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Neurodivergent Entrepreneurship and Motherhood
16 Plays27 days ago
Are you a neurodivergent mom? Maybe you’ve always felt like a quirky puzzle piece or just figured it out in adulthood—either way, juggling routines for yourself and your family while working from home or running your own gig can feel like a circus act! Join me as we dive into the delightful chaos we navigate and whip up some savvy strategies to help us hit our goals and discover what truly clicks for us!
Sarah Wooden, Systems Strategist and Online Business Manager with a passion for strategies that help mompreneurs create more FLOW. Helping them find the systems and strategies that work for them and their brain.
Find Sarah here -
- Webpage with all the bits: www.knockonwoodvirtualassistance.com.au/links/
- Podcast: www.knockonwoodvirtualassistance.com.au/podcast/
- Instagram:www.instagram.com/knockonwoodvirtualassistance/
- Facebook: /www.facebook.com/knockonwoodvirtualassistance
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Transcript
Introduction to 'Mom Tabulous' Podcast
00:00:01
Sharla Mandere
Hello and welcome back to Mom Tabulous. And with me today, all the way from Australia, is Sarah Wennen.
Sarah Wennen's Role and Expertise
00:00:08
Sharla Mandere
Sarah is a systems strategist and online business manager, a certified period coach with a passion for strategies that help busy business owners find more flow. Specializing in helping busy women in business streamline their operations and achieve their goals with a strong history of supporting neurodiverse entrepreneurs.
00:00:29
Sharla Mandere
Sarah excels in creating efficient systems, managing projects, and implementing the foundational admin pieces for long-term growth in business." So obviously, we are talking to mompreneurs, and I love that the adding in like the neurodiverse moms in business, because I think that there's a lot of us are finding that we are, right?
00:00:52
Sarah Wooden
Oh yeah. Oh yeah. And that was the case with my
ADHD Patterns and Personal Experiences
00:00:55
Sarah Wooden
clients. Like I started noticing these patterns with my clients and as I like reels became a thing and we started getting these little, you know, drops of wisdom and I started putting two and two together and like putting the patterns together. I'm like, Oh,
00:01:10
Sarah Wooden
All of my clients, they've all got ADHD and they don't know it. And then as I looked at it, I'm like, oh, I have ADHD.
00:01:19
Sharla Mandere
yeah And I feel like that's the same for me too. like I've always had multiple interests. I thrive in chaos. And and yeah many people have said to me, like can't you just focus on one thing? And I'm like, no, I literally can't. I literally, it is impossible. right I was the kid in school that was in trouble for daydreaming. i was all If we read out loud,
00:01:41
Sharla Mandere
I was always four or five pages behind because I was off in La La Land, like daydreaming about whatever, or my mind would just wander and I'd look at like the clock and the pictures on the wall that the teachers had or whatever, and i my mind would just be all over the place. And so I look back and I go, oh yeah, I would um totally had undiagnosed ADHD as a kid. and and And as an adult, like I do not work well for other people.
ADHD Impact on Work Preferences
00:02:07
Sharla Mandere
I just don't.
00:02:09
Sharla Mandere
run my own business. I have to work for me because I don't do well working for other people. Is that a trait of ADHD? Women, people, they don't necessarily work well for others, or is that just me?
00:02:25
Sarah Wooden
I think it presents in different ways. I know for a lot of my clients, there's definitely a disconnect between having the ideas and having the desire and the vision, but actually being able to structure that in a format that is, all right, so we need to do this and this and this. And that's where that division sort of comes in with, I don't work well for other people. I don't want to be employed, but at the same time, I kind of just need someone to tell me what to do and like to give me the task and to give me the timeline. And that sort of, I think that division that sometimes shows up a little bit with ADHD entrepreneurs.
00:03:01
Sharla Mandere
Yeah. Yeah. Like I write a to-do list in the morning, but I can't, I've had planners where it's like at nine am this at nine 30 am m this, and it drives me. I can't do it because if it doesn't get done at nine 30.
00:03:15
Sharla Mandere
and it's like noon, then I feel like my whole day is, but if I just write down and I can do the task whenever works for my brain, then it'll get checked off and I find great satisfaction in checking it off, but I have to have the freedom of I'm not locked into this time, you know?
00:03:27
Sarah Wooden
Uh-huh.
00:03:33
Sarah Wooden
Yeah, absolutely.
