ADHD for Smart Ass Women with Tracy Otsuka

EP. 381: Diagnosing Everyone but Herself with Psychologist Dr. Shawn Horn

Tired of ADHD strategies that don’t work? Here’s what actually does. FREE training here: https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/signup [https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/signup] _____ The hardest part of ADHD is not the symptoms themselves, but the shame story built around them? Dr. Shawn Horn is a licensed clinical psychologist and the author of Thrive Socially with Adult ADHD. Known as The Shame-Busting Psychologist, she helps adults understand the painful stories they have carried about being “too much,” “not enough,” or “bad at relationships.” Growing up, Shawn was constantly corrected for talking too much, interrupting, and not paying attention. She was placed in special education, misunderstood at school, and spent years believing those experiences meant something was wrong with her. It was not until much later, after earning her doctorate and looking back at her history, that ADHD finally made sense. In this episode, we talk about how shame gets attached to ADHD early, how those experiences shape identity, and why being misunderstood can turn into a lifelong story. We also get into rejection sensitivity, nervous system dysregulation, and why healing starts with changing the story you tell yourself. If you have spent years feeling like you were too much or not enough, this episode offers a different lens. You may not need a new personality. You may need a new story. Resources: Website: https://www.drshawnhorn.com [https://www.drshawnhorn.com] Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/drshawnhorn [https://www.facebook.com/drshawnhorn] Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drshawnhorn [https://www.instagram.com/drshawnhorn ] YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/drshawnhorn [https://www.youtube.com/c/drshawnhorn] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-shawn-horn-2934347 [https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-shawn-horn-2934347] Send a Message: Your Name | Email | Message [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2316437/fan_mail/new] If this podcast helps you understand your ADHD brain, Shift helps you train it. Practice mindset work in just 10 minutes a day. Learn more at tracyotsuka.com/shift [https://tracyotsuka.com/shift] Instead of Struggling to figure out what to do next?  ADHD isn’t a productivity problem. It’s an identity problem.  That’s why most strategies don’t stick—they weren’t designed for how your brain actually works. Your ADHD Brain is A-OK Academy is different. It’s a patented, science-backed coaching program that helps you stop fighting your brain and start building a life that fits. 👉Learn more here [https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/aok-academy]: https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/aok-academy [https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/aok-academy] Learn more by connecting with Tracy through Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/tracyotsuka/], Facebook [https://www.facebook.com/heytracyotsuka], LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/tracyotsuka/], Pinterest [https://www.pinterest.ph/adhdforsmartwomen/], or visit adhdforsmartwomen.com [https://adhdforsmartwomen.com/]. Are You Ready to Discover Your Brilliance? Order Now: https://tracyotsuka.com/book2 [https://tracyotsuka.com/book2] Visit our website:  https://tracyotsuka.com [https://tracyotsuka.com]

EP. 380: Smart, Capable… and Still Struggling with Friendship? Let’s Talk (with Caroline Maguire)

Tired of ADHD strategies that don’t work? Here’s what actually does. FREE training here: https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/signup [https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/signup] _____ What if the hardest part of friendship isn't meeting people, but knowing when a connection is real? For a lot of ADHD adults, friendship still feels confusing, painful, or just out of reach. Not because they don't care, but because the actual steps were never clear. How do you move past an acquaintance? How do you know if someone genuinely likes you? How do you stop rushing in and ending up hurt? Caroline Maguire has spent 21 years answering exactly those questions. She's a coach, educator, and author of Why Will No One Play With Me and the newly released Friendship Skills for Neurodivergent Adults, the first book by a neurodivergent person, for neurodivergent people, on friendship. Diagnosed with ADHD at 12 but told it wouldn't matter because she was a girl, she grew up carrying what so many ADHD women carry: the weight of feeling socially behind without ever knowing why. What changed everything was breaking friendship down into something learnable. Patterns. Stages. Signs. Instead of treating connection like something that should just happen, she teaches how to actually build it. From understanding the impulsive friendship cycle, to recognizing that trust is a track record, not a feeling, to knowing the difference between a participationship and a real friend. If you've ever felt like you missed the memo on friendship, this episode will show you that nothing is wrong with you. You may have just been moving faster than the relationship was ready for. Resources: Website: https://carolinemaguireauthor.com [https://carolinemaguireauthor.com] Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/authorcarolinem [https://www.instagram.com/authorcarolinem] Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@authorcarolinem [https://www.youtube.com/@authorcarolinem] Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@authorcarolinem [https://www.tiktok.com/@authorcarolinem ] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/authorcarolinem  [https://www.linkedin.com/in/authorcarolinem ] Send a Message: Your Name | Email | Message [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2316437/fan_mail/new] If this podcast helps you understand your ADHD brain, Shift helps you train it. Practice mindset work in just 10 minutes a day. Learn more at tracyotsuka.com/shift [https://tracyotsuka.com/shift] Instead of Struggling to figure out what to do next?  ADHD isn’t a productivity problem. It’s an identity problem.  That’s why most strategies don’t stick—they weren’t designed for how your brain actually works. Your ADHD Brain is A-OK Academy is different. It’s a patented, science-backed coaching program that helps you stop fighting your brain and start building a life that fits. 👉Learn more here [https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/aok-academy]: https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/aok-academy [https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/aok-academy] Learn more by connecting with Tracy through Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/tracyotsuka/], Facebook [https://www.facebook.com/heytracyotsuka], LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/tracyotsuka/], Pinterest [https://www.pinterest.ph/adhdforsmartwomen/], or visit adhdforsmartwomen.com [https://adhdforsmartwomen.com/]. Are You Ready to Discover Your Brilliance? Order Now: https://tracyotsuka.com/book2 [https://tracyotsuka.com/book2] Visit our website:  https://tracyotsuka.com [https://tracyotsuka.com]

