Beyond ADHD: A Physician’s Perspective - The Benefits of Accommodations with Dr. Carolyn Lentzsch-Parcells

The Benefits of Accommodations with Dr. Carolyn Lentzsch-Parcells

04/24/23 • 48 min

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: Come join me May 1st through the sixth, so that you can rest rediscover your strengths, reconnect with yourself and those physicians like you who are ready to leave, work at work, and re-energize. This is the invitation for you to make 2023 your year. Join me in Costa Rica in this really amazing, non-judgmental, intimate decision community.

I am gonna show you how to rest and how to recharge. Let's transform your brain so that you can start to dream the life that you always wanted this year in 2023. I can't wait to learn all. What kind of view you're gonna have after this conference? Take care. Hello. Welcome to Beyond ADHD, a Physician's Perspective.

I am Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh, I'm a family medicine physician practicing in rural Texas. I used to be hindered by my adhd, but I now. See it as a gift that helps me show up as a person. I was always meant to be both in my work and in my personal life. In the past two years, I've come to realize that unlearning some of my beliefs and some of my habits were just as important as learning the new set of.

Hello. Hello. I am so excited to have a dear friend of mine here and an amazing person, Dr. Carolyn Lentzsch-Parcells, and we've been knowing each other for some years now. I'm gonna say two or three years. I don't know how long, but it feels like a pandemic sometime. Yeah, it feels like a lifetime, and it's been amazing because.

She is here in Texas and she is doing the work of encouraging young adults and teenagers and all the works to have better life. And it's an amazing, right? Yes. And it's an amazing journey that she's been on. And not only that, but she's a really solid advocate for A D H D using as a superpower.

Thank you. And she, At all the platforms and not just here and there, but like at the national level. She is been an amazing speaker at the a D conference and she's been there years and years. So anyways, I just wanna bring her today for her to share her story and for her to share a little bit about herself and so that we all can see that we can do wonderful things like.

Dr. Carolyn Lentzch-Parcells: Thank you, Diana. Like Diana said my, my full blown full doctorate name is Dr. Carolyn Lentzsch-Parcells. I'm a board certified pediatrician practicing adolescent medicine in Fort Worth, Texas. And as Diana said, I do, I take care of basically kids and teenagers and young adults, many of whom have a D H D learning disabilities.

Or other challenges. And of course myself am also A D H D, human and mom and business owner and all the things. Yeah, and I'm happy to be here. I got to meet Diana through our A D H D nurse and it's been really fun getting to know her. Awesome. So

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: I know that your story is a little bit different from some of our stories in the sense that, yeah, some of us females tend to be diagnosed a little bit later in age.

Yeah. And I remember you telling I knew a little bit earlier. So would you mind sharing a little bit about

Dr. Carolyn Lentzch-Parcells: that? Yeah, I would love to I consider myself very lucky especially for a woman and especially for a woman of our generation because, like you said, so many of us slipped through the cracks until really recently.

And essentially what happened for me was my, my I had a family member who was a younger male and he was getting diagnosed cuz he had more kind of classic symptoms. And my parents looked at that and went, hold on a. That looks familiar and they had already advocated for me throughout my life.

My dad would read my summer reading to me because I also have a learning disability in reading, which we didn't know, but he still did that. They got me tutoring and they really supported me all the way through. And then this occurred when I was a junior in high school, so I had a full assessment done and was diagnosed with a D H D combined type and a learning disability and reading and written expression as a junior.

At a very rigorous, private all girl school. So that was interesting. But it explained a lot for me and for my folks. And what was interesting too, though at the time is, being 17 and therefore knowing everything I refused a lot of the help that was offered to me. I refused medication.

My parents were actually very supportive of medication. One of my mom's favorite phrases has always been, You know that this is like diabetes it's another condition. And if you were diabetic, would you not take your insulin? I don't think so. So that's again, something that's pretty unique from what I came from.

But I still refused medication at the time. For the same reasons. I had a lot of the same kind of, Concerns, misconceptions, what have you that a lot of folks have. I was worried about the side effects. I'd seen some family members have some negative side effects and that concerned me. I was worried about using my di...

