The Emotional Side of ADHD with Dr. Tamara Rosier (Part 2)

Summary

Podcast Summary: Laugh Lines with Kim & Penn Holderness

Episode: The Emotional Side of ADHD with Dr. Tamara Rosier (Part 2)

Air Date: March 10, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this episode of Laugh Lines, Kim and Penn Holderness welcome Dr. Tamara Rosier—licensed clinical counselor, ADHD expert, and author—for a deep dive into the often-overlooked emotional side of ADHD. The conversation centers on why emotions feel so “big” for those with ADHD, how these dynamics play out in families, strategies for parenting ADHD kids, navigating young adulthood, and overcoming issues like perfectionism and shame. The tone is a mix of humor, heartfelt honesty, and practical wisdom, with memorable metaphors and relatable advice for anyone touched by ADHD.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Understanding the Emotional Side of ADHD

• Neurological Basis for "Big Feelings"

  • Dr. Rosier explains that ADHD is a “neurological difference, not a disorder” (07:22), with unique brain wiring—specifically, a prefrontal cortex that has trouble regulating impulses and working memory.
  • “If you cup your ear, this is about where the limbic center is... that's the place the amygdala hides... in charge of fight, flight, freeze, or fawn. If you watch a lot of ADHD people, they're relying on that part of their brain. They have quicker eye movements, and they're looking for danger.” — Dr. Tamara Rosier (08:02)
  • ADHDers tend to process emotions more intensely and rely on emotional ‘operating systems’ rather than problem-solving logic when not regulated.

• Emotional Dysregulation in Daily Life

  • “How does that end up with me getting really overwhelmingly upset and crying—like when I’m sixteen, when I should have stopped doing that when I was eight?”
    — Penn Holderness (09:29)
  • Dr. Rosier: In ADHD brains, without medication or management, the logical self-soothing circuit from the prefrontal cortex doesn’t ‘kick on’, leaving people to ruminate in strong feelings.

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2. Recognizing ADHD—Especially in Women

• Hidden ADHD and Female Experiences

  • Many women are initially misdiagnosed with anxiety rather than ADHD due to cultural expectations and the tendency for females to ‘hold it all together’ (13:05).
  • “Women are just bosses, like, they’re incredible, and yet every day they kind of feel ashamed because they know they’re a fraud...and they’re not a fraud. They have a different brain and they’re trying to pretend they don’t.”
    — Dr. Tamara Rosier (13:42)
  • Kim notes she was told she had anxiety and was medicated for it before discovering ADHD; Dr. Rosier highlights that anxiety often acts as a motivator—but isn’t always a full ‘disorder’. (15:05)

• Time Distortion vs. Time Blindness

  • Kim: “I’m chronically early... I don’t know how long things take...”
    — Kim Holderness (14:12)
  • Dr. Rosier: Some with ADHD become “early” due to anxiety compensating for their time-distorted brains—solving internal fear by overcorrecting.

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3. ADHD Within the Family System

• Heritability and the "ADHD Home"

  • ADHD is highly hereditary; if one or both parents have it, odds dramatically increase for children (16:56).
  • Dr. Rosier recommends making the home an “ADHD-friendly place” where symptoms and needs can be openly discussed without shame.

• The Swimming Pool Analogy

  • “Everyone has a swimming pool, and the swimming pool is filled with your biggest emotions... People without ADHD don’t have a lifeguard on duty, and we don’t have a fence around the pool...”
    — Dr. Tamara Rosier (18:02)
  • Practice “pool proximity”—track how close any family member is to an emotional meltdown, debrief after upsets, and avoid shaming, focusing instead on growth and self-recovery (19:41).
  • Family members may also act as “pool shovers” or the ones who drag others into the emotional “pool.”

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4. Metaphors for the ADHD Experience

• Dr. Rosier encourages clients to develop personal metaphors for their ADHD—examples include:

  • “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie” mouse (21:31)
  • A lizard seeking sunlight (21:35)
  • Toilet paper stuck to your foot—“It’s embarrassing and I hate it...”
  • Little elves constantly distracting you (Kim’s metaphor, 24:11)
  • Peter Pan (Penn’s metaphor, 26:37): “I want to go flying out the window...and I have trouble growing up, and it’s taking me longer than other people.”

• Metaphors can start negative but become empowering with coaching.

  • “Mostly they start there, but then we redeem them. Peter Pan is a great quality, and you know when to bring Peter Pan out.”
    — Dr. Tamara Rosier (28:34)
  • Emphasis on transforming self-shame into understanding and self-acceptance.

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5. Parenting & Coaching ADHD Kids and Teens

• Delayed Emotional Development

  • ADHD kids and adults may have a “protracted adolescence,” emotionally lagging 5-7 years behind peers (27:41).
  • Pandemic disruptions (“Covid blanket messed everyone up,” 29:13) have compounded struggles for Gen Z and Gen Alpha, making their transitions into adulthood even more complex.

• Dialogue and Listening Over Directives

  • Teens often say: “I guess I’ll just try harder.”
    — (33:38)
  • Dr. Rosier: Instead of commanding, ask probing questions and listen—“What do you think you’re going to do?”—to encourage agency and insight.
  • “Every adolescent I’ve ever worked with... wants to be listened to. This doesn’t change generationally. They don’t want to be talked to. They want to be listened to.”
    — Dr. Tamara Rosier (35:08)

• Navigating Rejection Sensitivity (RSD) and Feedback

  • Kids with ADHD may experience profound pain from criticism, making correction tricky.
  • “We have to, like, really hit the safety hard. Yeah, you’re safe.” (38:05)
  • Use “debriefs” instead of lectures; ask the child for their account first, then gently explore alternatives and next steps (40:05).

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6. Launching Young Adults & Parental Scaffolding

• Gradual Transfer of Responsibility

  • Many parents over-scaffold for their ADHD children, unintentionally hindering independence.
  • Dr. Rosier’s advice: Move conversations out of the home, offer gradual independence, and be explicit in explaining when and how parental support will change (53:05).
  • “Let's start to talk about what things should we turn over when. It's this gradual...turning things over. I'm not cutting you off. I'm here for you."
    — Dr. Tamara Rosier (53:06)
  • If kids are resistant, use boundaries (not doing their laundry, letting natural consequences occur).

• Coaching vs. Over-Support

  • ADHD coaching or therapy is not “doing too much”—it’s providing the right kind of support vehicle toward independence (55:09).

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7. Managing Reminders & Building Agency

• Instead of repeatedly instructing, prompt with, “Walk me through your plan for tomorrow,” to empower self-reliance (56:09).

• Allow for natural consequences in non-dangerous scenarios, like missing a test due to lack of alarm without rescuing.

