Hi, Jane. Hi. Hi.

Absolutely great to have you on. So we ran a couple of I little bit like was I was so loving listening to Ben. I mean, what what a true inspiration.

And I I love seed lip drinks. I mean, they've totally changed my life in a way because like you, I always used to hate those sickly drinks and lime and soda tendons from my go to. But, yeah, the seed lip drinks just changed the way I work. I think I always want to be self employed now, but if I ever go into employment, I think I'll be knocking on Ben's door because the company sounds amazing.

It sounds like you can perform as you want to perform. Like you can do it the way you want to do it and achieve those those results. Right, I've to do the proper introduction. Okay. So this segment with Kaye is seeing ourselves clearly, the transformative power of community with adults with ADHD. I started to talk and then I realised I should talk with you. But you know, in our support groups, this is something we look to do. We've taken the positive side of that meeting virtually so much more now and we create groups based on community. Those vary from.

ADHD in women, is some of our biggest groups, have ADHD in men, but we have ADHD in learning a musical instrument. We have ADHD in the Polish language, ADHD in the Romanian language. We're like we're looking to bring people together on commonality to help foster that community and make a difference. And so we are in this. As you talked about feeling like an outsider is a common thread for us, for neurodivergent people. Right? It's difficult. Hugely so. Find ourselves like tripping, like we find ourselves like, Ben talked earlier about eye contact, that you discover that you're not doing something that essentially can lead to you being ostracized.

And so it causes massive problems. You just don't know what it is. You don't, like I know, find often people won't tell you. I've definitely had conversations. I'm like, right. I'm neurodivergent. Need to like, this was a political, slightly difficult situation. I was like, just please, can you just be clear? Just tell me what you want. Like and I remember at the end of that meeting, they were nodding and smiling. And I was like, you think we've agreed something? You think we've and like, I haven't and I don't know what it is. And it was one of those like time was hard end and I was like and it did. It went straight towards disaster. Difficult. Right. You've got slides. I have got slides. Yeah. You've got because And.

I I I always get a husky voice when I'm nervous. So so I might keep pausing to have a a sip of water, but yes. Have Okay. To show now.

Yeah. I'm actually I'll drop them in. You can then control them. So they'll come in in about thirty seconds. Oh, wow. So do you want to do do you want to do an introduction to your the slides will arrive and then when you over to you. Okay.

Thanks, Henry. Well, I'm really delighted to be asked because this is the fourth time that I've spoken at the Global ADHD Conference. And this is probably the subject that's closest to my heart because I've just spent my whole life not feeling like I belonged, really trying to fit in and never feeling like I fitted in. And even after all my training and knowledge in the coaching world, I still couldn't quite figure it out. So I I'm gonna be talking through my own story, and, we originally had two people who were gonna, talk afterwards, after my slides about how they found being part of my group, but we've got one in the videos now and then one so we've got Sarah in the videos, and then Lucy will be joining us live afterwards.

To talk about her experience because I think it's always better to hear from other people. You know? And we're natural storytellers, aren't we? We like stories. So, yeah, there we go. Are you ready to share, Henry? Shall I share my own screen?

Give us two seconds. They're processing. Okay. They'll they'll be But with it it will we've had some issues because you're gonna play some video. So I that's the bit I'm nervous on, which might be the bit that's causing the processing issue. But if you're happy to talk to your first slide, it will appear I say momentarily, but, like, it should it should be in just one second. Okay.

Okay. So I've I I chose the title about mirrors and having true mirrors because I really feel like for many of us who are neurodivergent, it's like we've been looking at fun house mirrors all our lives. So we've not seen our true reflections. We've, we've been reflected back and projected back as being too big or too small or we have two heads, you know. And, for me, finding real safeness and belonging in a group for the very first time really helped me to kind of understand that power of mirrors. So here we go. I'm gonna have to take my glasses off actually because I have I have have, I have very focused on it. It means I can't see the the screen when it's that small, but we'll, we'll give it a go. Okay. So seeing ourselves clearly.

The transformative power of communities. It's all about mirrors. So a little bit about me. Other people used to think that I was so confident, and I used to believe I was really confident as well. But actually, turns out a bit like Ben was saying, earlier that it's it was all a performance. And that performing all the time left me absolutely exhausted. It it led to anxiety, to depression, to repeated cycles of burnout. But I I felt like I was confident. I could never understand it. And I could also never feel like I fitted in anywhere, whether it was, you know, brownies and guides as a kid.

Or, the dancing I used do or school, and and I could never find the right career either. So wherever I was at work or at home or in groups, never quite felt like I fitted in or belonged. So that was a little bit about me. And then after this whole lifetime of not fitting in, in my fifties, whilst I was studying on a master's, during lockdown, actually, I just had a massive breakdown and burnt out really badly during the COVID lockdown as I was homeschooling my kids. And, and I decided I wanted to look into positive psychology and coaching, I think really to sort of understand myself better. And then I thought if I get a job out of it, then that would also be good. And that's when I realized I was neurodivergent.

