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EP 12: Hormones really kick ADHD up a notch (Ale's Story)
215 Plays1 year ago
In this episode I chat with Ale Wiecek Rojo, a visionary leader, author, podcast host, renowned speaker, the founder of Sqr One, an online education platform, and is passionately committed to empowering purpose-driven entrepreneurs and burnt-out creatives to find their inner wisdom, align their purpose with their business, and make a positive impact on society by addressing systemic inequalities and raising consciousness.
It was an honest and vulnerable conversation about hormones, perimenopause, mental health facing your fears and finding what lights you up. Ale's is a self described 'multi-passion' individual and I think that is a great way to describe many adhd'ers.
Her journal/book Breath In (f**k this Sh*t) Breathe Out, will be available soon.
To hear more from Ale, check out her podcast Living in Alignment
You can find her on her website here.
If you'd like to share your story you can email me at jade@awakeninsights.com.au, visit Awaken ADHD or follow me on Instagram
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Transcript
Introduction to Awaken ADHD Podcast
00:00:06
Speaker
You are listening to Awaken ADHD, a podcast where people share their ADHD stories, life before and after diagnosis, support strategies, strengths and challenges. Hi, I'm Jade and I'll be your host. I'm a counselor, ADHD coach and fellow ADHD. So join me as we Awaken ADHD.
00:00:31
Speaker
This podcast was recorded on the land of the Bunurong people of the Kulin nation, and we wish to acknowledge them as traditional owners. We recognise First Peoples of Australia as the original storytellers and pay our respects to elders past, present and emerging.
Meet Ali Wachikroho, Mental Health Leader
00:00:49
Speaker
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Awaken ADHD. I am super excited for this chat today. I have a fabulous guest with me, Ali Wachikroho. She's a visionary leader, renowned speaker, an expert in mental health, nervous system regulation, entrepreneurship, innovation, and purpose. ah She's a founder of Square One, an online education platform.
00:01:17
Speaker
She's passionately committed to empowering purpose-driven entrepreneurs and burnt-out creatives to find their inner wisdom, align with their purpose, with their business and make a positive impact on society by addressing systemic inequalities and raising consciousness.
00:01:34
Speaker
I got it out. I thought I was going to trip and stumble. She's also the author and author and a podcast host, a mother of two children, married and currently lives in Valencia, Spain after moving from Brisbane, Australia in October, 2023.
00:01:52
Speaker
Ah, there's so much more that we could say about Ali, but welcome.
Ali's ADHD Journey and Hormonal Discoveries
00:01:57
Speaker
Thank you. Oh, my God, I was just saying just before that I realized today is literally a year since we arrived to Valencia. So, yeah, it's been crazy, crazy journey the last year. And obviously how that has affected my ADHD, hormonal journey. I can tell you everything.
00:02:14
Speaker
it is going to be a fun journey. It's funny, in preparation for this, I jumped onto your podcast, of course, and I was actually listening to the podcast episode you did, which was only a few days after you'd arrived. So I'm sure a lot has happened since that that moment and that episode. Okay, let's dive in. um I was just, you know, I guess I usually start off with saying,
00:02:42
Speaker
When was the moment that you kind of awakened to ADHD within yourself? What what was this journey like? um It was interesting because for me, actually, it did not start with ADHD, it just started with we with hormones. and And I think that's and that's probably where I really kicked off my journey of discovery that I had ADHD. It kind of one thing led to the other. And so probably around, you know, I was 38 years old, I'm 44 years old now, 38 years old, I started kind of really feeling a little bit different towards my
00:03:21
Speaker
my new-to-face essentially just before my period. My behavior will change, my mood swings will kick in, and I will just turn into this very different person that I didn't know who I was for about 10 days, two weeks at times.
00:03:35
Speaker
um And that was really scary um at the time. I didn't know what was going on. um It wasn't until two years ago that i I said, after, you know, you kind of go into this rabbit hole of discovery, information after information, talking to friends, finding things on TikTok that you're like, wait, wait, wait. This is really interesting. The correlation between a hormone imbalance likely to be perimenopause,
00:04:03
Speaker
and ADHD, even though there isn't sufficient scientific research, there is a lot of information that really links about neurodivergent women being more prone to the sensitivity of the hormonal changes. So that's why I actually went to my, when I had an appointment with a psychiatrist that took me ages to book, as we all know, for a lot of those listeners who are still waiting for for an appointment to be diagnosed, do not lose hope. um I did it and it was him actually who said, have you ever heard of PMDD? And I'm like, what is what is PMDD? And it was word by word what I was experiencing.
