November 22, 2024 • 51 mins
One of the most challenging aspects of getting a late diagnosis (at least for me and this week's guest) is recognizing the impact it's had all through your life and then finding a community that accepts, welcomes and understands you. Kendra Koch is the founder of Divergently, an online community designed specifically for late diagnosed neurodivergent women. We discuss her divergent path and the role managing her physical health had in her understanding her spicy brain.
Subscribe to the Divergently newsletter and hop on the waitlist over at https://www.joindivergently.com/ and say hi to Kendra on Threads at https://www.threads.net/@joindivergently
Thank you for listening! Make sure to like and subscribe to Divergent Paths wherever you listen.
Resources mentioned:
Divergent Mind by Jenara Nerenberg. https://www.nnlm.gov/reading-club/book/divergent-mind
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
I worked in the wellness industry for over a decade and I have a degree in
(00:06):
psychology and I worked in early childhood education. I had access to
pretty much everything you could. Like all my friends work at the forefront of
health. I'm in like the innovation city of the world. I'm surrounded by doctors.
I'm working at a genetics lab in women's health and still I didn't get a
diagnosis or like even think about ADHD for myself.
(00:39):
Hello and welcome to Divergent Paths. I'm your host Dr. Regina McMenemy. I am a
doctor but not that kind of doctor and this is a podcast not medical advice.
Have you always felt a little different but didn't know why? Have you struggled
with tasks that some people seem to handle with ease? Are you mystified by
(00:59):
social norms and interactions? Divergent Paths is a podcast for late diagnosed
neurodivergent people that explores the joys and frustrations of having a spicy
brain. In each episode we'll dive into the unique experiences of discovering
ADHD, autism or both later in life. What defines a later life diagnosis? Anytime
(01:21):
the realization happens outside of the so-called norm of childhood and
adolescence. Kendra Koch is founder and CEO at Divergently, a social safety net
bridging the support gap for late diagnosed neurodivergent women. Kendra
and I have an amazing conversation where she shares with us her experience with
her own late diagnosis and how social health is deeply tied to physical health.
(01:45):
So stay tuned and thanks for listening to Divergent Paths. Do you have like a
special interest or something that's kind of persisted for you through your
life that you've like to talk about? Yeah I've been thinking about this a lot
lately just because it's coming up in my community and people are talking about
(02:06):
their special interests and I'm just learning about that term. And I actually
had a hard time figuring out what it was and then I realized that there's kind of
like a thread that's gone through my whole life that's been consistent but
the manifestation of it has always changed and so I will have like a pretty
(02:28):
intense special interest for maybe like a one year to three year bucket of time
and then I'm kind of over it and move on to the next thing. So I've had a lot of
different ones. A lot of different ones yeah. So I'll just like pick one and go
deep but I think the the common thread is like human experience. Okay. Yeah.
(02:48):
Just different variations of what that can look like and I'd say when I was in
high school I was super into sports so I really did I did every like I did every
sport I could sign up for. And then when I was in college I honestly can't say I
think I was just too busy working and going to school to even have a base for
(03:11):
a special interest. And then I moved to San Francisco and I started working in
That's my hometown. Oh yeah okay yeah it's a beautiful city. It is yeah. Yeah I lived there 12 years so a good time.
Yeah. And I started working in early childhood education and I noticed that
(03:36):
the kids there were not eating great and partially because of what the school was
feeding them, partially what the parents were feeding. And I think at that time
like health was a special interest to me but I was really into what factors of
like our lifestyle can help facilitate health and how do we make our
(03:59):
environments healthier. And that's probably a theme that's gone through
literally everything I've done from the sports I mentioned in high school to now
I'm building a community space right in mental health and like a social health
platform. And the you know the food led me into working for different startups
(04:21):
in the health system and then I was really into startups for a while but not
like I'm not like a tech person like everyone's like oh you're like a tech
person but I'm actually not it's just like the environment I was in and
because I lived in San Francisco for 12 years every company worked out was a
startup. Right right yeah. But yeah I did nutrition education, I did food tech and
(04:45):
agriculture tech, I did family tech, I worked in allergy prevention, death care,
genetics, like lots of different kind of manifestations of health and then
I was like this is too cerebral I got a little bit burned out from it so I went
to acting school and then like this. This is so ADHD. I know. Yeah so by day I was working at a
(05:12):
genetics lab and by night I was going to acting school. Yeah it makes sense now
this is all before I had a diagnosis too so I had no. I was out that's actually
kind of what I was gonna lead into like I have found you know that because one
(05:33):
of my special interests is just kind of people in general like and humanities
and you know I have a PhD and you know social science essentially you know I
I was able to mask a lot more effectively because of how closely I was
studying people and so I wonder with people who are late diagnosed if one of
(05:55):
the reasons why people or lifestyles or even health and some of the stuff you're
talking about puts off the diagnosis to a degree because you're you're so savvy
about the people right so I was kind of wondering if that might have been part
of what kind of played into diagnosis as well. Yeah maybe um I mean I had a sort
(06:18):
of atypical childhood in general and so I'm not even sure diagnosis would have
come up for me and I did I liked school and I did well at school. I was one of
those kids that was in gifted programs so that's probably the clue there but um
I yeah like I wasn't struggling really at school but I do remember kids saying
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oh you're like the smartest, dipsiest person I know. Like stuff like that yeah so it was
like yeah I was aware that in some places I was considered very smart but
in other parts of my life people were like what's wrong with you um and like
how could you miss that or you know how could you forget like one time I left
(07:05):
all the clothes I owned at camp in a dirty clothes bag and you know my
family friend who drove me home went three hours of driving before I realized
I left all my clothes at camp so you know stuff like that um but I think it
was just like oh you're not paying attention or you're too you're like right
(07:29):
you know I was like very daydreamy so inattentive kind of yeah yeah exactly
and also I was like quiet and well behaved like my the manifestation of my
ADHD was very like I didn't bother people with it really right right and
(07:49):
that's you know as we're as we're learning now that's one of the reasons
why assigned female birth bodies tend to be diagnosed later because they didn't
understand that not everybody manifests by bouncing off the walls in the room
and instead are bouncing off the walls of their brain you know yeah I am seeing
that that's very similar to what my story was like too yeah and I I don't
(08:15):
know I guess I have always studied people and I loved reading so that was
a big thing that I did a lot and I would read all these stories about like just
kids who had lives very different from my life and I loved that and I loved
right and I love novels and I read way above my you know maturity level which
was probably not great um but I was super interested in other people's lives
(08:40):
right but I don't think I had an awareness of it really it just I would
just like do it I would just read and read and read and read forever and my
parents were like she's reading she's fine you know so right yeah yeah so it
wasn't yeah yeah and now you have a podcast interviewing people so it all
makes sense yeah yeah all these things tend to tend to line up with each other
(09:06):
yeah so are there other aspects of your childhood you said were you said your
childhood was like atypical or the other aspects of other than you know I don't
think this is an atypical presentation of a female bodied ADHD at all I think
it's very typical experience but are there other aspects of your childhood
that sort of impacted your knowledge and your awareness of ADHD in general yeah
(09:32):
yeah I don't think so I got diagnosed completely out of the blue I was not
seeking a diagnosis at all oh really oh tell me about that yeah yeah I had been
going to therapy for probably eight years or something and I was on my
second therapist I had started seeing her primarily for just like crippling
(09:58):
anxiety mm-hmm that's what I thought it was yeah and I had one specific job that
I was just having panic attacks like before I would go into work um yeah and
I didn't I really thought that maybe I was just stressed or overwhelmed with
work or I was not mm-hmm maybe I was just pushing too hard I don't know or
you were in burnout yeah I was yeah but I didn't realize that's what it was
(10:21):
I mean it's almost impossible to recognize when you're in it when you're
after you're like oh my gosh now I see yeah yeah and then now looking back to
it makes sense why it was that specific job because I had always worked in
early-stage startups that were very fluid I was constantly doing new things
I was working in product I was working in marketing I was working with the
(10:42):
executive team I was meeting clients I was like bringing in agencies so my job
was very dynamic and interesting and also the teams were small and I mostly
worked remotely and I had a lot of flexibility and so those
accommodations now that I know that need to be made our accommodations yeah
they were I didn't know that but like I had been getting those met and then when
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I switched to this specific job I had to take a train for an hour a day down to
the South Bay to get to the office I was required to work in the office getting
up from my desk was seen as a big negative so movement was like not okay
at that job yeah it was an open floor plan super noisy and all of my
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colleagues were on calls the whole time so I heard there were like ten
conversations behind me and before that I never really had that experience at
work and so I think it was just like not a good environment for me and also the
there were just like little things like the microwave was close by so I could
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smell people's food and I was just in sensory overload oh yeah yeah yeah
sorry you just brought me back to like a time I I worked as an adjunct
instructor for so many years and when you're an adjunct you're sharing an
office with 20 other people maybe more you know depending on your department
and there was so often that I would be in you know this corral of like little
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tiny desks shoved in a room in a corner where nobody could see you because nobody
wants to see that there's 20 adjuncts carrying the University that's another
podcast but somebody came in one time with some kind of fish that they had
heated up in the microwave and I nearly died I was I was like I cannot function
in this room and I didn't have the have to stay at my desk I just got up and
(12:35):
