We were lucky to catch up with Genevieve Dahle recently and have shared our conversation below.

Genevieve, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?

While homeschooling my daughter, I realized that the accommodations I was providing my daughter weren’t addressing the full picture of her needs. We knew that ADHD was a probable diagnosis and that we needed more information to help her thrive in school. As a former teacher, I had already done everything I knew to do for students with ADHD: breaking school into smaller chunks, incorporating movement, and allowing more breaks to process and transition. While those things helped, they didn’t her sleep or emotional regulation.

Our pediatrician required me to fill out evaluation forms for ADHD and as I went down the list, I realized that they weren’t just familiar problems for my daughter. “Often interrupts others during a conversation or struggles to wait their turn to speak.” Oh, that’s something I struggle with. “Often misplaces items that are used regularly (example: keys, homework, cell phone).” In college, I had to come up with a systems to address my constant problem with losing my keys and my credit cards. As I went down the list, I related to more and more of the statements and began to question if I had ADHD too. This realization changed the way my husband and I looked at our family and some of our struggles.

Within a year, we had 3 diagnoses in our house and I needed to find ways to help all of us. All of my free time was put into understanding all of the ways that ADHD impacted us on a daily basis and researching what supports and systems my family would need to be successful. One of the major problems I’ve found in ADHD is that even when people have a diagnosis, they aren’t provided a ton of information about how it effects all parts of their lives. When my daughter was diagnosed, we were told to seek out medication and therapy. My diagnosis came with a list of suggestions, although most of them were pretty vague and unhelpful like, “Genevieve needs more structure in her life and needs systems to help her feel accomplished.” Wonderful, now how do I do that? Without helpful resources from experts, we were left to find the information ourselves.

While looking into some ADHD information programs, I came across the ADD Coaches Academy’s “Simply ADHD” class and found out that it was part of a larger certification program. ADHD Coaching would provide an opportunity for me to get the information I was already seeking, as well as the ability to help others. With my experience as a former educator, a parent, and a late-in-life diagnosed female, I knew there were several avenues to helping others with this information. There are so many ways that my diagnosis could have helped me long before the age of 37 and I want others to have that opportunity.

Genevieve, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I entered this business to help others receive the help that wasn’t available to me. I currently provide one-on-one coaching services for adults and parents to address the ways in which ADHD impacts their lives. I also work with young adults (16-22 years of age), in collaboration with their parents, to help them transition to adulthood. I provide professional development presentations to schools to help them understand the unique needs of students and work with homeschooling groups to address environmental supports at home for ADHD students. I am currently working with several local agencies to provide education and services to families who might not otherwise have access to my services.

ADHD is one of the most studied conditions, so there is a wealth of information available. Unfortunately, it takes time to sift through all of that information and apply it to our lives. In addition, symptoms and their presentations vary from person to person, as does their strengths and talents. This means that the solution for any common ADHD symptom will likely be different for each client. As I often tell clients, if there were set solutions for ADHD symptoms, there would be one website making billions of dollars. Instead, ADHD Coaching seeks to look at what is already working for the client, leans into strategies that work with that client’s strengths, and addresses beliefs that might be getting in the way of making changes.

Through coaching, clients have addressed chronic lateness in work and social situations. They’ve also found better ways to prompt their memories and developed unique organization strategies to improve their productivity and stress levels. Sometimes, the coaching session is used to question beliefs that affect a client’s view of possible solutions. One client told me that they would work out more, if it didn’t require changing their whole outfit. In admitting that athletic wear wasn’t a requirement, they made a plan to wear clothing that met work requirements and allowed them to go straight to the gym. Another client told me that they were using time in the outdoors to regulate their stress, but needed to be inside to study. When I questioned their restriction to be inside to study, this client got really excited about studying at one of the many parks near their apartment. In both cases, the clients didn’t even realize that they had created rules for themselves that weren’t helping them achieve their goal.

Parent coaching has helped clients to better understand how their child’s brain works so that they can better support them at home and school. Creating transition routines for homework helped one family reduce the meltdowns that were occurring nightly. Another family created a system to help everyone get out the door in the morning, with a staging area for shoes, backpacks, and weather-related accessories. All of these solutions, while seemingly generic, were tailored to the needs of the client’s family. In some cases, we incorporated systems that were partially successful or strategies that were used in other parts of their lives. Other times, these solutions addressed a unique need, like limited space or sensory requirements for their child.

I came to my diagnosis believing that I was a broken adult, incapable of doing the everyday things my peers seemed to be able to do without effort. I know how profound a late-in-life diagnosis can feel, the grief of what might have been if I had known, and the difficulties of advocating for myself when my symptoms are invisible to others. I also understand the strength that comes from feeling understood and supported by my family. My first goal with any client is to help them feel seen. Many clients bring beliefs with them that are rooted in neurotypical expectations, leading to feelings of shame about “laziness” or “failure.” They are often surprised to hear how ADHD is impacting many parts of their lives, assuming that their symptoms are limited to inattentiveness or hyperactivity. The way that ADHD affects our executive functions can change shame about perceived laziness or failure into an understanding of unmet needs. Once they understand their brains, we can shift their perspective, letting go of a belief that their past will repeat itself, and focusing on the possibilities of a supported, successful future.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

The hardest lesson I’ve learned from the past few years is that I need help and cannot do everything myself. In order to accept help from my husband, I had to challenge some of the beliefs I had about family structures. I grew up in a family with traditional gender roles and a mom that raised 4 kids while working full time and managing a household.

