Sharon Collon [00:00:00]:
So Sharon, how do you keep your cool when things are actually starting to kick off?
Sharon Collon [00:00:04]:
Regulate yourself first, they said. It will be easy, they said.
Sharon Collon [00:00:08]:
Yeah, but that's not in real life. When you've got kids screaming, you've got the dog eating food off the ground and he's chaotic and you're trying to stay calm at the same time, it feels like it's impossible.
Sharon Collon [00:00:19]:
I'm Sharon Collin. I'm a credentialed ADHD coach and parenting consultant.
Sharon Collon [00:00:24]:
I'm Jamie Fadden, educational neuroscientist. And Sharon and I are mums. And we are professional chaos wranglers. We know that real life doesn't come with a pause button and that is why we've created this workshop which is called Regulate Yourself First. But not with three kids screaming. This is about giving real tools to real parents.
Sharon Collon [00:00:43]:
In just one hour, we'll share practical.
Sharon Collon [00:00:45]:
Strength based strategies you can use right.
Sharon Collon [00:00:48]:
Away even when you're running on coffee and hope.
Sharon Collon [00:00:51]:
Coffee and hope is the staple to my diet. But on top of that, you are going to get real scripts, co regulation.
Sharon Collon [00:00:58]:
Hacks and a community of other parents.
Sharon Collon [00:01:00]:
That actually get it. This is no judgment, no fluff. This is real tools that you can use in your family right now.
Sharon Collon [00:01:06]:
Can't make it live. No worries, the replay is yours for six months. Watching your pajamas at midnight or while hiding in the pantry. We won't judge.
Sharon Collon [00:01:15]:
We definitely won't judge. And if you are ready to swap overwhelm for I've got this, then click on this link and save your spot because I guarantee this is going to.
Sharon Collon [00:01:24]:
Be fun and full of laughter.
Sharon Collon [00:01:25]:
This is not a super serious boring workshop, Sharon. And I definitely do not run those.
Sharon Collon [00:01:39]:
Welcome to the ADHD Families Podcast. I'm your host, Sharon Collin, an award winning credentialed ADHD coach and consultant and mama and wife to a very ADHD family. I am seriously obsessed with making life easier for people with ADHD and those that support them. My business, the Functional Family, provides life changing support and strategies for adhd. I particularly love anything that saves time, decreases conflict and creates space for fun. Do you want a life with your beautiful family that is more functional, fun and full of joy? Let's explore together the wonderful and sometimes wacky world of family life with ADHD in the mix. Have you ever found yourself wondering, oh my gosh, I wish I could just clone myself because then I would have more time to get things done? I know I certainly have and I know that it can be family life and the demands of family life can be a lot for our beautiful families, mine included, to manage between work, raising kids and supporting all our kids with all their extra points, appointments and all of the things, we can often find ourselves very, very burnt out. So today we're going to be going through some of the wonderful things that you can actually outsource.
Sharon Collon [00:03:01]:
Now, it's just an ideas trigger, not for you to have to do all of them, but maybe just to consider to buy yourself a little bit more time and capacity in your family. We're also going to be talking about the art of saying no. Now, this is one of the things that I consider consistently see my clients have trouble with. We take on way too much and there's this real obligation or a problem with boundaries of how to say no, not wanting to offend the person. So we're going to be delving into that today as well, because I feel like it piggybacks off, you know, extra time. It's no good buying yourself extra time if you're going to fill it with stuff that you don't care about. So I'm going to talk about that today. It's going to be a really practical episode.
Sharon Collon [00:03:43]:
Let's get to it. Back in the early days of my family's ADHD story, I used to try and do everything. And it was one of those things that I kind of wore as a bit of a badge of honor. I could do everything I could. I was on top of all the stuff. And over the years that has become less and less sustainable. And I realized that that badge of honor is just. It's just leads to burnout.
Sharon Collon [00:04:08]:
There's no one giving us a certificate for doing it all. So what we need to do is find out what, what are the most or the easiest things for us to outsource that is going to have the maximum return. Now that's going to be different things for each family because obviously some of us love doing things like some of us love doing laundry. Others of us couldn't think of anything worse. So what we're trying to do is not choose to outsource everything, although of course do that if you want to, but also to choose the things that have the biggest bang for our buck and that's going to be different for each individual. So we already know that we are working harder than other parents with neurotypical kids because everything just takes slightly longer. We also know that parents of kids with adhd, whether they have ADHD themselves or they are neurotypical, are much more likely to have a dysregulated nervous system and also be navigating burnout. I know that a lot of our families will hear me when I say that.
Sharon Collon [00:05:06]:
And knowing what to outsource, but also when to outsource, it can give us more capacity and help us feel supported. How I view outsourcing is like levers and not all the time do I outsource everything. It's not a one and done. Kind of like I don't do washing from now on. Like that's not how it is. What I do know is I have a list of contacts in my phone that I can outsource should stuff hit the fan. So you guys know that I am raising three beautiful kids who are neurodiverse and have a whole variety of health needs and things going on. My husband works crazy hours and he is gone at like 3:30 in the morning and and when he comes home he literally just goes straight to bed.
Sharon Collon [00:05:52]:
And I am navigating, running a business and a chronic disease myself. So I have to use outsourcing really cleverly to make sure that our family can exist and survive. Otherwise we would all burn out really fast. So I view it like a lever. So, so when to pull that lever and when to like when we can turn that outsourcing on and off. So knowing what to outsource, what buys you capacity and time when to pull that lever is a really, really great skill. So we want to play to our strengths when we come when we're talking about outsourcing. So perhaps, you know, we can outsource some of the stuff that really drains our energy.
