and leave us a review, come more people who leave positive reviews, the more the podcast has shown, and the more people we can help understand that ADHD is a gift, not a curse. Opening and closing themes were composed and produced by Steven Byrom who also produces this podcast, and the opening introduction was recorded by Bernie Wagenblast. Thank you so much for listening. We'll see you next week!

Dr. Luisa Sanz is a psychiatrist with over 25 years of experience working mainly with young people. She is immensely passionate about her work, and at the root of all she does, is the drive to help others through understanding, acceptance, compassion, respect and love. Such passion and devotion are unquestionably the results of having two brothers with schizophrenia and living its consequences from the age of 7. Being originally from Madrid, Spain, she moved to England at the age of 26 to specialize in Psychiatry and still lives there. Throughout her professional career, Dr. Sanz has actively contributed to developing services, improving the provision of care for individuals with ADHD/ASD and their families, including developing pathways to optimize diagnosis and treatment. Her special interest has always been in neurodevelopmental disorders, particularly ADHD but also ASD, and this is where she's mainly focussed her work. During her recent career break working as a regional Clinical Director for Mental Health services in the National Health Service, Dr. Sanz founded Mind Yr Life for the purpose of eradicating the stigma around Mental Health (MH). Mind Yr Life does so by, firstly, sharing credible information on MH conditions/illnesses, secondly, having open and honest conversations about personal experiences with MH problems and, thirdly, adopting an attitude towards a) acceptance and love, b) humbleness with an open mind, and c) staying grateful and positive. Today we're talking about her organization and the path that lead her here. Enjoy!

In this episode Peter and Luisa Sanz discuss:

1:12 - Intro and welcome Luisa!

2:17 - So what pushed you towards focusing your work towards ADHD, ADD, ASD?

3:20 - Talk about some of the challenges you went up against; how attitudes towards the neurodiverse and the environment there was prior to, and after your time at NHS?

5:30 - What have you noticed in terms of changing the conversation/ breaking the stigma?

7:22 - How to break stigma?

8:53 - Tell us about your organization Mind Yr Life!

10:00 - We don't exactly have a blood test for all things neurodiverse, do we

10:50 - Dr. Sanz on her family's experiences with mental health

11:20 - A bad attitude and ignorance are usually contagious

12:17 - When people don't know about mental health illnesses, or about most things for that matter they may feel fearful or threatened; and often times they try and put a person down because that makes them feel more in control, more secured. So.. there is a lot of work to be done!

12:54: How can people find more about you and what you're doing?

On the Web: www.MindYrLife.com

Socials: @MindYrLifeMYL on Twitter Facebook @mind.yr.life on INSTA and Luisa Sanz on YouTube

16:00 - Thank you Luisa! Guys, as always, we are here for you and we love the responses and the notes that we get from you so please continue to do that! Tell us who you want to hear on the podcast, we'd love to know. Leave us a review on any of the places you get your podcasts, and if you ever need our help I'm www.petershankman.com and you can reach out anytime via [email protected] or @petershankman on all of the socials. You can also find us at @FasterNormal on all of the socials. It really helps when you drop us a review on iTunes and of course, subscribe to the podcast if you haven't already! As you know, the more reviews we get, the more people we can reach. Help us to show the world that ADHD is a gift, not a curse!

16:30 - Faster Than Normal Podcast info & credits

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TRANSCRIPT:

[00:00:38] Peter: Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to another episode of Faster Than Normal. My name is Peter Shankman. This is the number one podcast on ADD and ADHD and I'm thrilled that you joined us today. We have an unusual guest well all of our guests are a little unusual. This one is unusual, cause she's actually a Doctor. As you know, we have people from all over the world who join us at Faster Than Normal from, from professors to rockstar actual rockstars. Remember we had the band Shinedown. We've had politicians, we've had CEOs. We've had regular ordinary folk and occasionally every once in a while, we've brought in an actual doctor and today is one of those days.

Please welcome Dr. Luisa Sanz who is a psychiatrist with over 25 years of experience working mainly with young people, incredibly passionately. Her drive is to help others through understanding acceptance, compassion, respect, and love. She's originally from Madrid. She moved to England at the age of 26, specialized in psychiatry, still lives there throughout her professional career. She's contributed to developing services, improving the provision of care for individuals with a ADHD and ASD and their families, including developing pathways to optimize diagnosis and treatment. She spent good number of years as a regional clinical director for mental health services in the national health service, she also founded something called Mind Yr Life for the purpose of eradicating a stigma around mental health mind your life does so by sharing credible information on mental health conditions and illnesses. And by having open honest conversations about personal experiences with mental health problems, and thirdly adopting an attitude towards acceptance and love humbleness and open mind and staying grateful and positive. Well, we are grateful and positively thrilled that you joined us today. Dr. Sanz thank you!

So for taking the time.

[00:02:10] Dr.Sanz: Oh my pleasure. Thank you to you for inviting me!

