2306: Forging Successful Kids with Diane Dempster and Elaine Taylor-Klaus from Impact Parents

Sep 7

We're continuing our family series on the podcast with our dear friends Elaine Taylor-Klaus and Diane Dempster of Impact Parents. Together, they have taken their ADHD coaching and evolved their work into an incredible resource for parents raising complex kids.

Independence starts today

The rock-climbing metaphor is striking. Every move toward independence and confidence happens in the smallest of movements, not giant stretches. It is only with the gift of hindsight that we're able to see the great strides we've made. But if that's the case, how do we know what to do here and now?

Through an assessment of two parenting experiences this week from your fair hosts, Diane and Elaine walk us through the things we can celebrate, and the steps we might take to redirect in an effort to implement the tools we can learn to help our complex kids to be independent and successful.

Take a minute to browse Impact Parents and learn more about the work Diane and Elaine are doing for parents.

Episode Transcript

Brought to you by The ADHD Podcast Community on Patreon

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Yeah. But you have to start with the assumption that the transformation happens in tiny little increments, right? Tiny little increments. So, I don't know if you've ever done rock climbing, but when you're rock climbing you don't go for the farthest reach, you take the tiny little steps to get there because that's what gets you there safely and without exhaustion. And it's the same when we're parenting is we're looking for the little wins. One little win at a time. And very often, when we have complex kids, our kids need a win. And if we step in and we say, "I'm going to have to take this over," we actually prevent them from the opportunity to learn, to see what they could have done well enough and where the gaps were and to learn from that.

Pete Wright: Hello everybody and welcome to Taking Control, the ADHD podcast on TruStory FM. I'm Pete Wright, and right there it's Nikki Kinzer.

Nikki Kinzer: Hello everyone. Hello Pete.

Pete Wright: Hello, Nikki. Nikki, Nikki, it's a parenting show.

Nikki Kinzer: It is.

Pete Wright: I feel like we need it.

Nikki Kinzer: I love it.

Pete Wright: We're hungry for it.

Nikki Kinzer: Oh, yes.

Pete Wright: I'm going to start off with a story. I'm not going to tell you right now, I'm going to tell you when we get our guests on here. Because I think it's going to give us away to start talking. It's a parenting moment that I'm not afraid to admit threw me a little bit sideways. I was surprised it ended well. I'm okay, everybody's okay. But parenting, it's amazing. Especially parenting within the storm of ADHD. So fun. So fun.

Nikki Kinzer: Yes.

Pete Wright: We've got our return guests, they're fantastic, from Impact Parents Today and we're going to talk about all families and how we can as parents help implement tools to help our kids become independent and confident and strong. And not be afraid that they're going to miss something important or forget to go to the dentist, I don't know.

Nikki Kinzer: Yeah.

Pete Wright: It's stuff. It's stuff. And so we're excited to have our guests back today. They're wonderful people. We'll introduce them momentarily. Before we do that, head over to takecontroladhd.com and get to know us a little bit better. You can listen to the show right there on the website, or subscribe to the mailing list and we will send you an email each week when new episodes drop. Connect with us on Twitter or Facebook at Take Control ADHD. And if this show has ever touched you or helped you make a change for your life for the better, if you've ever found that you understand your relationship with ADHD in some new way, we invite you to consider supporting the show directly through Patreon. Patreon is listener supported podcasting, a few bucks a month guarantees that this show will continue to grow and that you get some perks. Perks like joining us for the livestream of this show as we record it. That's always fun. We always stick around with our guests after the end of our podcast recording, and we get to ask them questions that don't make it to the final show. If you're a member of the show, you get access to those livestreams, you can join us and ask your questions directly to our guests. That is a super great perk and you should take advantage of it. Just one of many, head over to patreon.com/theadhdpodcast to learn more. Do we have news for the people, Nikki Kinzer?

Nikki Kinzer: No.

Pete Wright: What?

Nikki Kinzer: It's a slow news day.

Pete Wright: Slow news day.

Nikki Kinzer: Yeah.

Pete Wright: Outstanding.

Nikki Kinzer: I know, right? We can get right into the interview.

Pete Wright: All that housekeeping out of the way. Let's go ahead and talk to Diane and Elaine. Diane Dempster and Elaine Taylor-Klaus are back from Impact Parents. Now, you'll remember them, they've been back a couple of times before. It was originally Impact ADHD, but that was too small a pond. Now it's Impact Parents and they're amazing. They're podcaster and coaches and they teach other coaches how to be coaches. And they help a lot of parents. Today, they're here to talk to us about how families can implement tools they learn in real ways to help our kids be independent and successful. Diane and Elaine, thanks for coming back.

Diane Dempster: We're always happy to come and visit you.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Indeed. Indeed.

Nikki Kinzer: Welcome, welcome.

Pete Wright: So, my daughter. She's 19 now. Oh, we've talked about her before.

Diane Dempster: Oh. Fun. Even better. We're jumping right in.

Pete Wright: She's 19.

Diane Dempster: This is going to get [inaudible 00:04:37].

Pete Wright: Well, look. Look. What I hear is we're going to be talking about how families can implement tools they learn in real ways that can help our kids be independent and successful. And so, I have this kiddo. 19.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Even before you say anything, I want to say even if she was nervous coming to you, you're already scoring a parenting because she came to you.

Pete Wright: Yes. Thank you.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Okay?

