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Welcome to ADHD Friendly. I am Patty Blinderman. I am a professionally certified ADHD coach. I've been doing this since 2012, if you can believe that. Created the podcast to share helpful tips that I am always looking for to create more ease in my life. I share them here in the hopes they do the same for you. This is episode 229. I can't believe it. If you'd like more support going to wrap really quickly back around then I can provide in this format. Check out my website ADHD Friendly where I have information on the ADHD Friendly membership where eders get more things done. All right, in this episode I'm celebrating Reading day. I'm going to talk about what that is and how it came about. I have a tip related to post it notes and my main topic for this week is how to reset after an avoidable ADHD mistake. So not a oh my gosh, what happened? It fell off my radar. Completely avoidable. My mistake. I'm going to share what happened and what I did to support my future self to not do it again. All. All right, so as we do, we're going to start with my celebration and it's reading day. I have no notes here and I'm like, why are there no notes? I'm like, because it was reading day. So I'm like, I don't need notes. I know exactly what I want to celebrate here. So I work with a lot of college students and college students have a thing each semester after the last day of regular classes and before the first day of exam period. Okay. So the day in between those two is reading day. And we didn't have this when I was in college. I don't know when this came about. I probably need to dive in and research like, what's the origin story of reading day? But ever since I saw it on the first syllabi of a student, I thought, reading day. That's amazing. Well, it's been, you know, 12 plus years that I've been coaching students. 13 plus years. I've lost track. 14, I'm in my 14th year. I don't know, I can't do the math. 2012, you do the math. I don't math. Don't despect. Always says, don't make me mad. It never connected in my brain to structure a reading day for myself until a few weeks ago. I. I'm always printing articles. I don't like to read articles online. So when I find something I like, I print it out. And I have this growing folder of Work, you know, like my business articles that I want to read. Yeah. They're all about things that interest me, related to ADHD or how I think it could apply to somebody with adhd. And it was getting stacked. I bet. Yeah. And so I, it started to become a toleration and I thought what if I designated a reading day for myself and just carved out. I thought a Friday would be best. Yeah. Because it would motivate me to get my work done earlier in the week so I could give myself the Friday reading day. I blocked my schedule so nothing else was going on. And so reading day looked like this. Instead of working from 8 until 1, which is my normal schedule on Fridays. And then if I have everything done at one o', clock, I break for lunch and I'm done. That's like my reward for finishing everything all week. I decided to earmark 8am to 1pm for reading day. And I was just going to go through my, my final of all of the articles I printed out and I did it. I did it last Friday. I looked forward to it all week. Yeah, I protected it. Like I was going out of town or something. I was like, nope, kept that time unavailable. I can't reschedule on Friday. I can't do that on Friday. Nope. Friday is reading day. Yeah. And I had no like discomfort with it. It was just this is what I'm doing and it's professional reading. I felt very, you know, and I not that there be anything wr giving myself reading day with just, you know, fiction or non fiction novels. Right. But it was a bunch of work reading that I needed to get done. So I sat in my comfy location where the sun was shining. I had my coffee. I had highlighters and little flags to mark different areas. I had a notepad that I can make notes. I had my laptop in case I needed to look something up. I needed all of those things. So I felt like I did a good job setting myself up so I wasn't constantly getting distracted, going to grab more things. And I read everything in that file. Nice. I found five like really exciting things that I want to bring and share here that will be like bigger topics that I'm super excited about. And I found like a bunch of tools and a bunch of like one of the articles referenced different apps that I did a dive into and researched and learned. No, I don't want those. You know, because I like, I do like to test things out if I'm going to share a reference someone I haven't done a lot of Apps lately because I'm trying to stay off my phone and off my devices. And I thought, well, maybe these would be. They were like money apps. Like, well, maybe these will be something. So there's one I'm probably going to try before I talk about the topic around the money app. But the rest, I was like, no, let that go. But it was so much fun. And now the file is empty again. Literally went through the whole thing. So, huge success. I finished at 12:30, so it only had me four and a half hours. I had time spare and I had time to spare. And here's another little, like, what do they call it when somebody gives you a. Like a backdoor compliment? Oh, but in a positive way. I don't mean this in a negative way. It was a compliment with. It was backdoor to me, where I realized it