Why Disney was Transformational #unmaskingjourney #ndcoaching #disneytrip #disneyretreat2025

Hello there. I'm Danielle Ralston. I am the founder and head coach here at ND Out Loud. What is ND Out Loud? ND Out Loud is a team of neurodivergent coaches. We are neurodivergent, every single one of us. TBIs, PTSD, ADHD, autism, AudiHD, and so much more. Bipolar disorder, all of the things. We also have a passion for supporting others like us so you don't have to struggle like we did in our past. We have All taken trainings and certifications and all of that so that we can support you in living a better life and upgrading all of the things that are frustrating about your life. What is this session going to give you? This session is going to give you actionable tips. So yes, we're gonna talk about our programs and all of the things that we offer, but I want you to walk away with something actionable for something that is overwhelming, frustrating, or just plain annoying you right now in your life. Or if you're a parent or a spouse of someone with neurodivergence, To help them as well. I want you to walk away with something today, so please sign up today for a free call. We can learn more about each other. Good morning everyone, this is Danielle and Shay with ND Out Loud, ND Hive, ND Visionary Partners, all of the ND things, and we are here talking about our trip Last month. I can't believe it was last month.

That makes me sad. Last month.

I keep— I mean, it wasn't quite a month ago, but it was still last month now.

Yeah, feels like it was forever ago.

I know. It's— well, it feels like it was forever ago, yet it feels like we were just together in each other's pockets and with one another because it was actually only 3 weeks ago.

Still feels like it was longer than that.

I know. I miss everybody. And some of us are just now, 3 weeks later, because we as a team have really implemented a lot of engagement and a lot of ways for us to stay connected because of how transformational Disney was.

Yeah.

That some people are just feeling the letdown now. It's taken them until now. Some of us felt it immediately. Other people's took them a week or two. And then we've got some people that started feeling it yesterday. Shay being one of them.

Yeah, I think it's that coming back, you jump right back into everything and you have to handle stuff at home. You've been gone a while, and I had a trip previously right before that, and so I just jumped right back in. And so I think I kind of blocked all of that out for a while. And then my husband's been gone on a trip over the weekend, and I was by myself with my son, but he was working some of the days, and it kind of just really sank in. Really hard. So yeah, it was a little rough.

It is coming off of a trip like that. So I want to talk about why this trip was way more than just about Disney, because it was— while we did it in Disney World and we're going to continue to do this once a year in Disney World, it was not about Disney itself. It was about the training. And how to unmask, because that was a big part of what we were talking about, being a neurodivergent adult and unmasking, but doing it in the safe community space.

Right. And it's, well, so here's what I've realized, and I think it's the biggest thing is that we don't realize how, how much we mask until we're with people that are just like us and we realize it's okay to let our guard down or to open up a little bit. And then when we do, it's almost like this instant connection because we accept you for how you are. And I accept, you know, myself for who I am, as well as the person that I'm with. And so there's a lot of that acceptance that's going back and forth that we didn't realize we had missed or that we didn't have in the first place. And so now that we have that with that group, leaving it after being with you for multiple days It's a big, huge letdown. It's, it's almost like a grief is going on.

Absolutely. Um, and Rebecca says, I was late too. It didn't hit me till last week. I thought it was going to hit me since it didn't happen right away. So she was caught off guard by it.

I mean, yeah, yeah, I think a bunch of us were.

I think absolutely a bunch of people were caught off guard by it. They didn't believe me. Like a couple of people like, I'm fine. I had so much fun. It was such a great trip. And then a week later they were like, oh my gosh, I spent all day crying. What's wrong with me? Because I'm crying. And I was like, I warned you, I warned you, I warned you, I warned you this would happen. But it's so— I think the being able to unmask and understanding how to unmask and how to play as a neurodivergent adult, especially if you were late diagnosed or if you grew up or live in a household where fully 100% unmasking is not Easy. I'm not saying it's not possible. I'm just saying just not super easy because we've, especially if you're late diagnosed, you've spent so much time building that normal person mask that it's hard to take that off.

It is. And especially if that's almost like it's expected of you. You put that mask on because whether it's for safety reasons within your home, it's how you get through your day.

