With or without an official ADHD diagnosis, therapy or coaching for ADHD can help you with the symptoms. Whilst I cannot provide an ADHD assessment or diagnosis, what I do is work with people who feel as though they may have it. Our work together can help you with areas in which you may be struggling, such as time keeping, focus, impulsivity, self-belief or feelings of restlessness.

Even if you don’t have ADHD, but feel like some of the symptoms fit, therapy may be helpful. I often work with menopausal and perimenopausal women who confess that they feel as though they are experiencing ADHD traits, even though these have not affected them before.

First, here are some things you may be experiencing if you think you may have ADHD. Having some of them does not necessarily mean that you have ADHD. Likewise, if you have ADHD, you may not experience all of these.

• Impulsive behaviour, making decisions on the spur of the moment
• Feelings of restlessness. These can be both in the moment and in your life in general.
• Issues with focus and concentration. Finding it hard to start or finish tasks.
• Feeling as though you can’t stop your mind whirling.
• Problems with organising yourself.
• You find it hard to be on time, even when you think you’ve given yourself plenty of time.
• Forgetting things if you don’t write them down, and then possibly even forgetting to check what you’ve written
• An ability to hyperfocus on certain things, so much so that you tune out other people and lose track of time.
• You are always moving, such as jogging your foot without realising it. Things like fidget toys or tactile fabrics you can str0ke help you focus.
• Excessive worrying and rumination.

Therapy for ADHD

The most important step is finding out about you, your own life and goals right now. This means that we can zoom in on the ADHD symptoms that are causing the biggest issues for you. Sometimes, I work with clients who have struggled with time keeping in their work, and their line manager has pulled them up on this. Others, particularly students, might be experiencing a hard time getting started on something they know has to be done. It feels overwhelming and they just can’t bring themselves to knuckle down to it. Or, it might be that your symptoms are causing issues in your relationship. Your partner may be complaining that you don’t listen to them, or that your impulsivity has got you into debt.

We’ll work on embedding new behaviours, taking it at your own pace. If relationships have been damaged, we can address rebuilding them. For those who feel as though their minds are always churning, we can look at ways to soothe and calm that.

If we have a lower ability in one area, we can sometimes make up for it with our strengths. We’ll be looking at these too, and building strategies around using them more effectively.

It’s important to remember that you are more than your ADHD, so we will be looking at your life as a whole. How are you getting all your needs met right now?

Medication for ADHD

I can’t prescribe medication for ADHD. Only your GP can do that once you have your official diagnosis. Therapy and medication work very well together. Even with a diagnosis, many people choose not to take medication as there are side effects. Additionally, there are often ADHD medication shortages. If you’re struggling in your life, therapy offers a way of looking at how you can tackle things in a different way.

Business owners and ADHD

Whilst creativity and implusivity can be useful for business owners, being a business owner with ADHD has many challenges. For a start, business owners are unlikley to have that workplace support from HR or an executive coach. Once the company has reached a certain size, those issues that could be ignored, suddenly start impacting on the business. You may find challenges with concentration hold you back from pitching, going for funding or even just doing boring admin tasks. Likewise, that restlessless can make it hard to make decisions as you can see the opportunities almost everywhere you look.

Once again, we can look at these in therapy, and together build a strategy that will benefit you and your business.

To chat about therapy for ADHD, book a chat or contact me. Otherwise, you can go ahead and book an online session into my diary here.

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Dealing with those unwanted thoughts of feeling like a failure

I often see business owners, and many non-business owners, muse about how they are feeling like a failure; that they haven’t done enough in life. Perhaps their business isn’t where they thought it should be. Perhaps they are single, once again, and wondering when they’ll ever get things together.  Clients question their paths, wonder what held them back from reaching their full potential and express disappointment in not being sorted enough. While many of us are happy enough to admit that we could be more organised, more productive, maybe even more driven, there are some who really struggle with guilt about their lack of progress so far.

