Looking for further guidance and support on ADHD Women's Wellbeing? Check out my resource library here. The 'ADHD Women's Wellbeing Workshop Series' is on offer this July. Head here to learn more about the workshops and use code JULY to get 35% off.

If you've ever wondered why it took so long to get answers, for yourself or for your daughter, this episode is going to feel very familiar.

On this week's episode of The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Podcast, I'm joined by Dr Olivia Kessel, a former medical doctor who graduated from the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland and began her career in the trauma unit at Johannesburg General Hospital.

Olivia is now the host of the SEND Parenting Podcast and has spoken at the UK House of Lords on patient-centred care, appeared on BBC Radio and BBC Sounds, and addressed healthcare professionals and policy leaders on neurodiversity. She is also the mother of Alexandra, fourteen, who has mild cerebral palsy, dyslexia and ADHD, and the author of Beyond the Label: Empowering Parents of ADHD Girls.

In this episode, Olivia shares the remarkable and deeply personal journey that took her from practising medicine across three continents to founding the SEND Parenting community, after years of not recognising ADHD in her own daughter despite her medical background. We talk about why girls are still being diagnosed four to five years later than boys, how emotional dysregulation, masking and internalised struggles are so often missed, and what parents can actually do when they find themselves navigating a system that wasn't built for their child.

In this episode, we cover:

• Why girls with ADHD are still being diagnosed four to five years later than boys, and what needs to change
• How ADHD can present in girls as anxiety, people pleasing and internalised struggle rather than hyperactivity
• Why 52% of people with dyslexia also have ADHD, and why the two should never be looked at in isolation
• The emotional dysregulation that doesn't appear in the DSM diagnostic criteria, and why that matters
• Why Olivia, as a doctor, still missed her daughter's ADHD for years
• How the EHCP process almost broke her, and why it shouldn't be this hard for any family
• The four wheels that need to be running for an ADHD brain to thrive: medication, nutrition, sleep and school support
• Why early screening for neurodivergence in schools would benefit every child, not just those who are neurodivergent
• How Olivia's daughter Alexandra went from chaos to making cottage pie by herself after finally getting the right support
• What parents can bring to their GP to start asking the right questions

Discover other ADHD Women's Wellbeing Podcast parenting-related episodes here.

Timestamps:

00:00 - Welcome, and introducing Dr Olivia Kessel

01:44 - Olivia's career: from South Africa to Swaziland to the UK

08:55 - The EHCP process, and why it almost broke her

10:16 - How a former medical doctor missed her daughter's ADHD diagnosis

12:19 - Why girls are diagnosed so much later than boys

14:19 - How ADHD presents differently in girls: internalisation, anxiety and masking

16:27 - Dyslexia, ADHD and autism: why they rarely travel alone

18:17 - Sleep, emotional regulation and the things the DSM leaves out

22:06 - What changes when families finally understand their child's diagnosis

24:34 - Parenting with a neuroaffirming lens: Kate's own experience

27:06 - How Alexandra has grown in her own self-awareness at fourteen

30:26 - Why so many neurodivergent people were always there, just hiding

34:27 - Screens, social media and navigating this as an ADHD parent

40:19 - Why schools should teach every child as if they were neurodivergent

43:30 - Olivia's book Beyond the Label, her podcast and her ADHD mum community

45:33 - Why patients are currently leading the doctors on neurodiversity

Links and Resources:

• Find my popular ADHD workshops and resources on my website here.
• Follow the podcast on Instagram: @adhd_womenswellbeing_pod
• Visit Olivia's website: sendparenting.com
• Connect with Olivia on Instagram: @drolivia.sendparenting
• Listen to Olivia's podcast: SEND Parenting Podcast
• Get Olivia's book: Beyond the Label: Empowering Parents of ADHD Girls

Kate Moryoussef is a women's ADHD lifestyle and wellbeing coach and EFT practitioner who helps overwhelmed and unfulfilled newly diagnosed women with ADHD find more calm, balance, hope, health, compassion, creativity, and clarity.

Welcome to the ADHD Women's Wellbeing Podcast.

I'm Kate Moore Youssef and I'm a wellbeing and lifestyle coach, EFT practitioner, mum to four kids and passionate about helping more women to understand and accept their amazing ADHD brains.

After speaking to many women just like me and probably you, I know there is a need for more health and lifestyle support for women newly diagnosed with adhd.

In these conversations, you'll learn from insightful guests, hear new findings and discover powerful perspectives and lifestyle tools to enable you to live your most fulfilled, calm and purposeful life wherever you are on your ADHD journey.

Here's today's episode.

Today I have a fascinating guest.

As always, I always think my guests are fascinating.

I wouldn't have you on if I didn't think you were fascinating.

We have Dr. Olivia Kessel.

Now, she is a former medical doctor who graduated from the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, began her career in the trauma unit at Johannesburg General Hospital.

She is now also the host of the Send Parenting podcast and has spoken at the UK House of Lords on patient centered care.

She's also appeared on BBC Radio and BBC Sounds and has addressed healthcare professionals and policy leaders on neurodiversity.

And she's also the mother of Alexandra, who is currently 14.

She has mild cerebral palsy, dyslexia and ADHD and she also has runs the sendparenting.com we'll talk all about that, but I just first of all want to welcome you to the podcast.

Olivia, thank you for being here.

Thank you for having me.

We were just having a conversation off air, weren't we, about just I guess the non linear career that you've had from, you know, obviously being a doctor, doing what you were doing before your awareness, before your understanding.

And then obviously your daughter was diagnosed and there was sort of what I can only imagine there was the before and the after and how that's shaped your career.