You know, staying up to do my essays till four and five in the morning and, you know, in my fifties, which meant that I was then completely exhausted for the rest of the rest of the week. And that opened up so many other things. So I now work after, studying all this for several years now. I work as a neurodiversity coach, and I also supervise other neurodivergent coaches. And more and more, I facilitate groups because I really feel like that groups are the place of healing and connection and growth for us. I'm also a single parent of two two neurodivergent teens, who both struggled to be in school at times. So I've really had to learn to not rely on my willpower.

And discover this thing that I call way power, which is really sort of tuning in and connecting to your purpose, your why, as Ben was saying about as well. And, you know, sort of not having to dig deep and push on and be exhausted all the time. So these are my coaching qualifications, and there's a lot there. Right? I don't expect anyone to read them. And I'm not sharing them to tell you how brilliant I am at all. I'm sharing them because even with all that knowledge, I still couldn't figure out why I didn't feel like I belonged anywhere. It was never covered on any of the courses. And.

Like, what I learned in my positive psychology masters was that we are all wired for connection. Human beings have got this deep, biological need for connection. And I know that I've always carried this longing to belong as well, but I know I've also carried an equally deep fear of rejection. You know, and every time I was in a group or even with one of the person, I'd be thinking, oh gosh, do people like me? Am I being too much? Am I taking over? Am I not saying enough? Am I interrupting people? Like, all this stuff would go on in my head all the time. Even with all that knowledge and studying and research that I've done.

And one of the things I found really hard to capture is it's almost like it's a felt sense really that goes far beyond words. So it it means it's difficult to articulate. And also, this sense of what I used to call and in fact, I refer to it later, strained belonging. So it's like we belong, but we're almost kind of like on the edge and we can't quite let ourselves go, but it's underneath our conscious awareness. So we don't necessarily we're not necessarily aware of it, so we therefore we can't change it. So you probably can't see this, can you? I'm gonna read it from my PowerPoint because the first time I ever was part of a group and felt like I belonged.

Was such a massive, impactful experience for me. I actually wrote, a letter of gratitude to the trainer, and it was back in September 2023. So I wrote, I wanted to express my deep gratitude for the space, community, and energy you created during the training. I now realized that I had felt truly seen by everyone there, and this is what made the experience so uncomfortable for me. When I was first introduced to coaching, it took me a while to get used to being heard, and I always used to cry immediately when someone heard and validated me. But being seen was next level. This is why I found it so hard to look into the eyes of everyone else because everyone was seeing me and it felt I felt almost unbearingly vulnerable.

Now Lynn, who ran the training, she introduced me to this idea of a of a of a boundary rope, a psychological boundary rope. And, so I had this around me in her training. And I've actually got it on the floor today because I know it's a global audience and I knew that I'd feel, quite intimidated. It's about having a psychological boundary. And this psychological boundary rope helps me feel less raw in my being seen in my wholeness by other people. It was your ability to create a level of psychological safety that I have never experienced before, where I felt almost physically held, that enabled me to show up in a group with no masking for the very first time in my life.

So you can see it was absolutely huge for me. And I and I and finally, it was almost like having felt that I could all I could put it into words what that was like. And having put it into words, I also shared in my journal. I often write haikus when I'm journaling. I find that they're a really nice way of getting to the essence of something. So for me, being seen means I can stand in my truth in this vast expanse with no blurring at the edges. And also what I recognised was that when I was able to be more open and not mask, I was able to then connect to other people more. So I wrote an opening bud, tender, tentative, allows others to open.

So there was something in me that was really moved by being in this group, and it was it was only a weekend's training. So it was really impactful to me. So I wanted to experiment, really. Was my experience unique? Could I create a space offered to the people the safety, the acceptance as I am that I'd experienced, that validation, and that hope as well, because I just was left with this huge sense of hope that I could continue growing and flourishing from this experience. And beyond that, more than that, I wanted to get to sort of the beyond words stuff. Like, could I create, could I recreate that magic of truly belonging and the deep healing that can come from being seen in a group? So I ran an experimental beta program.

This was earlier this year. It took me quite a while to kind of work my way up to it. And I invited 18 of my, coaching clients or ex coaching clients, 10 of whom signed up. So you'll hear from Sarah, and then you'll hear from Lucy live after after this presentation. And it was only a four week group program. It was literally I just wanted to test it for four weeks to see what we what would happen, you know, if I went in with that intention. And as part of that, we got she co created a sailboat, which actually is a visual anchor for all of us.

To navigate the seas of life when you're late diagnosed. Because as we know, the seas can be really rough and tumultuous when you're late diagnosed. And I called it find your way power because for me, finding my way power as opposed to willpower had been, really helpful in me studying my ship. And it turns out, no, it wasn't just me who experienced this. So I just wanna introduce Sarah, and Sarah will share a little bit about how she found the first program. Now can I get this to play? That is the question. Henry or is anyone there to see if we can get this to play? Because it'd be really good to hear from Sarah directly. She's got a lot of really good stuff to share.

Hello. Let's see see what we can do. I'm not sure we can. Oh, no.

Could I have a go I have a go on Yes.

Absolutely.