was authentic to the person giving it to me. So my husband and I went to dinner that night because we had tickets to go see a play in Chicago, I think I mentioned. And so we had date night and we went. And when we were having dinner, we've been married. You were coming up on 34 years, so. So I. I brought this list of questions to ask somebody that you've known a long time to try to, like, you know. Yeah, like what. What was the first time you ever tell me about your favorite? This, you know, from childhood, like, to see if there were stories we haven't uncovered yet. And so one of the questions was, what's the thing that you admire most about yourself? Yeah. And I asked my husband that and he said, you know what? Right now, I would have to say the first thing that comes to mind is your work ethic. And it was so funny because I immediately went, oh, yeah, because I sat around reading all day today with my coffee and my highlighters and. And I'm thinking, like, like, that looked so luxurious and like, like, like, did you throw some bon bons in there with that? But when I was looking at him, he genuinely meant it. And I thought, you know, if I do step back and look at what he sees and through his lens, instead of judging it through my lens, it did take a lot of structure. And it did. And he wasn't judging that one day. But of course, that's what I was focused on is, yeah, after reading day, that's what you're seeing is my work ethic every day. But I just thought what a lovely compliment that I first deflected and wasn't allowing myself to see and acknowledge. But it's been several days now. And I'm, I'm really appreciating that for perspective that he shared for me because I don't see myself that way. Right. And so that was really. And I know he's not going to tell me something he doesn't mean. That's just not in him. So I, I was like, that was really sweet. So anyway, there's the whole celebration, multiple celebrations, reading day. Definitely going to do that again when I get another, like, get a bunch more articles. Yeah, it motivates me more too because sometimes I get like a bunch of things I always forward to myself in emails and I have to print them and I'm like, print these articles out and they start clogging up my inbox. So now to be like, I got more articles, I can, I can, you know, hold until I plan my next reading day. All right, so what I purchased this week, it's also my product of the week. So I'm going to show my, my happy little set here. I love this little thing. So this is my product of the week that I purchased this week and it's also going to be my tip of the week. But let's start with the product. It is this four pack of post it notes comes in these lovely four sizes. If you are listening to this, check out my YouTube channel, ADHD Friendly, where it has these little square guys, slightly larger and then it has the two lined ones. I love the variety. This little four pack, 7.29. I don't know if I'm just getting used to inflation, but that sounded super good to me where I was like, yeah, I'm going to absolutely buy that. I love the different sizes. I love the sizes and the colors. So the variety is very sparkly. These have two times sticking power. I am not a huge fan of the two times sticking power. Does that mean like extra, extra sticky? Yeah, I do like it because there are certain times that you where they just lose their stick. Yeah. But what I always want to share from my experience, you know, full transparency. I would say I give them like a 7 out of 10. Like they're really helpful if you really do need them to stick. But I found even on my nice paper, if I leave it there too long, it will pull the paper off. Not all of it, but it'll take the first layer off. So if there's lighting underneath of it. Yeah, it's really strong. I don't like it being so strong. It pulls my paper apart. Right. And then you said, yeah, your writing will go with it. Yep. Yeah. So that's just something to keep in mind. Since it's a product I'm sharing. I want to just to highlight that that might be a concern if you're sticking it on something that it could happen with. Be mindful of that. Or how if you're sticking on something you're going to leave for a while. Yeah. Because I do find it happens more on things. I've left this sticky there for a little bit as opposed to just putting it there and moving, you know, as I'm going through things. So. But I do love the colors and the variety of sizes because you know, there's always different reasons you need different things. Little jot note, a little bit of a more standout. Like I think of it as think of this size as my steering wheel note because it was always the size I keep in my car to write something, something and stick on my steering wheel because it's like the perfect size for the center of my steering wheel. And then the two line varieties are nice if you do need a little more structure. Making a little list or something. So729 on Amazon now. My tip for the week. I wanted to share how using post it notes can really help support your ADHD brain. Yeah. As a tool. So here's my tip slash tool for this week. Think about again the various sizes Becca knows my desk. I have all of these sizes within my finger. Like because I need all different sizes depending what I'm doing. So they let you capture your thoughts instantly. This is hugely important. If your working memory is impacted. That executive function of working memory