Mm-hmm.

It's to feel accepted. It's to— whatever you want to classify it in, it's something that you carry and you just automatically start doing. So when you're around other people, you will automatically have that mask on because of concern of what they're going to think of you, if they're going to accept you. Are you going to say the right thing? Are you going to do the right thing? And the reality is that most of the time we don't do what's classified as the right thing. But that's okay.

And fine.

And the more you accept it, the better it is for who you are, because then you can walk into any situation and begin to learn what's appropriate and what's not, which is something you lose.

In learning how, how to wear a mask or what masks to wear, because I think that saying we're unmasked, 100% unmasked 100% of the time is a lie because nobody is like that. And nor should you be because Tara, I'm talking about you. Some of us chose to unmask in a way that was hilarious to the rest of us and wasn't necessarily holding back anything. And that's not always appropriate depending on your situation. If you're in a professional position, you can't tell somebody to bite me or buzz off in the middle of a conversation if they're annoying you. You know, you just can't do that. And I think understanding there's so much information out there about unmasking and unmask and be your true self 100% of the time. We can't, I mean. You have to deal with other people. You can't do that. Yeah, right.

Well, like you said, you have to be appropriate at appropriate times. So if you're in the middle of a business meeting, you don't just say buzz off or bite me or any of that. And I think some of the reason that we thought it was so hilarious with Tara, with some of the things that she was just letting loose with, was great at that time, was because some of us wish we could do it too.

Yeah, we weren't comfortable enough to do that in that situation.

Yeah.

And while it was hilarious, it was still so cool to see that she was just able to be for that week.

Yeah.

And it's important and learning to play and learning to have fun. And you know what? It's okay to completely— a few people were giggling at how much I geeked out about being able to ride Galaxy's Edge, stuff in Galaxy's Edge and Guardians of the Galaxy. 'Cause I'm a huge fan and I love that stuff and have so much fun with that. And they're like, You're acting like a 12-year-old. Yes, sure. And who cares? But understanding that is okay and having a space where it's safe to do that. And I think that's what Disney gave everyone, is such a safe space in a community that was a safe space to do it inside of Disney.

Right, right. And, and to be able to play For some of us, we never got to play as a kid. And I don't mean like, you know, the normal play, like, oh, I'm going to sit down and play with my Barbies. Yeah, you did that. But there was a lot of times that there was a lot of responsibility put on you, or don't play that way because that's not appropriate. This is the way you should be. And the you shoulds go in there a lot. And I think that's where we kind of have a difficulty in learning how to play. And, you know, I don't even remember the question I asked in the one training that we had about play, but I do know that it's really hard for me to just sit back and be like, let's just play, let the responsibility slide for a little bit, and let's just take a breath. It is hard for me to do that, and I'm a go-go-go, but I'm learning that that play is just as important as that go-go-go. If we can incorporate some of that play in that, it helps us to relax, but it also helps us to see things in a different perspective and be able to connect with our younger— The younger groups, the younger kids, our kids, our grandkids, things like that, that we may not have been able to do with siblings when we were younger.

Right. And things that we don't necessarily feel like is okay for us to do as adults. And let me tell you, it's okay. It's okay to skip and run and jump and geek out about Tigger walking by you and chase after him so you can get the pictures or the pictures with Winnie the Pooh or Sully Edna Mode. We had so much fun with Edna Mode and all of these things. It was so important to do these things, but the training, the training, I think was really the thing that set that up. And then the follow-ups to the training. We're not going to go into the details of the training.

Right.

But the follow-ups, that first night sitting in Hollywood Studios at the Fantasmic fireworks area and just Sharing the deepest, darkest things that we're frustrated about, that we hate about our lives, that we hate about being neurodivergent. Because while I talk about, and I try to bring the positives forward a lot, there are parts of my ADHD, my autism, I actually freaking hate. And it's frustrating and it's hard and it's horrible some days. And being able to share those things.

