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How do you make your time off the most efficiently relaxing? Or unlock a peak game night or other family time experience? And why are we so hell bent on intensity of experience, versus frequency? David and Isabelle straddle talk of perfectionism, their own relationships to building time-off experiences, and how frequency is our friend, as well as the idea that perfectionism is not a dirty word, but perhaps relates to masking, needs for structure and predictability in neurodivergence.
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Isabelle describes how her and Bobby would take time away just the two of them, and realized how time would move so differently, especially if they just let themselves hang out and not put extra pressure on the time off. David names that we focus so much on intensity of experiences (for Isabelleâs family, the most intense all-inclusive Disney trip EVER!) versus frequency, when actually, you need more frequent interactions in order to have a template for how to be with each other. So maybe we do more time off or together timeâmore often, and lower the bar for what we have to do in that time? Isabelle struggles with this, however, in how she tackles family game nights, as family dinner might be something of a challenge for folks (letâs not assume all families are functional and you want to spend time with each other, either). She goes to great lengths to set it up, get the snacks, the music, the settingâŠand she always wants to make it 2% better, but it often backfires or doesnât match up to any expectations. This brings her to her new hyper fixation, on perfectionism (see book she names, below). She describes how thereâs a type of perfectionist that seeks to have every part of a process go well, and if one part goes wrong, they throw it all away. This relates for her to being so in the present moment and struggling with what happened just before or just after, so she wants to nail each part of a get together. David does not relate to this, it brings up the fact he knows nothing can be perfect and in fact, he felt so ânot enoughâ for much of his life, that he does not carry this. Isabelle describes how thereâs this type of perfectionism where you work really hard but you try to appear effortless (effortlessly styled, cool, fit, etc.) and David names how he wants to unlock peak experiences with minimal effort. Isabelle and David get into a debate about whether or not David might be a type of perfectionist, if you think of perfectionism as ambitions or goals or striving toward and ideal, and Isabelleâs own journey exploring if she has autism, makes her think that maybe this is how she uses scripts in social settings, like she knows what her role is and what is expected of her and she wants to do it well. David names that if he puts great effort into it, then it doesnât count, except when heâs making âDâs Nuts,â a holiday spiced nut roasted sugared nut blend that blows minds in little mason jars every year. Isabelle finally gets what David means; heâs going for peak efficiency, like he puts in no effort, and itâs a HUGE win for the person. With Dâs nuts, itâs extremely labor intensive and heâs proud of it. Isabelle likes to give people shortcuts, like discount codes and bargains and feels so seen when David names he has benefited from her use of this many a time.
The Perfectionistâs Guide to Losing Control by Katherine Morgan Schafler
Types of perfectionists (per the book above, taken from Medium summary article)
Classic perfectionist â They attempt to control essentially everything. This is the type weâre all thinking of. They like structure and consistency. They tend to hold themselves to extremely high standards and are overachievers.Parisian perfectionist â This type wants to be perfectly liked by everyone in an effortless way. They have a sense of ideal connection and tend to be people pleasing to bridge that gap.Procrastinating perfectionist â These folks want the conditions to be ideal before they get started on a project. They have an ideal notion of how something might go, and are afraid of having it ruined with the reality of actually getting started.Messy perfectionist â This doesnât mean physically messy. What it means is that these folks have a hard time following through once a project has gotten underway. They believe that they can focus on multiple things without having to give anything up, but frequently donât finish what they started and have multiple projects in various states of completion at any given time.Intense perfectionist â These people can be extremely demanding of others. Think the boss that is exacting and keeps you at the office late. They have an ideal outcome or vision and are willing to be extremely unlikable in order to bring it to fruition.David makes âDâs nuts.â For those not familiar with Chicago accents, hereâs an old SNL sketch that makes big use of this.
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Cover Art by: Sol VĂĄzquez
Technical Support by: Bobby Richards
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Break free from the overwhelm, shame, and constant battle with your ADHD. Order the Something Shiny ADHD Toolkit Series - available now until January 2nd, 2025!
Just in time for the mounting stress at the end of the year, hereâs an ADHD-friendly gift-giving guide! David and Isabelle have ideas, accommodations, and acceptance around giving and receiving gifts with neurodivergent folx. How hard it is to buy things for folx who impulsively purchase all (cheaper) things for themselves? How to tackle the mystery of huge shopping carts and no good memory if you bought the thing after all, or not? What to get your brilliant neurodivergent child (psssâŠitâs the experience, not the shiny thing!)? And MORE!
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Aside from discussing how Isabelle has a cold and David thinks they could be like Voltron, David describes how he only buys things he can touch or get a use out of: dopamine will make you think something that looks shiny and cool (like a skin in a video game) is the thing to buy, but then the rush fades and your left without something useful. Dopamine releases around the potential of awesomeness, not actually the awesomeness. Think about how quickly something Isabelle gets hooked into having loaded shopping carts at various websites, especially around gift givingâsheâll spend two hours hyper focusing on what to get and getting it, but when it comes time to buying something, she freezes and forgets to buy it and then doesnât remember if she bought it or not. David points out this is the inattentive part: the difficulty of making the choice. You also then log a memory of the check out screen (but not if you actually bought the thing or not). The shopping cart loading is externalizing your memory, using an accommodation to assist with working memory as you find things that might be potential gifts for people. David makes a point around buying something with a use case, even more so than quality of experience: can you specifically use it for something? Does it do something other than just sit there? Sometimes we donât want to use something up (like candles) because it feels too precious to use them. David names that he gets overwhelmed with too much stuff: he wants it all, but he doesnât want it all. For example, at a birthday when he got all five video games he wanted, when we get all that we want, all at once, we donât actually want it all. Give him five video games, but give him one each throughout several months. What if you could rotate toys (Isabelle calls this toy store with her kids) and wishes she could do this with herself. They hit upon that subscription boxes as a cool solution. David names as that someone who is impulsive, there is nothing he wants under $20 he hasnât bought for himself. If youâre debating getting the expensive thing but caught with decision paralysis, average out how much the thing costs per use (for example, a coffee machine ends up being $1 per cup of coffee for a whole year) and then decide if itâs worth the 5% boost in your day. David names finding the win for yourself: finding the win/lose condition and setting yourself up for a win. That includes receiving gifts: make it simple for your gift givers! You like bunnies? Get bunnies. Set up your givers for a win. Isabelle describes loving to browse a store, but hating to have to make a buying decision, while David thinks of the gift that someone would be embarrassed to buy for themselves but could not reject (without it being silly, such as a 15 lb. Bag of gummy bears). Both inattentive and impulsive types of ADHD lead to self-doubt, but itâs how many times we touch that doubt: for inattentive type, itâs a lot before buying something. For impulsive type, itâs huge the moment you hand the gift over and wonder if you havenât made a mistake. Isabelle ponders a giant sized Toblerone, David recalls how disconcerting holding a huge gummy bear actually was. For kids, consider the experience of going to the store and getting to impulsively choose the thing they want for themselves. Preserve the magic of the buy: the parent/guardian/gift giver has zero interest in how great the gift is: if they have buyerâs remorse, thatâs learning, itâs important, not a failed gift.What is Voltron? I mean, the logo aloneâŠ
Quick visual searches (not endorsing any particular brand, just for reference):
Giant Gummy Bear
Giant TobleroneDAVIDâS DEFINITIONS
Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria (RSD), where you interpret feedback or questions or redirections as being very harsh and personal, and then really take it to heartâeven if thatâs not really what is being communicated to you. Can be present a lot with folx with ADHD.
Use case: Does a thing do something other than just sit there? There is a case for how youâd use it.
Thoughts on gift giving
Dopamine releases around the potential of awesomeness, not the actual awesomeness. Make it a win/lose, and set yourself up for a win, and those giving you gifts for a win: pick something you Harness your impulsivity: follow your first instinct. Be outrageous.Donât expect doubt to go away: thereâs a chaotic variable in giving in a gift, a novel way the person could react.Think about things that people maybe would never buy for themselves but they would not reject (run the scenario, pretend youâre mad at the gift you just gave)âfor example, two 15 lb. Bags of gummy bears. Itâd be silly for someone to reject it and itâd make a funny story if they do.Advice for kids: create a day to go to the store with the kid so they can pick out what they impulsively want that day. Give them the power to choose. Predetermine budget or safety issues, but otherwise, no micromanaging. Even with buyerâs remorse, thereâs a lesson and itâs okay.-----
Cover Art by: Sol VĂĄzquez
Technical Support by: Bobby Richards
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How do you survive holiday travel with ADHD? What about traveling with children, particularly small children? And what happens when you find yourself rushing, leaving things until the last minute, and forgetting your charger once again? David and Isabelle swap stories and share specific tips to traveling and also discuss WHY ARE THERE SOCK NUBBINS AND TAGS. Seriously.
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There can be so much pressure to have a Hallmark, picture-postcard perfect holiday and itâs so important to revise those expectations and think about what you actually want to do, for example, maybe itâs âwe go to the this house, tolerate everyone for 45 minutes, you grab the turkey, I grab the mashed potatoes, and we leave.â And what about the uncomfortable holiday clothes? Isabelle laughs and mentions a brilliant SNL fake ad for Macyâs thatâs all about childrenâs clothing and how uncomfortable it is. David describes this might be where task meets emotionality (for definition, see below)âis the task of the holidays spending time with family? David remembers the holidays being hard, everyone fighting on the way there and then fine when they got home, and wearing uncomfortable clothes, and just wanting to leave and it being awful. Isabelle remembers coming home so late and it was freezing and trying to sleep in the back seat, freezing. David had the experience going to his partnerâs holiday celebrations andâthey donât have ADHDâeveryone got along, hung out, sang songs, played pianoâand this is real? Friendsgiving is a thing, and you can make choices, what you do for holidays is a choice: like winter is a choice. Anytime you feel trapped or caught in something, changing the language to âIâm choosing to do blank because blankâŠâ with what needs your meeting with it, changes it from you âhave to go see Meemawâ You can take the shoulds, musts, and have-to and change it to choices. And maybe Meemaw doesnât care what you wear, she just wants to see you. WHY ARE THERE TAGS IN CLOTHING? And NUBBINS ON SOCKS? We have evolved so many incredible things, we have AI, we have genome sequencing, and we have sock nubbins, and who invented pantyhose and shapewear. David likes shape wear because the underarmour stuff he wears is nice and tight. Isabelle describes that itâs more designed to smush you in and sometimes itâs greatâthis is maybe Isabelleâs trauma after being a 6 ft woman at 14 year old, so she was fitting into shape wear and pantyhose as a kid and hated it so much and it was so uncomfortable. David always got all these hand-me-down socks that were in a constant state of yawnânow David gets the really tight socks that stay up all day, âlook at you sock, staying up all day!â And transitioning back to travelâand sometimes travel is really hard because weâre pushing ourselves harder than we should. Having the toolbox is just as important on the airplane or airport, or knowing how long youâre waiting with a toolbox. Whoeverâs doing the traveling, your self care is the most important: you canât control your kids being miserable, they will be, you have to put your oxygen mask, go at your pace, go at your tolerance. Kids will fall apart. You need to be there for them when they do. So what do you need to be there for them? Maybe itâs a treat, maybe itâs slowing downâtake care of you. Pack the day before. And always include an extra day back at home before transitioning back. You can change the day backâthe end is always going to be the end of the vacation, but you being able to have a different re-entry ritual into your day to day can be game changing. Isabelle shares some tips from her own front line experiences, such as when driving from Indianapolis from Nashville as part of moving, when she forgot the iPadâŠand everything else, and her kid was stuck in the way back for hours bored out of their mind. Needless to say, iPads are last steps, so itâs a plan B, but it forces them to have lots of plan Aâand on this trip, she forgot all the plan Bâs and Aâs. And everyone is going to have a meltdownâIsabelle, as mom, will also have a breakdown. It doesnât matter how prepared you are, travel will break you at some point. Travel with kids is courting brilliant memories of chaos, so she anticipates and plans on her having a breakdown. So she tells herself that âIâm a good mom whoâs reached her limit.â Youâre trained from babyhood to meet their needs all the time, but itâs a set up, the game is rigged, and part of the rigging is us thinking weâre never going to lose it ourselves. Maybe itâs the rule, not the exception. What about outsourcing, like checking your bags curbside, strapping your kid into the carseat on the plane (because theyâre used to it and airplane seatbelts do nothing). Be kind to yourself. Thereâs also this idea that a vacation and a trip with kids are two separate things. The labor does not change, but increases, but the expectation for fun and frivolity is also increased, but maybe change the expectations inside. Also okay if itâs extra hard because it actually really is. Take the wins. David names that itâs very hard to hold dialectics, to opposing truths: you can love your kids and they can be too much, really hard, really frustrating. You need to find yourself a support group that can validate all the truths. For David, being a child who had ADHD, and seeing people with kids travel, and typically things feel better when there isnât as much pressure, when youâre not rushing at the last minute, and have everything you need. Accepting that all of those things are going to be harder with ADHD and smiling when those things don't happen is the key. Accept that win, when you actually remember the charger. We can also flip the shame spiral into gratitude because you can maybe get the thing when you arrive, and David has needed to buy pretty much everything on arrival. Anything important, the things you canât live without, phone stuff, medication, certain items, should be carry-ons. If ever possible, donât check a bag, have a very compacted carry on.SNL Fake Macyâs commercial for childrenâs uncomfortable clothing
DAVID'S DEFINITIONSTASK V. EMOTIONALITY
Task: what youâre trying to do - the âworkâ of a group or a person. for example: I am finishing my project this weekend.Emotionality: what you do to prepare to do a task - beliefs/fears/assumptions about what youâre doingfor example: Iâm doing it wrong/right, I always procrastinate, big fear youâll never get it done, dream that someone will come and save you from having to do it, etc.Traveling survival tips
Prep your go-bag, tool kit (and consider several plans, not just one, like the ipad, because batteries die)Kids will fall apart. They will fall apart when they travel. Be there when they do. What do you need to do to be there for them? Go at your pace. Pick up a treat. Do things to make it easier on you. Get ready to leave the night before. Have things packed. Plan to have a day off once you return. -
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How do you survive family dinners? Sitting at a table until everyone is done? Overstimulation? Sticky conversations and setting boundaries? David and Isabelle talk concrete tips for getting through family dinners, and even enjoying themâand the truth behind ear worm songsâ lyrics that may pop your Thanksgiving Day Parade Spiderman balloons.