in my brain is like, is it there? Like it's so, it's so minimal. So I do tend to keep my post its everywhere. Like I just mentioned, I have it in my car. I have a post it note pack in my like a little guy in my purse. I keep it in my knitting bag because I, I keep the nice larger size ones to go down on a pattern that holds my place when I'm moving it down. I keep. There's one in the kitchen. There's one on my nightstand. Like they're just every one in my bathroom drawer because I'll think of things there and I'll take it and stick it. I actually just use one this morning for that exact reason. So it frees up your brain space to have a way to capture those things. And again, because they stick, you can put it where you need to see it. So if I'm like in a session and something comes up that I have to follow up with, I will write it and stick it on my computer screen. I'm not gonna miss it. And it was, it's not gonna hurt my computer screen. And it works great. So that's first, capture your thoughts. The next is you can turn a bigger project into multiple steps. Literally writing one step out per posting. Breaking it down. Yeah. So it can be really helpful. I've had clients do this where they like, they put it on like the countertop and they just go down the the list and they just, you know, take them off as they complete each one. It can be just, you know, that lowering resistance. It's the what's the first thing I just go look at the very first post it note. And I just do that. It creates a very visual, this is what I'm doing now, this is what I'm doing next. This is what I'm going to do later. Or this is what I have to do. This is what I've started and I need to go back and finish. And this is what I finished. So it's like need to do. It's progressing, it's done. I love this on a wall. You take like one post it and you label it to do and you stick it at the top and then all of the posts underneath of it on that section are things that have to get done. And then you can have one that's in progress in the middle or done at the end. You can just have to do and done, keep it, whatever works for you. But seeing the progress, the physical, tangible, moving the thing over from one side to the other, it's visually satisfying and rewarding. It activates your brain. It gets the momentum going. And you can see when you're done. It's like when everything gets from the left side to the right side, I'm done. And you, we have the visual evidence that we're done. If you've ever tried to relax and you're like, I feel like I should be doing something, I love it. Because you can look up, nope, nothing on the to do list. It's done. My today list is done. We're not using them to list everything you're going to do for the rest of your life. We're listing what, in this example, what needs to happen today so we can see it and do it. I'll do this on whiteboards. I'll do it. I have like a little folding whiteboard that I use. Always within reach that I'll do to do. Done. And I'll just have my stickies move it so I Can move it from room to room if I'm doing different spaces, keeping it really sparkly with the. The different post its. Right. Reminders to yourself to support your working memory. So one of my favorite examples is wash. If you're doing laundry, it has so many multiple steps that you have to come back to. You can't do them all at once. So putting a load in the wash and then having a sticky note. I'll stick it on the face of my phone because I'm going to see it. Yeah. And it'll just say move laundry. Yeah. Switch laundry. Right, right. Or, you know, laundry. Fold laundry from dryer. You know, something that. Or I'll set a timer. That reminds me. And the timer goes off. And there's my post it. That reminds me of why is my timer going off? I need to move the laundry. So having a visual prompt to help you remember. Becca knows. Like, I have like prompts on my doors to remind me to turn the alarm off. They become wallpaper. If you're using a prompt permanently, like to always remind you, change it up. Use a different color so your brain notices it again. When it becomes wallpaper. Move it to a different location on the wall, on the mirror, on the door, wherever it is so your brain notices it again. It doesn't mean the prompt doesn't work anymore. It means your brain has gotten used to it so it's not standing out. So simply choosing a different color, writing it in a different color marker or whatever, or just moving the location will make it sparkly again. Next is to leave reminders at the point of performance. So my favorite example in the car was leaving the post it. You know, pick up our ex on the way home. Don't forget Lily. Like I was always afraid I would forget my youngest at school because it might be like a day I wasn't normally picking her up. Yeah. And so I would put the post it on my steering wheel. So as soon as I got in the car, so I wouldn't automatic pilot, drive home and forget the post. It's right there. Yeah. Go get her. Okay. That's it. Thank you. Right, so put it at the point just like the alarm on the door. Sticky. It's reminding me. Don't open it. You're going to be sorry. There's an alarm. Yeah. Turn the alarm off before you open the door. So put it at the point that you need to do it. Maybe if you want to take your medication, you put the post it on the coffee pot because you know you're going to go to the coffee pot. Yeah. And it said oh that's right, right. And