00:04:48
Speaker
For those listeners that might not have come across that term before, do you just want to share a little bit about it? um So, it's Promestral Dysphoric Disorder. It's essentially you going into um into irritability, depression, and anxiety, sometimes depression, sometimes it could be suicidal ideation, it depends.
00:05:12
Speaker
Um, it's like PMS on overdrive. It is yeah hardcore PMS. Yeah. Yeah. And just
ADHD's Impact on Focus and Consistency
00:05:22
Speaker
because PMDD and perimenopause are really similar and, you know, after a lot of different different back and forth with all my my crew of holistic practitioners and doctors, we decided that I was probably started with PMDD then went into perimenopause just because of my age. So I just want to make that really clear that not because you are irritable, have depression, symptoms during your little phase, you have PMDD. If you are past 38 years old, it's likely that you're perimenopausal. So
00:05:54
Speaker
Anyway, but but he's come and really triggered a lot of information in me, but that was how I really wanted to understand do I have ADHD because I started and my brain wasn't, I started feeling and thinking my brain doesn't feel the same. I don't do things the same way. Things that didn't overwhelm me before they overwhelm me now. um There was this feeling of, you know, the the rejection dysphoria that happens to a lot of ADHDers. I was really sort of kicking in much more than ever.
00:06:29
Speaker
andma you know, introvert analytical person. So of course by default, I will be in my head a lot. So that's how sort of my journey started really. Okay, that is that's an interesting journey. you know The correlation between um PMDD and ADHD, there are strong correlations there. Many of my neurodivergent clients experience this, and then also in addition to that, have a much harder time during perimenopause. It can be both, or if they haven't had it before, definitely that experience kicks in with perimenopause.
00:07:09
Speaker
So that's a little bit about how you kind of went, oh, okay, something's going on here. And you went down the diagnostic route. How did it show up in your life now retrospectively, now that you're able to kind of have a look back, can you see how it showed up in the past for you, that perhaps you were masking or?
00:07:29
Speaker
I am someone who is multi passionate and that comes with, as we know, for those fellow creatives that comes with a lot of pros and cons. Can I just say, did you say multi passionate?
00:07:42
Speaker
Yes. I love that term. I love that term. I'm going to borrow that. Multipassionate. Yep. Keep going. I think that describes a neuro divergent individual so well. I'm multi passionate. For sure. And you know, and one day you feel like you want to, you know, you're going to start a new business and then you do like, Oh my gosh, you know, get get down into the the deep dive of research. And then two weeks later, you think of ah a great e-commerce product idea and then you're like, oh, but that sounds amazing too. So I think I had a lot of difficulty in staying focused. And that was something that perhaps when I was in my corporate career was not as, wasn't as much of an issue. And that's because there's a lot of accountability around you. You know, there are systems and processes that as default allow for ADHD or to be
00:08:32
Speaker
More on track. I genuinely believe, you know. There was scaffolding there. Yes. Yeah. Okay. What about in the personal world where maybe the scaffolding wasn't, you know, as reliable? When scaffolding wasn't unre reliable, especially when I started my business, which was about 2016, I noticed that I would be big I wouldn't make progress on things, but all of a sudden I would get distracted, as I said. And so scaffolding wasn't something that I had learned. I guess I learned from the court my corporate life that that could exist and I had a lot of structures. But when you are on your own, especially at the beginning of starting a business or a venture or being a freelancer, whatever that is, you realize there's no one else that you need to report to. there is no
00:09:23
Speaker
checking meetings, there is no weeks in progress meetings, there is nothing for you to really show up even last minute. Absolutely. No accountability. It's all on you. You've got to have that ah internal accountability. There's no threat. No, no. And so I think what I started discovering is that I would work on a project and it would with my business say I want to launch ah an event or a big a big event or a webinar or a workshop or something. I would, number one, make that process longer than it should be because I was constantly multitasking. I was constantly
00:10:00
Speaker
lacking focus into the one thing because I was jumping on something else. And that's, that's common in business, that's common in entrepreneurship. But I think from an ADHD or perspective, I can see in retrospective that that was something that wasn't quite happening before. And instead of really sort of trickling in a little bit more, or perhaps it was something that was actually happening all my life, but I didn't realize until I was on my own in my, to my own devices. And I was like, okay, this is becoming an issue now.