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David and Isabelle name that any time youâre meeting with family, traveling, disrupting routine, and then you throw in kidsâhow do we do this? Letâs start with dinner, and then work our way back to how you get there. Whenever youâre going out to eat with familyâŠfamily is a tricky word. Family describes ritualâpeople who get together at different times, donât have to be related. Whoever is in your network, where you go. Kids really need help knowing the story behind people, understanding the story behind Uncle Jack and Aunt Sueâit can help create connecting moments by throwing in novelty. Kids can be really honest and if itâs boring, they may ask: âWhy are you boring?â Also, we love Aunt Sue. Partners might use this, too, not just kids. Let alone how family stuff can be so loaded, you may not want to share the same room with some people, there can be anxiety, and anticipatory dread. Part when youâre going to go visit v. hostingâhow do we cope with the different layers of anxiety. With a heavier family situationâbring the toolbox, especially with kids. Before you leave, have a backpack, help your child pick toys (even if theyâre 14), headphones, and talk about where you can use your phone or play games. What about the interesting power struggle of having kids sit at the table until everyone is finished eatingâletâs think about that differently, because sitting for that long is so hard for kids, and adults, with ADHDâand why is hosting so FUN, because youâre always translating your restlessness into effective hosting. Most people with ADHD fall into really good host and amazing networker, and we can also know how to help people feel connected and welcome because we know how hard it can be to be isolated. Take breaks with your child. Be honest about how long itâs going to be (like 3.5 hours, not "just 15 more minutes"), and be realistic about what battles youâre going to pick with your child. Sometimes when we think about social norms weâre trying to show and build the frustration tolerance in our childrenâwe place such a load and raise the stakes so much for the holidays, and we forget that that is a set up with kids. The more you raise the expectations and raise the stakes, the more itâs asking for disaster. For the parents who feel that pressure, judgment, and family rulesâreally hard to have an unreasonable expectations and have them passed on. Can be helped to know that expectations are resentments waiting to happenâand let the table know the expectation weâre actually dealing with (eg. Weâre trying to help kid finish food, as opposed to sit quietly for an hour). Have a wonderful moment with your family, knowing that the most unconventional moments are the memory makers. Also can be really overstimulating, and have a plan for what to do then ahead of time, and how to manage that. How do we recognize we are overstimulated? Isabelle went to Costco and only realized 3 hours later how she was overstimulated. Weâre all going to feel things differently, but certain things will always be overstimulating: loud noise (increases heart rate) and triggers your fear response. Think about that moment you left a loud concert or house party and that moment when you walk into the cold night air and then you take a breathâknowing that weâre overstimulated is really hard to notice (want to work on with a therapist or close friend)âwe can tolerate the heat getting turned up really high and we donât notice it until itâs at a certain point. David knows heâs overstimulated when heâs worried about breaking things or bumping into people. When Isabelle starts to feel sheâs obstacle coursing it, thatâs when sheâs overstimulated. Sometimes being overstimulated is really good, or really badâitâs not necessarily one thing or another: it's whatâs appropriate for the moment. David will sometimes look at his partner where sheâs like âwe donât have time for that.â Getting signs and knowing these things, like with your kidââI noticed that you were walking around with your hands balled upâââcan I check in on you at Meemawâs house when youâre hands are clenched, maybe we can go on a walk with me?â Walks are important intervention: changes environment, smells open up, visual stimulation, movement. Or have a place in Dodgeâa weighted blanket in the basement, watch a couple of TikTokâs. Isabelle describes the giant mega Christmas party theyâd attend that included all these pockets of peace and respiteâlike smoke breaks (side note: folx with ADHD being drawn to the stimulant with nicotine, but also the habit of taking breaks with a few different people). How valuable it might be not only notice your kidâs cues and give them prompting, but also how it might feel for your kid âIâm getting overstimulated, you know I notice my jaw is tight, and I feel like Iâm going to bump into things a lot, I need to go for a walk, want to come with me?â We want to make âCalm Down!â not a swear word. Itâs usually the opposite effectâweâre often not saying this to ourselves, weâre telling other people to do it. Do it with a partner, the more premeditated it isâyou can be predictable and take a break. Boundaries are not personal, even though they almost always feel that way. David uses the example of the briefcase where he keeps his notesâif he saw anyone going near it, heâd freak out, because it has to do with his boundary around client confidentiality, but itâs not about who is doing it (whether itâs a stranger or a partner). You can set the boundary just by changing the subject. We take boundaries personally, we also think boundaries are about what weâre asking the other person to do, when actuallyâ(pause for effect)âthe boundary is what youâre going to do. For example, Isabelle will find herself being asked for therapeutic advice at family functions, but the boundary when she doesnât want someone to talk about the thing, but itâs the moment she changes the subject, walks away, etc. itâs the moment where I actually set the boundary for myself. Itâs not about getting the person to stop talking, itâs giving them something to chew on, like a sandwich, so they canât talk about it. And another caveat: as inveterate people pleaser, Isabelleâs discomfort shoots up, and it doesnât feel better to her to set a boundary, but itâs a short term huge burst of discomfort that sheâs trading for a long haul sense of self-betrayal, or being worn down, or all the bigger consequences that come from not having a boundary. You tend to have to set boundaries again and again, and it rarely gets easier, you just get more well versed at how you do it. This reminds David of putting on sunscreenâitâs so gross, he hates the greasy stuff, but itâs better than getting the sunburn. The boundary setting can be announced or not announced. And one of the powers of ADHD: engage ADHD distraction mode when someone starts talking about something youâre not about. Like do Delorians need special garages so the doors would still open? Like moths to a flame, we... -
Break free from the overwhelm, shame, and constant battle with your ADHD. Order the Something Shiny ADHD Toolkit Series - available now until January 2nd, 2025!
What do you do when people are openly judging your food sensitivities (or the food sensitivities of your kid)? What's the difference between a soft and hot response to commentary? Why do we go to town over certain foods we love and then have such particular things we dislike and how much the Thanksgiving feast of it all can be about winning the feeling and vibe, rather than 'winning' at some carbon copy idea or expectation of what the holiday (and meal) should be. Filled chock full of food facts, favorite foods, and alternate ways to celebrate, this episode has David and Isabelle so grateful for you, Team Shiny!
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Isabelle wonders if her experience would have been different if her food sensitivities, then cast as being âtoo picky,â âtoo sensitiveâ, had been more the norm in her family friend group growing up. She was the odd one out and that left room for so much judgment and commentary. Meanwhile, she sees her partner Bobbyâs family and notes that pretty much everyone has food sensitivities, their yucks and yums, so they accept it and roll with it and stock up on what people like and seem to not be phased by it at all. David relates this to his experience being vegetarian for years and how he would feel when people would immediately show him the vegetarian dish on the menuâbut he knows now that this was them looking out for him, verifying that this was a place he could eat. He couldnât hear it then, but as he got older, he would just say âthank you.â The difference when youâre trying to advocate for your kid as a parent v. Others outside of that. David has his soft responseââif thereâs ever a night to eat what you like, itâs with familyâ and his hot response is âshould I follow you and talk about what you eat?â Isabelle noticed that she could change the texture of vegetables and thus reinvent her ability to eat vegetables, including the bitter ones she couldnât handle for so long. There was so much labor put into the food of her Polish Christmas eve celebrations growing up, like pierogi, and thereâs this sense of wanting to pass on food pushing and abundance and scarcity. Davidâs mouth is watering about pocket foodsâpierogi, samosas, tamalesâdelicious. Which links up Isabelleâs fun fact about fried chickenâthat frying preserves the food! And then, isnât it technically a pocket food, too? But, as David points outâthe bone! But, Isabelle counters, what about tenders? So is a chicken tender a pocket food with no other filling but chicken? And also foods on sticks. Isabelle likes the risk involved and also chewing on the stick. David doesnât understand how to eat the food off the stick, but thereâs a big difference between impulsive behavior and well thought out behavior. David and Isabelle are now very hungry. Isabelle asks if traditions really arenât about transmitting memories, and if so, kids wonât remember the meal you served, but they will remember the feeling that someone stood up for them and their needs? David reframes this: are you trying to win an argument (about food) or win a feeling? Are you aiming for togetherness and connectionâitâs not the day to argue about the food, or the screen, or the phoneâgive yourself that day. This brings Isabelle to asking David about jello with chunks in it, if he likes that kind of texture, and he doesnât, he likes hard jello. Isabelle is confused by what he means and describes aspic served for Polish Easter, and furthermore, one of the most neurodivergent ways of relating to food, which can include eating copious amounts of the things we love repeatedly. For her, on another holiday with another food profile, she ate 27 eggs. In one day. Gave herself hives from the eggs. And thatâs not including the mayonnaise. David meant hard jello like jello made with apple juice. Also as a former bartender, David cautions everyone about drinking and driving around Thanksgiving, a holiday notorious for stress and overindulging, and also about the dangers of alcohol soaked foods like jello shots. And he is grateful to Isabelle and to Team Shiny (we love you, Team Shiny!) For all we have made together, for all the people who now know more about ADHD or have new diagnoses: weâre sad you had to get a diagnosis and happy you had to get a diagnosis? Weâre here for all of it. Have a great holiday!
The backstory behind Nashville hot chicken
Frying as a way to preserve food - "Since fried chicken traveled well in hot weather before refrigeration was commonplace and industry growth reduced its cost, it gained further favor across the South." (Source: Wikipedia)
Fascinating rabbithole of a site that makes industrial fryers -- most processed foods are fried!
Recipe for âhard jelloâ aka Jell-o jigglers (which sadly does not mention apple juice, but does specify the water to gelatin ratio)
And bonus: how to make gelatin out of any fruit juice (like apple juice)-----
Cover Art by: Sol VĂĄzquez
Technical Support by: Bobby Richards
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Break free from the overwhelm, shame, and constant battle with your ADHD. Order the Something Shiny ADHD Toolkit Series - available now until January 2nd, 2025!
This week we're revisiting what happens when you show up at a holiday meal and immediately realize with a sinking feeling- "Not againâŠI can't eat anything hereâŠ" From honoring the cook's efforts while not betraying your own needs, to recognizing the joys of chewing on pens and ice, join David and Isabelle as we embrace our sensory sensitivities and make our own neurodivergent-friendly and inclusive traditions. Check out our Holiday Survival Guide! Part of a holiday prep series designed to help take some pressure off the holiday season.