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8. Widening the Window of Tolerance

• The “Window of Tolerance” Metaphor:
  • ADHDers often have a narrow ‘window’ between overwhelm (fight/flight) and shutdown (freeze).
  • “The goal is to widen it... If the child is totally shut down...that’s when we step in. But struggle is how we know how to learn.” — Dr. Tamara Rosier (58:13)

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9. Perfectionism and ADHD

• Many ADHDers are “recovering perfectionists”—a trait Dr. Rosier highlights as common but often unrecognized in themselves.
  • “If you’re a true perfectionist, you probably just said, I can’t be one because I’ve never done anything right in my life.”
    — Dr. Tamara Rosier (60:17)
  • Perfectionism becomes an emotion itself, fueling shame when the impossibly high bar isn’t met.
  • “Because we don’t know when done is done... we wake up every day unemployed.”
    — Penn Holderness (62:01)
  • “Potential” can be a harmful word, feeding this cycle in “twice exceptional” (high IQ + ADHD) individuals.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “You are a very fun person... there’s videos of you cracking yourself up, and you guys are just like two squirrels playing in a park. And that’s lovely.”
  — Dr. Tamara Rosier to Kim & Penn (11:23)

• “I'm not here [anymore]. Now we're good. I don't knock [my ADHD self] out anymore. We negotiate differently.”
  — Dr. Tamara Rosier (23:56), on her earlier self-loathing and current self-compassion

• Laugh-out-loud moment:

  • “I think I’m sleeping with your friend.” — Penn to Kim in riff on meta-discussion about parental overhelping (36:36, 56:36)

• Metaphor magic:

  • “Little elves just throwing out distractions all day long... I just thought that's what every woman's brain does.”
    — Kim Holderness (24:11)
  • “Mine’s Peter Pan... I have trouble growing up.”
    — Penn Holderness (26:37)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 07:15 — Neurobiology of ADHD emotions ("nerd out" on brain function)
• 13:05 — Why ADHD is often missed in women; anxiety vs ADHD
• 16:56 — Heritability and making the home "ADHD friendly"
• 18:02 — The swimming pool metaphor for emotions in ADHD families
• 21:13 — Power of personalized ADHD metaphors
• 27:41 — Emotional development lag and the Peter Pan metaphor
• 33:38 — Why "just try harder" doesn't work in ADHD
• 35:08 — Importance of listening to ADHD teens
• 38:05 — Handling feedback and rejection sensitivity
• 53:06 — How to gradually hand over responsibility to young adults
• 56:09 — Transitioning from reminders to prompting agency in young adults
• 58:13 — The window of tolerance and learning resilience
• 60:17 — Perfectionism as an emotional component of ADHD

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Resources & Where to Find Dr. Tamara Rosier

• Website: TamaraRosier.com
• ADHD Center of West Michigan: miadhd.com
• Books:
  • Your Brain's Not Broken
  • You, Me and Our ADHD Family

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Laugh Lines continues delivering expert insight and comedic warmth, making this essential listening for ADHD families, educators, and anyone craving self-compassion and actionable advice.

Transcript

[Penn Holderness]

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[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Okay, Peloton, let's go. That's the new Peloton Cross training Tread plus.

[Kim Holderness]

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[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Built for breakthroughs with real time insights and endless ways to move. Keep your chest lifted. That's Peloton iq, helping you lift smarter, train safer and move with confidence.

[Kim Holderness]

With strength, yoga, pilates and personalized guidance,

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

this is the future of fitness. Let yourself run, lift, flow and go. Head to onepelaton.com to learn more about the cross training TREAD plus terms apply. Okay, I have to tell you, I was just looking on ebay where I go for all kinds of things I love. And there it was.

[Penn Holderness]

That hologram trading card. One of the rarest. The last one I needed for my set.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Shiny like the designer handbag of my dreams. One of a kind. Ebay had it.

[Kim Holderness]

And now everyone's asking, ooh, where'd you

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

get your windshield wipers? Ebay has all the parts that fit my car.

[Penn Holderness]

No more annoying, just beautiful.

[Kim Holderness]

Millions of finds, each with a story.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

EBay, things people love.

[Penn Holderness]

So we'd like to officially welcome the Tamster.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

No, I'm sorry.

[Penn Holderness]

No, no.

[Kim Holderness]

I just thought that's what every woman's brain does. Yep.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And that's what happens when two ADHD people meet. When we're both not in a dysregulated state. We're two squirrels having fun.

[Penn Holderness]

Kim, I have to make a confession. I think I'm sleeping with your friend.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Oh, dear. I didn't know this was scraping expose.

[Penn Holderness]

Every day got more wrinkles.

[Kim Holderness]

That's okay.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yeah, we're laughing.

[Penn Holderness]

When we age, life is like a comedy stage. And that's why we got laugh lines.

[Kim Holderness]

Hi, I'm Kim Holderness.

[Penn Holderness]

And I'm Penn Oros. And you are watching laugh lines or listening?

[Kim Holderness]

I don't want to exclude the people who are.

[Penn Holderness]

You are on laugh lines. We're on laugh lines. You're here for the best intro I've ever done.

[Kim Holderness]

Okay.

[Penn Holderness]

Sorry.

[Kim Holderness]

If you have ever used a mood ring to determine your mood, your home, we are your people.

[Penn Holderness]

Can I tell you something?

[Kim Holderness]

What?

[Penn Holderness]

I didn't know what a mood ring was until, like, midway through college. I don't know how I missed that, but. And then. And then someone made that same face at me. Like, how do you not know what this is? Was that primarily a female thing or.

[Kim Holderness]

Maybe. Maybe. Yeah. Did you ever have the shirts that changed colors? Like. Yeah. Yes. Those were.

[Penn Holderness]

Same technology.

[Kim Holderness]

Rough. It's like a temperature thing.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yeah.

[Kim Holderness]

Nothing to do with. I mean, I lived in Florida, so it was always, like, red because it was always. Anywho, if you listened last week, it was a big episode. I talked about my ADHD diagnosis and it was a big deal.

[Penn Holderness]

And I was so proud of you and you were so awesome and you were going to change so many lives.

[Kim Holderness]

You were so sweet to say that, but I don't know how many. Like, the lives changing thing, I think is a bit dramatic, but I thank

[Penn Holderness]

you if you did watch or listen to that. Um, I. I wanted to be. I wanted to affirm everything that you're doing, and I wanted to try to help explain as someone who's had and been aware of having ADHD for a long time, like, to. To kind of ease you into the club, because it's a great club. But I think that this next guest that we're going to bring on is gonna do an even better job because it's like her job to do this.

[Kim Holderness]

Today we are talking about the emotional side of ADHD with Dr. Tamara Rosier. She's gonna be in the studio, but first it is the laugh lines. So let's head to the laugh line.

[Penn Holderness]

Call us up and you tell us what's on your mind.

[Kim Holderness]

Hi, this is Carla from Portland, Oregon, and I'm currently sitting on a plane parked at the gate, and I wanted to call in about a couple things. I just discovered that the Smokey Robinson lyrics are not second hand emotion, but I second that emotion. Holy cow. Couple decades later and I get clarity on that. I've always wondered what a secondhand emotion is. Hold on a second. It is not secondhand emotion. That's.

[Penn Holderness]

Wait, you think that's what it is? I second that emotion. You thought it was second hand emotion.

[Kim Holderness]

It's been a minute since I've heard this song, but I would have agreed that it was secondhand emotion.

[Penn Holderness]

Like, quick, quick background here. Carla. Carla's calling and telling us this because we famously have gotten these wrong.

[Kim Holderness]

Yes. For a very done pieces about famous,

[Penn Holderness]

like for song for a very long time. That's the song I'm thinking about, right?

[Kim Holderness]

Yes.

[Penn Holderness]

You think that Loving me is a lifetime of devotion. Maybe a second hand him. What is this? What would a second hand emotion be?

[Kim Holderness]

It is not for me to know.

[Penn Holderness]

You know what it is.

[Kim Holderness]

It is not for me to know.

[Penn Holderness]

Honestly. Here's why you think it. You're basically constantly dealing with secondhand emotions. I am an empath. As an empath, when someone else is

[Kim Holderness]

suffering, you are feeling a secondhand emotion. Truly.

[Penn Holderness]

Maybe it should be called that.

[Kim Holderness]

I'm telling you. Yeah. That is how I live my life.

[Penn Holderness]

You are the queen of secondhand emotion.

