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Foreign. You are listening to the Navigating Adult ADHD podcast with your ADHD coach and expert, Xena. Hello, my beautiful friend. Welcome back. Today we are Navigating Adult ADHD together. It kind of feels like I haven't talked to you for ages, which is weird because the podcast has come out each week as normal. But I have been away. I am just back back from having a two week vacation. My partner and I, we went to Sri Lanka for a week and then Singapore for three nights. So we were away. Like we took a two week vacation basically, but we were away, I think 1112 nights in total with the travel. And it was amazing. Oh my gosh, it's so funny. I was thinking about this. I was like, well, how much do I share? Because I really feel like I'm talking to a friend every week when I record this and I talk to you, even though I'm pretty much just talking to myself as I record. So I really do want to share a little bit of it with you because something pretty significant happened. Yes. I turned 40, the big four zero. It was fabulous to be in Sri Lanka in a country I'd never been to. I feel very, very grateful for that experience. It was amazing. But two things I want to share. The first one is I brought some brand new Apple earbuds. I had had the same pair of Apple earbuds for probably five years and they had gone the distance they'd survived, like falling in water. I think they fell in my coffee cup at one stage, or one of them did managed to survive. Right? Like they'd done the distance to the point where the left one would only work for like an hour, which is no good when you've got back to back coaching calls and you need them to be working. So anyway, I finally invested in a new pair of earbuds and I bought the Apple Pro 3. And that part's important, the Pro 3, if you're wanting to upgrade your earbuds, because, holy balls, these things are fantastic. The noise canceling in these is epic. Now I have got me some tiny little baby ears. I don't know what was happening when the ears were handed out, but I got me some baby ones. Okay, so these, these earbuds come with, I think, five different sizes. And I need the extra small, which is so funny to me because I've never been an extra small in my life, but apparently my ears are extra small. I need the extra small to like get it to fit into my ears. And thankfully they fit perfectly. But the noise canceling on these is so epic. So when I am, for example, in the kitchen cooking dinner and the kids are in the lounge making a shit ton of noise and I've got the TV on and then my partner's got his headphones in and he liked to sing loudly. When he's listening to his music, like at random, he doesn't sing the full song. He'll just like sing words at random. It's hilarious. So anyway, that's happening. But with my noise canceling, like, the level of noise canceling in these earbuds is so good that none of that touches me. It just washes right off me. Because often at that time of the night, like when I'm making dinner, it's around, you know, 5, 6ish, my meds are wearing off and I am not feeling great about overstimulation. Like, that's often when I'm very overstimulated towards the end of the day. So these are an incredible investment. So just wanted to shout them out. And definitely not sponsored by Apple, but that would be pretty freaking epic, let's be honest. But the second thing I wanted to share with you all is. And I actually haven't told everybody yet. Like, I haven't. I've told my family and closest friends, but now you, my friend, you get to hear this before everybody else. When we were in Singapore, we went to the top of the Marina Bay sands to have dinner and have Singapore Slings. Like the famous cocktail with this beautiful view over Singapore. And guess what? It only took six years, seven months and one day. Not that I was counting. Okay, maybe I was. But my partner got down on one knee and he proposed and we are engaged. So I've got a flash little ring on my finger. I say little, it's actually not little, but I've got a flash beautiful ring. And guess what? Everybody who has seen this has said, oh my God, that's so you. Because it is bright pink. Who knew you could get a pink sapphire? Yes, you can. My ring is bright pink. How's Xena? So while it's super weird and I'm totally adjusting to the fact that I have a fiance and I haven't once introduced him as that and probably will never because it's just super weird to me, it doesn't really change anything, but it's very exciting and I wanted to share that with you all. My friends. That's my news. Feel like I caught you up on all the life things. So today I wanted to share with you. I'd actually been compiling this list for a little while and I wasn't really sure what to call this episode because it really is a bunch of weird things that I do that support my adhd. And these are things that I have taught to some of the clients I've worked with as well because they're just silly, simple little things that can make actually quite a big difference. So I want to share them with you. I believe we've got seven on this list and who knows, we could even end up with more. So the first thing, one of the weird things that I do that really supports my ADHD is I delay sending emails. Now here's what I mean by that. I will type out the email and then I will click Schedule Send. So you can actually delay sending it. And typically I do it, I'll delay it by one hour. You can delay it by like 24 hours. So you can sort of, you know, have emails ready to go and be sent off. So for example, if you're up at 3am and you don't want your colleagues to know that you work at 3am, you can have it sent at like 9am the next morning. Right? So you can delay sending emails and put the scheduled time in. This is something that I use, I would say about 80% of the time