618- ADHD Time Blindness and Prioritization Help for Middle and High School Students

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0:40Suzanne Allen: Welcome to the Attention Deficit Disorder Expert Podcast Series by Attitude Magazine.

0:50I'm Carol Fleck and on behalf of the Attitude team, I'm delighted to welcome you to today's ADHD experts presentation titled ADHD time blindness and prioritization help for middle and high school students. Leading today's presentation is Dr. Suzanne Allen. Dr. Allen is a licensed clinical psychologist who works with children, teens, and families who have mental health concerns or who are touched by neurodivergence. She's the host of the Parenting Pair podcast, where she and fellow psychologist Annalise Karin share compassionate practical strategies for raising children and teens. Dr. Allen is also the co-director of CBT Westport, a psychotherapy practice in Connecticut.

1:40Today, Dr. Allen will help parents, teachers, coaches, and others better understand the behaviors in teens and tweens that are rooted in time blindness. She'll provide strategies to help kids develop the practical skills needed to thrive now and in the years ahead. If you value the work we're doing here at Attitude to support the ADHD community, and I so hope you do, please consider subscribing to Attitude Magazine. Your subscription helps us to continue providing trusted resources and information to help your family. Visit attitudemag.com slash subscribe. So without further ado, I'm so delighted to introduce Dr.

2:25Suzanne Allen. Thank you so much for joining us and leading this important discussion today. Good afternoon, everyone. Carol, thank you for such a warm welcome and thank you very much to Attitude Magazine for having me here. What lucky teens and tweens are out there that have the adults listening to this, whether that's live or recorded, that care so much about them and want to help and support them. So I'm really glad you're here. So as we get started, I want to begin in with something a little bit visual. And so you can see here that I have two measuring cups and each has about a cup in them.

3:04I'm going to pour them into some different glasses and then hold it up. And as you will see, it was the same one cup of water, but in these two glasses, it looks very different. And I like this visual because it reminds me a lot of time blindness and a helpful way to think about how teens can experience time. So 20 minutes doing something fun with their friends or reading a book that they love can go by like that. 20 minutes of sitting through a boring class or maybe a family meeting when you're reviewing the upcoming schedule for the week can feel like it takes forever. So the same 20 minutes, but a completely different experience.

3:57And that is one part of time blindness, which is just the, the like experiencing and the feeling of time, how that can feel different and be hard to kind of track. um but it also the other component of it is then being able to use time effectively so to plan your day to plan your week to decide what you're going to do or how long you need to get ready for something so it's that component of the sensing and then the doing or the using time effectively late. Before we really dive in, I just want us to sit for a moment and really imagine and think about what that feels like for tweens and teens. There are so many mishaps that can occur to them each day, right?

4:51They plan to work on a homework assignment for 30 minutes. They think that's how long it'll take. 90 minutes goes by and they're finally done. And now they've lost the time that they thought they might relax, eat dinner, watch a show. Deadlines sneak up on them or they miss them entirely. People in their lives, their family, their friends, siblings, teachers, coaches are frustrated with them and might assume that they're lazy or unmotivated and they don't care. It is really disorienting to live in a world in which you think that, or you develop over time a lack of confidence that you can sense and feel time and use it in your best interest.

5:43And once we can really like think about this and kind of sink into it, it helps us see that some of those things, as I mentioned before, like the assumption that maybe they're careless or they don't care or they're lacking motivation, we might see those things differently. And when we see and we think about things differently, we do some things that are different. So my goal today is not going to be to hand you a list of strategies because I have a feeling this is a very astute and well-versed ADHD group of people. And you can go online and find lists of strategies. We are absolutely going to be talking about a lot of strategies, so don't tune out now.

6:26But I want to heavily focus on understanding and compassion and really trying to figure out what's going on for the teen in your life, whether that's a student or your child. because it is the understanding and the curiosity and the really nuanced approach of applying it directly to the teen that you know and you love that helps facilitate communication, working together to find strategies and looking for support. and that understanding and that communication can really reduce friction which is going to hopefully make it more likely for them to be less defensive and work with us on this which is incredibly important.

7:15So we talked about this already some of the key aspects of time blindness that difficulty perceiving estimating or tracking time but then being able to set up your life your day, your schedule around that inner clock. Dr. Russell Barkley talks a lot about time nearsightedness, which is this idea, temporal myopia, when something is far away, young people with ADHD see it. They know there's a deadline. They know the tryouts are coming up. But when it's far away, it's a little bit blurrier and hard to track or to feel energetically like they need to do something, as it gets closer, and unfortunately, sometimes when it's right here smacking them in the face, is when that energy comes into play to get the thing done, and often that can be too late.

8:04We also know that there are other executive functioning skill deficits that people with ADHD struggle with, perspective memory, working memory, processing speed, that sometimes can also impact, you know, the perceiving of time or using time. And in the end, what all of this, you know, comes down to is that when it is hard to anticipate the future or to feel time well, we're not able to prepare as well as we might want to, or as our parents or teachers want us to. And as a teen and tween, this starts to really impact everything. um I share this slide we're not going to get into the the neurological underpinnings of ADHD but I like to share this information with teens so you can use this if it's helpful to you you know because a lot of times by the time a teen comes into my office they might be saying things to me like well I guess I don't really care or I'm really lazy when it comes to this um and I'm able to say to them, you have a really great brain, but your brain works differently sometimes.

