Episode 32 - Good Girls and ADHD with Kristen Carder

This week the amazing Kristen Carder is joining me to talk about ADHD. I’ve been looking forward to this for a while. She is an incredible coach with 10 years of ADHD expertise and also my friend. I’ve started to become curious if I have ADHD after looking at the symptoms. It's mindblowing once you make the connections and realize that this might be something you struggle with. ADHD intersects with the "Good Girl" programming in that masking behaviors are often present in both. After Kristen’s diagnosis at 21 years old, she started her research and wanted to find a way to help others. She created the podcast, I Have ADHD, and the group coaching program called FOCUSED. There’s a lot in the episode that can help start the conversation with yourself and resources that can help if you think you have ADHD.

Find Kristen here:
https://www.ihaveadhd.com
https://www.instagram.com/i.have.adhd.podcast

Find Sara here:
https://sarafisk.coach
https://pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations
https://www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/
https://www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/
https://www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach
https://www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

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Transcript

0:54

Okay. Do you edit or no? Um, yeah. Yes. So anything we say can be edited. I'll just make a kind of where we are in the podcast. Um, of course I edit because I lose my train of thought. I think I have, you know, the next brilliant thing to say I get caught up in what. People like you who are brilliant say, and I'm like, wait, where were we? So, um, I feel like that's a great introduction to this podcast right there. I have the amazing Kristen Carter. She is an internationally recognized expert on adults with ADHD. She has a podcast that is incredible. I've just spent the last, I mean. I've been listening for a while, but the last couple days, just really getting into how she talks about ADHD, especially because it has become personally relevant for me. She is a mother. She is, uh, the creator of the focused group coaching program that works with adults who have ADHD. And I'm just beyond thrilled and honored that you would be here with me to have this conversation today. I have been looking forward to this for weeks. I am so thrilled to be sitting across from you. I wish I was in person so I could squeeze you because I know you give the best hugs and I'm just so grateful that you asked me to be here. Hi. Hi. This episode is going to be an interesting mix of the personal, um, and the, the factual, the clinical, because we're talking about ADHD, um, and we're talking about how it intersects in really, really important ways with the good girl programming that. It's kind of my mission in life to really help people see so, so that they can keep what they like, that they can get rid of what, you know, no longer works for them. How did you, I mean, I know you were diagnosed, you got your diagnosis of ADHD when you were 21, but then it seems like there was kind of a period of time where it wasn't a big player in your life or just didn't seem to have the focus that it does now. How did you come to this work as a coach for adults with ADHD? Yeah, you're absolutely correct. So I was diagnosed at 21. And that was that. I didn't really know anything about ADHD. I was put on a stimulant and it helped a lot. Um, and so I kind of just went about my life. Um, I didn't realize that I was still struggling so much because when you've never truly been healthy, you don't know, um, how good it could be. And so the fact that I was able to move the needle a little bit, Uh, you know, so to speak by taking medication and seeing an improvement there. I was like, oh my goodness, this is amazing. Um, and so I thought that that was just that, um, and you know, I was also in my twenties, I was What we know about people with ADHD is that they're about 30% behind developmentally. So yes, I was 21 years old, but I was really acting more like a 17, 16, 17 year old. I got married really young. Thank God. My husband is, um, steady and he is my anchor. So I'm very grateful that I got married, um, at 23, which now I look back and I'm like, I was a fetus. I was so little, I can't believe it, but truly it is what kind of like. Um, anchored me. So that's great. Um, and when I was in my mid thirties, I was, um, working with students who struggled in school. So I owned a tutoring company in my town and I was working with students and, um, many of the students that I had struggled with ADHD. And so I began to research ADHD and how I could maybe help them. Uh, with their struggles. And as I began to learn about ADHD for the first time in my life, I was shocked that. Seemingly everything that I hated about myself, the fact that I was late, the fact that I was impulsive, the fact that I interrupted the fact that I, um, was emotionally explosive, the fact that I couldn't, um, just like stay focused on one thing long enough to get it done. All of the things that I thought were character flaws I discovered were connected to ADHD symptoms. And so for me, that was. Mind blowing. What was that? Like, like, tell me about, because I feel like I'm in a little bit of that mind blowing right now. I mean, side note, I've been on your website. I've been reading the symptoms. I'm like, oh, my. Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh, it's over and over like this and this, what was that like for you? Well, I mean, it feels like a lifetime ago because that was so many versions of me ago. Does that make sense? Like, I feel like I have evolved so much since then. And so I struggle to connect with that version of myself who was just waking up and, and realizing like, wait, what? I can remember being mad. As in, why did anyone tell me this information and that's really where my podcast was born out of was this frustration of like, why didn't anybody tell me this? And people need to be talking about this and everyone needs to know that ADHD is more than just an inability to focus. As a matter of fact, it is, it is like, that is maybe the least of our worries. You know, the fact that we struggle with focus and attention. Like, that's. That's the least of our worries. So when I learned about all of the executive functions, when I learned about time blindness and working memory issues and, um, emotional dysregulation and all of the things that literally I thought were just my personality. And my flaws and the things that I needed to pray about and take to the Lord, like literally was like, dear Jesus, please help me not to be late as if it was something that I could just pray away. And that to me is just so frustrating. Um, so at the time we're talking like 2015 ish and I. Uh, podcasts were just starting podcasts were just becoming a thing. And for a couple of years I would go and I would look for podcasts. Um, and there were like two ADHD podcasts and I mean, they just weren't my jam. And I would just, again, get angry. Why isn't anybody talking about this? Why isn't anybody fun and smart and cool talking about this stuff? And so, um, eventually I finally heard the screams in the back of my head, like. Uh, could be you, like you could just go do it. And that's when I started the podcast, which was really cathartic because then I was able to share my frustration. I was able to talk about like, does anybody know this? Like, how do we not know that this is like, we are not flawed. We're struggling with symptoms of ADHD and. Medication is great, but pills don't teach skills. So how are we going to learn to compensate for these deficiencies that we have? So much sense. And when I hear you talk about like, why aren't we talking about this? That's how I felt about like all of this good girl programming. It's like, wait a second. You mean I was taught that being nice is the most important feature that I could develop you mean that I was taught that I'm supposed to be focused on everyone else but myself and it, it feels like when you take ADHD symptoms, which are a deficiency in the way your brain works and you pair them with. The good girl programming to be neat, to be organized, to be polite, to be on time, don't interrupt, be adjusted well, get good grades, focus on the positive. It just creates this clusterfuck. I don't there's I mean, there's not another word for it of skills that people who are socialized as women have to develop to hide the fact that. This is hard. And so this is a really interesting, like, I feel like I have just in the last, like, maybe 12 months been like, I wonder if I have ADHD. It has to do with my kids, some of my kids being diagnosed, which is interesting. For a lot of women, how they come to a late adult, you know, diagnosis, I'm thinking back to, um, you know, events in my life where things like estrogen lowers and perimenopause starts and all of a sudden it's like, my brain just doesn't work anymore. And I joke about it, you know, with my husband, I'll say like, Hey, remember when I used to be smart. Remember when I used to be able to like find. The, the word and finish sentences and walk from one room to the next and know exactly why I'm here and not have to retrace my steps. And when I didn't have 50 million computer tabs open, and if I close them, I'm going to forget that thing I have to do, it just, it feels like a lot, um, yeah, co signed, I will co sign that belief. It's a lot. It is a lot. And, I think the hardest thing for those of us who are, who were brought up to please, who are taught to please, whether you're a woman or a man who was brought up in a. In a family that was just like your value and your worth comes from what you can bring to us, how you can please me, how can you, how you can make me look good, um, for those of us who were socialized to please it, it really is unfair because. So much about what we bring to the table is kind of a hot mess. And when our parents, our teachers, our Sunday school teachers, our like, you know, coaches or whatever, look at us and they say, you're so smart. You're so smart. Why can't you just turn in your homework? You're so smart. Why can't you just sit down and finish this paper? You're like, you come from such a good family. You come from so much privilege. You're not the kid that we should have to be worrying about. Essentially, those are the messages that I feel like I received. I come from a two parent home. Was it covertly, extremely abusive? Yeah, it was, but nobody knew that. Right. So I come from an intact family from a white family, from a middle class family. Um, and so like, what's wrong with me that I can't just do the things. And for me personally, it was ADHD, but it was also a Being ingrained in a family system that was not for me, it was not set up to support me in my family system. The kids are set up to support the parents. And so we were there as a function of emotional, mental, physical support for our parents. And so the, the family system that I existed in was also really tricky. And so just trying to function, um, you. And when I finally got married and moved out, I was so not able to function. I talk about this on my podcast where I just