left because I had lots of autonomy in that job but I know I know exactly what
you mean about that you know all of those are triggers like all one of the
five things you just listed are triggers you know like and to have all of them at
once yeah now now looking back it's so obvious that when I was in it I had no
(13:00):
idea so I go to therapy for anxiety and I saw her for quite a while and during
that time I had switched jobs good and it was better and that's around the time
I think I started acting too so I had this kind of physical outlet which was
really good for me like acting is very somatic in a way yeah and that's
(13:20):
actually where I learned about somatics was in acting but I and I and I was in
San Francisco so I was walking a lot too like I was I didn't have a car I walked
everywhere so it's getting exercise I was doing I was like meditate meditating
every morning I was eating really healthy I was doing all the right things
getting good sleep so I was doing pretty well actually and then I got pregnant and
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my therapist was like oh by the way you have ADHD and I think she I don't know
for sure because we didn't discuss it but I feel like she knew the whole time
but she told me when I got pregnant because she was aware that that would
change my ability like all these things I had put in place exercise and
meditation the sleep the routines you know when you have a baby say goodbye to
(14:09):
all of that yeah yeah yeah I wasn't diagnosed before I had my daughter and
yeah I would very much point to that as the time when everything fell apart
because you just I couldn't like exactly like she said or you know she intended
for you all all of the accommodations I had built into my life not recognizing
(14:33):
there were accommodations one away yeah yeah yeah yeah I'm glad you got some
warning I know but I timing of that is a little hard because like you're already
going through like you know being pregnant that like it's like this long
transition into motherhood right like it starts as you go through the whole
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process of growing a person in you and like to have to transition into
understanding that your brain is working different and you have been
accommodating yourself your whole life and this is why you feel so stressed
and why you're so burned out I imagine was a lot it wasn't at the time it was
the pandemic also okay but actually I know okay like this is like no yeah but
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weirdly like in the pandemic maybe it's not so weird I was okay like I mean the
external things are taken away from exactly yeah yeah and I think I in a way
I got lucky being pregnant at that time compared to people that I know who had
like teenagers or age kids you know if you're gonna have a kid like that she
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was protected in my body I had a pretty a lot of space and quiet I could rest
like it wasn't horrifically bad I think it was isolating in a lot of ways right
um I was really lucky to have care from a group of midwives at a birth center
so they were able to like close the birth center and see one patient at a
(16:12):
time so like I was able to get better health care than if I had been
primarily being seen at a hospital so considering all the things that were
really terrible and hard about the pandemic I feel like I got very lucky
and I didn't really take my therapist warning that seriously like she said oh
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you have ADHD you should learn about neurodivergence she gave me a book
called divergent minds I think it is yeah that was my book that found that
that yeah that's mine that put me on the book this path to oh interesting yeah um
I read it and I I think I just read it and it was like interesting and also
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yeah didn't really yeah put too much on it and and then I had my baby we moved
to Atlanta we moved from San Francisco San Francisco yeah it was a big culture
shift yeah and um we moved into a house that had mold so I didn't like that and
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like made me really sick and then having the baby and then being in the pandemic
with a newborn and not being able to like get out of the house and being in
house that was making me sick I think all of that plus like the hormonal changes
and then the sleep disruption and stuff that's when I was like okay this is
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something I really have to take seriously like mm-hmm I got treatment for
the mold and we got out of the house and all of that's better now but it did
amplify the ADHD symptoms that I had and really made me like understand my body a
lot better because everything was just it was like I'm doing fine to I think
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that company option where I couldn't even function like I couldn't remember
what I did two hours before I was like super disoriented I was completely
ungrounded and just like felt like I was floating through my life and like in a
dream and that part was really really challenging and I think it's taken about
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two and a half years or so I don't know timelines are kind of fuzzy for me but
like two and a half years to make sense of my diagnosis make sense of my body's
needs understand like what pieces of this is sensory like related to sensory
overload and I did always know I was highly sensitive but you know it's like
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something you hear a lot once you learn about yeah just like oh highly sensitive
just probably means you have ADHD or autism but yeah well that's what that's
what I had learned about highly sensitive children I had learned because
my my daughter was showing signs of you know neurodivergence when she was very
little and I didn't understand what was going on because of course I didn't have
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a diagnosis and so I had found a group on Facebook that had led me into like
highly sensitive children and I was like okay so this is what I'm dealing with a
highly sensitive child and now I'm like okay now I know we're probably dealing
with a form of oddy HD that is very similar to to me but I think her dad
although he is undiagnosed pretty sure is autism as well but you know he's very
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resistant to any kind of labels right things labels are bad I think labels are
empowering it's very differing point of view yeah I wonder too if there's like a
gender component to that because I mean for many reasons but I feel like in a
way women almost need the label to be taken seriously whereas like men can
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more easily just be like I need this accommodation and people like okay right
yeah you know I think I think you're right that's actually a really good
observation just about the general sexism around neurodivergence I think
men getting accommodations might be easier like you said just because it's
like oh well if I need I need a standing desk I cannot imagine somebody in a work
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situation you know an assigned male at birth body saying I need a standing desk
and somebody saying no you don't you know no they'd be like okay well we'll
get you one you know and you know not recognizing that standing desk wouldn't
help me I don't it doesn't like that doesn't help me focus I know I bought
one and I bought one and then then I got a treadmill because I'm like okay the
treadmill underneath will help none of it none of it helped I have to go outside
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to walk yeah but you know those those kinds of asks I think would be easier
and thought about the difference in there yeah yeah I wonder too also because
a lot of times like it like you were saying you learned about it through your
daughter and with women we're often more connected to our kids in that way and so
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like I don't know I wonder if there's something there I think for me like my
daughter's four so and so I don't know like she probably is neurodivergent just
based off of like we noticed but I almost feel like I can't properly
help her or get her the support she needs if I am not able to do that for
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myself and so I'm feel so connected to her as her mother that I feel like I
need to give her a label I have to do that to myself as well right yeah it's a
tool right like the labels are a tool so if you don't need it then okay I can see
why people don't want it and there are risks to having it too there are risks
to having it yeah it is not it's not a cut-and-dry situation but that is also
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very similar to you know I got my diagnosis last year and I was 49 and a
lot of people were like why are you getting this diagnosis at your age like
this doesn't you don't need this and I was like well I would disagree to that
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entirely but also in understand in me understanding myself and understanding
how I function I will be able to be a better parent having a family history
that accurately you know documents your divergence will make it easier for the
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next generations to get the kind of support that they need you know so
there's like so many steps and so many reasons why it is important to do this
especially as my daughter is 10 she's gonna be 11 early next year so like
she's heading into the time I know that all of the hormone changes she's going
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to go through in the next few years are going to compound her divergence as well
her neurodivergence as well her spicy brain is gonna go nuts because she's
gonna have all the spicy hormones heading in there and that's gonna make
this whole little like curry activity that is going to it's gonna be a thing
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it's gonna be you know something that we're gonna have to you know be more
careful about and I feel empowered by it I know that that's not true for
everybody people let you know feel labels are limiting in some aspects but
I think it can I think it helps more than it hurts at least my experience yeah
yeah I mean there's the stigma and I think that's what people are afraid of
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and I get that but um we can't really move past it unless we start to finding
things so it's right challenging yeah yeah yeah that's uh I think that one of
the reasons why I was I wanted to talk to you was because of the the
recognition that you had and and the the community you're building so tell us a
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little bit about divergently and like where where in your story that comes
from so I have a feeling it's kind of like tied into kind of right where we're
at in your your evolution here yeah for sure um you know all that stuff that I
went through with the mold and and having a baby and learning about my
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symptoms and being feeling really confident like oh I was managing ADHD
fine before I had my daughter and I like was naive thinking I would be able to
continue doing that but I couldn't and when I was kind of forced to like take
a break and heal I also probably was in burnout I was like co-founder of a
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different startup and just it was just all way too much I stripped at like I
literally stripped my life down to a blank slate as much as the person can
because we had the mold we moved and I we threw away everything we owned
because if we didn't want to like bring mold sports with us absolutely I left
(25:13):
