Speak Easy

Janine VanStee
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[00:00:00] Transcription by ESO, translated by

Tyler: Hello, everyone. My name is Tyler Sellhorn, and welcome to another episode of Speak Easy, the podcast where we discuss communication, capturing our thoughts, and how we share those thoughts with our future selves and others. it's We believe that managing our brains is core to 21st century work, and we're here to learn how to do it better than we did yesterday.

Thanks so much for listening! Speak Easy is brought to you by Cleft. With our cross platform applications, you can simply speak your mind, and Cleft will collect your thoughts. Cleft enables you to process verbally wherever you are, and send your best bits later. Today, we are blessed to be learning out loud with Janine Van Stee.

Janine has an inspiring story. From a young age, Janine felt a deep desire to feel, to make a real difference in young, in people's lives. This led her to explore several different paths, including teaching psychology, nursing, [00:01:00] and medicine. Ultimately, she found their calling. Ultimately she found her calling in special education for 30 years.

Janine dedicated her career to supporting students with a wide range of disabilities, working her way up from teacher to central office administrator. Interestingly, it wasn't until the age of 50 that Janine discovered for herself. that she had been living with ADHD. This personal revelation provided a deeper understanding of her own challenges, and perhaps even more importantly, amplified her empathy for the students she served.

As her career and education drew to a close, the desire to continue making a difference remained strong. That's when She discovered ADHD Life Coaching. It was a perfect fit. Now as an ADHD Life Coach, Janine brings a wealth of experience from special education combined with a uniquely personal understanding of ADHD.

To help others navigate the complexities of their own experiences, she is passionate about working one on one with individuals, helping them develop effective strategies, build self awareness, and create [00:02:00] lasting positive change. Together, she explores strengths with her clients. overcome obstacles and set achievable goals that truly align with each individual's values.

Janine, thank you for allowing us to capture your thoughts here today. I'm curious, what was the journey that helped you come to discover that you yourself were struggling with ADHD at such a late age? The other thing that we're going to be doing is we're going to be doing a little bit of all for joining us and we'll see you next time.

Janine VanStee: behind. And. I just kept going and kept going and then I hit perimenopause and I said, [00:03:00] Oh, this is crazy. So then all of my coping strategies and mechanisms stopped working and I, here I am in a central office position for the first time in my life and my brain is going a million directions and my focus is completely gone. You know, I used to call it the rotation where I would sit at my desk and I would do something to the left. I would do something on my computer. I'd do something on the right. And I just keep kind of rotating through them because I had so much going on and I didn't have the ability to get it back under control at that moment.

And that happens for a lot of women. When they hit that stage of their life, a lot of those coping mechanisms stop working and suddenly we're like, what is going on? I mean, cause. The way I say it is we've been functioning like we were in menopause our whole lives. We hit menopause and now you get to multiply it by two. So that's kind of what [00:04:00] happened is because we've been functioning with brain fog with the crazy stuff that goes on in our heads for a long time. In different ways, and now we've got this on top of it. I was talking with my psychiatrist who, um, We had a long term relationship and she knew a lot about me. I had previously been diagnosed with OCD, anxiety, and depression, which is also really common for women because for a long time, we weren't diagnosed with ADHD. And then finally one day she looked at me and she said, Look, I just want you to consider. Consider that you may have ADHD and I'm like, pish, posh,

Tyler: Silence.

Janine VanStee: the more we dove in, the more I realized she is [00:05:00] so very right. And I do have ADHD. It was a. Difficult thing for me, especially because I felt a little embarrassed about the fact that, you know, I've worked with these people all of my life.

And yeah, I hadn't identified it myself, but that's one of those things about coaching. You start to be able to see yourself in a different light and see things in a different light. And so when I, Okay. out that I had ADHD, I had to change a lot of my thought processes because my first place that I went was shame, um, and a little bit of anger too, to be honest, because when you tell somebody, I've just been diagnosed with ADHD and I'm shocked and they look at you and they go, of course you have ADHD. Why didn't anybody mention this before? If

Tyler: Um, Silence.

Janine VanStee: knew I had ADHD, So

Tyler: What?

Janine VanStee: kind of my story, but really it all [00:06:00] started with when those mechanisms stopped working, and get control of the things that were going on in my head, in my life, in my calendar, and of those things.

