Episode 1: Welcome to ADHD Coaching!

In this episode, I'll be sharing with you how I got the idea for this podcast and why I wanted to create it.  I will also explain a little more about what my approach to ADHD coaching looks like and why I believe this approach can be so effective.  I'll walk you through the 3 parts of coaching I really focus on with my clients so that you can see how those parts are incorporated into each episode.  If you are unsure of or confused about what ADHD coaching actually entails, this episode will hopefully answer some of your questions and give you a better understanding of why it can be so helpful and beneficial for someone with ADHD.  

If you enjoyed this episode please subscribe to this podcast and make sure to rate and review so more people can access ADHD coaching support. And I would LOVE for you share it with your friends and family!

Disclaimer:
This podcast is not intended to be a substitute for coaching, therapy, or any other medical intervention. Rather it is a resource for you the listener to learn more about yourself and your ADHD. Furthermore, these sessions reflect MY personal style of coaching and how I was trained, and are not meant to be a representation of all ADHD coaching.

All sessions being highlighted in this podcast are being done so with permission from the client being featured. Some details may be slightly altered in order to keep their identity anonymous.

Learn more about my coaching business ADHD with EMILY:
http://www.adhdwithemily.com

If you are interested in working with me and would like to book a free consult, check here for my availability
https://www.adhdwithemily.com/getstarted

Follow me for more ADHD content:
https://www.instagram.com/adhd.with.emily/

Transcript

Hello. Hello, welcome to Monday morning ADHD coaching. I am your host and coach Emily, and I am so excited to finally get this podcast up and running. I had originally thought that I was just going to get started right away with my first episode diving right into a client session. But then I realized I should probably back it up a little bit and give some background info on how I came to make this podcast, how I coach and why I believe this approach is so important. 

 So, if any of you have ever followed me on Instagram or heard me on another podcast, or listen to me talk in real life, you know, I have a lot to say, especially when it comes to ADHD. And I don't exactly keep it super concise. Uh, and as I was coaching my clients, I was just so excited about and proud of what they were learning about themselves and the new levels of awareness they were coming to within our sessions. And like the amazing shifts they were making in their lives due to all of this.  

And of course the excitement made me want to shout it to the world and share it with everyone. Because the thing is people with ADHD are of course, all so unique. But also, so, so, so, so similar in so many ways. There are just so many shared experiences amongst ADHDers, as we tend to struggle in very similar ways. And are confronted with very similar challenges. And so often people with ADHD think that they're the only ones who struggle in these ways, which leaves us very frustrated with ourselves. And confused as to why others seem to have such an easier time. Managing their lives and it can feel very isolating. 

But it doesn't have to be like that. I learned this firsthand When I joined a group coaching program, shout out to focus with Kristen Carter. And realized how many people were just like me. And sharing stories I could so relate to and struggling with the same things I was struggling with. That I don't know, it felt really embarrassing or just made me feel like I was lazy person who just needed to try harder. But like also I was recognizing that I was trying really hard and yeah, it all felt so confusing and I felt crazy sometimes and finding people like me was so validating and so healing.  

So being with my clients when they were having these like aha moments or, you know, just better understanding what was holding them back or finding different ways to move forward with support in a way that really works for them. I really wanted to share it with other people who might be going through the same thing. It felt very similar to how group coaching was so helpful for me. Because I was able to take so much away from what other people were sharing and see how I could apply it to my own life.  

And so I tried making, you know, quote unquote brief little stories on Instagram. But they weren't brief. Um, they were long and they were often so long that even I, who knew how important and helpful they could be. Acknowledged that like, I wouldn't have the patience to sit there and watch them So how could I possibly expect other people, especially people with ADHD to watch them.  

And after one particularly enlightening session I had with a client. It dawned on me that. My sharing of our session. I mean, I had her permission of course, where I was trying to be concise, but it was just becoming way too long for an Instagram story, It needed to be a podcast. All of this amazing staff could be turned into a podcast so people can listen to me at 1.5 speed. Like, please speed me up. If you haven't already. And, you know, people can do other things while listening and choose when to listen and pause and come back or binge, or however you listen to your podcasts. And that would allow me to really share what I wanted to share and hopefully reach and be able to help more people.  