00:10:29
Speaker
And the second part was that I would have this fear of rejection, which to be honest, it was quite big at the beginning, but I sort of managed it well. I was still showing up. It was probably later the last two years when I really that fear of rejection really kicked in. I think I would say from a mental health perspective, it was really after COVID when, you know, for a lot of those listeners who had ADHD, maybe had something going on or COVID happened. I went downhill when it came to that rejection. The rejection feeling is like, if I put something out there, what's going to happen? And so my business took a big toll because of it, because I was not able to deal with that rejection.
00:11:16
Speaker
So you weren't taking the risks. You weren't showing up. Exactly. Exactly. The hypothesis is that, well, this is not going to work. Or maybe i I'm working on it constantly, but it's not going live. I'm not putting it out into the world. It's that. if I'm still a very creative, multi-passionate person. But I will still struggle with putting it live. And the third thing would be consistency. I know for a lot of ADHDers, consistency is a big thing. I still struggle with consistency. oh So do I. Right. yeah So yeah, consistency still see is a problem. um I would look problem aka problem. I think we have different flows. And I think especially now that I understand even my hormonal journey, I am much more careful. I look at myself with ah much more care towards those fluctuations of up and down great super creative one week. Then next week I do very little, you know, all those things.
00:12:13
Speaker
You know what, Allie? I think that is such an important thing. If we can be a little bit kinder and know that but we're going to be consistently inconsistent, yes it's almost a given for most ADHDers.
Embracing ADHD Traits and Overcoming Challenges
00:12:28
Speaker
And if we can learn to go with the flow and when we're in our flow and we're we're you know on fire, we're getting twice, three times, four times the amount of work done and then we drop off or our flow changes. It's creative or it's this or it's that. If we can learn to ride that.
00:12:47
Speaker
and be a little kinder to ourselves, then I think we get less stuck in that paralysis of I should, I shouldn't, I haven't, why didn't I kind of story. Absolutely. And I can only say, Jay, one thing that has really worked for me, and I know this is, I suppose, female listeners or anyone who has a period or always is in the process of you know dealing with hormonal changes when everyone, you could be 12 and already had your period, you can be 42, it doesn't matter. Working with your cycle as an ADHDer is really critical. I really believe so. absolutely And I really wish I had that information before. I really wish I knew
00:13:29
Speaker
that you know on my menstrual phase, I was going to be maybe maybe a little bit of PMS, but I would be actually you know i' kind of flourishing in different ways. Maybe on my follicular phase, if I knew I would be so great at communicating and at working and getting work done, i there's so many things that I wish I knew.
00:13:48
Speaker
about my future phase and how much was going to affect my mental health and how okay it was to not be productive in that phase versus being caring and self-care and looking after myself and loving myself and self-accepting versus oh my god I have to do all these things isn't the worst part of your cycle. Pushing through when we shouldn't have The sad part about that is, you know, now I'm i'm right in this right in the thick of perimenopause as well, that there's no discernible cycle for me now to track. i can't I can't do that now. So this is a shout out to anybody that's still got some sort of regularity and predictability to their cycle. yes It's a different journey for us. Yeah, totally, totally.
00:14:38
Speaker
Can I ask about the the rejection part? Was there any kind of you know imposter syndrome or anything that feeds into yours when you were creating a business? I know that can show up for individuals when they're when they're out there kind of selling themselves in a sense. In a PC sense, of course. Yeah, absolutely. Imposter syndrome is huge. I think imposter syndrome really comes from trying to show up when you don't know how you show up in the world of business authentically.
00:15:09
Speaker
because you don't know who authentically you might be. And in hindsight, I learned that if I had shown up as the authentic version of myself, Ali, purpose-driven, ADHD-er, without knowing at the time, multi-passionate, really thinking about changing the world, making it better, using my voice to help others find solutions to their problems so I could make their path easier, I would have removed a lot of pain. I truly believe if someone anyone listening is to launch any venture of any sort, try to find what is that thing like that lights you up and brings you energy. You know, it could be speaking, it could be writing, it could be painting, it could be cooking, it could be that thing. And and that is part of your purpose, if not your purpose. And if I had done that earlier on, I wouldn't have felt like an imposter.