Now perhaps you can give us a little bit of an explanation of what was going on with Dr. Olivia Cassel and way before any of this awareness and then I guess what happened afterwards, once you guess with your daughter and yourself.

Because I think so many people find it very comforting to hear that, that journey.

Absolutely.

And it's definitely not a straight journey.

It's got lots of turns and, and movements about.

But you might mistakenly hear me as an American.

But actually I started my life in South Africa and then moved to England, had a British accent, then moved to America where it behooved me to lose my British, British accent rather quickly and get an American one.

And my career path has kind of followed that trajectory around the world.

So I ended up going to medical school at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, which was fantastic.

And then I did my residency in Johannesburg General Hospital which was right when the HIV pandemic was really prevalent there.

And it was just a shocking time to actually be practicing medicine and trying to get people who were very much against HIV medications onto treatment.

And because of that, the options that were available in developing world at that time were really bad.

Like they caused, you know, life changing effects to the skin on their face, to their, to their extremities.

So you could tell when someone was on medication.

So that kind of led me to think, well, I want to get better treatment options for these patients.

And so I ended up moving into the dark side some might say, but pharmaceuticals.

And I worked for one of the largest companies for HIV drugs called Gilead Sciences.

And I worked as their medical like lead in the access country.

So I traveled all around the world getting treatment guidelines changed and getting access to therapies.

And then I, you know, I do follow my passions and I decided, well, you know, how can we actually help people stay on these medications?

And I wanted to run an adherence program so my company didn't want to, so I decided I would leave and I moved to Swaziland by myself.

At eight and a half months pregnant.

I um, most people and single most people thought I was absolutely insane and I guess I am.

But I think you know what we're going to be talking about today and from listening to your podcast too, I think one of the beauties of being neurodiverse is you really do take a lot of risks and you can be impulsive, but it can also lead you to follow your passions.

And I went to Africa and you know, I founded a not for profit to help patients kind of adhere to their medication.

So it was simple text messages that reminded them, gave them a top upcoming credit on their phone and it kept that kind of connection between healthcare provider and the patient.

And I had my daughter there which was amazing.

And at nine weeks of age she got really ill. She got the Coxsackie virus and normally like that's pretty self limiting.

Kids normally get it at like 6, 7 years of age but it spread to her brain because she was so young.

So her blood brain barrier was still quite open and she almost died actually it was two days where I was not sure whether or not she was going to make it and she survived and, and I thought everything was fine.

And then at about nine months of age, she wasn't able to kind of get up.

She wasn't.

She wasn't walking the way that you would expect a child to start pulling themselves up and walking.

And so that's when I started to notice that something wasn't quite right.

We did CT scans of her brain and it turned out that she had cerebral palsy.

From that which a lot of cerebral palsy comes during birth trauma.

But this was after her birth and living in Swaziland, there's not the greatest healthcare there, so ended up having to, like, create my own, like, treatment regimen for her.

But because she was so small and because her brain was still so hyperplastic at that stage, we really were able to re network her brain.

So if you looked at her now, you wouldn't know that she had cerebral palsy.

You'd be like, no, Olivia, you're lying.

She has a little bit of residual in her left foot, but other than that, she's done really, really well.

But that was part of the impetus to move back to the UK when she was about two and a half years old, was that there's more treatment available here, speech and language, stuff like that.

And also, I have to say, living in Swaziland is a little bit lonely.

I was little bit lonely.

It's a small landlocked country of about 1.2 million people, so we moved.

I also worked there as a GP for a period of time as well, in Imani, which was interesting going back into clinical medicine again and really enjoyed that as well.

So when I moved back to the uk, it was like, do I want to go back into clinical medicine or do I want to continue with pharma?

And I ended up continuing with pharma.

I enrolled Alexandra into school and.

And told the school about cerebral palsy.

They had a heart attack.

I told them on the day that I dropped her off and they're like, you should have told us this before.

But she was in nursery school.

She, you know, doing okay.

Nothing that I could see.

But as she got older and progressed within the school, she started to struggle a little bit more and she started to, you know, at about 6 or 7, they realized that she had dyslexia, which is something I also have.

I wasn't diagnosed till university.

And, yeah, so that's kind of the twists and turns of my career path.

And then it was through her struggles at school, actually, that led me to start questioning, is she in the right school environment?

Is she getting the support that she needs the school themselves said, we don't think we can meet her need at this school.

And I was like, well, why should she stay here if she can't get the support that she needs?

So I started to look at other schools and it became really challenging because first of all, if you even mention that your child has cerebral palsy, they don't want to speak to you.

And that wasn't even the issue.

And eventually, and this was through Covid too, we found a school for her that, that met her needs.

It specializes in dyslexic training and other neurodiversities.

And it's called the Unicorn School in Abingdon.

And then I went through the process of trying to get an educational healthcare plan, which was absolutely just, you know, I'm an intelligent, educated woman.

I had some savings, I borrowed money from my family and I still found it incredibly difficult, difficult to navigate.

My heart rate was like 10 beats per minute higher than it normally was.

It almost broke me.

And it took about, almost three years to get her, her EHCP in a pretty cut and dry kind of case.

And so I thought, well, I can do one of two things.

I could fight the local authority, which I'd had enough fighting them, or I could take all that anger and frustration and do something to help other moms and parents.

And that's what made me kind of form the Send Parenting podcast.

Cause I'm like, if I can bring the experts to other people's ears and if I can share other people's stories, then we can learn from each other.

And nobody has to go through that.

Feeling so alone, feeling so out of depth, feeling like you're the only one that's experiencing this.

And so that's what, you know, made me form the Send Parenting podcast.

