We’ve talked plenty about asking for help. This week, James Ochoa and his son Jules join us to take on the other half: what happens when someone actually helps you, and why that can feel so much harder.
Jules has spent the past year rebuilding James’s practice from the inside, which means James has been on the receiving end of a lot of help he didn’t ask for. In this conversation, we explore why unrequested help can feel like an accusation, where the imposter voice comes from, and how to tell the difference between gratitude and the debt ledger so many of us carry. Jules shares what he’s learned about how to help someone with ADHD without triggering the walls, and James is remarkably open about how much of this still gets him, 30 years into the work.
Plus, Jules calls his dad out live on air, and it goes about how you’d expect.
Links & Notes
11Q Your ADHD, the free yearly reflection tool from James and The Life Empowerment Center
The Complex, the audio drama Jules wrote and produced with James
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Pete Wright:
Hello, everybody, and welcome to Taking Control: The ADHD Podcast on TruStory FM. I'm Pete Wright, and I'm here with Nikki Kinzer.
Nikki Kinzer:
Hello, everyone. Hello, Pete Wright.
Pete Wright:
Nikki, are you ready for today's experience?
Nikki Kinzer:
Yes, I'm ready. I'm seated.
Pete Wright:
Are you sure? All right. It's not often— I guess it's kind of often that we have a Hall of Fame ADHD guest. It's not as often that we get a representative portion of the whole family. Today, we've got James and Jules Ochoa here, and we're gonna be talking about receiving help and how hard that can be for us with ADHD.
Before we get into that, hey, everybody, we gotta talk about the Patreon community, because if you are a regular listener, this is the place you need to go next. Members get to join us for the live stream podcast, where they get the before and the after of the show. If you are just listening to this right now, you didn't hear the before. You didn't hear the after. And it's chaos reigning, sometimes. And we're very proud of the chaos. We love that you get it. You get access to the episodes a week early, and you get access to our double secret channels in our Discord server. We'd love to invite you there as well.
Nikki Kinzer:
What's "double secret" mean, exactly? Why are they double secret?
Pete Wright:
Well, they're double secret because of Animal House, the movie, where they put him on double secret probation.
Nikki Kinzer:
Oh, we're really dating ourselves.
Pete Wright:
Why would I do that out loud? Why would I choose a reference that so obviously dates me? Nikki, I don't know. We don't know everything. There's science. Some questions science hasn't answered.
Nikki Kinzer:
Okay, all right. All right, keep going. They're double secret.
Pete Wright:
They're double secret. Don't forget triple secret. They're triple secret too. The thing we hear people talk about most is the community. And it is a fantastic community here around the ADHD circles of Take Control ADHD. These are all people living with ADHD who show up for each other in an incredibly special way. If you've ever wanted to be more than a listener, this is where it happens. So visit patreon.com/theadhdpodcast to learn more and to join us. And if you're not ready for that, that is just fine too. You can find us at takecontroladhd.com. Connect with us on the socials, join the Discord, or sign up for our weekly email. We'd love to have you wherever you land.
All right, here we are, James and Jules Ochoa. We've done a lot of podcasts about asking for help, and today we're taking on the other half. What happens when someone actually helps you? A friend or a family member offers to carry the bag and you hear yourself saying, "No, no, I've got it." Or maybe you say yes and spend the rest of the week trying to pay them back. Receiving help can be harder than asking for it, and the people trying to help us feel that too.
So our voices for this one: James Ochoa, a licensed professional counselor who has spent more than 30 years counseling and coaching adults with ADHD, author of Focused Forward: Navigating the Storms of Adult ADHD, one of our very favorite books around here, and our Hall of Fame guest. And he has brought his son, producer, confidant, consigliere at this point, Jules Ochoa, who, relevant to this chat, has been offering and actually providing help across James's practice. I'm very excited to hear how this is going, boys. Welcome to the show.
James Ochoa:
Well, always good to be here.
Jules Ochoa:
Good to be here.
Pete Wright:
Are you feeling helpful?
Jules Ochoa:
Actually, yes, entirely so. But I'll tell you, this is multiple years in the runout. Or in the coming, right?
Pete Wright:
In the making, yeah.
Jules Ochoa:
In the making, yeah. And so a lot of people will recognize that we did our podcast, The Complex, back in 2019, whatever it was.
Pete Wright:
Okay, and let's just say, because you just tossed that off, The Complex was a feat of audio recording and engineering.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah. It was.
Pete Wright:
It was a massive undertaking.
Jules Ochoa:
Yes.
Pete Wright:
With a full cast and storylines and the works.
Jules Ochoa:
Yep. Yes, yeah.
Pete Wright:
And you were behind that.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah, I was the full director, producer, editor. I helped write the script too with my co-writer, Robin Chotzinoff. It was a whole thing, but I loved doing it.
It's always been something that I've enjoyed doing, helping James with his practice and with his ideas and ways of going about the ADHD world, because I do understand how significant of a role we can actually play in affecting that space. In my career and in other ventures in life, they're not so much aligned with directly helping people or changing lives or being impactful. It's more just paying the bills. And I've always really gravitated more towards that space of actually helping and impacting people's lives. And so, in this latest edition of me rearranging James's practice—
James Ochoa:
That's a good term. That's a good term.
Jules Ochoa:
It really came about from, I think, a desire and a need that James had to start shifting his practice—
James Ochoa:
We'll come back to that.