Tyler: Okay you, mentioned a few different things that exist inside of your mind, right? You were talking about some of the feelings of embarrassment, of shame, of anger, right? You also talked about masking. You talked about your brain was going a million directions. And all of this was related to hormonal changes that were happening and probably like things that were happening in your brain before menopause kind of like brought some of these to the forefront of multiplying by two, right.

And I guess maybe I'm curious to learn. What were those mechanisms that stopped working for you? You mentioned masking, you mentioned things that were, that you had been [00:07:00] managing your ADHD with previously. What were some of those things that you were doing to, like control and manage your time and your brain to be able to operate?

You'd been a successful, you know, educational administrator teacher. Right. And now those behaviors that had been working, weren't continuing to work. What were those things that you were managing all of that with before?

Janine VanStee: I was managing them with traditional calendar, which oftentimes will work for people, with ADHD for a period of time. And so I was using a traditional calendar and I also always had, and I still always have journal or a notebook. What started happening is I forgot to put things into the calendar. I forgot to put things into the notebook. I forgot to look at the notebook. I. You know, was not able, I was double booking myself [00:08:00] a lot. I, my time blindness just went crazy and I would forget to put something in my calendar. Then I would double book, just things like that, or where I couldn't, couldn't get that focus where I used to be able to get that focus.

And I like where I used to be able to put on some music and grab a cup of coffee and off I go. the. Music and the coffee piggybacked is not, not cutting it anymore.

Tyler: Interesting. Okay, so one of the things that I think is really interesting about what we're trying to do here at Cleft, right, is to fill in the gap of that forgetting, right? Have Cleft be so Full disclosure. We've talked about this on the podcast before, but this is your first listen, uh, to speakeasy.

Go back to episode one. Johnny Cosgrove, one of our founders here at Cleft. He is identified autistic neurodivergent ADHD person. In fact check [00:09:00] out his episode on Janine's podcast. If you're wanting to go deeper with him. But Justin and Johnny are both identified neurodivergent individuals.

And we wanted to build something that was for those people that can be, it turns out that computers remember stuff better than people do, especially people like us. Right. And it's really crucial to have an easy way to have a, you know, Johnny's phrase is a release valve for his brain, maybe that speaks to you or a listener or Janine, but I think that's something that for me, I, I am not identified, but I am somebody who.

Talks too much. Right. And needs some help with some executive function. Right. So often that we see with ADHD or neurodivergent individuals is okay, I need to shorten this to something that someone can actually absorb instead of all the words. Keep going with this. What am I doing?[00:10:00]

Janine VanStee: You're trying to learn how to bottom line.

Tyler: Bottom lining. Okay.

Janine VanStee: Yeah. The most important details go on bottom line. The rest of them kind of float around above it. We only stick on the bottom line when we're trying to get our point across in a way.

Tyler: I definitely appreciate cleft helping me to bottom line especially when I, when it's a, you know, a moment where maybe the cursor is blinking back at me and it doesn't come out of my fingertips, right? It's very helpful to process verbally and just get back something that I can send in text.

I guess maybe I'm curious to learn. Okay, now that you are identified and you've come to the other side and you're helping other individuals. What are the, mechanisms and behaviors that are helping you and helping your clients today as you are growing and improving?

Janine VanStee: Of but there are a lot of [00:11:00] universal truths we run into when we're coaching. The big things that my clients. Get out of learning from me and coaching with me is they learn how to do the process of when they run into a roadblock or identify a roadblock, they find out that they have mechanisms in their brains where they can go in and figure out a way around it.

Over it or through it. And so what I'm trying to do is teach them to ask the right questions, challenge yourself in the right way come up with your own strategies that work for you when you come to those roadblocks. So the first step in that is being able to identify the roadblock in the first place, right?

If

Tyler: course.

Janine VanStee: know it's there, we've got to identify it first. So the universal truths of that is that there is a process to Help yourself, learn coping strategies and ways of getting [00:12:00] around things and it's a way of changing your thinking. I don't know if that answered your question.