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David and Isabelle stare down the fast moving train of holidays and expectations that is barreling toward us right now. As we approach Thanksgiving we have a bunch of "shoulds" coming at us--we should be like everyone else and even though we have sensory issues with cars, and sounds, and people, and all that stuff. Everything from sitting still from being held hostage on a plane or in the car, or being stuck in a service or sit at a table, or eating - the sound, the food, the overstimulation, while simultaneously coupled with frustration and your routine being destroyed, and all of this at the same time. This explains why Isabelle has a lurching sense of dread approaching this time of year. The holiday dread is real. David and Isabelle have covered other aspects of holidays, like speaking with family, and the glories and pains of holiday travel, and here they are focusing on food and sensory sensitivities. Isabelle remembers how growing up she was known as a picky eater but actually there were a lot of sensory sensitivities going on. She had memories of celebrating âwigiliaâ (Polish Christmas Eve celebration) and sitting at a much larger table, with much more eyes on her, and as someone who only ate pretty much chicken and white rice and potatoes, she was facing down a traditional non-meat meal of 12 mostly fish-based dishes (such as pickled herring). You fast before this evening meal, and then you commence the eating. She would be lightheaded and nauseous because sheâd be so hungry and would fill up on dinner rolls with butter, everyone is judging and commenting, then she lives on the high of opening presents, and then theyâd go to midnight mass at midnight, and then theyâd light candles and means the oxygen is rapidly leaving the area in an enclosed place and so sheâd either pass out and throw up. Everyone can look back in time and find the holiday memories of âwe canât believe we did that on purpose.â We donât make time any other time of year to have these rituals, and see each other, and it's really about connections, yet we get caught up in following these rules that donât always work. Isabelle thinks about how for years she carried the shame around this being her fault, sheâs the picky eater that would end up passing out or throwing up, but then thinks about how easy it wouldâve been to provide some kind of option for her. That there are traditions and ways of keeping the meaning behind the traditions, but also making even small accommodations that can make all the difference to us. How we can always make new traditions. Thereâs a really hard part with food: there are people that work really hard for hours in the kitchen and they want you to try and see what you like about it and not like about itâhow can we try certain things that work for us, and how can we bring our own foodâlike hereâs my tub of Mac and cheese, there has to be a middle path. The way to be a gracious guest and host, and how as neurodivergent folks we can prefer to host because it gives us structure, she can stay on her feet, it helps her mask less. What is this about ADHD and food sensitivities? Thereâs a lot around taste aversion, what happens when we associate a food item with a thought in our headâlike âeww, this tastes like sandâ and we donât eat sandâŠor boogers. To make the eating experience a lot more about the flavors theyâre experiencing rather than the thought in the brain. Is it salty? Sweet? Savory? Textures? David is a texture person, there is a fine line between âthis is edibleâ and âthis makes me gagââlike bananas, one day to the next changes. Isabelle and David firmly agree on bananas being this type of thing, and Isabelle does not do overripe bananas, you make it a cooking liquid and you put it in banana bread. David also likes drinkable yogurt and he doesnât mind it because heâs drinking it. If heâs moving his mouth hole up and down there needs to be something there to fight my mouth.â And crunching is stimulating and stress reducing. Whether weâre chewing ice or almost-cutting-the-top-of-your-mouth bread crust. Is it the act of chewing thatâs stress reducing, or something crunchy is stress reducing? Isabelle notices chewy things, like gum, gummy chews, and chip crunch, or a cold crunch, she does not like itâthere are special ice cubes that collapse in your mouth that shrink in your mouth. Tiny ball ices at Sonic or certain places have that. David knows chewing gum is a stimulation, and David is hazarding guesses with the crunching thing (like itâs objectively dominating something in your mouth, or youâre making progress, or itâs the sound itself)âthere are a lot of parts of that that is soothing. If itâs paired with dopamine, your chocolate chip cookie crunch is paired with delight and celery crunch is a HORROR to Isabelle. Davidâs favorite crunch is an apple-pear crunch, or a jicama crunch. What is an apple-pear? What is it exactly? This links us to grapples (apples that taste like grapes), and cotton-candy grapes (itâs too much) and champagne grapes and boba. Isabelle loves it, and David describes how he never got boba, he just thought they were fun to launch and make stick to the things, and then years later, it was cold, and he got the boba and then he had a moment when all of a sudden, he chewed it up and was like boba. âBoba, youâre delicious!â And now heâs a full boba fan. There was a challenge to himself to experience it again. Isabelle wants to go on 800 food related tangents and realizes it might be a food related special interest. The sound of the crunch is a tiny sonic boom in your mouth. And David leans on a couch with his hand on his chin and his finger got in and he accidentally came down on his finger absentmindedly, and you canât even pretend to bite yourself, oh my goodness, it is so painful and powerful. Every time Isabelle bites her tongue or cheek it feels like she severs her tongue. But also, why did David put his finger in his mouth accidentally? And if he put his finger in his mouth and chew it. Isabelle loved chewing pen cap (old school pic pen caps), and sheâd chew on everything. Sheâd also chew on lollipop sticks, she chews on the cupcake wrapper, she doesnât ingest these things and doesnât like chewing, but she loves chewing paper and the pen cap, and it got vertical in her mouth and it sliced a line in the center of the tongue, and she still has a divet. Every single person who is listening has done something like that, or has eaten too many sour patch kids, or has eaten hot pizza too fast and burned their mouth open. This connects to masking and needing stimulation, and a little bit of clumsiness, oral gratification, and itâs important. Switching and making new fantasies for the holidays: ...
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Is there a way to switch gears even when you're running late, overhwhelmed, and already past crispy? Isabelle and David explore how changing gears, especially during a transition--whether it's starting a conversation, leaving the house, beginning a work task--is up to us and how hard and real the struggle is and how important it can be to get your reps in. From potato sprouts and Carl Rogers, to neurodivergent trauma as culture, to all those half finished water bottles underneath your carseat, this conversation embraces what it means to share collective wounds as well as adaptations to a world not built for neurodivergent folx.
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Isabelle (speaking of a hard moment trying to get herself and her kids out the door when they're already running so late and then stopping, covering her eyes and ears, and just sitting on the couch)-- thought this "busy-ness" was a personality trait, moving on to the next, to the next, to the nextâto always be busy, harried, running behind. And you canât expect the environment to stop when things feel like too much. Pandemic was not a blessing in disguise (thatâs BS), and Isabelleâs experience was that on top of the systemic and personal trauma and wanting to chew her own arm off, it was the first time the world did stop to a degreeâit took a lot of demands and choices off the table for her. How often when she is burned out and crispy does she want the world to stop, for things to slow down, to quiet down on a sensory level. And when the world stopped, that wasnât the answer either, she actually found herself doing moreâitâs a lot to realize that the world wonât stop for you and even when it does, it doesnât address the overwhelm problem. David names that a lot of social expectations changedâdoing laundry, doing hygiene. Finding out which things were effective and which werenât was a lot then. In couples, thereâs a big difference between a harsh versus a soft startup, taken from the work of the Gottmans (see links below). The harsh versus soft start up through transitionsâare you giving yourself a harsh or a soft start up to a task? What do you need to transition to a particular activityâdo you want to get there late, stressed, sweaty? Or do you want to get there and be bored for a bit, because you're about to read to kids in a library and need to come in with less energy? When Isabelle sits and asks for help, she interrupts and resets a harsh start up to a soft start up. She is doing for herself what she wishes another person would do. Sits her down, has her take a moment, helps take away the expectations and demands. Bobby can do that sometimes, but also she canât expect someone to do that everyday. And it helps her get reps at switching from a soft to a harsh transition. She didnât think she had a gear shift; she was on and off. Itâs existential, you have to reset your own expectations and what it means to stop. Isabelle has to unmask, and reveal how vulnerable she is and ask for what she needs, she has to face trauma. A client of hers recently invented (she thinks?) This term âADHD trauma.â Being neurodivergent in a neurotypical world thatâs constructed to benefit and aid neurotypical ways of being generates trauma by virtue of the not having the right manual. And David calls this ADHD culture. We have different problems with friend groups or making purchases or being an imposter, the thing that makes this podcast fun to listen to. Culture is defined by how we dance with trauma. Every kind of cultureârace, class, etc.âsets the standard of how you interact with the world. The feeling of going into a class and forgetting you had a test; all those empty water bottles under the seats, if you could clap your hands and the pile of laundry, the corner you forgot existedâand suddenly we feel better because youâre not the one who is like that. Does having ADHD make me allergic to rigid capitalist systems? Thereâs two people: the ADHD person is going to look down at the cliff and see apples and yells âapples!â And then the other person hears âoh, apples?â and makes an apple farm. We're not all the same but we do have something in common. Anything that overwhelms our capacity to cope or unable to change itâisnât any identity the world wants you to change but you canât going to set you up for overwhelming your capacity to cope (you canât run from it, hide it, fight it, play deadâŠetc.) David has a thought: when he was getting kicked out of school, his brain coded that as bad. Fast forward, he ended up going to grad school at Northwestern. And not a lot of people at Northwestern got kicked out of high school. Itâs definitely not something that you talked about. But then, he started working and advocating with Eye to Eye and other groupsâsuddenly, his story had worth. The amount of relief he started to see on kids faces that âoh, you can recover from every mistakeâ and he wasnât proud when it happened, but now itâs an important part of his origin story. In community and connection, the very thing youâre hiding is what I'm hiding--whoa, we don't have to hide, how much energy we get from not hiding this thing? When David first went to Northwestern he would lie and tell people he went to a local âmultidirectional school" âthose people werenât good people and he didnât want to be branded with those people. Isabelle doesn't want to say where she went to college. Because people from our culture donât go to schools like that (like Harvard?) David had no models, didn't know how to say it. Everyone âthinks theyâre the mistake.â Pause for effect, Isabelle went back and looked through her old medical records and she got her records from counseling while at college. In those clinical notes she received an ADHD diagnosis; multiple sessions where she as a client thought she had ADHD, and as many listeners will remember, she didnât know she had ADHD until 15 years later. Isn't that really interestingâisn't that interesting that she was never told she was diagnosed with ADHD, there was no affirmation or information, and in the notes it indicated even why she was even given the type of antidepressant or weaned off, she walked around telling everyone who knew her "I think I have ADHD because I canât focus anymore.â She wasnât told she had a diagnosis. Even when she asked point blank. The world 25 years ago was really different, how much they maybe saved her from a tougher road. When youâre "not supposed to" be there, the messages you get at each of these places, to hide, to shame, to silence, to minimize. "Everyone has some ADHD, right?" The masking component has more consequences to neurospicy culture. We don't have the same the care and feeding instructions as the people around us, weâll still grow but it's not the same. A potato sprout is going to grow and develop no matter what situation you're in, whether the potato is in the root cellar or planted in the earth (as Carl Rogers states, see actual full quote below). Across animal groups, culture is modifying your environment in order to adapt, at least how Isabelle learned what culture was when studying archaeology and social anthropology in college. We started to cook as a form of survival, the culture we form is the things we try to do to survive and adapt. Because we have to survive and shelter in the same places. Isabelle feels way better being a potato in the root cellar...
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Why do we push ourselves so hard, hyperfocus, are ready to do 80 things at once, then crash and run out of steam before we ever move the needle? How much does this boom/bust cycle harm us, our relationships, and our wellbeing? David and Isabelle discuss how, as neurodivergent folx, we can't see our own energy bars and how this gets us into trouble. They also describe a game changing idea, of making their energy bars observable, that has helped them both actually see and attend to their needs well for the first time--and why they were compelled to build this into a Something Shiny toolkit (coming soon!).