Jules Ochoa:
—to something that would be sustainable in retirement.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Jules Ochoa:
And looking at the whole thing, it was like, okay, well, you can't see 25 clients a week into your 80s. I mean, you could, but you're gonna be burnt.
Nikki Kinzer:
Yeah.
Jules Ochoa:
You're gonna be burnt pretty hard.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Jules Ochoa:
And so I love taking an operational stance, an operational view on something. And so I just dove into everything that James has going and started chipping away at how we can rebuild it.
So I'll leave it there for James to react, or for y'all to react.
James Ochoa:
Yeah, yeah, okay.
Pete Wright:
Yeah. Well, I think there are two things I want to do as I turn to you, James. And the first one is to talk to us clinically a little bit. If you separate yourself from the experience and the vulnerability of asking for help, walk us through what happens in the ADHD brain when the help equation rears its head. When you are faced with having to accept an accommodation or an assistance. And then we'll talk about you.
James Ochoa:
Okay, okay. Good frame. That helps me to kind of put that aside. So the clinical space starts with the reactivity, right? Whether it's external or internal. So when you're receiving help, you're still going to have a reactive event internally. You're going to be, okay, will the help last long enough? Will it be the right help? Am I gonna fall off another cliff because I followed someone else's direction?
So we have that space of debate that doesn't go away, even when we've asked for good help. And so when we go to ask for help, one, we have that response. Why? Because we have our own neurological mindset with how we see the world and how we believe we could use that help and it would be effective and meaningful. But there are several things that happen when I start to receive that help. One, I can get reactive. But two, suddenly my mind can change, and I become inconsistent. Okay, I don't want to do it anymore. But the other person's contracted. The other person is already on board. And so it's running a channel of help that's coming at you potentially from a linear point of view. You've got to be able to neurodiversify that, if that makes sense. How do I make it so that it's going to fit for me as it comes to me?
So this is going to bleed over, Pete, into both sides. There's no way I can talk about one without the other, because it's what's happened to me. And so my ability to be open and vulnerable in that space, that's a decades-long development. Someone with ADHD doesn't just learn to be open. I mean, we're open based on impulsivity and hyperactivity and not thinking about things. We're open. But being open consciously, it takes a real effort to stand out there and say, "Oh, that's not working for me. Oh, okay, you're coming at me like this. This isn't gonna help."
Pete Wright:
Well, and often to the point where you don't know that that reactivity is so sort of pernicious. Like, you don't know that you're— I could say all the livelong day, "I'm open to help," until you offer it, and then I have the feeling.
James Ochoa:
Yes. Or I have the response of, this isn't working, or I'm worried about it, or I'm overthinking it again. This is part of what I've told Jules over and over. I just come to him. I'm like, "Okay, my head's going crazy again. This is what I—" And Jules is like, "Yep, that's pretty normal."
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah. Right. And that's what I wanted to comment on. I want to make sure that there's no disbelief here that this doesn't affect James just as much as it affects everybody else.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Jules Ochoa:
Even though he has practiced this for literal decades—
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Jules Ochoa:
—he still gets caught in the place of defensiveness, of cutting things off, of not being willing to receive help. And so that was a big dynamic. And I'll bring it into, I guess, less of the clinical space and more of the personal space here. That was a really big dynamic of us working together initially. I was like, "Yeah, include me on all the things and we'll work together." And it was months and months where he was just like, "Oh, I had this meeting with this person," and I was like, "Did you need me on that?"
Pete Wright:
That's not what this looks like.
Jules Ochoa:
That's right.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Jules Ochoa:
And so over time, we kept talking about that, and it shifted and it changed.
James Ochoa:
Right, right. So I had agreed to it, okay, but getting consistent with it, as I said. I mean, there's a visible piece there. I can just go ahead and throw another bomb in here, which is the imposter space, the imposter syndrome. Am I really— God, am I that valuable for this kind of help? It still kicks off, you know? Those things don't go away. So in the receiving of help, there are multiple things that activate.
And as I've talked about for years, how does one resource themselves when help's coming at them? And yes, I'm 65. I have a very successful practice. I love what I do. And I'm tearing it apart. I've literally had nightmares. Same kind of thing happened when I did Focused Forward. Why do I do it, Pete? Because I think it's helpful on the ADHD spectrum to understand this from the inside out. You've got to go into things to understand this help piece. We're already vulnerable. So being consciously vulnerable, it's just like, okay, I know now what I'm asking for, and I know it's going to be reactive, and I know it's gonna be hard. That's not an easy thing to do.
So yeah, I still consider myself one of the great experiments on the adult ADD spectrum. I just keep pushing into that space. And this is a big one. I mean, I've done some real reveals with y'all, back when I screwed up the audio on my book, and it was one of the worst storms I'd ever had. Because we've got to have courage on the adult ADD spectrum to face those things. We're not going to have that courage if myself as a leader, or other people, don't face it. We don't talk about it. We don't expose it, which is why I love y'all's podcast. And yeah, why would I ask about my whole family coming on here? Because I think that that's what people with ADHD need. It's not like I want to be this poster child for it, but I think it's a real authentic leadership kind of space. And Jules has done this with me. So does that make sense?
Pete Wright:
It does. And Nikki, one of the things we were talking about before— and I think James's comment about being in the imposter space really triggers this. I'm curious what you see. The whole statement: if I ask for help, I'm demonstrating that I can't do it.
Nikki Kinzer:
Oh, for sure.