right. Like I've had clients that will put the post it and they want to take their medicine. Well then there's like this handy thing called flags that they were also made by post it where you can take the flags and like, like put them down to mark that you've done it each day. So you have like maybe like Monday through Sunday written at the bottom. You just move the flag so you don't have that. Did I take it? Did I do the thing? Did I take my walk? Like whatever it is you want to track it, you can easily see it. Use them to help remind you visually of what you have going on time wise. So maybe you're setting a timer and I'll put a post at the top. This is, you know, end in 30 minutes to get ready to go or whatever. Because sometimes the timer will go off and I'm like, yeah, I'm just going to finish this because I don't remember that there's something immediately behind it that I wanted to do. When the timer went off, it was just like, like letting me know what time it is. But I might forget, which we'll get to in a minute. What I was doing that I needed to be aware of the time. So why am I stopping here? It can also help you to build momentum. So I already talked about how if you're going from to do to done, it's that, oh, I can see the progress. I can see I'm moving along. I have students do this with assignments where they, they are like so overwhelmed with the number of things they have to do. I'm like, and I can see it. They're like, and like you're in your head. Like I can see your eyes. You're up in your head looking. Instead of looking at the physical external tool that can support you to go from these things need to be done to they are now checked off and completed. Doesn't mean we're externalizing everything on a post it. But post its are a sparkly way to do that. If that would work for your brain, they can be great for sequencing things. I do this, I've talked about this like in pocket charts where when I'm working with kiddos that are trying to create structure around a routine like what is done look like. So it might be like, okay, brush your teeth. Well first, you know, put toothpaste on the toothbrush. Brush your teeth for you know, two minutes so that you know you're listening to maybe you turn on your song that plays for two minutes or whatever it is, rinse your toothbrush, you know, before, like, like the steps, like what does it look like? So that you can follow along the steps easily. You put them right on the mirror and you're done. They're just right there, easy to see. And then finally. Oh, this one's good. Reduce bedtime. Swirling thoughts. So if you're ever lying, this is why I have one next to my bed. If you're lying in bed, it's great to have a notebook, but here's my thing. If it's a note, I just need to remember something that I need to go do. I don't want to write it in my journal. No. I want to wr in on a post it. Yeah. So having a post it and a little sharpie like that, like a fine point on there, I can just write myself a quick note like, oh, remember to email blank. Like in the morning I can shut my brain down and relax without worrying how am I going to remember that? Should I wake up? Should I, like go get my phone turned on and you know, email myself or. No, little post it. I always have my drink. I literally just stick it on there on my drink so I can't miss it because my drink, this is like, swear. It's like a bottle goes everywhere with. It's my little comfort thing. So I could. I know I'm going to see it. So just think about where post its can support you. They are a phenomenal tool. I wish I invented them. My gosh, that person has like crazy money. But when you think about adhd, brain wiring paired with post its, they support working memory, so you're remembering things. They support visually prompting you so you can see what you're trying to do. They give you a physical interaction. Right. It's a tangible, physical thing that, especially if you're moving it, it's like the satisfaction of I can see this happening. They create flexibility. I use them on my calendars to move things around that are flexible. Like if I'm like, oh, I need to go for a walk that didn't get done. Something came up and got in the way this morning. I'm going to move that, post it down here where I can see I have time again so it doesn't fall off my radar. I can see it's something that's not scheduled, but I don't want to forget. Right. So it helps us be flexible. Low commitment. They're not a big investment. No. There's tons of knockoffs that are cheaper. I will tell you, I've never found one that the, the sticky part, to me, the most important part works as well. They tend to curl at the ends. They don't. They don't really hold up whatever, whatever post it has for their secret formula. They know what they're doing. As my daughter would say, chef's kiss. And they reduce overwhelm because we can see what we're trying to do. We can capture our thoughts without worrying about them falling off. They turn something that we're holding on to in our brain into something that we can see, touch and work with. Post it notes all right, I wanted to share a couple of examples of ways that I've used them. I talked about a few, but I found a few pictures that I printed out. So this is an example of a reward menu that these are all. I just photocopied it. So these are all photocopies of post its around a reward menu of different categories that I just add to as they come