Wow.

I mean, first of all, no, it's, it's so.

I think it's so powerful to hear because it's always emotional driven, it's always a personal story, it's always a personal experience.

And the fact that you as a doctor, as a clearly very intelligent woman, and that ehcp, I've heard so many times, it breaks people.

I interviewed someone else on the podcast.

She's an advocate and she is the person that, you know, is like that mediator between.

So if you have not got that headspace or you are dyslexic or ADHD yourself and you can't fill that in and understand it, it's like legal language.

She then comes and helps and does that.

And that sort of brokers, brokers the situation, but it shouldn't be like that.

It should not be so inaccessible, especially to neurodivergent families.

I mean, first of all, I'm fascinated by the fact that you have sort of made that transition as a doctor.

And I know that you.

The conversation there of, like, I was a doctor and I still didn't really understand what was going on with my daughter and what.

How.

What ADHD or the neurodiversity sort of, you know, aspect.

Tell me a little bit about that, as with your doctor hat on, but also, like, as a mum hat, how you felt, I guess, when you kind of like, how did I miss this?

And if I'm missing it, what's going on for the rest of the, you know, the communities?

It was really, really shocking.

And, you know, I started that podcast, sim parenting podcast, to help other moms, but it actually ended up helping me because I started talking to experts, and I was like, wait a minute.

This sounds a little bit like my daughter.

Wait a minute.

This isn't what I learned in school, in medical school about adhd.

And so the penny started to kind of drop in my head through talking to other experts that maybe what was going on at home with my daughter was adhd, because honestly, I mean, we had.

We'd gotten through cerebral palsy, which is not an easy thing to get through.

We'd gotten back functioning in her left arm.

You know, she had dyslexia.

And I can honestly tell you that was a cakewalk.

That was easy compared to adhd, because I didn't know what was going on.

Felt as a mother, like she was about 11 years old.

And I was like, is it hormones?

Why is it so difficult at home?

Why is this so challenging?

And it's not an uncommon story.

I talk to other moms who just, you know, you just don't understand what's going on with your child because it's not the typical hyperactive little boy who's running around, which is what I think most people think of when they think of adhd.

And also I did as a doctor, so girls are.

They don't get diagnosed till about four to five years later than boys, okay?

And boys are two times more likely to be diagnosed than girls.

And they looked at a study in Wales where they looked at childhood diagnosis of ADHD and the ratio for boys to girls is 4 to 1.

And they did.

They looked then again at the adult cohort and said, okay, what's the adult prevalence?

And the ratio is 1.9 to 1.

And some would even say that you know, still, there's a lot of women of my generation that aren't being diagnosed.

There's, you know, the numbers differ, but 50 to 75% of girls and women aren't diagnosed.

And that's something that I don't think people get because they're.

Oh, ADHD is everywhere.

Everyone's being diagnosed with it.

Oh, they're so adhd.

Well, I'm sorry, it's.

It is.

It's a serious thing to have adhd, and it's a serious thing if you don't understand it as a parent.

Absolutely.

You know, yeah, I completely concur.

It's.

The undiagnosed ADHD is very, very serious.

And I think when you have the diagnosis, the awareness, the understanding, it's like, oh, okay.

But like you say, you know, there's so many women and girls going around the world not understanding, not knowing what's driving them, what's challenging them.

And that is the big, the big problem.

And especially I think, with girls.

Listen, you know, I've been doing this podcast for four and a bit years, nearly four and a half years, and I'll still never tire of the fact that women and girls can show up in the typical ADHD way.

But most of the time, generally we don't.

And it is often very much internalized.

And there's a whole school of women and girls who are the good girls, the quiet girls, the ones that sit in the class and don't cause any problems.

Everything's internalized.

But as they get older and the hormones start kicking in and start sort of derailing the situation, that sort of internalization does come out in, in the meltdowns, in the.

The friendship struggles, the anxiety.

Then we see, like, more severe mental health challenges kick in, like disordered eating and OCD and depression and, you know, God forbid, suicidal ideation and self harm and all these things.

And that is when it stops being just sort of this like, issue in school with concentration and becomes something that has to be addressed.

And doctors have to be able to see these connections and have to see the lifelong path it takes, especially in girls.

I mean, as a doctor, what do you think is the gap that's still being missed, that girls are still going so undiagnosed and so sort of even dismissed.

There's so many different ways it can show up.

Why are doctors still not connecting the dots?

Well, you know, I have to feel some compassion for them because I am a doctor and I did not connect the dots with my own daughter running a neurodiverse.

Podcast.

So, you know, I think some compassion that clinicians don't get the training for this that they should.

And that's really important.

So there is an onerous to educate not just clinicians, but also educators and parents more about these signs because as you mentioned there, with the long term kind of knock on effects that can happen, kids that aren't diagnosed properly of ADHD and aren't supported with medication and additional support, their life expectancy can be reduced by 21 years.

Okay, that's in worst case scenario.

On average it's about 11 years.

That's worse than the top five killers.

So, you know, the consequences are huge.

So missing.

This isn't just a nice to have, it's a really important discussion that has to be had.

And you know, girls are 14% more likely to be diagnosed with anxiety than ADHD, whereas boys, it's about 5%.

Okay.

So if you have someone, you know, if, if some, if a parent or a clinician sees a girl with anxiety, think adhd, think about screening them for that and making sure you're looking at all those kind of symptoms that you described earlier, that internalization.

They can be the very quiet child, the very creative child, the child that's always, you know, off in the clouds or staring off into space.

Understanding those subtle signs of how girls present the people pleaser, you know, and then it all goes pear shaped when they go home is really, really important.