On my lap. On my lap. If that works. See if that works. It would be really good to hear from Sarah. It would be really good to hear from Sarah. I'm unable to share the screen inside the screen.

The excitement of I think I've got it, actually. So don't Oh. I'll I'll play it now. K. So give me two seconds. Fantastic. Thanks. We'll have to talk amongst ourselves very quickly. Get rid of that. Yeah. Mine with my screen in this specific way.

It's not it's not it's not an you know? I keep forgetting about that.

My my childhood lonely, and I didn't feel like I never felt like I belonged, but I didn't know why. It's not having ADHD is not like having any other difference or disability because, you know, if everyone else can run and you you can't and it's because you've only got one leg, can see that. But when you can't do the things that all the other kids can do and you can't see why, you don't know you're any different from them. You assume your mind is the same, but something just doesn't click, and I just never did click, you know, with only a little handful of people, and I never knew why those people I did click. I just knew that there were some people that I could relax with even as a child if I'm talking about 10, 11, 12, and.

Be myself, completely be myself. There were only a handful of people. And then as I got older, life went off the rails quite badly largely due to this undiagnosed ADHD and all the baggage that went with it. And I tried and tried to feel that I belonged. I was desperate, so so desperate. I felt like the odd one out in my family, in my own nuclear family as well, which didn't help. So it really felt that I was the one at fault here. It was my fault that I wasn't fitting in anywhere because if you don't even fit in with your nuclear family, you know, where do you belong?

Yeah. I think a lot of us feel like that. Really do. So what I'm gonna cover today is about what we know about relationships and connection, why it's especially important for people with ADHD, what those challenges are when we've got ADHD. And then what's useful for us to know as individuals with ADHD, what's good for us that we we can kind of like own it and and sort of understand it. And then a little bit, I'm gonna include a few tips for a group facilitators as well to increase psychological safety if you're running a group with neurodivergent people. Oh. So why relationships matter? So one of the most watched TED Talks of all time with over 50,000,000 views is Robert Waldinger's TED Talk, what makes a good life?

And he's the director of the Harvard study on adult development, which is the biggest, longest study of of adults, ever. It's been going for over seventy five years now. And his key finding was that good relationships keep us happier and healthier, period. End of. Nothing else. And he actually has three key findings. I can't get my slides to move now. There we go. So the first one is that social connections are better for health and well-being, and loneliness kills. It's that simple. Loneliness kills. So we need social connections for our health and our well-being. The second one is that it's about quality. It's the quality of those connections. So having higher quality and closer connections.

Is more important than having lots of connections, which of course, very often we do these days in days of social media. Right? So it's the high quality and deep close connections that are important. And the third one was that good relationships are as crucial for our brains as they are for our bodies. And this is true for everybody whether you're neurodivergent or not. But for neurodivergent people, it's probably even more important. Oh, my slides keep getting stuck, Henry. There we go. So doctor Ned Halliwell, who wrote ADHD two point o, and I'm sure many people watching this will know really well. He talks about connection as the other vitamin c that we all need.

It actually appears on his clinic's treatment page alongside medication and coaching as one of the treatments for ADHD. And he says that human connection is one of the most important components of us living well when we have ADHD. So why is it harder for us when we're neurodivergent? Because we are wired for connection the same as everybody is. It's just that we're wired differently. So with my sailboat sailboat that I, co created with my 10 people who came on my first, cohort, we we're gonna look at three of those parts that are really important. And the reason I'm focusing on these is because they're all under our conscious awareness. So we're gonna look at the hull of the boat, which is our sense of safeness and belonging.

And then we're also going to look at the deck of our boat, which is our sense of self. And we're gonna look at masking and our lack of reflection for ourselves. So this is where the mirrors come in. So this is our deck of our boat. And then we're gonna look at the buoyancy of our boat, which is our sensitive nervous and sensory systems. And specifically how this shows up with, our persistent drive for autonomy or PDA. So it's the nicer reframe of PDA also around rejection sensitivity. I'm not gonna go into too much detail with this for now, somebody's covering RSD later. So one of the things I wanted to talk about was the difference between safety and safeness. Because very often groups focus on safety.

But don't necessarily consider what safeness is. And the easiest way I can explain the difference is to sort of imagine, an earthquake and thinking of a young child getting rescued. So when the rescue worker has pulled that child out of the rubble, he's safe. So that child is feeling safety, but it's only when he's handed to his mother that he starts to cry and the kind of the full extent of his experience will hit him. And that is safe nurse. So it's really quite different, and this shows up in groups. So safety is very often like the measurable contract contractable contractual and procedural stuff. It's about rules, about clear group agreements. It's about things like confidentiality, maybe having a zero tolerance policy.

And he asked the question, am I protected from harm? So when you're thinking about safeties, am I how am I protected from harm in this group? Whereas safe nurse is like the beyond words stuff that I was talking about earlier. So the question here is, do I feel safe enough to be myself? Well, then do I feel safe and protected? So it's almost, I almost feel of it like it's a it's almost like a softness in the body. There's permission to be yourself. It's how our body and our nervous systems feel when we sense warmth and trust, and then we feel able to connect and be curious and play. So it's again, it's quite difficult to articulate. It's the beyond the word stuff. And healthy groups and relationships need both. So we as humans need both.