9:14And that is what is causing this problem, not laziness or a lack of motivation or any of these other character deficits that you might be mentioning to me. And I know that there's a brain difference, particularly in terms of time blindness, because we've seen that with the use of stimulant medication, which helps increase the amount monodopamine in the brain or increases activity in the prefrontal cortex, that that can help alleviate some of the difficulties and problems related to time blindness. That does not mean that that is the solution for everyone. There are lots of reasons why young people or adults cannot or are not going to take medication.

9:52So I use this just as a way to prove like this isn't you and you don't have bad character. This is just a brain difference. And so we've got to figure out how to work with it. And now for a quick shout out to all the therapists out there. Here at Attitude, we know your work doesn't end when the session does. There's scheduling, notes, billing, insurance follow-ups, all the admin that happens before and after the work you actually care about. That's why I want to share Simple Practice. Simple Practice is an all-in-one EHR that is HIPAA compliant, high trust certified, and built specifically for therapists.

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11:37A lot of times adults can feel really blindsided and so can teens about why this all of a sudden kind of hit so hard in these tween and teen years. Well, if you think about kind of the difference between like a kindergarten teacher and a high school teacher or even middle school teacher, The kindergarten teacher is saying to everyone, you know, okay, everyone come into the classroom and take off your backpack and hang it in your cubby and put your lunch on the counter and then come sit in your spot, right? So with little kids, we do, adults do a lot of the managing of time and, you know, telling them what to do.

12:15So as kids are growing up, right, we start to pull back on some of those external supports because we expect them to be able to do more of those things and kind of keep track of those things on their own. And teens want this too. And so do tweens, right? So this isn't us forcing something on them. They want to be more self-regulated and manage themselves and their decisions more effectively on their own. So we start to pull back. they start to kind of need to push forward. Those time horizons get longer, right? We're not just talking about your homework that's due for tomorrow or what you need to get done by the end of the day.

12:55We're talking about the college applications a year and a half from now. The summer camp application for work that's due in February for a camp that starts in June, right? So we're starting to talk about things that are much further in the distance and asking them to manage it. as I mentioned teens develop mental tasks they want more autonomy some more independence they want to make their own decisions they want to you know think about their own thoughts and ideas and take action on them and so as they're wanting to do this they may be needing more support right because the demands are getting higher the time horizons are getting longer and so this can be a really uncomfortable position for parents and for teachers when they may need more support and they don't necessarily want it.

13:47And from our part, you know, we may be tired and have already done a lot, right, for our kids along the way. And so all of a sudden having to lean in during these high school years when also, you know, in college years when there's school portals we don't have access to anymore. We don't have teacher conferences, right? So a lot of things kind of come out of our purview. They need to manage them more and yet they might really be struggling. So I'm just going to keep in mind a couple of themes for us today, right? Adolescent development and just important things to keep in mind as we talk about these teen and tween years and time blindness, communication, the ways in which you talk to yourself as a parent or a teacher or caregiver, and how you speak to your teen and for your teenager, how they are thinking about themselves, talking to themselves and talking to others about their ADHD.

14:41And I just want to highlight that understanding and compassion are very nice. And all of you are here because you love and care about and want to support these young people, but they're actually so much more than nice. They are essential components of intervention. So we have to hold on to that. Okay. And finally, the last thing I'll say, and then we'll keep going forward is I am going to keep in mind here this goal of protecting your relationship with this young person. We know that the parent-child, parent-teen relationship, signs of warmth, communication, attempts to understand and support growing autonomy, that many of those factors are related to the overall health and well-being of young adults and then beyond into those adult years with lower levels of anxiety and depression.

15:36It impacts kind of their later interpersonal relationships. And so helping you help your teen, but also being really mindful of protecting the relationship you have with your teen is very important for us to talk about. If you are listening to this right now and thinking, I have a really challenging relationship with my teen, or we really struggle or we are in a tough spot, that's okay too. Protecting the relationship doesn't mean that you always have the best relationship or a great relationship, whatever that is. Your efforts to support your teen and to communicate that matter, even if they don't seem like they are the greatest receptors of that.

16:22So I always say you can be on their team, even when they're acting like they don't want you to be a part of it. And that is still protecting that relationship. So as Carol mentioned before, I like to talk about time blindness and kind of these four modes just to take it off the pages of kind of the diagnostic manuals and what, you know, it really looks like in real life. So that lateness and seeming lack of urgency, that is when When you are about to leave and maybe you've given warnings or told everyone this is the time we're headed for the airport or school or work and five minutes to go and you hear the shower going off upstairs or your teen all of a sudden emerges downstairs and they're making pancakes, right?

17:05And we all know that five minutes isn't going to be enough to get that done. This goes back to that time perception, not filling the time that they need, not preparing adequately. So sometimes even when they recognize the time, they've got to get to school, but they haven't showered or packed their bag, so they still need to do it. Or that that kind of urgency signal, the now or not now, doesn't go until it does. And unfortunately, sometimes when that urgency signal lands, we find ourselves in panic mode. And this is where a lot of young people with the late assignments or permission slips or missing things leads to a lot of panic.

17:44and often, you know, we can see teens shut down because it's just too overwhelming or the opposite. We can see a lot of teens really escalate. And this is where parents find, you know, teenagers storming into their room at midnight that they need to go to the store and buy, you know, the poster board or the snacks or the class party the next day, or, you know, phone call after phone call after text, after text, like, I need you to do this now. You haven't done it? Why haven't you done it yet? Right? And it's because they're in a state of panic over something that they've missed or is coming up.

