ADHD Tools for To-Do Lists, Boring Tasks, and Negative Self-Talk

On YOU: The Owner’s Manual, Dr. Michael Roizen talks with Shanna Pearson, founder of Expert ADHD Coaching and author of the USA Today national bestselling book, Invisible ADHD, about why so many women only find out they have ADHD as adults, and about tools from her book for long to-do lists, tedious tasks and negative self-talk.

Shanna also explains why her publisher wanted the book written for women, and why she says every ADHD symptom can be managed, with medication and with tools and skills.

In this episode

• Shanna’s own ADHD diagnosis as an adult, and why women of her generation were missed when ADHD was seen as a boy’s condition
• Why the publisher asked her to write a book only for women, when Expert ADHD Coaching works with men as well
• Why every ADHD symptom is manageable, and why the book keeps only the tools that work every time, for men as well as women
• How trouble compartmentalizing turns a long to-do list into overwhelm, and “keep it to three, and you’re free”
• Getting through tedious tasks with physical state changes, music and timing yourself, and why a reward only works once the task is done
• Why negative thoughts take over an ADHD mind, and the book’s “Facts are Friendly” exercise

Episode links

• Apple Podcasts and Spotify, where it’s listed as “EP 1,255B - Proven Mood & Life Management for Smart Yet Scattered Women”
• The episode page on Doctor Podcasting, the show’s podcast host, with the episode’s description

Transcript

This transcript follows the audio episode above. Times are minutes and seconds into it. It starts at 2:22, where Dr. Roizen brings Shanna in; the episode opens with his welcome, a first introduction of Shanna and her book, a sponsor message and a note about his own website. From 6:18 to 8:14 it leaves out Dr. Roizen’s story about publishing his own books, and it ends at 21:14, before the closing sponsor message and the show’s sign-off. It also leaves out sounds that aren’t words (ums, uhs, laughter), words cut off partway and stuttered repeats; every other word is as spoken.

Dr. Michael Roizen (2:22): Shanna Pearson is the founder and president, as I said, of Expert ADHD Coaching, as well as a renowned coach herself. Shanna, where are you from and where do you live now, and how did you happen to get into this field?

Shanna Pearson (2:43): I love the three questions in one questions. I am a proud Canadian. I'm born and raised in Toronto, Canada.

Dr. Michael Roizen (2:52): So I was gonna say Pearson is like the airport. What relationship do you have to the airport?

Shanna Pearson (2:59): My husband likes to say Pearson like the prime minister, although a lot of people won't even remember Pearson being the Prime Minister of Canada. But we have no relation to the prime minister or the airport. We're just, we just happen to have the same last name. And we got smart about probably 10 years ago or so and moved to beautiful, glorious San Diego, California, where the weather is usually fantastic.

Dr. Michael Roizen (3:26): Better than either in Cleveland or Toronto.

Shanna Pearson (3:29): Oh my goodness, yes. You're in Cleveland.

Dr. Michael Roizen (3:32): Yes.

Shanna Pearson (3:32): Okay. Well, when I digress, I can talk about my time in Cleveland watching the Blue Jays annihilate the Cleveland Indians back in the day.

Dr. Michael Roizen (3:42): Don't hurt me like that.

Shanna Pearson (3:43): Dave Stieb pitched a no-hitter.

Dr. Michael Roizen (3:46): I don't know if you know, the Cleveland Clinic does supply the medical care to the Toronto Blue Jays, as well as to the Cleveland Guardians now.

Shanna Pearson (3:54): Oh, wow. Okay.

Dr. Michael Roizen (3:55): And there is a large Cleveland Clinic Toronto, and not only do we take care of the Blue Jays, but we, do most of the needs for the entire NHL.

Shanna Pearson (4:06): Oh, that's gotta be huge. I can't even imagine. That's a big-

Dr. Michael Roizen (4:10): Anyway, now that I've shown you my ADHD-

(4:13) ... by not being able to-

Shanna Pearson (4:14): This interview's gonna be really fun. We're gonna be everywhere, so.

Dr. Michael Roizen (4:18): Stay on one subject. Tell me what got you into... I know from the book, so I'm setting you up with a softball. What got you into ADHD and invisible ADHD for women?