Sharon Collon [00:06:29]:
But also, let's flip it. We can also have the potential to earn a bit of extra money doing some of the stuff that we love to do, but other people perhaps don't. So we can actually earn a bit of extra cash by doing the flip side of that and taking on a few extra things that we love to do and can do really easily but other people can't. A good example of that is, you know, social media stuff. If you've got a business, you have social media that you need to do, you can outsource that to so easily and cheaply and it can, that could literally take weeks not to cut that bit out. I recently did a time audit and as the functional family has got busier and busier and so have our lives, like as the boys are getting older, there seems to be so much more coming at us all the time and you know, just navigating all of that stuff and I'm sure you, you're exactly the same. I was a bit lost as to where my time was going. I knew I was doing a lot.
Sharon Collon [00:07:28]:
I knew I was running around doing lots of things, but I just wasn't sure where. Where I was spending my time. It wasn't very concrete. I knew I had work hours, but my work was kind of eating into everything and I just constantly felt rushed. And perhaps you can relate to that. You constantly feel like you're chasing your tail. And so I knew that I had to do my least favorite thing in the world, which is a time audit. Now, I'm going to give you in the show notes to this episode, a time audit form so that you can do one if you feel that would be a value to you.
Sharon Collon [00:08:00]:
Now, I will put this time audit thing off for so long because I bloody hate doing it. I hate it. But the data that it gives me is so valuable because I always learn where my time is going. And it's always a really good exercise in terms of treating my time as it is valuable because it is. It is the only thing that is, you know, finite, which can't make more time. So we best be using it in a way that aligns with our values. And it's not about being productive every second of the day. Oh my gosh, I'm definitely not.
Sharon Collon [00:08:33]:
But it's about using your time that's in line with your values and allows you to feel like you've got a bit of space, that you can spend time as a family, that you can get your work done. It's kind of finding that balance or equilibrium for your time. So what I discovered in doing my weekly time audit and what I was doing is just taking stock of what I was doing every half an hour via an alarm. It was the most irritating thing ever. I. I wanted to throw my phone across the room, but the, the insights that I got from it were really, really handy. So I worked out that I do have about two hours of productive time a day. So that is a lot less than I thought.
Sharon Collon [00:09:13]:
It really is. So two hours of productive creative thinking where I can create things and really my brain is switched on. There's only two hours. So if I waste that going to the shopping mall, picking up shoes or something, that is a wasted, productive two hours. Because I know as the day goes on, my brain sort of switches gears a little bit and it's not as productive and I can't get those creative or outside the box time in. Now you. Depending on your chronotype, and chronotype is what time you Know your kind of rhythm of the day. So we have the people who are morning people, the people who are middle of the day people and the people who are evening people and do their best thinking in the evening.
Sharon Collon [00:09:54]:
So it's really good to, to know what sort of prototype you are because it really helps you plan when you're going to use your productive hours. So I worked out that I had two. That was a lot less than I thought. And then I was, even though I was getting up early and doing lots of things for the kids because of the fatigue that that causes me because of the morning rush and getting everyone out the door and it. I was. What was happening is that in the evening I was having all these wasted hours. So my brain wasn't active enough to be able to get things done. So they're not productive hours.
Sharon Collon [00:10:29]:
All I could do was like doom scroll or watch trash TV for those hours because my brain has effectively gone offline. But then I would stay up late doing that and then I'd wake up the next morning tired and had this really big flow on effect. So I needed to tighten that up to be able to get control of my time a little bit more Again. When you know that your time is so, so limited and it's so important because it is your life, I realized that I was wasting quite a lot of it on doing stuff that I just didn't care about. So it became really important. And that's why I'm tacking on saying no to the end of this episode. Because when you start viewing your time as a really important resource that you have, knowing that you only have those two productive hours, hopefully you have a little bit more than that. Then you realize how important it is to not waste it and to.
Sharon Collon [00:11:17]:
And to say no to things that you don't care about or that are not in line with your values. What you should expect from this episode is a rapid fire list of some things that you can outsource, why it helps, and then the typical Australian price tag for outsourcing that we're going to go through some of the obvious ones first and then we're going to go into the more obscure. And I think that sometimes the more obscure ones actually the cooler ones to think about outsourcing. And as I mentioned at the start of this episode, episode, it is not something that you need to outsource all the time. But it is a really good idea to have some contacts for these outsourcing if they're a value to you so that you can pull the lever if you find yourself getting a little bit burnt out, if you know you're going into a busy period at work or if you know that you've got a couple of busy months coming up. So of course the first one is house cleaning. So this could be a regular or a deep clean. It can also be things like laundry folding, window cleaning, that sort of stuff, oven cleaning.
Sharon Collon [00:12:17]:
Typically in Australia we, or in Sydney we're looking at about 50 to 60 dollars an hour. And obviously it depends on the size of your house as to how much that costs. So that's something that most people I work with have considered for short periods or have a regular clean. But then we also have things like laundry services. So wash, dry, fold, like some. Some places even pick up or drop off. Typically that is about 25 to $50 a per load. So that's really handy.