my startup I took about four months off just to get better and I had when I was
out the previous startup I was trying to get out of the wellness industry
because I was feeling a little bit burnt out like frustrated that I worked in the
wellness industry for over a decade and I have a degree in psychology and I
(25:35):
worked in early childhood education and still I didn't get a diagnosis or like
even think about ADHD for myself right yeah that I was thinking about that a
lot as I was healing like how how come the one thing that's actually helped me
was just like yeah it came so late it was not something I thought about I feel like I
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got lucky in a way and I had access to pretty much everything you could like all
my friends work at the forefront of health I'm in like the innovation like
city of the world you know and yeah I'm surrounded by doctors I'm working at a
(26:21):
genetics lab in women's health and still it was this hard for me and I think that
really hit me hard and also when I went to go learn about more about my brain
and my needs I didn't find a lot and it was very hard for me to find the
information that I was looking for and I didn't have a good like nothing to
(26:42):
stake myself on of where to start mm-hmm and like my therapist just gave me a
diagnosis but then I moved and so I was not working with her anymore because
she's not licensed in my new state so I did like find new health care providers
and I found one and you know he's like I'll give you medication but that's
(27:04):
where that ended I will I will tell it the benefits of medication I won't you
know I think it's an you know it's helpful but it's just such a band-aid
like it does it does help but if you don't have the supports in other ways
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to understand you know the changes that you go through even going on medication
like you know no but when I picked up my first prescription they never told me
don't take it with orange juice mm-hmm right because like it will counteract it
yeah citrus citric acid will counteract the you know so like there's there's
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things that like you should be know that I didn't I shouldn't have had to learn on
my own right and so like somebody just tossing you a pill it's like well thanks
for the help but yeah and even that is yeah sorry I did not mean to cut you off
no you're totally good I was just thinking like even that is such a trial
and error for most people too oh yeah yeah yeah having to go through and try
(28:13):
different medications and one of my interviews one of the first interviews I
did Rachel she she said she tried her her insurance required her to take so
many different ones before she could get to what she ended up ended up taking she
had to take all different kinds before she ended up on the the medication that
finally helped but she had to try and try and try and some of them had like
(28:37):
horrible effects on her and but she still had to go through taking them in
order to get to you know what worked and so yeah it's hard yeah I had been
through that already with migraine treatments and then other like chronic
health stuff I'd had since I was a kid and because I worked in the health space
I saw a lot of people navigating their health like you know I a lot of women
(29:02):
with chronic health I overlapped with them in my work so when it was genetics
it was like infertility and cancer and things like that rare disease and when I
was working in nutrition a lot of it was women with chronic health challenges
trying to solve it through like food sensitivities you know like boosting
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their nutrient intake and things like that like increasing protein going keto
you know all those like buzz right here and when I was working in allergy
prevention a lot of it was around like controlling your environment to not be
having like these big reactions to foods or to other things environmental
allergens things like that so the theme that I picked up on like just from
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working in health and so many different angles was that most of the advice is
around like making your life smaller so it's like eliminate this stop doing that
you know don't go here don't do that activity don't stay up late you know and
I just felt not just my world like caving in the more I tried to like
(30:10):
micromanage my health but I noticed this was happening to all the women and like
the people around me who are also trying to micromanage their health and what I
learned in nutrition working with kids and families in schools was that it
doesn't matter how much knowledge and education you have if the environment
around you doesn't support mm-hmm your well-being and healthy eating you are
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not going to eat well like it's just if you don't have access to healthy food
you don't have time to cook it or it's too expensive or it doesn't align with
your cultural like expectation of what your foods should look like or what
you're used to having good luck like you're not gonna be able to do it as
much as you want to and I've never met a parent who was like no I don't really
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care if my kid eats healthy like I think everybody's doing the best they can it's
just like a really difficult challenge yeah and so that's kind of where
Divergently came out of like I was healing I had stripped everything down I
had like space to think about what I really cared about and like get almost
(31:18):
like a high-level perspective on everything I had learned and what I
felt was missing and then being a mom too I was like well what do I really
value and what do I write about and what kind of business like a start-up is not
the business to have if you're raising a kid and you actually want to see them
(31:38):
what kind of work can I do that's meaningful and solves the problems that
I care about and still allows me to be a parent and live my values and those
things and so that's really where I landed with Divergently and I basically
just started building the thing I wish that I found when I went online looking
for resources and looking to understand my ADHD and my sensory needs and all of
(32:05):
that and so I was like well what's missing from health community social
health is super critical especially right yeah I think that was the biggest
piece that I I noticed and then environment like are the people around
you supportive and then I was thinking about that a lot and I'm like well I
(32:26):
don't like I'm very vocal about having ADHD but I don't think everybody can be
it's a certain level of safety in order to disclose and right in certain jobs I
would have never ever disclosed it would have been a huge risk to my career right
(32:48):
and the way people perceived me and so that was also part of why I wanted to
create a space which is like if you are newly diagnosed and you're still
figuring out what that means for you even if you're not newly diagnosed like
you're just thinking about it who can you talk to and not everybody can talk
to their spouse or their parents or their friends or their workplace so it's
(33:12):
like come talk to other women who are going through it right and then the
other thought thing I was thinking is missing is information that you can trust
which is something that really bothered me about the health space is like you
can do paleo, keto, there's a million different diets, gluten-free, vegan,
and they're all right for they're all right you know like for individuals
(33:38):
depending on what your individual needs are but at the base of all of it is like
eat food that's food right and I think we can identify generally my my thing is
like eat food you can identify like look like like can you you know pick out
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what this is and if you are eating something that's in a box you know that
has a label do you know what the things are that are in the ingredients list
and that's always my like differentiation like you know if you
can't pronounce it and you don't know where it came from maybe it shouldn't be
going in your body yeah yeah at least not for all your meals but yeah I think
(34:27):
that I I got frustrated with like the marketing of health yes and this kind of
push to make us all believe we can control our health outcomes and that you
know we can just buy our way to better health or like buy healthier products or
whatever but a lot of times it's just really simple like lifestyle things and
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if we're so caught up in you know I saw these posts on before you before you eat
your tomatoes like cut them and leave them sitting out for 30 minutes because
they'll have more nutrients I was just like if we're thinking about that kind
of level of right optimizing our health yeah that becomes a stressor right which
(35:10):
is also not healthy right exactly then you're like what information should I be
focused on and if you're like me and you have ADHD you're taking it all in right
and trying to apply all the rules perfectly and it's just like not possible
right exactly yeah I I very much have that same that same reaction where it's
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like oh god there's so much information I'm supposed to be tracking there's so
much I'm supposed to know about this and I can't know everything about all the
things even though my ADHD really wants me to know all of the things about all
of the things it's just you got to stop and if you know them all you can't apply
them all exactly so then you just feel like you're always behind or that's how
(35:53):
I'm like I'm always messing it up I'm always behind I didn't know what value
are prioritized it's right I'm always there's always some sense of failure
right because like you can't you can't do all of the things you can't be all of
the things and so I think that at least for me that's where a sense of the shame
(36:14):
comes from because I have this idea that I can do all of the things but like
nobody can do all of the things that's that's not that's not how it works yeah
so you're building a community and it's an online community so we have like you
know the capacity for like lots of people what what is the online community
(36:34):
like what is the space like how are you sort of building it to help support
people in this space that you identified that there is so little sort of for
social health yeah well we're pre-launched so we're launching January 1st
so I can tell you what I'm envisioning it as and how I'm building it but I think
once we get people in there will evolve you'll know better and it will evolve in
(36:59):
whatever direction the members need it to so it's not really up to me I think
I'll just wait and see you know what people need and what they're asking for
but right now it's a community so you'll like you'll be in an online space like
you said with lots of people and the idea is to facilitate conversation so it
(37:20):
could be like things about what we're talking about here having space for
people to process their emotional experience around a diagnosis or around
just like their daily kind of support needs and then resources and tools so
it's like okay I'm really struggling with sleep and then like what we'll do is
(37:40):
help you find information about sleep that's been vetted it's you know we have
really great advisors on the board and medical experts who are coming in to
like review content and make sure everything that we share talk about is
accurate and true yeah and then also that everything we talk about has nuance
(38:02):
so it's like my perspective is again going back to the thing where I felt
frustrated with the way health was being marketed is I don't want to be the kind
of company or brand or place where it's just like here's a prescriptive protocol