up. And it's very sparkly when you think of A few of my tools that I made for my personal owner's manual are based on the post IT model. Because I use them so much in the beginning, I thought, well, I should just turn this into an actual tool. You can just print with kind of mop boxes. Yeah, boxes just automatically on there. I use them to plan my different podcast topics and my membership offerings, my live events. So these are all little post its on a semester calendar. I can move around. It helps me to plan long term because I can look at literally instead of just planning numerically. Okay, this is episode this. Or I'm going to do these three things this month. I'm like, oh, well, that falls in spring. I should probably start thinking about what kinds of things. Like, are you going to be taking a trip over spring break? Do you want to focus on, you know, getting the house, kind of like revitalize after the winter? It helps me see those things because I can see my time. And even if I've already planned, I just pick post it. I'm like, okay, I'm gonna stick that on the side. I'm gonna put this here. I'll hold that topic for later or I'll move it around somewhere else. It makes planning so much easier for my brain because I can see the time more concretely. This is one of my favorites for my kids when they're asking what they can do before company comes, where it's like, okay, we've got company coming. I need all these things Done certain things you're just doing. But then if it's like I need somebody to clean off the patio table, like it just got dusty or whatever, I'll throw money at it. So if nobody's taken the sticky, I'll stick them on the fridge in the kitchen. Yeah. So it's really clear. Like, like take it off when it's done. So I know what's been done and I can see what still needs to be done. Well, if these aren't moving, I'll put money on it. And I'm like, all right, if you go do like, like this one's worth five bucks. If you're looking for a quick $5, you can go do it or change the sheets in the guest room. Hate doing that. That's like five bucks. Because I hate changing sheets so much. So it's like, oh, I'll do that. I need $5. I'm going to go grab a coffee or whatever. It's just simple, easy, and it helps me see what I need done and what already is finished. What could still be done? Do I want to incentivize it to get them done more easily, whatever it is. And then I have an example of a weekend to do list where I broke it down on a whiteboard by Saturday and Sunday. And this is my example with the post. Its there. I have little time circles on here that show how long each thing takes. And again, you can take them off as you do them. It was during a busier weekend where this was a few years ago where I was needing to grocery shop and meal plan and back to school shopping and I was feeling overwhelmed. So I broke it down visually where I could see everything that needed to get done and, and the time it would take. So I knew what I needed to and I could take them off. As the day went on and I got this, nothing fell off my radar because I had my post it. All right, that was a big. That could have been a main category. I'm sorry, I should have said at the very beginning this is going to be a longer episode, guys. All right. Because the main topic, it's another big one. All right, so this is what I'm calling how to reset after an avoidable ADHD mistake. So I'm going to share my example of what I did, which was pretty uncomfortable for me, and then how I navigated around. So it ends with a success and a win. But it took a little bit to get there, I'm not gonna lie. A little bit of rumination, a little bit of Beating myself up. I did a couple of things I thought I wasn't really doing anymore. You know, our brain doesn't just magically never, you know, there's no perfect. So it's helpful to always keep that mindset of acknowledging progress. So I'm going to talk about that and share some strategies that I'm using and you might explore for yourself for when it happens. But I'm going to start with A quote from Dr. William Dotson, who always says with ADHD is not a disorder of knowing what to do. It's a disorder of doing what we know. And so I, I am completely owning my mistake was absolutely avoidable. I went into it eyes wide open, fully hoping everything would just work out. Yeah. And taking, you know, kind of gambling, just taking my chances. And it didn't. And so then I was in full beating myself up. Okay, so here's the setup. I had my annual schedule, my annual physical schedule this past Monday. So two days ago, as I'm recording this, I had to schedule it for 12pm and I have to fast before. This was on a Monday. I never schedule appointments on a Monday if I can avoid it because it's really hard for me to remember, it throws me off. And I would never schedule a physical at 12. If you have to fast. If I have to fast. But I chose this day and time. I did this because when I made the appointment, I had to, I had to change it. It was originally in the morning, but the morning that it was, I have a client. It felt like it would be a lot of effort to move these. It was like a Thursday morning at like 8:20, which would have been perfect except I had like three clients in a row and it would have been a lot of effort to try to move them when it was scheduled. So even though I had like a couple of months, I could have done this. I decided it would be easier just to move