Sharon Collon [00:12:47]:
If you are unwell or you're coming back from a holiday, just drop the washing straight off. I always choose holiday accommodation that has laundry in there, you know, like a washer and dryer in there, because I like to not bring washing home, I like to do it when we're on holidays. Plus I'm a terrible packer and I really often need to rewash things. So having a laundry service can be a really good lever to pull if and when you need it. And of course gardening and lawn care, things like mowing, weeding, general maintenance. That's usually anywhere between 40 to $80 for that per visit. We've got decluttering and professional organising. Now if you are neurodivergent yourself, it is a really good idea to look for a professional organiser who has additional training in neurodiversity.
Sharon Collon [00:13:38]:
Be really specific about the areas that you want to declutter or organize. Now I've used a professional organizer for my pantry only because I had a. This is a few years ago now I had a. I have a butler's pantry and it was. I had a couple of goes at organizing it and you know, doing all these beautiful pretty labels and wasted a whole lot on buying containers because I don't like to measure things. I have. My brain just does not do numbers. I kept buying these containers that were kind of in ill fitting for it and it just always looked really chaotic and I just couldn't seem to get it right.
Sharon Collon [00:14:15]:
And so I hired a professional organizer. I got that for myself for Christmas one year to do the pantry because I wanted their experience and their expertise on how I can best make that work. And that was really money well spent because they suggested stuff that I just wouldn't have thought of because that's what they do for a living and they had all this experience. They suggest suggested putting things in an overflow area so that all stuff wasn't in the one section. I had like an overflow for things that are a bit more bulky or that we needed regularly that were we'd buy multiple of. They also suggested narrow thin containers which meant that we could see more at a glance which I thought was really, really handy. So that was a really cool lever to pull. And you know, obviously as a Christmas present, getting money towards that was really, really awesome.
Sharon Collon [00:15:05]:
Then we have other things like home maintenance. You can actually get VA's or a concierge service to book all your tradies, your pe, your repairs, handyman services. So I have a lovely little arrangement with my husband where we have a shared notes of things that are in the house that are broken. Now he's pretty handy but he's really time poor. So I have things on this notes so when something breaks I just jot it down in my notes in my phone and it's a shared list so he can see it as well. And I usually leave it there and if it's still there on in six months time I will invest in a handyman to come, come and finish off, complete that task because those sorts of things are a toleration for me. And when we talk about tolerances in terms of adhd, tolerance is like a pebble in your shoe. So something that every time you walk past it you, it bothers you a little bit, it just drains a little bit of your energy.
Sharon Collon [00:16:02]:
And often just getting those things done can really take that purple at issue and help you walk a little bit easier. Have you ever had one of those, one of your friends who is selling their house, doing their house up to sell and then they finally get it all ready to sell, they get all the stuff, the odd jobs done and they absolutely love it and then they move out of it. I really like the idea of trying to keep our house up to not, not show home ready but all the little handyman jobs done so that we can actually enjoy our house. And I'm not just walking around our house just getting annoyed at all the things that aren't done. So that's our little system. We put it on a list. Anthony gets to the parts that he can and if it's sits on there for too long I book a handyman to do it. And I actually a couple of years ago I just paid a handyman, $500 cash.
Sharon Collon [00:16:52]:
And I gave him a whole list and just got him to just knock over all the jobs that were on the list. And he got through so much in that day. We pre planned it so he had everything he needed and it was amazing. And then we've got things like mobile car servicing. Like if you waste a day taking your car to get service, you can get mobile ones of those things like car washing, detailing and things like that. But I prefer honestly to pay kids for that. Now I've got a meal planning, an ADHD friendly meal planning course coming out soon and I look forward to sharing that one with you because I think you're going to really love my meal planning system because I noticed that this is one of an energy suck for a lot of my the families that I work with. So I wanted to have a really wonderful way of making this easier but also honoring variety and honoring not.
Sharon Collon [00:17:43]:
Not locking you into some sort of really intense meal plan. So I've got a really great resour resource coming out for that. But I know that a lot of families use meal kit deliveries. Things like hello Fresh can be really, really handy. Now I don't recommend you go all in on when I talk to clients about this. I don't recommend you go in for the seven days because give yourself a couple of days breathing room. So it might just be three days. Try it out three days a week, try it out, see how you like it.
Sharon Collon [00:18:10]:
And maybe even if you've got kids that are a little bit older, you can get them to prepare a meal kit once that everyone does one night a week. And that can be a really handy way of helping your kids learn how to cook. And we know that that's a life skill that is really, really important. And those meal kits with the step by step instructions can really make it a whole lot easier. And so having a look at one of those is great. I know, I think when I did the research, every plate was the cheapest. Hello Fresh probably was the nicest. I've trialed all of them now.
Sharon Collon [00:18:46]:
But we're also, we have some specific requirements in the way that we use. We need one that does six portions because we pack lunches for the next day too. And so we needed the bigger size. There might be some other ones that do smaller sizings that are better. And then we've got some families I know use a meal prep chef in home. So this is something that you would post on Airtasker and the chef comes in and prepares the meals for the week. That can range between anything between 200 or $400 a week, but then all your meals are done really cool. Specifically, if you've got special dietary requirements, like if you're gluten free, if someone's got allergies, if you've got a child that has, you know, a feeding disorder or anything like that, that can be really handy.
Sharon Collon [00:19:33]:
I've actually got a version of that. This is something that I'm outsourcing at the moment, but it's not a full meal prep chef. They're not doing full meals. What I do at the moment is I have a lady that comes in once a week after my fruit and veggie gets delivered. So I get our fruit and Veggie delivered from BoxD Ivy. The reason I like that is it's coming straight from farmers. We're cutting out supermarket middleman. She delivers it to the house and you can do reoccurring orders and you can also select what you want.
