What is being Neurodivergent and why do we hate Accountability?

Hi, I'm ND Out Loud, and we are talking about why— what is being neurodivergent and why we hate accountability. And then we're going to talk about why accountability isn't a checklist that we all think it is.

Yeah.

And why am I going back all the way to what is being neurodivergent? Because I have today gotten 6 people asking me what being neurodivergent is. So We don't just talk about neurodivergence here as its own thing, or ADHD as its own thing here, and skip out on neurodivergence. Why is that? Because everybody on my team is way more than just ADHD. Most of us have dyslexia, uh, sensory processing disorder, PTSD, um, migraines, um, learning disabilities, Tourette's, dyslexia, autism.

A mess.

And all of those things, and there's way more, I only gave—

Anxiety.

A handful, are what neurodivergence is. And I really want to make sure that we're understanding that being ADHD isn't the root of the problem. ADHD is not the problem, okay? Autism is not the problem. It's, it's the fact our brains are literally, literally As in, we can see it on a brain scan now that they have fancy brain scans, that your brain is wired and looks different on a brain scan. And I really wish they would just give a brain scan to diagnose because, hello, 2 seconds flat, instead of all of these therapists and psychiatrists and psychologists who say, well, you don't fit the criteria because you're an adult. No, do the brain scan because you can see it.

Or even like, you don't fit the criteria because you're an adult and because you don't have symptoms Or you don't have evidence of symptoms before the age of 12. That just happened to my uncle, actually. And I'm just like, yeah, I—

It does not make sense at all. Think about being neurodivergent as an operating system that is not running at the default factory settings. Our operating system does not run at default settings. We have completely different settings. We're running, we're actually running 10 to 20% faster And more optimized than a neurotypical brain. It's just that when you do that, the sound systems are turned all the way up to 11. For any Gen Xers, you will know what I mean, all the way up to 11. And the sensory, like your skin, um, your sense of smell, your sense of sight, everything is dialed all the way up plus 10.

Mm-hmm.

So it's not that We're broken and can't do the things. It's that our brain is doing all of the things at the same time, and we have a hard time honing in on just one thing and completing a task or whatever that is.

And then our environment just doesn't match it, just doesn't match anyways. So our environment is a ride.

The environment, I think more— I mean, more so in developed countries than other countries. Uh, is more tuned into the quiet, slow, unable to process very much person.

Mm.

Which is dumbing down everything, and it makes it harder for those of us whose brains work at more optimized processes. Of course, then we also have the processes that aren't optimized, you know, the ones way up to 11. And it causes this big jumble for us. And the neurotypicals treat us like we don't know what we're doing and we can't do things and we're broken, but we really aren't. We're just—

Right.

Don't have the right tools and the right structure around us. And this is where accountability comes in. And I want to take the 4-letter word of accountability, and I know it's way more letters than that, but we really treat it, especially neurodivergent people, as a 4-letter word. It's this horrible, horrible thing. We can't do that because As kids, it was laced with shame and punishment.

Yeah, a negative emotion. And, oh, you can't get it done. Oh no, a lot of shame and punishment.

Yeah, a lot of shame and punishment. And it's also laced with, uh, internalized perception. And again, this is probably due to trauma from external things that we can't do. That we can't do it when we can do it, but there's just a but on it.

Yeah.

We absolutely could do anything and everything a neurotypical person does, but we need to do it differently. We need to do it on a different timeline, or there's nothing that we can't do. And I say this as an almost 50-year-old with both ADHD and autism. With 1,500 plus clients, we can. But um, but and we've also been burned by the neurotypical way of doing things. Get that new planner. That planner will solve everything. Just get that task management app. Just get that new habit app. Just just just just buy a gym membership and just get out the door. Yeah, just. Just leave the house. If you just get out of bed, just take your shower. Just do it. Just— yeah, just. But if only— But let's add the but in there. But we also need the right structure, the right plan, the right thing for our brain. And what Katie needs to get things done is completely different than what Danielle needs to get things done. And what Shay needs to get things done is completely different than what Katie and I need. It's understanding how our brain works.

How?

Because we can, but— so what's, what's our but? What is after the but? Masking. The other part of accountability is masking is exhausting.

Yeah.

When you are in an account— and I've done this so many times over the years to myself. I've done this to myself so many times over the years. I'm going to be in an accountability group because this will help me get the thing done. And they're all neurotypical people, or they're highly masking, high achieving people, which is even worse. It's actually way worse than neurotypical people. Highly masking neurodivergent people are way meaner, way pettier, and way more critical of each other than a neurotypical person is of us.

