Taking Control: The ADHD Podcast

What do you know about your ADHD medications? We didn’t know much, so we brought in the expert, Dr. William Dodson, a Board-Certified adult psychiatrist and one of the first clinicians who specialized in adults with ADHD decades ago.

Because here’s the thing: we don’t deal much with ADHD meds. As a coach, Nikki refers folks to their physicians. And apart from being a patient himself, Pete’s experience dealing with medications is far from diverse. And yet, the field of questions we get from folks in our community relating to medications is vast. Today, we start the process of getting those questions answered.

Debunking Myths, Clarifying Understanding

As Dr. Dodson says, no one ultimately is going to care about your specific decision around medication other than you. But it’s important that you have the data you need to get your questions answered before you make that decision yourself. We can say this for sure: Dr. Dodson is a professional in the field with qualified experience in practice and a respected and verified source. We hope you find something you can take away from this discussion that helps you in your decision-making.

About William W. Dodson, M.D., LF-APA

Dr. Bill Dodson is a Board-Certified adult psychiatrist was one of the first clinicians who specialized in adults with ADHD 25 years ago. He has been on the faculties of Georgetown University and the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center. He was named a Life Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association in recognition of his clinical contributions to the field of ADHD (2012).

He was the recipient of the national Maxwell Schleifer Award for Distinguished Service to Persons with Disabilities (2006). He has written more than 120 articles and book chapters designed to help a lay audience better understand ADHD and its treatment.

Dr. Dodson is now semi-retired and devotes most of his professional time to working with homeless adolescents on the streets of Denver and writing a book about the optimal treatment of ADHD in both children and adults.

If you live with ADHD you know the precarious line that you can walk between fact and fiction. Whether you’re tempted to lie to yourself about what you’re capable of in a given time period or lie to your boss about what you’ve accomplished this week, the instinct to make those around you feel better by smoothing the edges of reality is strong.

This week, we’re thrilled to have Ari Tuckman back on the show to talk about ADHD and lies, the situations that are most likely to cause you to push that button, and how to reframe your behavior and make amends if you’ve found yourself in uncomfortable, lie-inducing situations.

Links & Notes

Thank you for supporting The ADHD Podcast on Patreon!

• Ari Tuckman, PsyD, MBA
• ADHD After Dark: Better Sex Life, Better Relationship by Ari Tuckman
• Tell Me No Lies: How to stop lying to your partner — and yourself — in the four stages of marriage by Ellyn Bader and Peter Pearson
• (00:00) - Welcome to The ADHD Podcast
• (00:35) - Support the Show: Patreon.com/TheADHDPodcast
• (01:38) - A message from the future with Nikki! Group Coaching is OPEN!
• (03:49) - Introducing Ari Tuckman
• (05:11) - Thinking about "people who lie"
• (09:07) - The ADHD-lie-pile-on
• (10:40) - What happens when you're lying?
• (11:47) - Cultures of mistruth
• (14:36) - Lying as a social contract
• (18:20) - Lies at work
• (21:48) - Rehabilitation
• (26:04) - Little white lies
• (27:58) - Radical Candor
• (29:28) - Developing an integrity practice
• (32:29) - Lies and fight or flight?
• (33:35) - Trust-inducing behavior
• (36:55) - Recommendations

With hundreds of episodes of Taking Control: The ADHD Podcast, it can be dizzying to figure out how to get started. That’s why we — Nikki Kinzer and Pete Wright (your fair hosts) — recorded this episode. It’s for you, new listener, a brief guide that can help you get the most out of the podcast and the fantastic ADHD community that runs through everything we do. Thanks for joining us on this ride. We hope you find what you’re looking for!

You can't do what you want to do. You never finish what you start. You aren't able to focus. Sure, we say this stuff to ourselves when our ADHD is getting the best of us. But how often is that really true?

This week on the show, we examine what lives between all and nothing and try to tackle the beast that is all-or-nothing thinking with some tools you can employ right away.

We'd never heard of the phrase stinking thinking until Sharon Saline used it with us on the show this week. But we knew what it meant immediately. We live with it. It's the thinking we use about ourselves when we're compromised or when our reserves of resiliency have been tapped, and when what we need more than anything else is just a little bit of self-compassion.

But as ADHDers, finding self-compassion isn't always natural. We have to make a practice of it, integrating the language and behaviors of compassion into our days and hours such that when we need it, it's not so hard to find.

Dr. Sharon Saline specializes in an integrative approach to managing ADHD, anxiety, executive functioning skills, learning differences & mental health in neurodiverse children, teens, adults & families and she joins us again today to talk all about living with ADHD and still managing to find a dose of self-compassion under the weight of it all.

About Sharon Saline, Psy.D.

Sharon Saline, Psy.D. has focused her work on ADHD, anxiety, learning differences, and mental health challenges and their impact on school and family dynamics for over 30 years. Her unique perspective, a sibling of a child who wrestled with untreated ADHD, combined with decades of academic excellence and clinical experience, assists her in guiding families as they navigate from the confusing maze of diagnoses and conflict to successful interventions and connections. Dr. Saline funnels this expertise into her book, What Your ADHD Child Wishes You Knew: Working Together to Empower Kids for Success in School and Life. Heralded as an invaluable resource, her book is the recipient of two awards: Best Book Awards winner by American Book Fest and the Gold Medal from Moms' Choice Awards. She recently published The ADHD Solution Deck: 50 Strategies to Help Kids Learn, Reduce Stress & Improve Family Connections.

Find Sharon on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn

And, in case you're wondering, here's a little background on Alternate Nostril Breathing