So the safety piece without the safe nurse can feel cold. So I don't know if you've ever been in a in a group or a setting where you know all the rules are in place, but you'd somehow still don't feel welcomed. And safeness without safety can feel warm, but it might feel a bit unstable. So one way to think about it is that safety is a scaffolding and safe nurse is the settling. And our bodies and nervous systems really know the difference between both of these as well. So I wanted to show you that from the very first session, group facilitators can can sort of bring this in right from the very beginning. So this is a copy of the slide, one of the slides I had in our first session.

So you can see it was it was called grounding and gathering, and it was about we had a settling practice where I got people to titrate, being connected with themselves, and also being connected with the group. Because very often after meditation, the teacher will say, open your eyes now and you're suddenly in the group, and it's kind of like I've lost that connection with myself. So there was a real titration process. And then we had, I went through what our four founding principles were, my suggested principles, and then we had discussions in pairs about what we wanted to create together and then fed back to the group. So that was like one of the main sections of our first, group program. I'm gonna share the four, principles now.

So the first one I'm sorry. This is very sticky, these slides, so, it's taking longer than it it would normally. So the first one is around radical acceptance. So this was one of our founding principles when I ran the group. And I, I said that it was on many levels. I wanted people to radically accept themselves and whatever emotions emerged in the moment. And also, to accept all voices in the group even if people didn't necessarily agree with them. And also to radically accept whatever emerged in the moment. So both me as a facilitator and the group, sometimes things would kind of want our attention, want attending to, and to radically accept that in the group as well. And I also talked about the the second principle is about many mirrors.

So this idea of having mirrors reflecting ourselves because we've been used to fun house mirrors, which I'll I'll come on to. And this required honesty from us as well and courage as well. And then the third one was about us as a group being all one. So a group is is a is a is a concept concept in itself. It's greater than the sum of all of us put together. And the aim of the group is to accelerate and amplify our learning for all of us. And that when one of us has a realization and a learning moment, we all share it. The whole group learns. So that's the power of groups, really.

And then another contribution we wanted to make was about the sort of the legacy of the group going out into the wider world and really sort of thinking about the ripples that would happen afterwards. So these were the four founding principles and I'm going to let Sarah talk again about how she found those principles.

So apologies, Henry. There's no And then I got a diagnosis and then I found a group where I did belong And I felt it right from the start just sharing with other women the experience of being late diagnosed and the grief of it and knowing that it wasn't me being an idiot all that time. And And other people shared that and mirrored it, showed me that they felt the same, and that was amazing. And what I can say is you, Khanh, okay, the group facilitate you're the group facilitator and right at the very start you laid out principles for the group and the most important one for me was hearing the words radical acceptance. I had never felt that I had that from anyone before. Radical acceptance, be exactly who you need to be.

And to be able to do that in a community of other people also sharing that experience probably for the first time was really magical.

Oh, it still gives me goosebumps every time I listen to Sarah say that, because this is real. People have carried this stuff for years and decades, you know, and then suddenly to feel seen for the first time is huge. And I just want to make the point that safeness doesn't need to be complicated. Okay? It does need to be named and acknowledged, and there needs to be a discussion about how you're going to co create that in a group. And also there's a there's a a place as well for the group facilitator to role model that out. I think that's also a really important part. So moving on to the next the next slide if it wants to move. There we go. So we're onto our deck now. So this is the second point. Our deck of the boat is our sense of self.

And I really want to explore masking because it comes up so much in groups. We're we're so used to performing. So what I thought was confidence at the start, if you remember my story, it wasn't that at all I was performing to the point that I did not know that I was performing. So very often masking is kind of suppressing our autistic or ADHD traits to appear more neurotypicals that would be accepted. It's learned over decades and decades. It starts from a really, really, really young age. And it might start off as conscious masking, but over time it becomes unconscious. And and really crucially, it becomes a deeply embedded.

Part of us and a part of our survival strategy. It's how we keep ourselves safe in the world by masking, by not being ourselves. And that's so sad. Like, just saying that out loud is kind of just acknowledging how desperately sad that is. And yet it's true. Masking protects us and keeps us safe, and that's how why we've used it in the past. And it also comes at a cost. So we can become really disconnected from our authentic self so that we don't know who we are. You know, Ben was talking earlier about how we find socialising really exhausting, and this is one of the reasons why it can lead to deep exhaustion when we're constantly masking all the time.

You know, the research shows us that masking is connected to increased rates of anxiety and depression. And another another problem with it is, although we're longing for deep connection, what happens when we're masking is we make only superficial connections because people tend to connect to the mask of us rather than the real us, and then we and then and then that causes difficulties for us, again. And and in terms of the impact on groups, what happens is when we're masking is that belonging to a group becomes conditional. And we have this kind of belief that we'll only fit in if we hide our true self.