18:17And understandably, really frustrating for parents who either saw this coming and were concerned about it, or, you know, if you struggle with ADHD yourself as a parent, that you may be doing so much to try to manage your own schedule and time that this is really, really hard to then have another person who struggles in this way in your household. Messy transitions. We know that transitions are not a one-step process. I finish this and I start this, right? Pulling attention, shifting attention to the next thing, getting started on the next thing, task initiation, right? This is kind of multiple steps along the way.

18:57And if we like the thing that we're doing and then we have to stop that and move on to something else, that is hard for everyone, but particularly hard when you have ADHD. Often, I'll find young people who say, like, I was actually doing something I didn't want to do and needed to head out the door to go meet my friends or to go to a movie or do something fun, and it's still messy. It is often because of those multiple steps and time blindness, and sometimes other things come up, like, oh my gosh, it took me so long to get started on this that now I'm afraid I'm going to lose my train of thought or I won't be able to get back into it and finish it, right?

19:34So sometimes like anxiety or thoughts about what we're able to do interfere. And then the time creeps on, right? That buffer time between doing one thing and now getting to the next starts to disappear and we go back often into panic mode. And then the last one that I think a lot of people miss sometimes is this stuck in waiting mode. And this is when, you know, there's something later in the day or later in the week or the month. And it's looming and it makes it really hard for a young person to do something prior to that. So if you think about like, you know, if a young person's in a school play and they have a show on Friday night and one Saturday night and two on Sunday, the show on Saturday, let's say, isn't until five o 'clock.

20:20And so there's this whole window of time between, you know, 10 or 11 a.m. and four that they could be doing their homework that they need for the next week. And every other minute of the weekend is taken by the show. Young people know that this would be a good idea and a good time to do my work. Their parents know it, right? But there's this feeling of being stuck, like this thing is looming. And so I just can't get started or get into this. And as you all know, and are probably very well aware, which is why you're here, there's a real impact in many ways for young people with time blindness. You know, we have those academic impacts or missed opportunities.

21:05And sometimes that can lead to other people's assumptions about kids, right? Or the statements they might say to them, like, you just need to get more organized, you know, or you're capable of so much more, right? Or you're going to learn from this experience. And I think a lot of teens with ADHD are kind of like, yeah, I'm learning that I'm incapable, you know, or other people are really frustrated with me because they need more than those statements and they need more than just getting organized to be able to kind of hit those deadlines or capitalize on those opportunities. There's also a tremendous impact to their sense of self.

21:49When you feel like you're not capable or you have goals or hopes and you're not able to meet those, even though you really want to, your sense of self, your sense of self-efficacy and your ability to take care of yourself can really take a couple of knocks. And then there's this relational piece to it, right? When I think about this sometimes, you know, I think about a couple of years ago, one of my sons broke his kneecap and the school wouldn't allow him on the school bus. So for a month I had to rearrange clients and leave work and rush over to the school and pick him up. and I was always rushing and always feeling far behind him.

22:35When I pull up into the parking lot, I'd be sitting there and kind of thinking like, where is he? Where is he? The teacher's got to get him out sooner. You know, I've got to get back to my office before my next client comes. And then I would see him walk out the door in his full leg cast and on the crutches and with the teacher carrying his stuff and kind of hobbling across. And because I could see the cast or the, you know, the brace, I knew he can't move any faster. This is the pace, right? I had to understand it. And my colleague, Dr. Annalise Karen, she says this all of the time. When there's no foot in the cast, right?

23:13When the struggle isn't visible, we tend to fill in the story ourselves. Like they're lazy, they don't care, they're disrespectful. And so this can really impact a teen's relationships with other people in their lives, their siblings, other adults, because we can't always see that struggle. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. If you could wake up tomorrow and be better at one thing, what would it be? I can think of a few, some funny and some vulnerable. I'd like to keep my houseplants alive and put down my phone at night. I'd also like to communicate my needs more clearly and handle stress in healthier ways.

23:56But number one, that's probably practicing patience with my kids, especially when they are emotionally dysregulated. Because I know that getting better at this is how progress and connections are made, but I also know it's really, really hard. Better is a feeling defined by you. And for better help, it's a better help therapist who really gets you. It's a focus on global emotional well-being with thousands of therapists and millions of members in over 100 countries. It's progress. And it's getting better at practicing patience when it matters most. Sign up and get 10 % off at BetterHelp.com slash attitude.

24:47That's BetterHelp.com slash attitude. okay so what now let's get to some redesign this is my bathroom cabinet um I live in a house from the 60s I think my bathroom was remodeled in the 70s because it is funky I had carpet in it with a shower and no shower curtain um it's very funky material and design my cabinets are all broken There's nails sticking out from the bottom of them. And as a result, like they're kind of a mess. I haven't done a great job of taking care of them. Well, a couple of weeks ago, I found a roll of contact paper and a couple of these little plastic things. And so I laid out this contact paper and, you know, kind of redesigned my bathroom drawers, which are still broken and still have gunk on them.

25:44If you can look at the sides that I can't get off of it. I can't begin to tell you how much joy I feel every time I open these cabinets in the morning. I've actually brought friends upstairs to show them what I did. Just this small redesign has made such a difference in my life and how I feel when I'm getting ready in the morning. You have a great kid and you are doing a great job. And so we don't need to blow your household up, remodel everything and do everything different. We just might want to help you figure out a couple of tweaks or redesigns that might make some improvement in how you feel about this, how your teen is feeling and how they are doing in terms of managing this.