Pete Wright: Because it's nothing to do, and we've spent a lot of years trying to get something right. She has been working at a primitive skills camp all summer. She's a teacher there. She leads kids in teaching primitive survival skills. She goes into the mountains on Monday and comes back on a Friday and she's training with other people her age and demeanor. And we have worked for so long to help her with social skills and confidence and all these things. And this is the pinnacle experience because she's without us. She hasn't gone to college yet because she did her first year at home. And she comes home, I pick her up at the train station. And she gets in the car, and we've been doing this all summer. So I have these Friday events with her. All summer, she comes home, she says, "Yeah, it was great. I had a great time." No other real significant stories. This time, she comes in, she gets in the car and she says, "Before you go." She puts her hands up over her mouth, her fists up over her mouth.

Nikki Kinzer: Oh, bless her heart.

Pete Wright: And I said, "What's going on?" She said, "I have to tell you something. Before you move the car." I said, "What happened? Did something happen? Are you hurt? Are you okay?" She said, "I got a tattoo."

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: That's a primitive skill?

Pete Wright: Apparently. Apparently.

Diane Dempster: I don't want to know what they used to pierce her.

Pete Wright: Well, as it turns out.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: It was berries and-

Pete Wright: No. It's actually legit. She and one of her camp mates or teachers happens to moonlight as a tattoo artist during the off season and had her whole tattoo gun and inks and everything with her.

Nikki Kinzer: With her on the trip.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: She had her kit in the woods.

Pete Wright: She had her kit in the van. It was midnight and they sat around the campfire and gave each other tattoos and it's a lovely just very sort of austere sort of mountain scape with a little moon over it. And it's on the top of her foot. It's very classy, and the first thing I said was, "Ah. You did it without me." I kind of wanted a tattoo too. So I feel like-

Diane Dempster: That's another dad win.

Pete Wright: She kind of [crosstalk 00:07:07] me. Oh goodness. But apparently she was not scared to talk to me at all about it. She knew that the worse thing that would come would be I would be mad because we didn't go together and get matching tattoos. She was really terrified to talk to mom. And mom was also okay. I feel like we did all right. It was just a sign. I was so excited to talk to you guys today because I feel like we ... there is this sort of collective oh my gosh, I think everything I do I'm breaking my kid. And it turns out, even when they get the tattoo, when they do things that are outside of our worldview of expectations of them, I feel like they do it with grace and joy and enthusiasm. And I feel like that's kind of a win.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Huge win.

Pete Wright: And I really just wanted to celebrate that with all of you.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: I love that. So, oftentimes if a client was coming to us with this story, we would start ticking off, okay what were the successes. What were the wins, right? So, as we started, huge win. She told you.

Pete Wright: Yes.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Huge win. Let's be honest, no offense to mom, but she wanted to tell you first.

Nikki Kinzer: Yeah.

Pete Wright: Yeah.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Because she wasn't as afraid of you or of your response.

Pete Wright: Right.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: You have enough of a relationship and connection that she knew you would kind of feel like out and disappointed, right?

Pete Wright: Yeah.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: So, that speaks to your relationship. There's an authenticity. She didn't beat around it. And let's be honest, she chose a pretty meaningful tattoo for her. So, she's not just marring her body. She actually went and did something that has a significance to her.

Pete Wright: Right. Yeah.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: So, she's got values and she's reflecting her values. So, that's what I think.

Diane Dempster: And the value there, which is a great opportunity for you and I bet you took it, Pete, was the fact that she did it with all these friends, right? It was something they did in community together. It was this bonding moment. It's like I had this vision of them in the woods with the drums beating in the background.

Pete Wright: Kind of.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Well and you said she'd been in social skills group along the years.

Pete Wright: Yes.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: So, this was not a prescribed inauthentic experience. This was a real, as Diane said, bonding community event.

Pete Wright: Well, and the thing she celebrates most, the first picture she shows everyone is all four of their feet looking down with all of their tattoos on of mountains on all of their feet. Just different mountains, but all mountains. And to celebrate that together, for them, gives me like my cup runneth over. That is the sort of joy. I feel like she is a joyous punchline at the end of a now 15 year joke of us, setup of us trying to figure out how to live everyday.

Diane Dempster: Well, so Pete, I mean the question I want to ask is I mean, I hear you celebrating which is awesome. Is there part of this that you're like holy crap. Is there another side of it? Is there an upset of anything?

Pete Wright: Well, upset no. Abject terror, absolutely.

Diane Dempster: Yeah?

Pete Wright: Yeah. Because now there's so much I realize that is out of obviously. And I've realized intellectually.

Diane Dempster: Wait. Finish the sentence. Out of your control.

Pete Wright: Control. Of course. And I realize, but see that's important. Because intellectually, yeah, I've known that for a long time. I haven't been able to influence her in many years. But in my heart, I realized that I had not let go of that.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: So, I'm going to challenge your language a little bit. Can I play with it?

Pete Wright: Yeah.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: I would argue that you have great influence. You haven't controlled in a long time. Which is appropriate.

Pete Wright: Yeah.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: And exactly what you needed to do was to begin to relinquish control and transfer it to her. But you've maintained relationship, which is how you've maintained influence. Which is why she got a beautiful mountain scape tattoo in a subtle place instead of something that could've been really horrific.

Nikki Kinzer: Like dad sucks.

Pete Wright: A broken heart with dad written in it. Yeah, right?

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: There's so much juicy stuff. And we've been doing a huge amount of work this year in 2021 with parents of young adults. And so, you just kind of spoke right to so many of the pieces of it. Because it's all about communication and connection and relationship and control.

Pete Wright: Yeah. Absolutely. I didn't even know that this was going to be such a rich field.

Nikki Kinzer: I know. I feel like this is going to be a few minutes of them coaching us.

Pete Wright: I know. Yeah. Exactly. And it sounds like I need it.

Nikki Kinzer: Yeah.

Diane Dempster: No, you did great. No you did great.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: You should be proud of yourself.