And that's where the exhaustion, the burnout, the shutdown comes in. And that's why many of us actually withdraw from groups because we just find that they're too exhausting. And masking goes so deep that we don't necessarily know the extent of it. So I'm gonna bring up Sarah again because she talks about how she'd never even heard her own voice before.

Yeah. And do you know I can I've only just realized, Jenny, it's all these layers when you start to unpick it that when I'm in the group, the weight pack group, I don't ever spend any time thinking my or feeling like my voice literally, it used to sound like other people's voices. I would my my accent would change. The timbre of my voice would change. And I never really knew what I sounded like for sure. And now I know because that's the voice you will hear in the group.

It's just so desperately sad, isn't it? Somebody can live a successful life and, and not know actually what their true voice sounds like. I just want to make a point that obviously this stuff goes back decades and decades, especially if you're late diagnosed. This is really tender work, Kaye, because it goes deep. So it's really important that we're compassionate and gentle with ourselves because masking has kept us safe up to this point. So just a real, invitation to be mindful when you start to explore your true self and start to experiment with unmasking that you know that you feel safe and supported. So it's just like a little caveat really about keeping yourself safe. Just some tips really for group facilitators.

Masking is is invisible usually, and people can appear confident like me. But actually, they're deep in survival mode, And and the cost to people is absolutely huge. And my my one thing would be to say don't ask people to unmask because it is so tender and those masks have kept people safe for so long. And I think our role as facilitators and peers as well is to help create that container of safeness and not just safety. And perhaps people from there can then start to explore their true selves rather than kind of inviting people or asking people to unmask. So yeah. There we go. So I just wanna move on to the other part of, the the deck, which is about our sense of self and mirrors.

And a lot of this stuff comes from Donald Winnicott, who was a childhood development researcher, and he's like a real pioneer. And he talks about the true self and the false self when we grow up. And our true self comes from our caregivers living emotional mirror where they mirror back to us when we're very, very young, like a baby in arms, so that a child grows up knowing, their authentic self. But for many of us who are neurodivergent, we might have had neurodivergent parents, we might have trauma in the family. There's all sorts of issues that very often we might have had distorted mirroring from parents or even absent mirroring altogether. And this creates what Winnicott calls a false self.

And what happens with a false self is that then a child starts to obscure their needs so that they don't know what they want because they're being compliant because they know that that will get them loved. And it creates a really strong sense of shame. And this is like the start of the journey to this lifetime of not being seen that many of us have. So I sometimes talk about fun house mirrors because even in adulthood and in our neuro normative society that we live in, which is not at all neuro affirming, we get reflected back to us that we're too much or we're too big or we're not enough. And what happens that then is it exaggerates our, our challenges and it minimizes our gifts.

And our self worth then becomes, dependent on being externally validated. We don't have our own self worth that we would have had if we knew what our true self was. So this disconnection from our authentic self also leads to a loss of agency and even more difficulty then finding our community. So it's a really community effect. So in a group with true mirrors, so we've got a neuro affirming group that's got safeness and safety. And this group can then provide true mirroring mirroring, and that creates a really powerful container for people to discover and start to express their authentic selves, which is huge. And a group provides a multiplicity of mirrors. So there's a, Ervin Gallom is a a group psychotherapist.

And he's written lots of books on group psychotherapy. And he talks about groups being a whole of mirrors, where group members receive feedback from all the different sources. And that helps people distinguish between maybe distorted projections that they've internalized from the past and their genuine qualities. And this group gives us much more understanding of ourselves than a single relationship can ever provide because it's multiple. So it kind of amplifies and resonates as more and more people are in the group. And then there's also the role of mirror neurons, which is really interesting. So this role of neurological mirroring. So when you're in a group and you're feeling that safeness and connection.

We witness other people's authentic expressions. We witness their emotional experiences, those moments. And all mirror neurons in our brain create this, empathic resonance that helps us understand our experience and our feelings and helps us validate those. And this process is a real gateway to opening us up to compassion. I know I've read so many things about ADHD that say be more compassionate, but they don't necessarily say how. And this is a really good way of of kind of increasing that compassion by seeing ourselves as others see us. And two mirrors can also correct what was missing in childhood. So if you've had a really, you know, a traumatic childhood and your family of origin didn't provide that in the beginning.

Groups can provide a real opportunity to have that healthy memory that was missed in our childhood. And we can be seen and accepted and valued for who we really are. And they also create safety for authentic expression. So this is around neuro affirming environments. Okay? So neuro affirming environments can normalize the different ways that we might have around, Henry, you were saying before about eye contact and things like that. So we might have different ways of processing, different ways of communicating, different ways of relating to other people. And it it normalizes that that's that's okay when neurodivergent. You have different ways of doing all of those things, and it helps prevent the re traumatization.

That happens when sometimes people have to mask repeatedly and repeatedly. And they also and this has been really key with the group that I the first group that I run. It enables us to challenge our internalized ableism because what happens is group members start to question all those negative messages that they've internalized about their neurodivergence, And they start to see their traits as differences rather than deficits. And it it really is truly magic when you start to see it in a group. When we when we start to receive other people's acceptance and, you know, what Carl Rogers called unconditional positive regard, It's it is it is pure magic. It's like, it's yeah. I can't describe it any other way really. It's pure magic. So.