when I am sending emails because it really speaks to my fear of forgetting things. I worry that I am going to forget things. For example, I will send when I've had a one on one coaching session with a client. I will then later that day at some stage send a quick recap, any sort of images or any tools and any action items. Like it's just a very brief email but I always worry that I'm going to forget something or think of something else that I could add to make that more valuable. So I delay it by one hour. One hour. That's all I do. I delay sending it by one hour. So I've typed it all out and I've clicked, you know, send in one hour. And it will my, you know, Gmail, whatever, it'll automatically send it. But this is so helpful if you're somebody who gets anxious. I used to get really anxious when I was writing emails and worry about saying the right thing or, you know, if RSD comes into it. Like what if they feel criticized or attacked or, or what have you, or what if they don't take this the right way? Like if you worry about those sorts of things, it's like having this little buffer in place that makes, for me, it makes this world of difference. Now Whilst I delay sending an email by about an hour, 99% of the time I never go back and add anything. Like I just forget it and it's just gone. Like that's the benefit of having poor working memory is sometimes you forget things that you don't even need to worry about. This is one of them. Like 99% of the time I do not go back and add anything. I can only think of one time recently where I did this, where I forgot to put the zoom link in that somebody would need when we met. So I went back and put that in and I was like, oh great. Well, the email hasn't even gone yet, so I don't need to send a new one with the zoom link. I can just go back and edit it and put that in. Right? So again, number one, delay sending emails. This is so helpful. The second thing I do that's pretty weird, but really supports my sensory needs and preferences is I will wear activewear under my real people clothes. And yes, I'm doing like air quotes as I say real people clothes. For example, this morning I went to my Toastmasters meeting and I had on a pair of like baggy jeans and a, like a big jumper and a coat. Right now I typically don't wear jeans when I'm at home. I will have on it my like activewear pants because let's be honest, in the era of zoom, nobody sees your bottom half. So you can wear whatever the heck you want or not wear whatever you want. Hey, I'm not judging. So with under my baggy jeans, what I had on was a pair of like activewear shorts. To be fair, I could have gone like full length activewear. It was so fucking cold this morning. But I have on a pair of like tights. I love the feel of my activewear. It is like the most comfy shit that I own. So I will wear that. Like I'm talking, I had sports bra on, like all of the comfy things underneath the real people clothes. Because then I'm not tugging at my clothes. I'm not annoyed by it. It's not hijacking my brain, none of that. It really supports my sensory needs and preferences, which of course helps me to stay in a regulated state so that wearing activewear underneath things, if you see me out in public wearing real people clothes, just know that's probably happening. And yes, I'm happy to talk about the next one is number three, I change up my working environment. So yes, I have a beautiful office and there's so much sunlight in Here it gets ridiculously hot, which is a good thing in. Unless it's summer and it's a challenge. But like I have a beautiful, beautiful office, right? But I don't spend a lot of time in here unless I'm coaching clients, recording this podcast for you all. Like I will actually work from my bed quite a lot. I love my bed. Like it's. My favorite place in this entire house is sitting on my bed with a cat next to me. And I've got a little desk, you can get like a, a little like 25, $35 bed desk for when you're sitting in bed. Like literally this is the best investment ever. And that I love working from the bed. I just do, right? Some people will say it's not great if you, especially if you have challenges with sleep, you should really separate your work from your sleep. Etc for me, I love it, I'm all for it. But also I will work from cafes. I have a couple of cafes near me that I love to go to because I feel like it's weird, but I feel like everyone's staring at me. They're not. They don't give a shit what I'm doing. But it really helps with like that body doubling effect to like get shit done. So again, it's just speaking to the ADHD brain's need for novelty sometimes our need for comfort, our need for interest and difference. These things really help us to produce dopamine. It can also support regulation, these sorts of things which again help our brains to switch on to work to get things done. Right. Typically working in a quiet environment does not work for ADHD brains. I used to force myself to, especially when I started working full time for myself from home, I used to force myself to turn off all noise and work work like at the kitchen desk back then, kitchen table, rather like in this quiet environment. And our brains love to have some sort of novelty or distraction. It could be, you know, music playing, some music that we choose, right. It can't be just anything. Or it could be that we're in that cafe environment or it could be that we have white noise playing. But whatever it is, typically we need some sort of some form of stimulation. So again, changing that up can be so helpful. All right, so that third one for me, changing up the working environment number four, this is something I do and if you're one of my clients, you will have heard me say this shit a lot, right? I love to use the words experiment, gather data and play. I think that everything in our