A (5:30)
Okay, I have all sorts of ideas for you on this one, but I'll start by giving a little backstory for anybody who's not familiar. I mentioned in a few different podcast episodes how at the beginning of 2025, rather than set a massive annual goal, which was something I had done for, you know, over a decade. That, that year I decided to set quarterly goals and really focus in on things that were challenging, but that would change the quality of my life or my family's life. And at the beginning of 25, my first quarter goal was to really figure out how to best help my daughter. She has always been our wild child. She's always been very strong willed, and she learns differently than her brothers do. And she has behavior stuff that's different than her brothers. I honestly was just kind of observing it for the early part of her life. It wasn't something I had experienced before, but my first step was I consulted with a child psychologist. So probably when she was in first grade, I had a consultation with a psychologist, and I told them all the things that we were seeing and asked his opinion of what he thought. And he gave really great advice, I think, which was he's like, some stuff is kids just learning how to exist in the world, and some stuff is things that they can't control. So he said, if it ever gets to the point where she cannot thrive in school, because that was like the biggest issue we were experiencing. If she ever can't thrive in school, if she's having a really hard time and the behaviors are starting to affect her ability to just be at school, that's when we need to talk about doing a deeper dive. So that was first grade, and then it kept going on. And so what that looked like for her was she had a very, very, very hard time sitting still. She would get overstimulated, she would act out and she would get in trouble. And what she was experiencing was literally every day of her life that she went to school, she would get in trouble. And it would always be around the same thing. Like, she would talk back, she would, you know, get into an argument with another kid, she would push another kid. I mean, she had three big brothers, so she was really physical. She would just like, you know, she'd start stuff and she'd finish stuff, and she got in trouble every day. And I think the big thing there or the big lesson for me in that experience is, you know, kids are always holding up a mirror for us, right? So when she was getting in trouble, I literally felt like I was getting in trouble. I was such a good girl, and I had a lot of fear in me in my childhood and in my adult life about being a bad girl or doing something wrong or getting in trouble. And then here I have this little girl who's getting in trouble literally every day. So I would experience A lot of emotional feelings about her getting in trouble. And I think for the first couple years, I was kind of like wrapped up in the emotion of that, and I couldn't really separate myself from it. And it was only when I was able to separate myself from it that I became a bit of a detective as her mama. And that allowed me to be a better advocate for her. So instead of just every day, you know, teachers like, oh, no, I did this today. And I'd be like, okay, I'll, you know, yeah, we'll talk to her. We talk to her every day. Like, we'll talk to her again. I really started to. Number one, I would ask for more information about when and how and the circumstances of what would happen. And I started to clue together that she always got in trouble at recess or pe Always in the classroom, she would be okay. But when she would go into experiences where a lot of kids, lots of energy running around was always when she would have a hard time settling back down. It was always when she'd, like, talk back to the teacher, whatever. So that just gave me a ton of info around my kid and. Okay, well, clearly when she gets into situations where she's overstimulated, it's gonna bring out behaviors in her that don't allow her to thrive. And that's, I think, so important as a parent to understand whatever your kid is showing. If, you know, for instance, wow, they really get overstimulated in these situations, it's going to help you. For instance, if her cousin's having a birthday party at Sky Zone and it's a trampoline park and there's going to be sugar and screaming and loud noises. It means, of course, like, she's still going to get to go to that. But I'm also then prepared as her parent to help her navigate that experience, knowing that she's going to get overstimulated inside of it. It also means that for her birthday party, we do really small, calm things because she can go into experiences where it will be too much. And then I know she's not gonna have the best time because it's just not setting her up for success. So, first step was start to be a detective of what is causing behaviors that are really challenging for them. That's number one. Number two, I definitely started to push back a bit. She was in public school at the time, and in second grade, I think there were 32 kids in her class for one teacher. And it just. I mean, that's just impossible for that teacher. 32, second graders not support. Like, that's so hard. So no shade to teachers who I think are living angels on this planet. But then if you have kids in that class who have different challenges, that makes it even harder. I did start to push back on things and started to point out to the teacher, hey, have you noticed that this happens always at recess? Have you noticed this happens always at PE Is there anything that we can do to set her up for those experiences in a better way so that she doesn't get put into something where she can't control herself? And then this is happening. So that was when I started advocating and I started pushing back. And I am. I want you to know, like, I am the mom who. I don't think that it's like, oh, well, you have to, you know, bend your whole teaching curriculum for my kid. I really don't think that I teach my kids that if you're in a teacher's classroom, you have to play by their rules. This is their environment. You have to be respectful, because that's important. That's how you're gonna learn to navigate the world. You might not always like your teacher, just like you might not always like your boss. That's reality. But at the same time, if there are things that we can do that make it so that my kid can be better set up, like, if it's not asking a lot, it's just sort of asking for compassion in this moment and