I just wanna share Kelsey who really wanted to be here today, but she has lots of chronic health issues and she's not well enough to be here. But what she shared was that she normally struggled so much being in a group and to to be online as well for that amount of time. But because of the mirroring, because of that safeness, her chronic conditions didn't impact at all. She was able to be present. And as she said, my heart feels full with love and compassion and care that I've received, and that is huge for me. Getting a bit emotional reading that as well. And I just want to very quickly go through these because I know somebody is covering, RSD later, rejection sensitivity.

But also this idea of, the persistent drive for autonomy or it's called pathological demand avoidance in the medical literature. But it's about our nervous systems or our sensory systems, again, totally under our conscious awareness usually. And they both often lead to an increased risk of withdrawal or avoidance of groups when the demands feel overwhelming. So rejection sensitivity, we all feel it very differently, but what can happen is that the situation can feel overwhelming to us even if it seems small to other people. And it's very often accompanied by shame. So what you see from the outside very often, if I can get the slide to go, is a fear of rejection, that holding back. There might be more masking or.

Sometimes sort of lurking. I'm a I'm a I'm a group lurker. I'm an edge dweller, and I quite often lurk in groups because I don't wanna kind of, you know, go in and be too much. So there's very often a holding back. There can also be overthinking or rumination after the group. Did I talk too much? Was I too big? Was I too loud? Did I interrupt people? You know, all of those things I showed at the very beginning. And then also, like I said, avoidance, this desperate wanting to be liked, the people pleasing, you know, the foreign response in, in our nervous system as well. And also hypervigilance. So what often happens if we've got, high rejection sensitivity is where we're not fully present because we're kind of constantly scanning.

For any signs of criticism in terms of voice or people's behavior or even in the environment, even the way that the chairs are set out in a in an in person meeting, for example, this can all trigger our rejection sensitivity. So just a couple of things a few things to bear in mind as a group facilitator. So I think it's really helpful to name the rejection sensitivity so that it reduces the shame, members know it's not just them, like to actually gently name it, to have clear grouping, agreements around things like interrupting, which I know we do in the, ADHD UK groups. And, you know, we can come back if repairs needed. And I think also just to recognize that RSD can sometimes look like over politeness.

Or compliance because it's associated with this people pleasing thing. So it doesn't necessarily look like people feel rejected. It kind of can come across as being over polite or or very compliant. And then I think it's really important that we role model our imperfections and how we own it so we're not over apologetic. So if we forget things or our slides get stuck like they did earlier, you know, when, you know, the slide doesn't work, actually owning it rather than being over apologetic.

So just offer reassurance, gently bring people back in. And I think as well just making sure that the quieter voices are heard even if it's not in the main group, then have, you know, breakout pairs or smaller check ins. Just make sure that everybody feels included there as well. And then very quickly, PDA. So this is a profile where even small demands can trigger very high anxiety. So this idea of persistent desire for authority. So even when a person really wants to engage, it can lead to resistance, it can lead to shutdown, withdrawing, it can lead to anger. Because what happens is it the person gets in a fight or flight with their nervous system. So in group settings, and I I used to be this is me. This fun activities.

I used to hate the idea of forced fun at work. So fun activities used to spark my anxiety so bad before I knew anything about neurodivergence. So just being mindful of that that some things can feel overwhelming to other people. There's often a fear of being controlled and then masking to cope so that we hide our distress with this, which then leads to burn out as well. And then this idea of strained belonging, which I mentioned before, that we want connection really badly, but we often struggle with the pressure that comes with it, this pressure of being in a group. So we want it and we don't want it, Like a lot of things with ADHD. So what you might see from the outside is a facilitator or his peer.

Might appear as rudeness or lack of interest or not caring or laziness, which again all sound very similar to traits with ADHD, don't they? But it's almost like doubled. And then this judgment from others can cause even further disconnection, and it reinforces that outsider feeling that we already had to start with. So for group facilitators, I think it's really important that we use an invitational tone, and we have very low demand structures. So whenever I'm sharing something in a group, it's always I use words like perhaps, maybe, you might want to, would you like to, rather than saying this is what we're going to do. Doing self paced sharing, so not expecting everybody to share, but doing it in a self paced kind of way.

And giving people options, emphasizing choice so people don't have fixed instructions. Really, a gentle a gentle facilitation is really helpful with this. And then also a flexibility flexibility in how people are able to participate. So doing nothing or stepping back, observing, and then with the option to rejoin later is always really helpful if people have got this. And I think as well, respecting when people don't want to join in. Not not shaming people, not pushing people, but just respecting people's choices there. And I think really celebrating the different ways that people might show up. So belonging to a group doesn't mean that you're going to take part in absolutely every activity.