26:31So let's talk about some of the ways in which we can redesign. So I'm going to start with redesigning our thinking. And as I mentioned earlier, how we think affects how we feel and what we do. And so when you can start just by noticing your own thoughts about your teen's behavior or what you observe in some of those modes that we discussed earlier, right? What are the kinds of things you're thinking or you're saying to yourself about your teen, your ability to handle it, this behavior? reminding yourself this is their ADHD. This is time blindness. It's not an excuse. It is not us throwing up our hands and saying, well, they'll never be able to live on their own or pay a bill or manage anything.

27:23There are plenty of people living in this world with ADHD that are managing their lives, right? So it's not an excuse. It's not an out. It's just a way to remind ourselves this is their ADHD. They're not doing this on purpose. It's not their fault. Sometimes we can help increase that empathy when we really imagine what it's like for them. I think probably all of you would agree that most of us want to do well and be perceived well. And in those teen adolescent years, being respected, being valued is incredibly important to them. and so when we can imagine how hard this must be for them how frustrating it must feel for them that can really help us to align with them and join with them even in really difficult moments and again just assuming that the behavior doesn't reflect intention if they don't turn something in if they you know are running behind that doesn't necessarily mean because they don't care about you or their siblings or they don't care about the school project or getting the job it is more reflective of time blindness than their intention.

28:32And I think linked below, you'll find a couple of references. There's a really great video from Jessica McCabe who wrote the book, How to ADHD, and she runs a really fantastic and useful YouTube channel with a number of videos. And Motivation Bridge is one of my favorite ones of hers that really, in like five minutes, gives such a great description of this behavior, not reflecting intention and motivation. So I I would recommend taking a look at it. It's a great one I share with teens and young adults all the time too, to help them see this less judgmentally. Okay, so we're redesigning our thinking, which is going to help us be able to redesign some of the conversations that we're having with our teenager, right?

29:17And I like to keep in mind, this is before, being on their team, even when they act like they don't want us there. Some of the ways we can do this using validation to empathize and join with them, right? Much of the time our teens are expecting that, you know, they come home with a bad grade or they have to tell you that they forgot to, you know, turn the permission slip in or whatever it is. And they're often expecting from us, understandably so, like, I can't believe this. I reminded you, oh, this is going to ruin your whole summer, right? They are expecting our emotional reaction and frustration.

29:58It can go a long way when we can validate and join with them in their frustration or upset. Like, I'm so sorry. You must be so disappointed about this. There's time to go back to what went wrong or what needs to happen in the future, right?

30:18But It helps them come off the defensive and, again, aligns us more as a team. This is where using that curious and nonjudgmental language, right? Instead of, I told you to, or I knew you were going to, or when you're on your phone, right? Or some of the things that we say in frustration and accusations, when we can shift those to things like, sometimes I notice that when I come in to remind you about doctor's appointments or things you need to do that when you're playing your game or looking at your phone, it seems like you forget. I wonder if that's not a great time for us to review your schedule for the day.

31:02Or I wonder if there's a better time that I might be able or a better way I might be able to help remind you, right? Curious and nonjudgmental. One, it allows for information that you may not have, we might be making assumptions about what's going on or interfering with their ability to manage their schedule. And we may not be aware. And it also, again, puts them less on the defensive because we're not making assumptions or accusing them of things. If you can, ask questions. You know, sometimes we can't have this much conversation. It's overwhelming or can be dysregulating to teens. But if you can, ask questions, be curious, And be open to their ideas.

31:45This is a part that I think sometimes we speed past a little bit, you know, when we advise parents to be curious or to ask questions. But a lot of times we ask questions thinking that we know the answer. And teens know that we think we know the answer. And so that can create some barriers to open conversation. being open to their ideas, recognizing they might know things or think things or feel things that you don't know about will go a long way in how you present that to them. Annalise and I recorded a podcast a while ago on curiosity and that I think that is linked below also. That's a good one to listen to because it's like 20 minutes about how to actually be curious and what that looks like.

32:32So that might be something else to take a look at. Okay. Redesigning the conversation. I know I mentioned this before, but, you know, communication is not always easy. And so there are other ways that are less verbal or less verbally loaded. There's a great book. It's an oldie, but a goodie, how to talk so kids will listen and listen. So kids will talk. And they offer some really great ideas, you know, saying something in a word, dentist, 230, and leaving it at that, or leaving a note, right? So putting a sticky note somewhere that your teen might see it, like different ways that you might be able to share information that might be better tolerated by some teenagers.

33:13And then finally, in terms of redesigning the conversation, You know, we can do a lot to help our teens and kind of model how to talk about ADHD or how to talk about time blindness in really kind and empathic ways. And so I'm always thoughtful about adolescence privacy and not just kind of going around and, you know, telling grandparents or siblings like, well, your brother has ADHD and so this, that, or the other, right? I want to be respectful of a teen's privacy, their diagnosis and what they're willing to share or not share. But I think sometimes letting them know that, you know, when you don't tell people or kind of share your narrative or your story, other people might make assumptions.