EP 379: ADHD, Medication, and What Actually Works with Maggie Alexander, MS, PMHNP

Tired of ADHD strategies that don’t work? Here’s what actually does. FREE training here: https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/signup _____ Are you on the right medication but with the wrong dose? Maggie Alexander is a psychiatric nurse practitioner who has spent over a decade treating ADHD in teens and adults. Since 2013, she has worked with hundreds of patients using a holistic but grounded approach that includes medication, micronutrients, and targeted strategies. When she first entered the field, she did not even believe in ADHD. That changed after a patient came to her suicidal, despite looking like he had everything together, and then improved within days on the right medication. That experience pushed her to question what she thought she knew and learn how ADHD treatment actually works. In this episode, we talk about why stimulant medication fails for so many people, how to find the right dose, what side effects are actually telling you, and how labs, genetics, and hormones can shape treatment. If medication has not worked for you, this conversation may change the way you think about it. Resources: * Website: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/psychiatrists/maggie-alexander-beaverton-or/141306 [https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/psychiatrists/maggie-alexander-beaverton-or/141306]  * Website: https://www.booksamillion.com/p/Shine-ADHD/Maggie-Alexander/9798887971841 [https://www.booksamillion.com/p/Shine-ADHD/Maggie-Alexander/9798887971841]  * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maggie-alexander-0912b1a0  [https://www.linkedin.com/in/maggie-alexander-0912b1a0 ] Send a Message: Your Name | Email | Message [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2316437/fan_mail/new] If this podcast helps you understand your ADHD brain, Shift helps you train it. Practice mindset work in just 10 minutes a day. Learn more at tracyotsuka.com/shift [https://tracyotsuka.com/shift] Instead of Struggling to figure out what to do next?  ADHD isn’t a productivity problem. It’s an identity problem.  That’s why most strategies don’t stick—they weren’t designed for how your brain actually works. Your ADHD Brain is A-OK Academy is different. It’s a patented, science-backed coaching program that helps you stop fighting your brain and start building a life that fits. 👉Learn more here [https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/aok-academy]: https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/aok-academy [https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/aok-academy] Learn more by connecting with Tracy through Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/tracyotsuka/], Facebook [https://www.facebook.com/heytracyotsuka], LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/tracyotsuka/], Pinterest [https://www.pinterest.ph/adhdforsmartwomen/], or visit adhdforsmartwomen.com [https://adhdforsmartwomen.com/]. Are You Ready to Discover Your Brilliance? Order Now: https://tracyotsuka.com/book2 [https://tracyotsuka.com/book2] Visit our website:  https://tracyotsuka.com [https://tracyotsuka.com]

EP. 378: Tech is Stealing Your Attention. This Gives It Back with Dr. Nodira Khoussainova