Shanna Pearson (4:33): So what got me into ADHD was my own personal diagnosis in my 30s, and just by the way that my life was going at the time, I would have done anything, anything in the world to have known I had ADHD much, much earlier. And as is such with most women in my generation, I guess we're known as the lost generation because back in the day, it was a kid's condition and definitely mostly a boy's condition, and there's a lot of reasons for that, but girls were just not called out or diagnosed with ADHD back in the day. So a lot of women now are finding out that they have ADHD much, much later in life, which is unfortunate that they didn't know, you know, decades earlier, but also it is fortunate that they're finally finding out rather than living their entire lives not knowing, quote-unquote, what's wrong with them.

(5:33) Yeah, there's a lot, there's so much, there's so many things that are different between women and men with ADHD, but I wanna say my book, Invisible ADHD, you know, the subtitle is, you know, For Smart Yet Scattered Women, and that's only because the publishers approached me to write this book. I didn't have a book already written that I was selling to a publisher. They came to me and they said, "Will you please write this book? And we want it to be only for women." And I was like, you know, my coaching company works with everyone, probably 51 to 55% of our clients are men. Why... We know how to help men with ADHD, why on earth do you want me to write a book just for women?

(6:16) And they really just...

Dr. Michael Roizen (8:14): So tell us about ADHD in women. Why did you wanna learn about... Why would you have wanted to learn about it earlier in your life? How would it have changed your life? And it clearly has changed your life now, since this is your career helping other people with ADHD.

Shanna Pearson (8:33): It's the most fulfilling thing on the planet to help people that are actually quite easy. It's easy to help people with ADHD because ADHD, if there's one thing I need people to know, is that ADHD symptoms are all manageable, every single one of them. So if ADHD is hurting you or your loved ones or your children or your partner or whomever, and everyone's- and people are struggling, everyone should know that the symptoms are 100% manageable, not just with medication, but also with tools and skills. Like, this is not a terrible thing. You just have to know how to do things differently. And so it's like you finally find these answers, and you know that they work, and you just wanna share them with absolutely everyone because it's like you wanna...

(9:15) It's like, it's so easy. It's not easy, but it is easy compared to what our life was like, you know, before knowing how to fix these things. So I said yes to the book deal because I don't know if I would say yes right away now, but I didn't know it was gonna take so long to write a book. But I said yes, honestly, because of the amount of people that come to us desperately needing help and not having the ability to participate in our coaching program, either not having the money or not having the time, and yet they need this so badly. So I just put, I put everything into this book, all of...

(9:52) Like, the tools that 100% work all of the time, I left. You know, a lot of tools are not in this book that don't always work. The ones that always work are in the book, and they work for men. They work for men as well as women, so you should know that.

Dr. Michael Roizen (10:07): One of the things that's in the book is a to-do list, and the descriptions on to-do lists, and what to do on to-do lists. I always do a to-do list. My to-do list is generally about 20 things long, but I'm happy if I only get three done. As my research associate behind me will tell you, I said how happy I was today 'cause it was an efficient day when I got more than three done. So tell us about that.

Shanna Pearson (10:38): People who have ADHD, our brain, and you're gonna know this for yourself, but we have a brain that has a very hard time compartmentalizing. So we live inside of this reality of everything all the time, all at once, yesterday and tomorrow, right? And it's all just swirling around in one big, you know, smoothie, and it's impossible to separate one task from another to another to another unless you're completely engaged in it. So when you live in an everything, I call it everything all at once right now, reality, it's, number one, it's totally overwhelming. It's very hard to know what to do when and how to start on anything because everything has the exact same level of importance.

(11:22) So when it comes to to-do lists, I would say probably 95% of our clients would, you know, start... You know, they come to us, and they tell us, like, what their life is like and their day-to-day, and practically all of them have to-do lists that are over 30 items long, and they're stuck inside of that because you-

Dr. Michael Roizen (11:40): So only having 20 on my list is pretty good.