James Ochoa:
Yes.
Jules Ochoa:
Yep, yeah.
Nikki Kinzer:
That's like the immediate belief, right? That something's wrong with me. And I can't keep up, I can't do this, I'm taking too long, everybody else is doing it. Absolutely, there's a shame component that's very, very real.
Pete Wright:
Is there a difference between that and accepting help when it is offered but not requested?
James Ochoa:
Yeah. Because for me, that's 99% of the time. It feels like it's coming out of left field. And I immediately shut in, unless someone can convince me, or I have to sit with it for 24 to 48 hours. Okay, I can see why they're—
Nikki Kinzer:
Do you feel defensive?
James Ochoa:
But generally, I feel defensive, but I feel more like on guard. It's like, uh-oh.
Nikki Kinzer:
Yeah, right. That's a good way of saying it, yeah.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
It's like, all of a sudden the music's changed. It's become suspenseful.
Pete Wright:
Yes.
Nikki Kinzer:
Right.
James Ochoa:
It's like, wait a minute, I didn't ask for that.
Nikki Kinzer:
And what am I missing?
Pete Wright:
Right. Right. Right.
Nikki Kinzer:
Am I missing something?
Pete Wright:
Right. And I linger on that because that's my experience of it.
James Ochoa:
Yes.
Nikki Kinzer:
Yeah.
Pete Wright:
Like, if somebody offers help that I didn't ask for, then they've noticed something I didn't notice.
James Ochoa:
What am I missing? Yes.
Nikki Kinzer:
That I didn't, yeah, for sure.
James Ochoa:
Yes.
Pete Wright:
And they're coming out of a blind spot, and I feel ill-equipped to even address it because I thought everything was fine.
Nikki Kinzer:
Right, right.
James Ochoa:
Right.
Pete Wright:
And that's the equation helpful people don't understand.
James Ochoa:
Yes.
Nikki Kinzer:
Yeah. Or even if you know everything is not fine, you're still kind of believing that it is.
Pete Wright:
Right.
Nikki Kinzer:
And now it's like, oh, what just happened?
Pete Wright:
Right.
Jules Ochoa:
That's such a crazy trap. That is such a crazy trap that we get locked in.
Pete Wright:
Yes.
Jules Ochoa:
And so much, dude. I can't even begin to tell you guys the things that James and I have gone through in relation to directly that. Of him just feeling like everything is fine and everything is dandy and all the things are going in the right direction, and so he just keeps plowing forward. And where the vulnerability comes in that he's talking about, and where the imposter syndrome really comes in, is when I dived into his practice, I immediately just started pulling all the skeletons out. And I was just like, "What's this thing? What's that thing?"
James Ochoa:
I'm like, wait.
Jules Ochoa:
"Why is that that way?" And then he was just like, "Hold on, wait, no, this is not—" And I was like, "Well, we should be doing finances X, Y, and Z way, and then we should be—"
James Ochoa:
"What are you doing here?" So, all right, here's one brief example. This is really funny. Okay, we're already here. So QuickBooks, right? I've had QuickBooks for 25 years. How many expense accounts did I have in QuickBooks?
Jules Ochoa:
Oh my God.
James Ochoa:
Eighty-seven. How many income accounts did I have? Thirty-seven. Jules is like, "That's a lot for one person."
Jules Ochoa:
Which, yeah—
Pete Wright:
And you say, "Jules, those skeletons are in a closet for a reason."
James Ochoa:
I'm like, "We're working fine." He's like, "No." He's like, "What are these?" I'm like, "I don't really know." So we start looking at them. They're 20 years old. Twenty-five years old. I used them once, never. Again, it's a keeping up with.
So here's this weird part. We need the help. Receiving the help is challenging. Just accepting that my brain is altered. It's different. And that is a hard thing to do as an adult on an ongoing basis. It just is. It's like, "Ah, I swore I was tall enough for that. I know I was." And it's just, whoop, missed again. Oops, missed again.
Jules Ochoa:
I've got an interesting question here. So it seems like, in the scenarios that we're talking about, those with ADHD want to take on the world, want to take on everything and be the driver and operator for all of it. When in fact, in society, and this is very logical, so it may not get into the emotional piece of it, but in society and in systems in general, everybody has a specialty. No one person does all the things. And if they do, they are a single point of failure, and you're inadvertently going to keep hitting walls. And so how can we shift that idea and dynamic for someone with ADHD, from "I am everything, I do everything" to "I have very clear specialties that I am incredibly good at, and I outsource and delegate the rest of it"?
James Ochoa:
Okay.
Jules Ochoa:
Like, maybe that's super triggering.
Pete Wright:
Okay. Uh, yeah.
Jules Ochoa:
I don't know, but—
Pete Wright:
I feel like you just backed yourself into a firing line.
Jules Ochoa:
I did. And very intentionally, right? Because I have the same kind of thing that James does. I love the vulnerability.
Pete Wright:
Yeah. Well, I mean, first and foremost, before the experts say anything, for me, it's because I have such a documented history of not being able to do all the things. And since I don't have enough of an opportunity to make up for it by doing my competency at its very best, I feel like I just need to take it all on and make everybody happy, because I'm just taking more shots at the happiness bat.
Jules Ochoa:
Prove people wrong. Sure, yeah. That makes sense. So you're just trying to prove people wrong, essentially.
Pete Wright:
It's all shots on goal, baby.
Jules Ochoa:
Love it. Okay. It's all shots on goal.