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The things we use to help ourselves and reclaim our time doesnât actually give us more resources, it can take resources away from us. David, for example, feels very successful when he avoids the YouTube video reel hole, scrolling from a sports ball thing to a weird deck someone builtâŠhe didnât notice the spoons were going, he took up energy, he sat too long, he didnât get something done. Sometimes the things and cycles we get into what we get into when weâre avoiding things, donât help us. This connects to a big course launch coming soon from Something Shiny! A big aha between David and Isabelle has been recognizing that their energy bars are invisible to them, and with their shorter time horizons, Isabelle assumes that the energy she has is forever, and then halfway through taking on so many tasks sucks. She runs out of all her energy and momentum before she knows it, and itâs hyperfocus and intensity and crash. It hurts her relationships, her life, her health, so how can we actually see our energy bar? Especially in times like this where demands are many and slots are few. David points out that the way they check on their energy bar is odd; you see that your gas tank is full; âI got gas!â And half full âI got gas!â And quarter full âI got gas!â We ask if thereâs gas, not if itâs enough, or if it matches what weâre trying to do. We push past this point without knowing it. David and Isabelle crisped themselves during recording this course without even knowing it. David lost the gas to eat, to observe the world. This is why David and Isabelle took time off this summer: a step by step guide to learn how to read and respond to your energy bar that makes it so your life gets easier. Itâs fusing together what David and Isabelle know about how neurospicy brains work and then actually building the skills that help. It has deeply altered Isabelleâs sense of how she feels about herself on any given day. Itâs the closest sheâs coming to what she expects of herself day to day and responds to her needs. Picture the gas tank, but youâre in a car with your whole family, and your whole family has to get to the emergency room, she does not have time to get to the gas station and she needs to get the whole family there STAT. Isabelleâs self-neglect is real. The term âBurnoutâ is so interesting, coming from Industrial Revolution terms, that when a machine ran out of resources would run out of fuel, the machine destroys itself because it runs out of fuel. Itâs not just that weâre running on fumes, itâs that when weâre running on fumes we have destroyed ourselves, our relationships. Isabelle, in her attempt to get to the emergency room, she gets angry, impatient, taking in any request, and then she is engaging in toxic behavior patterns, asking the world to STOP, but sheâs hurting herself. David names that youâre not just hurting yourself, youâre hurting other people, youâre leaking out. When weâre done leaking, we donât know what weâve done to hurt other people and weâre hurtingâboth things are true. David thinks about his behavioral roots: the first thing you do to make change is you make your behavior observable. Itâs really hard to actually observe energy, talking about the endings and beginnings we can't see, it makes different parts of back to school or our burnout observable. Itâs observable so we can change some of these things: did you need a break? Would it have been better to be late to this? Where do we get those messages about what weâre supposed to do. Even as the term accountable (like âpotentialâ) can make your spine curl, because it's been leveled at us anticipating mistakes we couldnât, how can we be accountable for our own breaks because no one is going to give them to us. By the time Isabelle is running on fumes, that is not the time she has any bandwidth to think her way out of her feelings, and that's not a strength she has anyway, she canât tell herself itâs going to be okay, by nervous system does not work this way, she has to take an action to change her internal state, but sheâs so crispy to think that she needs a breakâthe idea of thinking she needs a break and then taking a break is 6 steps too far, and then she gets cranky, she gets grumpy, blaming everything around her, but itâs a set up when you expect others to snap you out of it; depending on others to help you just then breeds aggression, and you can't change it, and you canât solve it once youâre there. Thereâs got to be another way, or if there isnât another way, how can I make it pass quickly and respond accurately. Itâs important for us to have people around us to take care of us, and itâs important to have skills and resources around us. When David is saying something about taking breaks yourself, that's not âput yourself in a room,â itâs giving yourself the freedom to go get yourself the things you need. Everyone is going to be aware of what you canât do. What is different right now that you can do right now for yourself. Big way that Isabelle does something differently, like those 2 out of 3 kitchen magnets, sometimes thereâs a random cough from a kid and she has to decision, she is really reliant on routine to keep things moving, as if every day would be the same. Isabelle likes minty coffee and has a sequence, but then she has a perfectly planned routine, this is how weâre going to get out the door in time. The example could really apply to any big transition. But she has to constantly revisit the plan, which is that the environment has altered, the establishing operation has alteredâthe circumstances around you has been totally altered. But to pivot means disaster, she has no slots left to make new decisions, and so sheâs crashing and burning every single day. She just decided that when in doubt, she is going to be late, whenever she hits that panic, itâs her signal thatâs somethingâs upâher panicking is her racing around the house with no discernible direction, thinking sheâs getting it done but she's lost the plot. So when sheâs in that state, in order to change that state, she has to sit down. She forces herself to sit down. And the second she sits down, âoh, actually, I have to stop and thinkâ and I need to stay in one place, covers her ears, closes her eyes, and asks for help. âI need your help.â And she tries to just think about what she needs help with, âI need help rememberingâ or âlet go of being on time.â And she says it out loud, and sheâs changing the establishing operation. She changes what the reinforcement looks like, we get there, as long as we survived, itâs a winânow, the question is "are you safe? Do you have everything?â David points out that all her decisions are lined up very differently right now.DEFINITIONS
Establishing operation.&nbs...
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Ep075: Does back to school season hit you hard, too?
Why is it so hard and triggering and exhausting to go back to school (even if youâre not a student or have a student in your life right now)? And what is this idea, âpervasive demand avoidanceâ (or a persistent drive to autonomy) and how can it crop up during massive transition times? David and Isabelle come back from a summer spent working on exciting new Something Shiny resources and describe some of the demands that may be filling up your slots this time of year. Also included: tangential journeys involving the cinematic classic âLegend,â deep cut Disney songs a la Tim Curry, and Isabelleâs allergy medicine hallucination moment.
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David and Isabelle welcome fall and the new school year, complete with the way germs start circulating and sick days shoot up once the school year kicks in, and then histamine levels and allergy medicines. There may be some links between antihistamines and psychiatric symptoms (see link below!). Isabelle describes a hallucination she had when taking a commonly prescribed allergy medicine, referencing the Tom Cruise movie, Legend. This brings up how intense childrenâs movies were back in the day, where kids were in real mortal danger a lot and awful things happened a lot. David recalls how intense Willy Wonka was, with the kids getting killed and then the tunnel sequence, which leads to Isabelle remembering how she shopped a class in college about childrenâs literature and it was all about Roald Dahl and how he hated childhood and was bullied and just dealt with a lot of things that made him hate kids. So, returning to Isabelleâs hallucination, she wakes up from a sleep, she sees Tim Curry in Legend demon costume asking if she has anything to eat, and she knows sheâs hallucinating, but it was in the room. She hears him working in the kitchen. She then sees a pig walk in with human hands for feet, she wakes up, she is fully awake, the pig fades away, and she walks into the kitchen, and I say âYouâre not real, Iâm hallucinatingâ and he says âof course.â Also, it was almost morning, light was in the space, this wasnât sleep paralysis or lucid dream, she fixed breakfast, called the doctor, and stopped taking this medicine immediately. Of course she told the whole story to the doctor because of course these details would be important. David names how strange the brain is and all the connections are. And this links up to an amazing CD put out by Disney where Tim Curry sings a Davy Crockett song. David was tormented by this song in elementary school, and they would make fun of him by singing this song at him, but why did this bother him actually? Isabelle recalls that back to school season as more triggering than she realized, she would use the relationship with her teacher to accommodate her, to do the hard things and ask for extensions and try and be. The teacher at her kidsâ school was not picking up on her big hand gestures and quirk and charm, so two questions: 1) back to school season being triggering? And 2) when there is a vacuum, she becomes a cartoon character, as their previous guest Ren, brought up. Going back to school is so complicated; David notices that when he sees the back to school supplies on sale, it was a âgulp,â it always meant more work for him, the break being over. Now that he is not in school anymore, it has become a bit more of a âhaha, I donât have to do that anymore.â But regardless he wants to point out that neurotypical or neurodivergent alike, this is a time of intense transitions, beginnings and endings, and routine changes, and waking up earlier (for parents and kids and even fellow commuters who suddenly have to notice when school is in session on their traffic routes), it is a hard, hard time. Itâs highly activating on a nervous system level, and germ load aside, kids will need down time and fatiguing and the adjustment period. This brings up the idea of cognitive demands on usâhold up ten fingers, and each slot is taken up with a task or a load: âbuying school supplies,â âIâm sad my kid and I wonât have the same together,â and âI gotta change my morning routineâ â in the face of so many demands, things become a canât, not a wonât. In the face of so many demands, I actually canât do any more, even a pleasant thing, everything is one ask too many or one step too much. And some people don't have ten slots, they have twoâfor example, a kid being ushered into a transition, even like three requests of a parent is actually too many demands, and they respond with âI donât wannaâ but also whatâs in there is they cannot. They can do more, but with help. Theyâre going to get crispy and ragey, you become oppositional, pick fights, it looks like a sensory overload, or a shutdown, I am going to avoid anything that I perceive as a demand. David not sure how he feels about this diagnostic label because when weâre overwhelmed, we SHOULD react this way. Video of how it felt for a person who is autistic went into a grocery store, the screen started to pixelate the farther into the store they got, it was like a satelliteâs images during a storm. David gets into a place where he goes âNOPEâ and it comes from a place where he has nothing left. Is he pathologically demand avoidant, but arenât we all? Actually isnât this a common thing we share across. Isabelle is going into neuropsychological testing with her family to update things, and carries a lot of curiosity going into it about sensory stuff, and wants to welcome it. You see it reflected in people around you, and ton of people around her identify as being on the autism spectrum and oh, that is where she finds her tribe. For her learning about PDA is the closest sheâs come to for resetting her expectations for herself, and âoh, Iâm not just trying to avoid hard work,â itâs âoh, I ran out of spoons and slots, I had no bandwidth.â David names that this is a thing that connects with neurodiversity and not being resourced. Power struggles are going to be activating all the time, and just because a power struggle is happening is not PDAâbut on the autism spectrum, sound, texture, movement is filling the slots, too. It can help illustrate that itâs important to lower the demands and help your kid (or yourself) by meeting yourself with compassion. David and Isabelle also mention that they are working on a energy bar ideaâŠmore to come!
Antihistamines connecting to psychiatric side effects, like hallucinations
Legend (1985, starring Tom Cruise) trailer- Tim Curry is the voice...and shows up around 0:48. YES THIS IS A KID'S MOVIE.
Intense kids movies
Stand by Me (1986) trailer (PS. this is based on a Stephen King short story, "The Body") YES THIS IS A KID'S COMING OF AGE MOVIE.
Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory Tunnel Scene Clipâ Again, kid's movie.
Roald Dahl book: Boy
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What happens when the rewards for doing something don't show up until way later? Or if it's harder to tell you're making progress on something, like saving money, applying for jobs, buying a house? David and Isabelle are joined by Isabelle's husband, Bobby, who also has ADHD, swapping stories about delaying gratification, shame spirals, and how we ruminate and distract AND hyperfocus for the win.
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The only thing thatâs reinforced are tasks toward goal completion. What could I do today that would move me toward that goal? The only question: is it moving toward my goal? If so, itâs effective (or if not, not effective), rather than good or bad. For example, David venting about his paper to his friend helped him be on task, rather than not being on task and going out to eat at Burger Kingâitâs still about the paper (itâs still on task). How effective is it toward the task? More effective than going to Burger King and not talking or thinking about the paper at all. Long term goals are specifically hard for folx with ADHD because of the delay of gratification. The more you wait, the more you feel like youâre failing. Neurotypical folx will read that waiting as normal or to be expected. Bobby names things like saving for retirement, saving for a house, paying off debtâthe progress is so slow it feels so boring. David relies on his awesome neurotypical partner to save for a house by taking what they would pay for a mortgage every month and saving whatever that was on top of their rent (so if their Lego House rent was $10, and they wanted a $30 mortgage, they saved the extra $20 every month). Isabelle wonders if neurotypical shame spirals go as deep as neurodivergent onesâfor example, Davidâs goes to homelessness, and she notices that neurotypical folx notice how close they got the finish (like getting the brick at the bottom of the pool during swimming lessons), and factor that in, whereas for her itâs the outcome that matters and she goes straight to everyone she loves is going to abandon her and ditch her. David names that he has a few shame spiralsâfor work, itâs homelessness, for relationshipsâitâs abandonment. This leads to black and white thinking, which is more than just worth mentioning, itâs the difference between ânot getting a snackâ to âfailure begets failure begets FAILUREâŠâ And this extreme is dismissed so often, people donât get it. As a therapist youâd never say âitâs not a big deal,â youâre invalidating those feelings. What we ADHD folx feel, our level of intensity, is REALâinstead of âit shouldnât hurt that much,â itâs âthatâs extremely frustrating.â Bobby is slurping all this data up, and taking the feels, and feeling themâŠand thatâs what you do. You acknowledge how intensely youâre feeling them. Bobby sits in the role of âNovice EveryDay-erâŠEvery Day Dudeâ (which is what it says on his nameplate). And not just acknowledging your feels, but acknowledging the intensity of how strongly you feel them. Feel the feeling, know itâs more intense, or it might not be felt by other people. And do what you need to do to regulateâ-as opposed to let it go. Itâs like telling someone with ADHD not to look at the ceiling (we all looked at the ceiling). Telling someone to fight something is not effective, it can go on forever in a power struggle. Isabelle describes that she prefers the phrase self-soothe to self-regulate, because it can be a pressure to return to masking and appearing as though you are neurotypical or âregular.â David is wondering if self-soothing is the task, actuallyâyou might not be able to soothe or make the injury out of the way, and instead get grounded again. Itâs not about getting out of your ADHD mindstate, itâs about lowering your hyper focus and lowering the pressure to act. David does this intermittent fast now and just got distracted about the food he wants to eat (schwarma)âheâs not pretending heâs going back to the point and instead is focusing on food and saying âSchwarma.â The group decides they will say âSchwarmaâ any time this happens, if they can remember, which Bobby reassures them he will. Isabelle then describes that she thinks Bobby circumvents working memory problems by using some of the rules of comedy, like callbacks, and thenâŠshe also loses the plot and goes back to telling her story. Isabelle describes fixations on movies or things across many genres and seems to do with what the movie makes her feel. She is reminded of one of her roommates in college who was a lovely person, but would fixate on one or two somewhat depressing emo songs and for Isabelle, she didnât like the emotional state it would generate. So she recognizes that she goes through fasts almost, of media that stirs up feelings because she gets so sucked in, so she avoids fiction and movies and music for a while. Then, itâs like a switch flips, and she gets sucked in and rewatches things over and over again. Like the Netflix film âTall Girl.â Because she is tall. And it hooked her (despite not being the best movie maybe, but she liked it). And she found time, when she has no time, to watch it four times in the span of a week. What is this? Davidâs like: itâs the definition of hyperfocus. Itâs that you fall into it intensely. Itâs that you do the same thing over and over again, or a genreâlike David only watched shows that only made it one season. Isabelle can daydream for five hours straight while driving, she can rewatch things in her head. David is naming that this is not the safest driving technique, but David is wondering if there were any changes in this span that changes your capacity to move around? Were there things that gave you more unstructured time? Were there things you were avoiding or wanting distraction from on an emotional level? When all of those things happen, hyperfocus can kick in for preservation, like youâre going to get sucked into the Full Metal Alchemist because you donât want to think about life after graduation. And in another way, rumination can kick in when you donât move around during the day, which turns into a type of thinking at the end of the day, those thoughts can be a way to get out that energy. Everyone is going to kick into hyperfocus for different reasons and it will vary based on types and on the environment that theyâre in. Isabelle connects very much to preservation idea of hyperfocus, how survival-related it feels and the times she was in a fandom over a particular show or movie that relate to major life transitions, like graduation, or career changes, or life changes. David names that itâs probably much easier to remember the relationship she had with those things than the transitions themselves. David names that this is a superpower. It usually happens when youâre sitting in helplessness. Are you sitting in your helplessness, or are you sitting in âthese amazing actors and actresses are nailing it?â Isabelle insists Bobby will watch it and grow to love it. It can happen when you donât have structure or your routine changes, and it provides structureâthe reality is, for David, itâs important to go wild if you really are in a state of helplessnessâthen go to town watching all the shows. But if youâre using it to avoid a task, thatâs a whole other story.