Journey to Systems Strategist
00:03:35
Sarah Wooden
And that's where so personally I do like a weekly to-do list rather than a daily to-do list. And then I just grab like three things off that list and they're the priority for that particular day rather than looking at this giant list of things on any given day.
00:03:50
Sarah Wooden
Um, I find that really helpful. And sometimes, I mean, let's be honest, that weekly to-do list gets moved over to the next week because, you know, you're in the knock five things off it. That's just sometimes how it goes. But I found smaller to-do lists helpful. Um, but also, yeah, I, I never did very well with, um, the planners that had hourly allocation for things that really never worked very well for me.
00:04:15
Sharla Mandere
Yeah, no, it physically gives me anxiety like when it doesn't get done at that time.
00:04:19
Sarah Wooden
um
00:04:20
Sharla Mandere
Even though I'm the one that said, but time, I can change the time, I can move the time, but it physically gives me anxiety. um Okay, so tell me, how do you fall into this systems strategy and what is a certified period coach?
00:04:25
Sarah Wooden
um
00:04:33
Sharla Mandere
Because I feel like I hear that and I'm like, that's a woman. That doesn't sound like it works with stress. I'm sure, I'm sure it is different than what I'm thinking it is.
00:04:41
Sarah Wooden
All right, so. going a little bit of a journey. I was actually, yeah, we built a tiny house on wheels um as a family. We lived in there for two years. And during that process, I had so many questions from people going,
00:04:57
Sarah Wooden
How do I do it? And slip, like I started setting up this business doing tiny house coaching. It actually never went anywhere and that's completely okay. The reality was that it was my learning grounds for how to build websites and how to build email funnels and how to do all of the things. I've got a background in everything from telco management to hospitality to admin. Like I've done all of the things I've even worked in trades. Like I've done all of the things and then During COVID, I lived in Victoria, so we actually had eight lockdowns during the three years. um couldn't leave You were only allowed to leave the house for, I think it was 30 minutes a day or something like that, all the parks got closed, the beaches got closed, the playgrounds got closed, like everything got closed. It was basically our surprise.
00:05:43
Sarah Wooden
And in the madness of I need something to do, I reached out to a friend um who was a busy business owner and I could see was drowning, but I could see that I had the skills to help. And I was like, hey.
00:05:56
Sarah Wooden
can help you, would you like help? And originally she actually said no, but then eventually was like, um, please help. So I fell into this role of, um, virtual assistants quite by accident and didn't set up a business to be a virtual assistant. It was just, that was the start. And then it word of mouth, I ended up with four clients within a couple of months and very quickly saw the difference that it made to put systems in place. So my very first clients was,
00:06:24
Sarah Wooden
consultation-based business, busy clinic, no forms, no booking system. no like it was just It was all being done manually. There was no automation or system or structure around any of it. So when we put some of that stuff in place, she sent 10 hours a week on administration and not because I was doing it for her, just because that was time that no longer had to be done.
00:06:45
Sarah Wooden
manually and I very quickly saw the difference that it made for just that, like the the feedback I was getting from my clients is I feel like I can breathe now. That was the difference that it made to put some systems and automations in place. And so over the last been doing this, I think four years now, I sort of, because I didn't officially start the timeline, it's a little bit, fuy but I think it's been four years now. Um,
00:07:13
Sarah Wooden
you know, I've been able to work with so many different people and set up so many different systems and just seen again and again the difference that that makes. And then earlier this year, actually kind of hit with burnout a little bit very badly. So what I realized for myself was the way that my brain works, being ADHD myself, I went and got diagnosed and started putting some strategies in place.
00:07:36
Sarah Wooden
I realized that carrying the mental load for all of those different businesses for, you know, three, four years was really starting to take effect. As much as I loved my clients so much, this year was sort of that transition to going, okay, I'm not actually built to be in that VA role right now. um What I need to do is be able to come into a brand new shiny object, set up some systems and structure for people that make a huge difference for them.
00:08:03
Sarah Wooden
and then pass them off to them to keep going. So I've sort of transitioned from like that ongoing virtual assistant work that everybody knows into really that strategy and development role. So that's been very exciting. um And period coaching is honestly what
Period Coaching and Business Strategy
00:08:17
Sarah Wooden
you think it is. So I worked with Stasha Washburn. She was friend and client um in both directions. So I've worked with Stasha as her VA for years and helped her manage summits and talking about, you know, everything from menopause to menaki you know, all the taboos that come into it. And so my philosophy is incorporating that into business structure. You know, how can we make business work better? Because we don't have the same cycle that a man does where we have just repeated hormones on a 24-hour basis, and we can get up and just do the same thing day after day. like We don't have that. But that's our strength.