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: I know that your story is a little bit different from some of our stories in the sense that, yeah, some of us females tend to be diagnosed a little bit later in age.

Yeah. And I remember you telling I knew a little bit earlier. So would you mind sharing a little bit about

Previous Episode

The Metabolic Syndrome and ADHD Link

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: Come join me May 1st through the sixth, so that you can rest, rediscover your strengths, reconnect yourself and those physicians like you who are ready to leave, work at work and re-energize. This is the invitation for you. 2023 your year. Join me in Costa Rica in this really amazing, non-judgmental, intimate decision community.

I am gonna show you how to rest and how to recharge. Let's transform your brain up so that you can start to dream the life that you always wanted this year in 2020. I can't wait to learn all about what kind of year you're gonna have after this conference. Take care. Hello. Welcome to Beyond ADHD, a Physician's Perspective.

I am Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh . I'm a family medicine physician practicing in rural Texas. I used to be hindered by my adhd, but I now. See it as a gift that helps me show up as a person. I was always meant to be both in my work and in my personal life. In the past two years, I've come to realize that unlearning some of my beliefs.

And some of my habits were just as important as learning the new set of skills. I am so excited about today's topic, which is the relationship between metabolic syndrome and A D H D. I see this in my practice every single day. People look at me like, oh my God, she's a genius. It's not that I'm a genius, it's that I have firsthand real life experience with it myself.

It, when you have that real life experience, you're able to pull it out and make connections that somebody else might not have. So again, let's go through what is D H D A? D H D is a neurological neurodevelopmental. Disorder that affects our executive function and our executive function is this mental task ability to complete tasks, right?

So most of us, when we think about D H D, we think about the usual things like attention. It affects attention, okay? We think about impulse control, we think about the hyperactivity. Many of us might not be aware that there's more than those three. There is 12 executive functions and all of them, or some of them could be affected and sometimes one day more than the other.

And so when we talk about that, it's. Important for you to know, because if you don't realize that task response response inhibition. Task switching. Task initiation task. Completion management of time planning, prioritizing emotional control, time awareness, all those metacognition. There's so many of them.

There's 12 of them that can get affected, and if you're not aware of that, you might be blaming yourself and thinking you have this character. Defect is part of your condition, and you'd be surprised how many times my clients have this aha moments and even my patients when I asked them, okay, gimme all the things that you love about yourself and gimme all the things that you dislike about yourself, and many times all the things they dislike about themselves.

Are part of those executive function, and there they are sitting thinking that they are broken and they have a character flaw because they can't seem to do X, Y, and Z, when in reality it's part of their condition. And why am I talking about this? I'm talking about this because metabolic syndrome a set of symptoms or a.

Things that come together. For example, if you have high blood pressure, if you have high blood sugar levels, if you have excess abdominal adipose tissue or fat around your waist, or you have any. Cholesterol levels that are elevated. All those four things put you at risk for developing metabolic syndrome.

And what people don't realize is that A D H D is a neurodevelopmental disorder that is, Affected how much dopamine levels are around. So usually your A D H D tends to be unfavorable when your dopamine levels are low, and you tend to do well with your A D H D when your dopamine levels are high.

And so certain things like food can really increase your dopamine levels. And so that makes sense why, three o'clock, two o'clock, you might be looking for candy or for something for you to use to help you enhance your dopamine levels, because they're probably a little bit low. So with that premise, I am explaining to you that many times your eating habits can be a response to your unmanaged.

And there is a link. Okay. You see what I mean? When a individuals with A D H D have a higher risk of developing this syndrome, because people with A D H D have higher rates of obesity, insulin resistance, and. That is concerning because if you're not aware that you're using food as a means to regulate your A D H D, you're not aware that the underlying cause is not that you're eating so much, but that you're using food as a way to increase your dopamine so that you can try to complete the task at hand.

If we were to treat and diagnose you with A D H D, then it would. Easier for you to not have to be overeating. You be surprised how many times I have diagnosed people with A D H D when they...