Sharon Collon [00:20:04]:
So it's not just a random box because I like to choose. And I found that to be really, really great. And it's also, you know, supporting the hubster or the local community. So we use BoxDibi for that. But what I was finding is that because I have psoriatic arthritis and it attacks my hands and neck and feet, it's a pain in the bum, that chopping all the vegetables, like chopping all, like pumpkin and carrot and stuff like that really actually hurts. And so one of the coolest outsources that I've ever got is this lady comes after our fruit and veggie gets delivered on a Wednesday. She comes over on a Wednesday for an hour. Now she's an ex chef and she just chops it all and puts it into containers for us.
Sharon Collon [00:20:46]:
So she chops up our cucumber, all our fruit, you know, the fruit that doesn't brown, obviously all our veg, and she pops it into containers into the fridge. Now that has been such a game changer. Not only it doesn't cost very much and it's something that I just found on Airtasker. I just put the job on Airtasker for a weekly meal prep support. And she's a local mum that has chef training. And the way that she can get through it so quickly because she has awesome knife skills compared to what I was doing and how long it used to take me. Now that means when I'm preparing meals, then I am cutting out so much time because all my fruit and vegetables is chopped. And so I literally just Throwing stuff in.
Sharon Collon [00:21:31]:
It encourages us to eat a lot more fruit and vegetables. The boys will go to the fridge and just get out some chopped veg and hummus and stuff like that, or some fruit that's already chopped up, or some chopped up watermelon. They'll go and do that. But they're unlikely to chop it up themselves. That's a barrier for them. So having it all chopped in containers is really good. And years ago, I used to do this. I used to go shopping on a Sunday.
Sharon Collon [00:21:54]:
I would chop up all the fruit and veg and put it into the containers. And I'm not joking, it would take me most of the day because by the time you wash it, you chop it, you wash out the containers from last time and you prep it all in the fridge, it was taking half a day and it was also really hurting my hands. So that has been a really clever outsource. The veggie chop, we have loved that and it. Not only has it made us eat healthier, because we're really keen to get through all the stuff that has been chopped, but we're also wasting less because before perhaps I wouldn't get around, it would just, you know, sit in that veggie drawer for forever and then I would throw it out. So that has saved that money that we invest in having a lady come to chop. It has actually saved us money in terms of we haven't been wasting it and we've also been eating a lot more fruit and veg. There's also people that use similar service on Airtasker, but for lunch prep.
Sharon Collon [00:22:50]:
So they may get healthy lunches made and you can get them even, even made off site and delivered. And that can be anywhere between eight and fifteen dollars per lunch. And that's probably a more expensive option, but it is something really cool if you can, you know, that's an area that you want to outsource. And then, of course, grocery delivering, you can even get your groceries delivered and unpacked. That's an Air Tasker task as well. We order our shopping from Woolworths sometimes and get it delivered. We've got a delivery and because we've got our pet insurance through there, we get 10% off. And that's been really good.
Sharon Collon [00:23:26]:
But generally these days, because of the price of shopping, we're shopping at Audi, which I don't like because I have to go in there and it's not a valuable use of my time. But the. The cost payoff has been better. Since groceries have gone through the roof, I will be Looking forward to going back to Woolies, but at the moment we're saving the money with Audi. And when I weigh it all up, I would much rather have the vegetable chopping lady and get really good fruit and veg from Boxdivy, but I spend as little as possible in the big supermarkets. We get our meat delivered and even chemists and things, you can actually get your chemist to deliver, which saves you a lot of time. Most chemists will have a delivery day a week and you can save yourself the time and effort because let's just break this down a little bit. It's not about just going into the chemist, right? That's an easy job, but you've also got a park.
Sharon Collon [00:24:14]:
You've also got to go in there and wait, get the thing back in the car and drive home. Like every little task like that is a minimum 40 minute task. So I want you to create space and a bit more breathing room in your life and sometimes the idea of just the chemist dropping it off to make you feel like you've got more time. Next, let's talk about family admin. So on the sites like Upwork and Fiverr that you can put admin tasks on. So if you have paperwork that you need help with, if you need sorting your digital photos, oh my goodness, that's a crazy job. If you need medication reminders, your social media managed someone to help you navigate the 10,000 messages that you get for school. Now, like you've got WhatsApp chat, you've got Facebook groups, you can actually throw a couple of dollars to get a offshore VA to help you with those things.
Sharon Collon [00:25:13]:
Having a offshore va, I've got one in the Philippines called NADS and she is fabulous. To support you with those things for really, really affordable pricing can be great. Now you can do it on a task by task basis on Upwork or Fiverr. So you just specify on what you're looking for. Now, particularly if you have ADHD yourself and you need a bit of support with paperwork, school forms, EIS paperwork, paying bills, managing family calendars, appointments, even creating your routine charts, you know, having visual cues around the house, chore chart management or updating them, even tracking all your subscription payments, you know, canceling unused subscriptions. I didn't audit what I did and this might be helpful for others. What I did is I uploaded our bank statements into AI and I are family ones. I don't care about private privacy stuff.
Sharon Collon [00:26:06]:
Now I think that horse is bolted, right? And so I have uploaded that into Sintra and got them to analyze it they have a data analyst bot in there and I said, show me all my regular subscription payments.
Sharon Collon [00:26:21]:
So Sharon, how do you keep your cool when things are actually starting to kick off?
Sharon Collon [00:26:25]:
Regulate yourself first. They said. It will be easy.