buy all these products and follow these right and here's the supplements that
will help you and take this and you know bugger off yeah exactly because like
(38:28):
health is personal and I don't know what are what my members individual needs are
it's so depends on their family their environment they're like broader access
to resources and support and like only they know what they need so I feel like
our goal with divergently is to give you options right and explain what those
(38:53):
options can do for you so it's like if you want to pursue the medication route
here's how you can do that here are some ways to go about that here are some
risks and benefits of doing that now like you decide what you need and we'll
do what we can to help you facilitate it but we'll never say you should go on
(39:15):
medication that's right yeah exactly yeah I think that's really important
that it's not a one like it's not a there's no one solution right you know
and everybody has to figure out what the solutions are that work best for them
yeah and also I think the benefit of community is that we can share stories
(39:36):
and strategies and try things on like right you know you might have a strategy
that you love like you just were telling me before we started recording that you
wake up and you have protein first thing in the day like that's something that I
should try that would probably really help me too and so in a community
setting we can learn from each other and try each other's strategies and then
(39:59):
talk about it like how did this help and I think that's really healthy and
healing and it also helps us feel seen but we you know we're not gonna get all
of the tools and support we need for our day-to-day lives from the medical system
right so wait like we can't expect to like go to our doctor and and like have
them help us like remember to wash our laundry you know no yeah well I mean like
(40:25):
I said you you you barely get the support for what being medicated is like
from your your medical professionals or even from your pharmacists like you know
if you do pursue you know medication you have to do a lot you have to learn a lot
on your own and I think any any venue or any avenue any path that allows you to
(40:50):
kind of see that you know you're not alone and that there are other ways you
can do things and there are things you can do that can supplement whatever you
know systems you have in place I think is really important yeah and then the
access thing is the other piece that we're trying to build in so it's like if
you need an evaluation right now I I get a lot of questions like where do I go
(41:11):
how do I get one and then they're super expensive and how do I navigate all the
forms and all of that and so you know there's a lot of involved yeah mm-hmm
yeah so we're working on bringing in partners that are vetted and verified so
it's like here are some places you can go and just to make it more accessible
(41:33):
and then if there are products making them more affordable by providing
partner discounts and then for things like if you want to like have therapist
you know answer some questions we have a therapist who's gonna come in and do like
a Q&A and so just making things that normally are expensive time-consuming
(41:55):
difficult to access a little bit more accessible yeah um yeah so those are my
goals yeah I love it I think I really I can't remember exactly how I came across
no I did I came across you on threads and I was just one of those things that
just kind of like popped up and I'm like what is this and let me take a look and
(42:15):
then looked into the conversations that you're even having now on social media
which I think is really important that we have places like that and that and
that you can grow into it I love the idea of taking something that kind of
started grassroots you know like and you know social media and building it into a
(42:35):
community that will really be support though a lot of us a lot of us really
need yeah yeah and I love social media and I love those connections and then
like finding people like you through social media is amazing
and even it goes so much farther because I was listening to your podcast and then
I discovered all these other people that you've interviewed and so it's really
(42:57):
cool ecosystem but then there's this downside of trolls and some of the nasty
conversations that come up and the misinformation and so I think one of the
nice things about community space is we can monitor that more closely and we
have more control than we would on like a social media platform and so you know
(43:20):
if people are being nasty like I'm not above kicking them out just be like right
you can't be in this space like right right not what we do here and if there's
medical misinformation flying around we can address it and have a conversation
around it or move it because like that's yeah yeah versus just open social media
where anybody can have you know anything and can post and you know not sources
(43:44):
aren't vetted and you know you're relying on your your communities or your
connections being mindful about what they're sharing and as we have seen the
most people are not most people don't take the step to make sure that the meme
that they are posting is accurate right or the link that they're sharing comes
(44:08):
from someplace you know vetted or that has some sort of credibility yeah and
it's hard to tell like there have been things where I looked and I couldn't
figure it out I was just yeah and I have I have been guilty of posting things and
not looking and then having somebody call me on it and taking things down and
(44:30):
going you know okay I'm sorry that I put this up this isn't accurate you know and
things like that where you know it's really hard in the way that the
information age such as it is evolved it we don't have clear markers of
credibility and we don't have internet literacy in a way that people can look
(44:51):
at you know sites and go oh well who's sponsoring this like who's paying for
this and then you know and then people get swept up in an idea and if you're
preying on people's fears or you know people want easy solutions and that's
what you're presenting for the low low price of my supplement for $49 you know
whatever it is that they're selling in the end you know people don't make those
(45:14):
next steps in the critical process and that's I really appreciate the idea that
divergently will will help with that because I think just being in a
community where people are going to be more mindful of that it's like when you
raise the the water all the ships raise up you know right you know that sense I
(45:34):
think that's really powerful yeah I really like that analogy it is exactly
what we're talking about earlier with the like the food how can you vet your
information when the entire like your entire environment is flooded with bad
information it's just really difficult yeah yeah but we've been pretty lucky on
threads actually um we had a really positive space like I've I've had a
(45:58):
couple of threads go kind of low-level viral there about ADHD and I've been
really impressed with not not as many trolls as I have had in my other life on
some other social platforms that I will not name because I don't like the people
who own them yeah yeah social media landscape is pretty terrifying but not
(46:20):
all bad not all bad it's not all bad you know and I think that that's that's
important to note too that we do have we can build communities so I'm excited to
see where divergently goes and to follow your path and so as we wrap up here I'm
gonna ask you my my question my big question so if you could tell your
younger self one thing about discovering your spicy brain other than this is what
(46:46):
you have what what would you tell them oh this is such a good question um I
think it would be something along the lines of like your internal experience
was not wrong because I I did spend a lot of my life second-guessing what I
(47:09):
noticed and perceived and then what I was told and not like and really noticing
that there is a difference between those two things um now that I'm like nearly
40 and I've had lots of experience and I understand neurodivergence more in the
connection between pattern recognition and high sensitivity and all those
(47:30):
things like oh I was not wrong all those times yeah I was thinking in a longer
term time horizon and with more information like perceived than the
people around me or what I was noticing was threatening to the people around me
and that's why I was being shut down so it's like either they didn't see what I
(47:53):
could see or they were threatened by what I could see but it wasn't wrong to
see what you were saying yeah yeah and I'm still navigating that like it comes
up all the time and I'm still navigating you know when should I push it I just
like know that I know and move on in life and also like understanding the
(48:20):
the felt sense of when I'm clear on something and I know I can it's like a
physical sensation and so learning to trust that and myself time to pause
enough to feel it I think I would have yeah tell my younger self to allow that
process to happen and get really good at it because now I'm aware of it and I
(48:44):
have to almost unlearn all the bad yes I learned absolutely yeah absolutely
that's that's beautiful I think you know the process you're describing I think is
you know like self-gaslighting right where we have been given so many signals
that we shouldn't perceive what we perceive and if we do perceive it we
shouldn't talk about it and you know all of that and I think coming from you know
(49:09):
neuro spicy space where you see so much and you see so many patterns and it can
be threatening to people you can be threatening to the status quo when
you're like the person who's gonna just point out and say the things like I can
have many memories of my childhood saying things I wasn't supposed to say
and learning not to say them not learning you know that they were
(49:30):
accurate but learning that it was bad to say them and to voice them and
unlearning that is it's it is the work
as long as I live I'm sure yeah you know I said I just said this week to to a
(49:51):
friend of mine that I and I talked to my counselor about this yesterday too I
don't trust people who say they're healed like past tense because I don't
really believe that our our traumas stop affecting us and our difficulties and
our patterns if you're breaking out of patterns I don't think you get to be
healed past tense I think you it's it's a lifelong process of recognizing how it
(50:18):
continues to impact you you know that's really wise thanks it's taken some time
to get here and to recognize that it is a path that I will be continuing on but
I think it's valuable definitely yeah thank you so much for chatting with me
(50:41):
today let our listeners know where they can find you and they can find out
information about Divergently yeah Divergently is at join Divergently on
social media platforms we're most active on threads and then our website is join
divergently.com right now if you go there you'll be added to our free
newsletter and wait list for the community and the website and community
(51:04):
will be live by January 1st probably earlier than that but great well thank
you thank you so much a huge thank you to Kendra for joining me today please
make sure to check out Divergently on threads it's such an exciting project
(51:27):
and I'm so glad to support it make sure to subscribe to divergent paths
podcast wherever you listen to podcasts and like and leave a review and share
with your spicy brain friends and perhaps those who love them as well
follow us on Instagram at Divergent Paths Consulting No Spaces and until
next time stay spicy
I worked in the wellness industry for over a decade and I have a degree in
(00:06):
psychology and I worked in early childhood education. I had access to
pretty much everything you could. Like all my friends work at the forefront of
health. I'm in like the innovation city of the world. I'm surrounded by doctors.