Pete Wright: Thank you.

Diane Dempster: You did great, Pete.

Nikki Kinzer: One of the things that we're dealing with is I have a son who's going into his freshman year of college. And we, up to this point, have really tried to let him do his thing and get registered and enroll and get his housing. And he's getting all the emails. I've told him, "I'm not getting them. You're going to have to do it." And I had to step in last week because he missed his orientation that's required. So, I had to be a little bit more aggressive with-

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Hands on.

Nikki Kinzer: Yeah, hands on.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Okay.

Nikki Kinzer: So, my question what is too hands on and what is okay, he needs to figure this out. So if he doesn't do it, there's this natural consequence that maybe he doesn't go to school this term. Which seems really harsh, but-

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: That would be harsh.

Nikki Kinzer: Yes. So, curious what you guys think. Independence. How independent should they be?

Diane Dempster: We talk about the difference between supporting versus enabling.

Nikki Kinzer: Ah. Yeah.

Diane Dempster: It's this sort of fine line. And the challenge, and I think you're bumping up against it, Nikki, and we do workshops about this all the time, is that you know how to be in charge, and you know how to let him be in charge. And the reality is what he needs right now is the space in between. And so it's that sort of how do you step in to this. Becoming independent is a process. It's not just this magic moment where it's like, okay all of a sudden, you're in college, you get to be independent now and too bad if you miss your deadline. I mean, there are sometimes you want to let you kids make mistakes and fail and feel the natural consequences. There are other times where it's like the stakes are too high. Too high for you, too high for them. And you want to stay a little bit closer, but you don't want to be all in controlling the whole thing because they want to be able to be more independent. Elaine, what would you add?

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: So many things. So what Diane's speaking to, there's a framework we teach that there are four phases in parenting, right? Phase one is the director mode. We all start there. We're usually pretty good at it. We could do this for a long time. Phase two is collaboration. That's where we begin to share the agenda with our kid. Phase three is support. Now they've taken on the agenda and we're more move into support role. One of my clients this week said, "So, you mean I'm supposed to be the roadie?" Yeah. You're the roadie at this point, right? And then phase four is when they're independent, you're championing them independently. So as Diane said, most of our work as parents happens in collaboration and support. Collaboration and support. The game is to figure out when are we sharing the agenda because he may not be ready to do it completely independently on his own, and when does he really have it and we move into support role. So in this case, you may ... you started with, okay you're on it. You're on your own. That made him do phase four. So what would it look like to move back to phase three, to support role? You're on it and how can I help? What do you need from me? Give me a job. So, that you're still interactively engaging with him around it. So that he doesn't feel completely lose because he doesn't really know how.

Nikki Kinzer: He doesn't.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: He's never done this before.

Nikki Kinzer: Right. Yeah. Yeah.

Diane Dempster: An important context is that it's not like all or nothing. It's not like you're always the director or always the supporter or the collaborator. It's every situation. So you may be total champion with regard to this part of their part. But you may need to be more of a collaborator. And finances is a great example where parents collaborate with their kids on finances. I had a mom this morning with a 30 year old, who's their daughter showed up on their doorstep yesterday who said, "My credit cards are all maxed. I need help. Will you please help me unravel from this financial drama?" And she needs them to step in to a supportive role. Even if they're-

Nikki Kinzer: Right.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: So I'm thinking about, so my eldest kid. Part, I think because I keep thinking tattoo, tattoo, tattoo, right?

Pete Wright: Yeah.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Because our rule with them, just as a funny aside, was you have to be on your own insurance and you can have a tattoo when you're on your insurance. As long as you're on our, no tattoos.

Pete Wright: Oh. You mean getting non-sterile-

Nikki Kinzer: That's a great rule.

Pete Wright: Woodland tattoos would not have fit the rule?

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: We were very clear.

Pete Wright: Okay.

Nikki Kinzer: I like that rule.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: At age 19, we see in social media tattoo, tattoo, tattoo, tattoo. So, of course my husband picks up the phone and calls and she's like, I just got SAG insurance.

Nikki Kinzer: Geez.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Great. So, anyway, that's the kid I'm thinking about because my eldest child, they are very independent now and functioning, married, living on their own. But became an actor at a very early age. And so, when they moved out to California and we're here in Georgia, there were things where they were taking it on their own, getting up, going to school, getting to rehearsals, all that stuff was theirs. But as Diane said, the financial stuff was still on our plate for many years. The health insurance was until the tattoo. But we would navigate with each other where are you ready to take it independently and where do you still need my help and what do you need from me? So it was a conscious conversation, it wasn't just a throw my hands up in the air, I'm done.

Pete Wright: Well, I think that gets to, that absolutely gets to the challenge that I feel like I'm living in everyday. Which is that liminal space, right?

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Yes.

Pete Wright: That I feel like I've walked into the woods and it's really dark and my kids are in their too and neither of us know what we're doing, but we're kind of finding our way looking for the other side. And the degree to which we're walking out and walking back in the other way changes from conversation to conversation, right?

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: And you can hear the Sondheim musical-

Diane Dempster: And it does.

Pete Wright: Yes. Oh yeah.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: You can hear the tones, right?

Pete Wright: There are giants in the sky. Yes.

Diane Dempster: I love that. That's perfect. So, Pete, but the other piece of it that I want to highlight is that you have this amazing relationship, right? And a lot of people who are listening may be at a point with their young adult or teenager or-

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Whatever, right.