watch daytime TV all day long. And I never finished. I never wrote my wedding. Thank you notes. They just sat there in a basket on the floor. And every day I stared at them and my husband would come home from his job and be like, So you, you didn't write any wedding. Thank you. Like you don't, you're not working. What are you doing? And I was just so non functional. And so to anybody who can relate to that, like, I just want to send so much love your way because you are not the problem. That's what I want people to know. Like, is it ADHD? That's the problem. Is it a toxic family system? That's a problem. Like you are not the problem. We need to find answers to what the problem is, but it's not you. I heard you say that over and over on your podcast and it just, it mirrors so beautifully what I say about people pleasing and that people pleasing is not the problem. It's that you don't know how to stop people pleasing when you don't want to, and it has to do with the way we're programmed and whether you are an adult who grew up with messages around, why doesn't your brain work this way? Why can't you just, you know, fill in the blank, do this thing? Or whether you are an adult woman who is coming to the realization that, you know what, and, and this is where I am like, it is so hard for my brain to just do things that seem to be easy. Like, I, it was my birthday a couple of weeks ago. I scheduled a massage for myself. I was 10 minutes late. And as I was driving over, at least now I don't. Beat myself up. Like, what the fuck is the matter with you? This is a massage. You paid a number of dollars to have this beautiful experience. Now I can ask myself the question. All right. What thing did you try to squeeze in? Because that's what I do. I'm like, I have time. I totally have time and I don't understand how long things take and I don't beat myself up as much anymore. But that's, that's what I want to talk about next is You are so open about the shame spiral. You are so open about the way and I see like women's brains are programmed to always be searching for what is wrong with them, how they can be better, how they can contribute more, how can they can be more efficient, how they can produce more and that, you know, when you overlay like capitalism with patriarchy, that's what you get. Tell me how you understand and talk about this shame spiral. I mean, shame is one of the most prominent experiences and reoccurring experiences of someone with ADHD. It is prevalent in our lives almost at all times until we can do the deep, deep, deep work of healing and self acceptance, which is deeper work. I'm going to cough. I'm so sorry. We all got it. I'm so sorry. Um, it's deeper work than what most. ADHD years are able to do on the, at, like at first. So what I talk about with my clients is when you come into my program, we need to triage. Like we need to just make sure that your airways are clear, that you're not bleeding profusely. Like we need to patch up the biggest wounds. And most of the time that's. Do you need a diagnosis? Do you need better medication? Do you need like proper medical treatment? That's number one for triage. As far as I'm concerned, then number two is like, do you know what the ADHD symptoms are? Can you separate your character flaws, which Yeah, we all have character flaws, but they're not your symptoms. Can you separate your character flaws from your ADHD symptoms? So that right there is the beginning of the unraveling of the shame. Because when I can look at ADHD and I can say, I'm timelined, I'm forgetful, I'm emotionally explosive. I am, um, I struggled to prioritize and plan. I struggled to regulate my behavior, my attention, and my, um, Emotions like self regulation is huge. When I can hold that in this hand and say, these are the things that I struggle with, and then I can, in the other hand, look and say, I am a kind human. I love people. I am always up for a good time. I'm willing to give to the people who are safe in my life. I know I make a contribution to society and I can hold. Both things as being true, that's when we can begin to just scratch the surface of unraveling shame. But until that point, and like I said, that's not first on the list. First on the list is just like triage. Are you breathing? Are you bleeding? Like, is everything okay? Let's get you some medical treatment, right? First, we have to triage and then we can say, hey, symptoms are real, but you are not your symptoms. And so let's just. Put a tiny bit of space between who you are as a person and how your symptoms present and annoy you and everyone else around you because that's, that's the thing it's going to be a thing, but that, that's not you. Those are your symptoms. And so, first, we have to internalize that and then that's the first part. Then we can begin to externalize it. Because what happens so often is that the unhealed version of us has set up relationships where we believe we're the problem and our partner also believes we are the problem because that's how we've set up the relationship because that's how we've set up. Every relationship, because that's just what we've always been taught and what we've always thought. And so once we realize, Oh wait, I'm not the problem. It's my ADHD symptoms. And I can really internalize that and begin to get a handle on that. Then comes the next layer, which is externalizing it and being able to say to my husband, I know I'm running late. And instead of saying I should have started earlier, why don't you offer to help me? Cause that could really solve the problem here. And so being able, I know that's like, that's like new level unlocked. And