Sharon Collon [00:26:28]:
They said, yeah, but that's not in real life. When you've got kids screaming, you've got the dog eating food off the ground and he's chaotic and you're trying to stay calm at the same time, it feels like it's impossible.
Sharon Collon [00:26:40]:
I'm Sharon Collin. I'm a credentialed ADHD coach and parenting consultant.
Sharon Collon [00:26:45]:
I'm Jamie Fadden, educational neuroscientist. And Sharon and I are mums. And we are professional chaos wranglers. We know that real life doesn't come with a pause button and that is why we've created this workshop which is called Regulate Yourself first But not with three kids screaming. This is about giving real tools to real parents.
Sharon Collon [00:27:04]:
In just one hour, we'll share practical.
Sharon Collon [00:27:06]:
Strengths based strategies you can use right.
Sharon Collon [00:27:09]:
Away even when you're running on coffee and hope.
Sharon Collon [00:27:12]:
Coffee and hope is the staple to my diet. But on top of that you are going to get real scripts, co regulation.
Sharon Collon [00:27:19]:
Hacks and a community of other parents.
Sharon Collon [00:27:21]:
That actually get it. This is no judgment, no fluff. This is real tools that you can use in your family right now.
Sharon Collon [00:27:27]:
Now can't make it live. No worries. The replay is yours for six months. Watch in your pajamas at midnight or while hiding in the pantry. We won't judge.
Sharon Collon [00:27:36]:
We definitely won't judge. And if you are ready to swap overwhelm for I've got this then click on this link and save your spot because I guarantee this is going to.
Sharon Collon [00:27:45]:
Be fun and full of laughter.
Sharon Collon [00:27:46]:
This is not a super serious boring workshop. Sharon and I definitely do not run those.
Sharon Collon [00:28:00]:
And they listed them all out and I was shocked because mostly because I didn't know that we had so many subscription plant payments. We had Netflix Prime Stan and over the, over the years they just kind of accumulated and I didn't, I wasn't aware because the kids had just purchased them on the TV and just subscribed and I was a bit shocked. And so what I was able to do is by using AI, they were able to go through a couple of months worth of bank statements and just flag all of our subscription payments and then I was able to go through and cancel them and that has saved us a bucket ton of money. So rather than going through your bank statements yourself, you can use a service like Sintra Chat, GPT or perplexity and ask them to do it. It's been a game changer, actually. Even putting in our bank statements, asking them to analyze how much we're see spending on, you know, like things like coffee or things like, you know, family entertainment or takeaway has been a real game changer. We're pulling back on all of that stuff and trying to save and conserve as much energy and as much money as possible with that, all of that stuff. Because I would rather use my money to outsource things and buy me time and space than buying coffee out each day.
Sharon Collon [00:29:16]:
We've been really intentional about what we're doing, spending on, what we're budgeting on, because I don't want it to be wasted. Using AI to help support you in knowing what you can, where your money is going and what you could improve on to save money can be really helpful in gaining some of that back and just having an awareness about actually where it's going, particularly when it's becoming, when subscriptions are involved, things like, of course, medication, Medication reminders. I have to take 10 billion supplements. And so I have a reminders app on my phone on the home screen and it gives me reminders throughout the day and I have to check that it's done. But I also wanted to let you know that there's some free services. So if you're using iPhone and I think Android has one as well, there is a reminders app and you can literally say, you can enter a reminder. I'm not going to talk to her right now. That S I R I person because she'll get involved in this conversation and I don't want her to be on my podcast.
Sharon Collon [00:30:09]:
You can literally say, hey, that person. Can you add a reminder next time I see my brother to give him the pair of shoes that are in my car that will track next time you go to your brother and it'll remind you when you're talking to them to give them the shoes. So using tech to your advantage with those sorts of things that's completely free and it's already on your phone. They're already tracking everything anyway. You may as well use it to your advantage. So I have that for my. All my supplements for medication. I have a reminders list on my phone for Sunday tasks, like things that I do on Sunday to get ready for the week because I gosh, that really helps me.
Sharon Collon [00:30:44]:
Just a few things on a Sunday really helps me. Sets me up for the week, for the busy week. So thinking about those kind of family admin roles is it time to have a VA for a couple of hours a week? Is it time to outsource specific tasks? Is it time to set up some shared notes in your phone or a reminder in the Reminders app to allow you to do those reoccurring tasks? Now, how I distinct between notes and and reminders is notes I use for things that are reoccurring lists. So things like they're not tasks necessarily. So I would use my notes and use the checkoff function in notes for a packing list for a family packing holiday. Anything that's like a reoccurring list that you would use it, I would put it into notes and then tasks like things like to do lists, my Sunday list, my medication list list and supplements list. They are in reminders because I like that they come up on the phone with a visual alert and remind me to actually do the thing. But completely up to you.
Sharon Collon [00:31:46]:
I know a lot of people are using the Skylight calendar at the moment for those sorts of things. I did trial it out. I didn't love it myself. It glitched a fair bit. And also I found that I was the only person looking at it. So I actually returned it. You can buy it on Amazon and just try it out. You can always return it if you don't like it.
Sharon Collon [00:32:04]:
I thought it was actually more valuable to have it on my phone. Have the family meeting on a Sunday to chat through with the family. That's where I get the family's involvement and divvy up the responsibilities of the family for that week. There is a blog on my website, I'll link to it here where you can get my family meeting agenda that we go through to be able to divvy up some of those roles in the week and let everyone know what is happening for that week. Which is really, really handy because often, you know, if we don't ask for help, we don't get it. So I think it's really important to let everyone know what's coming up and workshop it on a Sunday. The other thing that I wanted to raise is every Thursday at 1:00, inside our big Facebook group, the ADHD Families Group, I actually do a 15 minute body doubling session. It's completely free.
