Episode 72: What to Do First After an ADHD Diagnosis (So You Don’t Burn Out)
Host: Sharon Collon
If you've just received an ADHD diagnosis for your child and your first thought was, okay, now what do I do? This episode is for you. My name is Sharon Collin and I am your host of the ADHD families podcast. And I am so delighted that you are here. Look, this is a topic that is so close to my heart because I know this is something I felt the panic.
I really overcommitted with this as soon as we got my first child's diagnosis. Because you see, while a diagnosis can bring relief, it often opens the door to overwhelm urgency and the pressure to fix everything all at once. You're like, right, I've got the answers. Let's do all of the things. And then all of the things are, it's bloody exhausting, right?
So today I want to help you slow this moment down so you don't burn yourself or your child out before you've even had the chance to understand what they truly need. This is the same stabilising work that I walk parents through inside my free coaching week coming up in March and where every family walks away with their very own unique ADHD tailored roadmap. I'm going to put a link to the show notes and I really hope that you can take advantage of this amazing opportunity.
So I'd love to tell you my first son's story. So we knew he had ADHD, right? We knew what to look for. My brother had been diagnosed with ADHD. I'd been a nanny for a little boy that had ADHD and my husband has ADHD. So we've got this very strong genetic line and we knew from very early on, all the males in his family have ADHD. And so it was not a surprise that my eldest son was going through the diagnostic process. So when it got confirmed.
I was waiting for all the support. I don't know what I was waiting for, but it was my first time going through this and I got a pamphlet. You might've heard me mention this before. I got this like photocopied old retro pamphlet that had like six little pages of a pamphlet. And I was like, what the hell am going to do with this? What support can we do? Do we get NDIS? No, no, you don't get NDIS. So we don't get any funding. Okay. Right. But yeah, you should do psychology, OT and speech. Okay.
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Okay. So we're booking in all those things and I got to my car after that diagnosis and I cried. Not because my son got an ADHD diagnosis, but just because I felt so overwhelmed and I'd been waiting for this day thinking that all this support, we're going to be surrounded by all this support. And I got a pamphlet, pamphlet, and I really hope things have changed now. I really hope that they are handing one of my pamphlets over in that diagnostic process.
But I hope that you felt more supported because what it caused me to do is I just started booking everything in. was like, right, we're going to go for it. We're going to book all the stuff. Right. So I was booking all these appointments and it was just really, really exhausting. So I want to reassure you that if you've just, if your child's just got an ADHD diagnosis, you do not need to book everything in immediately. Sure. Get on some wait lists, right. But you don't need to like go put your.
Petal to the metal. You don't need to become an ADHD expert overnight. And also I would preface that by saying, just ignore stuff about social, from social media about ADHD because they did a study in America a couple of years ago and 50 % of it was wrong on TikTok and all of the things. So we just want to make sure that we just limit your ADHD consumption because often it adds to the overwhelm. That would be something that I would ask you to flag within yourself. Is it making you feel calmer?
and making you know a clear way forward, or is it just adding to the noise? Because sometimes if it's adding to the noise and adding to your stress levels and you're thinking, that's a good strategy, but then you can't remember it in the moment, it's probably not the right pathway. So what you do need at this time is clarity, confidence, and permission to just take one steady step at a time. This is exactly the advice that I wish I had have been given. So my step one.
In this little framework that I've come put together is to pause the panic. There's no panic here. ADHD isn't going anywhere. It is a lifelong condition, despite what some textbooks will tell you. You don't grow out of it. is the ADHD brain is the neurological difference. It's nothing that needs to be fixed. We're not going to grow out of it. You're not on a time limit. We don't need to panic about it. Now, urgency is not the same as importance. What the steps you're going to do are very important.