[00:02:14] Peter: So, what pushed you towards focusing on ADHD and ASD

[00:02:20] Dr.Sanz: I believe that when I first went into specializing in psychiatry, initially I went into adult psychiatry, but I found it a little bit overwhelming because I, I have two brothers who had schizophrenia, and there was too much of the same outside and inside, you know, outside at work and inside at home.

So I decided to specialize in children and adolescent, and I thought that I could possibly intervene early life. Uh, of these, of these people and make a bigger difference. And, uh, without a question of doubt, ADHD is the most common condition in mental health altogether, but much more in children and adolescents.

So being such a common condition, I was just driven towards, um, to, you know, to, to these, these, these conditions.

[00:03:11] Peter: Interesting. And what was the attitude before you joined, um, national, uh, health service? I'm assuming you spent a lot of time focusing on changing the environment and changing the conversation.

How was the attitude before you joined and, and, and can you cite, uh, sort of some of the challenges you went up against, uh, in changing that conversation?

[00:03:32] Dr.Sanz: Yeah. Uh, I think Peter that, uh, for me, because, because I grew up with mental illness at home, you know, through my brothers, I think I, from, from day one, when I became a psychiatrist, I was different in a way to many of the psychiatrists.

Because I had believed mental illness from, you know, very, very close in the household. Uh, so my, my approach was different and I, from the very beginning, I always empathize the empathize, the, the, uh, you know, with patients and, and, and, and felt, felt them closer in my heart. And, uh, and you know, the conversations that I always had were, were around.

Being more compassionate and, and definitely, definitely not judging, not making assumptions and just accepting people for who they are. Um, in, in with ADHD. I, I, I always believe everything happens the, the way it's meant to. And I was meant to specialize in, in know, neurodevelopmental disorders, ADHD in particular, because, um, more than

anything ADHD. I realize that, you know, precisely we can't judge, we can't make assumptions because most of the times those are wrong and people with ADHD my daughter, Peter has ADHD, but people with ADHD are so incredibly creative, charismatic, uh, you know, gifted and, and because of, of others judging and criticizing, we tend to.

You know, hinder all those talents and, and, and beautiful, beautiful personalities. So, um, you know, you, your question was how, how have I tried to change those conversations? How have they changed? I suppose that from, from where I stand, my conversations have always been similar. The response I've had is different because for people that know me now, they know they know the type of conversations they can have with me.

[00:05:30] Peter: What have you noticed in terms of changing the conversation? I, I kind of feel sometimes, and I I'm gonna continue to do it, you know, until my last breath, but I sometimes feel like it's like emptying the ocean with a, trying to empty the ocean with a teaspoon. Right. It's it's, you know, for every person that we talk to and explain.

That, uh, different does not equal bad or that, or that, you know, this is not a disability per se. Uh, we come across schools or, or doctors, whatever who, who treat this exactly as such as a disability. And, and when you're seven years old and you're diagnosed with ADHD, uh, and you're told the first thing you're told, the first thing your parents are told is that you are less than everyone else.

That's a hard stigma to shape.

[00:06:10] Dr.Sanz: It, it is aweful and, and the conversations have changed because when I first started, you know, working in ADHD 20 odd years ago, um, the, I had to speak to professionals, to doctors about the fact that. It was a genetic condition. It wasn't about bad parenting. It wasn't about children just being awkward and difficult and naughty.

And that those conversations were with professionals. I still occasionally have one of those conversations with a doctor, with a teacher, but not as often more often, uh, than not now people accept that it is a condition, that it is a genetic, uh, inherited, uh, condition. But generally people don't understand how it shows and how it really, uh, what it really means.

And again, this, this very wrong assumptions about, you know, when people, don't people with ADHD, don't do certain things. This is still this assumption that they've just been awkward and oppositional, whereas, you know, they don't see what really is happening. In the brain in the executive, you know, function in the, in the brain and in the neuropathways pathways of the brain.

So those conversations are still going on and will continue to go on for a very long time. But Peter, that is about stigma and that is about. You know, uh, you know, how, you know, lack of understanding because there's two aspects to the conversations. One is the lack of understanding of what it really means.

And the other is, uh, seeing it as a, as you very well defined it as a disability, as a, as a, uh, people are less for having ADHD. So it's, it is both things. 1. People don't understand the actual signs and symptoms and how it really presents. And two then is, you know, very stigmatized and is very derogatory the way it's spoken about.

[00:08:11] Peter: It's interesting because you know, other diseases, for lack of a better word, other conditions, you know, they, they don't seem. I guess they don't see it as stigmatized. Right. You know, you don't, you don't look at, um, I mean, mental health as a whole, it has always been stigmatized, but you know, you're never gonna tell someone with cancer.

Oh, just pull yourself up by your bull straps or just pay attention more. Right. And yet when the condition is unseen, uh, like ADHD or any foreign mental health, it, it, it it's always seemed like it's much easier to, um, I don't wanna say mock it, but much easier to sort of dismiss it. Right. Which is, I think very, very frustrating for millions of people.