00:08:57
Sarah Wooden
Through that, we see that there's phases that we're really good at the tech and really good at the troubleshooting and really good at the planning and really good at the goals and the vision. And you know we we actually have places that we can lean into that power and lean into those strengths. The reverse of that is that if we can start recognizing how to avoid the things that we're just not right and quite in the right mindset for, things get a lot easier. yeah So that's what I do. There's different period coaches will focus on different things. And so there's some who will specifically focus on menopause or perimenopause or, you know, period problems like endometriosis. Mine is I've taken that into how can we actually capture that in our business structure a little bit better.
00:09:42
Sharla Mandere
I love that. It's like cycle sinking, but for business, right?
00:09:45
Sarah Wooden
o
00:09:46
Sharla Mandere
Like there's that exercise in fitness.
00:09:48
Sarah Wooden
Absolutely.
00:09:50
Sharla Mandere
There's, there's a thing of ah cycle sinking and, and you know, when, when you should do workouts and when you should do more like yoga or take a break and, and, and lower intensity workouts.
00:09:53
Sarah Wooden
Well.
00:10:00
Sharla Mandere
And so I love, I love, I love the thought process of like putting that in with business because I don't even think like, yeah, maybe today I'm so unfocused because it's just the hormones.
00:10:16
Sharla Mandere
Yeah. Men have that 24 hour turnaround. Women have a 28 day right turnaround on average, but, and then you hit perimenopause and it's like, well, it could be a 40 day turnaround, you know, whatever.
00:10:28
Sharla Mandere
And so, um, that's, I think that's super smart tying business in like cycle sinking for business.
00:10:35
Sarah Wooden
yep Mm hmm.
00:10:37
Sharla Mandere
It's really cool. So if we're talking about like, peri-metapos is we're kind of on this, like are you like what it tends to me to be like that ADHD tends to get a
ADHD Diagnoses and Hormonal Changes
00:10:50
Sharla Mandere
little bit worse. And I noticed with my mom, like when I was 10, 12 years ago, even like even like maybe earlier than that, but i just I just remember being like, God, mom, like you have like adult onset ADHD is like what I would i would say. And my sister and I would talk all the time about like, she is just,
00:11:10
Sharla Mandere
I mean, cannot even remember conversations.
00:11:13
Sarah Wooden
ah
00:11:14
Sharla Mandere
You know, she's she's passed on now, but um and now I'm like, oh, oh, oh yeah, it wasn't like necessarily adult onset, but just maybe maybe she always had it.
00:11:28
Sharla Mandere
And I don't know, I don't know, we didn't know, you know, but like, and and I noticed it with me of just, yeah, I feel like it's firing big time, right? The last couple of years.
00:11:38
Sarah Wooden
Absolutely. absolutely Yeah, I think it's There's so many women who have managed through masking or through strategies or through just the peer pressure of you will not be lazy or, you know, whatever it is. Um, and then they hit that point and the hormones start changing and they just, they're not able to continue keeping up with it anymore. And so we're seeing a huge increase in women in their, you know, late thirties, early forties being diagnosed with ADHD.
00:12:10
Sarah Wooden
And I know that there's been a lot of blame on social media and, oh, it's just a trend. I don't think that's the truth. I think, yes, social media plays a part, but it's been about equipping us with the information to go, actually, my brain is actually meant to do that differently. And because it doesn't, that has always felt so much harder than it has to everybody else. And it's that recognition and validation. And it's the permission to go and get some more information to maybe get a diagnosis or to join a support group or whatever it might be that you know gives the answers that people are looking for. But I don't think it's that it's trendy. I think it's just that we have
00:12:49
Sarah Wooden
more information than we've had before. And so now we've got these women who are reaching that point that they actually just can't cope anymore. The hormones have changed. So what happens is the, as the estrogen drops, the symptoms get worse. And so we'll see this, we will see spikes in ADHD symptoms around the period. You know, what people class as PMS, it's it's the flip in the hormones and the way that we respond to that. PMS is not actually a symptom. It's it like a category for how we sort of label different things, but PMS is not actually a symptom. We see increases in ADHD symptoms because of the estrogen dropping, and this is what happens in perimenopause as well as we see the estrogen start dropping off during perimenopause, which is also why interestingly um ADHD medication
00:13:36
Sarah Wooden
we know doesn't work particularly well during the period, it's to do with the estrogen dropping. And so there are some doctors who will do something called cycle dosing where they will actually give a slightly stronger dose for the week during like that late luteal period phase um because we know that we don't respond as well to the medication anymore. So like hormones just play a huge part in how we function and then they change. So everything changes for us as well.