If this resonates with you then I’d like to reassure you that these thoughts are normal. Most of us have thoughts that don’t serve us, and they can be a pain to deal with.

Let’s imagine, for a moment, a future where you may will never feel as though you have things sorted. Let’s imagine that you will always feel that there is more you need to achieve. Would it be a relief to realise that there is never a point when you say, that’s it? Can you see that not reaching some vague goal is not the problem here, but the guilt and stress that accompanies that pressure? Would you be able to breathe and stop pushing so hard? Would you pause and realise that achievement might not be the goal, and that dealing with these thoughts may be more valuable?

Dealing with these unwanted thoughts of feeling like a failure

If you’re bothered by thoughts of lack of achievement, there are a number of ways you can approach them. The first is the path of mindfulness. Just start to notice that these are just thoughts and you can step back from them and let them pass. I particularly like the analogy of watching a sushi conveyor belt and deciding to leave that particular dish on the belt. It may come around again (and it no doubt will), but you can just let it pass by. Other lovely visual examples include thinking of the thought as a balloon, and you can imagine yourself just letting it go. Or imagine it as a car coming towards you on a bridge. You can see the headlights, but you can steo back and let it pass. Watch it disappear into the distance. You can choose one of these visual tools every time these thought crop up. Play with them and noticed which works best for you.

A more left-brained approach is to build a portfolio evidence to the contrary. This means compiling a list of evidence as to why you are such a sorted and successful person, even if you haven’t achieved everything on your list yet. (If you are a parent with young children you automatically get double points here). Or, try gathering together a menu of your achievements in life, and everything you have to show for your efforts. Keep this handy to refer to when you need it.

It’s more likely that these thoughts will come faster and thicker when something is missing in your life. As a Human Givens therapist, I work with what we call the Human Needs, and there are nine of them. They include a sense of achievement, meaning and purpose, status, privacy, connection, community and a sense of control. If one of these is missing, or out of balance, we are more likely to feel wobbly and prone to unwanted thoughts like these.

Making a plan for success

What if there is a grain of truth in these thoughts? What if you really do have goals you haven’t yet reached? The simple answer is to make a plan to do just that, breaking it down, step by step. Then take the next step. Start setting bigger sales goals. Book that plane ticket to New Zealand. Buy a new notebook and start the novel. Download the dating app and get comfortable with it. Once you are taking action, those thoughts will start to dwindle.

If you’d like help with unwanted thoughts of any kind, or want to look at setting yourself achievable goals, you can book a chat with me here.

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Dealing with difficult redundancy conversations is something for which few of us are prepared. One of the saddest things about being a business owner is when you have to let people go, due to redundancy. While medium to large businesses will have a HR person or department that can handle this, it may be that you need to deliver the news yourself if you are a small business.  Meanwhile, if your business is such that you are having to make people redundant, it’s probable that you may not be in the best state of mind yourself.

In this video interview I talked to clinical psychologist Dr Natalie Bodart about how to handle the delivery of the bad news. First: how do you have those difficult conversations? Dr Bodart looks at how to use your values and knowledge of a person. This will help you guide the session. She also shares advice on how to look after yourself in this process. Self-care is vital at this time, especially if you are having to do a number of redundancy conversations. Being on the delivery end also has a psychological impact. This is especially so if you work closely with a person and know them and their circumstances well. 

This video is ideal for anyone who has to deliver the tough news of redundancy to their employees or colleagues, and who wants to do it in an ethical and compassionate way. It’s rarely good news for the recipient, so thinking carefully about how we approach this makes good business sense.

Dr Natalie Bodart

Dr Natalie Bodart is a chartered psychologist with the British Psychological Society. You can find Natalie at https://www.thebodartpractice.co.uk

Are you struggling with your business and would appreciate talking this through with a therapist and business psychologist at this time?  You can contact me to book in an introductory no-cost session to see how I can help.

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