I'm working at a genetics lab in women's health and still I didn't get a
diagnosis or like even think about ADHD for myself.
(00:39):
Hello and welcome to Divergent Paths. I'm your host Dr. Regina McMenemy. I am a
doctor but not that kind of doctor and this is a podcast not medical advice.
Have you always felt a little different but didn't know why? Have you struggled
with tasks that some people seem to handle with ease? Are you mystified by
(00:59):
social norms and interactions? Divergent Paths is a podcast for late diagnosed
neurodivergent people that explores the joys and frustrations of having a spicy
brain. In each episode we'll dive into the unique experiences of discovering
ADHD, autism or both later in life. What defines a later life diagnosis? Anytime
(01:21):
the realization happens outside of the so-called norm of childhood and
adolescence. Kendra Koch is founder and CEO at Divergently, a social safety net
bridging the support gap for late diagnosed neurodivergent women. Kendra
and I have an amazing conversation where she shares with us her experience with
her own late diagnosis and how social health is deeply tied to physical health.
(01:45):
So stay tuned and thanks for listening to Divergent Paths. Do you have like a
special interest or something that's kind of persisted for you through your
life that you've like to talk about? Yeah I've been thinking about this a lot
lately just because it's coming up in my community and people are talking about
(02:06):
their special interests and I'm just learning about that term. And I actually
had a hard time figuring out what it was and then I realized that there's kind of
like a thread that's gone through my whole life that's been consistent but
the manifestation of it has always changed and so I will have like a pretty
(02:28):
intense special interest for maybe like a one year to three year bucket of time
and then I'm kind of over it and move on to the next thing. So I've had a lot of
different ones. A lot of different ones yeah. So I'll just like pick one and go
deep but I think the the common thread is like human experience. Okay. Yeah.
(02:48):
Just different variations of what that can look like and I'd say when I was in
high school I was super into sports so I really did I did every like I did every
sport I could sign up for. And then when I was in college I honestly can't say I
think I was just too busy working and going to school to even have a base for
(03:11):
a special interest. And then I moved to San Francisco and I started working in
That's my hometown. Oh yeah okay yeah it's a beautiful city. It is yeah. Yeah I lived there 12 years so a good time.
Yeah. And I started working in early childhood education and I noticed that
(03:36):
the kids there were not eating great and partially because of what the school was
feeding them, partially what the parents were feeding. And I think at that time
like health was a special interest to me but I was really into what factors of
like our lifestyle can help facilitate health and how do we make our
(03:59):
environments healthier. And that's probably a theme that's gone through
literally everything I've done from the sports I mentioned in high school to now
I'm building a community space right in mental health and like a social health
platform. And the you know the food led me into working for different startups
(04:21):
in the health system and then I was really into startups for a while but not
like I'm not like a tech person like everyone's like oh you're like a tech
person but I'm actually not it's just like the environment I was in and
because I lived in San Francisco for 12 years every company worked out was a
startup. Right right yeah. But yeah I did nutrition education, I did food tech and
(04:45):
agriculture tech, I did family tech, I worked in allergy prevention, death care,
genetics, like lots of different kind of manifestations of health and then
I was like this is too cerebral I got a little bit burned out from it so I went
to acting school and then like this. This is so ADHD. I know. Yeah so by day I was working at a
(05:12):
genetics lab and by night I was going to acting school. Yeah it makes sense now
this is all before I had a diagnosis too so I had no. I was out that's actually
kind of what I was gonna lead into like I have found you know that because one
(05:33):
of my special interests is just kind of people in general like and humanities
and you know I have a PhD and you know social science essentially you know I
I was able to mask a lot more effectively because of how closely I was
studying people and so I wonder with people who are late diagnosed if one of
(05:55):
the reasons why people or lifestyles or even health and some of the stuff you're
talking about puts off the diagnosis to a degree because you're you're so savvy
about the people right so I was kind of wondering if that might have been part
of what kind of played into diagnosis as well. Yeah maybe um I mean I had a sort
(06:18):
of atypical childhood in general and so I'm not even sure diagnosis would have
come up for me and I did I liked school and I did well at school. I was one of
those kids that was in gifted programs so that's probably the clue there but um
I yeah like I wasn't struggling really at school but I do remember kids saying
(06:44):
oh you're like the smartest, dipsiest person I know. Like stuff like that yeah so it was
like yeah I was aware that in some places I was considered very smart but
in other parts of my life people were like what's wrong with you um and like
how could you miss that or you know how could you forget like one time I left
(07:05):
all the clothes I owned at camp in a dirty clothes bag and you know my
family friend who drove me home went three hours of driving before I realized
I left all my clothes at camp so you know stuff like that um but I think it
was just like oh you're not paying attention or you're too you're like right
(07:29):
you know I was like very daydreamy so inattentive kind of yeah yeah exactly
and also I was like quiet and well behaved like my the manifestation of my
ADHD was very like I didn't bother people with it really right right and
(07:49):
that's you know as we're as we're learning now that's one of the reasons
why assigned female birth bodies tend to be diagnosed later because they didn't
understand that not everybody manifests by bouncing off the walls in the room
and instead are bouncing off the walls of their brain you know yeah I am seeing
that that's very similar to what my story was like too yeah and I I don't
(08:15):
know I guess I have always studied people and I loved reading so that was
a big thing that I did a lot and I would read all these stories about like just
kids who had lives very different from my life and I loved that and I loved
right and I love novels and I read way above my you know maturity level which
was probably not great um but I was super interested in other people's lives
(08:40):
right but I don't think I had an awareness of it really it just I would
just like do it I would just read and read and read and read forever and my
parents were like she's reading she's fine you know so right yeah yeah so it
wasn't yeah yeah and now you have a podcast interviewing people so it all
makes sense yeah yeah all these things tend to tend to line up with each other
(09:06):
yeah so are there other aspects of your childhood you said were you said your
childhood was like atypical or the other aspects of other than you know I don't
think this is an atypical presentation of a female bodied ADHD at all I think
it's very typical experience but are there other aspects of your childhood
that sort of impacted your knowledge and your awareness of ADHD in general yeah
(09:32):
yeah I don't think so I got diagnosed completely out of the blue I was not
seeking a diagnosis at all oh really oh tell me about that yeah yeah I had been
going to therapy for probably eight years or something and I was on my
second therapist I had started seeing her primarily for just like crippling
(09:58):
anxiety mm-hmm that's what I thought it was yeah and I had one specific job that
I was just having panic attacks like before I would go into work um yeah and
I didn't I really thought that maybe I was just stressed or overwhelmed with
work or I was not mm-hmm maybe I was just pushing too hard I don't know or
you were in burnout yeah I was yeah but I didn't realize that's what it was
(10:21):
I mean it's almost impossible to recognize when you're in it when you're
after you're like oh my gosh now I see yeah yeah and then now looking back to
it makes sense why it was that specific job because I had always worked in
early-stage startups that were very fluid I was constantly doing new things
I was working in product I was working in marketing I was working with the
(10:42):
executive team I was meeting clients I was like bringing in agencies so my job
was very dynamic and interesting and also the teams were small and I mostly
worked remotely and I had a lot of flexibility and so those
accommodations now that I know that need to be made our accommodations yeah
they were I didn't know that but like I had been getting those met and then when
(11:06):
I switched to this specific job I had to take a train for an hour a day down to
the South Bay to get to the office I was required to work in the office getting
up from my desk was seen as a big negative so movement was like not okay
at that job yeah it was an open floor plan super noisy and all of my
(11:27):
colleagues were on calls the whole time so I heard there were like ten
conversations behind me and before that I never really had that experience at
work and so I think it was just like not a good environment for me and also the
there were just like little things like the microwave was close by so I could
(11:49):
smell people's food and I was just in sensory overload oh yeah yeah yeah
sorry you just brought me back to like a time I I worked as an adjunct
instructor for so many years and when you're an adjunct you're sharing an
office with 20 other people maybe more you know depending on your department
and there was so often that I would be in you know this corral of like little
(12:11):
tiny desks shoved in a room in a corner where nobody could see you because nobody
wants to see that there's 20 adjuncts carrying the University that's another
podcast but somebody came in one time with some kind of fish that they had
heated up in the microwave and I nearly died I was I was like I cannot function
in this room and I didn't have the have to stay at my desk I just got up and
(12:35):
left because I had lots of autonomy in that job but I know I know exactly what
you mean about that you know all of those are triggers like all one of the
five things you just listed are triggers you know like and to have all of them at
once yeah now now looking back it's so obvious that when I was in it I had no
(13:00):
idea so I go to therapy for anxiety and I saw her for quite a while and during
that time I had switched jobs good and it was better and that's around the time
I think I started acting too so I had this kind of physical outlet which was
really good for me like acting is very somatic in a way yeah and that's
(13:20):