00:14:06
Sharla Mandere
Yeah. And that's that's an interesting point, right? I feel like we don't think about medication doesn't work as well during certain points in the month for women.
00:14:16
Sharla Mandere
It's just, you take this dose and this is your daily dose. If you're taking meds or supplements or whatever, right?
00:14:19
Sarah Wooden
All right.
00:14:22
Sharla Mandere
that This is the daily dose. That's all we've been told, but all this research is done on men, right? So maybe maybe that that research needs to be done or done more on women because now now we're we're talking about it. And I love that we're talking about it more and we're bringing this all to light because there is so much of like, well, we don't know.
00:14:43
Sharla Mandere
this or that and there's so much that we don't know and and we don't know what we don't know, right? So yeah, I feel like that's a really interesting point about the medications and and that that if you feel like, well, it's not really working, that maybe it just needs to be adjusted during that time of the month, right?
00:15:02
Sarah Wooden
Yeah.
00:15:02
Sharla Mandere
um
00:15:03
Sarah Wooden
And that's like, that's absolutely a conversation to have with your doctor. I'm not like advocating for people to go do that themselves, but like talk to your doctor. Um, yeah, it's, it's, it is a known factor though.
00:15:10
Sharla Mandere
Yes.
00:15:13
Sharla Mandere
Yeah, for sure. And I feel like with the social media, I think, oh, God, there's so much, right? Like, yeah, our attention span is getting because TikTok has this 15 second thing and the and all all the things, yeah.
00:15:24
Sharla Mandere
But also, I think a lot of women that when it comes to us in perimenopause is just amplifying it, that we've had it.
00:15:30
Sarah Wooden
yeah
00:15:31
Sharla Mandere
Otherwise, so we've masked, we've just been able to push through, we've been able to get through because they didn't test kids in the 80s, the girls, they didn't test girls in the 80s and 90s for this stuff. It was very much a boy thing.
00:15:40
Sarah Wooden
Mm hmm.
00:15:42
Sharla Mandere
ADHD was a boy thing. And girls couldn't have it because we were sugar and spice and everything nice. And so, you know, but now it's like, Oh, I know I had this for sure as a kid, like I said in the beginning, and I had an episode, um, actually two episodes. We made it two episodes in season one with an IEP expert. And we specifically talked about parents, mothers, and dads getting diagnosed with all of these things as their children are getting diagnosed.
00:16:09
Sharla Mandere
because they take their kids in for the testing and they go, or answering questions about their kid and they're going, oh, oh, me too for all this stuff. And, and you know, and I shared a story on a couple of episodes back, I have a friend and they took their daughter in and comes back and says like, yeah, your daughter has ADHD and suitable to you.
00:16:30
Sharla Mandere
ah you know And it's like, yeah. And I feel like that's pretty much our story too. No doctor has ever really said like, so do you, but I know for a fact, i'm i have I have got it.
00:16:37
Sarah Wooden
Mm hmm.
00:16:42
Sharla Mandere
um And so I think social media just is bringing more awareness around it, right? That then if there's awareness for adults, but also awareness for the kids, for the parents to go and take their kids in to get tested.
00:16:55
Sharla Mandere
And then in getting their kids tested, they're realizing, oh, maybe I should get tested too. Or just self-diagnosing, basing on the questions going, well, yep, I'm a yes for all those things too, right?
00:17:06
Sharla Mandere
And so
00:17:06
Sarah Wooden
yeah
Parental Awareness and Self-Diagnosis
00:17:08
Sharla Mandere
pretty sure I've got it, right?
00:17:10
Sharla Mandere
And that's, you know, my husband did that. We took my youngest daughter in for testing and he was like, I feel like I could say yes to a lot of these for me. And I was like,
00:17:19
Sarah Wooden
and yeah
00:17:20
Sharla Mandere
I don't notice any kind of lack of focus in him. He is, but he's a guy, like you're saying, right? His hormones aren't, he has a 24 hour turnaround. He can do the same thing every day and that works.