00:16:05
Speaker
You know, I really think that imposter syndrome really comes in at any time, of course, even when you're on purpose, you're like, oh my God, especially in ADHD, or you still have that rejection feeling like, oh my God, people are gonna hate it. What are they gonna think? All those things. But um I think it it becomes less. the Imposter syndrome would always be there as that sort of passenger on on the and the sort of next to the driving seat going, hey,
00:16:33
Speaker
What are you thinking? What are you thinking? You know, and then you just got to have that certainty within yourself. And that comes in when you know what you're doing and what you're doing is aligned to your purpose.
Nervous System Regulation Techniques
00:16:45
Speaker
It's almost like you're going to have that voice. It's going to show up from time to time. It's going to be again, like the flow and the um inconsistency. This might be present with us, but we can almost say Yeah, I know. It's scary. And I'm going to do it anyway. Yeah. Because this does light me up. So I'm going to take a risk. Yeah. I'm choosing to take a risk, even though the risk is I might fail or we might get hurt. But trust me. it Trust yourself that we can take that risk despite having the fears. We can have the fear and do it anyway. I agree. And I think the moment will also understand how our brain is jumping in in those moments. I really truly believe for
00:17:30
Speaker
For me, I'll speak for myself. I have a brain that is very active, even more from a primitive perspective. So my amygdala, my jump in and go, do not, do not, you're gonna, you're gonna die. You know, if you lost that podcast, you're gonna die.
00:17:45
Speaker
You know, that's the mentality of my of my primitive brain. And I think the moment we realize it's not us, it's our brain. um That's also a beautiful, oh God, big relief. So that was really helpful for me. And I know for anyone who embraces that mindset of experimentation as well, that, you know, things don't need to be perfect. Like you're learning along the way.
00:18:07
Speaker
And I was listening to this very famous music producer whose name escapes me, but he was talking about when you do any creative projects, you know, think about being as a dairy entry. Like you're writing in your diary in your journal and it's a dairy entry. You just, it doesn't have to be perfect. You just put it out, get feedback, keep working or not. You just kind of going from there. So yeah, experimentation mindset, realizing how your brain is wired to stop you from harm, which is not real harm.
00:18:37
Speaker
um I mean, to pushing forward is really critical, I think. When you're trying to challenge that part of you or or sit alongside it, whatever it is, you know, we're talking about nervous system regulation as well. We're talking about, you know, the body, the brain has those thoughts and ideas. And that obviously sends a message to the nervous system to to freak out. So do you have practices that might be helpful to our listeners to soothe that nervous system? What are you doing? Yeah. um Look, your nervous system is going to get activated. um Your sympathetic nervous system is what's going to go into fight or flight.
00:19:11
Speaker
when something might feel like danger. right like And danger could be anything. it could be I saw Jay's post on Instagram asking for a guest to her show talking about ADHD and my heart is telling me I should do it but um my my nervous system is getting sort of dysregulated right now and I'm not going to even message her because I'm a failure. Who am I? Who am I thinking? What am I thinking? And I'm not going to do it. So what you're going to realize in that moment is that your nervous system is getting dysregulated. And is that moment, number one, realizing that that's happening is key, super important. Your sympathetic is really stopping you from harm. And there is no harm in sending Jade a message, but I am going
00:19:54
Speaker
No tigers, no tigers here. not tiger So I think in the moment you got to realize I love using um from Mel Robbins, she has this really great practice, the five second rule. So before, you know, you count to five, obviously imaginary, like in your head.
00:20:10
Speaker
You know it's like I so like essentially what happened for this podcast is like I saw your pose I reply within five seconds without letting my brain sort of jump in to stop me my my sympathetic nervous system so you send a message within five seconds even though you feel nervous even those you feel still like a fool you still do it just to show up.
00:20:29
Speaker
Oh, I love that because I thought you were actually going to do. I thought what you were were leading to was the kind of pause between stimulus and response, right? To actually give yourself time to not make an impulsive you know decision or to allow yourself to be soothed first. But there's this other bypass hack that you're talking about, which is another one that I i do use as well. it's It's now or never sort of thing. I'm just going to jump in and do it.