it. And my doctor is very booked up. So this was the one opening they had before my appointment, which was also not scheduled until like March. And I didn't want to wait till March, which I know when this comes out, it's March, but I'm recording that's the end of February. So I know because I intermittent fast, which means I stopped eating around 1:30 the day before. Waiting until 12 noon was really hard for me. So last week leading up to it, I kept thinking I should probably call the doctor and confirm that I can go to the lab beforehand and just have my blood drawn and then I can go eat and Then I can go back to the doctor. No worries. I can do that. And that was my plan. I'm just going to go and have my lab work done Monday morning so I can eat and then I'll go back to my appointment later on, which would be a hassle, but not as much of a hassle as trying not to. Yeah. And so I kept thinking in the back of my brain, you should probably call and confirm that the lab orders are there so that they can draw your blood for what your annual physical things are. I also knew in the back of my head because you know how much I hate phone calls. I've shared this. I could probably message it through the portal, but I wasn't sure they see it, that they would see it, that I'd remember to go back and look at it. And I just felt like if I'm going to do anything, I should just call. I don't know. This was all happening in my head, guys. Things don't typically go well when I'm problem solving like that. Just in my head, especially around something I know I'm kind of avoiding is, which is I don't want to reach out at all. I just want to get this done. Yeah. And I know to rescheduling isn't an option because it takes so long to get in with her. I'd have to wait six more months. So I didn't do anything and just hope for the best for Monday morning. So I took that chance. And Monday morning I wait till 8am I now have a hunger headache because I always eat by 7, 7:30. Well, because you get up early. I get up early. And somehow because my brain knew I wouldn't be eating, I swear I got a hunger headache at like 6:45, which is ridiculous because I never eat. Like I'd be fine. Yeah. But I was just like anticipating. I can't eat. Yeah, it was ridiculous. But I waited till 8 until the lab or until the office opened and I called to see if the orders were sent down already because I was just going to go in and get my labs drawn so I could eat. And they told me that my doctor was off that morning, it wouldn't be until noon and that no, they could look in and see the lab orders were not sent down. So I was like, that's not going to work. And they're like, well, you could just reschedule. No, darling, you can come in for the physical, but you can get. You just have to come back and get your labs done another day after you fasted if you're going to eat before then. So that's what I did. Yeah, I was starving and I ate like the, the worst breakfast. I literally went. Because again I. I was starving. I went to my default mode. What's the fastest, easiest thing? I grabbed the kids box of Reese's puffs, had the best friggin breakfast I've had in months. It was, it was. I. I cheated myself for my mistake. Anyway, I digress. That wasn't something I was planning to say. Okay, so I know your appointment. Well, there's no appointment for the lab. You just go in. Okay. So I go to my physical and I'm really beating myself up. I'm irritated that I can't get it all done. I was setting myself up all week. Like I watched what I ate all weekend knowing I was having labs drawn, knowing I was going to get weight. Like all of these things. Yeah. Oh yeah. And I ate the Reese's Pops, which I'm like, I'm not have my lobster on anytime soon because I'm going to have a sugar coursing through my body for a while now because it was like sugar high but it was completely unavoidable. So now I'm aware I'm going to have to come back and get this done again this week. Now I had my hair appointment this week. I had my nail appointment this week. Deep green. Yeah. I Love that for St. Patrick's Day. Love it. I have my mammogram tomorrow. So I have yester. Last week was the week of social engagement. Super fun. This week, the week of. Oh my gosh. I love getting all the medical things checked off. They're all my annual thing. Not, not my hair and my nails but they were more appointments on top of one week. Yeah. And so at lab, physical, mammogram, nails here, five appointments this week. And I ended up just really beating myself up for making it harder on myself when I knew all along this was not going to work if I couldn't go get the labs done first thing. And I didn't just make the phone call, which I know I have a hard time with. But then I didn't just go on the portal and try that just in case it works. And I paid the price. Yeah. So here's the thing. Beating myself up didn't solve the problem. Didn't make the lab orders appear. It didn't make the inconvenience disappear. It just made me feel worse. Yeah. So I had my nail appointment scheduled for after my physical. Oh, I didn't Say I also scheduled swimming laps after my physical. So I was going to go to the physical at 12, swim laps at 2, and then go get my nails done at 3. And even my husband was like, he saw my schedule. He's like, are you doing all of those? And I'm like, yeah. I just wanted everything checked off. I wanted to get home after my nails were done and be like, did