Talk to us about, um, uh, Mind your life. I'd love to know a little bit about, uh, this, uh, organization you founded

[00:09:01] Dr.Sanz: well it's, uh, I'm, I'm incredibly passionate about it because the, the purpose, the reason why I created my new life was precisely to eradicate the stigma. And you very well just mentioned Peter, that, um, you know, with mental health, we, at this moment in time, we can't get away.

You know, the stigma that is attached to it. And you're absolutely right with other physical illnesses. You know, people are much more understanding, supportive and, and caring with mental health, uh, is very difficult to get that genuine attitude from, from people in general. And the reason comes from the lack of, uh, uh, research and, and investigations with cancer.

You can get, you know, some, uh, radiology, uh, Investigation to prove, oh, here there's a tumor. And you can see it is in your livers in here or there, you can do some bood tests and say, yeah, you've got anemia. And this is, this is how it shows with mental health. We can't really, we don't have any x-rays any blood tests or any other physical.

Investigation that we can prove what the reason, what, the reason which leads to people, just having opinions. You know, we, um, I sometimes have to laugh when, you know, I hear conversations I'm on the, you know, on, on the cafe, whatever people are making, you know, diagnosis about anxiety, depressions, schizophrenia, even.

And I, I think, gosh, you know, most of the psychiatrists you know, that struggle to really, you know, with challenging presentations to get it right. Nevermind people in the streets, but, but we all think we know more than we do. So mind your life was founded because I, I am, you know, uh, very frustrated when I. See in general public, uh, making assumptions about people with mental health problems.

And I lived it. I, you know, I was seven years old when my eldest brother became ill with, with the first signs of his schizophrenia. And, and I, we suffered as a family, the stigma we had to move, uh, house because the neighbors were really harsh and, you know, and then, and then I was a teenager when my second brother became ill.

So even more of the same. And I, you know, I was, I was a young person thinking, gosh, you know, why, why? You know, public professional services are making life so hard for my brothers and for myself, there's no need for that. And unquestionably Peter. And this is where my heart is. We make people, we make, conditions much harder, much harder because of our, our attitude, because of the way we judge him, the way we, we assume. And, and, and I know my brother one, my eldest brother passed away last January. And, you know, I had beautiful conversations with him before he passed. And I asked him, you know, what, what he would, you know, want to tell people that have mental health problems and, you know, and his words were along the lines of, you know, we we've got each other, we understand what we go through.

We just can't take it to heart, what people say and assume about us, because that would kill us. And, and it's really sad when, when people with mental health problems live lives like that. So Mind Yr Life was created to really try and influence people's attitude towards anyone with mental health problem.

In fact, Towards anyone that is considered to be different. Um, because when we, when we don't know, we feel threatened and, and people don't know about mental health illnesses about mental conditions and, and they feel threatened because of the ignorance most times. And then they judge and they try and put them down because that makes them feel more in control, more secured.

So, you know, there's, there's, there's a lot of work to be done there about eradicating the stigma. But, you know, we, we can, you know, we bit, bit by day by day, you know, we get there,

[00:12:54] Peter: no question about it, Dr. Sanz how can people find, uh, more about you and, and, and where can they go to get more?

On the Web: www.MindYrLife.com

Socials: @MindYrLifeMYL on Twitter Facebook @mind.yr.life on INSTA and Luisa Sanz on YouTube

[00:13:00] Dr.Sanz: I thought of the name.

And I thought, um, you know, that mind obviously is about caring and looking after, and, and mind is about mental health and, and your, your is spelled with a Y and an R because I thought it's about you. It's about us, but it's about your responsibility and every single one, taking responsibility over, over mental health, over attitude and, and, and changing.

And, and life is about, you know, precisely about why, why we live these lives, how do we live it and how do we, you know, live it in a way that is that we, we achieve happiness. Um, so mind your life spell, as I said, with the Y and R um, you know, I've got in the website, there's, I'm, I'm, I'm doing lots of interviews to people that, you know, very willingly speak openly about their experiences with, with mental health.

I like to think that I lead by example. And I, I have an interview where I speak about what my experience growing up was, you know, when with, with mental health problems at home and, and, and we do do interviews and we, you know, I I've recently, um, wrote a, a journal, which is a wellbeing guided journal to help people.

Particularly people, you know, with, it's not specific for ADHD, but people with ADHD tend to need more guidance, more support, you know, a little bit of a prompt. And, and this journal is to change behaviors. You know, that sometimes you think, oh, I wish I, I could eat more healthy or I could do more exercise or I could make my bed every morning or, you know, so, so it it's to.

It's to, uh, support people in making those changes. And the journal starts with giving lots of information about why consistency is important, how, how the brain works and how this consistency provides the, you know, the, the, the, what is needed for, for changing behaviors. So in mind your life, we have. As I said, you know, um, interviews to, uh, to learn more about what people really experience.