00:17:31
Sharla Mandere
He's very schedule, schedule
00:17:33
Sarah Wooden
oh But also don't forget The presentation for men and women is quite different as well. For men, particularly boys, it does tend to be more physical. It tends to be more of the fidgeting and the flicking and the, you know, that really extreme, um, Oh, what's the word I'm looking for?
00:17:53
Sarah Wooden
like through thrill seeking, sensory seeking, like the real strong sensory seeking like having to be on the top of the back of the couch and like cartwheeling off the box and you know all of that sort of stuff tends to be I mean girls girls do present that way as well but when we think about the typical presentation for girls it's more you know extreme perfectionist and really struggling to keep up with um Timelines and you know really relying on those deadlines to get things done extreme pressure and stress all of the time Feeling like things are so hard to make momentum There's that well, why can't you just be like, you know so and so who just does the thing without being asked You know all of that sort of conversation. It's it's a different It is a different presentation, but it's also different societal expectations as well
00:18:43
Sharla Mandere
Yeah. Yeah. 100%, right? Different societal expectations on girls versus boys, women versus men, for sure. Yeah. And it does present differently. um Yeah, looking back, my husband, yeah, for sure. I think he broke his arms three or four times. He'd fallen out of trees as a kid and fallen off his bike. and that yeah so maybe Maybe he was just ... I'm like, how did you keep ... He's like, I don't know. I just didn't. I'm like, maybe you just weren't focused when you were in the tree. You probably had a little more focused up there, but maybe ... I don't know if it was balanced or focused. but
00:19:17
Sharla Mandere
So how do we, as mom entrepreneurs, right or moms,
Managing Family Life with ADHD
00:19:22
Sarah Wooden
Thank you.
00:19:22
Sharla Mandere
stay-at-home moms, or moms that work for you know ah someone else, that if you can work for someone else and you work great for someone else, the power to you.
00:19:31
Sharla Mandere
um you know But how do we work like with, you call it work with our flow versus this like soldiering on? right like we bet we've We've done that. We've masked, we've pushed through.
00:19:42
Sharla Mandere
And like you were saying, we tend to hit this burnout, right? And now as a mom, you're holding the entire family on top and and that that that soldiering on and pushing through starts to take its toll. So how do we work with our flow? And it's different for everyone, I'm assuming, right? But versus that, God, pushing through. Even when you're up on deadlines, when your kids have you know deadlines at school, doctor appointments, maybe they're sick, whatever, like you gotta you have to take care of people.
00:20:12
Sharla Mandere
You have to do the things you got to draw into the soccer and the, in the circus and all of that.
00:20:12
Sarah Wooden
ye I think the very first thing is to start having open conversations.
00:20:16
Sharla Mandere
But like, how do we, how do we work with our flow when we're holding everybody else's schedules on our shoulders?
00:20:29
Sarah Wooden
Um, my family knows exactly where my period is due. I, we have a whiteboard calendar. I put a little icon on the days of the week that I roughly predict that it's going to fall. Um, there I've got a shared Google calendar with my husband. It's on the Google calendar for a whole week. It blocks off my calendar for the whole week. If I sit at the computer, that is my choice and I probably will, but I don't take calls during that week.
00:20:55
Sarah Wooden
I don't show up for consultations. I don't host workshops. I don't do anything where I physically have to show up with energy. um That is something that I am able to do because of the structure of my business. I know that for everybody, that's not going to be the answer. But the more we can have those conversations and start creating space within our families, that's a really great start. And so doing things like for that week that you know that you're going to be feeling pretty blah, can you make some extra meals in advance and have them hiding in the freezer so that that week they're ready to go? Can you equip your kids to cook meals that week? My 10 and seven year old cook dinners sometimes, they're more than capable. We have meals that they know how to cook. We have ingredients that are easy for them to use. They know how to do that. So on the days that I'm like, I just can't today, my 10 year old's like,
00:21:45
Sarah Wooden
but um Like we can have those conversations with our families. So I think that's the very first thing is start getting rid of some of that taboo. Because as long as we hold that taboo ourselves within our families, that's what our daughters and our sons are going to carry forward into their own relationships as well. So we get to be the people who start making it normal to have those conversations. The second thing is start looking for patterns. Start charting, start diaring, like start looking for the patterns. Stasha Washburn, the period coach that I trained with,
00:22:15
Sarah Wooden
has a great free tracker if you'd like to use that one, but however you want to track the symptoms, but start looking for the patterns. So I know for me that I actually get a spike in energy about three days beforehand and it's like my brain's last attempt to just get all the things done before you have to go into hibernation, right? So I know that I have that there. I also can predict where my high pra pain days are likely going to be based upon patterns that I've noticed in the past. I know that during these couple days, I typically get worse pain. I know that, you know, how coffee or how alcohol or how those different things play into how I'm feeling, how stress plays into how that period is. We know that January
00:22:58
Sarah Wooden
typically ends up being January and February are the worst for period symptoms globally because of all the stuff that we eat and all the stuff we do over the Christmas holidays. We drink more, we eat more, we have more sugar, we have more alcohol, we stay up late, you you know, there's family dynamics and family drama and all that sort of stuff. So January, February tends to be the worst for period symptoms throughout the entire calendar year.