Shanna Pearson (11:44): I know, right? So with 30 would be the minimum. So and they've got these, like, endless to-do lists, and they're stuck in it because every single one of those items is, you know, combined with all of the other ones, even though they're completely separate, and it just, it doesn't make sense for their brain to know what to do first because we're not tend to, in general, we're not very good at prioritizing. So the, in the book I talk about very specifically, keep it to three And you're free. Keep it to three, and you're free. And you keep saying that, and you learn it, and you take it. Yeah.

Dr. Michael Roizen (12:16): Even though I've got a long list, I say, "This is the most important." And I'm very linear, so even though I'm a physician, when my patients text me or email me or call me, I generally put that off till a specific time, 'cause I'm linear and can only work on one thing at a time.

Shanna Pearson (12:35): Amazing. Yeah. So that's, I mean, that's such a blessing that you can do that. A lot of us aren't able to do that unless we're very engaged in whatever it is that we're doing. So if you keep your to-do list to three, and then hopefully you're, they're the top priority three at the time, it basically eliminates the visual overwhelm of a list that's, you know, 30 items plus long, if that makes sense.

Dr. Michael Roizen (13:03): Absolutely.

Shanna Pearson (13:04): So that's like number one is just, you know, cut it down and visually cut it down. We're very visual.

Dr. Michael Roizen (13:12): Now, you have a, I just put one, two, and three, and I only work on two after I've done one. And sometimes I reverse the order of importance just because one task I know is shorter to be able to do than the others. You talk a little bit about that in the book in your priority as well. The one thing that I didn't get to understand is how to gamify the tasks you want to do the least.

Shanna Pearson (13:42): Oh, you know how to do this. I have a feeling you'd be amazing at this. Gamification. If you don't want to do something that you absolutely have to do, what are some things that you already do to make those tasks doable? Do you just sit down and force yourself to do it? Because that might work for some people, but it's not gonna work for a lot of people. So we just talk about, you know, adding things to the mix in terms of, you know, state changes, or in terms of making it a little bit more enjoyable, whether that means with standing up and doing it on one foot, where we have clients like literally- like doing their emails while they're like trying to balance on something, which definitely occupies their brain in a way that allows them to do these tedious tasks.

(14:28) And other things are just, you know, music or, you know, a state change with like a physical state change that could involve just getting off your seat and just like exerting some energy and then going right back to your computer, timing yourself in one minute, how long can, how much can I do? Or conversely, how many of these can I do in two minutes? And just trying to like challenge yourself in a way where you're not just like, "I have to do this task. This is the most boring task in the world. I have to do it," 'cause then you won't do it.

Dr. Michael Roizen (14:59): Well, what I do, and tell me if this is... I- tend to, I try and give myself a reward when I complete it.

Shanna Pearson (15:06): Yeah.

Dr. Michael Roizen (15:07): So meaning I have the task that I don't wanna do, I will say, "If I do this, I get X."

Shanna Pearson (15:14): You know what? You are, number one, you got yourself through medical school. I know for a fact without, you know, ever having spent more than, let's say, an hour with you, that you're probably pretty high on the self-discipline chart. Would you say that?

Dr. Michael Roizen (15:30): Oh, yeah.

Shanna Pearson (15:31): You're self-aware, and you have a lot of self-discipline, which is beautiful. I think that's a gift and something you probably had to try pretty hard to hone. If you don't already naturally have that, then, you know, then you have to... It's like, well, if you're gonna reward yourself, see, so many of our clients, they'll do the reward, but then they'll just reward themselves before it's even finished. And they're like, "Well, I wanna do that anyway." And that's, and it's-

Dr. Michael Roizen (15:57): That, that's cheating.

Shanna Pearson (15:58): It's totally cheating, and that's what people, but people do it, 'cause they're so, you know, "Nobody's watching, so forget it. I'm just gonna go have that popsicle right now. So, you know, that'll help me get back into work mode." But the fact is is that, you know, rewarding yourself is great as long as you stick to, as long as you don't reward yourself when you haven't reached the thing that you wanted to do. But I- really think that gamifying and adding physical components to your tasks and increasing, you know, your dopamine hits while you're doing tedious tasks is hugely, hugely beneficial. That's what we need.

Dr. Michael Roizen (16:34): I wanna talk about one more thing before we finish with you. It's so wonderful we're over time, Shanna, but I-

Shanna Pearson (16:41): Already?