33:57And so it might help for me to be able to say to your sister, you know, part of the reason why we're late every day and you are late to school is because of this issue called time blindness. And we can certainly validate the distress of a sibling who may be suffering consequences or other people who might be having negative consequences from a teen struggle. but we can validate their distress, tell them that we're working on coming to a solution or trying to find ways to manage it, and also share with them what is going on, what the underlying concerns are to hopefully, again, facilitate some of that communication and maybe repair a little bit some of those relationships that get damaged along the way as a result of this.

34:46Okay, so we've been talking about a lot of like internal things like redesigning our own thinking and then taking that step outward of redesigning the types of communication we have. Let's go even further now and redesigning the environment. Making time as visible as possible without it being too distracting, right? Clocks everywhere. There are shower clocks. Those can help. Putting a clock on your wrist. Careful of the Apple Watch and other technology because sometimes the reminders, the alerts, those things can be more distracting, right? But making it visible so people can see time. Those large dry erase calendars, right?

35:25Helps with that kind of time horizon of not just looking at the next hour, the next day, but what's coming up in the next week or the next month, color coding things, right? So anything that's academic is in blue, sports are in green, right? To help add some like novelty and make it a little bit more fun and kind of visually stand out. count up client, um, countdown clocks, count up timers. Everyone's probably familiar with the time timer, you know, where you can adjust it and you can actually see how much time is going down. And then for teens, because they like LED lights and sometimes, you know, this can, the time timer can feel a little bit babyish to them.

36:03Um, things like automatic LED lights or those automatic candles that go on at a certain time can be really great, right? So if a teen tells me, I come home from school, I like to chill for like 45 minutes, and then I know I need to get started with my workout or with my work, I'll say, great, let's set your LED lights up to automatically go on at four o 'clock. So that just gives you a sign or a signal that it's time to get started. That's a lot more palatable sometimes for parents and kids versus mom or dad shouting up the stairs or sending multiple text messages. We can also make time feel different.

36:40And so a lot of young people like music. You know, three songs is about 10 minutes or 12 minutes. Great. Let's make some playlists and use that so you know that by the time you get to the end of that song, it's time to get started on your work or start packing your bag for school. Setting the clock ahead. I wrote 10 minutes there, but I actually want to change that because I like doing it on kind of like a less, you know, an uneven number, like eight minutes or 11 minutes. One, even when you know that the clock is set ahead, it still kind of shocks us a little bit when we see it and the time, you know, is off.

37:16So sometimes that can alert people to time in a way that's helpful. And when it's kind of one of those odd numbers, we have to do a little math of subtracting it of like, wait, no, it's really 143. It's not 151. And again, that just gets us thinking about time, I'm making it more present, making it feel different. And then there's this idea of when things are kind of distant in the future, how can we like have some daily contact with it? For some young people with ADHD, that's great. It like keeps it kind of front of mind, you know, each day to be reading a little bit or doing one note card. I find for some teenagers, that's actually really exhausting.

37:52And the amount of like energy they have to put into initiating the task and doing a little bit every day is actually really aversive. So for those teens, I'll recommend like, let's just work in sprints. Okay. This thing is due at the end of the month. Let's set aside a couple of times in the month, two or three times where you can work for two or three hours, because that feeling of just like walking in, working hard feels better to them. Building in a buffer, redesigning the environment. My dad, every time he comes to visit, always asks me, okay, we're going to, you know, church see the play, what time is the button seat time?

38:34And I actually love that because it makes me laugh, but it also made me realize that I would say to my kids, like, let's leave at nine o 'clock in the morning, but everyone comes downstairs and they're getting on shoes and finding their water bottle and doing one more thing, right? And so actually we'd be blocking out the door and getting in the car at 9.04, 9.05, which means if it took us 15 minutes to get somewhere, now we're not getting there at 9.15, we're getting there at 9.21 and we're late. And so button seat means you are not underestimating. You're actually counting in the little stuff.

39:07Time to get on your shoes, time to find a parking spot, right? When we can default to adding some extra time, we give ourselves a little bit of a buffer and more likely to have success. Working with time differently, right? For those people who struggle with waiting mode, We don't always get the luxury of scheduling things earlier in the day, right? The play is at five. The soccer game is at 6 p.m. But when we can, if you can make appointments or sign up for activities or the course or whatever the thing is your teen wants to do earlier in the day, as long as that works with their sleep schedule, because we know with teens kind of they have that later to bed and later up in the morning, right?

39:50But the earlier in the day puts them less into that waiting mode. um also using things like a go mode alarm we know with that waiting mode it can feel really hard for young people to kind of chunk up those tasks get started and this idea of like well i can only do part of it or i'll use up all my energy doing this and i won't have my energy and focus for the thing later in the day sometimes alleviating that stress by like okay you need to leave at four o 'clock, let's set a go mode for three o 'clock. And that'll give you an hour to kind of get yourself together, transition from this thing you were doing, prepare for the next thing.

40:31And then we can take your worry about the thing that's coming next that you're holding in your head and kind of going back to, and we can just put it on a low shelf. And when that go mode alarm goes off, we take it off the shelf and we start to focus. And there are, you know, a lot of apps and tools that can help people with some of these kind of, you know, chunking the repeat interval timer. There's a lot of great things out there. I'm just cautious about it with teens. And I'm upfront with teens when we talk about this, that, you know, I know even for myself, I go to pick up my phone to send a message to someone and I see another messages come through.