And so I think clinicians need to be aware of it.

Schools need to be aware of it.

And what's interesting, because you mentioned not, you know, some girls do present as the hyperactive little boy as well.

Some boys also present this way too.

And I've spoken to mothers who have really struggled because they don't fit that cookie cutter kind of hyperactive, which is actually only 5% of children present with that really hyperactive, fidgety feel, kind of that.

Yeah, sure.

So external.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I mean, I think what's interesting is that we're hearing this sort of more socially acceptable diagnosis of dyslexia.

Yes.

And it's kind of almost celebrated.

You know, dyslexia, it's like, you know, you think differently and you, you know, you can be a gen genius and you can be an entrepreneur and you see patterns and all of this.

And you know, thankfully we've sort of, there has been a change of perception.

But what I struggle with is that people are getting the dyslexia diagnosis and that's kind of like schools are accepting it.

And you know, there's Lots of pathways and celebration around that.

But what I truly believe is that dyslexia never travels alone and ADHD never travels alone.

So if you have been diagnosed or a child with being diagnosed with dyslexia and they're presenting with other sort of significant mental health challenges like anxiety or, you know, like, I'll go back to OCD or sleep issues or friendship problems, rsd.

We've got to start thinking about this being a full neurodivergent picture and not just be like, that child's got dyslexia.

But no, no, no, they couldn't have ADHD because they're really well behaved.

52% Of dyslexics have ADHD.

Do you know what I mean?

So it's one in two.

So you've got two dyslexics in the class.

One is going to also have ADHD.

And it's also important to look at autism too, because ADHD can actually mask autism to a degree.

So when my daughter was diagnosed with, I luckily went to a really good clinic clinician who specialized in girls diagnosis.

And she's like, we need to look at autism too.

And I'm like, what do you mean, look at autism too?

She's like, no, it's really important.

So I so agree with your point there.

Why do we just have this, like, take one, one focus and instead don't look at the whole picture and having those kind of understanding.

No, I didn't know sleep was an issue with ADHD.

70% Of children and adults have issues with sleep.

My daughter didn't sleep for 11 years and I can't tell you.

What's that?

What's that like?

It's horrific.

Horrific for 11 years.

It's a lot.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I mean, that is crazy, isn't it?

I'm not putting any blame on you, but that in itself is like, yes, sleep is a huge factor with adhd.

I mean, there's a book coming out, a lady who's also coming on the podcast and she's written a whole book.

She's a sleep psychotherapist.

She was working in sleep for decades and it's only recently that she's been like, oh, I think most of my patients have been, or my clients have been neurodiverse.

Why have I not known this from doing your podcast and speaking to all the different experts and clinicians, what would you say your biggest sort of takeaway has been from that moment of understanding yourself and your daughter and listening to all of this?

What do you think needs to change, I guess more in clinical practice.

I think it's first about understanding what it can present as and as you say, looking at those connections.

So as a doctor, if a mom or dad comes into the surgery with a child and they start talking about things that they can start to connect the dots.

So first of all, in the family history, you know, do you have any neurodiversity in your family history?

Because guess what, it's highly genetic and it's highly heritable.

So you know, is there dyslexia, is there ADHD in the family?

Is there autism?

So that's the first point of reference.

And you know, you, you will find that in people's families that they do have that always, you know, Always.

Yeah.

I always say it makes me laugh because they had, there's a statistic that they say it's like eight heritable.

I don't think I've never met anyone.

Even if there's been like severe trauma that hasn't got, they can't say, I think my dad, my grandpa or my mum or my auntie, there's always another member of the family.

Yeah.

So it's, it's a huge indicator right there, you know, so that's the first point of reference and then it's to ask those questions that really matter, you know what I mean?

Like so, and in my book, I kind of talk about this with, with girls particularly, like what kind of signs come up and start asking those questions, you know, so how is their sleep finding out?

You know, is it difficult to go to sleep?

Does it take hours?

Are they very anxious before they go to sleep?

Do they wake up multiple times in the night?

And then looking at, do they act their age?

So, you know, are they, you know, are they able to do age appropriate activities?

You know what I mean?

So I remember with my daughter, she's 11, and I was like, my friends would be like, oh yeah, my daughter's making lunches now.

They get their, you know, their backpack ready for school.

They even help out with the younger kids and do stuff.

I'm like, oh my God.

God.

Like I can't even get her to get dressed and hair brushed and teeth brushed and forget about getting the bag ready in the morning.

Like it's just not going to happen.

If I gave her more than one instruction, forget about it.

She'd be like, mommy, don't give me more than one instruction.

I can't handle it, you know, because I didn't understand her prefrontal cortex is 30% delayed from other people.

So my expectations of what I was asking of her was not appropriate for her, you know, And I think if clinicians start to ask those kind of questions, what is your child capable of?

You'd very soon see a picture of a twelve year old more acting like an eight and a half year old than a twelve year old.

So those are really easy questions to tease out.

And then how is homework?

Can they do homework independently at home?

Or is it like our situation whenever she would say, we have homework, mommy, I wanted to go and run into a car.

Likewise, you know, yeah, it's a nightmare.

And then what's their emotional regulation like?

Like, I had no idea about this either.

Crazy.

We can measure it as parents, we can measure it very, very well.

It is the, you know, I run a membership community for ADHD moms, and I would say it is the hardest thing to deal with because especially when they're masking at school, they're finding the challenges at school really hard.

They come home and that's the point where they can just, you know, explode and they go from 0 to 100 in seconds.

My, my daughter describes it as I'm in a red haze.

And at that point she's not aware of what she's doing.

And this isn't uncommon.

