So I'm just interrupting today's episode to let you know about a brand new live workshop that I've got coming up on the 24th of May at 1pm and this workshop is all about reducing your ADHD overwhelm in family life and discovering and welcoming in more calm and regulation.

Now, I want to let you know that I don't have all the answers, but it's something that I deal with on a daily basis and I've discovered over the years of understanding my own ADHD and coupled with all my coaching and talking to my experts on the podcast as well, well as all my hundreds of coaching clients, that there is a way of living without feeling in this sort of default state, of feeling like you're drowning, that you're stressed all the time.

And juggling family life alongside an ADHD brain can feel overwhelming at best and debilitating at worst.

And life is happening at the moment at breakneck speed.

We are all struggling to feel balanced, like we're keeping up.

And so I wanted to share with you six steps that I know have worked for me and six steps I often talk about to many of my private coaching clients.

I wanted to share this in a group live workshop.

So if this is something that you are dealing with right now and you would love some more support, some new ideas, different perspectives, I would love it if you could join me.

All the details are on the Today's Show Notes but also on my website which is ADHD womenswellbeing.co.uk if you head to the Show Notes or my website, find all the information and it's in one hour you'll learn some new ways of coping and feeling more resilient and looking at life differently and feeling like you don't have to be at the mercy of everything that's piling up on top of you and that you do have control and choice over what you choose to bring into your family life.

So I really look forward to seeing you there.

It's the 24th of May, 1:00 and it's all the details are on my website.

Now back to today's episode and welcome to another episode of ADHD Women's Wellbeing Wisdom.

Little short bite sized pieces of wisdom that I've curated from all the many, many episodes that have been recorded over this time and I really hope that this short insight will help you on the week ahead.

So welcome back to another episode of the ADHD Women's Wellbeing Wisdom.

It's the shorter episodes on a Sunday just to give you that boost for the week.

And today we have a fantastic guest who I love speaking to.

We're always engaging on social media together, and I've absolutely loved watching what Leanne Maskell is doing in the space, supporting and advocating for the neurodivergent community.

Now, Leanne is.

She's a powerhouse.

She's a force of nature, and she has really helped so many people access more accommodations, understanding, compassion, support within the workplace.

And she's previously worked in mental health and disability law, and she's now sett.

ADHD works to empower as many people to learn how to make ADHD work for them.

She does so many different things with regards to sort of advocating and teaching people.

It's through courses and talks and coaching.

And she's also written a fantastic book called ADHD and A to Z.

So let's listen to what Leanne said to me on the podcast way back then.

I think it was about a year ago, and it kind of feels like the tide is shifting, the mood's changing, people are becoming more open.

But then you realize, actually in the much bigger corporates, you know, especially when it's deemed, you know, if you work in law or accountancy or, you know, like, really stayed corporate places, they're not interested in neurodiversity.

They're not interested in supporting or making accommodations.

What would you love to see in your advocacy, in your work, especially because in the grand scheme of things, you've not been doing this for long.

So what have you seen, I guess, already changing, and what would you love to see in the next five years?

I think it's a big question.

Everything.

Yeah.

Because I think there are so many different elements of it, but particularly, I guess, if we focus on the workplace, like my general life and the work I do, I just love giving people tools to empower themselves, generally against exploitation.

And that's a big part of all of the advocacy with adhd.

And for me, working as an ADHD coach and previously having worked in law, like mental health and disability law, actually, it makes me so angry on people's behalf when I see them, like, asking for basic support and being told like, no, we can't do that.

Like, no, no, that would set a bad example to other people and stuff.

And you're like, oh, my God, I want to bang my head against the wall because it's the law.

Right.

And it's like, they don't have a choice, like, and actually empowering people to understand their rights.

And I think with ADHD in general, like in the UK, adults couldn't be diagnosed until 2008.

So there are so many adults now being diagnosed.

And yeah, a huge number of reasons for that.

But for the purposes of, like, actually what that means for you n, like the whole journey there is very long and like, complex that can.

The whole topic in itself.

But then once you actually do get this magical diagnosis, or even if you don't get that, like, once you understand, okay, this is something that affects me and I'm experiencing these challenges, like, what do you do next with that information?

