Podcast Summary: Navigating ADHD Challenges – Planning, Expectations, and Emotional Dysregulation

Podcast: Translating ADHD
Hosts: Asher Collins & Dusty Chipura
Episode Date: November 17, 2025

Episode Overview

This episode explores the pervasive challenges adults with ADHD face around frustration tolerance, planning, expectation-setting, and emotional dysregulation. Asher and Dusty, both ADHD coaches, draw from client experiences and their own lives to discuss how ADHD uniquely impacts emotional responses to everyday setbacks. They emphasize strategies for self-soothing, rethinking success, and moving toward healthier and more sustainable planning.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Hidden Role of Frustration with ADHD

• Frustration as a Derailing Force:

  • Dusty recounts a "Costco" story (01:33) as a lighthearted but classic ADHD scenario—carefully planning only to have a minor setback (forgotten receipt) completely unravel her efforts, leading to a sense of being "trapped" and intensely frustrated.

    “I had to text Ash in all caps being like, help, I'm trapped in Costco.” (02:22, Dusty)

• Emotional Dysregulation Defined:

  • ADHD entails a lower tolerance for distress and a greater vulnerability to being derailed by big feelings.

    “What makes dysregulation different...is an inability to tolerate distress, an inability to self soothe and an inability to work towards goal directed behavior while in an escalated state.” (03:42, Dusty)

• The Vicious Cycle:

  • Careful planning can ironically increase attachment to a desired outcome, making a setback feel even worse and more likely to trigger giving up or shutting down.

2. The Planning Spectrum: Green Light vs. Red Light Thinking

• Green Light Planning:

  • Assuming all will go perfectly (e.g., every traffic light is green on the way to Costco).
  • Leads to underestimation of obstacles and disappointment when things don’t go smoothly.

• Red Light Planning:

  • Over-anticipating every possible problem or barrier.
  • Can paralyze action before it starts, fueling procrastination and self-criticism.

• Finding the Middle Ground:

  • Asher describes his garden project and the necessity of adapting expectations as new challenges arose. Instead of striving for total completion, he learned to value incremental progress and the importance of “regrouping breaks.”

    “I stopped looking for outcomes in my gardening sessions...I started measuring success in a lot of areas in my life as: have I moved it forward in some way?” (16:38, Asher)

  • Dusty admits her tendency toward “green light planning” and how this leads to recurring unforeseen challenges.

3. Expectation, Disappointment, and the ‘Thermostat’ of Frustration

• How We Experience Frustration:

  • Dusty explains (08:37) that frustration is essentially the gap between the expected and the actual difficulty—the brain's "thermostat" for frustration.

    “What causes frustration is the difference between your expectations...and how difficult it actually is...The difference isn’t in how hard the task is...It’s actually in your mental construction of the task.” (09:03, Dusty)

• Childhood Context:

  • Dusty reflects on how this played out as a child and now sees it in her own daughter: frustration often arises when fantasy and reality misalign.

• Front-Loaded vs. Back-End Disappointment:

  • Dusty distinguishes coping with disappointment in advance (“okay, this might not work out, and that's fine”) versus after-the-fact (task incomplete, meltdown ensues).

    “Really it’s just front end disappointment versus back end disappointment.” (15:52, Dusty)

4. Practical Strategies: Pause, Disrupt, Pivot

• Self-Soothing and Regulation:

  • Pausing to breathe, take a walk, or step away interrupts being “stuck” in the emotional brain and helps regain clarity or pivot.

    “Pause, disrupt, pivot is really relevant here...Because so often in those moments where we do barrel through, there’s no pause, we’re in frustration, we’re not acknowledging it...” (18:30, Asher)

• Externalizing Planning:

  • Dusty shares the importance of using tangible supports (written checklists, timers) to compensate for working memory gaps.

• Detaching From Outcomes:

  • Asher reframes success as “meaningful progress” rather than total completion. This reduces the sting when things don’t go to plan.

5. Individual ADHD Planning Styles

• Dusty: The “Green Light Planner”

  • Sets optimistic, best-case-scenario expectations, often blindsided by practical challenges.

• Asher: The “Red Light Planner”

  • Tends to overanticipate difficulties and procrastinate, sometimes leading to frustration when delayed tasks turn out to be easier than feared.

• The Goldilocks Zone

  • Both hosts agree that balanced planning—anticipating some obstacles but allowing for flexibility—is key (25:19+).

6. Emotional Maturity & Acceptance

• Learning to Experience Disappointment:

  • Dusty reflects on how learning to accept and anticipate disappointment (rather than avoid or overreact to it) feels like "maturity or wisdom" now.

    “I feel like there’s some sort of, like, maturity or wisdom there that’s very satisfying. Like, I feel very wise when I can be like, yes, disappointment is an emotion I must experience.” (21:57, Dusty)

• Asher’s Take:

  • Changing the metrics of success softerns the harshness of both over- and under-planning. He focuses on engaging with tasks and caring for "future me" to manage motivational lows.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Dusty’s Costco Breakdown (02:22):

  “Help, I'm trapped in Costco.”

• On Emotional Dysregulation (03:42, Dusty):

  “An inability to tolerate distress, an inability to self soothe and an inability to work towards goal directed behavior while in an escalated state.”

• On Planning Pitfalls (09:03, Dusty):

  “The difference isn’t in how hard the task is...It’s actually in your mental construction of the task.”

• Detaching from Outcomes (16:38, Asher):

  “I stopped looking for outcomes in my gardening sessions...I started measuring success in a lot of areas in my life as, have I moved it forward in some way?”

• On Accepting Disappointment (21:57, Dusty):

  “I feel like there's some sort of, like, maturity or wisdom there that's very satisfying...yes, disappointment is an emotion I must experience.”

Important Timestamps

• 01:22 — Topic Introduction: “Frustration tolerance or intolerance...”
• 02:22 — Dusty’s Costco Story (frustration, planning derailment)
• 03:42 — Defining emotional dysregulation
• 04:52-07:40 — Green light vs. red light planning; garden story
• 08:37-13:00 — The brain’s thermostat; childhood patterns; disappointment and expectation
• 15:52-16:38 — Frontloading disappointment vs. outcome detachment
• 18:30-22:00 — Strategies: pause, disrupt, pivot; self-soothing; detaching from outcome
• 25:19-27:00 — Different flavors of frustration; striving for the “Goldilocks zone” in planning

Conclusion

Ash and Dusty wrap by reiterating that effective ADHD management is less about flawless planning and more about adaptive strategies: building in breaks, externalizing steps, redefining success, and learning to sit with emotions like disappointment and frustration. There’s no perfect hack, but with awareness and compassionate tactics, meaningful progress (not perfection) is possible.

For listeners new to the episode:
This discussion offers practical takeaways and relatable stories for anyone navigating ADHD in adulthood, particularly around handling big emotions, rethinking tough expectations, and making planning work with the ADHD brain, not against it.