You know, it's it's it's all down to the individual. So considering all these things takes time, and it's so worth it. As you've heard from Sarah and you'll hear from Lucy, just this courage to show up authentically that means that connection can turn into a resource and not a drain for our energy and resources. Oh, sorry. It keeps getting stuck. So key takeaways I want people to think about are things like safety and safeness. The fact that supportive groups can be true mirrors so that people can see their genuine strengths and their gifts, not their perceived flaws and deficits that they've had their entire life. That authentic connection is a biological human need. We all have it. And and when we're mirrored compassionately.

We can move from masking in our own time to expressing our authentic selves. We don't heal or grow in isolation. We heal and grow in connection with other people. That's what humans are wired to do. And I just want people to leave with hope. So, yes, yes, whatever age you are, we can find the clarity, acceptance, and agency that years of masking may have hidden. You really can. I'm seeing it time and time and time again. So I really wanna I really wanna emphasize that, that even even with the most difficult of lives, we can still find this clarity, acceptance, and agency. I wanna leave with a couple of haikus from, two women that were part of the initial program.

I I said that I often use haikus when I journal, and I invited the women in the group to write haikus in our last week. And we've got Joe there, the drowning woman finds herself supported by her very own sea change. And Sarah, who said, meeting other women who have hidden their light in such a safe place is bliss, which is just amazing. Makes it all worthwhile while while this extra thinking that we might need to have to do. And I'm gonna leave with Lucy. Oh, no. I'm not. I'm gonna say I'm gonna be running the program again. We're on we're running another cohort at the moment. This is week four of ten weeks, and we'll be running another group program in January.

If you can't wait till then, I'm gonna be doing a mini sort of winter way power community. And if you head to Positively adhd forward /winter, you can get to download a free Winter Way Power companion and also then receive emails about the Winter Way Power community. So that's the selling picture. Never very comfortable with that. But yes. But if you want to be involved, if this has really resonated with you and you want to be involved in a group where that is really prioritized, that's safeness and authenticity and belonging, then that might be a good fit for you. And I can't get the slides to check. Oh, I was gonna finish with Lucy on the last slide, but maybe she wasn't on the ones that you received, Henry. But fortunately.

We have Lucy in person. I have the privilege and joy of having Lucy in person. So I don't know whether Lucy can join us. There you are, Lucy. Hello. Hello. Okay. Hi, Henry. Hi out there. Hello. I just wondered, did you wanna share a few words about how you found the group process?

Yeah. Absolutely. So I was part of the beta group, and I'm now part of the subsequent group. And my experience of it has been completely life changing. That's not an exaggeration. I might cry just as I say it, as I often do now in our group, having a long history of not crying. Yeah. It was only diagnosed three weeks ago. Uh-huh. Four maybe four weeks ago. But a few years ago, I had the last of a lifetime of major, major breakdowns or burnouts. I now understand it was a burnout when my child was quite small. And in the four years since that time, I saw I I I discovered belatedly about neurodivergence and thought maybe this. In fact, I I recognized immediately that it fitted my picture. So I've had about three years of exploring it.

I've had about three weeks of knowing for sure even though my instinct and luckily, I found you in the in in the last year, first as an individual coach in this group. And I can remember entering the the very first session of your beta group, and I couldn't sit still. I was fidgeting around. I kept moving room. I kept standing up and sitting down. I was looking at myself on the screen feeling like a complete loon. And I then, when the opportunity presented itself, said I'm really sorry. I'm so wriggly. Look, I'm doing it now. Immediately said that's not just accepted here or tolerated here. That is absolutely welcome.

And so from the very first moment, I sort of I'll get choked again. I felt seen in a way that I had previously even just that wriggly me has always felt unacceptable. And I suddenly was not just accepted, but seen and welcomed. And the whole thing proceeded from there, and it was a very quick experience to feel belonging, which struck me as remarkable. But there was a recognition, I think, amongst all of us, wasn't there? There was this this openness and this willingness and this, frankly, delight to feel seen and be welcomed. And it manifested in lots of different ways, you know, lots of crying. On my part, me and Sarah cried quite often and recognising each other that a welcomeness that you created around vulnerability.

The invitational nature of how you operate really, really, really resonates with me. I've only discovered PDA in the last month, and that is another thing that has like a penny has dropped. So for countless reasons, it felt like a homecoming. It feels like a homecoming every time I tune in. I've learned so much just from your PowerPoint. Some of it's stuff I've heard before and I haven't properly learned it. Other bits are new and I'm like, oh my god. Yes. Yes. Yes. So there's also this sense in which I think when you come to things like I'm 51, I've never fitted in. I've always been a bit kooky. I think I probably found lots of different ways to articulate that kookiness is acceptable even though it didn't feel acceptable.

That was part of my mask. But when you come to things really late and you feel seen and recognized, there's this there is a grief process. But it's also this sort of it's like a drink after walking through a desert, you know. It's like, oh my god. Give me more. I'll take this water. You know? It's like an elixir.

Wow. I've got goosebumps again, Lucy. That's so amazing. I just I just wondered if you'd be able to articulate what what difference it's made to the rest of your life. Are you able to say it speak a little bit to that perhaps?