Dr. Michael Roizen (16:42): ... I can't resist being over time with you.

(16:45) The forerunner of the Toronto Airport.

Shanna Pearson (16:49): There you go.

Dr. Michael Roizen (16:50): So I will never forget your name, obviously, Shanna Pearson. The book, by the way, that we're talking about is InvisibleADHD.com is the website. Invisible ADHD is the book. So one of the things you talk about is how to mix moods to nix negativity. So every- every now and then when I screw up, I tell myself how stupid I was to screw up on that or to not do that task. And I've got such a long list of tasks, there are always tasks I don't get to. And I love most of my tasks, so I have to fight to not enjoy, joy what I'm doing, but there's an occasional task I don't wanna do, and I forget to do it, totally.

(17:45) Like today, I know I've got a, I'm supposed to book an airplane ticket, and I almost forgot to call the booking agent to get it done for next Monday's airplane flight.

Shanna Pearson (17:59): Interesting. Do you wanna go on this flight, or is this something that you're trying to avoid?

Dr. Michael Roizen (18:03): No, no, I wanna go on it.

Shanna Pearson (18:04): You just don't wanna call your booking agent.

Dr. Michael Roizen (18:06): No, it's just that I, it was way down on the list.

Shanna Pearson (18:08): Yeah.

Dr. Michael Roizen (18:09): I had a whole bunch of other things, and as I said, I'm linear. I will focus on one task and get it done before I go to the next one. How do you manage your mood so you don't tell yourself how stupid you were to forget that till now?

Shanna Pearson (18:22): Okay, well, number one, you remembered it. I'm just saying. You actually remembered it. Like, you're telling me about it right now, and the flight's not till next week, so congrats. Number two, we do dwell on the negative about ourselves, and the reason we do that is because, as you know, if it bleeds, it leads. It's like why all, you know, the news headlines are negative, because we buy into it. We listen to it. It's stimulating. So a person with ADHD tends to fill up their head and their mind space with negativity. That's... Honestly, it's the saddest aspect of ADHD is how much negativity is going on in our minds because, honestly, because it's just a, it's just more stimulating.

(19:06) We grab it, and we run with the negativity. So I have an exercise, Mike, that is in the book that I'm sure you saw, called Facts are Friendly. I'm a huge believer in this, and you're an, you're a doctor. You love science. You understand this. Facts are facts, and you cannot negate a fact no matter how you feel, okay? Whereas you can say all, all these affirmations to yourself in the mirror every morning, and it's all BS in your mind because you feel terrible about yourself, right? You can tell yourself how great you are, but you feel bad, so you're gonna know that, you know, you're like, "No, I'm not great. I'm terrible." But a fact is a fact, and so if you feel terrible about yourself, three plus three is six, no matter what, and two times two is four, no matter what.

(19:52) And so we have our clients write down facts, true facts. Not goals, not affirmations, not dreams. Okay? Things that we've actually done successfully. For example, you remembered your flight. You just did. You just told me about it. That's a fact. "I remembered the flight. I had to call so and so." You can no longer tell yourself, "I forgot. I haven't done it. I didn't do it." I remembered it, period. That's a fact. Another thing you can do to conquer the negativity is just, like, you fill up a list with, like, facts of what you've done, small things and big things, recently, so that when you're looking at them... For example, if you have a comment, Mike, on your podcast, and somebody says, "Wow, that was so helpful.

(20:36) Thank you," you actually can take a screenshot of that and put it on your facts list, 'cause someone actually said that to you. It wasn't something you made up to tell yourself to feel good.

Dr. Michael Roizen (20:45): Well, this is very helpful. The book is Invisible ADHD. The website is invisibleadhd.com. You can go to Expert ADHD Coaching, and that's probably expertadhdcoaching.com. I don't know that website.

Shanna Pearson (21:08): It's actually a- there's a shorter website, adhdcoaching.com.

Dr. Michael Roizen (21:11): adhdcoaching.com.

Shanna Pearson (21:13): That's it. That's our site.

Dr. Michael Roizen (21:14): Thank you for coming on.

Transcribed from the episode audio.