Next Episode

Costa Rica (It’s OK)

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: Hello. Hello. Welcome to Beyond A D H D A Physician's Perspective. I am Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh. I'm a family medicine physician practicing in rural Texas. I used to be hindered by my A D H D, but I now see it as a gift that helps me show up as the person I was always meant to be. Both in my work and in my personal life.

In the past two years, I've come to realize, That unlearning some of my beliefs and some of my habits were just as important as learning the new set of skills.

Hey, did you hear that? That was the attention? So I just got back from Costa Rica like literally yesterday and. We spend an incredible week there and my tour guide, his name is Carlos and he's from the Mela tribe, and he gifted my husband a wonderful drum that he had. For himself for over 15 years and that's the sign for attention it.

Anyways, I wanted to grab your attention as I'm starting this and, uh, let you know that I will be, uh, Putting a hold on my group coaching for a month. I've decided I won't start again until June 19th. So, um, that gives you some time to start going through some of the modules that I already have there, and then when we come together, we can reconvene.

I am in Cloud 45 right now after such an amazing transformational ex. Experience that I was able to facilitate in Costa Rica and I wanna share all about it with you. Um, so June 19th, if you are considering the coaching group, you need to sign up now because of course spots are limited. And, uh, I really, really like my.

Groups to be small, private, and intimate. And of course there's already some physicians who are going to continue the level of membership and I'm glad to have them. And some of them have been with us for, for a while. But anyways, June 19th, put that in your calendar. Uh, you can come to the 11:00 AM class that I'll be having, or you could come to the 7:00 PM class that I will be having.

And so with that in mind, let me tell you about my most amazing week that I just had last week, and some takeaway points and some things that maybe will inspire you to consider it for the next time. What do I start? Uh, I was asked why Costa Rica? So first of all, in September when I went to experience Costa Rica myself, I booked that on a whim.

I, my husband and I had gone to Costa Rica for our honeymoon, and that was almost the 11 years ago prior to, uh, September. And in September we were gonna have our 11 year anniversary. So I decided to, um, Book a hotel and the flights and everything without telling my husband. Yeah, very A D H G impulsive.

Like I found this amazing hotel and I just could not wait. I didn't want it to be sold out. So I booked everything and then I went, I told my husband, Hey, um, in a month from now, we will be going to, uh, Costa Rica. To celebrate our, our 11 year anniversary. I hope you're coming cause I am going with or without you.

Cause this place is divine. And of course he came with and the rest is history. So when we went to uh, Costa Rica, I just. I fell in love with the hotel, with the atmosphere. It just felt like paradise. I love having my own private villa bungalow. It was so cool to hear all the birds, the frogs, uh, to see this logs, uh, in the hotel grounds.

And I felt like I needed to bring people to that place to experience it for themselves. And so the purpose of the retreat ended up being. A place where people could dis live behind all their troubles. They could like disconnect and just reevaluate and having fun along the way in doing such, and in a place where it would be non-judgmental and the place.

by the R N l um, volcano and the hot springs and the hanging bridges and the Safari River float. So I decided to. Also tap into the indigenous tribe that was around the area, which is called Maku. And I wanted to really learn more about them. Um, they are located near a town called San Rafael aso, which is about.

One hour from Launa where we were staying. There's about, uh, 600 people that live on that reserve and is one of the smaller tribe in Costa Rica. And so as luck would have it, when I attended in September, I. The tour guide that I met, his name was Carlos, and he and I met him on one of the tour guides where he was showing us the Safari River float.

And I just, in talking with him, I asked him if he knew. Any indigenous people that I was interested in, in maybe having like a coco, a blessing ceremony. And he got super excited because he told me that he was of that tribe and that he could help arrange that. And that was in September. And of course, uh, he probably thought that, you know, I was just this crazy girl having crazy thoughts, but I kept, um, Emailing him and sending him Zoom messages and zoom links and Instagram messages and letting him know that I would be coming May 1st through the sixth, so that I would be able to, to have this, uh, ceremony and, and, and ha...