00:23:23
Sarah Wooden
So if we can start noticing just the little patterns, but also things like moon phase as well. Like moon phase actually plays into it far more than you realize. And especially if you are approaching perimenopause because what we see is we flip from like that 28 to, you know, 28 to 34 day cycle. That's fairly common.
00:23:42
Sarah Wooden
um, through to a moon phase. And so we actually start seeing that while the period might start being, you know, four months apart and you'll get that occasional ones that are popping through, we will still see some of those ebb and flows coming through more in a line with the moon phase. So just noticing all those little things, giving yourself as much space to rest as possible. If your business structure gives you the capacity to have a couple of down days, to have a pause, you know, to do those things, do it.
00:24:10
Sarah Wooden
If it's not within your business, can you have a cleaner come in just once a month during that phase to take some pressure off? Like what is accessible for you within your business, but also your budget? What can actually be done?
Productivity and Personal Interests
00:24:22
Sarah Wooden
um Following your dopamine is a really big one as well. I know mainstream thinking is very get the monkey off your back. You know, do the big thing first. It doesn't work for us with ADHD. It really doesn't. What works best for us is whatever is exciting or we can cross off quickly. And so it might be just a little thing, a quick win, and then that snowballs into the next thing. And then that snowballs into the next thing. And it might take us six tasks, but by the time we've finally done all of that, we're ready to tackle that big thing. Or it might be that we give ourselves permission to spend two hours sinking into a project that we're really excited about, even if it's not actually a priority right now. But that fuels us with all that dopamine.
00:25:03
Sarah Wooden
to can't then keep powering through the other things. So give yourself permission to follow the dopamine and the patterns. You'll notice you'll have those days where you're like, oh, I could just do this all day. If that's possible for you, lean into it. And when you have the other days, you're like, I cannot look at the screen. Is there another way you can use that time?
00:25:24
Sarah Wooden
maybe it's sorting out the paper or maybe it's making phone calls or sending text messages or maybe it's just going and doing doing some gardening or doing some art or doing something with your hands and just not looking at the computer screen. It's okay to give us a permission to not do the things that are not working for you, like move on to something else. um And rest is not a dirty word.
00:25:49
Sharla Mandere
Yeah. Yeah. I love that. Rest is not a dirty word. It's a four-letter word, but it's not a dirty four-letter word, right? um So many good nuggets in there, and I'm trying to unpack it all in my brain.
00:25:55
Sarah Wooden
yes
00:26:01
Sharla Mandere
It's like, I love, again, I love, i'd like, if you can take that, and what you're talking about is just setting boundaries, right, around. If you know where you're at in your cycle, and if you don't, and you're in perimenopause or menopause, and like, following the moon, that's that's part of cycle sinking, following the moon phases.
00:26:14
Sarah Wooden
hu
00:26:17
Sharla Mandere
um and And so I love that. i love tying I love tying that into your life and your business and and and your workouts and all of that. But like if you can delegate out is what you're talking about. Yeah. My 15-year-old made a steak dinner last night that was absolutely amazing. And i was my husband and I were like, oh, she loves to cook. It's her She finds she finds it calms her and in you know she she gets to to be creative and and she's really good at it. And so you know she's 15, so we feel a little safer with her in the kitchen on our own. But like yeah, you know so if you can delegate things out, ask for help. I love that. And and the um the yeah um my now my ADHD is firing. But there were so many good nuggets in there that like I think
00:27:07
Sharla Mandere
I do get that dopamine hit. i When I check things off my list and that's it's like, I will go back to my list if I do something that's not on my list and I'll write it down on the list just to check it off.