Things Isabelle, David, and Bobby have hyper focused on (that are mentioned in the episode):The Matrix
New Girl
Tall Girl
Itâs Al...
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Why are some of us anxious and some of us excited (or a combo platter of both)? And is it possible to turn anxiety, or anger, or shame spirals, into something else? David and Isabelle swap stories, talk transgenerational trauma, and get curious about how we are socialized to mask and behave...and that perhaps the solution for being overly apologetic lies in the midwestern gem: "ope.â
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Isabelle starts by expanding on the idea of how you think about things, how that inner landscape can connect into tapping into norepinephrineâif youâre practicing going âI see you anxiety, I see what youâre trying to do, and Iâm so grateful I have you because it helps meâŠâ what it means to not shame or blame yourself for having an instinct to worry versus what you do know to be true. Short of someone giving you direct feedback, you donât have data either way, so saying hi to your anxiety or feeling, and taking a few breaths to be grateful. Then when you do have a tough moment, like a hard meeting at work, you wonât beat yourself up about it as much. David even says: you can skip the shame spiral. Norepinephrine is so much about the inertia and movement of something. People with kids who have ADHD either have a very very clean room, or very very messy room. For those with a messy room, theyâre like âwhere to start? Do I burn it and start over again?â Then you give them one specific thing to do, they earn dopamine from that one thing. So you build momentum by building a feedback loop between dopamine and norepinephrine, because you judge yourself on a very reasonable scale. If you make a broad request, itâs like âwhaaa?â If you say âpick up your legosâ or âHunt for all the legos you can, you have 7 minutes, you earn 3 snarf points? Whatâs a snarf point? Iâll tell you in 7 minutesââyou now have specificity, and time pressure, and reward. Isabelle describes that she lives in the anxious side of the spectrum, and David lives in the excitement of it. If anxiety and excitement are the same physiological symptoms, how can you replace the two things? Isabelle wonders at her anxiety, which she is not bummed about, but knows that itâs a part of her, and also knows that it has served her and her people across the generationsâlike she feels less anxious when she has a very stocked pantry or fridge. How can that be turned into excitement? Weâre talking about the interplay of epigenetics, and the interplay of how you lean into the anxiety. If youâre in the United States, youâd be hard pressed to not have a transgenerational history of trauma, and as men and women (and non-binary folx), we are treated differently and are rewarded for going to anger or anxiety. Men are traditionally reinforced for getting angry in the U.S.âitâs reinforcing for them, and itâs not great, and in the same way anxiety may be reinforced for women. Not that itâs so cut and dry and binary-based. David elaborates that his impulsivity has been viewed as confidence, whereas for women, it can be viewed as overemotionality, and can be shamed, or put in corners. David had to work really hard to find excitement, he was way more in that angry place, fighting any system, any person he could. When you get angry, you feel yucky afterwards for like two hours, and he met really good friends, had an amazing brother, and had good supports, and a lot of people donât have that. And he had a choice in that moment whether to get anxious or excited. Isabelle is so grateful David shared that about himself and felt so seen, really resonating with the idea that whereas Davidâs impulsivity was viewed as confidence, hers was read as overreacting, or overdramatic. She describes how she makes big gestures and shrieks and has big reactions to things and how often she has to blunt them or try to mask them in her daily life. She also recognizes the layers of privilege she carries as a white, cisgendered woman, that she has gotten a lot of reinforcement for her anxiety. Her asking, letâs say, her kidâs teacher a detail-oriented question seems almost assumed, that she would be the one who needs to be vigilant about the details of things, whereas her husband, Bobby, is seen as winning the day if he gets the kids to school, even though he is more effective at this. How weâre socially viewed impacts how we think about itâperhaps Bobby running late is viewed as he was busy doing important things, whereas Isabelle names she has been conditioned to be extra apologetic and nervous and take it on as some awful thing that sheâs running late. David goes into Tavistock group dynamics stuff (see show notes below)âbased around the work of Wilfred Bionâwhere people learn how they are in a group. David was in a group and someone came in late and were overly explaining it, the group ended up attacking her about all her apologiesâDavid named there is an art to being late, and it is this: acknowledging the inconvenience, being very small, and apologizing at the end. Donât talk too much or give too many specifics, just say âmy badâ and be quiet and wait to figure out whatâs happening. David and Isabelle both agree that they are habitually late, and hate being late, but will be late because of who they are. They just will be. Isabelle names an old meme: âSorry I was late, itâs because of who I am as a person.â She mentions connecting with her friends, one of whom says instead of saying âIâm so sorryâ for being late, reserve sorries for deep relational healing moments where you feel harm was caused, intentionally or not. For example, being late, or accidentally bumping into someone, or dropping something off lateâis not always the context for an âIâm sorry,â but instead, you could use the phrase âthank you for your patience.â David agrees, except for the bumping into someone else partâhe has to say heâs sorry. Isabelle thinks a simple midwestern âope!â Will suffice, which David recently witnessed himself doing in the wild.Ope: (according to Urban Dictionary) - a midwestern U.S. way of acknowledging another person or thing they have encountered. Ope! Sorry I bumped into you, Jim. Ope, thereâs my wallet. Ope! I missed my bus!
(added by us): Also known as an interjection of surprise and implied apology.
DAVIDâS DEFINITIONS
Epigenetics - from CDC âEpigenetics is the study of how your behaviors and environment can cause changes that affect the way your genes work. Unlike genetic changes, epigenetic changes are reversible and do not change your DNA sequence, but they can change how your body reads a DNA sequence.â (source: CDC)
Transgenerational trauma: from wikipedia
âis the psychological and physiological effects that the trauma experienced by people has on subsequent generations in that group.â (source: Wikipedia) Imagine the collective trauma experienced by groups of people surviving slavery, wars, famine, natural disasters, etc. and the ways in which epigenetic (see definition above) may alter the way even our genes can express themselves and how we adapt and respond to stressors. For more on this, check out the pioneering work of Yehuda and Lehrner (... -
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Why do some of us minimize and reduce the number of choices while others seek excitement and novelty? Why do some of us need everything listed out while others need to just try something blindly? The secret? Different types of ADHD and different ways our ADHD shows up in different environments! David and Isabelle are joined by Bobby and Noah, who also have ADHD, and talk about things like trying to leave the house, deciding what to eat, and why their accommodations all look so different.
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Transitions and choices are hard. Isabelle and David are joined by Isabelleâs husband, Bobby, and Davidâs friend and fellow clinician, Noah, both of whom also have ADHD to talk about different types of ADHD. We donât remember all the stuff we have to do to leave the house. Isabelle describes a detailed whiteboard and just how long it took to get into the habit of not forgetting things like lip balm. David puts everything into his bag at night. Isabelle has to do a one-touch rule. Noahâs and Bobbyâs work bag are empty. Bobbyâs really into minimizing things, which David points out is a wonderful intervention, especially for inattentive typeâ decision fatigue. Noah does this for going out, always ordering a blackened chicken sandwich. How exhausting it is to make decisions all the time. Noahâs experience in a blind restaurant. Bobbyâs picky eating is connected to something ADHD-relatedâhypersensitivity around texture. Davidâs experience of this is big after decades of vegetarianism, experiencing the texture of meat for the first time (bacon and hot dogs are great. Other meat for him? Not so much). Isabelle references the Paradox of Choice book (TLDR) and describes the phenomena of randomly remembering facts sheâs read, but struggling to remember what she read on command. Recognizing that when there is an overabundance of choice, we think we made the wrong one (or are left more disatisfied) because we always think we couldâve picked better. This relates to Isabelleâs reaction to Tinder as something that makes her nauseous thinking about it: too many choices. Same with old school diner menus. Or Cheesecake Factory menus. David agrees. Isabelle describes novelty seeking with food, whereas Bobby wants the same thing. David went to Superdawg and got everything on the menu he wanted because he couldnât make a decision. Noah would go there, deliberate what to get for 20 minutes, and leave with nothing. Why do we all sound so different and yet similar? Weâre talking about the distinctions between inattentive and impulsive ADHD types. What about combined type? Depends on the mastery of the environment: the more mastery, the more impulsive we can be, the less mastery, the more inattentive.What is Superdawg? If youâre in and around Chicago, youâre welcome to check it out. If youâre not, itâs still a fun place to look into. From the bottom of our pure beefy hearts.
Paradox of Choice - book by Barry Schwartz (TLDR for Isabelle but an interesting summary appears on wikipedia).
DEFINITIONS
ADHD types explained through how we order at a restaurant:
inattentive type: struggles to figure out what to order, stares at menu (accommodations: always orders the same thing or same type of thing, asking the server for their choice/having the chef or someone else choose for you)impulsive type: orders three different entrees (to try them all), or the novel/strange seeming thing on the menu (accommodations: finding new places to eat or food bars where you can throw on whatever you want in that moment)combination type: see above and experience BOTH, often depending on your level of mastery/comfort (more mastery in the environment, the more your impulsivity shows up).Decision fatigue: the more decisions we make, the more our quality of decisions (or ability to do so well) deteriorates. Too many decisions can lead to an overwhelming feeling, burnout and poor decisions. Avoiding the complexity of decisions, can be an adaptive tool for individuals to preserve brain power for more important decisions, especially when the inattentive-type ADHD experience is loud. Here's an article on how to notice when it's happening to you.
Hypersensitivity around texture: some textures are going to make people feel more yucky inside than you would think they could. Often times it can be really helpful to honor these sensitivities, and not try to push through them unless there's serious impact on food and nutrition.
Here's a quick article on how to cope with hypersensitivities to sound, texture, taste, smell, etc.
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Cover Art by: Sol VĂĄzquez
Technical Support by: Bobby Richards
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David and Isabelle navigated the treacherous landscape of surviving and being the lucky ones; are we trash? Are we seahorses? From defeating the enemy that is loose glitter, to brain regions resembling animals, to why it hurts when we beat up on ourselves, tackling the pain and looking at ourselves with intention.