[Kim Holderness]

I am just never the Internet shop of emotions. Okay, let's get to our guest, Dr. Tamara Rosier. She's a licensed clinical professional counselor and nationally recognized ADHD expert. She's the founder of the ADHD center of West Michigan and author of two books, you, Brain's Not Broken and you'd Me and our ADHD Family.

[Penn Holderness]

With more than two decades of experience working with children, teens, adults, and couples impacted by ADHD, Dr. Rozier specializes in the emotional side of executive function challenges, particularly shame, rejection, sensitivity, and emotional dysregulation. She's known for translating complex brain science into accessible, actionable strategies. And some great metaphors as well that help people move from self criticism to self understanding. So we'd like to officially welcome the Tamster. I'm sorry, no, no, Tamara. To our podcast. We, like. I feel like I already know you. As we were catching up, you said that one of your nicknames was Tamster.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yeah, I'm not giving permission to everyone.

[Kim Holderness]

No.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Right, right. It's a secret club, really.

[Kim Holderness]

But it's Dr. Tamra.

[Penn Holderness]

Dr. Tamster.

[Kim Holderness]

Doctor.

[Penn Holderness]

I'm sorry. Like, listen, I, like, I'm, I'm. I'm trying to do an icebreaker. We are in awe of you and have absolutely. No, I'm serious. Like, you have, like, your, Your book is good. You in person are great. Like, just the ability to kind of put a. A face and a voice with some of your philosophy, I think is. It could not come at a better time for us.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Thank you.

[Kim Holderness]

And we really want to focus today on the emotions and the emotional side of adhd, because I. I don't think that's talked about enough. I don't think we know enough about it. Yes. So is there a neurological reason that ADHDers feel things so big?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Why, yes, there is. I'm glad you asked. So I'm going to nerd out just for a second, but I'll come right back to you. Okay?

[Penn Holderness]

You can nerd out as long as

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

you want on this Podcast ADHD is a neurological difference, and this is hotly debated. I'm going to die on this hill. Neurological difference. I don't think it's a disorder, and it's not because I'm shy about it. I know the pain of having adhd, okay? I lose things daily. I spend half my time just looking for things, Right? So it's a difference, which means our brains operate differently. So if you think of the prefrontal cortex, that's right behind your forehead, and when I talk to people, I say, tap on your forehead. And I see audiences tap on their forehead just like you guys did. Okay. That prefrontal cortex is this modern amenity that says, okay, you parked here. Go into Target and return to this spot. Except when you have adhd, your prefrontal cortex and the short term in working memory, it's like, no, the whiteboard's too full for that, so it just erases. And so in the prefrontal cortex, we have short term memory, working memory. A lot of our motivation is there remembering to plan ahead. Right now, some of my clients will plan ahead, but they do it out of fear, and we can get there. So we tend to rely on a different part of the brain. And if you cup your ear, this is about where the limbic center is. Thank you. This is about where the limbic center is. In the limbic center is the place the amygdala hides in it. And that's in charge of fight, flight, freeze, or fawn. If you watch a lot of ADHD people, they're relying on that part of their brain. They have quicker eye movements, and they're looking for danger. That amygdala sends out signals, and then we interpret that through emotions. And so we'll get into it more. But that's. Our brains have the same operating system, but we use it very differently. Okay, did that all make sense?

[Penn Holderness]

Yes. But how does that end up with me getting really overwhelmingly upset and crying? Like when I'm 16, when I should have stopped doing that when I was 8.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Or me almost yesterday.

[Penn Holderness]

Yeah.

[Kim Holderness]

Or me this morning. Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Okay. All right. So as long as you're being real, like, let's take a neurotypical person. Okay. They go, doo, doo, doo, Oops, I've hit some. I've hit a little bump in the road. Ah, this is really bothersome for me. The mate is like, oh, I'm mad. And then the prefrontal cortex steps in and says, don't worry, you can plan your way out of this. You've got this. You can problem solve in the ADHD brain unless you're medicated. That prefrontal cortex doesn't really kick on.

[Penn Holderness]

Okay.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And it doesn't say, hey, let's go to problem solving. It kind of ruminates in the.

[Kim Holderness]

Ugh.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

I'm really mad about this. I have a big emotion, and so big emotions are really the thing we should be talking about with adhd.

[Kim Holderness]

So I am new to the club, and you walked in, and you're like, there were signs. So we just met, but obviously I've been around on the Internet, so what gave me away? What did you notice that I didn't?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

So, first of all, I want you to understand something. None of this is like, we were keeping a big secret from you.

[Kim Holderness]

No, I know. I know.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Because we have to respect the individual. And when my clients get diagnosed, they're like, oh, my whole family has this. I'm like, this is not your business to be going. You have adhd. You have adhd. So none of us were sitting back judging, like, ugh, okay. Totally safe. 1. You are a very fun person. I've seen all your videos, and there's. There's videos of you cracking yourself up, and you guys are just like two squirrels playing in a park. And that's lovely, right?

[Penn Holderness]

No, we really like that. That we are two squirrels playing in a park.

[Kim Holderness]

Yes.

[Penn Holderness]

Yeah.

[Kim Holderness]

And.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And that's what happens when two ADHD people kind of meet, when we're both, like, not in a dysregulated state. We're two squirrels having fun. We have this kinship, like, oh, I get how your brain works. And so a lot of us were watching you going, I get how her brain works. I could also see the burden of being a female. And so female adhd, we have not as wide of a range for behavior. You're expected to keep the house going. You're expected to be rational and just hold everything together. So what women tend to do is they get diagnosed with adhd. And something else I know about you is you're very smart. And I'm not saying that to be nice. I'm saying that because smart women can kind of hide and go. Yeah, I'm just hiding. Yep. I get Penn. He's great. And I don't know why I can understand him so well, but I can. And you can just kind of hold it all together. And a lot of us just saw you holding it all together in a very heroic way.

[Kim Holderness]

Well, you're kind to say that. So I was told very early that it was anxiety, and I have. I'M sure a lot of women hear that and maybe even medicated for anxiety, and they're wondering, like, why things aren't getting better. Why is it that women early on, or even teenage girls are there diagnosed with anxiety and not adhd?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

You know, ADHD is still a naughty boy disease. And it's okay to be a male with adhd, but that's why I kind of prefaced it like, hey, we're safe, we're good. Right? Because there's still kind of a shame for a female to have adhd because we're supposed to hold it together. I work with so many intelligent women who just are bosses. Like, they're incredible, and yet every day they kind of feel ashamed because they know they're a fraud and they're not a fraud. They have a different brain and they're trying to pretend they don't.

[Kim Holderness]

It's exhausting.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yes.

[Kim Holderness]

Like the fatigue. And you write about that a lot, too. And it was really eye opening reading your books because you used the term time distortion as opposed to time blindness. I don't know how long things take, but I'm chronically early for things because I don't know how long things take. So adhd, you're like, oh, I'm just gonna be late. And like, things are flying apart. Cause I don't know how to manage my time. I'm the opposite.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Right. Let's. Can we go through?

[Kim Holderness]

Why, yes, please.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Okay, so you know that prefrontal cortex, that's where time is stored? Like, that's like an internal watch going, okay, 15 minutes have passed. And by the way, we could be here two days and I wouldn't understand the difference. Cause I like this. Right? Things that are fun go faster. Things that are boring go slowly. And so this part isn't working. So you're like, that's okay. I'll solve the problem. I'll use my amygdala to freak myself out, make myself arrive on time. Yeah. And you're looking around to your family going, well, these numbskulls aren't going to freak out. So I'll freak out for everyone.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah, that's helpful, right? When I freak out for you on the way to the airport.