And just being able to just talk about it without Worrying about any judgment. When we talked about it, it was a lot of, oh yeah, I totally hear you. I understand what you're saying. And being able to converse back and forth about it, not only did it open up and be able to take the guard down, but it allowed us to really connect at a deeper level instead of just the fun. We also got to connect at a level where, hey, I hear you, I see you. And I think that is something That we desire the most is to have that connection of, I see you and it's okay. You're different. It's okay. But not to an extent that it would be detrimental to you or detrimental to anyone else. It's about lifting us up and being able to be there in the sad and the fun and the happy and the struggles and all of it together makes life just a little bit easier each day. Just knowing that I can reach out to somebody and say, you know what, I'm really struggling today. I am having such a hard time with focus, or I'm having a hard time with just, I'm feeling a certain way and I can't figure out why. It helps in such a tremendous way.

And I think, and that's why the follow-up that goes with a trip with us is so important. This isn't like going to a conference. This is absolutely not conference type feeling or vibe at all. One, we had so much fun. And to conference, when you ask somebody, "Oh, what was the most fun thing about your conference?" They're gonna say drinking afterwards. The conference itself was not fun. Yeah.

Do that, you know.

And the fun was built into every single thing we were doing. And people during the first training were going and buying lightsaber drinks, which was hilarious to me watching them play with the lightsabers in the background. And But being able to do that and it being okay.

Yeah.

Being able to be yourself and wear the goofy ears and wear the— well, maybe actual goofy ears— wearing the Disney ears or whatever. I don't have a pair sitting next to me right now. Wearing the t-shirt, wearing the thing, wearing whatever, whatever you want.

Buying the pins, getting the cute stuff, letting your little kid side out. I've got little Stitch pins sitting here right by my desk. because they're cute and they're funny. I have my other pins hanging up over there so I can see them while I'm working. Guys, it's okay to have these little things.

It is.

These little connections to that unmasked self.

Absolutely.

Joy and fun.

Oh, and Rebecca says, yes, it was powerful, vulnerable, and real, and lots of fire emojis. The connections were amazing and not feeling alone.

Yeah.

And we're opening up more slots for next year because we need to. We just had a discussion before we went live of we have to open up more slots because I, I was going to restrict it to 15 people and the team was like, nope, 20. So we, we don't have 20 slots. I don't want to know how many we have left because I can't do the math.

11, something like that.

10 spots left. So we have 10 spots left for next year and We do have a payment plan for somebody if you buy before end of June. Um, after that, the payment plan goes away because I just am not trying to figure out how to rework that as months count down. I did that last year. I will never do that again. It was a nightmare. And just finding ways for us to connect more. So we've got ND Hive where everybody that buys a ticket gets into ND Hive automatically right now. And we're going to have that for everybody so that they can join us on the body doubling sessions and they could join us in group coaching. Which is 4 days a week, and they can join us and be part of the transformation now and not wait until to arrive at Disney.

Don't wait a year, guys. Come on.

Come in now. Come join us. We're having so much fun. What was one of the biggest impacts that you took home with you other than the, just the friendships? Because the friendships are mega important. I'm not gonna, like, the friendships. that we made on that. Even I, who have been working with Shay for 9 months, 8 months, 9 months, however long it's been, and Tim a year. And I got to meet Tara. I met Tara at CHAD last year, but she's been watching my stuff for 5 years.

Wow.

Getting to hang out with her and getting to meet Rebecca face to face. I've worked with Rebecca for multiple years now, and I got to meet her face to face and give her a real live hug and then some more hugs. And Amy, who I've worked with for quite a while, and all of these people, my A lot of my clients came and it was so cool to connect with them. And yes, that's part of it. But what's the thing that you took home with you that changed how you operate at home now?

I think the biggest thing for me as a team member was at first I was like, I'm going to be a little reserved because I'm a team member. I need to be helping out. I need to be doing this. You go through all those things that you think you need to do, but I think the biggest part of transformation for me was It's time to stop hiding. We hide ourselves so much. And when we finally just let our hair down, so to speak, or just step into who we really are, that's when we have the biggest transformations. We have the biggest opening of our eyes and seeing who we really can be. And you can be— guys, at 53, I'm running down, you know, Disney World, having a good old time. I was one of those people chasing after tickets and I want a picture with ticket, right? But it's because I finally realized that I don't have to be in this square box of what everybody else thought I was supposed to be because they didn't want to recognize or they didn't understand or whatever the reason was that they felt like they needed to give me their information on how I should do stuff. It was so freeing. And I think that's probably the biggest transformation for me. was being able to come home and say, you know what, I appreciate your thoughts, your concerns, your suggestions. Thank you for sharing, and leave it at that. I don't have to pull that into me and try to make someone else happy. It's time for me to be okay with me.