Diane Dempster: Middle school or where they're at fisticuffs with each other because of this. And I would say that this is the dynamic that happens is that the parents know the kids can't be completely independent. But the parents don't know how to do anything other than direct. And the kids are like, mom leave me alone. Get out of my business. And mom doesn't know how to do anything other than that.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: And what happens is the mom's been directing so long that she then says, often she it could be he, the parent says, "Fine, you're on your own." And they throw their hands up. And then the kid fails because they don't know how to do it.

Pete Wright: Right.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: And then the parent takes that as justification to say, "See, I told you you needed me." Instead of really collaboratively working with the kid to figure out where can you do it independently and where do you need me to pull back. The metaphor we used to use for this a lot, switched to the metaphor of riding a horse, right? Handing of the reins.

Diane Dempster: Horse reins.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: We used to talk about the metaphor of passing the baton in a relay race. When you pass the baton, you make sure they have a hold of it before you let go. This is the extent of my knowledge of relay races. Right here you've just gotten it. But what happens with parents is that we don't do them one at a time. And then we throw all 10 batons at the kids at one time and then expect them to catch them.

Nikki Kinzer: And then they all drop. And they miss the orientation.

Diane Dempster: Good luck. You're on your own.

Pete Wright: I wish that was the Olympic sport, you guys. Somebody runs and throws 10 batons.

Nikki Kinzer: Now catch as many as you can.

Pete Wright: That's pretty much the US team for the last 15 years anyway, so all right. I'm sorry. Go ahead.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: No. Just that. If you can hold that image, our job is to give them one baton at a time and make sure they've got it before we let go. And then they've got that one and then we give them another one. That's the job. And we do it from 7 to 27. Or 17.

Diane Dempster: So I'm going to go back to Nikki because you were talking about your son. So what do you think, where do you think he needed you to be?

Nikki Kinzer: Great question. Oh boy. I don't know. I don't know. I think that, and I may be assuming this, and so I probably do need to talk to him more about it. I don't think he's been taught to not keep things in his head. And so I think part of it was a real legit, I mean it was really an honest mistake. He thought it was on Saturday the 28th when it was actually on Tuesday the 24th. And when he got the email that he read two days later.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: And he missed it.

Nikki Kinzer: Yeah. That he missed it. And so I think that part of it is I was expecting him to be a little bit more prepared and ready than he is. And I don't think he is. I don't think he's organized enough to think oh I should probably write this down and put it somewhere to remember. Oh this really is important.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: So, here's my question, Nikki. When he came to you to tell you, was he appropriately concerned?

Nikki Kinzer: I don't think so.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Was he concerned at all? Not freaked out, stressed out. But was he concerned, like oh I missed this. Can you help me figure this out?

Nikki Kinzer: No. He didn't ask me.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Or was it just oh well?

Nikki Kinzer: He just in passing said, "I was," because he was going to work and I said, "Oh, well when's your orientation?" And I didn't even know he missed it.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Okay.

Nikki Kinzer: And he's like, oh I missed it. It was today. And I'm like, okay, so what are you going to do? Oh, I'm just going to sign up for another one. I contacted my person and-

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Okay. So he handled it.

Nikki Kinzer: Yeah. He said he contacted, yeah. I mean he contacted the admissions person that was helping him. Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Okay. So he handled it, right?

Nikki Kinzer: Kind of.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: So, no, he may not have made it to the first one, but he scheduled another one. He realized he needed to go.

Nikki Kinzer: Well, but see, that's where I stepped in. Because he said he got, he messaged his helper. But then I ended up stepping in. Oh, I probably am not a good parent. I ended up like-

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: You are not a bad parent.

Diane Dempster: Promise you're not.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: It's a great place to look. It's like did he need you to step up or did you decide he needed you to step up?

Nikki Kinzer: I decided because then I got onto the website and there was only two sessions left. So then I contacted the school and asked if he could be put onto the list on Saturday. And they said, "Yes, but he needs to contact us directly." Because I understand that in college, and I told him that, I'm like, I'm out. They don't want me, they want you. And it did get worked out. But yeah. I did. I stepped right in and said, "Do this." And I almost forced him because he had gotten his second vaccine shot and he wasn't feeling very well. And I'm like, you need to text these people and let them know that you're going to be there on Saturday. Oh my God. I'm so bad. Because I even said, "If you want me to text it for you from your phone, I'll do it. I just want you to make sure that you go to this thing on Saturday."

Diane Dempster: This is the pattern, Nikki, right? This is sort of it's okay. But what happens is we want our kids to be able to independent, but then when they're not, we get scared and we freak out.

Nikki Kinzer: Totally, yeah.

Diane Dempster: And then when we freak out, and just remember the voice in your head, when you freak out the voice in your head is going to say I have to take care of this. I'm the only one that can take care of this and I have to take care of it right this minute, right? It's this sort of, that's the freak out place.

Nikki Kinzer: Oh, totally.

Diane Dempster: And if you're acting from that, you're going to jump in.

Pete Wright: And I will not be able to rest until I get this off my list.

Nikki Kinzer: I know. Yes.

Pete Wright: Right.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: So if we were coaching around this, we might ask something like what would the collaborative approach look like here? What would it look like once you knew what the deadline was and what the need was, how could you have still had that conversation, but done it collaboratively instead of directively? And that's the shift. And it's very possible it could still be you sending the text from his phone, but you want him to be the one telling you to send the-

Nikki Kinzer: To do it.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Text from his phone.

Nikki Kinzer: Yeah.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Instead of you saying, "I'm going to send a text from your phone." That's the shift.

Nikki Kinzer: There's a huge shift there. And I think that there's this, and I don't know if this is normal or not, but there's just this lack of trust that he's going to do it. Then that worries me. But then I'm thinking, okay but if he doesn't, then he's probably not ready to go to college right now.

Diane Dempster: So, yeah. So what if it's not that black and white?