Like, what does that mean for you?

And I think for people to understand their basic rights of like, hey, this shouldn't be happening.

Like, you know, you shouldn't be being discriminated against at work.

Or for me it was like, hey, you shouldn't have to pay 300 pounds a month to access medication.

Like, that's not a normal.

Because I remember going through that and thinking, but how on earth does other people, like, how does everyone else do this?

Because, like, £300amonth is so much money.

Like, that's not.

That can't be, like, everybody's experiences.

So that's kind of what led me to write all the books that I've written, because there's no rule book, rule book, there's no experience out there of what should be happening.

And I think in terms of, like, companies and reasonable adjustments and things, I think they're in really tricky places, the companies.

Because, for example, in the uk, the Equality act applies whether someone has got a diagnosis of ADHD or anything else or not.

Like, you know, you're not allowed to be discriminated against.

Then you've got people that are on huge, massive waiting lists and wanting help, or people that are being diagnosed with adhd, et cetera.

But they, again, no one tells you, like, congratulations, you've been diagnosed with adhd.

Here's an entire analysis of your personality and all of the things that could help you.

And now you're going to be perfect, have a wonderful life.

You're kind of just dumped with this diagnosis.

No one tells you what that means.

Then you're left down a new rabbit hole trying to figure out.

And along the way, there are a lot of people that will exploit you.

And it's really awful.

And that's why I've made courses and things for people.

But the first one I needed to make was ADHD and understanding what that means for you and, like, how to take responsibility for it and, like, what you can do in the way of, like, I know being happier person or managing some of the challenges before you go and rush into your work and say, hello, here are my adjustments I would like.

Because guess what, if they don't, if the support isn't there or they don't, they don't have the training, which I think it's something like 77% of companies haven't given their employees neurodiversity training.

So chances are they probably haven't.

Like you can actually really go down this very stressful and unnecessary hole of like fighting for rights and not understanding it.

And anyway, yeah, but I think that the biggest thing that employers should do is have a reasonable adjustments policy in place, like training, so that at least because it's impossible to expect them to train managers, for example, on every single possible condition out there and know how to handle it.

But at least if they've got a policy that explains like, this is what to do if you do experience like any kind of challenges to do with health or anything out like childcare, this is what you can do.

This is how you can talk to us about that.

And this is the kind of things that will happen next.

These are the questions that we might ask.

And it'll be an ongoing supportive process.

It's not here to like, you know, terrify you and make you think they were going to fire you, like, but giving that reassurance and being a bit more human, training up the managers in that process and then offering them support when it happens.

Because yeah, and I think so it's like education on both sides and just bringing a bit more like humanity and I think vulnerability into them in general.

From a world where we're like, oh, everyone's got these things now what do we do?

Oh my God, we don't want to set a conditions for everybody but just actually being a bit more like supportive and listening to people.

No, I think you're right 100%.

And what I'm kind of feeling is that when we get a diagnosis then we have to go into, into our workplace that's going to cause friction because the friction is going in and asking for the accommodations and asking for changes to be made.

And if we are a people pleaser, if we have, you know, we suffer from rsd, that's going to be a really big thing.

It's a massive undertaking.

And if we're just processing the ADHD and just understanding how it's shown up and everything, then to have to go and explain and need validation and not be questioned, like you said, this sort of a non judgmental space we want to go in there and know that that person's not going to be like, well, are you sure you don't look like you've got ADHD or you've never flagged it up before or you don't seem to have a problem sitting and you're never fidgeting.

You know, these questions which may just seem a little bit trivial or just, you know, surface questions feeding directly back into that kind of like, well actually is there anything wrong with me or should I really be here?

And all the imposter syndrome.

So we need, I think if there are going to be diversity experts, specialists, you know, anyone there sort of representing that role, that place in the business, they really need to understand it from quite a personal level, I think, and know from a vulnerable level how that person's going to feel when they come in and asking for those accommodations.

And it's not, they're not coming in to make a first, they're not coming in to be different or to make other people feel like, you know, they're fine what they're doing.

But actually I need more.

So it's quite nuanced and I do believe that as time, hopefully as more awareness grows and you know, people like you who are doing such great work, especially in LinkedIn, because I do feel Instagram, tick tock, there's already a space there, There's a level of understanding.