Mm-hmm.

And I think when we start doing that, the transformations naturally come because then we start seeing who we really are. And what we really want to do and what we really want to become. And that is huge. Your confidence level will change. Who you feel— what you feel about yourself, it's going to totally change because there's no more of this, I can't. It's more like, hmm, what can I do?

How can I make myself fit into this situation the way I want to? Right.

And it's okay to be a kid again. I don't mean being irresponsible and all that kind of stuff, but it's okay to have fun. It's okay to run down the middle of Disney. It's okay to be, you know, dancing in the middle of the street. It's okay to dance outside while you're working on your flower beds. Be you. I think that's—

Be you in, in the most fun and awesome way possible.

Right. You will attract the people that will need to be with you by being yourself, not the people that don't need to be with you.

For me, so I'm in a very different spot, obviously, in this process, because I've already done all of this. This is why I did the training, because I think it's so important to do these trainings, because I've been here, I've done this. And, and, but I will tell you, as a coach, as a therapist, as, as, as, as the outside person being able, being able to watch this happen, being able to watch All of these amazing people, my brother being one of them, and reconnecting with my brother in a way that as an adult I never thought would happen. It was not on my 2025 bingo card to one room with my baby brother. Totally not on my bingo card. And number two, to be able to connect with him as an ADHD adult, as a neurodivergent adult, never something that was discussed in my family growing up. And believe me. The ADHD version of my brother and the ADHD version of me, we connected and we had so much fun. And then watching him connect with other ADHDers and watching Shay connect with her roommates and watching Rebecca, like watching each of the people that attended this conference connect with each other and let go and let neurodivergence be their guide, which is not always the best idea. I fully admit because you need to save space and in my—

Parameters a little.

When I create the safe spaces in this community for this. I, as a coach, trying not to cry, as a coach, these are the moments you dream of. And I watched it happen over and over so many times throughout this trip. And then after, I watch you guys continue to connect and unmask and be and take the training and apply it to life and use it in daily life and it to make life better and to make ADHD less frustrating. It's still frustrating some days. If we can make it even an iota less frustrating day to day, it's amazing. And I got to step back and watch that happen this year.

It was a joy watching you and seeing this all come together and watching you and Tim. I mean, you guys You're like a well-oiled machine, which is funny because you guys haven't really been around each other very much.

So Tim and I, for the last— I've been married for 31 years. So Tim and I in the last 31 years have gotten together less than 50 times for an hour or so here or there at a family function where nobody's comfortable, nobody— everybody's masked, and it's not a good situation. So my brother and I got to learned Unmask as siblings together. And then I got to watch all of you guys. And if I ever hear Go Bills again, it's going to be too soon. I hate— as somebody from Western New York, hearing Go Bills in Disney and have one person, my brother, see somebody in a Bills t-shirt and yell Go Bills and hear it go on and ripple through the crowd. One of the cast members said to Tim, you guys are everywhere. They're called the Hills Mafia for a reason.

That is true.

But even things like that, who you're like, oh my gosh, and you roll my eyes at it, but it was so fun to watch.

And you know, it was awesome to see how he was just like a kid at times. It was wonderful. Now he was the only male person there this year. Next year will be different.

Well, no, we had Sage and Kale. I'm sorry. They were husband and wife. They're young males though.

But it was so fun seeing All of them, the younger males, seeing Tim, seeing them all kind of just open up a little bit. And Tim was like running around all the time making sure we were all okay, which was awesome. Checking on the young kids, checking on us old ladies, you know, checking on the young ladies. I mean, just back and forth. What do you guys need? You guys okay? Are we doing good? And he almost became like the big brother of the crew.