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Right.

Nikki Kinzer: See, I know.

Diane Dempster: The reality is that this is a kid with executive function challenges. And it's not that-

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: He's never done this before.

Diane Dempster: Right. He's never done this before. So, we wait until they've got all the executive function skills that they might need ever passably for any scenario that they might come across in college before we send them out the door, we're not serving them.

Nikki Kinzer: Right.

Diane Dempster: And we're not serving us.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Okay. I've got an analogy, but it's going to be off for a minute. But I promise I'll bring it back, okay?

Pete Wright: More Olympic analogies.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Not Olympic.

Pete Wright: Okay.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Research has shown that men will only need to feel 30% qualified to apply for a job. Women need to feel 100% qualified before they're willing to apply for a job.

Nikki Kinzer: Oh, I love this.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Okay. So, it's very similar. He's got 30% I got this and you are waiting for him to hit 100% and the truth is somewhere in the middle.

Nikki Kinzer: Yeah.

Pete Wright: But there's a plus six modifier for maternal instinct, right?

Diane Dempster: And then you've got the minus [crosstalk 00:26:10] for ADHD.

Pete Wright: Yes. I feel like this is what I meant by that dark space. It's just the uncertainty of I have 17 other years of being conditioned that they're going to drop the ball if I'm not right there to catch it, right? I am conditioned to expect to have to be not just parentally collaborating, but literally making sure collaborating in order to make sure that things happen. And the act of letting go of that, of learning to expect more is I'm finding has to be a practice like meditation.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: It is a daily practice.

Diane Dempster: It is a practice.

Pete Wright: It's so hard.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Yeah. It is.

Diane Dempster: And the people who are listening who have kids who are younger than all of ours, right? I'm going to talk to you for a minute because the process of your kids becoming independent doesn't happen the day they turn 18.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: No, it starts right now whatever age your kid is.

Diane Dempster: It starts right now. And so, if you're working on, let's say you're working on making sure they get their homework done and turned in. Or you're working on making sure that they clean their room on a Saturday. Whatever it is. You shouldn't just ... shouldn't, wow. I just should on your show. It's not enough to just focus on cleaning the room today. How do I get them to clean the room today? Because I'm going to nag, I'm going to beg, I'm going to clean, I'm going to do whatever. I also have to be focused on how do I help to do it more independently this time and then the next time and then the next time.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: I got a story. Okay? True story. Text thread in the book. My son was going to a sleep away leadership whatever camp at about 16. And he is, I've got it, I'm the best packer in the family, I don't need you, duh, duh, duh, duh. Fine. And I'm like, fine. You got it. You're on. And he gets to this camp, fortunately it was a camp where he still had access to a phone. Where I get a text that's like, I forgot the sheets. Okay. The text thread goes on for the next 24 hours back and forth with sheets, pillow case, laundry bag, all these things that I'm very calmly texting back like, cool. What do you want? What do you need? Well, if I get it there overnight, that's going to be $72 or whatever it was.

Pete Wright: Oh my gosh.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: If it's a couple of days, it'll only cost you $30, right? I'll take the $30. So, we're back and forth. He's being very respectful in this text exchange.

Pete Wright: Oh, yeah.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: And the very last one is could you maybe put a pillow in too?

Nikki Kinzer: Bless his heart.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: So, he slept for a couple of nights, borrowing stuff from friends and using a sweatshirt as a pillow.

Nikki Kinzer: I was going to say, yeah.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: And it was a fabulous lesson that I could not have scripted for him. But I had to be willing to allow him to go to camp without sheets. And that doesn't make me a bad mom, right?

Pete Wright: Yeah.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Because the stakes were what they were and I knew it was a safe place.

Nikki Kinzer: Oh, yeah. Absolutely.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Diane's point is really important. College registration is different. I would, I did take a different approach around college registration with the same kid. But whenever we can find these opportunities for them to what Diane and I call fail forward.

Pete Wright: Oh, I love that.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: From their own experiences, right?

Pete Wright: Fail forward.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: What worked? What didn't work? What are you going to do differently next time?

Pete Wright: Yeah. Yeah.

Diane Dempster: But you've got to find a safe space to do that, right? And the other thing is that, Elaine and her son have a relationship where that works great.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: And the text thread is hysterical, by the way.

Pete Wright: Oh my goodness.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: If you ever get a chance to read it.

Nikki Kinzer: I can only imagine.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: It's really funny. And in fact, it was so funny that when I read it, when I was preparing the book, he was coming down the stairs and he heard me saying something about it two, three years later. And that was even funnier because he's like, man, you really got me. Yeah. Gotcha.

Pete Wright: Yeah. I love that. The whole metaphor too. And I'm going to latch onto that because in the spirit of driving towards independence, that idea of failing forward does not stop momentum in that regard because it's really easy for the parental vibe to step in and for me to actually halt the journey to independence and not even know I'm doing it.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Yeah.

Diane Dempster: Fair.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Great observation.

Nikki Kinzer: I have a question for you guys. I don't know if you find this a lot in your work or not. But what about pressure from grandparents? Because yeah.

Diane Dempster: Pressure from everybody, whether it's grandparents or the school.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Aunts, school, teachers.

Diane Dempster: Yeah. I think that the piece that I'd say is yes, there's pressure. And I use that word should a few minutes ago. It's this sort of, if you can let go, what we call shedding the shoulds. So if you can let go of the shoulds, whether it's from your parents, or from the school, or just your brain going but he should be able to do this, right? Or she should be able to do this. Go back to meeting them where they are and raising the bar from there, right? It's this sort of I want to challenge my kids to be more independent, but I don't want to stand up here and go, "You should be able to do this." And you can't, I want to say, "Well, what can they do independently?" And what does a little more independent might look like? And I think that's the piece of it is that we don't look for the baby steps as parents. We think it's either I have to do it, or they have to do it 100% and we aren't looking for that step in between where you're working together. Or you have an agreement that you'll check in once a week. Or you'll have an agreement that you'll work on the first three things together and then they'll try one on their own. I mean, there's all kinds of ways to find that middle ground.