[Penn Holderness]

Sometimes unnecessarily, but yeah.

[Kim Holderness]

But I thought because I was early to things that I. That's. That can't be adhd.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Right. So I do have a whole group of clients who show up early, and if they show up early, there's anxiety driving that.

[Kim Holderness]

Yes.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

So if you're in my office 10 minutes before an appointment, I'm like, oh, we're dealing with serious anxiety here too. But in this case, the anxiety is the motivator.

[Kim Holderness]

It's

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

might not be generalized anxiety disorder. It might not be. Yeah, it might just be, hey, I'm trying to harness this brain to get it to do what I want.

[Penn Holderness]

You can be anxious and not have anxiety disorder. You can have obsessive compulsions and not have ocd. It's when it becomes like, when it affects you and people around you that you have to be diagnosed with it. Right?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yes.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And that's. So you set up an environment for yourself that was safe enough for you to keep moving and not needing a diagnosis immediately. It may have helped you, but a lot of women are just suffering so deeply because, like, I work with an accountant. Accountant who has adhd. She's good with numbers. And so everyone's. Yeah, so everyone's like, yeah, go into being an accountant. She's like, I hate my job. I just passed folders around all day. She goes, this is stupid. But she was good at math.

[Penn Holderness]

Yeah.

[Kim Holderness]

I mean, that's. That's. Oh, that's a different podcast about how. Yeah. How we follow things because we're good at it. Okay, let's back up. Yep. Kids. And you know, you talk a lot about family systems, children with adhd. Like you said, it's a naughty boy, you know, diagnosis. So we're. The image we are that is being projected is like the. The kid who's bouncing off the walls. Right. But it doesn't always look like that. What are some of the emotional things that could be cues? And also, as parents, how can we help our kids kind of harness this?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Okay.

[Kim Holderness]

Okay.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Love this. All right, first of all, let's talk basic hereditary. It runs in families. So I'm sure you guys have run some numbers lately. Like, if a dad has adhd, the odds of his offspring each have. Now the numbers change, but between 70 and 80% likelihood. Yeah. Right. Moms. I've seen 50%. Other studies put it a little bit

[Penn Holderness]

higher, but you can't tell because they don't get diagnosed enough.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Right, Right. Because we're hot. We're trying to hide it. Right. And so if it. If two parents have it, though, I usually say, hey, let's just play it on an EDC home.

[Penn Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And so we want to make this an ADHD friendly place. So we want to put things in place where we all know we have adhd. We talk about the symptoms. We don't use them as excuses. We're safe. This is a safe place. But we all need to understand our emotions. So here's the metaphor that I use, and it sounds like you've read my books. Thank you.

[Kim Holderness]

I did, of course.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

What a good student you are.

[Kim Holderness]

I mean, you came here, got to read your books. Yes.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Well, that was very nice. So you read about this? It's the swimming pool analogy. And the swimming pool analogy is when I work with families, I say, everyone has a swimming pool, and the swimming pool is filled with your biggest emotions. They're just great big emotions. So it could be big joy. Like, I cry at. Like, if someone says, I'm having a baby, I'm like, that's beautiful. I have a big emotion of joy. Okay. Sometimes I have big emotions of anger over something that's really dumb. Like, it's too hot in my car today.

[Kim Holderness]

Right.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And so I have to acknowledge that that swimming pool has all the big emotions in it. Now, people without ADHD don't have a lifeguard on duty, and we don't have a fence around the pool, which means we're just going through our day, do, do, do. And we trip and fall into that pool. So in families, we need to practice pool proximity. In other words, we just. How close are you to the pool right now? Now, in families, we also have to know. And you guys have kids.

[Kim Holderness]

So you.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

You see this happen. You're gonna have a pool shover somewhere in there. And the pool shover is the family member who looks and goes, she's pretty close to the pool today. One little push is gonna pop her into the pool. She pops into the pool, right? And now she's flailing around. You're also gonna have a person who's into the pool and trying to drag others in. You've seen all this, right?

[Penn Holderness]

Yes.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

You've gone on family trips.

[Penn Holderness]

Yeah, I've seen this in ADHD and in family trips.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

So the best advice I say is, know the pool. Talk about the pool with the kids as they're growing up going, hey, buddy, looks like you fell in the pool. We need to talk about your pool story. And so what that means is we do a debris for the kid. So we were in the store, and you fell into the pool. And this is when the child's calm. What caused you to fall in the pool? Well, you wouldn't get me this thing I wanted. Oh, okay. What caused you to fall into the pool? Because I didn't push you into the pool. And so we're teaching respect for the pool, and then we're like, but you know what a great thing is? You got yourself out. How did you get yourself out of the pool? And so we're going through what happened. I add what should have happened. Could you have stayed out of the pool on this? And then what are we going to

[Kim Holderness]

do next when people are calm?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yep.

[Penn Holderness]

That's de. Escalation is super important. Right. Because we all get overwhelmed. Like, we call it flooding. I'm sure everybody's got their own term for it.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

That's exactly it. And so families, though, who can talk about the pool without shame to go, hey, mom fell in the pool. I took a time out. I'm back. Then we're not raising kids with shame. We're raising kids to take emotional responsibility.

[Kim Holderness]

You are big on metaphors. In fact, you encourage your clients to come up with their own metaphor for adhd. So give us some of examples that have worked for your clients and then why that works.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

My clients are brilliant people. Oh my gosh, are they amazing. In fact, readers will send me their metaphors. And so one, one time I received a book in the mail and the book was, if you give a mouse a cookie.

[Kim Holderness]

Right. Love it.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And she said, my ADHD is this mouse.

[Kim Holderness]

Perfect.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And she wrote a whole letter talking to me about the mouse. Another reader sent a beautiful painting that she did, and the painting was of a lizard on a rock. And she went into this whole metaphor on how her lizard really needs the sun, which is kind of emotions, and went through describing another one. One of my clients said, you know, my ADHD is more like toilet paper stuck to my foot. It's embarrassing and I hate it. I walk around, I try to shake it off, and it's always there.

[Penn Holderness]

Yeah, it's super understandable, but sad because.

[Kim Holderness]

Or like little elves that are just like pestering you all day long.

[Penn Holderness]

I feel like we should probably share all of our metaphors. Oh, tell me, like, do you have. What's yours?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

So I write. I write about this in the book. It's a little dark, but just understand. I try to be really real when I talk about my ADHD. Okay. I went through my PhD not being medicated and not really remembering I had ADHD. Okay. So I wrote a dissertation. I had a newborn during that time and I worked full time. I wasn't doing great.

[Kim Holderness]

Okay. Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

So I think about that metaphor during. So it's like I'm running a three legged race. Remember in third grade field day, you would tie your legs together with someone else and you would, you know, practice running this race. Well, that's what my ADHD is. I have to tie my leg to this ADHD version of me. And sometimes I'm like, all right, we're gonna go. This is gonna be a great day. And halfway through, she sits down and starts plucking dandelions and goes, mama had a baby and her head popped off. You know, just. And I went, pull up. Didn't you ever do that with dandelions?

[Kim Holderness]

Yes. Yeah. Yes.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

So. So she's doing this. I'm trying to focus. And again, this is the dark part. I would just punch her, knock her out, and then just drag her across the finish line. And I know this sounds dark.

[Penn Holderness]

It wasn't a real person, so that's good.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Well, it was. That's the thing. I used self loathing to motivate myself, and that's why I'm like, hey, I'm not here. Now we're good. I don't knock her out anymore. We negotiate differently.