00:20:57
Speaker
before I can let the fear get in the way. Exactly. Before the imposter syndrome comes in, because the moment you start analyzing it too long, you might not do anything. You might not take action. Absolutely. I love that. So it's really like, let's just get it done. And that works well for me. It has secured me speaking gigs. It has secured me podcasts. It has secured me opportunities to talk to people I wouldn't have been able to talk before. um So that is a big thing. But the the real big one that I use, and I think this is a regular practice, which is how can I activate my parasympathetic nervous system, which is really that, you know, rest and digest, which which is also called. That is the part of your body that really is the opposite to the stress response. The stress response is in the sympathetic, the relaxation response is in your parasympathetic. So how can I activate that? Breathing helps, mindfulness helps, moving your body helps, like your body is your soma. If you go for a walk,
00:21:54
Speaker
that helps immensely a lot of people that may be having like a day that doesn't feel great, just go for a 10, 20 minute walk. Just move your body physically, get your legs moving. That will really calm your nervous system. Absolutely. And for, I'm not recording the video of this, but she did a lovely little walking fingers that, ah to really illustrate this, that is 100% accurate. We need to kind of move our body, especially I think us ADHDers need to move some somewhat more than others. You know, there is science and we won't go into it, but the the movement, left and right brain and the, you know, moving our body in that way really stimulates the learning and the processing. And yeah, there's a lot in it, isn't there? Yeah, it's so much so, I mean, Jade, you will have so many great techniques as well. I remember you shared quite a few and at at the time. For me, breathing
00:22:49
Speaker
really helps. I know that there are moments in the day where you're going to be in the middle of a situation that you don't know how to manage. Maybe you cannot go for a walk in the moment. Maybe you're in the meeting. Maybe you're heading somewhere. Like, you know, you're commuting. And so breathing really helps. Just really doing a very simple breathing technique when you're breathing through your nose for the count of four. You're breathing through your mouth with pure sleep to the count of eight, six to eight.
00:23:20
Speaker
And then you can pause after that for four to six seconds if you can, and then do that again. So breathe in for four seconds, breathe out for six to eight seconds, pause for four to six seconds and repeat. Doing that 10 times will already regulate your nervous system, will get your sparse empathetic so, so, so active. And so your sympathetic one feel in such danger. It's massive for me. It helps me so much. I get someone, I'm someone who's cortisol levels are quite high, especially in the evenings. And with kids at home, it's not easy because that's like routines, activities, things. So I have to, as much as I can, take moments to actually just, number one, breathe. And sometimes it's just as parents, ADHD or parents, when you're going through moments where you just know you're gonna be impulsive and you're gonna say the wrong thing to your child, step away, literally step away. Like go somewhere else, go to the room, go to the bathroom,
00:24:19
Speaker
I have to do this every single day in my household. If
Reflecting on Childhood and ADHD Masking
00:24:23
Speaker
I don't step away and breathe, yeah, it's it's not going to be great. It's pretty chaotic. I do a lot, and I think we don't talk about this enough. you know I think there is so much shame. I feel really passionate about this because there is so much shame as parents.
00:24:38
Speaker
that maybe the world thinks we got it all perfect. But we don't. We do struggle at home. And we do struggle with our own selves. And we have little people growing up. And we're trying to do the best we can as parents. And there is so much guilt that goes along with ADHDers. I really believe that.
00:24:57
Speaker
that we need to talk about these, like ADHD or parents, like for those listeners, like you are doing the best you can with the tools you have. I really truly believe that and have techniques and strategies to step away for the benefit of your child, the benefit of of your own, because it's not it's not you, it's your brain and you have such beautiful gifts. But in those moments where we know we might be coming positive just because this is our brains work,
00:25:24
Speaker
Do the thing, walk away. Do the thing that works for you. but Absolutely, we need to talk about it more. you know Thinking about kids, what what was it like for you? What was little Ellie like? It's so interesting. I know there is like you know ADHD. ADHD is like an ice cream shop. You have all the flavors. You know you have the very impulsive, you have the very um physically moving child that cannot stop seeing cannot stop in the same place, cannot be in the same place.
00:25:54
Speaker
I was a very calm, very great student. When I say calm, it's on the outside. And mind you, this is where ADHD happens, happening in my life.
00:26:06
Speaker
As an over analytical person, ADHD was in my head constantly thinking about what if this happens? What if this happens? What what if this happens? So being over anxious, maybe stressing out about things as a child, being perfect on the outside. um I was an A student all my life. I had the best marks. I did really well at school. I did really well in university. I was I, you know, if someone was to tell me about, you had a DHT, my parents would have laughed. They would have said, no, she does not. She she does not have any of these symptoms or characteristics, you know? It's interesting. I have, you know,
00:26:51
Speaker
A lot of people say, and you know, there's a common belief that if you're doing well at school and you're doing well in life, that you don't have ADHD and yet there was masking going on. There was a lot happening inside your head. It was very busy. I'm wondering what, you know, that sounds like there was some perfectionism going on for you. Yeah.