James Ochoa:
I also think, and Nikki, you will know this, people with ADHD see the whole picture at once. And because we see the whole picture at once and everything that's there, well, of course we can do it all. We're not going to evaluate that I can't do it. What are you talking about? That's sole survivorship, that's stimulation, that's run yourself ragged once again. And so there's these— again, we keep running into these pieces that don't go away. And they have these catch-22s that are, I don't know, permanent? Permanent catch-22s that you learn to live within. How do you learn to live within? You normalize vulnerability. You normalize exposure. And you asked me, it's like, why would you want to do it that way? I'm like, because—
Jules Ochoa:
Can I call out a potential logical fallacy that you just stated?
James Ochoa:
Sure.
Jules Ochoa:
And y'all are getting a glimpse into our dynamic here. And this is why—
James Ochoa:
Sure. Here comes that feeling, Nikki.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Jules Ochoa:
This is live. You said, we as ADHD, we see the whole picture.
James Ochoa:
Right.
Jules Ochoa:
Are you sure? Like, I think—
Nikki Kinzer:
What picture are you looking at?
Jules Ochoa:
I think you feel like you see the whole picture.
James Ochoa:
Okay, I'm going away now.
Jules Ochoa:
But this is the logical fallacy that happens.
Pete Wright:
Oh, my God.
Nikki Kinzer:
That's so good.
James Ochoa:
Okay.
Jules Ochoa:
You feel like you see the whole picture, and thus this dynamic gets built in.
James Ochoa:
Just the word "fallacy" has all the reactivity to it that you can imagine.
Jules Ochoa:
Totally, totally, totally.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
Just history. So what does one do when one has the belief they're seeing the whole picture? But it's those kindergarten details that I'm missing that are pretty critical. Oh, it doesn't get tied. Oh, I forgot to call the person to order the beautiful ideas that I was going to do, and now they're not showing up on this wonderful day that everyone is showing up for.
Pete Wright:
It's like standing in a museum, right?
James Ochoa:
It's what happens.
Pete Wright:
Like, I see a lot of parts of a lot of pictures. I don't think I see any one whole one. I don't think I've ever thought about tearing the metaphor apart until you did that to your dad live.
Nikki Kinzer:
Yeah.
Pete Wright:
But it really— I mean, that actually describes my experience to a T.
James Ochoa:
It describes all of our experiences. It's like someone loving, caring will say— Nikki, as a coach, might say, "Well, you sure you see the whole picture?" And you're like, oh—
Nikki Kinzer:
I didn't even catch that.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Nikki Kinzer:
I'm very impressed.
James Ochoa:
I'm just like, oh, because it just tumbled.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Jules Ochoa:
But I also want to be clear here.
James Ochoa:
It's like, oh, okay.
Jules Ochoa:
Even people without ADHD don't see the whole picture. That's what I'm talking about in terms of delegating and being communal and talking about it in a network.
James Ochoa:
Yes, but remembering that's underactive in our beautiful brains, and so it just gets incon—
Jules Ochoa:
Right. Exactly. And that's where the triggery stuff starts happening, because there's been such a crazy history of things going wrong in that respect.
James Ochoa:
Right.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
So how does one accept that help? How does one let that happen? You get people who have unconditional love, care, support around you, who get it, who can say something like that, and I know he's not gonna run away from me and he's not gonna shame me for it. It's not going to get put on a meme on social media. Although someone might now.
Jules Ochoa:
Well, yeah.
James Ochoa:
It's a pretty good one. "You think you see everything?" Oh, well, bam!
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
"Expert explodes on screen."
And that's what it is. And I don't know what else to do other than to keep stepping into it. And have the tolerance and the normalization. And that's why I'm such a banshee for resourcing now. I'm just like, I gotta have some protectors around me. That's why I was dancing to Bruno Mars five minutes before this, so I could keep my energy up.
Nikki Kinzer:
Mm-hmm.
James Ochoa:
Because if I didn't have the stature that I had in the relationship with Jules, oh my God, the shame. I mean, I came close to the shame attack. You saw me— I was like, "I'm getting the hell out of here."
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
And I could play with it a little bit, but it was there.
Pete Wright:
Oh, no, no, yeah, there is definitely a kindred spirit feeling.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
Pete Wright:
Like, I was like, oh, he just called James out. I should probably back into the bush too, Homer Simpson style.
Jules Ochoa:
Like, oh God, yeah.
Pete Wright:
And I think that's one of the things that gets to me. You talk about resourcing. It's this building of this muscle of rationalism, where I am allowed to remind myself every day that I don't see the whole picture, that I have to constantly be curious and investigating the dark corners that I have convinced myself I do already see. And that's a catch-22 I don't necessarily feel equipped to handle.
James Ochoa:
Right, and so how does one frame it as an adventure? Okay, I missed something. I'm gonna learn something new. This is a new adventure. And that's how I have to flip it, pretty quickly.
Pete Wright:
Yeah, I think that's a good one.
James Ochoa:
If you don't flip it— I mean, Nikki knows the shame side.
Nikki Kinzer:
It will stay there, yeah.
James Ochoa:
I mean, they're just insidious.
Nikki Kinzer:
Mm-hmm.
James Ochoa:
I will just tuck and run. And that's what, you know, the pods of support, those kind of things. But the receiving of help is as multifaceted and layered as the asking for help. It's on both sides. But I don't think we talk about that much.