Yeah. I mean, I do feel like a new learner in terms of seeing myself through this lens, the neurodivergent lens. I feel like I've got l plates on all the time, and I'm but I'll give you an example from this week. I did something this week that was big. I went to a big funeral. There was a big drive on the way. There was a big drive on the way back. There were a lot of emotions, a lot of feelings. And as I was driving back feeling like I've overdone things, I was overstimulated, I was emotional, I was feeling lots of different things, both belonging and not belonging Yeah. As part of that experience. I came back and I was able to say, it's okay.

We've got the group on Wednesday. It's okay. I can check-in with some of this. I've got up I've got, like, this life raft, this boat that we're building, and I do feel like it's a collective. For me, it's an ongoing boat building exercise. It's wonderful extended metaphor of the boat. And I was like so it's alright because I've got that now. And I think life without that is like I've been thinking about a different analogy to explain what it's like when you don't have that. And it's like it's like being on a tight wire, like a high wire above either no safety net or a safety net that's really gappy.

So you know that if you fall at any point, which you're very likely to do all the time because the high wire is really the mask. Right? It's really this kind of performative identity that you've created to sort of fit in. Everyone else seems to Ta da. It's going or like pirouetting on their high wires and you're like, Christ, I don't know why I can't, you know, I'm hanging off it or I'm, you know, I've split my difference in one leg to either side or whatever. I'm not managing it. Scrabbling to get back up, but I know also that the the the net underneath can't hold me. And so there's this terror really, and that was what my breakdown, my last burnout was. I've got a little girl. I've I'm a mom. I'm a single mom too. I've got.

I've got to be alright. And I could see that my safety net couldn't hold me. The infrastructure wasn't there. The mental health support system wasn't there adequately. I was misunderstood and misdiagnosed and misrepresented. I couldn't represent myself. And so now that I know I've this this this safety net is kind of weaving together. I've been thinking about this analogy a lot today and thinking it's more like a trampoline now. I can get rid of them. I can mop up and try again, but it's like it's more of a a tight weave that I and I can continue weaving it. I know that this is an ongoing experience of community building that I can I feel so welcome? I feel so accepted.

I know. I mean, do you remember I said very from the very beginning of sessions, how can we keep this going? Because I was like, my god. I can see it already. And if you can knit that weave more tightly, I mean, we're knitting it with my fingers, then it can hold me, then it becomes like a trampoline, then it becomes something that kinda you can bounce with and you can play on and you can experiment in and you can do a flip and see if you see how you land. And it I guess the difference between that that gappy net between beneath a very high wire and a and a tight woven trampoline is it's it's I think, to a to a safe life, to a life, you know, where I can grow. And the other thing that I think is is really.

Extraordinary about my experience being in the group with you and the others is that so much of my life has been about coping and scrabbling and pretending to be alright when I wasn't and performing, you know, a type of alrightness or a huge amount of people pleasing, which is my big masking identity is this sort of performative teacher mode, perky, is everyone okay? You know, that and that takes all my energy. And now I have a kid, that takes all you know, there isn't sufficient energy for all these things I've been having to do. And so it's all a bit about coping and enduring and kind of scrabbling. And I see my way now with this boat that we're building in this and, you know, mix my metaphors and.

This and this more secure sort of base, I can I can imagine a life that is sustainable, that isn't scrabbly and copey, but it's like rich? So there's a huge amount of optimism that I've not experienced anywhere else in anything I've accessed before, never in any mental health therapies. I mean, I like a bit of therapy, but not those kinds of group environments or those not in my my working world, not not anywhere have I felt that sense of recognition and belief, but also hope genuine hope. Because it's built on a completely different sort of foundation, isn't it? A diff a truth that previously wasn't even available to me, let alone the people around me. Yeah. The true mirrors. Yeah. It's a game changer.

Oh, thank you Lucy. I've been blown away by this. Like it's Thank you, both of you. It's absolutely extraordinary. Yeah, Kaye, clearly the work you're doing is something very, very special. And thank you for sharing it. Thank you for the work. I have to say it hurt me in the heart a bit, like the one of your insights, which was that people connect with the mask, that you're making these false connections and that they're connecting with a non true you. Like, the cost that I guess, just that was a it's an amazing insight and frankly quite tough to to listen to. Just how good it is. Thank you well done fighting the slides. I can tell you the issues with us trying to help because of the video play issue.

So I'm sorry for that. You did It a very good job on was okay.

We got there in the end. I think we did help just a little bit, didn't we? Because it was a bit difficult, we got there in the end. And thank you. No, well, it's all about what you're doing.

I thought we'd genuinely Thank you. Thank you, Lucy, for sharing your candor.

And I'm so glad.

But I have to say goodbye to you. So I've got to run to our turn and hit our schedule. Thank you, Lucy. Kate, absolutely amazing. And obviously, there's a reason why you've come to being kind and generous enough and obviously we're so pleased. I think it potentially is just you and I have been in all four. Yes. You. So it's actually maybe Darren Bull from ADHD New Zealand. Oh. But We'll see you next year then, Henry. I would look forward to that. Absolutely. I would not want to break the streak, especially what you bring is just amazing. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you. You're extraordinary. Thank you. Bye, Kaye.