We have videos that I've, I've uploaded that I do them myself for, for everyone. They're not for professionals they're for everyone that want to learn a little bit more about ADHD, there are three videos on ADHD. There are some on autistic spectrum condition and that there'll be more ?___? We, we, we upload information, informa educational videos.

We've got these journal as well. And we do loads of the things, um, that we keep, you know, uploading on the website to, to try and, you know, first make sure that people with mental health problems don't feel that they are on their own because we are all on the same boat. And, and, and second to help those that really want to understand mental health conditions better and support those with mental health conditions in a, in a healthier manner.

You know, uh, we've got the information available as well. Excellent.

[00:15:58] Peter: Well, Dr. Sounds thank you so much for taking the time. We really appreciate you coming on faster than normal. And, uh, we'll have you back again.

[00:16:04] Dr.Sanz: Oh, I, I love that Peter. Uh, I would love that. Thank you so much for having me today.

[00:16:10] Peter: Always guys, as always, we appreciate you listening. If you like what you heard, you could drop us a review. I know I say that every week. I really mean it this time…. —

Credits: You've been listening to the Faster Than Normal podcast. We're available on iTunes, Stitcher and Google play and of course at www.FasterThanNormal.com I'm your host, Peter Shankman and you can find me at shankman.com and @petershankman on all of the socials. If you like what you've heard, why not head over to your favorite podcast platform of choice and leave us a review, come more people who leave positive reviews, the more the podcast has shown, and the more people we can help understand that ADHD is a gift, not a curse. Opening and closing themes were composed and produced by Steven Byrom who also produces this podcast, and the opening introduction was recorded by Bernie Wagenblast. Thank you so much for listening. We'll see you next week!

Jillian Ashley Blair Ivey (please, call her Jill) is a communications consultant, content strategist, writer, editor, voice actor, and yoga teacher based in South Philadelphia. No, she does not sleep. The thing that ties all of Jill's work together—yes, even yoga teaching—is storytelling. Jill has two degrees in creative writing that, contrary to her parents' initial reservations, she puts to use every day. She helps clients develop an authentic voice and works with them to create compelling narratives that resonate with their intended audience, and she helps her yoga students live the story their bodies tell. You can find Jill's recent essay, "The Very Real, Totally Hidden, Costs of Being an Adult With ADHD" on Medium. We're old friends, and this is what we're talking about today.

In this episode Peter and Jillian Ivey discuss:

1:20 - Intro and welcome Jill!

1:40 - Jillian's article on Medium that inspired today's visit

2:18 - So tell us your backstory; when did you get diagnosed and all of that?

5:30 - About early morning risers and quiet time

6:00 - Tell us about what inspired you to write this article?

9:38 - About how companies will continue to charge us and how the 'fine print' is too often the 'find print'. Ref: TrueBill.com Ref: House of Lies

13:53 - So what's our answer, what's the solve; robots?!

14:80 - On activism

16:00 - Give us a couple of hacks that work for you which allow you to keep these kinds of things from happening?

18:30 - We honor Nancy Shankman's time-honed "task list scratcher" technique! Ref: https://www.followupthen.com

20:30 - Jill this was awesome! How can people find more about you and what you're doing?

On the Web: http://www.jilletante.com also www.JillianIvey.com Socials: @JillianIvey on all the socials except TikTok here: Twitter INSTA Pinterest and Facebook]

20:52- Jillian's consulting and new live story auditing service is at http://www.jilletante.com

21:35 - Thank you Jillian! Guys, as always, we are here for you and we love the responses and the notes that we get from you; so please continue to do that! Tell us who you want to hear on the podcast, anything at all; we'd love to know. Leave us a review on any of the places you get your podcasts, and if you ever need our help I'm www.petershankman.com and you can reach out anytime via [email protected] or @petershankman on all of the socials. You can also find us at @FasterNormal on all of the socials. It really helps when you drop us a review on iTunes and of course, subscribe to the podcast if you haven't already! As you know, the more reviews we get, the more people we can reach. Help us to show the world that ADHD is a gift, not a curse!

22:41 - Faster Than Normal Podcast info & credits

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TRANSCRIPT:

Hello, everyone, happy day, whatever day it is, but it's probably a Wednesday. Cause that's when this podcast comes out and is actually a Wednesday here as well and I am recording live from New York city is a beautiful day out as finally. It looks like we're about to get to summer. The sun is shining. Birds are singing. People in New York are still assholes, but that's who we are. Anyway. It is great to have you on another episode of Faster Than Normal. I'm thrilled that you joined us as I always am humbled and love the fact that you're here.