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Isabelle was told sheâs a talker, but sheâs also a listener. Thereâs this thing Isabelle borrows from mindfulness practices and therapy ideas: what you resist persists, what you go with flows, go for the ride. She had this moment the other day, at what point is it going to be bore her? She is easily bored, she is initially excited about and then she loses interest in it, she can be hyper fixated on the thing and then it passes, and then why is it that sheâs never been bored in a sessionâitâs never happened: when will it not be exciting or curious? Itâs not the same thing as it being easy or effortless, challenge does not mean something isnât fun, and maybe itâs one of her favorite things to do. David names: itâs amazing to be put into an environment where itâs dangerous if you donât pay attention to listening, attending to the patterns and themes in the groupâitâs almost what Iâve done in my entire life. Find ways to honor ourselves. I want someone to be able to look at me and respectfully out himself more often, and we donât see the models are dysfunction. âThis kid having ADHD and being in jailâ is part of the story. Until everything is shiny! Glitter! Except loose glitter which is Isabelleâs worst nightmare. She learned, the hard way, that loose glitter found itâs way into her world, the moment you try to clean it up, itâs âthis glitter will be here always.â The glitterâs arch nemesis is tapeâyouâre welcome everybody. You still have to sit there for hours, but it makes the cleanup satisfying. David has had the thought of rooms with too much glitter and thought: burn this room. Isabelle names that this is different when there is epoxy style glitter in a floor or a tile, or in a shoeâshe loves how thereâs a lot of glittery shoes, but the glitter is contained in a plastic shell. And thereâs something amazing about the shiny but it needs to stay shiny and not be embedded in anyoneâs skin. Isabelle's friend pointed this out: David has a pleasant voice, and Isabelle, back in high school, was on speech team, and she competed in radio speaking, where you essentially you get to be in a room separate from everybody and record into a microphone. That got her over her fear of public speaking, only they used tapes and tape recorders. Who knew? These little things, not exactly fate v. Free willâisnât it interesting the things that had to come into play were miraculous or exponentially improbable. David thinks his survival in life is pretty lucky. Like LeDerick said, weâre statistically survivors, how did we get there? David is sometimes looking at a river and itâs all pristine and thereâs this piece of trash attached to a log not getting sucked down the river, and that's him, heâs a piece of trash, and he got saved. He was powerless being swept by the currentâa lot of us wereâwhether we found partners, or friends, or jobs or something. The odds of David getting an advanced degree, being in a counseling practice, and having the same diagnosis. There was a moment in their office, it was Isabelleâs first or second month, and we were talking about structure and stuff, and it went brain-seahorse. And David went âmaybeâŠmaybeâŠâ and everyone else just saw, itâs going to go somewhere else. To finish the thought: once seahorses have partnered, upon the first rays of sunlight entering the ocean, they will do a synchronized dance to each other. Speaking of seahorses: the hippocampus is the part of the brain is responsible for episodic memory, ability to time stamp when something has happened in our life, seal it with a declarative contextâand to connect it to David's trash metaphor, how a seahorse gets around: it attaches to kelp or seaweed and it floats on the currents, and it mates for life, and takes care of itâs babies, and it does not make sense, and it exists nonetheless. Isabelle doesnât think weâre trash on a river, weâre the seahorses. David names that 50% of people with ADHD donât graduate on time. Isabelle names: a lot seahorses donât survive, statistically thereâs so many donât make it. David names thereâs a lot of compassion and meaning to what we seeâIsabelle is doing a lot of shaming to the trash. David is not trying to say weâre mistakes, but he doesnât think the system sees value in us, but we have to see value in ourselves. You see me, I see you, grab my hand, weâll do things together, we are trying to survive. David is never going to judge survival. Isabelle quotes Carl Rogers, when the potato sprouts, itâs doesnât matter if itâs in the earth or in the root cellar, it will reach out toward the little shaft of light, and he talks about it as an actualizing tendency, weâre always going toward the sunlight, and everyone else is casting shame âsilly potatoâ but itâs doing what it does. The labels that we put on things can be really distracting, and thereâs a big debate about diagnosing, and David names that labels can be minimizing and restrictive, but with ADHD, thereâs some power in that label, in knowing youâre not alone, that itâs really hard when youâre dealing with internal invisible motivational things, it's easy to think thereâs something wrong with you, and you need to spend time with people that donât make you feel like trash, and you spend time doing things, and you donât trash yourself. But also, David identifies with the trash in the river. ANd things changed when he didnât need the system to find value. How do you relate to yourself in seeing the value you hold and knowing that. It connects to internal family systems, thereâs this interesting idea that the reason why when youâre beating yourself up, it causes actual painâthereâs another part, however small or exiled, there is another part that is taking that hit. When weâre beating ourselves up, a part of us is trying to convince the part that desperately doesnât want it to be true. Itâs like trying to beat down a part that inherently knows it has value. Itâs not just practicing and noticing the strengths and the peaks, but also having the space and safety to grieve, that you had a lot more peaks, and lot of people missed it, and you were wrong about you, tooâthere's a whole reckoning. David would use this question to ground himself: âwhen did that not happen?â Oh, with these people, in that place, when Iâm doing xââwhere does it not happen?â Even looking at childhood, âmy parents were always angryââwhen were they not? This makes Isabelle think of your default neural networkâyouâre brain is going to always do the thing that it's most used to, because itâs more efficient to do the thing you do every dayâif youâre not actively or intentionally trying to counter that, youâre going to coastâand if youâve been knocked down, and you've been hit harder and felt it more acutely than most, and youâre default mode is going to be rough, and it does take concentrated effort to work with this, and that's where environments and community comes in.
Dr. Daniel Siegel - the neurons that fire together, wire together
Coolest books about seahorses - <...
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Does feedback sting extra hard? David introduces the concept of rejection sensitive dysphoria (RSD), where you interpret feedback or questions or redirections as being very harsh and personal, and then really take it to heartâeven if thatâs not really what is being communicated to you--and how this plays into relationships. This episode, David and Isabelle are joined by fellow ADHD clinician, Noah, and Isabelle's husband, Bobby, who both also have ADHD.
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Isabelle & David welcome Isabelleâs husband, Bobby, and Davidâs friend and fellow clinician, Noah, who both also have ADHD. David introduces the concept of rejection sensitive dysphoria (RSD), where you interpret feedback or questions or redirections as being very harsh and personal, and then really take it to heartâeven if thatâs not really what is being communicated to you (example: Did you empty the dishwasher? Someone with RSD: WHY DO YOU THINK IâM LAZY?!) What do you do if you and your partner BOTH have RSD and ADHD? Awareness is gamechanging. How you give people the feedback that maybe theyâre taking your feedback too personally/harshly? There is a comedic setup in giving people the feedback that they may not take feedback well. What if your partner is neurotypical and feels like your ADHD hyper focus forgetfulness feels like youâre doing things on purpose, then you go down a shame spiral of forgetting (for example)? The neurotypical partner may have resentment towards the behaviors and also, how can it get better? It will happen again, we will fail. Not trying to be something youâre not, but also always working to improve and putting in effort, as well as paying attention to repairs and actually doing the work to prioritize what your partnerâs needs are-speaking their love language (see Gary Chapmanâs Love Languages below). How RSD connects to years of feeling like youâre failing and getting social feedback thereâs something wrong with you. The importance of finding a partner who accepts you and gets that ADHD is not going away.WHO IS GOTTMAN? Basically John & Julie Gottman are relationship gurus who found an institute years ago where they research how people in relationships interact scientifically. With their experience they define the individual ways we crave, express and accept love from others. For more information, check out: https://www.gottman.com/
DAVIDâS DEFINITIONS of Gary Chapmanâs Love Languages (https://www.5lovelanguages.com):
1. words of affirmation - talking about your feelings of intimacy, appreciation or praise to another person
2. quality time - making time to be in close proximity with another person doing a preferable task
3. physical touch - acts of touching, kissing, hugging, physical acts of closeness
4. acts of service - being able to take care of things or fix problems for other people
5. receiving gifts - feeling appreciation from the things that are given to you by another person
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cover art by: Sol VĂĄzquez
technical support by: Bobby Richards -
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Ever wonder if itâd be easier to be partnered with someone who also has ADHD (or, someone who is neurotypical)? How can you coexist no matter what the combo platter of neurodivergence? Robin, Davidâs neurotypical partner, and Bobby, Isabelleâs neurodivergent partner, join a relationship round table filled with practical tips on how neurotypical and neurodivergent partners can better support, communicate, and respond in key moments with one another.
---ADHD is often scapegoated within relationships. David & Isabelle are joined by Davidâs partner, Robin, who is neurotypical, and Isabelleâs husband, Bobby, who also has ADHD. David describes his friendship with Noah, who also has ADHD, and how the two of them have different and complementary needs and accommodation styles (for example, Noah likes structure and being on time, David is more accommodated by not wanting to let Noah down). How relationships could look when people are aware of what they are good at, not so good at, and that they need to work differently. This is similar to how when Bobby and Isabelle were first diagnosed, they had very different ways of experiencing ADHD and their sample size (âbut wait, Isabelleâs more organized, she canât have ADHD!â) impacted their understanding of it. David and Robin describe how Robin gives David a part of a shelfâa place where he could freely be messy and do his thing. Like spots that she, as his neurotypical partner, does not try to manage. The group goes on a tangent about cockroaches running up legs and spiders in your mouth while you sleep (see below). David also observes that Robin does not ask him to do a lot of things so when she does ask him, it feels novel and he received instant gratification for doing the task, so heâs more likely to do it (and eager to please the person he loves). This also connects to how Robin asks him to sweep or clean up crumbs (more thoroughly). Isabelle notes Robinâs warmthâand recognizes that Isabelle and Bobby both arenât as warm to each other around this feedback. Robin points out that Isabelle (having ADHD) may not see the feedback as it goes, and instead notices the feedback when sheâs already overwhelmed. Isabelle and Bobby note what they call a Great America moment (see below) and notes how she was able to observe Bobby circling around distracted, like a shark, and that she was able to see he needed a different environment to complete his tasks and was able to choose to go to Great America anyway (for herself): in short, she didnât have to jump into the shark circling herself. David points out that children (which he does not have) are like the loveliest hedonist parrots (which Isabelle and Bobby add: are also the best thing ever). David also talks about mirror neurons and how people with ADHD can have much more active empathic responses, where they can really sync up to the moods/emotions of the people around them. As Bobby is circling like a shark, Isabelleâs mirror neurons are activated and she is syncing up, but Isabelle does not need the same level of intensity. How to know when you donât need that level of intensity, knowing when you canât think your way out of that circle (AKA Great American moment). Also important and hard to notice when youâve self-stimulated yourself into some intense emotion but then your next task doesnât need it. Hard to see yourself clearly in these escalated moments and how a partner can see you more clearly sometimes and help reflect back boundaries or what you need. And so when Isabelle syncs up to Bobby, sheâs trying to soothe them both, instead of paying attention to taking a break and NOT syncing up, which will help them both. Bobby notes that podcast recording sessions helps everyone. Robin also names times when she and David need to ask for what they need to sync up (or not sync up). David will call and give her a heads up telling her heâs âcoming in hotâ from his commute/work time, when sheâs on the couch horizontal watching the Office or Park and Recâhow they try to meet them halfway. How both David and Isabelle forget their age all the time.
For more show notes, go to somethingshinypodcast.comWhy is the cockroach named Rick? For no reason, except David and Robin like alliteration.
Isabelle mentions a sacred pact between humans and bugs? Well, itâs an ancient truce predicated on the idea that if a bug is around, thatâs fine, weâre on their turf, really, but if a bug is on your body without you electing to have said bug on your body, or the bug is on your bed or perhaps in the bath/shower with you, you will use whatever means necessary to remove said bug from said body/bath/shower/bed.
What is the Great America moment? Letâs say a group of people all want to go to an amazing thrill-ride packed amusement park (like Great America, a Six Flags park in scenic Gurnee, IL), but theyâre waiting on one person to finish their work before they go. Instead of making the whole group miss out if that person doesnât get their work done, you can honor both sets of needs: let the person finish their work and then also let the rest of the group go to Great America. Then circle back and plan another time to go together. The idea is that the person struggling shouldnât feel the pressure/responsibility of everyone elseâs âgood timeâ and that everyone can hold boundaries make autonomous choices that are also understanding and inclusive.
DEFINITIONS
Self esteem: is a global term that has to do with how you feel about yourself, your own sense of self-worth. One thing to consider is that with ADHD, self-esteem can be believing you're going to survive an experience: that the moment of discomfort you're experiencing will be worth it it in the future. This is hard to do when your sense of time can be two modes (now or not now). When everything feels like NOW, it's hard to believe in a later or a change or in growth. And when you believe you can do something, it dramatically increases the odds that you will actually do that thing. Self-esteem is believing that you can survive, you can do the thing, and you don't have to convince yourself of that all over again every time.
Mirror neurons: this is a very complex neurological phenomenon, that is a particular favorite of ours. When you are doing a thing, your brain fires motor neurons (eg. if you know how to ski, your brain will fire the motor fires that help you move on your skis). Mirror neurons fire when you are witnessing (or anticipating) someone else do a thing that your motor neurons do (eg. your mirror neurons fire AS IF YOU ARE SKIING, when you are watching skiing on tv). Put another way, your brain is inhibiting you from acting out what you're witnessing/anticipating, but other than that, you're copying the things you see/anticipate seeing. Think about how much we learn vicariously, through observation and then trying something you've only seen before (like a baby learning how to walk! or draw! or pretty much anything!) The more they're understood, the more we recognize that mirror neurons are also involved in recognizing emotional states and sharing your em...
