ADHD Women's Wellbeing Podcast

Looking for further guidance and support on⁠ ADHD Women's Wellbeing⁠? Check out my resource library ⁠here⁠ or search for any topic on the ⁠Podcast here⁠.

If you've ever lost your patience with your child and then felt terrible about it, or wondered why what works for every other family just doesn't seem to work for yours, this ADHD parenting compilation episode is for you.

Today's episode is all about parenting in neurodiverse families and the real day-to-day of parenting neurodivergent children when you're often navigating your own ADHD at the same time.

We hear from four guests across four different conversations, each bringing something distinct. Jessie Hewitson on what PDA actually is and how low-demand parenting can change everything. Dr Casey Ehrlich on why meltdowns are a nervous system response, not a discipline problem, and what it looks and feels like to go through the paradigm shift every PDA parent has to make. Kristen Pressner on giving up the search for a scaled solution and learning to become a brain friend instead. And Dr Tamara Rosier on the window of tolerance, why ADHD people have a narrower one, and what we can do about it in the moment.

None of this is about perfection. It's about understanding, acceptance, compassion, and choosing options that feel more aligned with your family, without judgement.

In this episode, we cover:

What pathological demand avoidance (PDA) is, how it shows up and why it's so often misunderstood

Why low demand parenting is not about giving in, but about lowering anxiety and keeping connection

How meltdowns are a threat response in the nervous system, not a sign of bad parenting or a bad child

The paradigm shift: moving from trying to fix your child to understanding how their brain actually works

Why interest, not importance, motivates the ADHD brain and what that means for family life

Kristen Pressner's concept of being a brain friend, and how a judgment-free household helps everyone thrive

What the window of tolerance is and why ADHD narrows it

The difference between hyper and hypo arousal and simple tools to move between states

Dr Tamara Rosier's pool metaphor for understanding big emotions in neurodiverse families

Why co-regulation starts with you, and how managing your own nervous system first makes everything easier

Timestamps:

00:00 - Welcome and introduction to this week's compilation

03:27 - Jessie Hewitson: what is PDA and how does it show up

05:12 - Why PDA is inconsistent and so hard to explain to schools and relatives

07:15 - Kate on recognising PDA traits in her own children

08:07 - Low demand parenting and why the hierarchy has to shift

11:27 - Dr Casey Ehrlich: moving out of fixing mode and into acceptance

13:47 - Why a meltdown is a threat response, not a lack of skills

16:52 - The new baseline: treating dysregulation like a panic attack, not a behaviour problem

18:30 - Casey's own journey to a paradigm shift through Buddhism and radical acceptance

22:10 - Kristen Pressner: why there is no scaled solution in a neurodiverse family

24:00 - Interest versus importance: how the ADHD brain actually gets motivated

28:00 - How Kristen's family members responded to their diagnoses

31:15 - The brain friend concept and creating a judgment free household

39:21 - Dr Tamara Rosier: what the window of tolerance is

41:10 - Hyper versus hypo arousal and how ADHD narrows the window

44:05 - How Kate's window shrinks across a busy day and what she does about it

45:24 - Practical tools for widening the window and staying regulated

49:05 - Co-regulation and why the pool metaphor helps families understand big emotions

Links and Resources:

Find my popular ADHD Women's Wellbeing workshops and resources on my website ⁠here⁠.