41:09There's a calendar alarm or alert, like a number of things that pop up and now I'm distracted. So if using a phone works for you, that's great. But to be mindful of the other distractions and things that can come up that then can sometimes derail us or take up time. And again, then we lose that buffer time. And I really love this idea of building a runway. You know, I talked to teens about like, planes don't just like pop off the ground and go, right? They start slow, they build up speed, and then they take off into the air. It is okay for you to build a runway to the things you need to do. What's the runway that helps get you up and out the door to school to get you to the baseball game or the ballet practice, right?

41:58What routines, what reminders, what timers, what things can we use to help kind of build that runway so that you can start slow and build some momentum. And body doubling is a great strategy for that. If there are people around and available, you know, I have a lot of teens who will like, you know, I say FaceTime. I don't know if that's what they're doing. They're snapping on video. I don't know. Like body doubling, right? Like, let me get ready with my friend. We're doing it at the same time. Or mom, can you come in the room and you do your computer work while I do this work? Sometimes that mirroring of being around another person who's getting moving can help cue some of those signals.

42:38And in the spirit of that protecting the relationship, you know, we cannot be the only person for our kids and teens. It's an impossible task. And so if there are other people, coaches, tutors, a grandparent, a neighbor, you know, one of your kids' friends, parents, who is just someone who maybe has some of these struggles, is able to talk to your teen about it, is able to do things to support you or your teen as you really try to kind of get a better sense of what is actually going on and what they need. If there is someone who can help you with that, that is not outsourcing your role or responsibility that is not indicative that you are not doing enough or not good enough at your job as a parent or as a teacher.

43:32It is protecting your relationship by not being the only voice in this because the honest truth is sometimes teens, probably all of us, hear things better from someone else. That's not just us as the parent. And it also gives you some support and maybe some additional ideas. I know I've thrown a lot at everybody and we're coming to time because I want to make sure that we have enough time for some questions. There were some incredibly thoughtful ones that were submitted and maybe more as I've been talking today. But I always like to say to teens and to parents to not forget that your teen is wonderful as they already are.

44:18And, you know, that part of this understanding and having compassion for themselves is also allowing themselves to be who they are and to let their brain and their bodies operate in ways that are more natural for them. And so if time blindness is a struggle, they're going to have to exert a lot of effort and energy and likely so are you along the way to support them in building these skills to be able to kind of function in a world that demands a lot of time awareness and time management. If there are spans of time, if there are blocks of time on vacations or weekends or sometimes an afternoon during the week after school where they can meander, they can take 45-minute showers or they can flit about the house kind of doing nothing, getting lost in what they're doing or just kind of letting their brain wander.

45:15that's a really wonderful thing and encouraging them to do that and to separate out those times when they can't or when they have to draw on some of these skills or exert that extra energy but honoring that it's good for them and okay for them and that you value the times when they can get lost and not pay attention to time I think is also another thing that goes a long way in building a relationship, protecting our relationship, and also reminding them that they are wonderful just as they are, even with some of the struggles that they might have.

45:58Okay. Well, thank you so much, Dr. Allen, for that wonderful presentation. Very compassionate. it. You're welcome. I loved the example you gave about your son in a cast and making his challenges visible, you know, and it's something that when people with ADHD, you can't see. So you're not aware as an adult or a teacher or a coach, what those challenges are. That's so important. And I hope we can all keep that in our heads because it changes the way we relate to one another. Now to your questions. We've had quite a few questions from parents who have ADHD themselves. And they're challenged, they say, by the same time management and related problems as their kids.

46:56Here's one example. How can I help my daughters with ADHD and autism get up and get out the door on time when I myself have ADHD and struggle to demonstrate good timekeeping and organization? Yeah, this is a common one I hear a lot from families. And I think like most things in life, there's not an easy answer, easy solution. I wish I could tell you one or two things. I think one thing to keep in mind, you know, is that everything that we talked about today in terms of redesigning, you know, our thinking, our communication, the environment, while I was speaking about those and how we can use those to address and support kind of the needs of tweens and teens, those strategies are truly universal.

47:52Obviously, some of the examples might need to be shifted a little bit differently for adults and our lives. But those things hold true. And so I think that noticing, not just noticing for an adult their own thoughts, but noticing what are the difficult moments, the difficult times of day. This parent is mentioning in the morning. you know okay so if we know that's a really difficult time trying to go through as curious and not judgmental as we can be towards ourselves as a parent as to you know what are some of the things that get in the way you know the better that we can kind of assess maybe what's happening and and you know it's very likely right that there's a lot of issues with time blindness but there might also be other things that we overlook too, right?

48:54If, you know, getting kids up and getting them moving in the morning, you know, if they're not receptive to that or, you know, are not mourning people, right? We may have a sense of dread sometimes too and kind of push that wake up time later if we're anxious about how this is going to go or whether our child is going to get to school or at the drop-off line if a teacher is going to be judgmental that they're late again, right? There may be things that are time blindness, but also emotional barriers getting in the way with our, you know, anxiety or stress or overwhelm ourselves. So as best we can, you know, trying to do a good self-assessment or doing that assessment with someone else, you know, and whether that can be a, you know, someone, an expert in ADHD or a clinician, someone who can support you or a good friend with strong executive functioning skills, who's compassionate or a family member, right?

49:48Really having them help you walk through and identify some of those places. And then again, not picking 17 strategies, because I think that's just asking too much of any of us, but what's one thing that I might be able to try, right? Do we not have enough buffer time, right? I love, and I do use it a lot, my dad's butt in seat, right? There's a big difference. And I talk to kids about this all the time of like the time we say we're going to leave and actually the time you get into your car or get to the bus stop or, and when we start kind of noticing some of those little gaps in time, you know, that can be something, I'm not going to say it's an easy solution, right?