00:27:11
Speaker
whether you felt you had to be perfect or what what was the cost to you? like i I always try to think about this and there is a lot of you know healing that I ah work on personally to understand inner Ali or the inner child version of me. I think she was it was really her way to keep herself sane. um you know what I was in a household with with you know loving parents, but there was a lot of conflict growing up in my wider family. And I believe that little Ali really found her way to just
00:27:47
Speaker
stay away from trouble by just just not being trouble herself. I must say though I really truly also believe that It didn't go beyond that. I really think it was just that. And there is probably so much scientific information that we need to really validate this. But what my intuition tells me is that my ADHD was dormant up until a certain age. And once my hormones kicked in, my ADHD was just like, hey, I'm here. I'm at the party now. There is a body of evidence, you know, and there's more and more coming out that says, you know, you might have
00:28:23
Speaker
the predisposition for it. It might be be there from from your history or from things that happened in utero and that it can be activated by events or experiences, hormonal changes, environmental trauma, all of those things.
Ali's Move to Valencia and Migration Grief
00:28:39
Speaker
And even if you've got it showing up early in your your childhood, it's going to kick in a notch in your teens, especially for girls, I believe. So for you, that's when it really kicked into gear. I really think that's when it kicked into gear. um Probably in my 20s, I was in impulsive
00:29:03
Speaker
But I was never in trouble. I wasn't you know doing like terrible things or you know ukraine being in a lot of trouble. But you do the things that you do when you're probably in your 20s and you're late you know when you're after you're 18 and you're able to drink alcohol and things that you do. or you I did that now in looking back, I knew that wasn't great for my brain either. You were living a life where you were trying things that you were not able to do before. and If I talk to my friends, if I talk to my parents, if I talk to, you know, my my my husband who I met, you know, over 20 years ago, I am an impulsive person by the default. I think I've always been that person. If there is a problem and you're telling me, Ali, I've got this problem and this, you know, whatever it is, it could be simple. I was like, let me get solved. And you're like, no, no, no, I'm just telling you about it. I don't need you to do anything.
00:29:55
Speaker
And so that's been a part of me that I i think sometimes it's beautiful, sometimes it's not. So that impulsivity, definitely something has been undergoing thread in my life. That is, um I think, of of my ADHD that I'm very proud of. And at times I'm like, oh, geez, I shouldn't have done that so quickly. so
00:30:15
Speaker
Right, because there's a there's a fast moving solution thinking brain in there. Yeah, that's creative. Before they've even finished the problem, you've got about 10 different solutions. And it's it's very difficult to hold on to that and not be impulsively just cutting them off and sharing it and and helping. Yeah, that there's a practice in in slowing it down. Yeah. ah How else do you think that it's um you know it impacted your life. Over the last year, I would say is where I felt has impacted me the most. I moved countries. I moved from Australia to Valencia, a year anniversary today, literally. um We moved with two children. My husband stayed in Australia while I was sort of moving over here.
00:31:08
Speaker
He's still not with us 100% of the time, even though he's closer to us. So he's been really challenging. And I would say that I'm in a much better place now, oh God, you know, if I if i tell you everything that's happened, but ADHD really affected me this last year when you moved to a new country and you are
Creativity as a Coping Mechanism
00:31:29
Speaker
reinventing yourself is what people call migration grief. Migration grief is like leaving everything you knew, becoming a new version of yourself,
00:31:37
Speaker
still feeling a bit, I don't know, all the feels, you know, you feel all the feels, or leaving a world that you knew behind, starting a new world. And this is my third migration. I knew exactly what I was going going to go through. um But it hit me very, very differently. And I i really believe ADHD really kicked in for me by creating, in, dis-regulating my nervous system more than, more that maybe should, but I can't blame ADHD alone. and Poor ADHD, like it's just so much that happened in my life. um He cannot take the bad rep. I would argue that it was really these, you know, these misstudied alignment between hormones ADHD that really, really was what made me go into a very deep depression and a very deep
00:32:34
Speaker
moment in my life where I really think the point of being here anymore. And so I think because of that, I learned that I needed to just have time to allow all these emotions to like, get out, like essentially get out. And that could be a week, that could be a month, that could be three months. It took me months to feel that way. But what I, I think ADHD,
00:33:03
Speaker
is there was a moment where I said, what can I do to feel alive? What can I do to feel alive? And what can I do to to want to be here? And ah the only thing that ah that came to me was like, you got to do something creative. And it's got to be something that just produce, I needed to do something. And I'm not a creative person with my hands, I don't do pottery, I don't do and didn't do painting. My creativity is like, I need to create something on on a computer of some sort, you know. And I remember having these, as we as we know, these obsessive ADHD brain that at times comes in. I sat every day for like six hours straight at times and I created, I started working on something that saved me.