And so I let all the ideas rush over me and I felt the excitement boiling over in my body. 
And I ran to tell my wife this idea. And I was speaking to her like a hundred miles a minute. And she, because she knows me really well at this point, she just kind of let me go on and on and on. And she totally supported it and thought it was a great idea. And she also helped me like iron out some logistics and think through a few things and consider how exactly I wanted to do this. And so I went from there and now here we are. 

So that's just a little bit about why I started the podcast. And now I want to talk to you a bit more about like what you'll hear in each episode.  Now when I first began working with a coach, I, 100% thought she was just going to kind of like teach me how to be a proper adult. Obviously doing air quotes around proper adults. , I really just thought there was like a correct way to be doing all this stuff and managing my life. And I just hadn't learned that way. And she was going to show me like, I don't know all the insider information.  And I was very incorrect. And I'll admit I was a bit frustrated at the beginning when I realized she wasn't just telling me how to do things more easily.  

But what I learned and know now is that there are really three parts to supporting someone with ADHD and managing your own ADHD. Maybe there's more than three parts, but I've kind of narrowed it down to three important ones.  So we'll start with part three, which is finding different strategies that help you and your brain. So you can do the things you want to be doing. Figuring out, you know, what support you need and how to get that support from others as well as yourself. And getting clear on what type of life works for you and actually aids you in being successful. Rather than making it harder for you to succeed.  And I say that's the third part, because it's so hard to do all of that. Without the first two parts.  

So the first part is just understanding more about ADHD so you can see how specific symptoms are affecting you and have affected you. And so you can be more aware of how deficits in executive functioning. Can make things that seem fairly easy to other people feel really hard for you. And so you can see why something that works for someone else without ADHD might not work for you because your brain is wired differently. This part is really so, so important because without knowing this piece, someone with ADHD just tends to think like, they're the problem. They suck at doing certain things and maybe it's their fault for not trying hard enough. And so they spend a lot of time just trying to be better. Again, air quotes, be better. Instead of getting support or doing what works for them or finding out what works for them.  

Which brings us to the second part, where we start to bring awareness to the fact that difficulties due to ADHD are often interpreted as character flaws as moral failings as. Crappy personality traits that we should be able to fix if we really want it to.  

 Adults with ADHD, not only experienced symptoms that can really create challenges for them, but they have also gone through their whole life, struggling with certain things and not really understanding why. Now this certainly doesn't apply to every adult with ADHD. But I know it does apply to many, and I see it with my clients who are either late, diagnosed in adulthood. Or we're diagnosed at younger ages, but didn't really understand what it meant for them And weren't really receiving the support they needed.  

And when you go through life, struggling with things that seem pretty easy, or at least manageable for other people. And you can't really figure out why. And oftentimes other people also don't understand why. It can be very frustrating and confusing. And so many people with ADHD have received so much negative feedback through their whole lives because of this that has eventually become internalized. 

Now I will repeat this in many episodes, but I don't say this to imply that every person. Relaying like a negative message has negative intent. It might seem harmless, like, you know,  how'd you let your desk get so messy or, oh, we knew you'd be late again. Or why are you waiting until the last minute to do that? Or, oh my God. How'd you forget that? Or it's not that hard. You just have to try a little harder. I mean, I could go on and on. And comments like this might come from a person who simply doesn't understand your difficulties.  But repeated feedback like this, as well as messages from society, such as consistency is the key to success or the early bird catches the worm or. You know, eat the frog first, or if you believe it, you can achieve it.  It can really chip away at one self-esteem and have us thinking, like, what's wrong with me? And then we just start repeating some of those messages. As we begin to tell ourselves things like, I just need to get my act together. I just need to try harder. I should be able to keep my stuff organized. And on and on.  