50:30Because none of these things are necessarily easy when inherently it's a challenge for us, but sometimes just picking one thing and trying it. And if you're able to, depending on, you know, your communication with your children, I think acknowledging these things out loud, right? Of like, oh my gosh, the morning is really hard for me, you know? And I think this might be my struggle. I don't think I'm building enough buffer time, or I think I start this thing and I think it's going to take 15 minutes, but instead I wind up having my coffee and reading for 30 minutes, right? When we can model that and talk those things throughout loud, that doesn't necessarily make it change overnight, but you're setting them up.

51:13And when we kind of think about parenting and raising kid rate, it is kind of for the long haul. God bless anyone who tells their kids something once and it works. That's not my experience in life. Like it is years of repeating. And so I think when we can model the things that are hard and talk about it, we're setting them up to be able to think through these problems themselves, you know, so that later on in life, if they're having a hard time getting to work when they're living independently, they can start asking themselves those questions. But I, you know, I would suggest to a parent to really maybe looking through some of these strategies and kind of shifting, like, what would this look like for myself as an adult versus for my child?

51:48And don't be afraid to ask for help if you're able to. You know, some people have grandparents or, you know, friends or something. You know, I've said, some people have said to me that, like, having the teenage girl next door come over in the morning and the girls get ready together helps. You know, sometimes that body doubling or other people can provide support in ways that, you know, we can be creative about. Okay. One mom writes that she struggles to not micromanage her kids who have time blindness, but she wants to make sure that they're being accountable and follow through. So she's asking how to juggle that?

52:32I, this is a really tough dialectic to hold, I think, because, you know, I think particularly in the teen years, right, the messaging we get from systems like, you know, school and sports teams and ultimately colleges or jobs, right, is, you know, you need to back off and give your kids space to do. And I think any parent, you know, who has a child, you know, with ADHD or, you know, maybe other struggles knows that it's not because they've been doing that their child is not, right? That if they just stopped all of the ways that they were supporting them, it's unlikely that that would just create space and their teen or tween or child would step right into it, right?

53:20So I think sometimes that can be a really hard message that parents get. And I think approaching it and trying to see it as this parent is, is not so black and white of, well, I have to micromanage all of this because if not, the bottom's going to fall out and they'll fail versus, you know, they're old enough. They need to know how to do this or I have to stop doing this because I don't want to and I'm exhausted and I can't, so I'll do none of it. Right. When we kind of think of like, all right, the goal is to get them to do these things and manage their time more effectively independently. And when I say independently, I don't mean without these strategies, but in a way that maybe they can identify and work on these themselves, right?

54:03When they're young adults, when they're living outside the home. Even if that means they're calling you mom and asking like, hey, I'm having a hard time with this. Do you have any ideas, right? Using people for support. But if we think of this as like a pathway, right? Like here's where I hope for my child to get that they're able to remember things, that they're able to keep track of something they need to do. Okay, what are the things before it that can help get them there? So maybe now I'm doing more micromanaging, you know, and I'm sending constant reminders or, you know, I'm putting the alerts on their phone or setting the Alexa for it.

54:39How can I step back from that while encouraging them to to take it on? You know, are there ways that we can talk about this together? Like, I wonder, do you want to set that reminder or would it be helpful for you to put this in your calendar? Can I help you set one up? Right. So when we kind of think it's like, there's, there's a pathway towards the end, although parenting doesn't really ever end, but like, you know, towards that end. And then like, what are the steps along the way? I think that can go a long way to helping a parent when they're worried about micromanaging feel like, no, this is where we are right now.

55:12I'm meeting my teen or tween where they are. And I, there's a pathway to where they're going to get. And I have some ways that I can try to, to step back from this and empower them, offer them ideas, right? Encourage them to ask their teacher. And we can do some of those things with them at first, right? Let's send an email to your teacher. I'll write it, but you sit next to me. The next time when they miss the deadline, can they write the email and you sit next to them, right? And kind of build those steps along the way. Okay. We had quite a few questions around tools and apps. A few people have said, you know, I bought calendars and different agendas, dry erase boards, you know, down the line.

56:00And some say it doesn't work at all. And some say it works for a few weeks and then, but it doesn't stick. So what could they do in these situations? Yeah. So I talk about this a lot with people with ADHD. I think there's a couple of things to keep in mind. One, calendars and wipe a rate, you know, and all these things are great strategies. They're not great strategies for everyone. So if it didn't work for you, that's okay. Let's look into something else. Or maybe there's a different version of it, right? Maybe the wall calendar, you don't pay attention to it, but one on your phone that's brightly colored, right?

56:37So when we can kind of see, is there a little bit more nuance or there are, you know, alternate ways to try this? And if it's not an idea for you, let's try something else. Oh, sorry. I lost my train of thought on this. Okay. The tools. When they don't stick. When they don't. Okay. There we go. Thank Thank you. Second of all, keep in mind, right? The ADHD brain likes novelty. And so sometimes when we get something new, a cool new planner or a new app, it's really fun to use. And that helps us do something that's maybe hard because it's engaging in that way. And this is where I see a lot of young people get down on themselves.