Tyler: think that's helpful. I hear you rhyming with Johnny, actually, when you're talking about uh, through it, around it, under it he uses that kind of phrasing all the time where he is so outcome focused, right? Even like the way that we designed cleft to be, is that we want to design it with.

accessibility first, right? And when we build for neurodivergence, right, we also build for any other kind of brain, right? Because if it can adapt to that edge case or that divergent thinking person, it's able to absorb any kind of a person's usage. Right. And that's really helpful in terms of.

Just how we think about building software, but it's also like helpful. And what you're saying is like just identifying roadblocks for yourself and thinking through the process of what it is that we're going to do to be able to get to the outcome that we're seeking. One of the things that I wanted to center in this [00:13:00] conversation with us is when you're building processes with clients when do you introduce. Like technology, we were both flagging the journals that we're using and during this conversation to each other, maybe it's as simple as a journal, but like, when do you introduce things that are external to our mind, uh, in those processes, how do we build.

The right triggers for when we're going to use a tool like cleft or any other, you know, like voice memo system or, a journal or a calendar or whatever, you name it, how do we decide which things go where, right? Where is the dividing line between? Okay, I'm going to manage this inside my own head.

Right. And here's where I'm going to put this and I'm going to externalize some part of my mind in a tool.

Janine VanStee: Well, so I remember what I was going to say is,

Tyler: Yeah.

Janine VanStee: can, I truly believe that every person has some sort of executive function issue. Nobody has a [00:14:00] perfect executive functioning system. And so Cleft works for anybody who, you know, has issues with this. You don't have to have ADHD. You don't have to have autism.

Same thing with coaching. You don't have to have those things to benefit from executive functioning coaching.

Tyler: I'm curious to learn, like, where is the divide and line between things that I should manage in my own mind and things that I should, like use a tool to manage.

Janine VanStee: Okay. So I would say let's, what things should I use to, what things should I try to keep in my head? Nothing. Um, to be honest with you, and it's difficult for people with ADHD to keep one thing in their head. Sometimes you go to another room and you forgot what you were doing. I've had clients who've had to piggyback different pictures in their heads, just to get to one room to the other to remember, never depend on your brain off completely. And that's not saying that you're not capable, but. The additional stress and [00:15:00] emotional that you have to put into remembering something is so much more detrimental than it is to learn to write it down or speak it aloud or do whatever you have to do and that's where the individuality comes into. I had a guy who used technology up the ying yang and was not being successful and then figured out he needed a paper pencil. Right. it just depends on the person, but I would say it's very difficult to depend on your brain for much of anything. And, I don't know, you know, I think about research, you know, eyewitnesses are the worst kind of witnesses there are because they really don't always remember that well, and it that's a normal part of the human experience.

Tyler: Okay, so I'm hearing you kind of like, so shout out to the PKM people out there. So, okay, PKM let's you know, personal knowledge management people talk about this idea. Uh, [00:16:00] Tiago Forte, he is a. Like kind of a leader in that space. And he, his idea is to create a second brain, right? Uh, using digital notebooks, right?

That's his idea. And I hear you echoing that thought just a little bit when you say, don't keep it in your head, right? Write it down. Right. I think that's interesting to, to hear. When we think about how do we do that in terms of identifying that? First of all, I shouldn't keep it in my mind, right?

Like we want. How do we overcome that? That you were mentioning earlier, right? Talking about shame and anger and embarrassment associated with not identifying that for yourself, having worked with those kinds of students. But I think maybe one of the things I want to help us to overcome in this conversation is for that listener to say to themselves, It's okay if you didn't remember.

In fact it's great that you even noticed that you didn't remember it. Like, [00:17:00] how do we get over ourselves and start leaning on the help that we need?

Janine VanStee: Well, that's a really good question. I can relate to it really personally. When I first started teaching, I could tell you what lesson I was on with which reading group and what day and all those things were up in my head. I barely needed a plan book, right? But that's all I was doing with teaching. That's, that was my main focus of my life.

I didn't have children. I had a husband, I was focused on my career and I couldn't continue to do that as I had more and more things. came into my life that I needed to focus on because that's all our brain fills up and then there's so much going on in there that things get lost. It's the same thing as if you have a nice clean dresser and you always keep your wallet on your dresser, right? And it's worked for years and then [00:18:00] suddenly things have changed in your life. You're busy. You've got kids You've got a new job Whatever and your desk becomes very cluttered and you forget that your wallets even there. Does that make sense?