it. I did it. I would. I was like, I hate my physical. I dread it for months. So this had like a disproportionate impact on my energy. So I realized I couldn't do anything about it. So. So this is before I got to the doctor. I just started working in the morning. I was like, well, I'm just gonna, you know, my, my day is open. Yeah, I'm not driving to the lab, so I'm just gonna go ahead and, and do things I had scheduled. But my brain was st starting to ruminate about the negative impact of not going and how I was still gonna have to find time to go. And I have to go first thing in the morning because I, you know, I have 8am clients all morning every day this week, including Friday. So I'm like. She's like, you can be on a Saturday. I'm like, because they do open at seven at the lab, no appointments. So I'm like, that's tight. That's gonna make me really stressed to try to get in. So I've got all this swirling in my head and I'm at my desk and I'm realizing I'm getting nothing done. I just keep staring at what I'm trying to do and nothing's happening. So I call my nail place and I was like, good morning. I was curious if I could come in at 10:30 instead of 3 because then I can get my nails done and then go right to my physical. And I canceled the swim lapse because I had a splitting headache from not eating right, which sounds ridiculous, but. No, it does. I had. And because you're not eating your normal breakfast in the stress of what I created for myself. So I was like, I'm going to give myself a little self care and take the swim laps off because that was just too big of an expectation and move my nail appointment. And here was the weird thing. Going to get my nails done, which you know I don't love, right? I love them done. I don't love the process, but getting that done. Now my nails are pretty so I'm not tolerating the grown out shipped gross broken three Week old. Yeah. Nails. And I go to my doctor's office. I get there plenty of time. Because I did the math about how long my nails would take and how long. I looked it up on ways to see from the nail place, which is, you know, a different location. Is it further? I'm still not aware of where I am in space here. Is it further? Is it, you know, how long will it take me to get from point A to point B? It worked perfectly. I was still there 15 minutes early. Nice. I was able to sit calmly and breathe in the waiting room and really calm my brain. That when the doctor came in to see me and she said, how are we doing today? I said, great. Like, I was like, I'm doing great. And she was like, like, she was like, stunning. I mind you, I was her first patient of the day, but she was like, great. I like that. I'm like, I do too. And I was like, I'm like, I, I, I just started turning it around and I realized it was the getting into action, which is what really helps when we start getting our brain spiral going. Yeah. It was doing something that was moving me forward, which was go getting my nails. And it wasn't as productive as getting this up at my desk done, but. But I knew I can come back and I could work on that in the afternoon if I freed up the time from not going to some laps. So I did all of that and I still made it to my book club that night. And I ended up not happy, but tolerating the inconvenience I created for myself because I got into action instead of just sitting at my desk and trying to push myself through. I always talk with my, especially my, my college students about this. I'm like, if you are sitting at your desk not productive for like 20 minutes, yeah, step away. It's not going to help to keep trying to force yourself to take in more information or, like, pressure. Like, I just have to get this down. If you're, if you're hitting a wall, step away, get some energy going, come back. But trying to push through is not the way to make it work for you. So the most important thing that I'm taking away now is that I wanted to support future me to not do this again next year. So I thought about what would I do to improve this for next year. So what I did was I scheduled next year's physical. When I checked out, I asked, I said, can I go ahead and schedule next year? I got an 8 20, which I know is the early essential Schedule. I asked for the labs to be requested a week before so I could even go like before the doctor's appointment if I wanted to and have it done. Or they could be there the morning of and I can get it done the morning of if I wanted to. But I was like, could I just have them sent out? And they were like, no, they're like, but you can request it a week before. So I put a reminder in my calendar to request it a week before with the note reminding me of what happened when I didn't request the labs. They are not automatically sent down. I don't know why they're not automatically sent down, but they're not. It would be lovely, but I don't have to rely on my working memory. I don't have to rely on my year from now future self to remember the experience. Even though right now I can't imagine I won't. I know that's not how my brain works. So I have the structure in place to support my future self with the early physical time and the reminder a week before to request the lab work be sent down so I can get it done. So recovery from making an avoidable mistake with ADHD has a few components. That's what I'm going to just distill it down. Right now it's adjusting your mindset from I never am going to make these