[Kim Holderness]

So mine was definitely the little elves just throwing out little distractions all day long. Like the. What about this? What about this? You should be doing this. Like, that is how my brain, which, honestly, I just thought was normal for women.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yeah.

[Kim Holderness]

I just thought that's what every woman's brain does. Yep. So I don't know. What about you?

[Penn Holderness]

Mine's Peter Pan.

[Kim Holderness]

More on this after these words.

[Penn Holderness]

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Book your virtual visit [e-mail] that's joinmidi.com I'm Peter Pan. Yeah, I want to go flying out the window. I want everyone to come with me. I want them to have an awesome time, sing some of the times. I might even be wearing tights.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Who knows?

[Penn Holderness]

And. And I have trouble growing up, and I'm. It's taking me longer to grow up than other people. And at every turn of my life, including, like, in my 40s, I look around and say, I'm still a little bit of a boy that needs to grow up a little bit more.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Okay, can we just talk about these for a quick second? Okay. So, Peter Pan, if you were my client, I'd say, all right, all right, Peter Pan. What do you like about Peter Pan? And you told me, but then I saw some shame come up. Yeah. When you told me the second half. And so I would kind of reflect that, like, I saw shame. That there's this lagging, and with ADHD coaching, there's some psychoeducation that happens in it. And I'd say, do you know that we run five to seven years behind our.

[Penn Holderness]

I do, because you told me. And also, I mean, it's a part of the book that I wrote. Like, it's the delay, not the lack of it, but it was very real for me. I was young for my grade, plus I had ADHD, plus I went through puberty when I was like 27. Yeah, it was like, wait, not that late, but pretty late. Like I was a late bloomer. And so I really did. I had this like, I felt like I was arrested in this like younger emotional self and I cried very easily. And so this was like. This is a big reason why I like, I wrote this book because I wanted to understand it. But I want to know more about

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

your book gives hope to people because of that, because they see themselves and go, I know that shame. I know that shame of looking out, like outside looking in. And that's what you're talking about.

[Penn Holderness]

How often are the metaphors like super negative and how.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Mostly, mostly they start there, but then we redeem them. Right. So Peter Pan is a great quality. And you know when to bring Peter Pan out.

[Penn Holderness]

When I was a kid, I think that my metaphor was a lot more morose. I've gone through a lot of work to get to the point where I can like recognize the good parts of it.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah, I think being, being a kid, being a teen, we're seeing it in our house. It's. It's hard with ADHD because there is this delay. So talk with us more about this. So the. In the generation of kids today too, they also had Covid that really met. We messed that. That just like blanket messed everybody up.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Oh, it did.

[Kim Holderness]

And so then you have a kid with adhd. So what should we as parents, as educators, like, what should we be expecting and how can we help scaffold them?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

So I just finished the manuscript for the teen version of your brain stuff broken. So I wrecked my Instagram because now I'm into all the Gen Z and Gen A stuff and so I'm getting stuff out when I don't want it. But I really had to in order to rewrite this manuscript. I wanted to get into what's happening with Gen A. Gen A is so self aware, but they're still young, so it's not a real self awareness because they don't have the age yet. So they have this desire to be self aware and in their immaturity they're starting to name things. Oh, I have anxiety, I have ADHD without doing the deeper meaning. And so my best advice to parents, yeah, there's a lot of obstacles, but we've always had obstacles. Okay. Things have always happened. So stop naming the obstacles with your kids and start being very inquisitive and start asking Questions. So you say you have anxiety. What does anxiety look like for you? If you had another word for anxiety, what would that be? Huh? If you could picture anxiety. And we want to help our Gen A, the Alpha generation, really get deeper and not just name it and move on, but name it and then kind of understand what it means for them, teach them how their brains work. This generation Alpha, really, they do want to know. I mean, they come off all sassy and cool and they're adorable. They're adorable. And they're. Oh, my gosh, their insults crack me up. I could not do this.

[Kim Holderness]

They're very creative.

[Penn Holderness]

And they're in adolescence, a lot of them, right now. So look, everybody has these moments when they read books or they hear people. This was listening to you on a podcast where you have to pull the car over because something just hit you like a ton of bricks. And it happened with you and me. I'm going to start and I'm going to let you finish it. But it was the conversation about a. How we have protracted adolescence for our kids. And then what really hit me was, why do you think they're playing video games all the time?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yeah.

[Penn Holderness]

If they're retreating to their video games, why do you think that is? Because the world outside is terrifying right now.

[Kim Holderness]

It feels so big and unmanageable and overwhelming.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

I'm glad I see smart things sometimes.

[Penn Holderness]

You don't remember this, do you?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Oh, no, I'm not even lying. I mean, this is my EDC in action going, yeah, that sounds like something Tamara might say.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yeah. So I believe it.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And I truly believe it.

[Penn Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And I work with and coach parents of ALS, late adolescents, now all the time, and. And into 20s. And there's these really good people who haven't let this generation feel the pain. And so they keep stepping in like, well, I can do this thinking for you. I can help you. I can help you. And then it's. It's easier than actually doing it yourself. So we. I work with college age students and their parents, and the college age students really aren't doing much because their parents manage it for them. Like how she has adhd, plus the fact that generations have made everything longer. We didn't expect millennials to really meet maturation until early 20s and then zillennials. They're a very interesting group. They're kind of this philosophical group, and we didn't get them to be. To maturation until later. And that's actually benefiting those of us with adhd. Right. And now the Alphas are coming along. And the alphas are like, I think we're going to mature earlier. And yet they're not going to, because the world is scary and it's easier to distract themselves.

[Kim Holderness]

So our kids, our teens, our early 20s, and you know, as a parent, you're going to look at them and say, like, just try harder. Oh, so why do. Why doesn't that work with their brains? And what should we be saying instead? To kind of get them. Get them going.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yeah. You know, I was working with a young man one time, and he wasn't even sure he had adhd. And his parents were like, hey, look, I just heard you were a great coach with it, with teams. So here's our son. And you know, when you have a hammer, you find nails. And I'm like, this kid has adhd. But he wasn't performing well in school. He was a freshman at this time. And I said to him, so, what do you think you're going to do? And he shrugged. He goes, I don't know. I guess I'm going to try harder. I'm like, oh, man, I thought you were trying hard. Like, what are you holding back on me? You know? And I went over all the things, and he's like, I don't know. I'll just try harder. And so even teens think they have to try harder. When you have an ADHD brain, I don't know if you do this to yourself, but I'm like, tim, are you really doing all that you can do right now?

[Penn Holderness]

The issue is we can't just be, like, sitting in front of a book for eight hours. It's just not possible. It's not. It's the world that we live in, but it's not in any way, unless you're really super into, like, tax law, which is, you know, which. We have met ADHD people who are really good at tax law.

[Kim Holderness]

If.

[Penn Holderness]

If we're not interested in it, which is most of school. Yeah, we. We have to try harder than most to begin with.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Exactly.

[Penn Holderness]

And then it still freaking looks like we're not trying hard.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

It looks like we're not trying to. So here's what I tell parents to do. First of all, every adolescent I've ever worked with, and I'm super old, worked with a lot of adolescents. They want to be listened to. This doesn't change generationally. They don't want to be talked to. They want to be listened to. Now, one mom said to me, yeah, but he says such stupid things, and he rants all the Time he goes on these diatribes. Yeah. Pretend to be interested in what he's talking about. Well, he's really into. And, you know, whatever he's into in that moment. Yeah. He wants to be listening. That's his. He's trying to connect. So a lot of kids want to be heard, and you can challenge your thinking just by asking questions. And so a lot of our children will say dumb things because they haven't been on this planet that long. So they say dumb things like. Yeah, I hate. I hate people who do this.