When I decided to start coaching, I talked to my husband and kids about how things would change some. I knew I had control over my hours and how many clients I took on, but I also didn’t think about the hours that would be needed outside of active coaching sessions to keep my business running. I honestly thought I’d still be able to homeschool 3 kids, keep my house clean, cook dinner every night, and run kids to their activities while seeing a client here or there in between duties.

That lasted until last fall. I had started advanced training through the ADD Coaches Academy in July. One of my kids started a pre-professional dance program 7 hours a week. Another kid started Science Olympiad, which is reliant on parent involvement. I was so proud to be at half of what I thought my full capacity would be in client load. Things had slowly piled up and I didn’t feel like we had anything we could drop.

On one Friday, I told my husband how tired I was and how hard this pace of life had become. He looked at me and said, “You have made it all look so easy, I didn’t realize you were struggling. Can I take over grocery shopping and meal prep? Can I run the kids on the weekend?” I felt guilty that I wasn’t organized enough to handle all of it. I also felt guilty that after working 40 hours a week, he would be required to come home and help out with the house and kids. He pointed out that my role as a stay at home mom was more than 40 hours a week. By starting a coaching business, I was doing multiple part-time and full-time jobs.

When we chose to homeschool the kids, we agreed that I would focus on homeschooling the kids first, making dinner second, and cleaning when I had time. Now, I had to admit that coaching was the first priority in that list, as the kids became more independent in their homeschool. The only hitch in that ranking was that now homeschooling now included supervision and transportation. It hadn’t dropped from the list entirely. I hadn’t considered that driving was all that taxing to my schedule, because I didn’t realize how many times I was having to mentally transition to the tasks related to that activity.

Making so many transitions and decisions in a day meant that I was reaching decision fatigue before I could decide what to do for dinner each evening. He and I decided to plan out dinners for the month and have him take over until we could work out a more complete solution. We sat down and talked as a family about the situation. My older two kids offered to take over family-related tasks and the 3 kids grouped tasks by room so that each kid could take a room each week. We also blocked off some hours on the weekend for self-care and family time.

Asking for help has freed me up to put more time and energy into coaching. It means that it’s easier to be present in sessions without the concerns of whether or not I can find a way to get to the grocery store and cook dinner before my kids need to go to their activities. It also means that I can pursue a passion without feeling guilty about the things I haven’t had time to do. Sometimes, I occasionally think it might be easier to do it myself than to remind someone of their assigned duties, but then I think about last fall and remind myself of all the things that are possible now.

Have you ever had to pivot?

When I was in my third year of teaching, my district was building a new high school. I impulsively decided to apply for the job, thinking that while I probably wouldn’t get any of the 3 positions available, it would be a good experience in going through the process. I remember sitting outside of the interview looking at the teachers around me thinking that with all the experience they had, there was very little chance I’d be hired. Perhaps it was that lack of expectation that allowed me to go through the interview so relaxed and answer questions a bit more honestly than if I’d really thought I had a chance.

A week later, the teacher next door came out to monitor the halls and said, “I just got my email. I didn’t get hired at the new school.” I went in to check my email and had an email that started with “Welcome to the teaching staff…” Once the shock wore off, I called my husband and celebrated the new path ahead of me. Over the next week or so, I’d start bringing things home and organizing the storage area at home.

Then, I found out I was pregnant. Being due in December, I decided that I would continue with my plans to teach at the new school and decide at the end of that school year whether to continue teaching or not. About two weeks later, there was talk of the recession affecting the school board’s budget and the real possibility of furloughs throughout the district. An email told us we would know the outcome of their budget decisions by the end of the week.

On Thursday morning, I received an email from the principal of the new school asking if I could come by the campus after the school day ended. There had been some mentions of me teaching some new AP subjects and needing more training over the summer, so I assumed that was what I was going to discuss. That afternoon, I was told by the new principal that I was going to be furloughed and would no longer be part of the new staff. I told him that we’d just found out about the baby we’d have in December and I’d just have more time to prepare.

Throughout the summer, I applied to tutoring companies and other job ads without success. Three days before school started, I received a phone call from one of the assistant principals at the new high school. She explained that they had too many students for the number of teachers they had been allowed to hire and asked if I was still interested in the position. She said that because the position had technically changed, they would need to consider several of the finalists they had for all of the positions.

Two days before pre-planning started, I was told that I had a teaching position at the new high school and that I should bring my classroom materials to the school that day, if possible. That afternoon, I met the principal and assistant principal at the front door. They unloaded my materials from the car, led me to my classroom, and spent an hour rearranging my classroom for me. It was an amazingly chaotic start to the best year of teaching that I had in my short teaching career.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.daringpursuitscoach.com
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DaringPursuitsCoaching/

Image Credits

Hannah Black