life we can Approach it through the lens of. Let's just experiment. Let's learn what works and what doesn't. Let's gather some data. Like, let's just get some information, go out and try this this week and find out, like, did it work? Did it not work? What parts of it, what parts of it didn't work? Right, play with it. I was thinking of an example to share with you all for this and my friend Logan and I started an Etsy store back at the end of last year, end of 2025. It's called Neurodivergent HQ. And we have on there an AI coach, an ADHD specific AI coach that like we've trained or like more so I have, you know, kind of trained that. But we've got that we've got. What else have we got? We've got workbooks. We've got two different workbooks on there. I think we've only got three products on there at the moment. But like a couple of them are doing like incredibly well. Like they're selling like hotcakes. They're really cheap, right? Really, really cheap. I'll link to this. They're all ADHD specific products. Really, really cheap. Like, we just wanted to try something different. Like he's got really great abilities to like do the graphics and everything. And then I've got a lot of tools and so like. And he does as well, he's adhd. So we've kind of like combined a whole bunch of stuff and it's just, we've just been playing with it, right? So that's the whole point I want to get to is we just decided, hey, let's just experiment with this and see does it, does it take off? Do people want to buy these products that we're creating? Let's gather a bunch of data about what people are wanting, about what is useful, about what we use. Let's just play with it. Let's have fun with it. Like, it's not a. This business is going to succeed or fail. Let's just go out there and play, gather a bunch of information, except experiment, then experiment again. So this is so helpful because our ADHD brains can be so all or nothing. Either I succeed or I fail. Either it worked or it didn't work. And it's like, no, let's get some information about what, what's working, what's not working. Okay, cool. Let's change the recipe a little bit. Let's go play with it again. So this is so helpful when we struggle with things like rsd Right. Rejection sensitivity. We are so afraid of failing. We're so afraid of like not doing it the right way or thinking that we need to do things the right way. So this approach is so much more playful and novel to our brains. Again, speaking to our dopamine. So again, I experiment, I gather data, I play with stuff all the time. And I really want to encourage you to take that approach as well. The next one on my list is I prioritize the things that make me forget to check. Check my phone. Hello. Dopamine and serotonin, for example. For me it's things like walking in nature, coffee dates with my friends, traveling. Like traveling was just so good. I was barely on my phone whilst I was traveling. There are all these new experiences, new places to see new sights, new, you know, like even just walking along the beach. And they've got the little hermit crabs like that, that, that can take me down a rabbit hole for hours. Hermit crabs are amazing. So fun, like just new experiences. Cuddling my cats, doing a was jig, you know, the back of the front. Jigsaw puzzles, like reading a really good book. These things that make us forget to check our phone, they are very regulating. So they help our nervous system to come down. They help us to come out of that fight or flight state. They help us to, to soothe, to feel safe like they are the green lights. They are so good for us. They also produce the brain chemicals that ADHD brains have got a little less of. The dopamine, the serotonin. Right. These are things that feel really, really good. So I prioritize those things every single day. Next one here on my list. And I've lost count of what number we're up to. But the next one is I always start my day with the fun or the easy stuff first. And I allow myself to task switch throughout the day without making it a problem. I used to beat the shit out of myself for task switching and saying I can never finish anything when in actual fact I needed to go away, get some more dopamine, get another win somewhere else, and then I could come back and finish it. So an example of this is like today, today my to do list includes record this podcast. It includes prepping for Friday's coaching sessions, replying to couple of emails. I need to also add comments to a document and then I need to prep for an upcoming talk. Now prepping for an upcoming talk has me going, oh my God, no way. So some people would say, you know, eat that frog. Which means do the hardest thing on your to do list first. Get it out the way, nice and early. That is great for a neurotypical brain. If that works for you, fantastic. By all means, go for it. But typically for those of us with adhd, that is terrible, awful advice. Okay? And that is going to drain us so badly. So if we can get early wins. For example, I have already prepped for my Friday's coaching sessions because that's super easy. I replied to a couple of emails that I had to reply to because, again, that was, like, super easy. That gave me a couple of early wins, and now I'm like, great. The next thing I want to do on my list is record this podcast for you all. And again, now I'm building up some momentum. I'm like, awesome. Like, I've actually achieved a lot and it makes it easier for me, me to tackle the next things. So these early wins that we get help us to produce dopamine, help us to feel like we've already achieved something, which then can make it easier to tackle the next thing on the list. So, for me, I always start the day with that fun and easy shit first. And when something gets really difficult, for example, I've been drafting this. I say drafting this episode. I