00:33:48
Speaker
which was what is now a journal slash book to help women deal with hormonal changes and pyramidal pause. And it saved me. It really did. I really truly believe I was there for six hours straight. My ADHD brain allowed me to be there obsessively just working on it. um And it really got me from really dark thoughts. It really got me through athletes, which I thought I was not going to make it. Wow, thank you so much for sharing. That's a pretty big journey. And i I really love how you, you know, this this ADHD part of you, you're kind of embraced and so I was like,
00:34:30
Speaker
Thank you. I had the hyper focus to dig in and find that new reason for being here. yeah Some tenacity and hyper focus just got you to dig in and find that new purpose, find something new that lights you up, give you some sort of meaning making out of the challenge and struggle that you're experiencing. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah.
00:34:58
Speaker
Yeah, it really it really did. um And yeah, so it's now officially a product that is almost going to be launched over the next month. I would I would talk about consistency earlier. Oh my god, he's taking me months to get it finished. So um it is about wow I'm super proud. I wanted to bring a flavor of a combination of neurosystem regulation, holistic practices, nutrition is embedded by medical practitioners and hormonal experts because I'm not a hormonal expert. I'm just a hormonal survivor, I guess, if I want to call it that way. ah hu yeah I'm a hormonal survivor too. Exactly. I wanted to bring a little bit of humor even to the title of the of the book journal um to
00:35:49
Speaker
Come on, share the title. Give it a break. Can I swear? Because this is it. Yeah, swear away. It's called Breathe In. Fuck this chick. Breathe out. I love that so, so, so much. That is, I want a t-shirt. Can we get some t-shirts printed? I think we may. I think we may.
00:36:09
Speaker
I think this is a need here. I need that t-shirt in my life. I have a t-shirt that my sister gives me and I wear it every now and again. Actually, I wear it pretty regularly at the moment. And it's a unicorn and there's like a little bit of blood dripping off the top of the unicorn's horn. Is that what it's called? Yes. And it's like feeling magical and stabby. Yes.
00:36:37
Speaker
That pretty much is a message to my family of where I'm at exactly in that particular moment. They're they're quite on board. Wow. Well, I am very excited for you. You should be super proud of yourself. This is definitely a journey that has been a hard one by the sounds of it. yes I'd love to get you back on again and hear more about this work.
00:37:03
Speaker
your experience, maybe a little, you know, few little snippets of this journal book. I really want to dive in and do an episode on the perimenopausal or hormonal journey in general, because the impact is significant. We're not talking about it as much as we should.
Experiences with ADHD Medication and Alternatives
00:37:21
Speaker
I think that will be amazing, Jade. And before we wrap up today, I would love to touch on meds. I do not take ADHD meds, even though I try them. Please go for it. So look, I know that meds are a thing and there's nothing wrong with meds, for God's sake. Like meds can be lifesaver for so many. I did push back on taking meds forever. Before I moved to Valencia, I said, I must take these meds because what if things go downhill? And they did.
00:37:50
Speaker
they did go downhill i started taking my meds actually not in australia but here in spain with my meds that i brought from australia from my psychiatrist doesn't make sense what i want to say is that i took my meds for a period of time i didn't notice that there was this Almost like the only thing I can say, and I know that you, for those listeners, can not see my hands, but it was almost like I just had this little bubble built around my head, almost like an astronaut type of helmet type looking thing. So imagine it's like this invisible helmet where you don't see anything outside and you're just focusing on my computer for but for whatever amount of time. That I felt that it was some certain level of productivity
00:38:37
Speaker
because of the meds. But I did not feel it was enough for me to grant taking the meds in my personal life. They were not changing my moods. They were not particularly helping me. When I was jumping in my little face, for example, I didn't think they were having the same effect. No, they don't. I actually decided to not continue taking them. I didn't take them for very long. And I just want to say that because I took them maybe for like a month and that was it. I didn't really notice a massive shift. And I'm like,
00:39:08
Speaker
I'm able to achieve the same levels of productivity on my own. I thought it would help me more with this like overthinking brain, but it didn't. I'm like, well, I've got to find some other things from my overthinking brain. And these rejection feelings that I have, the meds didn't help with that. So I think what I needed, the meds didn't provide, and that was okay. It was okay. But I wanted to share that because I know that, you know, there's a lot of things about meds, no meds.