actually where I learned about somatics was in acting but I and I and I was in
San Francisco so I was walking a lot too like I was I didn't have a car I walked
everywhere so it's getting exercise I was doing I was like meditate meditating
every morning I was eating really healthy I was doing all the right things
getting good sleep so I was doing pretty well actually and then I got pregnant and
(13:45):
my therapist was like oh by the way you have ADHD and I think she I don't know
for sure because we didn't discuss it but I feel like she knew the whole time
but she told me when I got pregnant because she was aware that that would
change my ability like all these things I had put in place exercise and
meditation the sleep the routines you know when you have a baby say goodbye to
(14:09):
all of that yeah yeah yeah I wasn't diagnosed before I had my daughter and
yeah I would very much point to that as the time when everything fell apart
because you just I couldn't like exactly like she said or you know she intended
for you all all of the accommodations I had built into my life not recognizing
(14:33):
there were accommodations one away yeah yeah yeah yeah I'm glad you got some
warning I know but I timing of that is a little hard because like you're already
going through like you know being pregnant that like it's like this long
transition into motherhood right like it starts as you go through the whole
(14:56):
process of growing a person in you and like to have to transition into
understanding that your brain is working different and you have been
accommodating yourself your whole life and this is why you feel so stressed
and why you're so burned out I imagine was a lot it wasn't at the time it was
the pandemic also okay but actually I know okay like this is like no yeah but
(15:28):
weirdly like in the pandemic maybe it's not so weird I was okay like I mean the
external things are taken away from exactly yeah yeah and I think I in a way
I got lucky being pregnant at that time compared to people that I know who had
like teenagers or age kids you know if you're gonna have a kid like that she
(15:49):
was protected in my body I had a pretty a lot of space and quiet I could rest
like it wasn't horrifically bad I think it was isolating in a lot of ways right
um I was really lucky to have care from a group of midwives at a birth center
so they were able to like close the birth center and see one patient at a
(16:12):
time so like I was able to get better health care than if I had been
primarily being seen at a hospital so considering all the things that were
really terrible and hard about the pandemic I feel like I got very lucky
and I didn't really take my therapist warning that seriously like she said oh
(16:34):
you have ADHD you should learn about neurodivergence she gave me a book
called divergent minds I think it is yeah that was my book that found that
that yeah that's mine that put me on the book this path to oh interesting yeah um
I read it and I I think I just read it and it was like interesting and also
(16:57):
yeah didn't really yeah put too much on it and and then I had my baby we moved
to Atlanta we moved from San Francisco San Francisco yeah it was a big culture
shift yeah and um we moved into a house that had mold so I didn't like that and
(17:22):
like made me really sick and then having the baby and then being in the pandemic
with a newborn and not being able to like get out of the house and being in
house that was making me sick I think all of that plus like the hormonal changes
and then the sleep disruption and stuff that's when I was like okay this is
(17:42):
something I really have to take seriously like mm-hmm I got treatment for
the mold and we got out of the house and all of that's better now but it did
amplify the ADHD symptoms that I had and really made me like understand my body a
lot better because everything was just it was like I'm doing fine to I think
(18:06):
that company option where I couldn't even function like I couldn't remember
what I did two hours before I was like super disoriented I was completely
ungrounded and just like felt like I was floating through my life and like in a
dream and that part was really really challenging and I think it's taken about
(18:30):
two and a half years or so I don't know timelines are kind of fuzzy for me but
like two and a half years to make sense of my diagnosis make sense of my body's
needs understand like what pieces of this is sensory like related to sensory
overload and I did always know I was highly sensitive but you know it's like
(18:52):
something you hear a lot once you learn about yeah just like oh highly sensitive
just probably means you have ADHD or autism but yeah well that's what that's
what I had learned about highly sensitive children I had learned because
my my daughter was showing signs of you know neurodivergence when she was very
little and I didn't understand what was going on because of course I didn't have
(19:15):
a diagnosis and so I had found a group on Facebook that had led me into like
highly sensitive children and I was like okay so this is what I'm dealing with a
highly sensitive child and now I'm like okay now I know we're probably dealing
with a form of oddy HD that is very similar to to me but I think her dad
although he is undiagnosed pretty sure is autism as well but you know he's very
(19:40):
resistant to any kind of labels right things labels are bad I think labels are
empowering it's very differing point of view yeah I wonder too if there's like a
gender component to that because I mean for many reasons but I feel like in a
way women almost need the label to be taken seriously whereas like men can
(20:02):
more easily just be like I need this accommodation and people like okay right
yeah you know I think I think you're right that's actually a really good
observation just about the general sexism around neurodivergence I think
men getting accommodations might be easier like you said just because it's
like oh well if I need I need a standing desk I cannot imagine somebody in a work
(20:23):
situation you know an assigned male at birth body saying I need a standing desk
and somebody saying no you don't you know no they'd be like okay well we'll
get you one you know and you know not recognizing that standing desk wouldn't
help me I don't it doesn't like that doesn't help me focus I know I bought
one and I bought one and then then I got a treadmill because I'm like okay the
treadmill underneath will help none of it none of it helped I have to go outside
(20:45):
to walk yeah but you know those those kinds of asks I think would be easier
and thought about the difference in there yeah yeah I wonder too also because
a lot of times like it like you were saying you learned about it through your
daughter and with women we're often more connected to our kids in that way and so
(21:08):
like I don't know I wonder if there's something there I think for me like my
daughter's four so and so I don't know like she probably is neurodivergent just
based off of like we noticed but I almost feel like I can't properly
help her or get her the support she needs if I am not able to do that for
(21:34):
myself and so I'm feel so connected to her as her mother that I feel like I
need to give her a label I have to do that to myself as well right yeah it's a
tool right like the labels are a tool so if you don't need it then okay I can see
why people don't want it and there are risks to having it too there are risks
to having it yeah it is not it's not a cut-and-dry situation but that is also
(22:00):
very similar to you know I got my diagnosis last year and I was 49 and a
lot of people were like why are you getting this diagnosis at your age like
this doesn't you don't need this and I was like well I would disagree to that
(22:20):
entirely but also in understand in me understanding myself and understanding
how I function I will be able to be a better parent having a family history
that accurately you know documents your divergence will make it easier for the
(22:43):
next generations to get the kind of support that they need you know so
there's like so many steps and so many reasons why it is important to do this
especially as my daughter is 10 she's gonna be 11 early next year so like
she's heading into the time I know that all of the hormone changes she's going
(23:04):
to go through in the next few years are going to compound her divergence as well
her neurodivergence as well her spicy brain is gonna go nuts because she's
gonna have all the spicy hormones heading in there and that's gonna make
this whole little like curry activity that is going to it's gonna be a thing
(23:27):
it's gonna be you know something that we're gonna have to you know be more
careful about and I feel empowered by it I know that that's not true for
everybody people let you know feel labels are limiting in some aspects but
I think it can I think it helps more than it hurts at least my experience yeah
yeah I mean there's the stigma and I think that's what people are afraid of
(23:49):
and I get that but um we can't really move past it unless we start to finding
things so it's right challenging yeah yeah yeah that's uh I think that one of
the reasons why I was I wanted to talk to you was because of the the
recognition that you had and and the the community you're building so tell us a
(24:11):
little bit about divergently and like where where in your story that comes
from so I have a feeling it's kind of like tied into kind of right where we're
at in your your evolution here yeah for sure um you know all that stuff that I
went through with the mold and and having a baby and learning about my
(24:32):
symptoms and being feeling really confident like oh I was managing ADHD
fine before I had my daughter and I like was naive thinking I would be able to
continue doing that but I couldn't and when I was kind of forced to like take
a break and heal I also probably was in burnout I was like co-founder of a
(24:53):
different startup and just it was just all way too much I stripped at like I
literally stripped my life down to a blank slate as much as the person can
because we had the mold we moved and I we threw away everything we owned
because if we didn't want to like bring mold sports with us absolutely I left
(25:13):
my startup I took about four months off just to get better and I had when I was
out the previous startup I was trying to get out of the wellness industry
because I was feeling a little bit burnt out like frustrated that I worked in the
wellness industry for over a decade and I have a degree in psychology and I
(25:35):
worked in early childhood education and still I didn't get a diagnosis or like
even think about ADHD for myself right yeah that I was thinking about that a
lot as I was healing like how how come the one thing that's actually helped me
was just like yeah it came so late it was not something I thought about I feel like I
(26:00):
got lucky in a way and I had access to pretty much everything you could like all
my friends work at the forefront of health I'm in like the innovation like
city of the world you know and yeah I'm surrounded by doctors I'm working at a
(26:21):
genetics lab in women's health and still it was this hard for me and I think that