So coaching for adults really means uncovering the thoughts and stories that they are now telling themselves that have created a very strong narrative in their minds about what they are and are not capable of what they should be able to do, how they should be able to function, what kind of person they are, et cetera, et cetera.  

And there are also lots of emotions that start to come up as a result of those thoughts. And that combination,  you know, those negative thoughts and the really uncomfortable, painful emotions. Those can really prevent them from even using the strategies or seeking out the support needed. To move in the direction They're wanting to move in. 

So knowing the strategies, knowing what could be supportive simply isn't enough. It's why like tips and tricks and hacks might work. Initially they might at times be effective. But eventually they don't work because there's a bigger barrier at play.  Anyone can set an alarm to go off when they intend to start a task, say writing a paper.  And I'm just using this example because, you know, setting an alarm can be a helpful strategy to support our time management and the fact that we struggle to sense the passing of time.  But when the alarm goes off, If you are, I don't know, like feeling really embarrassed because you're thinking, oh, I should know how to do this.  and you're not actually sure where to start and what to write, and you're not really clear on the assignment or where to get the information. Well, you're probably just going to silence that alarm and tell yourself, I'll figure it out later. I'll do it tomorrow. And rinse and repeat until who knows when.  And if you're anything like me and if you're listening, Odds are you are, that will be the night before it's due. 

 And that's because emotions like embarrassment usually cause a person to hide and avoid because we don't like feeling embarrassed. And so we stay away from the thing that's causing that embarrassment.  So we silence the alarm and find something that will make us feel better. The alarm won't make you start. It's just an indicator that it's time to start. Right. That's the support it offers. But what will help you get started is noticing and addressing the thought. I should know how to do this. And being able to pause long enough to see how it's holding you back from actually figuring out what would help you in doing it. What will help you is acknowledging what emotion is coming up and learning how to allow yourself to feel that emotion and learn to tolerate and soothe it instead of ignoring or running away from it.  That's the emotional regulation piece. 

And I actually really want to acknowledge that because it's kind of a crucial part. You know, I used to think I had no issues with emotional regulation because I didn't yell. I didn't really blow up at people or explode or snap. I'm, pretty calm and not outwardly, very emotional. So I thought, yeah, I don't really think that's something I struggle with, but I could not have been more wrong. 

Because struggling with emotional regulation, which is really at the heart of ADHD. Does not exclusively mean that you are someone who is very reactive or yells or blows up struggling with emotional regulation means when big feelings come up, they can be so overwhelming or uncomfortable or painful. And we don't really know what to do with them.  And. as a result you might suppress or ignore or distract yourself from the unpleasant emotions. Because you don't know how to regulate them. And suppressing ignoring distracting. Well, that generally drives us away from what we want to be doing.  

So, this is really why I loved that this is how I was trained and why so much of. my coaching is focused on these first two parts. Because as you learn how to do this, as you are able to become more aware of what's happening in the moment and pause long enough to move through an emotion or challenge a thought you're telling yourself.  You will then be able to decide how you want to proceed. That's when we can really get into part three of coaching where you'll be able to access like the more logical and rational part of your brain  in order to find. ways to more effectively support your ADHD and actually use those tools that help you achieve what you want to achieve.  

So that's basically what you're going to be hearing in each episode. A client comes to the session with some sort of challenge or dilemma they're currently experiencing. And we work together to uncover what's going on. What's creating it. I help them notice some of their thoughts they're having as well as recognize why those thoughts are there and where they came from. We work on regulating their emotions through acknowledging, allowing, tolerating and soothing. Though, that part is a little tricky to share through the podcast, but it is a part of it.  Big part of it.  I'll also talk about some common themes that many people with ADHD tend to have, like within their narrative. And why. And you'll see, as clients are able to make a shift in how they're approaching something. Once they have more awareness around, what's actually getting in their way. 

Again, people with ADHD are all so unique, but also have so much in common. And I really hope in hearing their stories and listening in on their experiences, it will help you notice and possibly address some of the things that are holding you back in your own life.  

Next week I promise I will get started with sharing one of these coaching sessions. I really can't wait for you to listen in.  And I will see you next week.