Oh, and I'll say that used to be me because I was kind of trained by my environment to believe that because I was like, oh, I, you know, I'm not good enough. So, but then like I would get angry at other people. I'm like, I, you know, well, you can't get this done and you can't get this done. I'd get like one thing done and I'd be like, oh, well, you can't get this done. You can't get this done. You can't get this done. But it was kind of like masking my own insecurities for what I couldn't do. And so, but now I have a nice support network. I don't need to do that anymore.

And being accountable when you're masking also means adding tasks. It means performing. It means survival. We're performing in that survival mode versus performing in our optimization mode.

That's not going to last too long.

We're all performing. I mean, we're Wherever we are, whatever we're doing, we're performing tasks, we're performing whatever. But then when you mask, it's 10 times harder to get a task done because you're also masking and you're using up a ridiculous amount of brainpower masking to act like you know what you're doing.

And you just crash.

And the biggest thing, and I think the biggest thing that I see in my neurodivergents that I have worked with and continue to work with, is hyper-independence. Hyperindependence is a trauma response.

It is not talking about me.

Not asking for help, not having accountability, not having community is bad. It is an extreme trauma response, especially when you're going through it. Every therapist about that.

It's hard.

Yeah, well, and also when you're hyper-independent, you feel like you're bad at life, you're bad at this, you're bad at that. So you have to do it all yourself and you have to control the environment. And then you're controlling the environment and you're masking and you're doing all of these things. You end up burnt out and decision fatigued, depressed, extremely— your anxiety's off the charts. All of these things just by not being willing. And, and you— there has to be a willingness here. Yeah, to be willing to have gentle, helpful community and accountability.

Especially when things go to shit.

Oh, especially when things go to shit. So accountability isn't a checklist, it's a relationship. And you just wrote a blog about this that will be up on our website for a little bit. So what— why isn't accountability a checklist? Why?

I mean, because just with our ADHD brains, just having something on the list of things to do and just being like, oh, like, I'm just gonna do it, you know, it's, it's really hard to be accountable just to yourself without knowing Like what that importance is behind it. What's that connection behind it? Why? Why? Why does it need to get done? And I see this a lot with myself, but also my clients, both little kids and older kids. I mean, older adults.

So why is accountability a relationship?

Well, it's a give and take. You know, I mean. Like, I love using my planner. I'll say that. I love using my planner. I love using it and checking things off, but just because it's written down doesn't mean I'm actually going to do it. But when, when you have ADHD, it's really hard to start things, to sustain your motivation, and then complete the task. And so when you have that relationship with accountability, You're able to, you know, you're able to— you're able to really harness your executive functions and really get through it and do the thing instead of just saying you're gonna do it and then just stopping there. You need the actual push to get into motivation.

Well, we're— we, as those of us that are neurodivergent, ADHD, autistic, whatever, we have connection-based motivation. Like, that is Motivation, task initiation, executive function all require dopamine, epinephrine, serotonin, like all of these things. Guess what we as ADHDers— guess what happens? We're making those things. They don't get to— they, they aren't getting to the right part of our brain because we're wired differently. Not the right operating— I mean, the right operating system, just tuned a bit different.

Yeah.

And because we don't have those things, we need things that will activate what we need— our dopamine system, all of those things. We need co-regulation. We need to do things so we aren't driven only by our interests. So I would rather be planning Disney trips 24/7 and going to Disney all the time. Can't do that because I have bills I have to pay and I can't afford Disney all the time. So therefore, I need outside motivation. because I'd rather be planning a Disney trip. And if you needed a clue, just look behind me. But so how do I get that? Body doubling. Accountability of, hey Danielle, how are you doing today? Hey Danielle, I saw your lives this morning. And yes, I got this message. Are you okay? You just don't quite seem yourself. And I don't mean that sounded bad. I don't want you to feel bad about what you did. I just—you don't quite seem yourself. You know how nice it was to have somebody message me this morning and say that? Because allow really nice. Oh, I need to reset. I need to step back.

I need to take a nap because we struggle with self-awareness even as adults, and that's really. Hard to admit. I think that's really hard, at least for me, to admit that. And it's funny, I work on this with, with kids. I work on it with 5-year-olds. And I'm sitting here thinking, oh well, that stuff that I taught my 5-year-old, I should implement that because it would be really, really good for me.