We are being joined today by an old friend of mine, a wonderful woman named Jillian Ivey. Jill and I have known each other since God, the early aughts, I guess, as they call them probably around, mid. 2007 ish, 2006 ish, something like that, I don't know. Uh, I've known Jill; she started in PR and then she went on her own, she started writing. Uh, I, when I met her, she was working for Philios, which was a similar site of Gothamist. Um, and she does a a hundred million things I'll let her tell you about, but one of the reasons that I wanted to bring it on the podcast, other than she's a great friend and I love her, is because she went an article a couple of weeks ago on Medium. She's a very popular [does he say contributor on Medium?]. She's a phenomenal writer. And she wrote a piece about the untold financial costs of ADHD. Jillian does have ADHD; she's one of us. And she wrote a really interesting piece that I wanted to talk about because a lot of times we don't think about other things, other than oh Adult Hyperactivity Disorder blah blah, we don't think about the hidden costs of ADHD. And so with that- welcome Jillian!

Hi, Peter. It's so good to be here.

So tell us your backstory before we start, tell us, uh, when were you diagnosed and what was it like as a kid and, you know, the, the usual, the usual drama?

Sure. So I, um, I'll work backward. I was diagnosed when I was 36 years old. I'm 38 now. So this is a pretty, pretty new thing for me. And it was something that my therapist had been suggesting for a long time before she just kind of came out and said, you know, I, I think that this is something that, like you should look into more. I think that you have ADHD. And so she sent me some things and I, I looked into a lot of articles because for me, having, you know, having grown up in the 1990's is when ADHD was the thing that everybody was talking about, with like the hyperactive boy in the class, the boy who couldn't sit still and who was talking a mile a minute and PE was the only class they ever actually enjoyed. And so that wasn't me at all. I was a really good student. I have two degrees. I have a Bachelor's degree from the University of Pennsylvania and a Master's degree from Rutgers Camden, uh, in Creative Writing, both of them. So there, there are degrees that involved a lot of time spent reading. And so I immediately just kind of wrote her off until I started to look into how ADHD is often missed in young girls, because they don't always have that hyperactive sort of behavior. And so if they don't have that behavioral marker that's associated with ADHD, or at least was in the nineties, then it was, it was missed. It was missed really, really frequently. Uh, what I had instead was hyper-focus. And so the things that I, I chose to hyper focus on were reading and writing. I was a really good student because I loved doing those things. And I've learned that as students, if you can find that thing that you're really interested in, that's how you're able to kind of see that hyper-focus work to somebody's advantage. It just happened to be for me that it was that. For some people it might be interested in dinosaurs or it might be an interest in math. I have no, no real aptitude for math at all. And I think part of it was that I started to see the numbers and my brain just shut off. And so I started, I started looking into that and I also started to look into some of the behaviors that are associated with ADHD that they don't talk about in kids very much; things like staying up really late, uh, which I've always, always been a night owl. And one of the things I like about staying up late at night is that it's very quiet. And so I feel like I can get my work done without distraction. Um, my husband is not a huge fan of that behavior. Um, but I recently.. I was talking to my mom about ADHD. And my mother is a grade school teacher. So for her, it really is still about that hyperactive boy in her classroom she sees it's just, oh, Jillian, you don't have ADHD. And I was like, mom, think about how often I was staying up late at night to work when I could have done my work earlier in the day. And you know, some of it I was doing, I was doing theater. I was doing a lot of other extracurricular activities. And sometimes I couldn't start my homework until nine or 10:00 PM, but sometimes I just didn't want to. And my mother is also a night owl. And when I pointed that out to her, the line just went silent.. and she goes, oh, well, you've given me a lot to think about. I'l; t alk to you later. The only time I've ever talked to her about.

You make a really good point though, because I think that, that there's something to be said for people they need to see there's something to be said for silence. You know, there's something to be said for, um, for being able to shut out the rest of the world. Um, for me, that's early mornings and I was a night owl; growing up college. I mean, I, I was, I don't, I didn't get it. If I didn't have a class, I didn't get out of bed till noon. Right. And then, but I was up to like three, four every, every night. And, um, you know, or in the morning or watching the sun come up and, and it wasn't until my late twenties, when I discovered exercise that I discovered getting up early and now, you know, but the same thing is a few hours. I'll get up at 3:34 AM and get on the bike for a couple hours. Um, you know, and no one's there and it's my time. Right. It's just our time down here, type thing. And so, so that's a wonderful, a wonderful feeling.

Um, so I want, wanna, I want to touch this article because I really was blown away by this. You, you, you, you put into words, everything that I think so many of us think of, but we don't really think about it until it's as need be. So, so you talked about you, you called the article the, I don't remember the actual title, but the subhead was, "another collections agency called today". [The Very Real, Totally Hidden, Costs of Being an Adult With ADHD

Or: Whoops—I got a call from collections again!] Okay. Great. So tell us about the article and then tell us sort of what prompted you to write it. I'm assuming, you know, obviously wrote it from personal experience, so talk a little bit about it.