Follow the podcast on Instagram: ⁠@adhd_womenswellbeing_pod⁠

Get my book, The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Toolkit (also available in ebook and audiobook) ⁠here⁠

Join the More Yourself membership community ⁠here⁠

Get Jessie Hewitson's book: ADHD: How to Raise a Happy Child with ADHD

Connect with Jessie Hewitson on Instagram

Visit Dr Casey Ehrlich's website: atpeaceparents.com

Connect with Dr Casey Ehrlich on Instagram

Learn more about Kristen Pressner and watch her TEDx talk: kristenpressner.com

Visit Dr Tamara Rosier's website: tamararosier.com

Connect with Dr Tamara Rosier on Instagram

Kate Moryoussef is a women's ADHD lifestyle and wellbeing coach, podcast host, author and EFT practitioner who helps overwhelmed and unfulfilled newly diagnosed women with ADHD find more calm, balance, hope, health, compassion, creativity, and clarity.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Looking for further guidance and support on ADHD Women's Wellbeing? Check out my resource library here or search for any topic you need on the Podcast here.
Whether you've been with your partner for years or you're navigating dating after a late diagnosis, ADHD changes how we love, connect and show up in relationships, and this episode is entirely about that.
Welcome to this week's summer compilation episode. Rather than a single conversation, I've pulled together some of the most resonant clips from three different episodes on ADHD, love, intimacy and relationships, because I wanted to bring all of this into one place for you.
We begin with Lisa Rabinowitz, couples counsellor, certified Gottman and PACT therapist and author of Why Won't You Stop Interrupting Me? Lisa talks about how blame rarely helps either partner, why neurodivergence is often present on both sides of a relationship, and how working as a team rather than against each other can genuinely turn things around.
Then we hear from Sara-Louise Ackrill and Bontle Senne, AuDHD therapists, writers, and advocates and co-authors of The ND Lovers Club. They talk about psychological safety, masking in relationships, self-disclosure, and why understanding yourself is always the foundation before you can truly connect with someone else.
And we close with Dr Angela Wright, a trauma-trained clinical sexologist, sex medicine practitioner and menopause clinician, who talks honestly about how hormones, the nervous system and ADHD all intersect when it comes to desire, intimacy and what changes in midlife.
In this episode, we cover:

Why neurodivergence is often present in both partners, even when only one has a diagnosis

How to move from blame to teamwork in a neurodiverse relationship

Lisa's concept of the "talk nook" and why having a dedicated space for connection matters

Why psychological safety is the foundation of intimacy for neurodivergent people

How masking and people pleasing quietly erode intimacy over time

What self-disclosure in relationships and dating really looks like for ND women

Why so many neurodivergent women are reconsidering traditional relationship structures

How hormones and perimenopause affect desire, arousal and connection

Why the ADHD brain's need for novelty and dopamine can complicate long term relationships

How the nervous system underpins sexual arousal, and why feeling safe comes first

Timestamps:

00:00 - Welcome and introduction to this week's compilation episode

03:30 - Lisa Rabinowitz: why both partners are often neurodivergent

05:47 - Moving from blame to understanding in a neurodiverse relationship

08:00 - How couples come back from the brink with awareness and teamwork

10:15 - The three legged race: working toward the finish line together

14:48 - Focusing on strengths and creating the talk nook

16:29 - Sara-Louise Ackrill and Bontle Senne: psychological safety in relationships

20:53 - Why masking is survival, not a quirky personality trait

23:27 - Self-disclosure: what to share, when and why

28:27 - How perimenopause and diagnosis collide in midlife relationships

33:04 - Celebrating the traits neurodivergent women bring to relationships

34:33 - Dr Angela Wright: dopamine, novelty and desire in long term relationships

37:00 - How hormones affect arousal and what changes in perimenopause

41:22 - The nervous system, safety and why emergency mode kills desire

Links and Resources:

Find my popular ADHD workshops and resources on my website here.