So there can be physical outbursts, there can be things that are said, there can be things that are broken.

And I've had a lot of moms and even myself.

You start to feel like you're in a bit of an abusive relationship with your child and you're very ashamed about it because no one else's child is behaving this way.

But we don't understand that.

So these are the kind of questions that clinicians need to ask moms and dads because they, you, you don't share that information with other people.

You feel very alone with it and you don't know how to deal with it.

And the sad thing is when you do get that diagnosis and then you understand it and you do the research, which is what I did and why I'm sharing it in the book, because once you get it and you know how your child's brain works and you're like, all right, you know, I need to do use post it notes for getting ready in the morning and each one has one step on it and she can rip one off and then do the next One.

Now, all of a sudden, she can get ready in the morning.

Same with a checklist for the bag, what to put in the bag, how to deal with emotional dysregulation, not telling her she should behave, not telling her to calm down, not telling her to do breathing exercises, let the rage pass, and then let her calm down.

Regulate yourself.

There's so many tips and things that you can do that just change your life so dramatically from where you're at when you don't know that your child has adhd.

And I think clinicians need to understand that too, because adhd and, you know, they call it a superpower at my.

At my daughter's school, once it's harnessed correctly and once you as a parent can actually put strategies in place, including medication, which I'm a firm supporter of as well, you get to a totally different place.

She's now 14.

We were diagnosed just before her 12th birthday.

And I can honestly tell you we went from absolute chaos, where I didn't know if I could still be her mom, to this past Mother's Day.

She made me cottage pie by herself.

She cleaned up.

You know what I mean?

She does her homework by herself.

She's a different child, and that's because she's being supported properly.

But before I knew that she had adhd, it was just carnage.

Yeah.

It's the only way to describe it.

Oh, I can't.

I couldn't agree more.

And I always say it's that awareness because you move from blame and shame and judgment and criticism to, okay, we need to change tack here.

Like, there's.

We have to approach this completely differently.

And then we get this.

The little tools and the techniques and the practices and different ways that we frame things.

And you, like you say you can see the change.

I mean, I. I've been parenting for nearly 21 years, and I've only been parenting with a neuroaffirming lens for five or six years.

So that was 15 years of parenting.

16 Years of.

No, 15 or 14 years of parenting.

Not quite understanding why my children were having outbursts, being rude, not speaking to me properly, not being able to do certain things, struggling with, you know, emotional regulation.

So many different things.

I was just like, I can't do this.

And it was that, oh, okay.

And so my youngest, bless her, she is the one that sort of benefited the most.

She's 11, and she's benefited the most because, you know, I could see straight away, the age of 2:1, I could really see straight away that there was something different going on.

And then through my understanding, my awareness and all this work, we talk about ADHD so openly.

We talk about her emotional regulation and sleep and overthinking and worry.

And I tell her about what RSD is.

You know, she's at that age now where girls are not being so kind.

I'm like an open book.

And I get her books and we sit and we talk about it.

And she.

Even now, if we're watching something on TV, she goes, Mummy, I think that person's got ADHD PhD.

I think what she's doing that thing that I do and she's overthinking.

And why is she taking on so much?

Like she'll.

She'll pick up on the nuances it now of it now.

And I just.

I'm so glad because I just think so many women have lived totally in the dark.

And I hope that this next generation, you know, with us as being that the wayfinders, I think is the word, or the, you know, being able to sort of light it, light the way for the next generation so they can just accept who they are, get themselves the help, lean into what works, pull back when it's feeling more challenging in different environments.

And I find that very, very comforting to know that hopefully things are changing.

What I would love to hear a little bit more about is do you have this open conversation, this dialogue, I guess, with your daughter?

And I can see clearly she's coming on leaps and bounds.

And does she have that awareness of how she can help herself now that she's 14?

Oh, my gosh.

She, you know, she.

She is.

I mean, she's amazing.

Like, she.

She now looks, you know, last night she said to me she was going to bed and she's just switched her ADHD medication.

So it's a little bit struggle at bedtime until she gets adjusted to it.

And she was saying to me, you know, mommy, I'm really tired right now, and I am upset about this, but, you know, I. I think, think it's better if we just talk about it tomorrow morning when I've had a good night's sleep and we can talk about it.

And I said, you know, that's really good.

She'll even say to me, she goes, mommy, what would you say to one of your moms on the send parenting podcast?

I'm like, she is.

You know, she's so aware.

She knows so much.

She, like, she comes on my podcast sometimes, actually, and does, you know, episodes.

And, you know, I'm sharing a very personal story in my book about her, and she's been there every step of the way.

And I talked to her about, you know, this is important because other moms and other daughters are going through this, and if we can help them, then that's a really good thing.

And she's like, I think so, too, mommy.

And, you know, like, she struggles.

It sounds like your daughter, too, with some of the social girls in her class and stuff like that.

And her emotional regulation has gotten so much better with support and with medication.

And she said to me, one of her friends in school has adhd.

She goes, mommy, she's really struggling with her emotional regulation.

Do you think maybe you could talk to her mommy about medication?

Because it helped me so much, and maybe it would help her as well.

And so it's.

It's, you know, having that knowledge and having that empowerment, it takes it away from being a disability or you're not good enough or you're struggling, and instead it empowers her to be able to realize, like, you know, yeah, this is stuff I struggle with, but I can get support.

I can advocate for myself.

And there are really positives, too.

She can hyper focus on something and do amazing things.

She has creativity.

She has.

Has empathy.

You know, that is incredible.

I remember when she was little, she would say to me at age 7, like, mommy, how is your day?

And I remember hearing my.