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Everything you ever wanted to know about ADHD...continues! WOOHOO! Go back and check out Parts I & III, or start here to learn more about dopamine, how to differentiate someone with ADHD v. someone who is neurotypical, why folx with ADHD run late, and what the impacts are on school (sadly, so far, not great) when someone is labeled with ADHD and receives accommodations. The things that are easy, hard, and all the myths and misperceptions that exist about what is really not a deficit, but rather an abundance and variety of, attention. The third part of a series from David, who has lectured as an expert and advocate on this subject nationally, and assisted by Isabelle, who is eagerly sponging up the information. A neurodivergent and neurotypical blend of friends Christina, AJ, Gabe, and Isabelle's husband, Bobby, sit in to ask questions. (Part III of Davidâs Lecture Series)
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Isabelle & David welcome Isabelleâs husband, Bobby, and their friends, Christina, AJ, and Gabe, to continue to listen and learn from Davidâs tried and tested presentation on ADHD, which he normally gives to fellow clinicians (for the first and second parts of this talk, please see episode 4, All About ADHD Part I and episode 6, All About ADHD Part II). David talks about procrastination, and why it raises the stakes, thus generating more dopamine (the chemical in our brain that gives us a feeling of reward or satisfaction), which folx with ADHD are deficient in. He relates this to the idea that winning, or a win/lose condition, as something that generates dopamine: if we leave for somewhere that is 10 minutes away with 9 minutes to go, if we get there in time, we feel like we beat the clock (won). Also, as we run late to something, for example, we raise the stakes and leave so that we will run lateâthus, giving us dopamineâbut weâre often miserable and blaming ourselves the whole time. Miserable, and loaded with dopamine: reinforcing the behavior that we are also blaming/shaming ourselves for. How struggles with time management (guessing how long something will take or how all the pieces will fit together) make transitions and running late even harder, and how it is important for neurotypical partners and folx to know it is not done on purpose. How to differentiate (or diagnose) someone with ADHD when a lot of symptoms of ADHD also occur in neurotypical folx (like procrastination? Enjoying sex?). Most psychological diagnoses are connected to things many people experience (such as anxiety); and most humans will struggle with executive functioning skills, but all folx with ADHD will struggle with these skills (see below for a list of skills!). Furthermore, when we get into how people recognize and learn from mistakes, thatâs when you see ADHD: a person with ADHD will make these mistakes a lot more often and also carry a lot more shame and self-blame for doing them because of just how often they make them. Neuropsych (short for neuropsychological testing) can help find an ADHD diagnosis but can also miss it. For example, audience member AJ names going to go to the store and seeing the coupons, but skipping the step of putting them in your pocket (ADHD)âand a pattern of this experience, over and over again (plus the âWhy did I do this AGAIN!â feeling). Davidâs use of the Yoda voice âThere is no later, only now!â Talking about the shame spiral of the pattern of this happening over and over again. Major consequences of growing up with ADHD - social and school. Folx with ADHD, if they are diagnosed as having it impact their learning (remember: ADHD is not necessarily a learning disability, it must be shown to be impacting learning), they are often tracked with lower level classes and are given accommodations to suit lower IQ students (make things easier). Dilemma there is most people with ADHD have above average IQ: with this setup, they are under stimulated in school, and also isolated and marginalized, systemically. Sharing different school experiences, from being in gifted programs to transitional programs, to having LD labels: and the validation of folx with ADHD often disliking school (especially when they receive accommodations). Seen as if youâre doing it on purpose. Especially kicks in around ages 9-10, when peers start normalizing your world v. Your family. Talking about kids will naturally accommodate themselves in school (figure out bare minimum grade, skip homework but do well on a test, for example)âbut when they do this, for example, not doing homework, can be read as personal (by the teacher) or avoid the consequences.Dopamine deficiency? ADHD is often understood as neurobiological (brain) difference, that includes lower levels of dopamine, the neurotransmitter (messenger chemical) in our brain that gives us feelings of satisfaction and rewardâthe feeling of YOU DID ITâŠahhhhhhh. Another way of viewing it is a neurotypical person has a shot-glass-sized need for dopamine and so little bits of dopamine fill it up enough to feel that satiation, whereas a person with ADHD has a pint-glass-sized need for dopamine. At times, you need a lot more dopamine and are starving for it, but at other times, you have so much dopamine it is so rewarding (and perhaps the reward feeling while eating that doughnut is actually that much greater), but it also makes it even harder to pull away or transition from getting that dopamine to not (imagine how hard it is to not keep watching a show you love or how it would feel if someone suddenly unplugged the tv). Keep in mind that dopamine is just one of the neurotransmitters doing some fun other stuff where ADHD is concerned.
DAVIDâS DEFINITIONS:
ADD or Attention Deficit Disorder: is an outdated diagnostic label that also used to a serve as a marker (often perpetuating some shame and stigma) differentiating a person from someone who had ADHD or the hyperactive part of ADHD. Currently, everything is called ADHD, with the following subtypes: inattentive type (too much brakes), impulsive type (too much gas), or combined type (too much of one or the other depending on the environment someone is in). Folx diagnosed with ADD will often present as ADHD inattentive or combined subtype.
Neuropsych(ological) Testing: can be very expensive, and is one way to get an official diagnosis for ADHD (another is meeting with a licensed clinician who does a thorough social/school/work/life history combined with self-diagnosis). Neuropsych tests assess your reactions and responses to different challenges, and can be helpful in either the validation of a diagnosis or awareness in what kinds of supports/accommodation and modifications might be helpful. It should be noted that these tests are largely dependent on the examiner's evaluation, and aren't perfect and can be wrong.From the Cleveland Clinic: "A neuropsychological evaluation is a test to measure how well a person's brain is working. The abilities tested include reading, language usage, attention, learning, processing speed, reasoning, remembering, problem-solving, mood and personality...
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Everything you ever wanted to know about ADHD...continues! WOOHOO! Go back and check out Part I, or start here to learn more about what's happening in the brain, how to use environments to cue ourselves, how debate and manufactured fights can be ways to help you focus, and more! The things that are easy, hard, and all the myths and misperceptions that exist about what is really not a deficit, but rather an abundance and variety of, attention. The second part in a series from David, who has lectured as an expert and advocate on this subject nationally, and assisted by Isabelle, who is eagerly sponging up the information. A neurodivergent and neurotypical blend of friends Christina, AJ, Gabe, and Isabelle's husband, Bobby, sit in to ask questions. (Part II of Davidâs Lecture Series)
---(Part II of Davidâs Lecture Series) Isabelle & David welcome Isabelleâs husband, Bobby, and their friends, Christina, AJ, and Gabe, to continue to listen and learn from Davidâs tried and tested presentation on ADHD, which he normally gives to fellow clinicians (for the first part of this talk, please see episode 4, Davidâs Lecture: All About ADHD!). We talk about Auditory Processing Disorder (APD) which often also exists alongside ADHD; however, they are two different things. ADHD can make you more prone to distraction when you hear sounds, no APD (see definition below). ADHD can also coexist with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). David gets nerdy about how blood flow to certain parts of our brain connects to distraction, and how our environment can also cue us to shift blood flow to the forebrain (prefrontal cortex). Gabe notes that sports served as an important accommodation. David makes the comparison that itâs like having an energy bar in a video game, and if you donât use it during your day, it will become anxious rumination at night. David and Bobby get distracted by Bobbyâs audio equipment (or Bobby tweaking his audio settings) and David points out that being oppositional rewards us with dopamine. Debate as a dopamine booster. As a parent, how do you get out of power struggles. Talking about ADHD as too much gas (hyperactive) and too much brakes (inattentive); combined type is both, and environmentally cued (the more comfortable you are, the more gas; the less comfortable you are, the more brakes). What about ADHD on vacation? We can get more irritable or more chill, and it can be because we have uprooted our accommodations: the structure we have in place at home that helps us get along. So we can start to manufacture structure (including undertaking vacation-only projects, getting into a predictable arguments, reading a book in a day, etc.). When we understand how ADHD impacts us (for example, starting to write a book on vacation to cleverly avoid interactions we donât want to have, plus building in structureâŠbut not finishing because we didnât factor in the response cost of it) we can work with it.
Click here for slides from Davidâs lecture.
How genetically loaded is ADHD?
Pretty loaded. For more on this, check out this article in Nature (prepare for science!)
On a related note, this article also points to ADHD being more of a spectrum than previously thought; as the article mentions:"Accumulating evidence from family, twin, and molecular genetic studies suggests that the disorder we know as ADHD is the extreme of a dimensional trait in the population. The dimensional nature of ADHD has wide-ranging implications. If we view ADHD as analogous to cholesterol levels, then diagnostic approaches should focus on defining the full continuum of âADHD-traitsâ along with clinically meaningful thresholds for defining who does and does not need treatment and who has clinically subthreshold traits that call for careful monitoring. The dimensional nature of ADHD should also shift the debate about the increases in ADHDâs prevalence in recent years. Instead of assuming that misdiagnoses are the main explanation for the increased prevalence, perhaps researchers should explore to what extent the threshold for diagnosis has decreased over time and whether changes in the threshold are clinically sensible or not.âIn other words, ADHD is part of a set of traits that live along a spectrum, and since we tend to diagnose ADHD when those traits/behaviors/experiences are read as a problem, we lump it into itâs own bag, when really it might turn out to be a neurodivergent branch of the same tree. And so those with ADHD can exist all along a spectrum, too! Hence: calling it attentional variability rather than a deficit.
DAVIDâS DEFINITIONS:
Auditory Processing Disorder (APD): a hearing disorder and has to do with how the brain processes auditory information. APD can impact attention as well, but itâs not ADHD. Note: ADHD can make it harder to hear certain sounds, for example a personâs voice in a noisy setting, but the mechanism behind why itâs hard is different than APD.
Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASDs): a group of developmental differences (AKA neurodiversity or differences in the brain) that can cause increased sensitivity to stimulation, social, communication and behavioral challenges.
Prefrontal Cortex (PFC): also known as the forebrain, is a part of the brain that, through dopamine, is linked to executive functioning, or the skills (check out the list below) that help you pay attention, curb your impulses, take in memories (working memory), and play with different scenarios and outcomes (cognitive flexibility), for starters. For further reading, check out this super science-y article.
Forebrain skills that are harder for folks with ADHD (no matter the type):
Response Cost - neurological skill that helps you know the consequences of your actions later on down the road
Delay of Gratification - receiving the reward or win, well after the behavior occurs.
Black and White Thinking - believing or acting as if there are only two ways of thinking right or wrong. Black and white thinking makes it harder to see middle paths during an argument
Time and Organization Skills - knowing how long tasks will take, planning transition times into tasks, appropriately guessing how long something will take, or all parts of time and organizational skills.
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cover art by: Sol VĂĄzquez
technical support by: Bobby Richards -
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Everything you ever wanted to know about ADHD. Seriously. From what's happening in the brain, to how it's experienced day to day--the things that are easy, hard, and all the myths and misperceptions that exist about what is really not a deficit, but rather an abundance and variety of, attention. The first part in a series from David, who has lectured as an expert and advocate on this subject nationally, and assisted by Isabelle, who is eagerly sponging up the information. A neurodivergent and neurotypical blend of friends Christina, AJ, Gabe, and Isabelle's husband, Bobby, sit in to ask questions.