00:27:09
Sarah Wooden
um hu
00:27:20
Sarah Wooden
um
00:27:21
Sharla Mandere
I'll add it to my list because I feel like then I was extra productive today and i and I'll check it off the list. It'd be like, bought toilet paper, check. like
00:27:30
Sarah Wooden
I think it works the other way as well. So yes, it's about giving ourselves that little hit of, oh, look, look I was you know another thing I can cross off but especially if you are having a peak ADHD symptom day and you're like what did I do with my time today if you can look back and you can have a couple things that you're like you know what I might not have got those things done but I did get those things done it can be really healing because I know that I spent a long time just feeling so down on myself because I'm like, I got nothing done today. When actually I had got things done, they just weren't on my to-do list. So sometimes that's actually a form of self-care.
00:28:09
Sharla Mandere
Yeah. I love that. Seeing that as a form of self care, right? Giving yourself the win, that, that dopamine hit, but that, that win, right? Of like feeling like, okay, if all I did today was take care of the kids, well, they were fed.
00:28:22
Sarah Wooden
aye
00:28:23
Sharla Mandere
I did the, I cleaned up and this and we did that. We did that. We took them to the park. I did the thing, right? Whatever. Like, depending how old your kids are, like if that's all you did today, that at least, you know,
00:28:36
Sharla Mandere
I don't know, for me, I'm like, check, check, check. Mom list done, right? um So real quick, if someone, i'm like,
00:28:47
Sharla Mandere
um And this, again, when we're talking about like working with our brain, right? The neurodivergent moms working in our flow, just like we talked about working with the flow, it's working with our own brain. Maybe the list thing works for you.
00:28:59
Sharla Mandere
Maybe it doesn't. Maybe you have a digital list. Maybe you write it out still like me, maybe, you know, or maybe the list thing just doesn't work for you and you just want to fly by the seat of your pants and you can organize it all in your brain.
00:29:10
Sharla Mandere
Um, you know, but working with your brain in mom land.
00:29:15
Sarah Wooden
uh-huh uh-huh
00:29:18
Sharla Mandere
like managing managing the tasks and however it works for you. And I think that's where we need to like take the comparison game away. As neurodivergent moms, it's very easy to look at a mom who you think has all of her shit together. Maybe she does, maybe she doesn't, right? I i was saying the other day to a friend, I'm trying to remember the conversation, but I was saying to a friend like,
00:29:42
Sharla Mandere
I just know now, and I fully accept, I will never be that mom that has all my shit together. No, it was on a coaching call. I was talking to my coach. I was talking to my coach, and I was like, I will never... She's kind of like a friend to you, but right I talk to her so much. i'm like isn't my my own coach but i i was like i have just accepted the fact that i am never gonna be that mom seemingly i will always roll up in like leggings and a workout top it probably wouldn't have showered till nine pm i'm sweaty and barely got makeup on and i'm probably running late it's just i just know this is why i don't work well for other people i just know that.
00:30:20
Sharla Mandere
that's just who i am and i've accepted it now i use you compare myself right to other moms that i thought.
00:30:22
Sarah Wooden
Uh-huh.
00:30:27
Sharla Mandere
Maybe they got the stuff together and their kids maybe eight the perfect breakfast in the morning and they're wearing heels and leging and like night pants leggings in a suit pants and. you know, they're off to their corporate, businessy job or whatever.
00:30:40
Sharla Mandere
And I just always was like, oh, at the school drop off, I feel like we're a hot mess. We're running late. I'm like, go, go, go. Cross the street fast. Like, I'm the one, you know? And like, I just had to take that comparison game away, right?
00:30:53
Sharla Mandere
If you're a known divergent mom.
00:30:53
Sarah Wooden
Mm hmm.
00:30:55
Sharla Mandere
you've got to take that comparison game away, because who knows? A, who knows? If that mom was yelling from until the second they got out of the car, who knows? And now she's like, I just look calm, cool, and collected, and I'm faking it. And you know she threw on leggings, but maybe she didn't get a shower. Who knows? I have no idea. I have no idea what her morning was like. you know But to be able to kind of own and accept your chaos,
00:31:23
Sarah Wooden
Mm-hmm.
00:31:24
Sharla Mandere
I think Is that like part of just like, ah is that a dopamine thing? Like owning and accepting your own chaos to give yourself that, like it's okay, you know?
00:31:37
Sarah Wooden
Yes, I think there's definitely things we can do to calm some of our chaos, but also just accepting that we're always going to be that hot chaos mum, like that's just what it is. um Yeah, there's definitely things we can do.