My other mother's friends would say, oh, my daughter doesn't even care what my day was like.

You know, she has that in bucket loads.

So there's a.

There's a lot of positives to ADHD as well.

Yes, it's difficult.

Yes, it needs support.

Yes, it is a neurodevelopmental condition.

But they're, you know, understanding it and knowing how you are.

It's just like knowing that, you know,.

You have.

How to.

How to work with your curly hair or your straight hair or how to work with, you know, your gut or anything like that.

It's just part of who you are.

And I think I do hope for our, you know, our daughters and their daughters that this is.

That this is going to change.

And I hope that, you know, podcasts like yours and mine as well stop people from just saying, oh, everyone's getting ADHD right now.

You know, everyone has it.

Why is everyone being diagnosed?

The prevalence rates aren't skyrocketing.

There are still populations, like girls and ethnic minorities as well that aren't being diagnosed.

And I like to use the analogy kind of like, do you remember?

Well, in my mother's day, nobody was Gay.

You know, she was in the Royal Ballet actually in England.

She danced and, you know, a lot of the.

The ballet.

Her fellow male ballet dancers were gay, but you didn't see them out.

And she.

My mom would say, oh, it's such a hard life being gay.

It's really, you know, it's difficult.

And she asked my brother if he was gay, actually, at one point, and she goes, you know, I' love you anyway.

But it's very difficult.

Well, fast forward now to our life, Right?

No, no.

A whole bunch of gay people didn't just pop out of the closet.

They were always there.

Yes.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

No, they were just hiding.

Just like with.

With neurodiversity, there were always these kids.

They were just being kicked out of school or not going to school or ending up being, you know, criminals or, you know, I just was.

Was reading on LinkedIn, actually, you know, 43% of women in undiagnosed ADHD.

So it's not that now we have too many.

And I think people can actually relate to that.

It's that they were in hiding and no one knew and they were suffering and struggling by themselves, you know, and it's.

It's been incredible work with prisons, with women, with getting the diagnosis, with getting them the support.

They don't reoffend.

Yeah.

No one's had an explanation other than, you need to sort yourself out or stop being like this, Be more like that.

Sort yourself out, change.

Women shouldn't act like this.

Why can't you do that?

Why can't you sort your mess out?

It's just like, boom, boom, boom.

Especially with women, because of the way we have been perceived to have to show up in life and either be mums, caretakers, domestically, friendships, relationships.

Like, there's just been this whole box that we've had to sit in, and if we don't work in that box and there's something intrinsically wrong with us that we need to.

To sort ourselves out.

And now we've got this awakening of women that are going that I've never fitted into that box.

And now I understand that.

It's not anything wrong with me.

It's just I'm wired differently.

My environment hasn't been working for me, and the people around me haven't been understanding, and there's just been this sort of mismatch.

I sort of see it as like an energy mismatch where we've just been cohabiting just slightly on a different plane, and now we're being able to be like, oh, okay, so if I just cohabit in the plane that fits for me.

There's.

Then I'm great, I'm great in that situation.

So, yeah, that's kind of what I was thinking about.

It's just we've had almost been dealt and even I don't want to compare, but like a really difficult card because we've just not had anyone that has been able to explain this to us up until recently.

No, absolutely.

And like the knowledge is it's growing in the workforce, it's growing in schools, it's growing with clinicians, but it is still growing.

I mean, I remember and I'm not formally diagnosed with ADHD because my mom's passed away.

So to get.

My father says he doesn't remember my childhood.

So it's hard to get a diagnosis if you don't have anyone to collaborate what's happened in your childhood.

It's changing in that respect now.

It is changing.

But you know, like my bosses would be like, olivia, turn your volume down.

And they, and they felt that was okay to do.

And you're going too fast.

People can't keep up with you.

Your brain is over here and our brains are back here, you know, loudly in, in, in public forums.

And so you, and then you feel like, oh, do I need to be quieter?

Do I need to be less shrink.

Or yeah, back pull.

Yeah, I can pull yourself in and feel shame about it.

You know, why, why, why can't I be quiet?

Why, why do I get loud?

You know, why, you know, why are these things happening?

And then if you put it with a different lens and think, well, maybe that's just who I am and maybe if people understood me more, then they would be able to have empathy and compassion towards that, but also to see the strengths of that as well.

You know, you, you're able to think quickly, you hyper focus.

I can get things done way faster and I know this than most people.

You know, I, then, then I get really tired and I've had to learn to balance that as well.

But knowing yourself and knowing where your strengths are and where your weaknesses are, and then playing to your strengths is so important.

It's so important in schools too.

And that goes back to our earlier point in the conversation is why don't we screen for these things with all children?

You know, why are there two to three year waiting lists?

We don't wait to, to test children's eyes for glasses.

You know, that's pretty like standard.

If your kid isn't able classroom, they get tested quite quickly.

Why isn't it just common practice in schools to do kind of screeners for dyslexia, adhd, autism and then put the right supports in place so that they don't grow to be bigger problems?

Yeah, early years screening, it's so.

It makes such sense because even in this conversation we could have written 15 point checklist of the most common traits and if the parents aren't quite sure, maybe there's a way of sort of being like, right, let's come back and check this in a year's time or in two years time, who knows, maybe this will happen and hopefully we might see this.

But like you say, it just makes so much sense because teachers then can be aware, even if it doesn't go down to a formal diagnosis, that extra little bit of oh, actually they might, you know, do really well if they learn outside a little bit more or they're not contained sitting down all day and we can do some more practical learning or we can just keep an eye on them if they're sort of, you know, struggling friendship wise in the playground.

There's just little tiny things that can be done to support from an early age.