[Kim Holderness]

Okay.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

That's a ADHD male thing. I've heard a lot. They say it like that. And you're like, oh, tell me about that.

[Kim Holderness]

Well.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Oh, okay. So. And you're just kind of working it out with them.

[Kim Holderness]

So.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

So you would treat that person differently if you met that person. Well, if they're gonna take up two parking places, then they deserve to be in jail. ADHD people, we go very extremes.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Oh, jail. And by the way, parents, don't start correcting. This is a philosophical. They're trying out ideas on you. And if they sound really stupid, just stay present and keep questioning.

[Penn Holderness]

Okay. A couple things really kind of set off alarms.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yes.

[Penn Holderness]

That I just. I have to. I have to jump in. That's what happens with adhd. I can't wait. No, it's time for me. It's time for me to ask this question. Most people with ADHD have some level of rejection sensitivity. For some of them, it is physical pain. Rsd, You've seen a lot of that. Right. We are parents who at some point need to correct our children.

[Kim Holderness]

We need to be able to give feedback.

[Penn Holderness]

Yeah. And it's tough for. For our. For our children.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

One.

[Penn Holderness]

One of them, I think openly says is mature enough to say, I'm going to show you what I'm doing. I would. Would not care for any feedback. And so we're like, okay. Which is funny. Like, lately, like, recently, she was like, what do you think of this? And I was like, you didn't want feedback. She's like, well, did you like it? I'm like, that's feedback.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

So I love that.

[Penn Holderness]

So, yeah, I can't. I can't do both. Anyway, in the other one, I think, you know, we asked him if we can help him out with projects and stuff. And I'm starting to think that one of the reasons he doesn't really bring them to us is because he's sensitive to that as well. So it's a tough tightrope to walk as parents. With this. So how do we do it exactly? Perfectly.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

So first of all, we have to, like, really hit the safety hard. Yeah, you're safe.

[Penn Holderness]

Yeah, you're safe. Good.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Like, and I used to say to

[Penn Holderness]

my kids, it's gonna be okay.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And they'd probably. They. They would say, stop saying it, Mom. You say it too much. I say, you can't make me love you more. You can't make me love you less.

[Kim Holderness]

Oh, that's so sweet.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And then inside I'd say, so stop trying. Like, stop trying to make me love you less right now. No, because you're doing a good job. Because you're doing great. But it was, I'm your ride or die. I'm here. And so I would always reinforce that message. But. And you guys have a great relationship with your kids.

[Kim Holderness]

We do.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

But they're still kind of protective because they're scared, because what you guys represent to them is their ideals. Now, they're not going to admit this, but you are the ideal man and you are the ideal woman in their heads. And so it's scary. I know, I know.

[Penn Holderness]

Whatever. You're a good ideal babe.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

But it's psychologically how we're made. Okay. And that's why when we don't have parents who are good for us, it breaks us a little bit.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Because we're created to be like that. Right. And so feedback feels very scary. It doesn't feel like we're walking beside. It feels like from the top down. So here's a couple techniques. We called them debriefs in our house. And I even say the word, and my kids hated that. And so we would do a debrief, and a debrief was, hey, that didn't go well. We need to walk through this. And so I would say. So in your. In your mind, what happened? You tell me. Like, I'm not. And I'm not coming at them, by the way. I asked their permission. Like, is now a good time to debrief? And if my little smart aleck second born would look at me. What? It's not a good time. I'm like, cool, cool. You stay in your room until it is.

[Kim Holderness]

Okay.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Like, I'm not going to make you do it. I'm also not going to let you go out and play with friends.

[Kim Holderness]

Right.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Okay, so what happened? Well, I just didn't like your tone when you asked me this, this, and this. So if you took me out of the story, what was happening in your brain at that time? See, I'm just asking questions. And they get really ticked. I'm like, okay, we can do this method or I can lecture you. Which. Which are we doing? You're like, fine. All right, so tell me what was happening in your head. You don't have to justify. Just tell me. Okay. Oh, all right. How could that have gone differently? Did you have any other options? Well, if you don't look at me with that face.

[Penn Holderness]

With that face.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

With that face.

[Penn Holderness]

Yeah. Would you like me to put on a new face?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Oh, what's horrible about this child, and I love her dearly, she could mimic my face back to me, which is a pure evil move.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

It's a Jedi move as a teenager. Then I say, how could this have gone differently? All right, so what do you want to do differently now? We could keep doing this, like, repeating, like, the blow up and all this. Or you're smart. What do you want to do differently? I'm giving feedback, but I'm giving feedback through my questions.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah, I think that. And you have to be genuinely curious.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Oh, and I really am. No.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

I mean, I don't say what the heck is going on in your brain is kind of what I want to say. But I am being like, hey, we're. I'm not doing a power move. I really want to know.

[Kim Holderness]

Because in the history of never has any child ever done anything because their parents told them to do it?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

That's not how any of this works.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah. So if a teenager looks like he's struggling in school and you say, you just need to block off time and study in a quiet space and do all this stuff, that's not going to. To work.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

It's why people pay me money to coach their kids. Because, one, I'm not their parent.

[Kim Holderness]

Right.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

A lot of credit there. And I say, oh, that's not working. What's going to work for you? And even when my client says a really dumb idea, I'm like, let's try it out. Let's come back and see if it actually works. And so we're going to run all these experiments. So this is. I started doing those three questions with my kids when they were very young. I have the advantage of having been a high school teacher before this. So I had to work with other people's ADHD kids. First. They were great because it really helped me raise my own. Then I taught college and I taught how to teach ADHD kids, which helped me parent, too. So I'm just using techniques.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah, you started. Yeah, you start. You had a head start on all this.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

I had A head start.

[Penn Holderness]

All right. So you have a really unique opinion about college. I'm guessing that because of parents.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yeah.

[Penn Holderness]

A lot of these meetings are because they are worried about grades, college and the future and how college gets them out of their house and into the real world.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

I am so tired of that. Yes. And they say they use the real world in the real world, and yet they're doing everything for their child and they're having anxiety that they're not dealing with. And so I delicately. And I don't say this like this, but I go, you're the problem. Change your behavior. Just change your behavior. You're acting out of anxiety. Well, he needs to get up every day by nine. Okay, that's perhaps true, but your anxiety is foisted on him. Let's work with your anxiety first. Let's help you. So those three questions that I used, they really paid off great. Because I'm thinking about that middle child who used to mimic my face. I remember one day, I was driving down the road, she called and she was around 22, 23. She's like, Mom, I gotta talk this through. And she said, here's what happened. I'm like, oh, that's the first question I normally ask.

[Penn Holderness]

Yeah, it's good.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

So I put myself on mute. I was on mute the whole conversation. I took myself off to go, mm, yeah. But she went through all the questions to get her to a problem or to a solution. So she's like, what? Here's what I'm seeing, here's what I'm experiencing. And then here's how I think it could have gone differently. But now here's where I am. So here's where I'm gonna move forward. How does that sound to you?

[Kim Holderness]

I'm like, that's a dream come. That's a dream call.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yeah, I think you've done some good thinking here. And she's like, oh, it's so helpful talking to you. I'm like, wow, I got a lot of points for doing nothing.

[Penn Holderness]

Well, you set it up.

[Kim Holderness]

You set that up. That is a dream. Come on.

[Penn Holderness]

That was a lot of work coming up to that conversation, I would imagine.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

So if parents are listening to this and they're like, oh, I missed the boat. My kids aren't. No, you can start this anytime. I hope my husband doesn't watch this because I'm going to say something.