maybe don't push her into stuff that's gonna go wrong. I will absolutely fight for that. So that was the first thing I did, the second thing that I did, and this is not an option for everybody, but I. This is just. You asked me, and so I'm gonna say I do not think it is possible for Noah to thrive in a public school. I just don't. I guess that there could be places in the country where the public school classrooms could have smaller classrooms, and in which case, I think then it would be awesome. But I haven't met that yet. I've been in Texas, I've been in California, and now we're in New York. I am absolutely willing to pay for private school because it means her classroom size is smaller and she can get support that she doesn't get in public school. So that was a big thing, too. Is taking her to private. And in private school, she has tutors, and she has all sorts of support that help her with reading and math and just different things that are important for her to do and for her to feel confident in. So those are Just scholastically, what was happening. And then the big one was we had her brain scans done. So I went and had brain scans years ago and learned all about sort of healthy brain and different types of brains. And so I knew that that was something that existed. We went to amen clinics and when I went, I saw that they had a ton of like a ton. Like they have a whole like wing of people who have adhd, add, any sort of like different way of thinking or being. They have like a whole division that's dedicated to that. And I was really curious what we would find. We took both Noah and her brother. I would honestly, I would have my teenagers do it as well. I think it was so freaking incredible. It's not cheap, but that is what we did. We took them and had brain scans done. And it wasn't an easy process. There's a lot of paperwork to fill out and a lot of, you know, doctor's appointments that you have with the doctor. And then the actual process of getting brain scans done involves needles, which like, I don't know a single little kid who likes that. And so that was just. It was like a whole thing. But the biggest takeaway, honestly for me was when I saw the scan of what a typical. I'm using air quotes because just every brain is different, but what a typical kid her age, like what their brain would look like and then what her brain looks like. And. And just so you know, what you're looking at is the activity in the brain. They test them two different days and one day is like where they're actually doing something. So they'll be like working on a computer or doing math and it's looking at what is happening in their brain. And then on the other day, it's the brain at rest, so they're just like hanging out. 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There's like you can see sort of all the neurons together. I'm making this up some, you know, neurologist is like, that's not what you're looking at, girl. But anyway, just imagine like what a brain looks like. And you're seeing all the kind of wiring. And they say if you see sort of the color white, that's like thought process. That's like the brain working. And if you see blue, that's a little bit of stress. And if you see red, that's extreme stress in the different areas of the brain. And in a typical brain, it looks like this. And then they showed us Noah's brain both at rest and when she's trying to work. And it was like, you know, you're looking at a Christmas tree just lit up, just full of red, full of blue. And what they explained to us that is like this forever changed the way instantly, forever changed the way I parent her is they. It was like this is what her brain has looked like when she's at rest. Meaning, like when she's at rest, her brain is like screaming like so much is going on in her head. And then it was like, here's what it looks like when she's trying to focus. And that was double the way the doctor described it to us was it's as if you're trying to do a math problem while sitting in Traffic on the 405. Like, you're not even in a car, just like a kid sitting on the road on the 405 in rush hour traffic. And like she's, you're asking her to do math and it's absolutely impossible. That was so helpful for me because now I can literally see her. You could see her start to work on a math problem, let's say, and you would literally see her brain start to get distracted. And then you could see her fight so hard to focus in. If you have a kid who struggles with this, like, oftentimes when they're trying to focus in on something, it's like they can't get their body to stop wiggling because it's like something's got to kind of be moving in order for them to focus in on the thing. But if you're in a classroom, like a typical classroom, what's the teacher going to say to you? Sit down, sit still. And like, you can't sit still, but then you're also trying to focus. It's just, it was so helpful, just that simple thing of understanding how our brain works. And then they prescribe different supplements, so different things that would support the parts of the brain that experience more stress. And none of them are medication. They're all over the counter, just different things. I think she takes like four things a day. And I am telling you that it was life changing, life changing for our family. I cannot express it enough. It's the best money I've ever spent. It is like the best thing that we've ever done. It was so helpful. And it wasn't like a light switch, but within a few weeks, she was calmer. She was calmer at school, she was calmer at home. And then once we were able to, to help her to like, be grounded and be calm, then we were able to get through to, you know, like, okay, now, now we can work on your math and now we can work on your reading. We now we can work on these things that she struggled with because it's almost like this wall was between her and education. And what's so wild to behold is the level that Noah was at at the beginning of 2025 to where she is right now at the beginning of 26 is astounding. You cannot fathom how fast she's learning, even six months ago, what her handwriting looked like versus what her handwriting looks like today. And I had never experienced this because my boys, they're different. Everyone's different, right? And so I never have had a kid who has had to work this hard on her education. And it is so inspiring. It was just her birthday. And on birthdays we go around and we always say our favorite things about the person and everyone in the