mean, I wasn't really drafting it. I was kind of making notes, but I knew there were other things I wanted to add or sort of move around. And I had wanted to do this two days ago, but I've actually allowed myself to task switch in and out of it across a couple of days just because I knew that either way, today was recording day, so it didn't matter. But I knew that there were things that I wanted to kind of mull over and think about and come back to. So it didn't matter that, yes, I task switched in and out of it eventually. Like, I'm getting it done before it needs to be released. Like, well before it needs to be released. So again, like, I do like to task switch a little bit, and I don't make that a problem. So when it comes to prepping for this upcoming talk, I'm probably going to do that amongst adding the comments on this document, and I'll probably just kind of dip in and out of both of those. And I'm also going to do it with noise in my ears. I tell you what, I'll be sitting on the bed with my bed desk and a cat next to me, and I might be watching some Netflix, like, something mindless. It doesn't really require my attention, or I might be listening to some music or Something like that while I do that. Okay, so that one was start with the fun and easy shit first because it really does help our brains to produce dopamine and build that motivation. But also sometimes it's okay to task switch. Like that's okay. It's all right to kind of go between different things. It doesn't have to be a problem. And the last one I wanted to share with you, which I think is just so helpful. Again, like some people think it's a little bit weird, but I think it's becoming more normalized, is brain dumping. That's right, brain dumping. So before I went on this two week vacation, I had a lot on my mind. Okay, what do I need to pack? Like, have I printed everything? Have we got the passports? Do I need to check anything else? Did I look up if we need visas? Do I? What about finishing up at work? Have I got everything covered? Have I set everything up for while I'm away? Is my out of office on? What do we need to do for the cats? What do we need to do for the kids? What do we need to do for like my partner's mum who comes to stay while we're away, like I have we got. You get the gist? It was a ton on my mind. Okay, Was I overwhelmed? There were times where I was a little overwhelmed, yes. So this is where a brain dump is so helpful because what you're doing is you're getting everything in your head and I say word, vomiting it literally, just word vomit it out onto a piece of paper. Okay? That means you get everything in your head and you just tip it out onto a piece of paper, scribble it. It doesn't need to be pretty. Nobody else is going to read it. You don't need to worry about typos and spelling mistakes or making sense to anyone else. This is just for you. Empty everything out of your head onto a piece of paper. Just doing that will help to reduce all of the load on your brain because right now you are trying to get your brain to remember it all. And all the sticky notes keep falling off the wall and you keep watch, worrying about them and putting them back up and thinking about it over and over and over again. It's exhausting. So just the activity of getting everything out of your head and onto a piece of paper will help. Anytime you are overwhelmed, so helpful. Even if you like, if you're feeling like you don't know where to start, you don't know what to do if you are overthinking again. This brain dump can be so helpful, such a simple, simple tool. But ADHD brains, where we try to hold everything in our brain. Again, this is so helpful. And then you can go back through that and sort of, you know, group things. Okay, well, these are the things I need to do. This can wait till I get back. You've then got it all in front of you. It is visual because when we've holding all of this information in our brain, it's like we're in a dark room, right? We're fumbling around in a dark room, but we're trying to find something and we can't find it. But when you get it out of your head onto a piece of paper, it's like you've turned the light switch on. Okay, great. Now I know where I'm at, what needs to get done. Okay? This is gonna be the my most logical place to start. Great. Okay, again, brain dumping, so helpful, right? And it's such a simple thing, but yet so, so, so helpful. It really does relieve the cognitive load, especially for the ADHD brain. All right, my friend, so just to recap, that is it. That's the list. These are the things, the rather weird, interesting, different things that I do that really do support my adhd. Number one, delay sending emails. Okay. Number two, I wear activewear, like my comfy clothes underneath my real people clothes. Number three, change up the working environment. Number four, I use experimenting, gathering data and playing. Right? I use that approach for so many areas of my life. Number five, I prioritize the things that make me forget to check my phone. Okay? These are the things that really support regulation. Dopamine, serotonin, all of those good brain chemicals. Number six, I always start with the fun or the easy stuff first. And I also allow myself to task switch throughout the day to flick between things and don't make that a problem. And number seven is brain dumping. I brain dump on the regular, especially anytime I'm feeling overwhelmed or catch myself in some sort of an overthinking place. All right, all right, my friends, that is it. That is our episode this week. Week. Huge, huge love to you. Take care and I'm excited to speak to you next week. Hey, friend, if you want some more help navigating and thriving with ADHD and some help applying everything that you're learning here on the podcast, then head over to our website, navigating adultadhd.com.