really hit me hard and also when I went to go learn about more about my brain
and my needs I didn't find a lot and it was very hard for me to find the
information that I was looking for and I didn't have a good like nothing to
(26:42):
stake myself on of where to start mm-hmm and like my therapist just gave me a
diagnosis but then I moved and so I was not working with her anymore because
she's not licensed in my new state so I did like find new health care providers
and I found one and you know he's like I'll give you medication but that's
(27:04):
where that ended I will I will tell it the benefits of medication I won't you
know I think it's an you know it's helpful but it's just such a band-aid
like it does it does help but if you don't have the supports in other ways
(27:26):
to understand you know the changes that you go through even going on medication
like you know no but when I picked up my first prescription they never told me
don't take it with orange juice mm-hmm right because like it will counteract it
yeah citrus citric acid will counteract the you know so like there's there's
(27:51):
things that like you should be know that I didn't I shouldn't have had to learn on
my own right and so like somebody just tossing you a pill it's like well thanks
for the help but yeah and even that is yeah sorry I did not mean to cut you off
no you're totally good I was just thinking like even that is such a trial
and error for most people too oh yeah yeah yeah having to go through and try
(28:13):
different medications and one of my interviews one of the first interviews I
did Rachel she she said she tried her her insurance required her to take so
many different ones before she could get to what she ended up ended up taking she
had to take all different kinds before she ended up on the the medication that
finally helped but she had to try and try and try and some of them had like
(28:37):
horrible effects on her and but she still had to go through taking them in
order to get to you know what worked and so yeah it's hard yeah I had been
through that already with migraine treatments and then other like chronic
health stuff I'd had since I was a kid and because I worked in the health space
I saw a lot of people navigating their health like you know I a lot of women
(29:02):
with chronic health I overlapped with them in my work so when it was genetics
it was like infertility and cancer and things like that rare disease and when I
was working in nutrition a lot of it was women with chronic health challenges
trying to solve it through like food sensitivities you know like boosting
(29:24):
their nutrient intake and things like that like increasing protein going keto
you know all those like buzz right here and when I was working in allergy
prevention a lot of it was around like controlling your environment to not be
having like these big reactions to foods or to other things environmental
allergens things like that so the theme that I picked up on like just from
(29:46):
working in health and so many different angles was that most of the advice is
around like making your life smaller so it's like eliminate this stop doing that
you know don't go here don't do that activity don't stay up late you know and
I just felt not just my world like caving in the more I tried to like
(30:10):
micromanage my health but I noticed this was happening to all the women and like
the people around me who are also trying to micromanage their health and what I
learned in nutrition working with kids and families in schools was that it
doesn't matter how much knowledge and education you have if the environment
around you doesn't support mm-hmm your well-being and healthy eating you are
(30:34):
not going to eat well like it's just if you don't have access to healthy food
you don't have time to cook it or it's too expensive or it doesn't align with
your cultural like expectation of what your foods should look like or what
you're used to having good luck like you're not gonna be able to do it as
much as you want to and I've never met a parent who was like no I don't really
(30:57):
care if my kid eats healthy like I think everybody's doing the best they can it's
just like a really difficult challenge yeah and so that's kind of where
Divergently came out of like I was healing I had stripped everything down I
had like space to think about what I really cared about and like get almost
(31:18):
like a high-level perspective on everything I had learned and what I
felt was missing and then being a mom too I was like well what do I really
value and what do I write about and what kind of business like a start-up is not
the business to have if you're raising a kid and you actually want to see them
(31:38):
what kind of work can I do that's meaningful and solves the problems that
I care about and still allows me to be a parent and live my values and those
things and so that's really where I landed with Divergently and I basically
just started building the thing I wish that I found when I went online looking
for resources and looking to understand my ADHD and my sensory needs and all of
(32:05):
that and so I was like well what's missing from health community social
health is super critical especially right yeah I think that was the biggest
piece that I I noticed and then environment like are the people around
you supportive and then I was thinking about that a lot and I'm like well I
(32:26):
don't like I'm very vocal about having ADHD but I don't think everybody can be
it's a certain level of safety in order to disclose and right in certain jobs I
would have never ever disclosed it would have been a huge risk to my career right
(32:48):
and the way people perceived me and so that was also part of why I wanted to
create a space which is like if you are newly diagnosed and you're still
figuring out what that means for you even if you're not newly diagnosed like
you're just thinking about it who can you talk to and not everybody can talk
to their spouse or their parents or their friends or their workplace so it's
(33:12):
like come talk to other women who are going through it right and then the
other thought thing I was thinking is missing is information that you can trust
which is something that really bothered me about the health space is like you
can do paleo, keto, there's a million different diets, gluten-free, vegan,
and they're all right for they're all right you know like for individuals
(33:38):
depending on what your individual needs are but at the base of all of it is like
eat food that's food right and I think we can identify generally my my thing is
like eat food you can identify like look like like can you you know pick out
(34:01):
what this is and if you are eating something that's in a box you know that
has a label do you know what the things are that are in the ingredients list
and that's always my like differentiation like you know if you
can't pronounce it and you don't know where it came from maybe it shouldn't be
going in your body yeah yeah at least not for all your meals but yeah I think
(34:27):
that I I got frustrated with like the marketing of health yes and this kind of
push to make us all believe we can control our health outcomes and that you
know we can just buy our way to better health or like buy healthier products or
whatever but a lot of times it's just really simple like lifestyle things and
(34:48):
if we're so caught up in you know I saw these posts on before you before you eat
your tomatoes like cut them and leave them sitting out for 30 minutes because
they'll have more nutrients I was just like if we're thinking about that kind
of level of right optimizing our health yeah that becomes a stressor right which
(35:10):
is also not healthy right exactly then you're like what information should I be
focused on and if you're like me and you have ADHD you're taking it all in right
and trying to apply all the rules perfectly and it's just like not possible
right exactly yeah I I very much have that same that same reaction where it's
(35:30):
like oh god there's so much information I'm supposed to be tracking there's so
much I'm supposed to know about this and I can't know everything about all the
things even though my ADHD really wants me to know all of the things about all
of the things it's just you got to stop and if you know them all you can't apply
them all exactly so then you just feel like you're always behind or that's how
(35:53):
I'm like I'm always messing it up I'm always behind I didn't know what value
are prioritized it's right I'm always there's always some sense of failure
right because like you can't you can't do all of the things you can't be all of
the things and so I think that at least for me that's where a sense of the shame
(36:14):
comes from because I have this idea that I can do all of the things but like
nobody can do all of the things that's that's not that's not how it works yeah
so you're building a community and it's an online community so we have like you
know the capacity for like lots of people what what is the online community
(36:34):
like what is the space like how are you sort of building it to help support
people in this space that you identified that there is so little sort of for
social health yeah well we're pre-launched so we're launching January 1st
so I can tell you what I'm envisioning it as and how I'm building it but I think
once we get people in there will evolve you'll know better and it will evolve in
(36:59):
whatever direction the members need it to so it's not really up to me I think
I'll just wait and see you know what people need and what they're asking for
but right now it's a community so you'll like you'll be in an online space like
you said with lots of people and the idea is to facilitate conversation so it
(37:20):
could be like things about what we're talking about here having space for
people to process their emotional experience around a diagnosis or around
just like their daily kind of support needs and then resources and tools so
it's like okay I'm really struggling with sleep and then like what we'll do is
(37:40):
help you find information about sleep that's been vetted it's you know we have
really great advisors on the board and medical experts who are coming in to
like review content and make sure everything that we share talk about is
accurate and true yeah and then also that everything we talk about has nuance
(38:02):
so it's like my perspective is again going back to the thing where I felt
frustrated with the way health was being marketed is I don't want to be the kind
of company or brand or place where it's just like here's a prescriptive protocol
buy all these products and follow these right and here's the supplements that
will help you and take this and you know bugger off yeah exactly because like
(38:28):
health is personal and I don't know what are what my members individual needs are
it's so depends on their family their environment they're like broader access
to resources and support and like only they know what they need so I feel like
our goal with divergently is to give you options right and explain what those
(38:53):
options can do for you so it's like if you want to pursue the medication route
here's how you can do that here are some ways to go about that here are some