Sharon Collon [00:32:49]:
It's in that group. And in that 15 minutes, what we do is go through our calendar for the next week and we actually triage it. So we go through it and this is. I do this on a Thursday. I just go through my calendar, I look at what's coming up because there's always clashes. There's things on top of each other, there's things that I haven't allowed enough travel time, there's things I need to cancel or push back and there's things I need to ask for support with or work out babysitter to get them to the thing. And so it's really handy to have that one 15 minutes a week where I just go through that and look at it before when I'm out of the heat of the moment where I'll take a bit of a bird's eye view of the coming week. I every week I find something that I've stuffed up.
Sharon Collon [00:33:30]:
Like every week I'm like, oh my gosh, that is booked over that. Like, how am I going to get to that thing on time? And so having that little view when you're out of the heat of the moment allows me to fix those challenges before they become a really big problem. So if you're around a Thursday at 1 o' clock and want to put a reminder in your phone, you can join us inside our Facebook group for that one too because it's a lovely little habit to get into and of course body doubling makes it more fun. So next one, we're going to talk about kids and school. Now, homework, you guys know I'm not a fan of. Unfortunately for assessments and things for high school, you have to do a little bit of it. For primary school, we opt out pretty much entirely. We just write a letter to the school.
Sharon Collon [00:34:10]:
If your child is enjoys it and it's okay and it's you are able to, your child's able to get through it, that's absolutely fine. But if it is causing you friction day in, day out, I recommend that you opt out of it. You if you have a child with ADHD only because if it's causing you guys distress and for a lot of families it really is, it's not worth it because we can't learn when we're dysregulated. So I very much prefer to just do reading or do doing things like cooking, either with a meal kit or a Thermomix or going through a recipe. They are learning with that stuff too. Doesn't have to be homework in the traditional sense. Other things like assessments and things. One of the levers that you might like to pull is tutoring.
Sharon Collon [00:34:53]:
Now tutoring is great because it's not you. It's going to be harder for our kids to learn when they're with us. There's a lot more, a lot more intensity that a parent throws when we're doing, doing homework and assessments and bits and pieces. So having an independent person that your child actually likes coming in can be a real asset and particularly great if you can do it before school where their brain is fresh and they've got a bit more transition cash to get through that task. Sometimes for my eldest son, he's in high school, we have to do, you know, assignments and exam prep and having an external tutor that we can call on and help support him when he needs it is a game changer. And that has been really good because it's an older boy as well, like, you know, in high school. And it's been really great. Now there's some free options for this too that you might want to suggest to your school.
Sharon Collon [00:35:52]:
So some high schools actually partner up a year 12 or year 11 student with younger students before school for a 20 minute homework session. They go in and they support them to get their homework or, you know, help them with a bit of their assessment. It's completely free service. So that is something really cool that a lot of schools do do. And you might want to suggest that if your school doesn't, particularly in high school. And then there's things like homework supervision where, you know, a uni student or a tutor can supervise them managing after school activities. Now this is one of the things that I would like to touch on as well. When it comes to saying no.
Sharon Collon [00:36:30]:
A lot of kids are scheduled to their absolute eyeballs and we know that we need to have a little bit of decompression time. In the old days, it used to to be like, oh, if your child was hyperactive, you just run them into the ground. So every day you've got an activity and that is great for some kids, but also can be really intense because our kids also get really tired. We have these high and low moods and so sometimes, you know, it's better to not have something on every day. And some kids can't really don't have the capacity to do anything at all after school. They've worked so hard to stay in that room. And it's worthwhile noting, you know, I'm really honoring the child that you have in front of you as to, in terms of after school activities. Now what we do as a family, at the end of every school term, we have a discussion in our family meeting about what they'd like to do the next term.
Sharon Collon [00:37:19]:
Now each child is only allowed to pick one thing just to save on costs and also time because I just do not want to be a professional taxi driver. Taking them to all these things so they are allowed to pick whatever. And so we often have pamphlets or in the computer in front of us and we've got, you know, the different options of things that are available for that term and then they can pick up that thing. I always recommend, if you're starting a new activity, to ask this provider if they will do a trial first. That trial really gives your child the information about whether they would like to continue doing that. You can see how good the provider is in terms of navigating ADHD and supporting your child in that sport or that activity. And you know, you can give your child a taster and they can make the decision about whether they want to continue, which is really handy. We have a long running thing of motocross for two of the kids on the weekend, which has been the best sport ever.
Sharon Collon [00:38:11]:
And I really like that one because I don't have to do anything for it when it comes to soccer and all the other stuff. I have to take them training and all of the bits and pieces. But motocross Anthony does. So I really like that one. And plus it's a really nice community and I think almost every kid there has ADHD and they've found really nice friends and it's been really beautiful in terms of the community. The little ones doing bus basketball at the moment, so that's our kind of one thing. And surfing is great, we do that a lot too. But that is, you know, non structured activity that we can just throw in whenever.
Sharon Collon [00:38:44]:
So they're a little idea. But you can help get a VA to create for you of what is on offer, what is available for you in your area, if I'm honest as well, for that age group, you know, in your area. And you can have that meeting with your family to see if that's something that you're interested in. The next of course is nannying, babysitting, any extra support you can pull in. There's also things like birthday party planning, outsourcing like invitations, decorations, games, even running the party, those sorts of things. Gift shopping and wrapping. You can get people to do that sort of thing for you on airtasker anywhere between 30 and 60, $60. So if you're really time poor, that would be a really cool thing to explore.