There is but in that corporate feeling where it just still feel quite kind of like you're in a box and you've got to conform and everyone's got to be professional and we're not allowed to talk about mental health or show vulnerability.

We can't be successful and have mental health problems.

We can't be successful and show our vulnerabilities.

But you know, we've got to break, break it all down and sort of rebuild it a little bit and I guess you know what you're doing.

Tell me a little bit about the ADHD works, what that is and how people can access that and what you're doing to support people.

Yeah, so when I was in my job, so I basically got diagnosed with ADHD at 25, managed to then calm down and I forgot a job in law, but still was struggling with different aspects of the idea.

Like we said, it's not like, oh, magical, woohoo, you're a wonderful human, here's your new job, have a wonderful life.

And so I was like scraping together money for therapy and then I found out that there was government funding called access to work that could Pay for people to have ADHD coaching?

What, are you kidding me?

I've been spending, like, so much money on private diagnosis, medication, all of these things.

And I think I'd written.

I'd already written half of the book, most of the book, before even finding this out.

And I was like.

Because that was purely me trying to figure out what this ADHD thing was, because when I was diagnosed, I didn't believe it was real.

And I definitely didn't think, even if it was real, like, it wasn't something that affected me because my symptoms were so, like, emotional.

Like, more than, like, I got all A's, my exams and stuff.

Like, exam's not a problem, because I could just memorize something for the day.

Couldn't tell you what was in it afterwards, but, like, I could remember it for a day, do an exam on it, and then forget.

Yeah.

So I'd written this book, found out about access to work, applied for it, and then that was actually, for me, the first time I met someone that had also been diagnosed with adhd.

She used to be a lawyer as well.

She was the ADHD advocate.

Like, it was really amazing coaching, and it just helped me so much because I think it was that validation, like, what we've just discussed.

And I'm sure so many people will feel like listening to your podcast as well, but, like, five years ago, these didn't exist.

It's amazing because it's quite a short space of time, but, like, no one was talking about ADHD.

There was nothing.

If on LinkedIn, it'd be like, what?

Like, when I actually put my book up on LinkedIn two years ago, I was mortified.

I, like, spent two weeks in bed crying.

I also misspelled the title as ahd, which I only realized after posting it, but I was.

I deleted it.

And I was like, oh, my God, like, why have I just destroyed this career that I've finally managed to get?

Like, why on earth did I need to tell anyone that I've got, like, mental health?

So, yeah, like, no one was really having these conversations, but for me, I had coaching, and it was just talking to someone, like, that had been through what I'd been through, that could understand my brain, that could understand, like, the problems weren't me trying to get certain goals done.

Like, the problem was that I didn't know what to even do in the first place.

And, like, you know, had so many ideas, but I couldn't figure out which ones to do or this or whatever, how to fit into the world.

So, yeah, having the coaching, which also was amazingly paid for by the government, really, really helped me.

And like, also at the same time, working in law and seeing these struggles that the companies had and supporting people with disabilities, like, because I worked with a lot of law firms and like, learning and the same thing.

That's why I really am quite passionate about giving people these resources, especially for free, because, like, knowledge shouldn't cost people money, especially in the world of adhd where you're already having to pay so much for, like, basic survival.

But I feel very privileged to have been able to, like, understand all of that and have experience in knowing the law and like, what reasonable adjustments are, for example.

Never would have ever known that if I hadn't done that job in particular.

And it's funny because at the time it felt so random.

And now looking back, I'm like, oh, they're all linked up.

But I kind of had these different experiences through the coaching.

Also managed to publish that book.

I just mentioned ADHD and a desired.

I just self published it because I'd started getting people asking me about ADHD and I would just send them the manuscript and they were like, that's so helpful, please publish it.

Really, really don't.

I was so humiliated in the first month and I was.

I'm never going to mention that ever again.

Was that your RSD kicking in?

Was that fear of being exposed, the vulnerability?

What was the bit?

If you kind of try and analyze it now, what.

What bit made you feel so scared, anxious, worried about sharing the book?

I think it was that I'd finally managed to like, get a real job and be happy and like, yeah, I was even managing to live kind of quite well with ADHD at that time.