that's why I talk about it in layers because it really is. There's these different levels of healing because when shame is running the show, we're a hot fricking mess. And what happens is we take something like. Already running late and already making it hard and then we layer on a heap of shame and we start to spiral and the shame spiral then begets more, um, maladaptive behavior. So now I'm shame spiraling and because I'm shame spiraling, I can't focus on work. I just want to binge eat. I just want to scroll on my phone because that's the only thing I know to do to soothe this shame. And so when we can recognize and say, Oh, this is shame and I'm feeling shame because I'm running late and I don't think I should be running late. And my answer to that is like, yes, you should, you have ADHD. You should always be running late. If you're not running late, it's a miracle. It's a miracle. So like when I think I should be able to be better, that's when I know shame is right around the corner lurking. I just, I'm torn between like furiously scribbling notes and just like being in this conversation. I'm just going to be in the conversation with you because I feel like what you just said mirrors so beautifully the same work that I do because the first thing you have to do is Right. The person away from the programming, right? Like you were taught that a good wife, a good daughter, a good student, a good woman, a good girl does these things. And that is not you. And you are good. You are good. And Sometimes we have issues, right? Like something that needs to be taken care of address. Um, we need some skills, but I find that the most common way that women people who are socialized as women have been taught to. Improve is by beating the crap out of themselves. Like if I just break myself enough, I will get better at it. If I'm just hard enough on myself, I will fix this. And so maybe it is a time blindness issue, or maybe it is. A way that they are showing up in a relationship at work with their boss, with a coworker that they don't like, but then they wrap that issue in criticism and self judgment doubt and ruminating and replaying old events. And that's where all of their energy goes instead of what could I say to this person that I'm comfortable with that would establish a boundary. How could I address this? And so the way that women's energy just hemorrhages criticism and judgment and self deprecation meanness, it just, it literally causes me pain right here in my chest because I've lived it and because. I just see, like, one of the things that was so, um, beautiful to me, the guests that you had on talking about radical self acceptance when she talked about, like, how she can hold this vision of a person as whole. I see you. It's, it's, um, episode number, I think it's 151. Um. And do you remember her name? It's fine. I'll that's the worst question I could ask. Right? Um, so it brought tears to my eyes when she was describing, like, holding the vision of a whole person who is good, who has been programmed to believe these things about herself. And you holding the vision of like, you are a person, not your symptoms. Yes. I think that is such a beautiful gift that coaching offers people when you don't have anyone helping you separate that. And when the prevailing narrative is, if you just beat yourself up enough, you know what, you'll get over this. I mean, no fucking wonder spend so much time trying to just beat it out of ourselves. And the question that I always ask, and I've asked it a million times is how's it working for you? Yeah. How's that? How's that working for you? How is beating yourself up working? How does it feel? And tell me the good things that it's brought to your life. Tell me how it has helped you change your behavior. Tell me how it has helped you to be a more realized version of yourself. Give me all the ways. Make a good case. I want you to make a really good case for me with your own life experience about how beating yourself up has worked in the long term. Now, does it work in the short term? Sometimes, sometimes we can use that self judgment and that shame and that just self deprecating fuel to get me to do something in the moment, but it, I know that it does not work long term. It might work in the moment and then I'm completely exhausted. And then I go back to my binge restrict cycle with whether it's like, you know, food or porn or video games or, um, whatever the case may be. Right. It's just this, like, I have to relieve this tension somehow. And so I, I'm burned out because I've beaten myself up. I finally did do the thing, but now I have to go into the cave and I have to cancel everything. And I just have to like recover. And it's just this vicious cycle, beating yourself up. Doesn't work. Like, and I know we can say it, but nobody believes us. And so that is the work I think that we do with our clients. That's so important. And that like listening to it on a podcast, it can be transformative, but working with someone like you, Sarah, to really make that. Um, an internalized true core belief that like, this does not work anymore and I'm going to try something different. Like that is the deepest work of our lives. I think it is. And it is complicated because you know, you, you brought up what I think is one of the most, um, potentially tricky dynamics to manage. And that is there are people who benefit from your people pleasing. Oh my gosh. There are people who benefit from you thinking that you are the problem. Like everyone. Everyone. Everyone. Okay, stop. Yes. Everyone in your life. Yes. Yes. Benefits on the surface from you being a people pleaser and