Um, so I, uh, I, I started it actually as a Twitter thread. I, um, to make a long story short, I do go into this in the piece. I used to see a therapist through a company called Thrive Works, um, and Thriveworks is a huge company. They have offices all over the place. They have a bunch of therapists, and I went to see them. I already had my therapist who I love, but I had a very specific issue that I needed to work on. And my therapist said, this is probably something you should go to somebody else for. So for awhile, I had two therapists, um, which was, was really fun. Um, but I needed somebody who took insurance and a friend of mine saw a therapist from Thriveworks, and she said, because they're so big, most of their therapists do take insurance. And so I found somebody who not only was local to Philadelphia because at the time it was pre COVID. And so I wanted to see somebody in person, um, but they took insurance and they had an availability the following week. So over the course of this. I was in distress. There was a lot going on in my life that led me to the point where I needed this therapist. And while I was being onboarded, while I was setting this appointment up, I'm sure they told me that, you know, part of being a member of Thriveworks, you have to pay a monthly fee to be a member. I don't know what the membership fee actually gets you. I still haven't quite figured that out, but whatever. So this would have been February, 2019, where I started, uh, started this process, started seeing this therapist by March of 2021. She had left the practice. And so I, I don't know. I just kinda forgot that I had this monthly fee because I'm not somebody who ever goes and looks at my checking account, which I know I probably, I look at the balance, but I don't look at the individual transactions. Um, and then when I was doing like getting ready to do my taxes at the beginning of this year, I saw that I was still charging, being charged with ThriveRx. And I thought, oh, you know, I must've just been on an annual plan where since she left in March and my, I started seeing her in February, I must just be on the hook for the next year. And in March, I get an email saying your subscription has been canceled. I'm like, great. Not going to worry about it. Uh, checking email is also not a thing I'm particularly great at, and I'm sure that that's a, that's a common behavior that a lot of us have. Um, so what I missed was the email that came up it was in my spam folder saying, oops, sorry, we didn't mean to cancel your account. You're still getting charged. And so when I saw that. Oh, I wasn't actually, uh, like this, wasn't an annual commitment that I'd made. This was a month to month commitment. So I contacted, Thriveworks, and I said, Hey, I'm going to need you to refund everything that I've paid since my therapist left the practice. And they said, oh no, we don't do that. It's on you to end your subscription when your therapist leaves the practice. And I added up what I had been paying since she left. And then I started to add up all of the other things that I have had to pay because I forgotten to cancel something, or because I've missed a deadline and then I've had to pay a late fee. And so it started as a Twitter thread and then I was like 11 tweets in it. Isn't oh, no, probably a out to move this over to a longer form where I can really start to explore it.

It is amazing, right? When you, you sit down and you think so, it's so funny, you, you, you, I feel very seen, heh, based on what you just said. Um, you know, I, I, I have a website, I have several websites that are hosted and. Recently, about a year ago or so I took my two biggest ones and I moved over to a separate host site that monitors them privately. And, um, it's much better, you know, if something goes down, I don't have to worry about it, they fix it. But, you know, I still have a bunch of others that they keep on this, on this other hosting platform. And I just randomly one day got an invoice and I think it was waiting for a flight, so nothing to do. So I clicked on the link and read the.. I was still being charged for the two big websites, even though they haven't been hosting my accounts over a year and you know, you get the notification that says, okay, your website has been officially taken off this platform. I think there's something about the ADHD in us that wants to assume it's going to be handled for us. Right. Because if I have to think about it and then deal with it. That's a whole process. Right. So, so yeah, I was paying like an extra $40 a month for like past year for absolutely nothing. And I can't tell you how many, how many times I've done that. I mean, you know, I think for, for us sites, like, uh, is it Truebill or whatever those are are, are, are godsends, but they're also scary as hell. It was like God, when they go through our, for their first run, this is going to be really depressing.

Yeah. Yeah. You know, I think that it's great that there are platforms like truebill and other services that allow you. I mean, I have, you know, there are, there are planners that are catered to people with ADHD. There are all sorts of reminders that you can set on your phone or your calendar to pop up an alert, like things that pop up once a month to, to remind me, you know, I have a subscription and if I don't want to get billed, I need to make sure that I tell them not to, not to charge me this month. Um, so, so that's all great, but at the same time with technology, there's really no reason that a lot of these companies can't do this stuff themselves. Like when my therapist left the practice. It would have been so easy for Thriveworks to go through their CRM and say, you know, pull all of the people who have seen this therapist in the last year and contact them and say, as you know, this therapist is leaving the practice. Exactly. Exactly. It's not the..

Company's bank on people like us, like on everyone, right, forgetting to do that.

Exactly. "It's not a bug, it's a 'feature'"! [fml]

There's a great episode of, uh, I think the first episode of a TV show on HBO or Showtime called House of Lies with Don Cheadle, Kristen Bell. Um, they talk about how they're going to, uh, uh, they're going to re revamp a big banks image. Uh, you know, that during the housing crisis, all these people lost their homes and the banks made billions they're going to revamp their image by. Uh, offering lone amnesty and that the CEO was like, absolutely not. And they said, no, you don't understand you, you, your normal DQ, like 90% of the people won't qualify. 8% of screw up in the application. Half a 4% will die. You know, you'll give out a couple hundred grand back, you know, and you accept the award of the year because they it's exactly the case. They don't expect us to follow through. And normally 910 times when we won't.