Tyler: It does make sense. I guess maybe I want to invite us to the moment where we're going to start to conclude, but I'm going to open up this kind of conversation to be kind of comprehensive, because I want to invite you to talk about like how you think about communication, how you think about, even your own self talk.

You know, how you think about managing your mind give us a before picture before your diagnosis and then maybe what was it that was inside of your mind during your diagnosis? Right? And then what is this post time? And now you're supporting others that are experiencing that same moment in time.

how do we, how do we talk to others? How do we talk to ourself in ways that are helpful to us in those different kind of moments? In, in, in [00:19:00] time.

Janine VanStee: you are touching a little spot in my heart because I am a big proponent of positive self talk and not negative self talk. and I always have been, even before I was diagnosed because I taught that to my students, you know, if you hear it in your head, if you hear it out loud, you're still hearing it and you shouldn't be hearing those things. And so as far as that goes, I see a lot of my clients go through a before and after with that negative self talk and it can be so detrimental. Don't get me wrong.

Tyler: [00:20:00] Okay.

Janine VanStee: this? Now you look ridiculous,

you know all the things but then after. my diagnosis and after going through my coaching training and receiving coaching myself and doing a lot of coaching and all of that stuff I was able to make a change

in my perspective,

Um, and now I go by the rule of thumb If I say something negative or mean to myself I ask myself would I say that to a 15 year old me? No I never

, would say that to a 15 year old me. I've even talked to a coach who said she has people get a picture of their younger self and look at the picture and say what I've said that to myself. So, you know, negative self talk, positive self talk definitely changed. Even though I was aware of it [00:21:00] before I did, it takes direct and in challenging yourself kind of effort to slow that down. And what I would say is need to understand why it's so important. And ultimately what it comes down to is if somebody else tells you you're stupid, you hear it. If you tell yourself that you're stupid. hear it, same impact, but maybe a little bit worse from you, right? But sometimes it might be worse from the other person, depending on how your rejection is, but it's still the same impact. So even if you're just saying it to yourself, you're impacting yourself in a negative way. People hear things over and over that are negative, they start to believe them.

Tyler: Well, um, I have tears in my eyes thinking of how I would want to speak to my 15 year old self [00:22:00] and how I would speak to my 42 year old self. I'm a person to just like that 15 year old and I think that as I think about cleft I do a lot of speaking to myself right inside of that space and I appreciate your invitation to be kind to that person right

Janine VanStee: Absolutely.

Tyler: to be respectful of myself to start with right and whoever it is that I want to be communicating with you know, Even just if I'm recording a cleft it's for myself to begin with.

Right. And then I will, decide what I'm going to send on to that other person. Well, okay. Uh, Janine, I wanted to just give you a chance to send off with how we can find you and how we can follow you learn more about you and your ideas. How should we stay up to date with you and what you're up to?

Janine VanStee: Well, you can find my webpage at J Van ADHD live coaching net.

Tyler: And we [00:23:00] will put that in the show notes. we will make sure that that you can find it. Uh, and you can click right on, if your podcast player supports it, we will have that link for you. Just right there in, in the, in, in the MP3. So get in there.

Janine VanStee: Email is also JanineVanSteeadhdlivecoaching at gmail dot com

Tyler: Fantastic.

Janine VanStee: and my YouTube channel is Janine VanStee, A DHD, life Coach

Tyler: Fantastic. Well, we will be able to find Jeanine Van Stee.

Janine VanStee: I

Tyler: sure.

Janine VanStee: my eavesdrop too.

Tyler: Please do.

Janine VanStee: podcast, so I also have my podcast that you can find on all the major providers and it's called ADHD eavesdrop. We had Johnny on just a little while ago. And, um, yeah, so I just wanted to plug that as well,

Tyler: Fantastic. Janine. It was awesome to be together today. Thank you for allowing us to collect your thoughts. Um, blessings.

Janine VanStee: Blessings

Tyler: [00:24:00] Speakeasy is brought to you by Cleft. With our cross platform applications, you can simply speak your mind and Cleft will collect your thoughts. Cleft enables you to process verbally wherever you are and send your best bits later. Check us out at cleftnotes. com, that's C L E F T N O T E S dot [00:25:00] com.