when you decide to stop people get confused and angry and they, they sometimes yell and they sometimes discard you and they sometimes tell you that you're being a problem. And so, I mean, that I think is the central tension of this work, whether it's. I'm not the problem. These are my ADHD symptoms that I'm learning some skills around, or I am not the problem. It's this people pleasing. Programming is what we have been taught is to internalize the discomfort and just feel all of it ourselves. So I'm staying up late to complete tasks. I'm overworking. I'm setting 500 reminders. I'm setting deadlines so that the feeling of panic induces me to work. Like, Okay. All of this is like 100% autobiographical. I'm, this is what, this is what I. Rather say, I have time blindness and so I'm going to need an extension on this deadline, or I'm going to need someone to co work with me, or I'm not going to do this thing anymore. And I'm going to have to experience other people's discomfort as I. Experience their disappointment as I experience them, potentially changing their opinion about what a together I'm using air quotes person. I am it's the management of that discomfort. Like, I am no longer going to just manage all of the discomfort of disappointing. I'm going to not disappoint me anymore. I'm going to start disappointing other people. That's the choice. You just articulated it. Do I want to disappoint myself? Do I want to make my life hard or am I willing to disappoint someone else? Because someone's got someone going to be disappointed. Yeah. So which one is it going to be? I think that this, like we have to take this back to our childhood, our programming. You call it programming. I'm a call it trauma. It's both. It's gotta be both because in my experience coaching now thousands of people with a D H D, there is so much trauma around growing up as a neurodivergent person not fitting into the box and then feeling like you have to make up for that. And so the way I'm gonna make up for it is I'm actually going to agree to do more. Yes. And actually, Right. I'm actually compensating overcompensating out of a need, not even a desire, a need to keep myself safe and a need to keep my core attachments. So when you are a tiny child and you're afraid that the connection with your caregiver is going to be severed, you're going to need to keep that connection, whether that means. Overcompensating performing, becoming a perfectionist, becoming your parents, therapist, making sure that they know they can rely on you overcompensating in ways so that your attachment can remain intact. That I believe is biologically wired into us. That is one of the ways that God helps us to stay safe in our family so that we can be fed and clothed and have a roof over our head and stay alive. It also, I'm sorry, it also protects us from further abuse. So it is an important part of our development that we develop to be pleasers so that we can stay safe. But now we're grownups y'all. We are grown ass women and it is a maladaptive coping skill. We don't need it anymore. And that's the thing is that so many of us have never made that transition into adulthood, have never made that transition into full. Autonomy have never made that transition into, I know who I am. I know what I want. I know myself, I know what I can and can't do. And I'm willing to just be a full person externalized into the world. So instead we show up as that little girl who feels like if I don't, um, manage everyone around me, my attachments aren't going to be secure. And therefore I will be unsafe. But like y'all we're grown, we're able now to take care of ourselves. Amen. The end. I mean, should we just close in prayer? I don't know. Close with prayer. Sorry. That was a joke. Cause I know we both have religious trauma. No, it's that's, that's how you do you close with prayer. I, that's the first thing I teach in my program is that our, it is essential. It is biologically essential that we have big people who take care of us, and it doesn't matter if they're good at it or not. We get the ones we get, and it is now recognize. I mean, fawning is recognized trauma response because. You know, we joke all the time at what age is a, is somebody able to fully house, feed, clothe, take care of themselves. You know, I have some adult ish children. I'm still kind of, you know, watching that. It's not until I mean, can we say 18 at the. 19, 20, 21. And so you have to have big people and those big people require that you please them perform for them. Even if they love you and they were raised by other big people who didn't, who required that of them. It's just there. It's essential. We are all raised to be people pleasers. It's just people who are socialized as males have outs. That people who are socialized as females don't, and I mean, everything you said is so essential to understand because what it does is it breaks the, there's something wrong with me. All that needs to happen is when you were a child, this is how it was, what was essential for you to survive to see it, to name it, to understand it. So that now as an adult, as a grown ass woman, which I love. Like I can take care of these things for myself in a loving, connected, graceful, gracious, generous way. But it's work. Yeah. And I think the primary work, I agree with everything you said, and I think the primary work is learning how to be safe for myself. Yes. I have said, if you are a woman who berates and beats herself up, you are not safe anywhere because you are with you all the time. And that is the first place where I think that safety has to be created of. Yeah. I will never. Add the pain of my