And there's one school near to me where they teach everyone as if they're dyslexic.

And I think that's brilliant, you know, and I actually think, you know, if we even think a little bit more outside of the box, what if we taught all kids like they had neurodiversity, all kids would benefit from what we're talking about.

My daughter's school, they have a movement break every 30 minutes breaking chunks down.

What about flipping it on the other side?

And you know, all kids would benefit from going out in nature.

All kids would benefit.

We have to change the education system in my personal opinion.

And neurodiverse kids are kind of the canaries in the mine who are screaming out thing, hey, this isn't working because it's not working for any of our kids, but specifically not for our neurodiverse kids.

And what's sad is because then they're getting shoved back into that circle as a square, then their self esteem, I mean gets, gets shot, the anxiety goes up.

All the other negative consequences of that lack of self belief has long term effects and that's where we get then into the prison population.

So if we change the way, if we looked at kids as all being neurodiverse and we change schools to fit that way, I think it would be a much better place, even as a neurotypical kid to go to school.

A hundred percent agree on all of that, I think.

Listen, you know, this shit shift, I guess from sort of like a neuroscience way, a neurobiological way of our brains have changed since social media, you know, iPads, phones.

There has to be a way.

And I'm not a doctor or an anthropologist, but our wiring of our brain must have shifted.

And the learning techniques that we are still adhering to from Victorian times, whether you're neurotypical or neurodiverse, it's gone.

That way of working is gone now.

And we need to, you know, we've got to work with our neural wiring that I guess people are being presented with, especially kids that are being born now and they're given phones and iPads from such a young age.

And you know, I don't agree that they cause adhd.

I do agree that they exacerbate that, that wiring.

And if you are of a anxious disposition, your nervous system is very sensitive already and then there's constant tech and you're constantly online and pinging and games and this and that.

It's going to exacerbate some symptoms that are already there.

But we have to kind of move things along a little bit.

And how are kids going to learn better in school and how are we going to work with their nervous systems and their brains and their, I guess, their bodies and all the different things that we are learning so quickly.

I mean, the shift has been so fast over the past 10 years that things need to catch up to match.

The kids that are coming out being like, well, I can't learn like that anymore.

So there's a lot.

Big shift.

I think it's so true and, you know, it's.

I would like to highlight that, you know, screens don't cause adhd, but screens are very bad for kids with ADHD and parents too, because it's, it's hard to stop.

You know, with my daughter, I can see her, her bouts of emotional dysregulation and the more strenuous ones, I'm sure you can with your 4 too happen when screen time has to be taken away or has to be moderated.

So you have to limit it as a parent as well in terms of how you teach your child to use that.

And it's not good for them to be on it constantly because it does exasperate the kind of problems that, that happen with having constant, constant content given to you can't, can't get off it.

There's all the discussion now around social media.

My daughter's Always known she can't have social media until she's 16, 17.

Then we'll decide then, you know, and yes, it's hard at school and mommy, why, you know, but that's.

She's always known that that's the way it is.

Because even YouTube, which is considered social media, that in itself is a nightmare because, you know, she is allowed one hour a day.

She knows it.

And now she, like, you know, she'll.

She'll give herself 30 minutes in the morning and 30 minutes in the afternoon, but it's also teaching her I have to limit it, you know, and then she'll take that over.

But it's.

It's such a minefield to kind of navigate.

And it's so hard for parents, I think, you know, sometimes it is the only thing you can is to give them the screen and be like, okay, I just need a breather.

And I have.

I understand that too.

So I'm not judging anyone, but the.

The more we can kind of limit the influence, I think the better because behooves you as a parent as well.

I. I know that when I've put not had things in place, like, let's say on holiday, oh, you can, you know, have as much screen time as you want.

It.

It backfires majorly.

Yeah, always.

It is.

It's very difficult to be a parent right now when we are up against that and the YouTube and the Snapchat and the TikToks are powerful beasts that many of us can't compete with.

And to then have to be constantly, like, checking or pulling away, and then you've got like the whole issue of, like, they're in that hyper focus and be like, no screen time.

And then we take off them and then we deal with the outburst.

It's.

It's not easy at all.

Tell me a little bit about your book, your podcast work, because I think after this conversation, people will really want to hear a little bit more from you.

And you've mentioned your book.

What's it called?

It's called beyond the Label, and it's empowering parents of ADHD girls.

But I'd say it also applies to.

To boys who are not presenting typically either.

Do you know what I mean?

And it's broken up into chapters.

So you can look at a chapter like, is it sleep?

And you can dive into that.

Is it that they're not acting your age?

And you can dive into that.

Is it homework, nightmares?

And you can dive into that so you can read it all as one book or you can Dive in and out.

And I designed that because of the ADHD kind of mind as well.

If you don't have enough time for it, then that's how you can do it.

And I'm going to create an audiobook with it as well.

And then I'm going to have some of my podcast guests come and do extra audio chapters as well.

But it's to kind of help parents, first of all recognize and go through kind of that process themselves.

Because there is a grieving process and a trusting your gut kind of process when you're going it.

And I've gone through it as a doctor figuring out my daughter's diagnosis.

Then I go, I put my medical hat on, and okay, let's understand the science behind what's going on in an ADHD wired brain so we can actually find strategies and solutions that work, you know, because if you understand it, then it's enlightening, you know.

And I describe it like an ADHD brain is like a car with four wheels on it, and there's four wheels that need to be running, running well for that car to go straight.

So, one, you need to think about medication, and that is really important.

And that could be a whole nother podcast.

Then you've got to look at nutrition.

You know, are they getting the right nutrition to fuel their brain, to even fuel the medication?