Sharon Collon [00:39:32]:
Running errands like picking up dry cleaning, posting parcels, picking up prescriptions if your chemist doesn't deliver. We've got pet care things like dog walking, feeding pet sitting, mobile grooming, subscription boxes like sensory kits delivered or kids activities if you've got Holidays coming up, a personal stylist. I know that in the past I have used a fantastic stylist. Now I don't care about clothes, I just don't, I never have. I don't care about clothes, I don't care about jewelry, I don't want to dedicate any brain space to that. But I also like to have nice clothes. Now I don't care about price of clothes. I don't really care about designer anything.
Sharon Collon [00:40:13]:
I just want well fitting, comfortable clothes. And so I know that in the past I have gone to the shopping center at Pacific Fair in the Gold coast and hired one of their stylists, which is incredibly reasonable and they just take you around the shops and they will get you your wardrobe. Now I've done that for photo shoots for the business before, but gosh, it has been the most incredible experience. I've also done it for my birthday one year I think at my 38th birthday and they just did some shopping with me and got me the most amazing clothes that I would never find myself. It stops me wasting money. Now I don't buy clothes outside of those sessions. So I never go and just go like, oh, I'm just going to go shopping for a new jumper or whatever. I just wait and get the stylist from the shopping center to do it for me because I know that what they get me is going to be way cooler than I would ever choose myself.
Sharon Collon [00:41:05]:
I'm not going to have to do all the running around for it. So I love use utilizing those services and surprisingly, the ones at Pacific Bear in the Gold coast when I've gone there for conferences and stuff have been so, so reasonable and so lovely and just saved me so much time. I know I'll get emails about this. The one that I used at the Pacific Fair was Amy Richmond and she was amazing and she was able to take me around and find me some really great things which I was able to get for my birthday. And then I've got those clothes and now I have photos of different outfits in my cupboard so I don't have to spend a second thinking about clothes, clothes. I literally just go that photo and I just find that thing and I get that outfit and it's set for me. So it's kind of like little uniforms, which has been the biggest time saver because I mean, if it's something that you love doing, if you love, you know, fashion and getting dressed and styling outfits, that's great. But I personally don't care about it.
Sharon Collon [00:42:01]:
So I'd rather Outsource that to someone who does. And that's been a really big game changer and one that I definitely will be saving up to do in the future when we can, you know, when we've got the money to pull that lever. So that's been one that's been really great. You can even pay people to decorate your house like for Christmas lights up, you can do that. They can set it up and pack it down. How incredible is that? You can do things like, you know, doing your wardrobe swap. So I put my winter clothes up, pull the summer clothes down and you know, culling things that have got stains on them or whatever, whatever. And you can do the other way.
Sharon Collon [00:42:37]:
You can put your summer clothes up and get your winter clothes down. You know, all of that stuff. You can do those seasonal wardrobes swaps and of course decluttering things like packing, sorting, moving. You can outsource all of that stuff as well. Next we have things like getting a family tech expert to help set up devices and do parental controls for your all your tech stuff. So if you feel like you're out of date with your tech things or your kids are light years ahead of you, which mine definitely are and I feel like I'm pretty good with tech, but far out, my kids are good at it. So having someone come in support you with that. Luckily we have a family member who is in that industry and is able to help us with that stuff every time we get stuff.
Sharon Collon [00:43:19]:
But if not, you can definitely outsource that from between 50 to $100 an hour. You can also get a VA that supports you to order school supplies, uniforms, end of year gifts and things like that, they can do that for you as well. Here's a little hot tip. If you are organizing teachers gifts or a class present or a coach present or anything, there's a website called Group Together that will do a card and also support you in collating all the money that's received. And they can either withdraw the money or get a gift card or a specific gift from that highly recommend. And plus for the teachers card, it'll help you collate that a photo of each of the kids and write this little beautiful message. And it's lovely. Such a time saver.
Sharon Collon [00:44:04]:
Group Together, if you haven't seen that already, any sort of group present definitely have a look at that next. Of course, if you are lucky enough to have ndis, you can get support coordination. You can get someone to help you with managing your plan, home organization and support workers which can be ndis funded we do not have access to that, but that's something I really wish we did. But here's the tips for outsourcing. We want to start with your biggest pain point. We can't go all of those things. I don't know many families that could afford to do multiple of those things. So knowing when you need them and when to call them in, like having a look at that calendar, if you know that you've got a busy month, if you know that you're having an operation and you're not going to be able to do that thing, you know, knowing that you have some levers to pull for outsourcing can be really, really handy.
Sharon Collon [00:44:50]:
So starting with your biggest pain point and the task that you dread or you always forget. So what are the things that suck your energy or things that you really dread doing or you forget often those are the things that you should be outsourcing. Trying a one off session. If you're nervous about the commitment, you don't have to commit. This doesn' have to be an annual thing. It can be a whenever you need it thing. That's the beauty of Airtasker and some of those other sites as well that we've mentioned. You can just try it and see if it's for you.
Sharon Collon [00:45:17]:
You can also use local Facebook groups, of course, Airtasker, as we mentioned, or word of mouth for trusted helpers. You can ask providers or any person that's coming into your house for their experience with neurodiversity where possible. We want to use people that understand, understand neurodiversity and, you know, able to support you in the best way possible. And there is some additional training, particularly for things for people that are professional organizers that they can do to be able to support you when you are outsourcing. And remember, outsourcing is an investment in your family's wellbeing. It is morally neutral. It is not a failure. You do not have to be a martyr.