So, like, why?

I was just really scared, like, oh, God, now, like, because I also worked with a lot of really incredible mental health and disability lawyers and I was like, they're all gonna be like, what is.

Like, how could she possibly have a job?

And like, oh my God.

And I was like, I've probably got things wrong in there because I just wrote it by myself and it was like self published.

It wasn't like for a big publisher, like, now it's been bought by a bigger publisher.

But like, I was like, just felt like such an important.

I made the COVID on canva in like 10 minutes and obviously misspelled, which I could fix really easily.

But also I had the kind of reference point of.

I published a book before that called the Model Manifesto.

And that book, like, when it was launched, it ended up on like, the COVID of the Times, I was in Lorraine.

And, like.

And so the contrast was.

And I put.

I, like, wrote to a lot of the journalists that I worked with before, and I was like, hello, I've published this book.

And none of them replied.

It was all these, like, rejection things and being like, oh, my God.

And.

Yeah.

And say.

And that's just really.

And, like, I remember someone that sent an email around to my work being like, look how amazing.

Liana has just published this book.

And I was like, oh, can we just not, like, can no one ever.

Oh, no, it's that it's a very.

Body, sort of visceral feeling, isn't it, of that.

Like, oh, just make it go away.

Like, I remember in a very similar vein, when I launched the podcast, I was terrified.

I was like, what am I doing?

It's, like, making me feel physically sick that I was, like, putting myself out there.

And it was.

It was all.

It was like this muscle.

I had to keep flexing.

Like, every.

Every week I'd be like, oh, my God, it's like podcast week.

And then I realized the people who were listening and the people who were tuning in and listening every week with the people that needed it, and I wasn't really getting the feedback and the judgment I thought I was going to get.

So that.

That kind of made me feel okay.

That's okay.

Because people who aren't interested in ADHD and neurodiversity aren't going to be listening and therefore not going to be judging.

So it did get easier.

But I totally get that.

It was like, I almost wanted to shut the whole thing down, throw my laptop in a bin and run away.

Yes.

Yes.

And, like, how amazing is it that you didn't do that?

But, like, my coach at the time, she said, it's not about you, it's about them.

Like, that was all the people that need the book, like, remembering your why.

Like, why you're doing it.

And now I coach people a lot on similar things and, like, well, like, no one cares.

Yeah.

So what you.

Anyway, yeah, they're all judging.

You're not going to know about it if they do, just block them.

But, you know, I'm really privileged to be in a position because I have to go into an office anymore, so I don't see people and worry about if they're judging me.

I'm just like, oh.

And I think that ADHD comes in really handy.

That because I like that book, I just kind of do it and then forget about it quite quickly.

Or, like, I just do things and then like the kind of out of my mind.

Whereas, like, yeah, it's a balance, but yeah, but I remember like the coaching session I had after publishing it.

My coach was trying to be really.

She was like, you need to celebrate it.

And put.

And I was like quite stressed at the time and just cry.

So crying.

I was like, I don't want to talk about that.

I was like, can we just not mention that book ever again?

She was like, but, yeah, anyway, so long story short, but like, ironically, about three months later, I got a message from someone on Microsoft.

She was a director at Microsoft person.

She messaged me on Instagram and she said, I loved your book.

It really, really helped me so much.

Can you come and train us at Microsoft?

Okay.

And my dad was, My dad was like, that's a hoax.

Don't do it.

Don't give me a bank account, details, I don't know.

I had my model agent at the time, so I said to her, maybe you could deal with that.

I was like, I feel like we should charge them something, but I don't know what.

And like, yeah, at the time she was like, what do you want to charge me?

Like 100 pounds?

And she was like, no, she charged me one half thousand pounds.

And they were like, yeah, sure, fine.

I was like, are you kidding me?

Like, what's that?

I'm like, right, okay, maybe I could do this as a job.

And then.

Yeah.

And so I, like left my job and then set this up again.

And like, when I first started coaching, the first people I spoke to were people that were really struggling at work in the same way.

And like, again, because they didn't know their rights, like things like reasonable adjustments and like, the support they should have been entitled to, they were blaming themselves.