Follow the podcast on Instagram: @adhd_womenswellbeing_pod

Get my book, The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Toolkit (also available in ebook and audiobook) here

Join the More Yourself membership community here

Visit Lisa's website: counselorforcouples.com

Connect with Lisa on Instagram: @rabinowitzcounseling

Get Lisa's book: Why Won't You Stop Interrupting Me? Simple Solutions for ADHD Couples

Visit Sara-Louise and Bontle's website: builttodiverge.com

Get their book: The ND Lovers Club: How Neurodivergent Women Lust, Like and Love

Visit Dr Angela Wright's website: spicedpearhealth.co.uk

Kate Moryoussef is a women's ADHD lifestyle and wellbeing coach, author and EFT practitioner who helps overwhelmed and unfulfilled newly diagnosed women with ADHD find more calm, balance, hope, health, compassion, creativity, and clarity.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Looking for further guidance and support on ADHD Women's Wellbeing? Check out my resource library here or search for any topic you need on the Podcast here.
What if the conversation you needed to hear wasn't one Kate was leading, but one where she was being asked the questions for a change?
Welcome back to a More Yourself Monday episode. This week I'm sharing a conversation I had as a guest on the Limited Time Only podcast, hosted by Esther Stanford and Susie Riddell. It's a beautifully produced show that feels like a proper chin wag over a cup of tea, and I had such a good time talking to them.
In this conversation, we go into some topics that don't always get as much space on the main podcast: what my life looked like before diagnosis, the shame that came with finally getting those answers, and the very real experience of sensory overload and limited social batteries. We also talk about how burnout can creep in quietly rather than arriving all at once, how hormones and perimenopause can amplify everything, and why decompression and downtime aren't luxuries; they're necessities.
I hope you find it as useful and validating to listen to as I found it to record.
In this episode, we cover:

What Kate's life looked like before her ADHD diagnosis at 40, and how her daughter's struggles during the pandemic finally connected the dots

Why the initial reaction to diagnosis is so often shame rather than relief, and how that shifts over time

Sensory sensitivities, limited social batteries and why understanding these is so freeing

Why ADHD and trauma are deeply interlinked, but trauma does not cause ADHD

How fluctuating hormones and perimenopause amplify ADHD traits, and why this hits neurodivergent women harder

What ADHD burnout actually looks and feels like when it builds slowly rather than arriving all at once

Knowing which "season" you're in and why that matters before making any big decisions

Why decompression time is non-negotiable, not a nice-to-have

Simple daily practices: movement, outdoor time and breathwork to regulate your nervous system

Learning to say no, protect your bandwidth and stop performing for everyone else

Timestamps:

00:00 - Welcome to this More Yourself episode

01:00 - Introducing the Limited Time Only podcast and what this conversation covers

02:58 - Kate's story: life before diagnosis and how her daughter's struggles led to both of their assessments

07:34 - Why girls with ADHD get missed, and the epidemic myth

08:50 - The shame that comes with diagnosis, and navigating it publicly

10:33 - Labels, autism, and finding language that doesn't hold us back

15:02 - Sensory sensitivities, limited social batteries and permission to protect your energy

18:27 - The parent experience: protecting yourself when you're already pouring into everyone else

23:14 - Hormones, perimenopause and why ADHD traits can feel amplified in midlife

28:57 - Gabor Maté, trauma and ADHD: why Kate disagrees with the causation theory

34:56 - Burnout, boundaries and knowing your bandwidth

40:42 - The empowerment of finally knowing your limits

49:50 - How to recognise which season you're in

52:33 - What ADHD burnout really looks like when it creeps in slowly

55:22 - Simple practices: movement, breathwork and giving yourself buffers

Links and Resources:

Find my popular ADHD workshops and resources on my website here.

Follow the podcast on Instagram: @adhd_womenswellbeing_pod

Get my book, The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Toolkit (also available in ebook and audiobook) here