00:39:33
Speaker
and every person is different. I didn't have the opportunity to change my meds also to go, well, maybe there is this other option.
Finding Purpose and Joy with ADHD
00:39:40
Speaker
So I don't know even now if I was to change them, if I was receiving a different effect. So anyway, I just wanted to mention that.
00:39:48
Speaker
Thank you so much for sharing. I think it's really valuable to hear everybody's different experience with medication, not medication. you know There's a certain amount of work you know being late diagnosed, both you and I are late diagnosed. There's a certain amount of work we've already done.
00:40:08
Speaker
in in managing and and coping and finding strategies and hacks to support us. And like you said, it does impact everybody differently. If you're feeling like you're your astronaut in your bubble,
00:40:23
Speaker
And that's just you know getting you to sit at your computer. Are you feeling like you're missing other things? so you like Is that not as helpful for you? Especially because in my experience personally and professionally, it doesn't have a great impact on things like consistency or you know, time blindness or rejection sensitivity, all of those sorts of things. It's not really helping with it might give you a little bit of focus so that you can employ those strategies a little bit, but you still have to do the grunt work. Yeah.
00:40:59
Speaker
the actual taking action and building and flexing and those muscles to to make different choices. So yeah, it definitely can't do the whole lot. It's not a magic pill. If we could have a magic pill to like, okay, I'm going to take this and I'm not going to feel like the world is going to reject me today. Amazing. Let's do this. you know forbid Oh, I would like that. I'd like one of those. Absolutely.
00:41:22
Speaker
Well, is there anything else you want to share before we finish out? I'd love to say that, you know, for anyone who might be dealing with a diagnosis or is waiting for a diagnosis and doesn't fully know, just like stop for a second and really look at yourself before a psychiatrist sees you before you know a friend tells you something just really start finding that purpose that thing that fulfills you because in my opinion the moment you find that you will thrive
00:41:56
Speaker
with your ADHD, you will start finding that joy in things and things will then automatically get much, much better. Procrastination is a thing that happens a lot of the times for us, ADHDers, because we hate admin. I hate admin. i I hate it, right? With the things that we hate doing. So what are the things that you hate doing right now? Think about them.
00:42:21
Speaker
And there might be your work, there might be a partner, there might be a friend. There is a reason for that. So decluttering, I think, is just the only thing I want to say. Like, just let's just take a moment, see what's happening around us. Let's find that joy. And yeah. Beautiful. You know, what I think I'm hearing in that too is many ADHDs that I work with and I know, you know, former versions of myself were doing work that wasn't really in line with how their brain worked.
00:42:51
Speaker
you know They were sitting under fluoro lights in an office all day every day, you know which is terrible for us. as that ah For most of us anyway, that's quite uncomfortable. So you know maybe even making some shifts to find a life that is more aligned with how you naturally want to be in the world so that you can find that flow and then be lit up by what you're doing. Beautiful.
Conclusion and Listener Engagement
00:43:18
Speaker
So give us a little bit of a plug and I'll put it in the show notes for your podcast as well. Yeah. Oh my gosh. So my podcast has been on hold since December last year, which I think it's going to get back on track and talk about consistency. But for me, it wasn't about consistency. It was about mental health and my survival as we just discovered.
00:43:38
Speaker
a moment ago, but he will come back. Living in alignment is the name of my podcast. So yeah, come back. There are a few loads of really great episodes there already, and I'm coming back. An absolute pleasure to speak to you today, and I'd love to get you on again and have a chat about this perimenopausal journey in more depth if you'd like that. I'll tell you all about it, Jay. Thank you so much for having me. It's a lovely chatting to you and everybody listening. Thank you so much.
00:44:04
Speaker
Thank you. So if you'd like to be a guest, please reach out Awakenedhd.com.au. I'd love to hear your journey. Until then, my guest's day in euro sparkly. Thanks. Bye.
00:44:22
Speaker
This podcast is not a licensed mental health provider. It represents the personal opinions and experiences of individuals. No content should be taken as professional advice or recommendation.