risks and benefits of doing that now like you decide what you need and we'll
do what we can to help you facilitate it but we'll never say you should go on
(39:15):
medication that's right yeah exactly yeah I think that's really important
that it's not a one like it's not a there's no one solution right you know
and everybody has to figure out what the solutions are that work best for them
yeah and also I think the benefit of community is that we can share stories
(39:36):
and strategies and try things on like right you know you might have a strategy
that you love like you just were telling me before we started recording that you
wake up and you have protein first thing in the day like that's something that I
should try that would probably really help me too and so in a community
setting we can learn from each other and try each other's strategies and then
(39:59):
talk about it like how did this help and I think that's really healthy and
healing and it also helps us feel seen but we you know we're not gonna get all
of the tools and support we need for our day-to-day lives from the medical system
right so wait like we can't expect to like go to our doctor and and like have
them help us like remember to wash our laundry you know no yeah well I mean like
(40:25):
I said you you you barely get the support for what being medicated is like
from your your medical professionals or even from your pharmacists like you know
if you do pursue you know medication you have to do a lot you have to learn a lot
on your own and I think any any venue or any avenue any path that allows you to
(40:50):
kind of see that you know you're not alone and that there are other ways you
can do things and there are things you can do that can supplement whatever you
know systems you have in place I think is really important yeah and then the
access thing is the other piece that we're trying to build in so it's like if
you need an evaluation right now I I get a lot of questions like where do I go
(41:11):
how do I get one and then they're super expensive and how do I navigate all the
forms and all of that and so you know there's a lot of involved yeah mm-hmm
yeah so we're working on bringing in partners that are vetted and verified so
it's like here are some places you can go and just to make it more accessible
(41:33):
and then if there are products making them more affordable by providing
partner discounts and then for things like if you want to like have therapist
you know answer some questions we have a therapist who's gonna come in and do like
a Q&A and so just making things that normally are expensive time-consuming
(41:55):
difficult to access a little bit more accessible yeah um yeah so those are my
goals yeah I love it I think I really I can't remember exactly how I came across
no I did I came across you on threads and I was just one of those things that
just kind of like popped up and I'm like what is this and let me take a look and
(42:15):
then looked into the conversations that you're even having now on social media
which I think is really important that we have places like that and that and
that you can grow into it I love the idea of taking something that kind of
started grassroots you know like and you know social media and building it into a
(42:35):
community that will really be support though a lot of us a lot of us really
need yeah yeah and I love social media and I love those connections and then
like finding people like you through social media is amazing
and even it goes so much farther because I was listening to your podcast and then
I discovered all these other people that you've interviewed and so it's really
(42:57):
cool ecosystem but then there's this downside of trolls and some of the nasty
conversations that come up and the misinformation and so I think one of the
nice things about community space is we can monitor that more closely and we
have more control than we would on like a social media platform and so you know
(43:20):
if people are being nasty like I'm not above kicking them out just be like right
you can't be in this space like right right not what we do here and if there's
medical misinformation flying around we can address it and have a conversation
around it or move it because like that's yeah yeah versus just open social media
where anybody can have you know anything and can post and you know not sources
(43:44):
aren't vetted and you know you're relying on your your communities or your
connections being mindful about what they're sharing and as we have seen the
most people are not most people don't take the step to make sure that the meme
that they are posting is accurate right or the link that they're sharing comes
(44:08):
from someplace you know vetted or that has some sort of credibility yeah and
it's hard to tell like there have been things where I looked and I couldn't
figure it out I was just yeah and I have I have been guilty of posting things and
not looking and then having somebody call me on it and taking things down and
(44:30):
going you know okay I'm sorry that I put this up this isn't accurate you know and
things like that where you know it's really hard in the way that the
information age such as it is evolved it we don't have clear markers of
credibility and we don't have internet literacy in a way that people can look
(44:51):
at you know sites and go oh well who's sponsoring this like who's paying for
this and then you know and then people get swept up in an idea and if you're
preying on people's fears or you know people want easy solutions and that's
what you're presenting for the low low price of my supplement for $49 you know
whatever it is that they're selling in the end you know people don't make those
(45:14):
next steps in the critical process and that's I really appreciate the idea that
divergently will will help with that because I think just being in a
community where people are going to be more mindful of that it's like when you
raise the the water all the ships raise up you know right you know that sense I
(45:34):
think that's really powerful yeah I really like that analogy it is exactly
what we're talking about earlier with the like the food how can you vet your
information when the entire like your entire environment is flooded with bad
information it's just really difficult yeah yeah but we've been pretty lucky on
threads actually um we had a really positive space like I've I've had a
(45:58):
couple of threads go kind of low-level viral there about ADHD and I've been
really impressed with not not as many trolls as I have had in my other life on
some other social platforms that I will not name because I don't like the people
who own them yeah yeah social media landscape is pretty terrifying but not
(46:20):
all bad not all bad it's not all bad you know and I think that that's that's
important to note too that we do have we can build communities so I'm excited to
see where divergently goes and to follow your path and so as we wrap up here I'm
gonna ask you my my question my big question so if you could tell your
younger self one thing about discovering your spicy brain other than this is what
(46:46):
you have what what would you tell them oh this is such a good question um I
think it would be something along the lines of like your internal experience
was not wrong because I I did spend a lot of my life second-guessing what I
(47:09):
noticed and perceived and then what I was told and not like and really noticing
that there is a difference between those two things um now that I'm like nearly
40 and I've had lots of experience and I understand neurodivergence more in the
connection between pattern recognition and high sensitivity and all those
(47:30):
things like oh I was not wrong all those times yeah I was thinking in a longer
term time horizon and with more information like perceived than the
people around me or what I was noticing was threatening to the people around me
and that's why I was being shut down so it's like either they didn't see what I
(47:53):
could see or they were threatened by what I could see but it wasn't wrong to
see what you were saying yeah yeah and I'm still navigating that like it comes
up all the time and I'm still navigating you know when should I push it I just
like know that I know and move on in life and also like understanding the
(48:20):
the felt sense of when I'm clear on something and I know I can it's like a
physical sensation and so learning to trust that and myself time to pause
enough to feel it I think I would have yeah tell my younger self to allow that
process to happen and get really good at it because now I'm aware of it and I
(48:44):
have to almost unlearn all the bad yes I learned absolutely yeah absolutely
that's that's beautiful I think you know the process you're describing I think is
you know like self-gaslighting right where we have been given so many signals
that we shouldn't perceive what we perceive and if we do perceive it we
shouldn't talk about it and you know all of that and I think coming from you know
(49:09):
neuro spicy space where you see so much and you see so many patterns and it can
be threatening to people you can be threatening to the status quo when
you're like the person who's gonna just point out and say the things like I can
have many memories of my childhood saying things I wasn't supposed to say
and learning not to say them not learning you know that they were
(49:30):
accurate but learning that it was bad to say them and to voice them and
unlearning that is it's it is the work
as long as I live I'm sure yeah you know I said I just said this week to to a
(49:51):
friend of mine that I and I talked to my counselor about this yesterday too I
don't trust people who say they're healed like past tense because I don't
really believe that our our traumas stop affecting us and our difficulties and
our patterns if you're breaking out of patterns I don't think you get to be
healed past tense I think you it's it's a lifelong process of recognizing how it
(50:18):
continues to impact you you know that's really wise thanks it's taken some time
to get here and to recognize that it is a path that I will be continuing on but
I think it's valuable definitely yeah thank you so much for chatting with me
(50:41):
today let our listeners know where they can find you and they can find out
information about Divergently yeah Divergently is at join Divergently on
social media platforms we're most active on threads and then our website is join
divergently.com right now if you go there you'll be added to our free
newsletter and wait list for the community and the website and community
(51:04):
will be live by January 1st probably earlier than that but great well thank
you thank you so much a huge thank you to Kendra for joining me today please
make sure to check out Divergently on threads it's such an exciting project
(51:27):
and I'm so glad to support it make sure to subscribe to divergent paths
podcast wherever you listen to podcasts and like and leave a review and share
with your spicy brain friends and perhaps those who love them as well
follow us on Instagram at Divergent Paths Consulting No Spaces and until
next time stay spicy
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