Nikki Kinzer:
And I also just want to say, I think that the person who's giving the help wants to help. And we forget about that, because we think so much about what we're experiencing that we're not thinking about that other person who's actually wanting to help.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
And that can be really helpful, Nikki, to really understand the intention of the individual and why I think it's important. And I've asked Jules this more than a few times in the last seven or eight months. "Are you sure you want to do this? Are you sure you really want to help me?" Because there's that, you know. And he's like, "Yes, yes."
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
And so how do you build those pods of support, where people are giving you that help that you can trust, they love you, they care about you? And man, it's just such a multifaceted space. But it's a great topic. It's super important for us.
Jules Ochoa:
One thing I've seen you do, James, that I think is incredibly helpful, and can be helpful for a lot of people, and actually what we're starting to build towards in the Life Empowerment Center, is building little feedback loops for yourself, where you can have automated self-reflection or automated little pops to get yourself out of the tunnel vision that everyone, and especially people with ADHD, find themselves in. And so one of the things I've seen James do is, within his resourcing, he's constantly reflecting on these things. We're writing it down. We're putting it in spaces outside of our head so that we can actually reflect on it and say, what are the priorities here? Why are we doing X, Y, and Z?
And one of the tools that we actually built for this is something called 11Q Your ADHD. You can go to 11q.tlec.info to use this tool. It's free, it's open to the public, but it's a way for you to respond to 11 questions that are all meant for you to reflect back on yourself, reflect on your systems. You can put little blurbs if you want, and that gets sent back to you.
James Ochoa:
Right. And I released that last year as a pilot here with y'all.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
And so it's up and running now.
Nikki Kinzer:
Mm-hmm.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
It is an interesting feedback loop. What does the help provide? Nikki, you said trusting or knowing that the people who are helping you, they want to do that. They love you, they care about you, they want to help you. That helps with the consistency of going back and looking at it. I go back and look at the notes and review. Okay, where were we? Where were we? It is helpful, because there will be things I forget.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
Pete Wright:
I want to talk about the ledger that I feel like is a natural outcome of ADHD and receiving help, even in asking for help, which is the degree to which we carry stress around paying back. Because you guys have both used a lot of the word "unconditional," and that demonstrates a real love and respect for one another. And that's not universal between people who have help. It takes, dare I say, lifetimes to cultivate. And sometimes you don't have it. And I'm curious how you approach separating indebtedness from gratitude.
Jules Ochoa:
That's a wonderful question.
James Ochoa:
It's a perceptive flip. So when I feel that indebtedness, shifting it with: what did I receive? What help did I receive? Is there something I can give back in a meaningful way? Versus indebtedness that has a guilt-driven response of shame. Like, I'm worthless, I'm gonna owe the world the rest of my life, and I'll never catch up.
Pete Wright:
You helped me do something that I am now convinced I was incapable of doing myself. What do I do?
James Ochoa:
Right. Right. And now I feel indebted to you. Well, if I feel indebted to you, then I shift that into gratitude. It becomes, okay, wow, I'm grateful that that person helped me. And if I feel that level of debt, though, a lot of times I will also talk to people about it. "Hey, I feel like I owe you back. I feel like I want—" And the vast majority of the time, it's, "No, no, no, no. I did this. I got more from it by helping you."
So there's that vulnerability piece again. It's like asking, okay, I feel indebted to you about this. And I think I've taught this to Jules several times. It's like, I just don't even know the space. He's my son, he works with me in my practice, I'm vulnerable with him on the ADD spectrum. And the joke is, I was joking with him when we first started this, I'm like, "Well, you're gonna have to deal with this now, or you're gonna have to deal with this later."
Pete Wright:
You're inheriting it either way.
Jules Ochoa:
Right, that's exactly right.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
"You're my heir to all of this."
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
"So you may want to come clean it up now."
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
"Get your brother in here too." But that's how you play with it. So how do you deal with that indebtedness? You can play with it, you can ask about it. It certainly drives huge guilt-related responses. That's how I play with it.
Jules Ochoa:
I want to specifically dig into one piece that you said. You said, shift it to gratitude. That's very easy to say.
James Ochoa:
I was waiting for someone to call me out on this.
Jules Ochoa:
Very hard to do in practice, I think. And so I hear a couple things that you do to try and shift that. For one, get it out of your head. Talk to somebody about it. Be vulnerable in that respect.
James Ochoa:
Right.
Jules Ochoa:
There's an aspect that might come into that of, well, social norms kind of dictate that everybody says, "Oh no, it's fine. You don't owe me anything." But you're still gonna feel that thing, right?
James Ochoa:
Sure.
Jules Ochoa:
And so it may instead be something more along the lines of, "Hey, I want to give back to you for this thing that you did. Here are some things that I think I could do that I think would be helpful for you. Is any of this meaningful?" And so that can be a really meaningful conversation to have and open up.
James Ochoa:
Yeah, but—
Jules Ochoa:
Because we even had that kind of conversation when starting, yeah.
James Ochoa:
I know, I know, but here's the flip back. Okay.
Jules Ochoa:
Okay.
James Ochoa:
So here's me pulling Jules out in the open there. That was a very linear thought, and Nikki and I will say it's a very linear, evaluated thought. Many people with ADD are like, "You mean I'm not going to come to you with this list of, these are the things I could do for you?"
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
That's another linear process of trying to evaluate something that is just a bear for us a lot of times.
Jules Ochoa:
Sure.
James Ochoa:
I do think that it's meaningful to say, what do I do with all the help I receive in my life? Well, I work at giving back to the world in a way that's meaningful to me. Okay, so this person helped me over here. I'm doing something philanthropic, or I'm gonna help someone over here. That's one of the other ways I manage my guilt-related response to that, Pete. Okay, how can I give back to the world in a way that's meaningful, that I know people give to me? Whether that's out of my passion or all kinds of things like that. But no, I think there can be ways that I can come back, kind of like what you said, Jules, but generally that's not a thought. I don't have that clear of a thought process.
Jules Ochoa:
Fair, yeah. That makes sense.
Nikki Kinzer:
Yeah, no, it's interesting, because when we were talking about the difference between being indebted and gratitude, what comes up for me is that, as some people know, my husband has MS. And we have a neighbor who is so gracious, and he mows our yard. So every time that he mows his lawn, he comes over to ours and he mows it, and he lets us know that he's doing it. And it's the kindest thing. And it's just interesting, because I've never thought that I'm indebted to him. I am extremely grateful, and I do want to do something for him and his wife, especially as the season is ending and we're not gonna have to mow the lawn, because the grass goes dead or whatever it does in the wintertime. Obviously, I'm not a gardener.
But so that's what's been going on in my mind. I'm just full of gratitude with it.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Nikki Kinzer:
And I don't think of it as being indebted.
Pete Wright:
I think that's an interesting observation, because I definitely fight the transactional nature of help. And I have a great neighbor too. And when my neighbor does something to help me, bring my trash cans in from the curb if they've been sitting out too long—
Nikki Kinzer:
Mm-hmm.
Pete Wright:
—I think, can I afford to just write him a check for a thousand dollars? Could I get away with that?
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
Pete Wright:
You know, it's absurd.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
Pete Wright:
It's absurd where my brain goes, and vastly inappropriate. And speaking of things that are easier said than done, I like to help people too.
James Ochoa:
Shut up.
Pete Wright:
But thinking about my transactional uptake of help debt, it's hard for me to put those on the same sheet.
James Ochoa:
Yeah.
Pete Wright:
I'll drop everything and help somebody solve a problem that they have today, right?
James Ochoa:
Well, and I do think the debt sheet does come from a history of guilt response, that I haven't been able to help myself.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
People had to step in. I screwed something up again. Someone had to clean it up.
Pete Wright:
Yes.
James Ochoa:
I think that goes back to that kind of constancy of disruption that starts in the neurological space, right? The RSD stuff that Dodson talks about, that builds in the emotional distress syndrome stuff I talk about. And it's like, we have to deal with it, though, Pete, all the time.
Pete Wright:
Yeah, yes.
Nikki Kinzer:
Well, and I think with the receiving piece, I think that you do put yourself in a vulnerable situation and have to lean into that, saying that we do need the help. Like, we're not only grateful, we appreciate it. And it does help. Like, it really does. And if my husband wasn't willing to be in that vulnerable state, I could very well see him saying, "No, no, no, I've got it." Because he's still walking. He just doesn't walk very well. But he actually walks better with a lawnmower, because he has something that keeps him steady.
James Ochoa:
Right. Oh, yeah.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
Nikki Kinzer:
So he could very well do this.
James Ochoa:
Right.
Nikki Kinzer:
And I could see him saying, "No, no, no, no." But he's not. He's saying, "No, I appreciate it. This helps." And so you have to be in that spot.
James Ochoa:
It's interesting, though. I think there's something developmentally that's different on the ADHD spectrum, because I just recently had right shoulder surgery, and I was in a monster sling for six weeks, and we couldn't take our trash cans down. Our neighbor was helping us. I didn't have indebted feelings like I do on the ADD spectrum, when I get help on the ADD stuff. It's very interesting.
Pete Wright:
Fascinating.
Jules Ochoa:
That's really cool.
James Ochoa:
Very fascinating, because there's something about it. There's just something, that internal difference, that constantly kind of shakes at me.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Nikki Kinzer:
Yeah, that's the key difference, isn't it?
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
It sets up, I think— I'll just never be able to—
Jules Ochoa:
Do you think the defining factor of it is, it feels like something you missed? Versus, when you are in your sling, you're like, I know the trash can has to go down. They're taking care of it. I'm grateful for that.
James Ochoa:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, it's not even thinking about something that I missed, which I'm trying to be aware of. It's what you asked me earlier. When I don't see it at all, and someone says, "Oh—" and they help me.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
I'm like, oh my God. That's the worst one. It's the stuff I didn't see at all that someone really helps me with. And I go, oh my God, I didn't even see that.
Nikki Kinzer:
Okay, so—
James Ochoa:
I don't know why I feel—
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Nikki Kinzer:
Another example, which is so interesting, because you're right on. So this happened a few years ago, but I remember my husband organizing our attic. Like, going into our little attic area and starting to organize the attic. And you would think I'd be grateful. Oh no, no, no, no.
Jules Ochoa:
Oh no, oh no.
Nikki Kinzer:
I was almost offended, because I'm like, what? You don't think I can do it? This has been so bad that now you have to go do it? I totally got defensive, thinking that he's trying to prove a point. He's not trying to prove a point. He was just doing something that he thought he had time to do. Whatever. But it is so interesting, because you are right on. That, I was not accepting. I was like, what am I doing wrong, that you need to go in and do this for me?
Jules Ochoa:
Well, and I think a level of that really does come from a history of people getting frustrated with something not getting done, either correctly or timely or whatever it is, and just taking it and doing it, and legitimately doing it out of frustration.
Pete Wright:
Yes.
Nikki Kinzer:
Yeah. Right, right.
Jules Ochoa:
Such that when there are times where it's not out of frustration, it's out of giving, or it's care, that all gets triggered. And it's just like, yeah.
Nikki Kinzer:
But this is the thing. I don't even have ADHD, Jules.
Jules Ochoa:
Right.
Nikki Kinzer:
I don't have ADHD.
Jules Ochoa:
Oh, I know.
Nikki Kinzer:
And I was still triggered by this.
Jules Ochoa:
I know. But it's exhibiting the fact that that is a historical pattern that can happen to anyone, but is especially primed to happen for people with ADHD.
Nikki Kinzer:
Yeah, yes, yes.
James Ochoa:
Right, especially when we don't know that we don't know something might happen.
Jules Ochoa:
Yes.
Nikki Kinzer:
Right, right.
James Ochoa:
So it's like, I can be as vigilant— and that's why I do things like, oh, I relax into the adventure of my life. Something could change in a moment's notice because I didn't see it. I practice that kind of mindset. I don't know how else to manage living with hypervigilance in a functional way. And I think other people with different types of challenges, whether they're physical or mental— this is why, when I started looking at the emotional distress syndrome 20, 22 years ago, it was a chronic issue. I had to look at it as a chronic issue. We don't want to. I hate it. I still— it's just like, my wife will point something out, and it's just like, totally missed that. And that's on my best days.
Nikki Kinzer:
Okay, so we have definitely come to the conclusion it is hard to receive help, no matter what. So what do we do? How do we open ourselves up to receive it and not feel indebted, or whatever it might be, or defensive, or whatever?
James Ochoa:
Right, right. So yes, what do we do? First of all, we recognize it. You gotta recognize, okay, this is a challenge. Here it is. Step two is be as clear as you can about what will help you. It's like, okay, these people are gonna help. Appreciation, gratitude, those kind of things can be meaningful bridges to help me feel like I'm accepting it in a way. But also, going back to communicating: is this helping me? Is this help I'm receiving? I need to communicate with someone, is this helpful or not? And that's a courage space, to say, "You know, we talked about doing it this way," and this is part of what's going on with Jules, "we're talking about doing it this way, but this isn't working right now. I'm getting really freaked out by this." And so I have to have— and then he can give me some more help with it. And he has.
Jules Ochoa:
And I think it's so important too, because in that space, there's a dynamic here between, we'll just say, individual with ADHD and person helping. When the individual with ADHD is in that space of either defensiveness or activation around receiving help, or not knowing where to go, the best thing the person can do who's giving help is literally just listen and ask questions. And not prompt anymore, not push anymore, not say what they should or should not be doing, because that's just going to keep triggering it. When I see James get into that space, there's a very intentional thing that I do. I sit back in my chair, I put my hands in my lap, and I just go into listening mode. And I say, "Okay, why are you feeling this way? Where is this coming from? Tell me more about that." And it helps him get through that cycle and come to a place where he is able to not just be activated emotionally, and instead truly see more of the variables in the picture that we can talk about.
James Ochoa:
Okay. Boy, that's a critical space.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
It really is. And Nikki, there's a really important strategy right there, which is someone who is giving the help knowing to be able to ask those curious, open questions and sit back and listen. Because what does a person with ADD do most of the time, but it doesn't feel safe to do? Think out loud. "Let me just think this out loud. Let me just go through it." And then I come to— I'm like, okay, there we are, back around again. And so that's why, after seven months, I'm able to say, okay, that's just a crazy thought. Those are just crazy thoughts in my head. We're not really going to do that. I know. And I can run past them now, but I've had to think them out several times with Jules when he was offering or giving me help. And I'm like, "I don't get how this is helping."
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
"Where are we?" He's like, "Okay. What's happening here?" So that listening piece, I think, Nikki, is really key for someone who is giving the help.
Nikki Kinzer:
Mm-hmm.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
My ability, though, even to be able to ask for it: "Let me just think this out loud here for a minute. Okay, just listen to me." So I can do that on my side as well, when I'm receiving help.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
Nikki Kinzer:
Right.
James Ochoa:
And it can be meaningful. But again, these things take courage.
Nikki Kinzer:
Mm-hmm.
James Ochoa:
These aren't the run-of-the— again, I've got an Achilles heel of experience here. I sometimes talk about this like, oh, it's nothing, you just go and do it. No, I've been practicing it for decades. And people with ADHD can do it.
Nikki Kinzer:
Mm-hmm.
James Ochoa:
We've got so much better insights about how to manage us and what it is or isn't. Just happening left and right.
Jules Ochoa:
And you can especially build this dynamic, I think, with the people closest to you, and who love you the most, and who are there to genuinely just want to help you. Building that dynamic of you saying, "I just need to talk. I just need to get this out of my head. I just need to process. I want to do that with you live." And the other person building that dynamic of actively listening, of recognizing also when you're looping and you're not recognizing it. I have a very keen sense now of when James is looping and not recognizing it. And how you can do that as a helper is, if it's the same topic they've talked about previously and they're saying the same things that they haven't resolved, or if they're maybe talking about a new topic and the thoughts are all over the place, it's unformed, there's no conclusion, that's a space to listen. They are just externally processing. And I think that kind of dynamic has to be built over time. It's not something that will just start immediately. But especially with those you love, they'll want to do that with you. It helps both sides of the coin feel good in that situation.
James Ochoa:
Okay, I just learned something of what he's doing.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
Pete Wright:
You get to sort of see through the Matrix a little bit, right?
Jules Ochoa:
That's so funny.
James Ochoa:
Right! And all of a sudden I can see him now going, oh my God. But it is helpful when I start to loop.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
It helps me to know that.
Nikki Kinzer:
Mm-hmm.
Pete Wright:
Pattern interrupt. Pattern interrupt.
James Ochoa:
Pattern interrupt, exactly, exactly.
Pete Wright:
All right. You guys, it's always such a treat to have you back.
James Ochoa:
Exactly.
Jules Ochoa:
We could go for hours.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Nikki Kinzer:
We really could talk more about this. I mean, there's so many angles around it too, because one of the things that came up for me, which we just don't have time to address, is when you really do want to help someone and they just won't let you in.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah, yeah.
Pete Wright:
Mm-hmm.
Nikki Kinzer:
And that is so hard.
Pete Wright:
Yeah, and then you as the helper, your persistence just further solidifies their expectation that you don't know how to do something, right?
Jules Ochoa:
Just worsens it. Yes. Yes.
Nikki Kinzer:
Yeah, yeah.
James Ochoa:
But I think what Jules was saying earlier is a real key space.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
Back off at that point. Get curious and listen.
Jules Ochoa:
Yes. Because that space is built out of walls, out of defensiveness, out of reactivity. And so backing off of that and saying, "Okay, I'm not gonna touch that. It's fine, it's fine. What do you think about this?" You're providing a space for those feelings to be heard and felt and seen, and not butt up against another wall.
James Ochoa:
And Nikki, I know you see this in your organizational efforts and the decluttering challenges and all those things that you run. You see this all the time, when people are— you're like, "No, don't go over there, go over here." And that's that muscle, right? When you can see that defensiveness go on, be curious and observe it. It does loosen that grip. But no, this is just so much fun. And yes, we could have several versions of this process.
Pete Wright:
Yeah, I feel like we could. And I hope— just breaking into it, I mean, we had a bunch of comments in the chat up front about just feeling like, uh-oh, I'm gonna feel on this episode.
Jules Ochoa:
Yeah, sorry.
Pete Wright:
I think I'm gonna be called out. And I certainly felt that. This is speaking to a deep part of me, and the work that I think we all have to do.
Jules Ochoa:
Sorry about that.
Pete Wright:
You know, we live in a society.
Nikki Kinzer:
Well, and I love that we're seeing it from the person who's receiving it, but also, Jules, you bringing up the person who's giving it too. I think it's a great perspective to be holding both.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Nikki Kinzer:
Talking about both.
Pete Wright:
For sure, for sure.
James Ochoa:
It definitely is. And I would say it is interesting, because I learned something from this, about the looping piece and other pieces that Jules is seeing. And that's the kind of dialogue we have, that he'll tell me, "This is what I see," and I trust him that he's seeing it. And it helps me a lot about myself, so I don't drive into that storm, or I know what the loop feels like. It's helpful.
Pete Wright:
I've got links, the standard links for all your usual suspect places and books, that I'll put in the show notes, and I encourage people to swipe up. Is there anything specific you're hot to talk about today that we haven't mentioned before?
James Ochoa:
Well, certainly the 11Q Your ADHD is up and running. And I'll announce— I think I may have told you before that the publishing of the second book is coming. 11/11/27 is my publication date. So I'm gonna keep it right here, and I'm working feverishly on it. We're almost less than a year out. So anyway, it's gonna happen.
Pete Wright:
It's coming. It's coming. Boy, that timeline just shrinks right up.
James Ochoa:
It shrinks.
Pete Wright:
You feel like every day passes, two days are chunked off the calendar.
James Ochoa:
And of course, writing the last part of the book is the hardest part of the book, as always, right? And we're talking a lot about help.
Jules Ochoa:
I was gonna say, a lot of this stuff is in that book, because it's about when the shiny wears off, right?
James Ochoa:
Talking a lot about customizing it.
Pete Wright:
Yeah, yeah.
Nikki Kinzer:
Yeah.
James Ochoa:
Yep. Yep, yep. So no, those are the big pieces, Pete. I still love what I'm doing, and it's dynamic. And I am doing an 11-month ADHD resourcing group. I piloted it this year with 10 people. I'm the 11th person in the group. This is my fun space. It's kind of my deep dive into resourcing and developing resourcing. It's a very different type of group, because it's a loving, functional pressure cooker, in a good way, to really help you help yourself. So those are some things I'm doing, because I think that we all need to have this. We need to learn how to do this. We can learn how to do it.
Pete Wright:
Awesome. Well, you're both great. Thank you for being here. Thank you for sharing your time with us. We appreciate the insights and the shenanigans.
Jules Ochoa:
Absolutely. It was fun.
Pete Wright:
As always. And thank you, everybody, for downloading and listening to this show. Thanks for your time and your attention. Don't forget, if you have something to contribute to the conversation, we're heading over to the Show Talk channel on our Discord server. We'd love you to join us over there by becoming a supporting member over on Patreon at patreon.com/theadhdpodcast. On behalf of Nikki Kinzer and Jules and James Ochoa, I'm Pete Wright, and we'll see you right back here next week on Taking Control: The ADHD Podcast.