mistakes again to recovering faster when you do make these mistakes. We have lots of patterns of repeating the same mistakes over and over. That's kind of a hallmark of ADHD brain wiring. It's shortening the amount of time we spend beating ourself up for them and getting back on the horse and continuing to move forward. It's my little dory, just keep swimming, just keep moving forward because that's all. We can't go back and change the past. We can change what we're doing from this point forward. The second is to shift from self attack to self support. So if you remember, I was beating myself up and I was like, okay, I'm not getting anything done. Let's call it. Yeah. And I can support myself by moving the manicure appointment to earlier, canceling the swim laps and just going in my nails done, getting the manicure or the physical and then coming back and working in the afternoon to get the things done that I wasn't able to focus on and recognize. We will still make these mistakes. The more we're aware of our patterns will make them less frequently and the goal is to recover faster. So ADHD is about being Perfect. It's recognizing every mistake is an opportunity to learn more about what our patterns are and how to work better with our brain and building those systems that support us. Especially when the things that we're trying to do don't get done the way that we were hoping them to or that we gambled would happen and they didn't work out that way. So couple of quick breakdown. Just want to highlight the first interrupt that shame spiral immediately. Don't let yourself stay in the muck. Yeah, get yourself out of that. So instead of I can't believe I did this again or I should have known better, I should have listened to myself, whatever that that mantra is, shift it to, okay, this is just a moment. This is not who I am. Because I did go a little bit to the identifying myself as that person who did that just a little bit. But I still have that in me, apparently. And well, I know I do, but I more than I was happy with. And so shifting it to this isn't about who I am. That's not who I am. It's about noticing that didn't work for me the way I would want it to. So what can I do next time? Remember, our shame will shut down. Our executive functions are moving forward and looking to problem solve and figure out what will work better. Connects to them moving into repair mode quickly. So that gets us into action and it reduces that emotional load because we're doing something about how we're stuck accepting the reality, not trying to rationalize or argue with it. It's like, oh, fine, well, I didn't. So let's move on. What do we do now? Look for the lesson without focusing on the shame. So just, yeah, okay, that didn't, that didn't work out. Would have maybe been lovely if the orders were called in and everything would have been like, I knew I didn't need to call. But that still wouldn't have been true because it still would have taken away some of the stress I felt all weekend worrying, will the orders be there? Right. I hope they're there and then the doctor's not even there all day to do it. And then the final bonus is it helps to rebuild trust with yourself to have one small win. So that just taking a step forward, making a decision that supports you having something that helps you to not repeat it can really boost up your self esteem and your self worth and how you perceive yourself. Because now you have structure to support you the next time around. All right. Becca's like, all right, so now for our book of the week this was a good capital G book Culpability it's by Bruce Housinger. I gave this four out of five stars. It is about a car crash involving a self driving vehicle that is driven by a 17 year old boy, dad in the passenger seat, mom and younger sister in the backseat. They have a collision with another vehicle driven by two retired grandparents who had just left a family gathering and they both die their grandparents. And so it gets into the culpability of who's at Fault? Is it AI? Is it the 17 year old, is it the dad who's technically the supervising driver in the front seat? It brings up a lot of questions, a lot of like how do I see this and how much is this defining and how that the impact of the older couple and all of the, it brings up all the, all the different ways AI is programmed. That was really uncomfortable and really thought provoking. So is it a new book? It's a new book. I think it's. It was an Oprah 2025 so last year. Really, really good. And then my quote for the week. Gonna say it again? Oh, I think I said it was Dotson. It's. It's Russell BARKLEY. I apologize, Mr. Barkley or Dr. Barkley. I gave this to Dr. Dotson at the beginning of the podcast. ADHD is not a disorder of knowing what to do. It is a disorder of doing what you know. And I read that because I saw him at a conference when he literally said that and I can picture his face with this white distinguished beard, like saying it very. He reminds me of like Sean Connery kind of ask in his. The way his beard is. But anyway, it's really about acknowledging if you're not doing the thing you know you need to do, what would you need to do it instead of judging yourself for not doing it? That's it for this episode 229. Any comments, anything you try from this episode you want to share, post in the comments for this episode 229. That's it for today and this episode. Until next time. Tally ho, Sam.