Diane Dempster: Even taking that step in between instead of saying, "Okay, I'll help you." Just say, "Hey, do you need help?"

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Anything I can do?

Diane Dempster: Hey, is there a place I could ... anything I can do? Use that language before, give me a job. I'm happy to help you, just tell me what you need.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: And sometimes we'll even-

Diane Dempster: And sometimes they won't even know.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: And sometimes we'll say, "Okay, your job is to do this. My job is to be the parent. So throw me the bone here, give me a job. Give me something to do," right? And again, but because when we do that, we're actually putting the power back in their seat. And this is all about a power dynamic. So we want to keep giving them opportunities to say, "Yes," to our support because when they say, "Yes," to our support, that reinforces their sense of self-control. So if we come in, they feel taken down. But if they're saying, "Yeah, can do you do that for me?" Now they're delegating. And that keeps them in the driver's seat. It keeps them with a sense of agency. So I think the piece, this is kind of philosophical context for it all. But we want to be thinking in terms of really helping our kids have a sense of agency. And what does it look like? What do they feel like they're in control of? Because ADHD makes you feel out of control. And so the more we can put that back into them and just asking a question where they answer it puts the agency back on their seat.

Diane Dempster: And the reality is sometimes our kids gets super overwhelmed and they don't know the answer to the question.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: That's okay.

Diane Dempster: So you might say, "What do I do?" And they say, "I don't know." And they're panicky or they're whatever, or stay out of it, or whatever. But if you can even, we call it scaffolding, take a step closer and say, "Okay. Here are three things that I could do, give me one of them." I mean, if you get an I don't know, there's all kinds of things you can do to get them from I don't know to okay, yes, please help.

Pete Wright: I think this is also great. And it just makes me back to the point about ADHD and your rock climbing metaphor which is amazing and perfect is that I feel like we don't know the grand strides we have made in the process of making them, right? I only know them when I get to have the tattoo conversation and am immediately slapped in the face with the last eight years of little tiny gains-

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: That's right.

Pete Wright: That we've made to get there. And we don't take enough time to stop and actually celebrate those little gains as much as we do the oh my God, look at what we've done hindsight gains.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: I told you this year we've done a lot of work with parenting young adults. And I couldn't agree with what you're saying more. We have a new coaching group that we started in March for parents of young adults. So it's only been running, the rest of our coaching groups have been running for 10 years, this one is only about five months.

Diane Dempster: And young adult we mean 18 to 30.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: To whatever.

Pete Wright: Okay.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: So a new couple came into the group this last week and they hadn't been in all year, but they got a chance to see some of the previous recordings before they came into the group. And when we did celebrations, which we do at the beginning of every call, they came in and said, "We just want to let you guys know," they were talking to the other nine parents in the room, whatever, "We want you to know how much progress you've made. Because we can really see the progress you've made in these last five months." Right?

Nikki Kinzer: Wow.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: It was unbelievable.

Nikki Kinzer: So impactful.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Because you could see the impact on the ... it was just the whole room was almost in tears. The Zoom room, right?

Pete Wright: Uh-huh (affirmative). Right.

Nikki Kinzer: The Zoom room.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: But at the end of the day, part of what coaching is about is slowing down and pausing and giving ourselves a chance to see what is working instead of just standing through it.

Diane Dempster: And the important piece in what you were just saying is that it takes time. And a lot of times because we talk about taking the marathon view. And because we're so anxious to get it fixed right now because we're all upset and urgent and that stuff we talked about earlier, we don't notice that over time it is getting better. Even though it's not fixed completely, it is getting better than it was.

Pete Wright: Yeah. Oh. 100%. That is absolutely the case. This whole idea that at the next turn there's going to be failure is might always be in the back of my mind. Never unintentionally is it around the next corner there's going to be success, right? I'm not conditioned to expect it. It is work to expect awesome every day.

Diane Dempster: And what if it's not about expecting awesome. But what if it's like wait. Maybe this is that time that they'll get it.

Pete Wright: Yeah.

Diane Dempster: It's that sort of if you can focus on, if you can change that, shift that just a little bit, Pete, and be willing to consider that it might work instead of being convinced that it won't.

Pete Wright: Well, I think you and I are saying the same thing. For me, awesome is it might work.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: And that you also have to be able to paint the vision, right?

Pete Wright: Yeah.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: You have to see what awesome, what the next incarnation of awesome looks like. Because we have this tendency, so we see this a lot with parents of middle school kids.

Pete Wright: Sure.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: They start catastrophizing because this kid's not going to be able to take care of an apartment when they're 25.

Nikki Kinzer: And they're 12.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: And that's true. But they're only 12.

Pete Wright: And they're 12. Yeah.

Diane Dempster: They're only 12.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Right. So getting a realistic vision of what's next, what the next step is for them, what that next increment is, is part of a lot of our work is shifting expectations.

Pete Wright: This is the ADHD problem though. I mean, my perspective is always projecting the crap I don't trust about myself.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Of course.

Pete Wright: Right? I'm already conditioned not to expect myself to be able to see around that next corner at all, let alone expect awesome. Right? Right?