Sharon Collon [00:45:55]:
No one is going to give you a certificate for doing it. All right. I just feel like we can tear ourselves apart for outsourcing some of these things, but it is an investment in your well being as particularly for a lot of the families that I work with who are navigating burnout. We definitely want to, you know, be able to have these things as an option if possible, if you can swing them. And you know, also looking at the flip side of the coin, perhaps there's other things that you can take on to save you money so that you can outsource some of these Things. Now, next thing that I wanted to talk about is when we're saying yes to too many things. Because if you're going to save yourself time without sourcing and you're going to buy yourself a little bit of extra time and space, the last thing I want you to do is to over commit the crap out of it. We don't want you to say yes to too many things so that you're not having that space, you're not creating a bit of extra room for you and your family.
Sharon Collon [00:46:48]:
You're not creating any downtime. So there was this saying that unless it's a hell yes, it's a no. What that means is that unless your body is screaming out yes. I'm so excited that then the answer should be no. Now, I don't know if I necessarily subscribe to that because there's a lot of things in my life that aren't a hell yes. So things like taking my kids to therapies, taking myself to medical appointments, they're not a hell yes for me, but they're also not a no because they're important. So I think that I don't have that rule. But what I do you subscribe to is not ever saying yes in the heat of the moment.
Sharon Collon [00:47:22]:
So if someone asks me to do something, I always say, oh, thank you for the offer, I'll get back to you. And then as I'm walking away from that person, I set a reminder in my phone the next day to get back to that person. Now what that does is I have a tendency in the heat of the moment when the person's in front of me to saying yes because I'm a people pleaser and totally over committing the vegetas out of it. I will say yes because I don't like to let people down. And then I will resent it later and. Or I will just stack my day so full that it is out of control. So I don't say yes. I have a blanket rule.
Sharon Collon [00:47:57]:
I never say yes. I say thank you, I will get back to you. That way I can buy myself a little bit of time. Now the trick with this one is to set the reminder. Because if you don't set the reminder, I will forget about it and then I won't get back to the person. And. And you know, that doesn't make them feel good either. But I walk away from I think what it is that they were asking me to do.
Sharon Collon [00:48:17]:
I check in with myself. Is it something that's in line with my values? Is it something that I want to say yes to. I check out for the shoulds. If I'm saying I should do that, that's usually a red flag that I don't really want to do it. When I'm testing to see if I want to do that, I check in with this little rule because often I have this perception that future me will have all this time. I'm like, yeah, future me will have this so sorted. My perception is that future Sharon has all this time. It's very luxurious with time.
Sharon Collon [00:48:47]:
But I have learned now from the experience that future Sharon is pretty much the same as today Sharon and she doesn't have any time either. And so I'm not gonna say I'm not gonna say yes to a whole lot of things on the premise that I have extra time in the future because I've learned now that I don't have that time in the future. The future then rolls around and I feel over committed. So checking in with yourself isn't in line with your values. If it was today or tomorrow, would you say yes? Yes. Because if it was, if it's a no for today and tomorrow, chances are it's a no for the future as well. Because you don't. You're not going to magically have extra time.
Sharon Collon [00:49:20]:
It's having that, oh, it'll calm down when you know I'll have time when chances are that's not coming around the corner. And so I wanted to challenge you to see what you could say no to. Whether you feel comfortable saying to the person, thank you for the offer, I will get back to you. And setting a reminder so that you've got some time to take yourself out of the heat of the moment, that you can make sure that what you're doing is in line with, with your values and with your time commitments that you've currently got. So little recap here. Outsourcing equals time, less stress and a happier family and a happier you. It's not about pulling all those levers, but thinking about one of them that you can do. Remember one thing that I didn't mention is that you can exchange things.
Sharon Collon [00:50:04]:
So if you have a friend who loves planning birthday parties and you really couldn't think of anything worth, but they hate doing washing. You could offer to exchange so you can do some of their washing. They can help you plan the birthday party. You know, you might be able to barter and exchange a few things as well. I'd really like to encourage you to outsource something. Just pick one thing that you can outsource. As cheaply and efficiently as possible and outsource that thing and also to share in our socials a win or a fail that you've had without sourcing to support others. So in the Facebook group, the ADHD Families Group, when we're sharing this episode, if you can write in the comments whether you've had some outsourcing wins, perhaps there's an item that you've outsourced in the past that wasn't mentioned in this podcast and if you can share that with our community as well because what a cool thing to share so people know that it's an option.
Sharon Collon [00:50:56]:
So in the show notes today I'm going to put a link to our time audit resource. So if you'd like to put yourself through that, that super annoying task, you can do so there. But you know what, it's so valuable in terms of the information that you get from that. So I'll put a link to that. But for now I would love to hear from you. What are you going to outsource and are you going to say no? Has that made you feel a little bit more comfortable about saying no to some things? When you are over committed, let me know. I would love to hear from you and I hope you have a fabulous week. Thank you for listening to this episode of the ADHD Families podcast.
Sharon Collon [00:51:36]:
If you loved it, please share it on your socials. I want this to start a conversation about adhd. If you want to make this mum do a little happy dance, please leave a review on itunes. If you would like to know more about what we do, check out thefunctionalfamily.com I truly hope that you enjoyed this podcast and you use it to create a wonderful, effective, joyful life with your beautiful children.