[Penn Holderness]

Oh, now I really hope he watches. I'm going to forward it to him.

[Kim Holderness]

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[Kim Holderness]

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[Penn Holderness]

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[Kim Holderness]

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[Penn Holderness]

Over 250,000 people have already picked up the Pack a Hoodie and I'm one of them.

[Kim Holderness]

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[Penn Holderness]

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[Kim Holderness]

To grab your Pack A hoodie, go to packa apparel.com that's P A K

[Penn Holderness]

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[Kim Holderness]

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[Penn Holderness]

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[Kim Holderness]

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[Penn Holderness]

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[Kim Holderness]

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[Penn Holderness]

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[Kim Holderness]

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[Penn Holderness]

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[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Okay, first of all, my husband and I have a great time together. We love each other dearly.

[Kim Holderness]

Two squirrels playing around.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

We are, we truly are. And we're very happy when the trash gets out on time. Yeah. Like we're high fiving like we just won an award. But I use these questions on him because as a wife, he tells me something happens at work.

[Penn Holderness]

I'm like, well, yeah, yeah, your male impression is amazing.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

I want to like say something to tell him. Instead, I'm like, oh, so what do you think went wrong there? Is the first question. What happened? Right?

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah, but I get your tendency with your partner who's already cooked. Right. Like he's already, like, you don't have to develop this one. Like, what were you thinking? Thinking that was an idiotic thing to say.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Right.

[Kim Holderness]

But you can't do that.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Well, I do sometimes. And, and sometimes we're both in the, you know, like you're in the soup.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Like, yes. Last week he said he goes, oh, I'm such a mess. I'm like, you know what, I'm glad you're finally admitting it because I've been meaning to have this talk with you. And he was doing the EDC shame thing where he dropped something he was holding and he went big, like he's a mess. Instead of just going, yeah, I just dropped something and I, I poked fun at it. Like, I'm still poking fun at it.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Like, I'll bring it up two weeks from now going, hey, how's the mess going, yeah, like, are you still a mess?

[Penn Holderness]

I think that's, like, a cool way to do it, though. Like, to add a little bit of humor to it. We talk about this because we get. We get shame when we do something wrong. And one of the things you do, A, give a little time, de escalate, and then B, like, talk about it like it's a police report, which you do. What happened? Give me the facts.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah.

[Penn Holderness]

And then once that's all over and done, like, they're able to say on their own, okay, this is, like, not as big a deal as I thought it was. And humor helps with that, too.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

So. You know, millennials love their Harry Potter. And there's a moment in Harry Potter where there's the ridiculous spell. He kept hearing all those scary voices, and he would say ridiculous, and they look like these weird little things. Well, that's kind of what we do with humor. We go ridiculous.

[Penn Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And we make something funny out of it. And we're not using sarcasm at the person. We're using it at the thing. So I was not calling my husband a mess. He. I was saying ridiculous. Like, you are not a mess.

[Kim Holderness]

Right.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And so sometimes we use the ridiculous spell, and it really does work.

[Kim Holderness]

Okay. So we have a generation of parents, and I'm asking this as for a friend. Not me at all. Not me at all.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Right?

[Kim Holderness]

Or maybe for their adhd, kid has really scaffolded the hell out of things, Right? Like, I have done a lot, and maybe. I don't know. Well, not me. My friend. My friend has done a lot, right?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Your friend.

[Kim Holderness]

My friend's done a lot.

[Penn Holderness]

So Kimberly

[Kim Holderness]

Schmemberly Schmolderness has done a lot. And. And he's. First of all, he's doing great. He's great. Everything's great. But at. How do. At this point, do I kind of incrementally step away so that he is not the kid who's. Not. That there's anything against being 26 and living with your parents because it's rough out there. It is super expensive. And that might happen because things are so expensive.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yes.

[Kim Holderness]

But how do you. How do you have the kid who wants to, like, launch and leave?

[Penn Holderness]

How do you make them want to do stuff?

[Kim Holderness]

How do you make them want to do stuff that I've been doing for him?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Okay. This is my bread and butter as a parent coach. Because they're like, hey, we love our kids so much.

[Kim Holderness]

He's perfect and beautiful in every way.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

He's so happy in our Basement. And we're feeling like it might be time for him not to be in our basement. But we love him. We love having him around. But this seems like this is a failure to launch.

[Kim Holderness]

Right.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And that is we've raised good people. You don't mind being around these great people. And yet you're kind of sensing, oh, I wonder if you can fly on your own.

[Kim Holderness]

Right.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

So I start. If it really depends. Can your friend have a conversation with her child? And if her friend. If your friend could, then I say you sit down. I'm always for bringing children to a third place. Not at home where things happen. Like out somewhere to eat where they love eating.

[Kim Holderness]

Okay.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Because happy tummies are happy conversations.

[Kim Holderness]

Okay. Okay.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And go. So I've done a lot to help you succeed, and now I think it's time to start turning things over. Let's start to talk about what things should we turn over when. And it's this gradual. I'm not cutting you off. I'm here for you. I'm not going to. I didn't bring you this far to drop you, son. But let's start with making sure you do your own laundry. So I'm just going to say, do your own laundry. Now, some of the parents I work with, the kid will not have a conversation about this. They're on the video game going, it's easier in this world. Meanwhile, they're living in a four star hotel.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Food disappears, laundry appears. It's lovely.

[Kim Holderness]

That's a great cake.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yeah, it's a great gig. In that case, then I work with parents. What do you, what boundaries do you need to slowly get into place? And I work with them to do this over a long period of time. Like, hey, I'm, I'm running out of time. I'm not going to be able to do your laundry. You're welcome to do it whenever, whenever the washer's open. And if you don't know something, just ask me. I'd be happy to help you do it. And so the, the mom, usually the mom has the boundary of, I'm not going to help you do your laundry, but I'm going to be here. Now, you may see the child get tons of laundry. Let them figure that out.

[Penn Holderness]

So meta question here. Mm, you're so right. Like it's. You've got to have these important conversations to remove these extra things that we're doing. We're doing extra things to help them get by.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Right.

[Penn Holderness]

Is ADHD coaching an extra thing?

[Kim Holderness]

Okay.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

I run into this a lot now, if the child is in therapy or coaching or whatever,

[Kim Holderness]

that's.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

That's the equivalent of giving them a vehicle to get to the next place.

[Penn Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And taking. If. If I'm not going to give you my support, I'm going to put you with someone who can help you.

[Penn Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Right. So I, you know, of course I would say this, but I recommend parents pay for coaching or therapy or, you know, physical therapy, like, whatever that child

[Penn Holderness]

needs that gives them a vehicle.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

That gives them the vehicle to help them move on. Pay for their expensive car. Not so much.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Pay for their gas. Oh, my goodness. What planet are you on?

[Kim Holderness]

No, what do you do? Okay, so what is it about the ADHD brain? So this friend I have.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yes.

[Kim Holderness]

Let's say I have to say my son, he's. He's mastered the laundry. But, like, I do have to remind him of, like, you have to set an alarm to wake up tomorrow morning. Like. Like these things. Like. Yep. Got. Oh, yeah, thanks. Got it. Like, those reminders. Like, how often should we be expected to do the reminder stuff?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Okay, let's just flip it a little bit. Instead of saying, you got to set an alarm for tomorrow, how about, hey, walk me through your plan for tomorrow.

[Kim Holderness]

Put it on him. Okay.

[Penn Holderness]

Give him agency.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yeah. And let's say your friend might say, what if he doesn't get up? Okay. Are those consequences that he will die from?

[Kim Holderness]

No, he'll be late and miss a test.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yeah, that.

[Kim Holderness]

He has to figure that out.

[Penn Holderness]

Kim, I have to make a confession. I think I'm sleeping with your friend.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Oh, dear. I didn't know this was going to be an expose.

[Penn Holderness]

Sorry. It's laugh lines.

[Kim Holderness]

You talk about, like, widening the window and, like, helping people feel better about being uncomfortable. Because this is all uncomfortable.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yeah. So can we talk about the window of tolerance a second?

[Kim Holderness]

Yes, please.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Okay. And this is not a metaphor I made up. This is from, like, it's very unsexy work from, like, the 70s or something. But the window of tolerance, it still just holds. So imagine a window, and the window of tolerance is when you just feel like yourself. You're good in your skin. You're not feeling anxious, and you're not feeling below the window, which is kind of the fight, the freeze. So in this window, you're just feeling like I'm good. Above the window, it's. I imagine it red. Like, I'm hot, my brain's on fire. I'm fight or flight. Like I'm on all the time. Beneath the window, I'm frozen. Frozen in Fear, Yeah. I'm going to try to escape. I'm going to try not to look at you or talk to you because of shame. And all these things have me frozen. And so those of us with ADHD have a small window of tolerance. Like me getting into a hot car in July can push me out of my window of tolerance. Like, oh, the car's too hot. Where someone else would go, well, what would you expect in July with black seats? And I'd be like, it shouldn't be this way.

[Kim Holderness]

Right.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

So I'm pushed out of my window of tolerance too easily. Parents need to understand their children have small window of tolerances, but the goal is to widen it. The goal isn't to make everything fit into that tiny window. So when you see your child just above the window of tolerance, that's a growth area. And so we can grow around the window of tolerance. If the child, though, is totally shut down out of anger or frozenness, that's when we step in. And remember, I'm Gen X. So I'm going to say stuff like this. It's okay to struggle. Struggle is how we know how to learn, how we know when things aren't working. And, you know, my kids, my kids went to school with boomer parents or, you know, with kids from boomer parents and their kids, like, if they forgot their swimming suit for school or their violin, their parent would run it up to school. I would be like, I hope you figure that out. And so it wasn't that I was callous. It was. That's a life or death thing.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

I'll step in if we need to.

[Kim Holderness]

Right. I think for kids and adults, perfectionism, and this is something I was unaware as because I'm a recovering perfectionist, was a symptom of adhd. Talk to us like why that shows up and how it shows up in adhd.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yeah. You know, my experience with perfectionism, I was listening to a radio show, and this was my pullover moment. I heard someone say, and today we're going to be talking about perfectionism. And I said to the radio, because we were listening to the radio back then, oh, I'm not a perfectionist. I've never done anything right in my life. And I went to turn the knob. That's how old this is. Right. And then the radio spoke back to me and said, you know, if you're a true perfectionist, you probably just said, I can't be one because I've never done anything right in my life.

[Kim Holderness]

Exactly.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

The reason I share that is because perfectionists don't always know they're perfectionist.

[Penn Holderness]

They generally reject it.

[Kim Holderness]

Yes.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Because I've never done anything right. And gosh, you know, I just finished a manuscript. I'm still a perfectionist. I called my editor, I'm like, hey, I don't know if you can use anything. This is all probably just stupid. I'm just telling you I've reserved a week for all your feedback. This is just horrible stuff. She's like, well, I'm not really seeing it that way. It's reading pretty well. I just have some minor edits, but I do those anyway.

[Kim Holderness]

Way.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

But you hear the perfectionism.

[Penn Holderness]

How have you written books? Several.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

It's not.

[Penn Holderness]

Well, no, but you have, like, it's the process. I know it's probably torturous for you, but they're very good books.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Oh, thank you, I appreciate that.

[Penn Holderness]

But you don't hear that because it just goes like, out the other one.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah, I do.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

I already dismissed that. And that's a sign of perfectionism.

[Penn Holderness]

Right, Right.

[Kim Holderness]

But how is that adhd?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Hey, I love this. We turn perfectionism into an emotion.

[Kim Holderness]

Yes.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

So I know I'm doing okay if I set this impossibly high bar for myself and then I don't reach it. And so then I use shame going, well, you could have reached that bar, but you didn't, did you? And so this is this emotional toggling that I do. Like, here it is. I'm going to work. Oh, I'm going to use self loathing. Let's be, let's beat you up while you're trying to reach this perfection. You hear it?

[Kim Holderness]

So it's like the emotional part of it all.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

It's all this game. It's also because we don't know when done is done. I mean, do you, do you guys know when done is done?

[Penn Holderness]

No, no, we, we always like, we always say we wake up every day unemployed.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Yeah. Because, oh my gosh, I love that.

[Penn Holderness]

Yeah. Because like we, whatever we did, it's done. And now crap. We don't have. We need to go. It's a gig economy. What are we going to get next? Yeah, what's next?

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Okay, first of all. Absolutely.

[Kim Holderness]

Yeah.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

And that exactly how, like, it's never enough.

[Kim Holderness]

Like it's never enough. But then it's also overwhelming to start something.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Right.

[Kim Holderness]

Because of the perfectionism.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Okay. And this is where we use the word potential with children. We need to stop using that because the word potential perfect. Their perfectionism gets in there and then they're always reaching for this thing. You know, I was told I have all this potential and, and now I'm in the gifted program. And what does that even mean? It messes with us. And something I do want to bring up here. I work a lot with what we call twice exceptional students and adults. Those are high IQ plus adhd and they're in a class of themselves because by themselves, because they use perfectionism like it's a Jedi, like they're Jedi knights. Like, oh yeah, I'll get myself to perform and I will do mean things to myself. And it's all under this perfectionistic kind of routine that they'll do. Is that.

[Kim Holderness]

Yes, that makes a lot of sense.

[Penn Holderness]

I want to thank you for continuing to talk about all of your imperfections and ADHD isms within the framework of. No, it's really, it's so helpful. It's really, really important. Like, nobody really wants a perfect person telling them what's going on in adhd because it's like, come on.

[Kim Holderness]

Okay, so where can people find you and find out about your work?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

My author website is Tamara Rosier.com and I run the ADHD center of West Michigan. So that's www.miadhd.com.

[Kim Holderness]

do you have to live in Michigan to be a client?

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Oh, good question. Not for coaching, but yes, for therapy and to see our nurse practitioner because

[Penn Holderness]

you need them licenses for that.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Y you.

[Penn Holderness]

Thank you so much. Like, having you in person was such a thrill.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Oh, thanks for having me here.

[Penn Holderness]

Because you're in person, you get to read the the end of the show.

[Kim Holderness]

Oh, yes.

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Oh, that's all right. Laugh Lines is written and produced by Kim Holderness, Pen Holderness and Ann Marie Tapke with original music by Pen Holderness. It is filmed and edited and live produced by Sam Allen and hosted by acast. As always, we love to hear from you. Please write to us@podcast theholdernessfamily.com or leave a voicemail at 323-364-3929.

[Penn Holderness]

We have a landline. I'm just letting you know that we

[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

were old school and we will talk to you soon on the laugh line.

[Kim Holderness]

Yay.

[Penn Holderness]

This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Fiscally responsible financial geniuses, Monetary magicians. These are things people say about drivers who switch their car insurance to Progressive and save hundreds. Visit progressive.com to see if you could save Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states or situations.

[Kim Holderness]

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[Penn Holderness]

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[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

Wayfair Every style, Every home. Okay Peloton, let's go. That's the new Peloton Cross Training Tread Plus.

[Kim Holderness]

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[Dr. Tamara Rosier]

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