Tired of ADHD strategies that don’t work? Here’s what actually does. FREE training here: https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/signup _____ What happens when someone who helped build attention-grabbing tech decides to help people get their focus back? Dr. Nodira Khoussainova is the CEO and co-founder of Focused Space, a body doubling platform for creatives, business owners, artists, and freelancers, many of whom are neurodivergent. Before Focused Space, she was an early co-founder at Streamlit and led the experimentation team at Twitter. She built her career in high-performance tech, but focus was still a struggle. It was only after building Focused Space and working closely with neurodivergent women that she began to see those challenges differently. That shift changed how she understood the problem. It was not laziness or lack of ambition. It was attention, task initiation, and the environments people are expected to work in. After years spent helping build systems designed to keep people scrolling, she began building the opposite. In this episode, we talk about how tech platforms are built to capture attention, why body doubling works, what makes Focused Space different, and why joy is part of what helps people move. Resources: * Website: https://www.focused.space/ [https://www.focused.space/] (use smartass for code) * Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/focused_space [https://www.instagram.com/focused_space/] * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nodira-khoussainova-74540267  [https://www.linkedin.com/in/nodira-khoussainova-74540267 ] * Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/focused.space.inc  [https://www.facebook.com/focused.space.inc ] Send a Message: Your Name | Email | Message [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2316437/fan_mail/new] If this podcast helps you understand your ADHD brain, Shift helps you train it. Practice mindset work in just 10 minutes a day. Learn more at tracyotsuka.com/shift [https://tracyotsuka.com/shift] Instead of Struggling to figure out what to do next?  ADHD isn’t a productivity problem. It’s an identity problem.  That’s why most strategies don’t stick—they weren’t designed for how your brain actually works. Your ADHD Brain is A-OK Academy is different. It’s a patented, science-backed coaching program that helps you stop fighting your brain and start building a life that fits. 👉Learn more here [https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/aok-academy]: https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/aok-academy [https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/aok-academy] Learn more by connecting with Tracy through Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/tracyotsuka/], Facebook [https://www.facebook.com/heytracyotsuka], LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/tracyotsuka/], Pinterest [https://www.pinterest.ph/adhdforsmartwomen/], or visit adhdforsmartwomen.com [https://adhdforsmartwomen.com/]. Are You Ready to Discover Your Brilliance? Order Now: https://tracyotsuka.com/book2 [https://tracyotsuka.com/book2] Visit our website:  https://tracyotsuka.com [https://tracyotsuka.com]

EP. 377: Decluttering and the ADHD Brain

Tired of ADHD strategies that don’t work? Here’s what actually does. FREE training here: https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/signup [https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/signup] _____ Clutter is not just about stuff. It is about how your brain processes what is in front of you. In this episode, I walk through the connection between clutter, overwhelm, and how ADHD brains track what matters.  For a lot of us, clutter builds up not because we do not care, but because when something is out of sight, our brain stops tracking it. So we leave things out. Papers on the counter, sticky notes everywhere, piles that slowly grow. Over time, that visual noise turns into stress, decision fatigue, and avoidance. The shift is realizing clutter is not just physical. It is emotional too. Every pile can carry delayed decisions, unfinished tasks, and stories we start to believe about ourselves. In this episode, I talk about why clutter builds up for ADHD brains, how it reinforces overwhelm, how tapping can help regulate the emotional response, and simple ways to get started without freezing. If clutter has been weighing on you, start smaller than you think. One surface. Five minutes. That is enough to shift your energy and begin building trust with yourself again. Remember: the goal isn't a Pinterest-worthy desk. It's one shift forward that makes your brain feel like it can breathe again. Resources: * Download a quick start tapping guide: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1bgo4UztHoYd2E3OFsZn3dvrvemTxpaQQ/view?usp=sharing [https://drive.google.com/file/d/1bgo4UztHoYd2E3OFsZn3dvrvemTxpaQQ/view?usp=sharing]  * Website: tracyotsuka.com [https://tracyotsuka.com/] * Instagram: https://instagram.com/tracyotsuka  [https://instagram.com/tracyotsuka] * YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@tracyotsuka4796 [https://www.youtube.com/@tracyotsuka4796] * Tired of ADHD strategies that don’t work? Here’s what actually does. FREE training here: https://programs.tracyotsuka.com  [https://programs.tracyotsuka.com%20/] Send a Message: Your Name | Email | Message [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2316437/fan_mail/new] If this podcast helps you understand your ADHD brain, Shift helps you train it. Practice mindset work in just 10 minutes a day. Learn more at tracyotsuka.com/shift [https://tracyotsuka.com/shift] Instead of Struggling to figure out what to do next?  ADHD isn’t a productivity problem. It’s an identity problem.  That’s why most strategies don’t stick—they weren’t designed for how your brain actually works. Your ADHD Brain is A-OK Academy is different. It’s a patented, science-backed coaching program that helps you stop fighting your brain and start building a life that fits. 👉Learn more here [https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/aok-academy]: https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/aok-academy [https://programs.tracyotsuka.com/aok-academy] Learn more by connecting with Tracy through Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/tracyotsuka/], Facebook [https://www.facebook.com/heytracyotsuka], LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/tracyotsuka/], Pinterest [https://www.pinterest.ph/adhdforsmartwomen/], or visit adhdforsmartwomen.com [https://adhdforsmartwomen.com/]. Are You Ready to Discover Your Brilliance? Order Now: https://tracyotsuka.com/book2 [https://tracyotsuka.com/book2] Visit our website:  https://tracyotsuka.com [https://tracyotsuka.com]