Are they getting enough sleep and exercise?

Because sleep and lack of it makes it so much worse.

And then the fourth wheel is, are they getting the support in school, at home to be able to flourish?

Because when you get those four wheels right, right, the car is cooking with gas, and, you know, it's never going to go in a straight line.

Tires are going to pop, you're going to go swerving off the road, and then what do you do to get yourself back on track again?

And so that's.

The book is very practical, and it's something that I refer back to with my daughter when one of the tires pop and I'm like, okay, what's going on here?

Is it sleep?

Is it nutrition?

Do we need to change our medication?

Like, what's going on?

And then you can figure your way back on.

And then you really feel like you and your child are in the driver's seat.

And it's no longer that this is taking control of your parenting journey and your relationship, relationship with your child.

It gives you back your relationship and that connection with your child.

So I'm hoping that it helps other moms.

And it was kind of like the book I would like to have read and it's told in a memoir kind of format.

So it's stories of my daughter and I.

So it's very.

It's very personal and it's.

It's what we've been through.

And I also run an ADHD mom warrior community, and that's for moms who are feeling very alone and who want to support.

Support.

Support space.

So we have group coaching sessions every week.

And it's just.

It's so refreshing to be able to talk to other moms and they can hear their stories and they don't feel like, oh my God, this is just happening to me.

And then they can help each other out.

You know, it's amazing, I think, the support that moms have for other moms and to help the person who's a little bit lower down on their journey of understanding and empowerment.

And they.

They always have a hand to pull them up.

And so it's a.

It's a lovely opportunity to.

To be able to help each other out.

Yeah.

And feel left alone.

I think the.

In this.

In this situation is incredible because often it's.

We know the answers and like you say, we could be struggling with one thing, but someone else is struggling with something else.

But we will have dealt with that, you know, a year ago.

I've got a community as well.

The More yourself community.

And I read the community chat and I think these women are just incredible because someone posts something and they're like, oh, well, I've dealt with this and I do this.

And they're not doctors, they're not psychiatrists, but they're having to figure it out because they've not had the support they've had to delve.

And, you know, I personally think that ADHD women or neurodivergent women, incredibly resourceful women, because we just have to figure it out.

You know, our brain is like, well, no, we're not going to just live with this.

It's gonna.

We have to find a solution.

And they.

There's gotta be a door out of this somewhere.

Yeah, 100.

And so we figure it out and then in these communities we share, and that's what's so powerful.

So.

So I think lots of women were going to be very interested in your book and your podcast and your community.

And I'll make sure everything goes on the show notes so people can find you.

And I can give you some links too, just to like a little checklist for, like, it's a girl's checklist.

Like does is my daughter, you know, and it's something you can bring to the gp, it's something that you can do with your teachers.

It's just a simple little thing to kind of look at that.

I can send you a link to as well, because knowledge is power and unfortunately we have to educate the doctors and the educators still.

Yeah, yeah.

It's interesting.

We're in this era, I think, of the.

You know, the tables have turned a little bit and again, I don't want to be disparaging to doctors and doing amazing, amazing work, but I think in this pocket of.

Of Meda, I don't know if you want to sort of, you know, psychiatry or neurodiversity or mental health, whatever you want to sort of call it.

Unfortunately, it's the patients leading the doctors because, like you say, you might have been taught about ADHD in one module 20 years ago and that's all you were given.

So there's a lot of catching up to do and I'm seeing the patients teaching the doctors the information right now.

There was nothing really on neurodiversity in medical school and unfortunately, I don't think it's changed that much.

And the same with educators as well.

And what they get is such a tip of the iceberg.

Now, I know they're saying a lot of funding is going to be going into it, but it's.

Even if you break that down, it's actually not that much funding.

That's like 46 pounds per patient with a new SEN white paper.

But it's not taught, it's not taught in education, it's not taught in medical school.

So it is, you know, I belong to a community, actually, of GPs in the UK and they are all about neurodiversity and they share information, they share research, they share knowledge.

And it's amazing because it's a.

It's a network that actually is upskilling the gps of the uk, which is fantastic.

So I think, you know, community, educating and understanding are the way forward.

Brilliant.

Oh, well, Olivia, thank you so much for being here and sharing, you know, all your knowledge and insights.

I'll make sure all the details are in the show notes.

And yeah, it's been fantastic connecting with you today.

It's been lovely talking to a kindred spirit as well.

Thank you very much.

Olivia, Thank you for being here and listening to today's episode.

I just want to remind you that if you are looking for more support on your ADHD journey, there are so many resources waiting for you over at ADHD.

Womenswellbeing.co.uk so inside the ADHD Women's Wellbeing Workshop library you'll find practical and compassionate guidance on topics such as nervous system regulation, rejection, sensitive dysphoria, perfectionism, emotional regulation, hormones, parenting and so much more.

All designed specifically for late diagnosed neurodivergent women.

You can also explore my new book, the ADHD Women's Wellbeing Toolkit, which was published by dk, which is also available in ebook and audiobook, which is packed full of tools to help you feel calmer, more regulated and more like yourself.

And if you do crave a bit more more deeper connection and ongoing support, come and join us inside the More Yourself Community.

It's a gentle space for learning, reflection and connection with other neurodivergent women.

And you'll also find the recordings from our first ever ADHD Women's Wellbeing Live event, which brought together incredible speakers and a room full of inspiring women for a truly special day.

We have recorded it all for you and it's there to buy.

So whether you're just starting your journey or looking to go deeper, there's something there for every stage.

Just head to ADHD womenswellbeing.co.uk to explore everything.

And as always, thank you so much for being here and for being part of this community.