Nikki Kinzer: Well, it's interesting because with my experience, I think I'm still- my issue is I was only looking at it from my perspective and what I know and my knowledge. And not really looking at it from his with what he doesn't know because why would he know? He's never been to college, he's never had to do these things. But when you said the 30%, it totally makes sense. Because in his mind, he's got it taken care of because he's met every single deadline that he's had to make. He's on his way. It's just really enlightening.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: So, here's my number one tool for parents of young adults. Ready? One question. It's the only question you need other than having a good relationship and all that other stuff. Ready? How do you want me to handle it when? How do you want me to handle it when registration, I know that there's a registration coming and I'm worried that you might miss a deadline. What would you like me to do? Remember going back to that sense of putting the agency back on them. How do you want me to handle it when you ask me to wake you up in the morning, but when I come in you shoo me away? How do you want me to handle it when I know you're going to be late for work today because you haven't gotten out of bed yet? Whatever it is, when we ask that question, we call it designing. When we design with our kids and give them permission to direct us in how to support them, then we've got not only the connection and the communication and a great vibe going there, but you actually know how they want you. I had a kid at one point who literally asked us to get a spray bottle for water to get them out of bed in the morning. And one of my favorite stories of all times was this noise and I go upstairs and my husband has got my kid by the ankle, who's got the bed by the leg, and they're scraping across the floor. The bed, the kid, and everybody's cracking up. We had permission. We did not go into that room with a spray bottle of water because it was our idea.

Nikki Kinzer: Right. Right.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Right?

Nikki Kinzer: Yeah.

Diane Dempster: So the caution I want to add to what you're saying, Elaine, is that if you're like Nikki and you're worried that your kid is going to screw up and you say, "How should I handle it when you screw up?"

Nikki Kinzer: Yeah. Don't do that.

Diane Dempster: They might be a little defensive.

Nikki Kinzer: So I won't do that.

Diane Dempster: Yeah. You want to give them a chance to make it work. And if it doesn't work, then say, "Hey, if this happens."

Nikki Kinzer: Which is cool. And I can kind of see that happening, or that question being used even with younger high school and middle school kids too.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Yes. Absolutely.

Nikki Kinzer: Especially with consequences or whatever you want to call them. Maybe they got a poor grade or they did something. I remember asking well, what do you think is fair? What do you think about this? And really it is amazing because especially with my son, if he did something wrong and he knew he did something wrong, he would take full responsibility.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: And probably put a more punitive response than you would.

Nikki Kinzer: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Pete Wright: Totally.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Most of the time.

Nikki Kinzer: And when he didn't think he was wrong, he would fight, fight, fight, fight. Which always made me think, okay, I'm not getting the full story. Because he was so adamant that he had a reason or whatever. But yeah. It is interesting to hear what they're thinking and saying.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: That would be the secondary question. The first one is how do you want me to handle it? The second one is what's in it for them? If we can just as parents ask ourselves the question, what's in it for her? Because she's not going to do this because we think it's good for her to eat healthy right now so that she grows up and doesn't.

Nikki Kinzer: Right.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: That's not really. We know that's good for her, but that's not what's in it for her.

Nikki Kinzer: Right.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: So, if we can ask ourselves that question, it really helps us take their lens.

Diane Dempster: And we talked about this earlier, Elaine, but about agenda. And a lot of times as parents we want our kids to want what we want. We want them to clean their room because it's a good thing to clean their room.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Because they think it's a good idea. They want them to agree with us, right?

Diane Dempster: Yeah. Or we want them to get good grades because they know that if they get good grades then they'll get into a good ... it's all this stuff that we know as grownups, that that's our agenda. And if you're trying to get your kid to do something that's your agenda, but not yet theirs. It doesn't mean you can't do it, but it's a whole other thing than if you're helping your kid figure out something, solve a problem that they want to solve, not a problem that you want to solve. That's definitely a place to start.

Nikki Kinzer: You're so wise.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Your son wants to get out of that house and go to college. So that's a problem he wants to solve.

Nikki Kinzer: Yeah.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Right?

Nikki Kinzer: It's true.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Yeah.

Nikki Kinzer: It's true. Wow. This is so helpful. Thank you guys so much.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: It's so fun to have real life examples right now.

Nikki Kinzer: I know.

Diane Dempster: Current.

Pete Wright: I didn't see that coming at all. I stand relieved. That was amazing.

Nikki Kinzer: I want you guys to have some time to talk about your coaching programs because I know the Sanity School has been around for a long, long time. You have other things that are going on. What is it that you do? How do you help people? What do our listeners need to know?

Diane Dempster: So we do virtual training and coaching and support for parents. And we do that for parents of what we call complex kids. So complex kids struggle with life or learning. It's that simple. They may be 3, they may be 33. But they're struggling, typically with some executive function challenges, whether it's ADHD, autism, anxiety, you name it. There's lots of things that kind of cause executive function challenges. And recommended treatment in that instance is something called behavior training, behavior therapy. And that's really about helping the parents, training the parents to create an environment where the kids can actually change their behavior. So, what we do is train parents and we coach parents so that they can take that information and actually make a practical and sustainable. And we also provide a supportive community environment.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: We created Sanity School because we realized that our parents in our coaching program were still missing the foundational training. And by that I'm not talking about information. It's not information about what is ADHD or anxiety or learning disabilities. But it's the context of what's happening with these complex kids and what's the environment that they need to set them up to be successful, which is really what we've been talking about all day, right? And so we created Sanity School. The secret of Sanity School is what we're really doing is training parents in coaching skills. We're not training them to become coaches, but we're teaching them a whole ton of foundational coaching skills to help them improve the way they interact with and communicate with their kids to help them improve their relationship dynamics, to help them understand the value of that, to help them calm themselves down so that they can build trust and be in relationship with their kids.