Join the More Yourself membership community here

Listen to the Limited Time Only podcast on Spotify here and Apple here

Follow Limited Time Only on Instagram: @limitedtimeonlypodcast

Kate Moryoussef is a women's ADHD lifestyle and wellbeing coach and EFT practitioner who helps overwhelmed and unfulfilled newly diagnosed women with ADHD find more calm, balance, hope, health, compassion, creativity, and clarity.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Looking for further guidance and support on ADHD Women's Wellbeing? Check out my resource library here. The 'ADHD Women's Wellbeing Workshop Series' is on offer this July. Head here to learn more about the workshops and use code JULY to get 35% off.
If you've ever wondered why it took so long to get answers, for yourself or for your daughter, this episode is going to feel very familiar.
On this week's episode of The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Podcast, I'm joined by Dr Olivia Kessel, a former medical doctor who graduated from the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland and began her career in the trauma unit at Johannesburg General Hospital.
Olivia is now the host of the SEND Parenting Podcast and has spoken at the UK House of Lords on patient-centred care, appeared on BBC Radio and BBC Sounds, and addressed healthcare professionals and policy leaders on neurodiversity. She is also the mother of Alexandra, fourteen, who has mild cerebral palsy, dyslexia and ADHD, and the author of Beyond the Label: Empowering Parents of ADHD Girls.
In this episode, Olivia shares the remarkable and deeply personal journey that took her from practising medicine across three continents to founding the SEND Parenting community, after years of not recognising ADHD in her own daughter despite her medical background. We talk about why girls are still being diagnosed four to five years later than boys, how emotional dysregulation, masking and internalised struggles are so often missed, and what parents can actually do when they find themselves navigating a system that wasn't built for their child.
In this episode, we cover:

Why girls with ADHD are still being diagnosed four to five years later than boys, and what needs to change

How ADHD can present in girls as anxiety, people pleasing and internalised struggle rather than hyperactivity

Why 52% of people with dyslexia also have ADHD, and why the two should never be looked at in isolation

The emotional dysregulation that doesn't appear in the DSM diagnostic criteria, and why that matters

Why Olivia, as a doctor, still missed her daughter's ADHD for years

How the EHCP process almost broke her, and why it shouldn't be this hard for any family

The four wheels that need to be running for an ADHD brain to thrive: medication, nutrition, sleep and school support

Why early screening for neurodivergence in schools would benefit every child, not just those who are neurodivergent

How Olivia's daughter Alexandra went from chaos to making cottage pie by herself after finally getting the right support

What parents can bring to their GP to start asking the right questions

Discover other ADHD Women's Wellbeing Podcast parenting-related episodes here.
Timestamps:
00:00 - Welcome, and introducing Dr Olivia Kessel
01:44 - Olivia's career: from South Africa to Swaziland to the UK
08:55 - The EHCP process, and why it almost broke her
10:16 - How a former medical doctor missed her daughter's ADHD diagnosis
12:19 - Why girls are diagnosed so much later than boys
14:19 - How ADHD presents differently in girls: internalisation, anxiety and masking
16:27 - Dyslexia, ADHD and autism: why they rarely travel alone
18:17 - Sleep, emotional regulation and the things the DSM leaves out
22:06 - What changes when families finally understand their child's diagnosis
24:34 - Parenting with a neuroaffirming lens: Kate's own experience
27:06 - How Alexandra has grown in her own self-awareness at fourteen
30:26 - Why so many neurodivergent people were always there, just hiding
34:27 - Screens, social media and navigating this as an ADHD parent
40:19 - Why schools should teach every child as if they were neurodivergent
43:30 - Olivia's book Beyond the Label, her podcast and her ADHD mum community
45:33 - Why patients are currently leading the doctors on neurodiversity
Links and Resources:

Find my popular ADHD workshops and resources on my website here.