Yeah, I, um, I have the, I live in, I live in Philadelphia and, uh, the state of Pennsylvania has a website where you can go and see if you have any unclaimed funds. So this is like refunds from a doctor's office, that for whatever reason, they didn't prescribe it to your account. And so I have for, now that you're saying this is probably two or three years, had money sitting, waiting for me with the State of Pennsylvania. And the reason that I have not actually been able to claim it is because it involves printing out a form AND GETTING it NOTARIZED!?! And yes, getting this and then putting it in the Mail. And so I have to go through all of these extra steps and like, that's, I have several things that just don't happen because they have, I have to leave my house. I can't do it online. I have, um, I have some, I overpaid, uh, on medical expenses last year. Like I hit my out-of-pocket max. And so I have to submit forms to the insurance company, which can only be submitted by mail. There is, you can't scan it and send it to somebody. I have a friend who works with this insurance agency in the Social Media department. And I was like, what, what the hell is this? I know, I know it's just, it is the way that they operate. And so there is, there's a lot of money, not only that I've paid, um, because of this, but I think there's actually a lot of money that I'm owed, uh, that I haven't pursued because of this.

So what's the answer. I mean, what do we, you know, obviously I, you know, Hey Siri, remind me of this, or, Hey Siri, do this is, you know, Hey Alexa, do this, that is great. But there has to be, I mean, look, we're not gonna, we're not, the companies are going to certainly not going to do it. Right. So at the end of the day, what's the answer.

Well, you say the companies aren't going to do it, but I think we forget how important a role activism is in the disability community and then neurodivergent community. So I think that part of this is going to be calling your Representatives and talking about the unethical practices of the people who are charging these fees, knowing that people who are neurodivergent people who have ADHD, people who have Autism are not able to meet the requirements in order to take advantage of the system. This system is calculated against these populations in the same way that there are systems that are calculated against Women and against People of Color against people in the Queer community. And so the more that we can raise visibility here, the more we can say, no, this is a real issue a nd it affects a lot, a lot of people. And I think since, you know, the DSM has been revised and the way that we see Autism has really expanded in the way that we see ADHD has really been expanded. It affects a lot more people than you realize. And to create that visibility so that the system works for us. I think we shouldn't, we shouldn't forget that we at least for now, live in a society where we have representatives met as part of their job.

That's true. And we do have that at least for another few months. Um, but no, I, I think, and I think it's interesting because, you know, I, I keynoted, uh, disability, the first ever disability confrence for Adobe, and it was a global conference, uh, you know, 10,000 people online, all from all around the world. And the one thing that I got the most feedback on was the fact that. You know, upwards of 15 to 25% of the workforce is going to be neurodivergent in the next 10 to 15 years. That's a massive number! Right. And if you're a company and you're not A. hiring for that, but B. understanding your audience.. you're going to lose.

Right.

That's very, very true. I wanna be respectful of your time. Give us a couple of hacks that work for you that allow you to, you know, obviously, obviously it's not, uh, not in terms of, uh, paying, paying your therapist bill, but give us other hacks that work for you and tell us what you've learned and the kinds of things that you do to prevent these things from happening.

So to prevent these things specifically. Um, as I said, I have an alert that goes off on my phone the first of every month I have, I'm a yoga teacher when I'm not doing the writing and, and also consulting on, on a content strategy for folks. But, um, I have a subscription to a service called Fabletics it's Kate Hudson's active wear line, and you get invoiced every, uh, I think the fifth of every month, so that you get your monthly credits to get more clothes. I have more yoga clothes than I could possibly need. And so right now I have an alert that comes up on my phone the first of every month. And I see it when I wake up in the morning and before I even get out of bed, I go to Fabletics and I tell it to skip this month. And so I think that those alerts, as long as we see them, as long as they come through at a time where we're likely to see them are really helpful. Now, if the first of the month is on a Saturday or a Sunday, and I'm sleeping in a little bit, it's not necessarily going to be at the top of my phone. So it's not a perfect system. But it does help. Um, I think other things that I've done are, you know, I, uh, I can't always rely on.. my husband is probably undiagnosed ADHD. He's got a lot of the same behaviors that I do. So I can't always rely on him to remind me to do some of these things, but what I can do is put something on our shared calendar that says, you know.. Six o'clock tonight we're going to get this thing. We're going to be making dinner. And it's going to say, talk about whatever this, this bill is that we need to figure out or talk about our taxes. Um, so, so it's really helpful just to have those, those things pop up on our phone. Now, that being said, I know that a lot of folks who are neurodivergent, who have ADHD turn off a lot of those alerts on their phones.

Right?

So one of the other systems that I used to do, I, I now I work all over my house, so this doesn't work as well for me anymore but when I always sat at my desk at the same place at my desk, every day, I put post-it notes on my computer screen of things that I needed to do. It's just around. The edge of the computer screen. And there's, there's something really satisfying about the tactility of- when you finish a task, taking that note off of your screen, tearing it up and throwing it away. Because it's more than just like clicking a box on your computer. There's actually something there that like, yes, I can do this. I can, I can get this done and I can actually feel getting it done, which a lot of us don't have when we work fully digitally.

It's funny. My, I used to make fun of my mother when I was growing up, because she had a black book and in her book were all of her contacts, but she also had a calendar and every year she'd replace it with a new calendar. And she'd write down all these tasks that were do on the day. And she, when she was done, she would spend upwards of 30 seconds crossing it out. And, you know, like, like crossing it out, like, like you're, you're the, uh, woman in Hamlet trying to get the blood out of..

That's Macbeth..

Ah Macbeth! That's what I meant. And I knew if anyone, if anyone would correct me on that'd be you! But you know, like ripping the page as she crossed it out. And I always asked, Mom, why are you crossing so angrily?! She's like I'm not angry, I just did it! It's done! LOL And I totally get it now!

Um, you know, I, I praise these guys all the time. I have no connection to them other than the fact that they've saved my life many times www.FollowUpThen.com. Um, I I'm sure I've told you about before Jill. Follow up then.com is this free service where you create an account and then you send an email to any time period. I followed them,,,?So 10 minutes had followed them to come four hours about, then it comes Thursday, March 28th, 2023. It followed that and it will simply send it back, whatever you wrote in that email to you. And so, you know, on, uh, for your thing where you have to do your Fabletics. Um, I do the same thing with certain things that have to be paid or have to be looked at, you know, um, January 5th, February 5th, March, I send one email to all 12 months and every, every fifth of the month I get an email, Hey, check your subscription or whatever it is. So yeah, those kinds of things are, are, are game changers for people like us.

Absolutely. Um, I think, I think while the system doesn't work for us, it's up to us to figure out what we're able to do to kind of hack the system. So, so, you know, apps like that, uh, offerings like that, just make it a little bit easier to exist in the world that is not really always made for us.

This was awesome. Jill, how can people find you?

[http://www.jilletante.com also www.JillianIvey.com and on the @JillianIvey on all the socials except TikTok Twitter INSTA Pinterest and Facebook]

Uh, so a couple of ways I'm on social media, all, all platforms, except for tick-tock because I'm old and I still don't understand it, uh, at a, at Jillian, Jillian with a J and IVs IBE, Y um, I'm also, you can find me at Jillianivey.com. Most of my work is archived there so you can find the link to the Medium article that way. And I also, in my consulting work and I am at Jill Aton, like dilettantes. Spelled with two L's and one T because two L's and two T's looked weird. Uh, so Dillatant dot com. And I'm actually about to launch I an offering where I'm doing live story audits with people. So going through their website, kind of helping them to figure out whether there's story works live in the minute I send them a recording. And I find that this actually works really well with my ADHD, because I don't have to remember to do any followup work after I send them the recording. And that is that is it.

That's awesome. I, you know, that's funny. I never, for the life of me knew how to pronounce that until just now, haa! I love it. I love it.

Thank you so much for taking the time to be with us today. I really appreciate it. This was a great interview. We'd love to hear what you think. And we'd love to know if you know, more people like Jill, who would want to be on our podcast. We are always looking for guests. We record a couple of times a month. We'd do like six or eight interviews in a day. So if you have someone that you know, or maybe yourself, shoot me a note, [email protected]. And we would love to hear your story and perhaps get it on the air. We get about 40 to 50,000 downloads an episode. So people definitely, definitely will hear your story. And, um, we'd love to help share that. ADHD is a gift, not a curse.

Jill, thank you so much, guys. Thank you so much for listening. We will see you next week. Big shout out to my producer, Steven Byrom, the best producer in the world! [Thank you Peter!! :-)] Uh, opening theme recorded and composed by him and closing theme recorded by him. And The Voice you hear at the beginning of every episode is none other than Bernie Wagenblast the same man who says, at Newark airport. "The next stop is terminal C. Airlines at terminal C include United, United Express and United International departures." We'll see you next week. Thank you so much for listening! Stay safe, be well.

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Credits: You've been listening to the Faster Than Normal podcast. We're available on iTunes, Stitcher and Google play and of course at www.FasterThanNormal.com I'm your host, Peter Shankman and you can find me at shankman.com and @petershankman on all of the socials. If you like what you've heard, why not head over to your favorite podcast platform of choice and leave us a review, come more people who leave positive reviews, the more the podcast has shown, and the more people we can help understand that ADHD is a gift, not a curse. Opening and closing themes were composed and produced by Steven Byrom who also produces this podcast, and the opening introduction was recorded by Bernie Wagenblast. Thank you so much for listening. We'll see you next week!