Diane Dempster: And ultimately so that they can help their kids to become more independent. Which is exactly what we've been talking about.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Right. And so it starts with this foundational, with shifting the communication patterns and then once we get parents through the training in Sanity School, then we often move them into group coaching or private coaching where they can start to practice. But one of the things Diane and I have figured out in the last couple of years is that information is not enough. And so often parents, a kid gets diagnosed and the parent gets referred to CHADD or [inaudible 00:46:47] or wherever they get sent. Great resources. They're all information.

Nikki Kinzer: Yep. You're right.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: We do great webinars. It's still information. At some point, you have to figure out what am I going to do with that information. How am I going to apply it in my life right now? And I truly believe, if every parent with any kind of a complex kid could just take Sanity School, they would understand how to communicate better with their kid and set the whole dynamic up for more success in their family. So much more calm, so much more confident, so much less stress. And it's not because we're so brilliant. It's because we took the foundational concepts of coaching and we made it really easy for parents to access. And it really makes a difference. 100%.

Nikki Kinzer: Oh, I can only imagine. Because I just think about the years of times or different times in the last few 19 years because he's almost 19 where I just felt so alone. I felt like I didn't know what to do. And I felt like there wasn't anybody that could understand. And when we would go to therapy, the therapist was not ... I mean, he was nice. But not helpful. Because again, it was here are the books you should read about highly sensitive children. Here's the book you should read about this or whatever. And again, it's like that's information, great. But I'm not going to sit and read that book. And it was really hard to know what to do. And it was really interesting that you say coaching because as a trained coach, I did find that I communicated much better with him if I put my coaching hat on and started asking questions.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Exactly.

Nikki Kinzer: Instead of telling.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: That doesn't mean you become their coach.

Nikki Kinzer: No, no, no, no. Not at all.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: We want parents to be their kids' parents.

Nikki Kinzer: Right.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: But if you can bring these skills to your conversations, it changes everything. And part of what you just spoke to, so when you look, Diane was talking about behavior management training. It's the number one recommended treatment for kids with ADHD is for their parents to get training. In addition to medication, right? Those are the two number one treatments. Most parents never get a referral for training. And there's a whole bunch of reasons for that. But part of what is included in the training, part of it is shifting perspectives, we've been talking about that today. Part of that is teaching parents how to set up an environment that supports the child and fosters independence. We've been talking about that. And part of it is giving the parents access to a supportive community where they realize they're not alone. And to a professional where they can get feedback. So in Sanity School, they get the six classes, but then they get three months of support in our community. They get each other and they can call us twice a month, they can call in and talk to us and ask us questions and get [inaudible 00:49:43] coaching. Because that's what the treatment requires is that the parent gets some support that's more than just putting your hand on the knob as you're walking out of your kid's therapist's office.

Nikki Kinzer: Right.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Right? That 5, 10 minutes is not sufficient.

Diane Dempster: So, there's a bunch of parents who are in the situation you were, Nikki, where it's just they get five minutes with a therapist here and there. There's a whole bunch of other parents that are on the internet at 4:00 in the morning reading article after article. Bouncing from podcast to podcast, and we both have podcasts. We both have great podcasts. And they're bouncing from podcast to podcast. As a coach, all of us know that about 10% of change is about information. 90% of change is about practice. And if you're struggling to put these ideas that you're finding on the internet or the podcast or wherever else into practice, which is what most of us have trouble doing, partly because it's overwhelming to be a parent of complex kid. Partly because a large number of us also have our own neurodiversity going on, which makes it hard for us to do stuff. Part of it is because it's just overwhelming.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: It's hard to ask for help.

Diane Dempster: It's too much.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Freaking out.

Diane Dempster: It's all of these things, right?

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Yeah.

Diane Dempster: So that's what parents need. They need information and they need help to put it into practice.

Nikki Kinzer: Wow.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: And so that's in a nutshell, that's what we try really hard to do as affordably and accessibly as possible. We've been virtual the whole time because we knew that parents didn't need one more office to drive to.

Nikki Kinzer: Right. Yeah. Absolutely.

Pete Wright: Well, we'll absolutely get the links in the show notes for this.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Yes. Thank you.

Pete Wright: Absolutely. And also the podcast Parenting with Impact. And also anything else? I mean good lord you guys are doing a lot.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: We do. Sometimes we think we're a little crazy. But mostly Diane thinks I'm a little crazy. It works.

Pete Wright: It works.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: Because you know I am a little bit. But yeah. We have an amazing resource, our website. It's got a really robust award winning blog. But what I would say to parents above all else is give yourself permission to do a program like Sanity School. Parents have this tendency to feel like if I've got a dollar to spend, I'm going to spend it on my kids. And let me tell you that if you take just a little bit and spend it on you, it will make all those other dollars go a whole lot further.

Nikki Kinzer: Well, I just want to say thank you.

Pete Wright: Absolutely perfect.

Nikki Kinzer: Just thank you for doing what you guys do. Because this is something that is so needed. And there's not a lot of resources out there where parents can go and get this kind of support. And thank you, both of you for what you do.

Elaine Taylor-Klaus: You're welcome. Thank you for that acknowledgement. I appreciate it.

Pete Wright: Thank you everybody for hanging out with us and listening to the show and downloading the show. We sure appreciate your time and your attention. If you have something to contribute to the conversation and you weren't able to catch the livestream, make sure you head over to the show talk channel in the Discord server and you can join us right there by becoming a supporting member at the deluxe level. On behalf of the wonderful Diane Dempster and Elaine Taylor-Klaus and of course, Nikki Kinzer, I'm Pete Wright, and we'll catch you next time right here on Taking Control, the ADHD podcast.

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