family says something. And what I told her was, I'm so inspired by you. I'm so inspired by how hard you work to get better, how hard you work on yourself. She's nine and she works harder on herself than most adults you'll ever meet. It's so inspiring. So all of that to say that is what we did. We did hear, you know, like, gluten free diets are supposed to help kids with adhd. We tried that for a minute and honestly, like didn't see that big of a difference. I think anything that's stimulating we're really hyper aware of. So sugar is gonna overstimulate her being in environments that are like loud and overwhelming. She'll still kind of have a hard time. And if she doesn't take her supplements, I mean, you can see it if for some reason, like it's a Saturday and so maybe we're not quite as regimented as we are during weekdays. And I'll forget to tell her and it's like 2 o'. Clock, she'll be acting in a way and I'm like, did you take your supplements? And she was like, oh, shoot. You know, like we can tell if she hasn't got them in her system. So they're just so helpful. I highly recommend. So that is exactly what we did. And I think it's something we'll continue to work with as she gets older because, you know, hormones and like just everything's gonna change and adjust. But if I could go back and tell myself when she was like four, because that was really hard. She was such a wild child and really defiant and that was something too. When she was in school, they had labeled her. There's like that new popular term like defiance disorder or something. Like I saw it in her file and I got so pissed because I was like, she's five years old. Like, what do you, you know, like, I don't, I don't. I'm. I hate labels. I think it's so dangerous, especially for little kids, for someone to label you something. And by the way, it's worth saying Noah doesn't know that she has adhd. Like, why would I tell her that? She knows that she takes supplements and we explained it to her that like, they help her to be calmer so she can focus in school. She knows that she has a tutor. She knows all of these things. But I don't think it would be helpful to label her to her. She doesn't know who she is yet. I'm not about to tell her who she is. Yeah, we'll continue to work with her as she gets older. If any of my kids needed medication, we would go there. But I will do everything in my power to help them in every other way before that's necessary. Just because I really don't want to introduce anything into their bodies. They're so little, right? Like, you know, when I was little I would get sick all the time and my parents, because it was the 80s, right, they just give you antibiotics all day. And now we know how dangerous that is. Doctors are so careful with antibiotics now because of what it does to the gut and like, it's just not good for your system. But we didn't know that back then. And our bodies are made when we're little. Like we should have all the things that we need to grow strong and healthy. And so I want to help as much as possible by helping them to ingest as little as possible. But yeah, the big things were sort of stepping back, separating myself from what was going on, seeing if there were any, was there any similarities, like, does it happen at the same time of day? Does it happen in these situations? Does it get worse if they eat certain foods, if they don't get enough sleep, if they, you know, like my son who's 13, has his own stuff and much to the chagrin. I mean, he just thinks we're the worst ever. Tells us all the time we're the strictest parents he's ever met. He does not have a phone and he is not allowed to watch YouTube. He's not allowed to be on social media at all, at all. And he's going to be 14 this summer and believe me, we hear about that endlessly. But the thing was when he was younger he would watch YouTube and he just like watch, you know, video game and cooking recipes and he wasn't even watching anything crazy. But the stimulation of fast changing videos because he'd always end up in shorts. The YouTube shorts is the worst, literally the worst thing for their brains. If you have a kid who has any sort of adhd, ADD stuff and you put them on A device where the content is shifting quickly. You watch them when they're done, and tell me they're not the worst version of themselves. So we noticed that with him, like, it's actually overstimulating him to the place that it's becoming horrible. And so we just took it all away from him, which is. Oh, my word, the. The drama of that you can't even imagine. But he is a better version of himself if he doesn't consume that. And so I'll just fight them every. I'm telling you guys, every single time a new country passes a law, because, like, I don't know if, you know, either Australia or New Zealand passed a law that kids under the age of 16 are not allowed on social media. And another country just passed the law too, because it's just horrendous for children to be on social media every single time a new country passes law. I'm like, ford, guess what? New Zealand pass? And he's like, so all of that to say, just pay attention to what makes it worse, and then, you know, remove those things. Advocate as much as you can, but I think being able to see inside her brain was the first time that I understood that she wasn't just being a jerk. And I know that that sounds maybe ridiculous, but maybe some of you who are parents understand that you're just like, why are you, you know, there? Why are you acting like, why are you pushing back? It was the first time I was like, you literally cannot control yourself. You cannot control yourself. And this little girl is so loving, so kind, so funny, like, she is so freaking awesome. But we only got to see glimpses of her in, like, small doses. And now we get her all the time. I remember talking to Aunt Linda about this when I was going through it, and she was like, oh, girl, that is the best money you'll ever spend. That is the best money. Whatever it costs for your baby to be okay, you gotta do it. And I was like, yeah, I totally agree. So I know there's all sorts of different paths that you can take, and I know not everybody has financial resources to get brain scans done, but I think at the very least, start documenting what's going on. Start paying attention to what makes it work or what makes it better, and start setting up a schedule around those things as some of the first steps that you can do to really help yourself in the process. Okay, let's see. Next question.