So I was struggling this weekend, like really struggling. Couldn't get things done. I had all of these plans. I had a list of 22 things I wanted to get done this weekend. And I am, for those that don't know, I have MS and I am bound to my bed or my couch a lot of times due to pain. So I had this list of 22 things I was going to get done because I was sitting on the couch. There was no reason why I couldn't get them done. Could not get it done. Could not get it done. Could not get it done. So my team, I didn't want to bother my team. It was a long holiday weekend. I didn't want to rely on them at all. So I went to ChatGPT and I asked ChatGPT a question. Now, for those of you that don't know me very well, I use ChatGPT a lot. I actually got to train ChatGPT way, way, way, way back when, way before any of y'all got to play with it. I have been using ChatGPT for more years than any of you knew it existed. So it's well— it knows me well. And I put, because I'm dyslexic and have a couple other learning disabilities, almost all of my coaching Resources I create go into ChatGPT to reword it for me and make sure it's spelled right because it's way better than Grammarly and it reformats things so it reads well and stuff. Stupid thing, and I have trained it to be sarcastic with me. I should not have done that. Um, said, hey, why don't you use some of the resources you tell your clients to use and use some of the tools you tell your clients to use every day? And it gave me a list of my things. I'm like, Well, I'm you. Shush! I know this. I know what to do. I know what the tools are, and I still couldn't think of them doing myself because I need co-regulation. Co-regulation is huge for me, and this is as a professional with a degree in psychology, working on my PhD for behavioral psychology, and with 25 years of coaching experience. I still needed ChatGPT to repeat the tools back that I tell my clients all the time. Because we need co-regulation, which is relationship building. When we build the relationships, and I will tell you, going to Disney, and Katie could not go to Disney with us this year. She just joined the team just before, like, all the tickets were sold out before Katie could even think about coming with us. And even she saw the difference in relationships on the team of everybody that went. And that has grown your relationships with everybody on the team, even though you weren't able to go, because community is so important.

And now whenever I have a bad day, I'm like, hey guys, I'm having a bad day. Someone pick me up. Like this morning, you know.

And we all have those days. We all have. I had one this morning. Multiple people jumped in and supported me before I even asked for help, which is, I think, even more awesome. And part of the relationship that is really, really cool is I got that accountability and that feedback and that regulation without even asking for it. Why you have to build these relationships— being hyper-independent, not asking for help, treating tasks as this checklist that you're going to fail at. Instead of— it's not gonna work— going to succeed at. It might not be success in the way you originally thought it was gonna look like. I didn't get all 22 tests done this weekend. Let me tell you, I had to rearrange things, and that was okay. But I know that's okay because I had people to bounce that off of and I had accountability. So relationship building is huge. I think the other thing that I had to learn, and I, I want to ask you, Katie, if this is true for me, I have tried co-regulation like using Focusmate and other free co-regulation things. And there are a lot of co-regulation things out there for ADHD specifically. Um, I have tried all of those like free groups and free this and free that. They never worked for me.

Yeah.

I didn't show up for them because I was like, oh, nobody cares. It's— and it was random people. It was never the same people. Like, it was very rare it was the same people on a call each time. That's one big thing I dislike about Focusmate. Personally, as a neurodivergent, is the fact that there are different people on body doubling every single time. Like, who am I talking to? It doesn't work.

Not this rando person.

Right. And that, that just didn't work for me. But the minute I started investing in it— now, I will tell you, investing in what we have here is very, very different for me. I have invested a mega amount of money building this community and building all of the things. So my investment isn't a monthly fee that I put in, but I will tell you the blood, sweat, and tears I've put into this and getting this where it is right now is huge for me. So that's an investment in it. And I know that talking to Rebecca and talking to Shay, having to invest in something instantly makes me want to show up more for it.

Absolutely. Absolutely. So what's your question?

So, well, one, have you had the same thing, which you already answered? And 2, what does investing in something do for you in order for showing up and being able to use it and having it be beneficial to you?

I mean, so I mean, going back to what you were talking about with the connection, I mean, no, that's part of the reason why I get on it every single morning, or I try to get on it as soon as I'm up and, you know, doing things. But Because I know there are other people on there that also need that co-regulation. So I feel like other people are counting on me to show up. But it also— it just helps me, especially as an entrepreneur and working remotely alone in my little home. It makes me feel like more connected to my work, even though the stuff that I'm doing, I want to be doing it. Well, most of the time. Some things I don't want to be doing, but like fixing mailer light, don't really want to do that, but I do want to do it because it's important. But when— It just makes, just makes me feel more connected to my work. And honestly, having the same place to go every single time I love that routine. I love that accountability. It's, it's all of it. It's all of it. I crave it now, and I get a little bit jittery, like, on the weekends. I'm like, oh, what do I do?

How do I get things done without the support that I need?

Mm-hmm. I mean, it's nice to, like, sleep in and have, like, a lazy morning, don't get me wrong, but You know, it just, it gives me that, it makes me feel good. It makes me feel really good.

It's, and that's why co-regulation and relationship building is such a huge part of this, such a huge part. So if you have questions, if you want to build relationships with other people who are neurodivergent and get it, I get it every single day. And, and I'm one of those ones that's highly educated and supposedly has a lot of letters next to my name that mean diddly squat when it comes to my own brain.

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Bye.