00:31:50
Sarah Wooden
Uh, if you feel like you're forever forgetting about things, it's okay to use reminders. It's okay to have a million reminders going off on your phone. It's okay to, you know, have systems and automations that pull some of that stuff in for you. It's okay to have 17 sticky notes stuck on your desk with things that you need to remember. My paper plan, so I ClickUp is my favorite system. That is what I use for my project management, but I'm very big on helping my clients find the right tools for them.
00:32:18
Sarah Wooden
And ClickUp is not going to be the right tool for all of my clients. You know, I've had clients on everything from Trello to Asana to, you know, everything in between. I work with a paper diary, even though I have ClickUp. My paper diary is like the hub for my brain for all of the things. It's like the top level. This is what has to be done. It lives open on my desk because if I close it, it no longer exists. So, and this is, this has been a thing that I have suggested to so many of my clients and it has made so much difference. I'm like, if there is something that you need to use,
00:32:47
Sarah Wooden
that you are trying to track if you're trying to use a journal, see if you can find somewhere that you can leave it open because the moment you close it, it no longer exists. And so whatever you need to do to work with your brain, um I have done, I put my goals for the year on my screensaver because now they're in front of my face. Even though I'm not necessarily in taking, like I'm not necessarily reading, they're still there. They're still in front of my eyes. They're still in front of my brain. So whatever it is that you need to do to just give yourself the tools, it's okay. You know, that's not lazy. I know that there's like this really big generational thing of money has to be earned through blood, sweat and tears. And I think it is making it so much harder for us to accept using some of these tools because we're like, oh, but if it wasn't easy, well, then I didn't do it right.
00:33:36
Sarah Wooden
No, it's allowed to be easy. It's allowed to feel good. It's allowed to work with you. um You're allowed to use the tools that work for you. It doesn't have to be the popular one. It doesn't have to be the same way that everybody else is doing. It drives me absolutely bonkers when I work with businesses. And I'm like, this system is not working for you. Did you, like, choose this? No, no, no. My coach told me to use this. And I'm seeing so often, like, people work with coaches who've just copy pasted to their clients. of This is the tech stack. This is the tech stack. Like, this is what you will use.
00:34:06
Sarah Wooden
and it is not working for them. it's well like it's It's meant well. It's meant to be giving people the systems, but our brains are so different and what works for some people won't work well for other people. So it's okay if everybody is raving about a tool and it just doesn't work for you. That's fine. Find one that does.
00:34:25
Sharla Mandere
yeah Yeah, I love it. fine and I think that's the theme right of this conversation. Find what works for you, period.
00:34:30
Sarah Wooden
Oh yeah. You know, one of the things that works for me
00:34:32
Sharla Mandere
reded
00:34:34
Sarah Wooden
is putting my shoes on, tying my hair up, and turning music on. That's like that activation key for my brain. Sure, maybe it won't work well for everybody, but for me, it's such a sensory thing. If my shoes are not on, my brain is like, well, let's relax time. Putting shoes on, I know it's such an irk for a lot of people wearing shoes inside, but that is my strategy to cope.
00:34:56
Sarah Wooden
Hiding my hair up, I cannot function with my hair out. I feel more feminine. I feel more soft. I feel more intuitive that my brain doesn't work. So my hair has to be tied up. You know, these are the little things like whatever that weird quirk is that works for you, just do it.
00:35:12
Sharla Mandere
I love it. I love it so much. That's the thing. Do what works for you. Don't compare yourself to other moms and just do you, right?
00:35:16
Sarah Wooden
um
00:35:20
Sharla Mandere
Do what do what works. This has been great. There's so many nuggets in there for the neural divergent moms and and i I know so many people are going to get. So where can real fast, where can people find you if they want more information and and and all of that?
00:35:34
Sarah Wooden
I'm in almost all of the places as Knock and Wood virtual assistants. So you'll find me on TikTok or Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, website. um Instagram is my favorite. I'm a millennial at heart. i think That's where I hang out most. um But you can find me there and there is a contact form on my website. If you would like to have a chat with me, you can fill that contact form out and book a time on my calendar.
00:35:58
Sharla Mandere
Awesome. Thank you so much for chatting and giving all of your knowledge and sharing your story. And I appreciate it so much. I know it's going to help a lot of women. Thank you, Sarah.
00:36:09
Sarah Wooden
Awesome.
00:36:09
Sharla Mandere
and And we will see you in the next episode.
00:36:12
Sarah Wooden
Awesome.