own beating down the pain of my own beating myself up to whatever else is happening. I'm in same. Let's just take all the women to an island before. Oh, it just, isn't it such a bitch that. Oftentimes, by the time we recognize this, we have children, jobs, we are married, we are working, we are in careers, we, and we don't have like the endless time to just dedicate to this. It's so interesting just how this human experience seems to work that no, you have to be the adult who earns the money to pay the mortgage, you take care of the kids to, you know, to do the thing at the same time. That you're in this journey of self discovery. Yes. And it's so interesting to provide, to try to provide a different experience for my own children who I, I raised them to be people pleasers. Until I started doing the healing work and now I am trying to undo the harm that I have done and it is, it's wild. So trying to navigate the relationship with my own parents and trying to be a fully autonomous person. You know, with my friends and with my husband and then trying to parent in a way that develops autonomous humans, not little people, pleasing robots. It's it's a wild journey. It is. I'm remembering my kids are going to listen to this. They are going to laugh. The way that I, I, I was emotionally explosive with them were young and it brought endless shame because I would see their faces and they were scared of me. And my daughter one day came to me and she said, mom, I'm going to tell you something and I don't want you to get mad. And I was like, here is this little human who is trying to manage me. Yeah, I decided that if I yelled at them, I told them, I said, if I yell at you, I have to pay you 50. And that's how I broke that habit, because I would yell and they would be like, But mom, do you, do you owe me 50 now? And I was like, I'm so sorry I did this. And so I, I had to set up all of these like outside consequences. I think that's brilliant. I hated that about myself. I hated that I would yell and that it felt like it would come on from out of nowhere and all of a sudden having this out of body experience where I'm yelling at these people who I. Carried in my body and would do anything for, and yet here I am, it's going to make me a little emotional, like doing this to them. Why can't I stop? And it just, if it's people pleasing, if it's emotional explosiveness, if it's perfectionism and codependency and performing and, and all of the behaviors. I just, I want people listening to understand that that is not you very same way that you talk so beautifully in your podcast. Like you are not. Your symptoms, those are two separate things. And when we can pry those apart and when we can understand this is factually what happens when you're a people teaser or perfectionist, this is factually what you deal with when your brain has this type of neuro divergent functioning, then we can have so then the door opens to do the work. To believe I am good, I am worthy and that goodness and that worth and that value isn't connected to anything that I do. And my kids made several hundred dollars, but it worked. It worked. I stopped. That's so achievements. Yeah, that's so admirable, Sarah, honestly, I've never heard of someone setting up a consequence for themselves in that way. And I'm going to recommend it to like everyone that I coach on this topic because truly, um, the power dynamic in a parent child relationship, when you begin to shift it and say, no, no, the child now has power. I'm giving my child the power of saying. I hear what you're saying, but also you owe me 50 that sets up a much more, uh, I don't want to say reciprocal because I know that parent child relationships are not meant to be reciprocal, but at least a much more fair power dynamic, which I think is just. It's so beautiful. It's so beautiful. And I just want to expand on what you're saying, where once you believe that you are good, that you are inherently worthy, that you, that you bring something to the table beyond just your symptoms. Once you can pry apart symptoms from character and personality and, and the magic that is you. It becomes so much easier to begin to work on symptoms. It becomes so much easier to recognize time blindness and implement real strategies to make sure that you are on time. It becomes so much easier to recognize. Um, working memory deficiencies and make a strategy and implement a strategy for, okay, how am I going to compensate for this? It becomes so much easier to learn, to regulate your emotions from the energy of, I know I'm good. I know I'm worthy. I know I'm here on this planet for a reason. And I'm going to bring all of my worthiness. Into, I want to mitigate these symptoms. I want to figure out how to make this better. I want to show up for myself and for the people in my life that I love as a more evolved human, but, but when I'm fueled by determination and willingness and self acceptance, it's doable. When I'm fueled by shame, self loathing, self judgment, it's not doable. How do we know? Cause we tried it for decades. That's such a brilliant summation of just. Uh, why? Yeah. And the, the endless time that women spend in rumination in replaying events and wishing they had done something different in being worried about future, you know, interactions that they're not going to handle. Well, all of that time and energy and effort now gets to just go to what do I want to do about the symptoms? Because it's not going to that criticism and judgment. And that's, are you sure we can't just take everybody to an Island for a little while and just. I think we should, but the thing is we would, the world is a