(Part I of David's All About ADHD Lecture Series)
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Isabelle & David welcome Isabelleâs husband, Bobby, and their friends, Christina, AJ, and Gabe, to listen and learn from Davidâs tried and tested presentation on ADHD, which he normally gives to fellow clinicians. ADD and ADHD are the same thing. ADHD is not a learning disability, itâs a brain difference. People with ADHD donât automatically qualify for accommodations in schools, need to prove they are struggling hard enough. ADHD is all about the forebrainâthe roses of our brainâeverything that makes you, you, and makes you unique. Blood tends to flow into the forebrain when you are making decisions. For people with ADHD (see below!), being directed to do something is not doing it. You can look at a red dot, for example, just under different environmental contexts. Itâs not a deficit of attention, itâs variability of attention. As youâre demanding more focus, you lose the ability to focus, unless thereâs a crisis. The root word for patience is suffering. But someone with ADHD experiences much more distress (physiologically) when they are understimulated. Boredom/waiting without structure is the worst. Response cost (see definition below) makes it hard for us to know when weâre doing something that has a consequence further on down the road. The act of debating gives you dopamine. Dopamine deficiency? See more about dopamine deficiency below. Do you ever hear someone get angry when they look away from the screen (WHAT?!) Itâs because theyâre being starved from dopamine when youâre already starving. What elicits hyperfocus instead of distraction? The environment: safety, comfort, consistency, the personâs experience/mastery. With ADHD, they need greater levels of stimulation (hyperactive type) or structure (inattentive type) to attend? Again, ADHD is best not thought about as a deficit of attention: attention variability. We have an overabundance of attention. A neurotypical person can attend to whatever in whatever environment, and if they canât, much easier for them to identify and advocate for whatâs interfering with that (for example, âI canât hear you, the fridge is making a weird noise!â) Whereas for someone with ADHD, it connects to self-esteem, much more difficult to ask for what you need because it makes you think youâre different or deficient or you missed the thing thatâs interfering to begin with. Itâs the ability to have self-esteem to advocate for the learning environment. We start to touch on ADHD and its link to Auditory Processing Disorder.To see some of David's slides from this presentation, click here (or visit somethingshinypodcast.com)
ADHD types explained through how we buy a printer we need:
inattentive type: struggles to buy the printer, doesnât take into account the cost of a lack of a printer, buys one six months laterimpulsive type: buys two printers, means to put the other one up for sale, forgets to, sits in a corner for six monthscombination type: see above and experience BOTH, often depending on your level of mastery/comfort (more impulsive). Oh, itâs fun.Forebrain skills that are harder for folks with ADHD (no matter the type):
Response Cost: neurological skill that helps you know the consequences of your actions later on down the road
Delay of Gratification - receiving the reward or win, well after the behavior occurs.
Black and White Thinking - believing or acting as if there are only two ways of thinking right or wrong. Black and white thinking makes it harder to see middle paths during an argument
Time and Organization Skills - knowing how long tasks will take, planning transition times into tasks, appropriately guessing how long something will take, or all parts of time and organizational skills.
Dopamine deficiency? ADHD is often understood as neurobiological (brain) difference, that includes lower levels of dopamine, the neurotransmitter (messenger chemical) in our brain that gives us feelings of satisfaction and rewardâthe feeling of YOU DID ITâŠahhhhhhh. Keep in mind that dopamine is just one of the neurotransmitters doing some fun other stuff where ADHD is concerned.
The Red Dot Study⊠came from a book David was reading off his colleague's bookshelf, pre-pandemic. Pandemic happened. Office closed (permanently). No memory of the author. We will keep looking for it, but in the meantime, our apologies and here is a study with similar findings: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3763932/
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Cover art by: Sol VĂĄzquez
Technical support by: Bobby Richards
Thank you to Christina, Gabe, and AJ for being our audience -
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David and Isabelle welcome Ren, a fellow therapist with ADHD, who digs into what was rough and unique about being homeschooled as a neurodivergent person. From the spaghettification-like transition to college, to the stereotypes of homeschooling as being for white Jesus-Jumper-wearing Christians (Duggar style), what it means to face things like frustrating and nonsensical busy work, a lack of structure, and learning how to study from television. Tackling questions about confidence, self-image, and Dickensonian skull-caps. Part II of a series.
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David wonders what different versions of homeschooling Ren was exposed to growing upâthey describe a number of different structures, and that their family lived more on the structured side. Studies were more experiential, going to plays or museums or reading books on your own versus just listening to lectures. Youâd do things based on your own pace, and it was almost entirely momsâa lot of it was birth order, the eldest kids had different experience because momâs had more practice, and got a little more tired. Ren doesnât want to pain too rosy a picture, it was a big struggle for many when they left the system and hit collegeâmaybe more help with the big transition? Ren spent a lot of their first year of college depressed, going from being the âbestâ by being a class of 1, do what I want when I want, to suddenly âyou expect me to sit in this class multiple hours, multiple times a week, listening to you talkâŠand then do more stuff later?â Ren never had their time wasted by an authority figure, or the concept of busy work. Isabelle pictures this as a froyo shop model of education, where you get to try so many different things and combinationsâa sense of autonomy and a sense of reassurance. In order to feel confident, you need to trust your experience, stealing from Good Inside with Dr. Becky. As caregivers we cut off emotional states, you canât trust your own assessment of your own experience, and weâre coming in with a counter of âyou donât have to have that feeling,â because you donât get a gauge for validation. Also offering empathy for Freshman-year Ren, like they saw through the Matrix and had already seen through it. Isabelle feels like the opposite of Renâshe went to school 6 days every week, she had a really old school Polish lessons on Saturdays based on the Polish school system. Isabelle is like the tame bird, while Ren feels like they were free and then were being told to go into a cage. David is realizing he would not have survived if he was Renâthe hardest thing was everything they just described, he was oppositional, heâd drag his feet at everything. David almost saw this as spaghettification, like if youâre in two places of different pressures youâll turn into spaghetti (see below, yikes, we edited out a more detailed and graphic description, be warned if you go down this rabbit hole). Ren walked into places with no defenses, which Ren relates to colonization, "oh hi, it's the Pilgrims again." They were touch-starved because as the eldest of 6, they hadnât gone a day without someone in their space, but they were also failing at the thing they were good at, and they were supposed to learn how to study. They learned about how people do school on tvâtheyâd gather up their textbooks and just sit at the library for 7 hours because thatâs what studying âlooks like.â They dealt with it by doing the closest thing to being a home schooler, which was being a theater major. An on-ramp wouldâve been nice. Isabelle wants to mention that the part they edited out about spaghettification, if you went down the rabbit hole and it's a lot and you're not alone, and maybe we just trauma bonded and yikes. There was a developmental trajectory that moved more and more into a âfeeling more free' directionâthe more BS David could do, the more autonomy he got, and so he got rewarded for doing the BS which helped him later on down the line. Isabelle wonders if Ren was learning more intrinsically v. extrinsically, because you want your own self-reference for building pride and capacity v. approvalâwhere did this anxiety start, if for 18 years they had themselves as their own self-reference? How it can take just one awful educational experience to challenge your sense of self. Up until college, all of Renâs anxiety was about going to Hellâafter college, it switched to everything elseâthey are getting things wrong in a way that is invisible to me, and everybody else feels like what's going on. Everyone else has seen the same things, but they are outside the bubble, was like an alien trying to blend in. What is a Jesus jumper, you may wonder? A long denim skirt that goes to the ankle, if you think of a potato sack with a sleeplessness. On the other end of the spectrum from Ren's mom, they did not wear Jesus jumpers and let their girls go to the college, but a lot of people think of this. The home school reference for people is white and Duggar style, Jesus jumper. So Ren's identity before college was good at running the household, not being difficult, being good at school and after college they needed to find a new thing, because nobody needs them to run a household anymore and school is requiring tasks that are stupid. So they became a stage manager because that was as close to running a household, and the validation of people needing you and the structure of rehearsals and it became their new thing. David keeps hearing that there are so many people that normalize their life based on TVâit's so real, like the Norman Rockwell version of studying with a feather pen and books on a table in a library, thatâs really studying. If it looks right, I'm doing it. Isabelle wonders if this is Norman Rockwell or Dickensâand the reason she suspects this, is because she was really into historical fiction, adoring the American Girl books and she was the kid that actually asked for a quill pen for her birthday, she wanted a candle, melted wax stamps, sheâs into everything David is saying. Itâs possible that for her for her studying that looked like this Dickensonian image may actually have been an accommodation.
Good Inside with Dr. Becky - talking about confidence
Spaghettification
Homeschool representation tends to be white and fundamentalist and wearing a Jesus Jumper (like the Duggars)-----
Cover Art by: Sol VĂĄzquez
Technical Support by: Bobby Richards
Special Thanks to Ren for sharing their brilliance with us!
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David and Isabelle are delighted to be joined by their colleague, Ren, a fellow therapist who describes their journey to understanding their neurodivergence. From to what it was like growing up the eldest of six kids and being homeschooled until college, to how different it is to cope with our neurodivergence when we recognize that it's "for keeps," to how we have a "cartoon" of ourselves that can do it all. Covering questions about structure, how strange it is to remove the pressure of having anxiety all the time through medications and accommodations, and how White supremacy generates the myth that the world is a level or equal place for everyone. Part I of a series.
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David and Isabelle welcome their colleague and amazing friend, Ren! David is excited for Ren to share their story because they were not traditionally schooled, but were homeschooled from the second day of 1st grade. On the second day of 1st grade, a kid named Jack who had bullied them all through Kindergarten, was going to do the same thing in first grade, and their mom decidedâhow about we not? Also, connected to their parents not being pleased with the school system in St. Louis, and they were also evangelical Christian, which factored in. They came to their diagnosis later in life, when they were already working at the Willow Center with David and Isabelle, and their friend Robin was thinking about them being newly diagnosed, and Ren was listening going âitâs not that dramatic, thatâs not ADHD?â Do they just think they have ADHD because they work with a bunch of openly neurodivergent people? Then Ren talked to Robin about it for about 12 hours and realized that they were. As part of diagnosis, people are often asked about school, and Ren was not only homeschooled, but fit the eldest daughter stereotype in that they were in charge of their own schooling. And of course their school record looks like everything is fine because they were in charge of their own progress and record. Isabelle wonders what some of the things Ren thought were ânormal, not ADHDâ wereâwhat tipped them off? Ren describes that them and their friend were both people with advanced degrees, and a big history of anxietyâand the way boredom works and anxiety can serve as a way to self-medicate as an accommodation. It doesn't take three hours to stress yourself out to be able to do a taskâthe abstract of how you think. Youâve been working with static in your brain forever and everyone else is not doing the static? Ren has done a lot of identity work whereas this is a jacket that just fitsââI donât have to work myself so hard to work.â David would brag âI just sat down and read the other day.â Itâs incredible, I donât have to fight to keep my eyes on one page, and then I retain it, and then I write about it. About 90% of their anxiety just went away. Isabelle names that when the anxiety is reduced so much, how does she get things done? It came before she was really conscious of accommodation strategies, it felt like she was unmasking way more rapidly than when she was conscious of it and replacing her anxiety with accommodations. It forced her to embrace all these limitations and then it made her feel icky to really face her actual limitations. Ren names that it was different when it is âfor keepsâ â and Isabelle used to think she had limitless potential but actually now she has to accept the page has been cut off. It serves her more to admit she canâtâbut anxiety told me I could, if I just did more! Ren describes it as cartoon youâand also cartoon partnerâthe real person has limits, and you see yourself as a cartoon thatâs limitless, and that contrast can motivate you, but also not. David wasnât sitting in anxiety as much as shame, and the ADHD diagnosis came later in the life, and all of a sudden the world was not longer level, but had ice shelfs and ridges, and much more complicated environment, meant that he could unpack shame. But also this is how white supremacy affects all of us, the idea that the world is level is ridiculous. Ren is Black, AFAB, Queer, nonbinary, and so the concept of the world is level is not a real thing. In the 80âs and 90âs, David names that there was this whole idea that the world should be equal, mainstreaming, âyou got your needs met, so youâre failing nowâŠâ and it didnât really work. Davidâs bias is around creating inclusion and having all sorts of neurotypical and meurodivergent kids doing the same work with different expectations and breaking the illusion that the world is level. Renâs way of homeschooling was the way that the schooling then applied to her other 5 siblings; they were the type A, just want to learn something. Their mom was still asleep and they woke their mom up, saying âitâs time for you to teach me something.â Their brother was diagnosed early, took their fridge apart, and Ren was reading and researching all the things. They were already at the top off the hierarchy in terms of learning, and you could tell which kids in the homeschooling group could adapt to the school environment and which kids never should be in this environment. Isabelle is curious what the homeschool environment looks like? What was the structure like? 13 year age gap between all the kids, their mom had the most executive functioning in the familyâthere was a list of subjects and a bunch of criteria for the subjects; she purchased textbooks, literature, and a homeschool group of a couple hundred, and they would get together and swap resources. Couple of a moms were good at music, and art, and match, and everyone would swap resources. Their transition to college was âoh God, so much being told what to do at all time.â Every year they took a state test to see what grade level they were at, and would get progress reports. Their mom worked in education her whole life, so she was not dropping standards but doing it for religious reasons. There was a vibrant community and not being penalized for wiggling. It was an evangelical Christian homeschool bubble, but nobodyâs mom had the time or energy to be committed to you sitting still, they were trying to pack lunch for 8 people. For Ren, that concept of asking an authority figure for permission to move their body from place to placeâthis only happened on tv.
-----Cover Art by: Sol VĂĄzquez
Technical Support by: Bobby Richards
Special Thanks to Ren for sharing their brilliance with us!
- Vis mere