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But we don't need to throw urgency into the mix because that's going to stress you out and add to your sense of panic. So what moms mostly do or what parents mostly do, let's be real, it's probably mostly moms. We book the psychologist, we book the OT, we book a dietician, we book the speech, we make all our pediatrician appointments. We might even need some neurofeedback. We might like do all of these things, right? We get a tutor and we just load everyone up.
all at once and then they start running these appointments like it is their second full-time job. And we burn out because a child who had already limited capacity and a smaller window of tolerance with an ADHD brain now all has all these things that they've got to go to. And we start consuming endless amounts of ADHD content without knowing what actually applies to our child.
So this is where the burnout begins, not because you are doing anything wrong. This is exactly the same pattern that I followed and I can't, I can't wholeheartedly recommend it, but because you're trying to do everything without an actual map. Like we're just throwing stuff, we're throwing spaghetti at the wall really. And a lot of the time people don't understand what all those professions do. Everyone does something that is very valid and a great, and great ADHD support within its own right.
But what is the difference between an ADHD coach, a psychologist, an OT, a speechy, a PEDE? What is the difference? And so we must know, because I don't want you to throw money at things, because it's about putting your money in the right place at the right time. So what is the highest challenge that your child is facing or what is the thing that benefits them the most? That is where you should be sinking your money. So you don't have to do everything all at once. I just want to take the pressure off a little bit for that.
so we want to have a really clean map about what we're working on. so we're not just throwing spaghetti at the wall. So just want to reframe it for you with nice grounding. ADHD is not an emergency. It is a lifelong neurological difference and your child definitely doesn't need fixing. And if I was going to say one area, and this is very bias of me, but I think it makes the biggest difference is that if you're going to do one thing first, parenting support should come before all else. This is my bias and this is what I wish I had been told and not just any parenting support, but ADHD specific parenting support should come before all else because you're the person on the front line. So going to an appointment every fortnight and raising a friction point that your child had two weeks ago, you're going to say, you know, remember that time that you had the meltdown in the supermarket and your child's going to be like, what? That was bloody two weeks ago.
Why am I, are we talking about that? I don't even remember that. So you're the person on the front line. If you have the coaching skills to be able to navigate that moment in the moment, and then directly after you're putting yourself in a really strong position to be able to support your child in the moment. Cause reviewing it after the fact, like a long time after the fact, it's just doesn't have the same impact.
so inside our roadmap coaching week, this is the very first thing we do. We slow down the pace so parents can make informed choices instead of reactive ones. There is so much support out there. Not like when I first got a diagnosis, there was just no pathways. But what I want you to hear is that there's so many options here, but you don't have to take all of the roads all at once. Step two in my little framework is come back to the child that you know. So you are not behind.
You are informed. Nobody knows your child better than you. So professionals can bring the expertise, but you bring the history, the context, the intuition. I just always want to want to highlight that, that mums know their kids. They know intuitively what is right for their kids. And so no report or assessment or anything can replace that. So have confidence.
in your own observations, because this sometimes gets a bit lost. Trust your own parenting instincts and look at the actual child behind the name, behind the labels, behind all the assessments, the child in front of you. Now, this is not anti-assessment. I think it is very, very valid. I'm very pro getting an ADHD assessment. like to know what we're working with, but really we're looking at your beautiful child right in front of you. The one that's right in front of you.
Being an amazing human. So I want you to ask yourself, and maybe you'd like to write some of these down. So I want you to ask yourself, and perhaps you'd like to journal on these or mentally take some notes about these. What does your child struggle with most? What's their sticky points throughout the day? Perhaps it's emotional regulation, perhaps it's time awareness, perhaps it is task initiation or momentum.
What does your child struggle with most and when do they cope better than expected? When are you bracing for impact? And then somehow they just go fine. There's clues in these things. What activities allow them to shine? Every single family I work with has a few key activities that really allow their family and that child to shine.
Where is that? That has some clues. Is it outside? Is it doing flexible activities? Is it like a high adrenaline sport activity? What allows your child to shine? Next, what drains them? Next, I want you to think about what drains them. So there'll be energies that just cause them like just like hyper arousal is the thing. What causes them to have low arousal or go into that sloth mode as my boys call it.