better place because we are here. So true. That is so true. And I think the gift that we give each other in group coaching experiences, especially seeing each other show up, seeing each other working through the, sometimes the very same thing or something very different, but that we can learn from. In a way that when we see someone else suffering from it, I, if you were listening and you have any questions about whether or not you have ADHD symptoms. One of my favorite things about Kristen is that it is not. She's not into the buzz wordy, tick tocky, um, part of this, which, I mean, I understand why it exists, but I think the humanity that you bring to this episode and to this work and to your podcast, to your group is your magic. It's your greatest contribution and gift to this. And I just love you so much. Thank you. Talk about this in such a humanizing way. Thank you. Should we tell everybody that you're the one that trained me as a coach? I mean, in all honesty, you came into coach training and I was like this one. Okay. And I, but yes, if I can, uh, have claimed to a small part of. Just loving you through it was a difficult process. Um, I did, I did get the chance to work with you and coach training and it was amazing. That was the best part of my entire experience was, was working with you. It was so amazing. And should we also. I don't even know if you remember this, tell them that I showed up an hour late to our first call because I couldn't do the time zone math. Do you remember this? And that is what it means to have ADHD. I was so ready. I was prepped. I was good to go. I get on the zoom. You let me in and you are wrapping up. And I was like, Oh shit, what? I was like, I'm ready. And you were like closing. It was one of the most humiliating experiences of my life where shame would be so present. And it was, but I just was like, yeah, of course this is what it means to have ADHD. Y'all like you can have the best intentions and you still can't do the time zone math. It doesn't have anything to do with whether or not you care enough, whether or not you are committed and I get such a disservice that we do to other people when we make it about their character or their or their intelligence, because it's not true. Any of those things. I was not late to my massage because I'm a not an intelligent person. Right. Who tells what time it's right. It's, my brain always thinks I've got some time. Yeah. I can just one thing more and it's because, I mean, I know exactly why I was late. I walked out. I wanted to make sure my son was up so we could walk the dog. I went up there, he was in bed. I started scratching his back. get him up in a gentle, loving way and. It's the things we are magical people who love and who prepare for things like coach training in these big ways. And yet something about our brain doesn't get the thing, right? Yep. No matter how good our intentions are, no matter how good. So if you are listening to this podcast and you have been like me over the last 12 months and you're like, Hmm, I wonder, could it be? Go to, I have adhd. com, look at the symptoms tab, have just like Kristen talked about the symptoms in one hand and just curiosity about, could it be that I am good, that I am worthy, that I am valuable in the other hand. And when you are ready to work on the balance of those things during her program, listen to her podcast, because I could not more wholeheartedly recommend anyone else to put this experience in whose hands to put this experience, because I know you can tell by listening, but her heart and her intelligence kind of come together in this beautiful way. And for those of us who are tired of. The way that it takes so much effort to get the things done. I mean, I've just become aware lately. Like my legs are constantly bouncing. Even sometimes as I try to go to sleep at night, it's like, I just need to burn something off. I've just realized over the past couple of days, like I get the best work done at night. It's like, after my brain has tired, has, has, has some degree of like fatigue, it doesn't bounce around so much. I don't get so easily distracted, would it be? So I am on my way in the next couple of weeks to actually evaluate it. And um, No one could be better for you than Kristen. If you find yourself in the same place, whether you are a kid who has grown up with the stigma of a lot of these, like, why can't you just what's your problem? I mean, I, I used to be a kindergarten teacher and I've thought about Paul the last couple of days because all was bouncing like so many of my kids. They had undiagnosed ADHD and as a kindergarten teacher, it was a frustration that I couldn't just get them all to sit down and do the thing at the same time like they were supposed to. So I know there are so many of us out there, you out there who have grown up with the shame of this since childhood, or if you're like me, who around 35, 36, 37 noticed like my brain just is not working like it was. All roads lead to Kristen. That's where I want. Wow. Thank you. Just thank you. Thank you so much. The heartfelt. Warmth that you bring. And I knew that's why I've just been like chomping at the bit to chat with you because you're just so knowledgeable, intelligent coach minded, but also just so warm. So thank you. It's just felt like a cozy blanket on a chilly day. Just conversations with you are always explosive in my heart. So thank you so much. Thanks for having me. Well, and I mean, how else. Should we be having these conversations? A warm blanket on a cold day. That is how we change. And so, to be doing this work with you. And thank you. Thanks for having me, Sarah.