He did become the big brother of the crew.

crew.

And that was so fun to watch. And then again, just watching every single person connect in a different way. There was one young woman that we had that came and she came with her bestie.

Yes.

And she is not a Disney person. She was uncomfortable, didn't like, and a lot of high anxiety. And to watch her unmask and have fun and can't wait to put her deposit down for next year, which I never thought for a second that she's going to ever want to do something in Disney World again. And this is not her thing. And she Cannot wait. And she can't— she wanted to wear my t-shirts and ears. Like, she's— I created Disney adult. And just watching even things like that, to watch people's anxiety decrease because they felt connected and, and part of a crowd that understood them.

Can I share a little secret? I was dreading going to Disney World. I really was.

Because it's Disney. No, you were. But you were walking up— It's loud.

There's a lot of people and just a lot of things that I've had to kind of work on, but once I got there, it was almost like, yay.

And I'm like, where did this come from? Right.

But I, I created more than one Disney adult. I think you've created probably all of us that hasn't gone for years and years.

I think there were 2 of us that went in it as Disney adults, and now we had 12 people that attended. So I think all 12 are Disney adults now. Nobody can wait until next year. Out of 12 people, every, all but one want to go again.

I think that's pretty darn good. That's amazing.

That is amazing. These are the moments as a coach and as a business owner looking for transformations and wanting to create transformations for the clients. This was that moment. This, I've done retreats before and they're good. And one or two people, you connect with one or two people and it's fantastic. Like, don't get me wrong, because I've done many of these kinds of things before. But this was like—

Yeah, it was life-altering in some aspects, very transformational. Um, in so many ways, it's allowed so much growth in such a quick time because we were right there together. And I think it opened a lot of people up where they've been closed for so long that they were able to just open up enough And just crack that door open. And then we went in and was like, let's just throw that peppy open and let's just see everything now and let's move forward. And I think that's really where the transformation comes in. It is.

And I can't wait until next year. Yes, we have tickets option. We have like 8 or so, however many left that we can sell. And maybe we'll open up a second trip if we have to. We've already talked about that and kind of have a second plan because we do need to limit it because we do need to make sure that those Personal connections happen, and we can't have yes, Rebecca. Proof that community is literally any everything, everything, everything, everything. And this is why I'm building N D Hive, and why Shay brought Shay and Tim and Tara and Rebecca and all are involved in this. Why community is so important. We need people who get it. We need people who are safe, and we need people who want to have fun. with us and make those transitions happen.

Yes, definitely. I'm here forever. You're stuck.

Well, no, nobody can leave. And I hope you join us. If you had thought about it this year and were like, well, no, I don't know anybody, please come. You could join us now. You could start building those relationships now. We're going to have specific networking times where people that are going to the Disney trip can start connecting with one another, probably starting next month because I need to recover And I'm tired and I planned this next year out already. Like it's completely planned down to timelines and training. Everything is planned.

Oh yeah.

Thank you, babe. And now we have crowdfunding that kicks off this month for Indie Hive and we have all of these things going on, but be part of that growth now. Find your community now. Don't wait until for a trip or some magical moment. I will create those magical moments for you in Disney World. I promise they will be there for next year again. But come enjoy it now. Come find your community now. And right now it's still just $19.99 a month to join the community if you only want to do that part. And we are taking payments for Disney, $200 deposit, and then whatever ticket you choose, that there's remaining payments per month and with no financing. So horrible credit, I don't care. I'm not even asking those questions. It's not even a discussion. I want to provide and be that financing for you. So if it's not something you can normally do because you have bad credit or whatever, it's available to you. You just have to make all your payments in order to come. But if you need 2 weeks to make your next payment from when it's due the next time because finances are not great, great. I'm here. I understand. And as long as it's paid for before we go to Disney, we're all good. I look forward to creating more events like this. And this— I can't wait till Disney next year. Believe me, we're still all Stuck on Disney. If you want to attend, just reach out, ask the question to SJ, ask me, reach out on the ND, uh, website, ND Out Loud website. We are there for you to create the community that you know you're missing in your life. Have a good day, everybody.