Fond of that term, sloth mode. So what drains them? And then when they're in sloth mode, what fills them back up? What fills their cup a little bit more? What gives them energy? These are great things to know about your child and to know about your family. This is exactly what gives us confidence to build a customized roadmap during our coaching week. So parents walk into the meet, into meetings with professionals and things grounded.
and not constantly second-guessing yourself. As I mentioned, you know your child better than anyone else. I want you to walk in confident and knowing exactly what you want to get out of that meeting. Step three, choose one focus. So as I talked about, you are an amazing human and you can do anything, but you just can't do everything. So progress comes from direction, not overloading yourself.
So trying to improve behavior, emotions, learning, sleeping, school communication, all of the executive functions all at once, it is your recipe for burnout. So you only need one priority right now. So if I was going to choose two things, if I was going to give you two options that I thought were the kind of main ones that I promote for parents, and this of course is only my opinion, you know your family best, you get to decide.
I actually think parenting support should be number one for the reason that I mentioned before, you are on the front line, you're able to handle friction points as they come up. And when those are really strong, you can actually avoid a lot of conflict and be able to navigate it. And the second one would be, which I often go for first is environmental changes. This is a low hanging fruit in terms of ADHD management and ADHD strategies. So environmental changes are really about customizing your home environment and school environment.
for the child with ADHD. And a lot of the time, our beautiful humans with ADHD are very, very sensitive to their environment, whether they acknowledge it or not. And I've done the research on my own poor family. You've probably heard those stories that I can, I know wholeheartedly that they are very, very sensitive to their environment. So making those little small environmental changes are a really key factor. That's the low hanging fruit. That's the easy one that we can measure.
And they're often the easiest one to implement. So people often go straight for behavioral strategies or teaching the child skills. And those things are great, but like, here's the little clue. Those things are the slowest. They are the slowest and they are the hardest. And so if you go for parenting support or environmental changes first, you are going to see quicker results and you'll give yourself the momentum and drive to move forward.
So you might choose some other ones. You might choose emotional regulation. Once again, one of the more trickier ones. I don't recommend tackling that if you don't have really strong emotional regulation strategy for yourself. School communication might be one that you choose. Family routines and energy might be another one that you choose. It's very personalized to that family, but just choosing one. The key takeaway from this step is just choose one. Choose one focus that is your area of focus for the next four to six weeks and everything else can wait.
So a friction point comes up, you get that judgy look from the guy in the supermarket and you just go like, you don't have to worry about that because that's not your one focus. So our roadmap exists to help you decide what matters right now and what doesn't, what doesn't is more important so that you can stop carrying everything all at once, all alone. So as you're listening, I'd love you to reflect. As I listed off those things, what one did you feel the most pressure from? Like did you have an internal sense of-
pressure, like, I've got to do all the things. You're a chronically high achiever, right? Like I've got to do all of those things. And yes, you might, but probably not all at once. I'd be looking at which one you think is going to give you the easiest or quickest win. That answer matters. So an ADHD diagnosis doesn't mean you need to do more. It means you need to do less intentionally.
I love that so much from someone who did all of the things and like literally burnt herself out doing all the things for everyone. And my kids didn't want to go to the appointments and I was doing all of the things and I was just being a professional waiting room person while my other kids destroyed professionals waiting rooms. You know, if you don't need to do more, you just need to do less, but intentionally we want to have that clear roadmap. Now, if there is just one thing I want you to take away from today, it's that you know your child best.
The diagnosis doesn't replace that. It adds context. You don't need to rush. You don't need to fix everything. You need a steady path forward. If you're ready to build that confidence and understand what actually helps your child, my roadmap coaching week is designed for that exact stage. It's where we slow things down, make sense of the options and help you move forward with clarity. You are not late. You're not stuffing this up.
You're learning and you don't have to do it alone. Thank you for listening to this episode of the ADHD Families podcast. 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.