57:21Like, you know, I got this app, it was working for a week or two, now I'm back to the same thing. Like I'm never going to be good at this, or I really am just lazy or unmotivated, right? And a lot of negative self-talk about this. And when I can explain to them, like, you know what? Sometimes the ADHD brain is really cool in the way that like, you know, some people just kind of like go down one street. And sometimes when you have ADHD, you like loop down the street. And so like you see stuff over there and over there and over there. And it's a really beautiful thing because you see a lot of things that other people will never see.

57:55and that is the way sometimes it is with the tools that we use that you might be looped over here and the calendar or the app is working for you for a few weeks and then you're off of it that might mean that you might loop back to that at some point and then you've used it you have that tool in your back pocket you might be able to to pull that back out and use it again you might not loop back to that, or that might be for a different time of your life. And we've got to find something else and really validating how frustrating that is that you are having to work harder than other people to, to get the thing done or to do the thing.

58:38Right. So that is exhausting. I'm sorry that that happens, right. That you have to work so much harder to plan your day or manage your time. And when we can kind of come down on ourselves a little bit less about it and just see it as part of the process. The other thing I tell young people a lot is, you know what, you are building an incredible amount of self-observation and insight into yourself and how you work. Unfortunately, sometimes when we have struggles, we have to pay a lot more attention to how our brains work and to how we do things and what helps us get things done. And that's a bit of a curse in some ways, but it's also an incredible skill and kind of talent you're developing that a lot of other people don't develop till much later in their lives or till ever.

59:23So you are becoming more aware, more self-aware, more creative. You know, it's a yes and, right? But I think it's important to really validate how frustrating it is. Like that every couple of weeks you maybe have to find a new app or a new tool to use. But I think that judgment around, I can't stick to anything. Like Like I have no stick it. Nope. Like when we think of ourselves as a swirler versus a like stick to it in one line, right. There's beauty in both. Um, they're just different. And unfortunately, a lot of, you know, the teen and tween years and for many of us, our jobs, right. Really require a lot of sticking to in a straight line at specific times.

1:00:06Um, and that's hard. There's nothing wrong with you. It's just, it's, it's hard to live that way when you're a bit more of a swirler. Um, the last question, because we're just about out of time is how can I help my son be self-motivated to do schoolwork and other things he just doesn't like doing? Oh, yeah. Well, you know, I have a lot of thoughts about that. And I know in probably the next minute or two, I can't answer them. Um, you know, sometimes we make assumptions, things they don't like doing. Maybe it's because it's hard. Um, it's stressful. He doesn't feel good about it. So there might be deeper things in there to ask some questions about.

1:00:47But the other truth is we don't always like everything, you know, and as adults, when we don't like something, we either stop doing it or try to minimize it or, you know, avoid it in whatever way. Kids, teens, tweens don't really have that luxury. They have to take certain classes. They have to participate in certain things along the way, whether or not they like it. You know, I think there's, as parents, it's trying to hold that line of like, there are things in life we don't like to do, but they must be done. Sometimes a lot of validation and just kind of laying that out. Like, how can I help you get there?

1:01:20I think as a parent too, I would also try to take a look at, are there other things that he is motivated to do or works on or shows kind of initiative or commitment to? Because I think sometimes that can help for parents to be able to see like, well, he really, you know, loves building Legos or helps his sister with this thing or loves playing basketball and he'll go out in the driveway and shoot hoops for a couple of hours. And, you know, so sometimes remembering like motivation isn't kind of straight across the board for all of us, you know, we don't show equal kind of motivation and commitment to each thing.

1:01:56Sometimes that, that skill is being developed in other ways and in other areas. And I know that's really hard when your child might need to pass their classes and get through high school. But I think being able to validate or maybe highlight to a kid where you see, you know, work ethic developing or motivation or care and really acknowledging that and supporting that and conversely highlighting like, I know it doesn't feel the same with school and, but I want to help you in life, be able to do things you need to do because that's going to come up a good amount, you know, paying taxes or going to a weird summer job, you know, or whatever it might be.

1:02:36So like, I really want to help you be able to do that too and have him be able to see, you know, and then encourage, right? Like the more that, you know, someday in your life or as you get older, how can we fill your weekend with things maybe that you enjoy more is a great way for kids to feel like we really see them. And again, for teens, kind of respect who they are while acknowledging that even as an adult, when, you know, kids always tell me I get to do whatever I want all day as a grownup, you know, there's a lot that we have to do that we don't want to do. And that's an important skill to learn in life too.

1:03:11Yeah. Dr. Allen, thank you so much for sharing your expertise with our ADHD community. We really appreciate it. Thank you. You're very welcome. Thank you so much, everyone, for joining. And thank you to everyone here today. If your question wasn't answered during the webinar, we do share audience questions with our experts, and yours may appear in a future edition of Attitude Magazine's Ask the Expert, or rather, Ask the Advisor column. If you would like to access today's event resources, visit attitudemag.com and search for Podcast 618. The slides and recording are posted a few hours after each live webinar.

1:03:51If you're listening in replay mode, simply click on the episode description. Please know that our full library of attitude webinars is available as a podcast. It's called the ADHD experts podcast, and it's available on most streaming platforms. Get alerts for future attitude webinars by signing up at attitude mag.com slash newsletters. Thank you everyone. And have a great day.

1:04:17Suzanne Allen: For more attitude podcast and information on living well with attention deficit, visit attitude mag.com. That's A-D-D-I-T-U-D-E-M-A-G dot com.

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