They were like, it's all my fault.

I'm never going to get a job anywhere.

I'm an awful person.

And I was like, actually, did you know that you can ask, for example, the interview questions in advance?

And that isn't.

Like, I had a girl, she would faint when she was having interviews, like, because she got so stressed out.

And I was explaining to her, like, it's not special treatment to give you the interview questions in advance.

Like, not everybody else is fainting out of stress and interviews, like it was recorded or that they would have seen you painting, being like mortified.

Like, yeah, but if we don't tell them in advance.

But again, if you don't have that education.

So that was pretty much what ADHD Works was about.

Set up started out coaching, and now I've coached lots of people, but the demand for it is so high.

I've got like a list of 200 people.

Really sorry for listening to this.

And I've not got back to you yet.

I will next week because we're now taking on, like, 25 new coaches next next week, actually, so, like, training them up to help with the demand because there's just so much of it.

And last year I tried to manage it by creating courses and doing group coaching, which, again, was like, incredible.

We had like over 500 people doing the courses.

But for me personally, like, by myself, me and my poor, poor virtual assistant, Beth, they were just like, podcast retreat.

Call this course.

This course is.

And like, that's my adhd, where I'm like, we can do five things at once.

And like, book law.

And we redid the book last year as well, of the public.

So that was quite.

It was very intense burnout time.

And now I'm trying to do it a bit more organizedly still, like, do all different angles of it, like training up companies.

And like I mentioned, we've got the ADHD retreats, which are really, really amazing to do.

But hopefully now I'll be able to do it in a bit more of a, like, organized way where it's not of, like, bootstrapping and me taking it all on by myself and exploding.

Because by the end of last year, I kind of never wanted to hear about ADHD ever again.

I mean, I'm listening to you and you're literally mirroring back to me, my life.

So thank you for that because I was exactly the same.

Yeah, literally exactly the same.

And I wanted to do it all and serve lots of people in different capacities.

And at the end of last year, come mid December, I was just so burnt out where I made this very intentional decision that January was going to be, you know, downtime for me and I was really going to kind of be more mindful about how I want to work and the capacity that I want to work in with a family and needing space and time for myself, my own wellbeing.

Because how can I serve other people if I am burnt out and exhausted and resentful that I haven't got time and space?

So I've tried to be sort of reconfigure the way I work, because burnout for so many of us with ADHD is always just there on the.

On the.

You know, just.

Just in the near distance.

But we can always sense it and taste it and see it and the signs, you know, come back to us all the time when we're taking on too much.

But, you know, with our ADHD brains, we have ideas, and sometimes it feels really hard not to fulfill them, especially when we go, oh, my God, that'll be amazing.

I'll do this and I'll do that, and.

And I think our clients are the same and the people listening to this are the same.

So it's trying to be mindful of all the energy and all the help and all the activism and the sense of justice that we have, that we want to do it all and be it all and help everybody.

But we are only this one person.

Even training teams, you know, like, you're doing that.

That, for me, is scary because I know how exhausting that can be.

So it's this passion that we have, this constant passion, but in a way, we've always kind of.

Kind of keep it on a.

So I always see it as like a bonfire that can go out, you know, out of control, and we've kind of got to keep that.

The embers, the ambers.

What's the m.

What's the word?

Burning.

Embers.

Embers.

Burning on a.

On a low.

But we can very easily throw, you know, like fire fuel to it.

And it all goes crazy and goes.

To my flat set on fire last week.

Oh, no, wrong analogy.

There was like a fire coming out of it.

I was like, really?

Really?

Yeah.

Should have wear out my pajamas today.

I had to call the fire engine.

Oh, my God.

Well, that sometimes.

Yeah, but sometimes those things that blow up literally in our lives is a little bit of a sign to us that things are.

We're taking on too much and we're doing too much.

So I hope you enjoyed listening to this shorter episode of the ADHD Women's Wellbeing podcast.

I've called it the ADHD Women's Wellbeing Wisdom, because I believe this so much wisdom in the guests that I have on and their insights.

So sometimes we just need that little bit of a reminder, and I hope that has helped you today and look forward to seeing you back on the brand new episode on Thursday.

Have a good rest of your week.