Follow the podcast on Instagram: @adhd_womenswellbeing_pod

Visit Olivia's website: sendparenting.com

Connect with Olivia on Instagram: @drolivia.sendparenting

Listen to Olivia's podcast: SEND Parenting Podcast

Get Olivia's book: Beyond the Label: Empowering Parents of ADHD Girls

Kate Moryoussef is a women's ADHD lifestyle and wellbeing coach and EFT practitioner who helps overwhelmed and unfulfilled newly diagnosed women with ADHD find more calm, balance, hope, health, compassion, creativity, and clarity.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Looking for further guidance and support on ADHD Women's Wellbeing? Check out my resource library here. The 'ADHD Women's Wellbeing Workshop Series' is on offer this July. Head here to learn more about the workshops and use code JULY to get 35% off.
If you've been told your pain is growing pains, anxiety or just something you need to live with, this episode might be the beginning of finally understanding what's actually been going on in your body.
On this week's episode of The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Podcast, I'm joined by Alexandra Orfanides, a London-based hypermobility specialist osteopath and founder of Hypermobility HQ.
Alexandra hosts the Help! I'm Hypermobile podcast and is the author of the book of the same name. She believes that "incurable" does not mean "untreatable," and she's on a mission to help the hypermobile community feel seen, supported, and informed.
In this episode, Alex and I talk about the significant overlap between hypermobility and neurodivergence, why so many women spend decades being dismissed or misdiagnosed, and what it actually means to understand your body through this lens. We also get into the difference between osteopathy and physiotherapy, how to recognise signs of hypermobility in children, and why self-treatment strategies are such a crucial part of managing a connective tissue condition day-to-day.
In this episode, we cover:

What hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos syndrome and hypermobility spectrum disorder actually are, and why the terminology matters

Why growing pains are not a real diagnosis, and what to look for in children instead

The strong correlation between hypermobility, ADHD and neurodivergence

How conditions like endometriosis, PCOS and dysmenorrhea overlap with hEDS and HSD

Why gastrointestinal issues in children should never just be dismissed as IBS

The difference between osteopathy and physiotherapy, and how to find the right practitioner

How chronic pain, headaches and migraines can be connected to hypermobile connective tissue

Why rhythmic movement, including swimming and dancing, can be so regulating for hypermobile and neurodivergent bodies

The importance of self-treatment strategies for people who can't always access clinic appointments

Why a diagnosis is a privilege, and how Help! I'm Hypermobile was written to reach the people who couldn't afford one

Timestamps:
00:00 - Welcome, and introducing Alexandra Orfanides
01:40 - Alex's personal story: growing up with undiagnosed pain
05:52 - From English literature to osteopathy
09:45 - Why hypermobility patients kept finding their way to Alex's clinic
11:46 - The overlap between hypermobility, ADHD and neurodivergence
14:12 - Osteopathy vs physiotherapy: what's the difference?
17:36 - Terminology: hEDS, HSD, condition vs disorder
20:30 - What patients are coming in knowing, and what they're not
23:57 - Signs to look for in children: growing pains, gut issues and more
28:15 - Endometriosis, PCOS and hormonal conditions in hypermobile bodies
30:39 - Migraines, headaches and the connection to the neck and connective tissue
36:32 - The gatekeeping problem and self-treatment strategies
39:24 - Working as a team with your patients
43:35 - Why Alex wrote Help! I'm Hypermobile
45:42 - How to work with Alex and what to expect
Links and Resources:

Find my popular ADHD workshops and resources on my website [here].

Follow the podcast on Instagram: @adhd_womenswellbeing_pod

Visit Alexandra's website: hypermobilityhq.com

Connect with Alexandra on Instagram, YouTube, TikTok and Pinterest: @hypermobilityhq

Listen to Alex's podcast: Help! I'm Hypermobile

Get Alex's book: Help! I'm Hypermobile: Your How-To Guide for hEDS, HSD, and Life in a Hypermobile Body

Research: Gynaecological conditions in hEDS and HSD (Daylor et al., 2025): https://doi.org/10.3390/jcm14165636

Research: Defining growing pains — a scoping review (O'Keeffe et al., 2022): https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2021-052578

Kate Moryoussef is a women's ADHD lifestyle and wellbeing coach and EFT practitioner who helps overwhelmed and unfulfilled newly diagnosed women with ADHD find more calm, balance, hope, health, compassion, creativity, and clarity.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices