Jen Fry: Setting boundaries & saying no

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Episode 205 with Jen Fry.

“I like to tell people that I’m not nice. I’m kind, but I’m not nice. I think niceness is weaponized way too much against people.”

Jen is an educator, speaker, and author of the book “I Said No: How to Have Boundaries and Backbone While Not Being a Jerk.”

Saying no is supposed to be simple — but for so many women with ADHD, it feels loaded with guilt, overthinking, and the fear of disappointing everyone around you.

Jen is a former college volleyball coach with a PhD in sports geography, and she now works at the intersection of conflict, culture, and sport, speaking to teams and organizations around the country.

We talk about the ADHD tendency to be a people-pleaser, and why Jen proudly says she’s kind, not nice. In this conversation, we talk about ADHD, hyperfocus, time blindness, imposter syndrome, and why so many high-achieving women end up chronically overcommitted, burnt out, and resentful.

We also explore what it really takes to say no — not just to other people, but to our own overexcited ADHD brains, our endless ideas, and our impulse to fill every spare moment.

If you’ve ever struggled with boundaries, overcommitting, or worrying that saying no makes you “difficult,” this episode is going to hit very close to home.

Website: jenfrytalks.com

Instagram: @jenfrytalks

Links & Resources: 

I Said No: How to Have Boundaries and Backbone While Not Being a Jerk by Dr. Jen Fry

The Power of Likeability (Forbes)

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Episode edited by E Podcast Productions

0:00
It takes a lot of a person to consistently say no when they're being badgered by one person or when it comes to family. And so you're trying to say no to one person now you have to say no to six people and text messages and emails and and that's where people don't understand how hard is to start setting boundaries because of all the other pressure and badgery in some aspects that occurs.

0:29
Hello and welcome to the women and ADHD podcast. I'm your host. Katy Weber, I was diagnosed with ADHD at the age of 45 and it completely turned my world upside down. I've been looking back at so much of my life, school, jobs, my relationships, all of it with this new lens, and it has been nothing short of overwhelming. I quickly discovered I was not the only woman to have this experience, and now I interview other women who like me discovered in adulthood they have ADHD and are finally feeling like they understand who they are and how to best lean into their strengths, both professionally and personally. Hello, hello and welcome back. Happy New Year. All right. Well, here we are at episode 205 in which I interviewed Jen fry. Jen is an educator, a speaker and the author of the book, I said no, how to have boundaries and backbone while not being a jerk. Saying no is supposed to be simple, but for so many women with ADHD, it feels loaded with guilt and overthinking and the fear of disappointing everyone around you. Jen is a former college volleyball coach with a PhD in sports geography, and she now works at the intersection of conflict, Culture and Sport, speaking to teams and organizations around the country, Jen and I talk about the ADHD tendency to be a people pleaser, and why Jen proudly says she is kind, but not nice. In this conversation, we talk about ADHD hyper focus, time, blindness, imposter syndrome, and why so many high achieving women end up chronically over committed, burnt out and resentful. We also talk about what it really takes to say no, not just to other people, but to our own over excited, ADHD brains. So if you've ever struggled with boundaries, or you've worried that saying no will make you difficult. This episode is going to hit very close to home. Hello, Jen, welcome to the women and ADHD Podcast. I'm so glad you could join me.

2:32
Katy, thank you very much for having me. I'm so excited about this.

2:36
Well, congratulations on your book. As soon as I saw the title, I knew I had to interview you. I think this is a topic we speak about a lot, especially as women with ADHD. And so we will get to those millions of questions I have about that. But first I wanted to hear about your ADHD diagnosis. How long ago did you discover you had ADHD and kind of, what were those signs for you personally that helped you connect the dots to say I should look into this?

3:06
You know, it's kind of funny because I didn't have an official diagnosis, but I remember my coach when I was in junior college. I was probably, like, it was right before I started, probably, like, 16 or 17. And my coach was, like, asking my mom, do you think you should have Jen test is for ADHD. ADHD. And my mom was like, No, she is just a really active girl. And I look back and I'm like, Mom, bless your heart. Like I appreciate your defending me. And it's really evident by if you talk to me, if you interact with me, that I have this like it's not and I think it was, you know, I'm 45 and I think before it was kind of always like a secret, just put people on drugs and don't talk about it, and now it's more widely talked about. But, you know, just the way I interact, the way I think through things, the way I jump to stuff. It's funny, my chief of staff Dawn, she does time blocking. And I'm like, You mean you just stop when the time is done, like you just I'm done. I'm like, I could never even envision that once I am down the rabbit hole, it will take God himself to pull me out. Like, the idea of just like, ding, okay, next task. I couldn't even fathom

4:22
that at all. I know right well, and even when I was first diagnosed, gosh, five years ago, at this point, it was that was one of my big fears about trying medication, was the fact that I was like, I that's kind of my best qualities are that hyper focus that you're talking about, I was really worried about losing that. And so, how long ago were you diagnosed? Were you have you been officially diagnosed? Are you kind of self diagnosed? I have not.

4:49
I have not been. I'm self diagnosed. And it's at 45 it got to be the point of, is medication worth it? You know, I'm a professional speaker. You. And so being on stage, I My biggest fear with adding medication is I wouldn't have the opportunity to figure out how my brain works in front of a crowd of 1000 people.

5:13
I don't it's a really complicated issue. And you know, I imagine even as an athlete too, I'm sure athletic departments and professional sports are filled, I know the Olympics are. They're filled with, you know, ADHD kids had a lot of energy, and their parents put them into sports. And I think sports probably exercise structure like, I think it's probably really great for the ADHD brain.

5:36
Yes, 100% 100% there.

5:39
Yeah, when I found out you had your doctorate in sports geography, I had to look it up. It's not a term. I think I certainly have never heard of it. I don't think it's a term a lot of people have heard of super fascinating though, when I did look it up. And so I'm kind of curious how you ended up going from being a professional volleyball coach to moving into the field of sports, geography and and then I want to ask you how you became a public speaker, but I feel like they're all connected, right? As that's the wonderful thing about ADHD, right? It's like all these seemingly random paths that all connect into this patchwork quilt of our life.

6:16
Yeah, so it does, and I think kind of, I have to jump around, but what happened was, was that I'm an educator at heart, like I love to learn. I am a person that I'm always taking webinars, classes, all of that stuff, and I had gotten my second masters, and that's kind of a story that ties adjacently to my professional speaking. I got my second master's, and I somehow was just talking to my friend of mine, probably about getting a third one. And she was like, Jen, you cannot get a third masters. You have to get a PhD now, like, you cannot be the collector of masters. You have to get and my mom didn't graduate high school, was a librarian when I think one of the most academic minded people, but I didn't even have this understanding of PhD, of this graduate level degree, of just really a knowledge base. I mean, we all know medical doctors or dentists, but didn't know about this. And I just, I've always kind of relied on trusting my friends and what they see in me. And so I was like, Okay, did very nonchalant. And then she said, you know, my mom got her her Bachelor's and Master's in geography at Michigan State, they have this program. You should look into it. And I said, okay, and I looked into it. And sport geography, interestingly enough, if you think about sports, sports is very geographical. Playing styles is very geographical, just like if you if you take baseball, for instance, someone's a baseball fan. How Asian countries, Japan, Korea train their athletes compared to Dominican Republic. Very different Cuba, very different training. So sport is very geographical, and that fandom is very geographical. If you think about a fan and how they Patriots fan versus a Dallas Cowboys fan, right? Fandom is very geographical. And so for me, I was like, I want to talk more about kind of the experiences of black female volleyball players in Europe, and look at that from a geographical land, like idea, and who would let me do it? And so Michigan State, the chair, he had a class on, like the geography of sport, or geography of football. And I was like, Okay, well, I can go there and do it, and they let me. And so that was, I think one of the best parts about it is I was able to kind of make, like you said, patchwork this degree together. And that's what all a PhD usually is. A PhD is a patchwork of a bunch of stuff to talk about a really, really small topic. And so Michigan State allowed me to do that, and so became, kind of, probably one of the a handful of sports geographers, okay,

8:46
and now, but I heard you mentioned, I think it was on another podcast you had mentioned that, you know, you ended up moving into public speaking after you were helping a lot of people with, Like, advocating for themselves, what was then the transition into public speaking?

9:04
Yeah, so what happened was, was that I decided to leave coaching, and I wasn't sure what I was going to do, and I went and worked at Duke, and I was, I was working there in the Office of Undergraduate scholars and fellows. And then I was blogging a lot about kind of this intersection of race and sport and college athletics. And then Colin Kaepernick kneeled, probably, like a month or two into me working at Duke. And then all of my friends were just very frantic, rightfully so. They're like, okay, my athletes want to kneel. What do I do if I kneel? What do I do? What is my first amendment right for speech, public, private, like, they just were kind of frantic about trying to figure out what to do. And I became the go to resource for them. And then someone said, again, another friend said, You should look at becoming a professional speaker. And I had like, you had told me I was going to Mars. I had no clue what that meant. And so I was like, Okay, let me look into that. And I treated it like a skill. I think when a lot of people come to me and ask me about speaking, and I think the problem. Is, is that they lead with, how do I get paid, versus how do I get good at this skill? And to me, that's always a conundrum, because if you lead with, well, I want to get paid, how do I do it? You are going to risk your reputation for taking an early check when you're not good. And so for me, I was willing to do as much free work as possible because I knew, like I had to learn that you, yes, you can speak in front of your team, but they kind of like you're holding them hostage, like they have to listen to you, right? They they can't just get up and leave. When you have a crowd of 500 people, they can get up and leave. And so you have to learn a very different skill set. And so I took time to learn it as a skill, not just how do I get paid?

10:44
Yeah, I mean, honest on a smaller scale, I feel like I relate to that just as a podcaster, where I feel like podcasting is one of those things, so like drumming or comedy, where people are like, how hard could it be? I'll do it. And I'm so, you know, I have a journalism background, so I, you know, credit my own journalist skills and curiosity with podcasting. And I'm like, you can't just show up and be like, All right, but I think a lot of podcasters do. That's a little side note.

11:13
Well, I think it's also the idea that when you're good at something, you make it look really easy. And since you make it look really easy. People ask, how hard can it be, right? Yeah, not understanding the amount of time that you've put in to make something look if you can make a hard skill look easy, you've put a lot of time into it. And people, a lot of them, don't think of it in that aspect. They think of it in the other aspect of you've made it look so easy. How hard could these things be? And I think that's what concerns me, especially when it comes to speaking.

11:47
But I think there's something in there in terms of that's going to segue us to the book, which is like, you know, you just said, I did a lot of stuff for free. I sort of chased my own interests as I was building my skill. And some might look at that as like saying yes, or people pleasing, right, in some weird way, which is like you not knowing your worth, doing things for free. I think there's a real emphasis right now on like, girl, you you know you got to charge more, and girl, you got to know your worth. Like, I feel like a lot of the time. It's almost like people, especially like younger generations, like feel like they need to be paid before they have the experience or the skill. And I'm kind of like, is that or am I being a doormat when I am not, quote, unquote, charging what I'm worth if I feel like I'm getting a lot out of the experience as well. Like, I feel like that's a difficult line to balance.

12:47
Oh, I think Katy, that's such a good question. And I think the first thing that a lot of people don't realize is that in some cases, you don't get to decide what you're worth. The market gets to decide what you're worth, and the market determines that, meaning you could say you're going to charge $30,000 for a keynote. You You can say, I'm worth, that the market will tell you I'm only going to pay 2000 like the market tells you you're worth when it comes to certain things. I think the next thing is, is that when it comes to professional speaking, once you take that check, you could get someone fired. And I don't think people really realize that is you can get someone fired. You take a check, you're like, oh, I can do this. You don't know how to handle people. You don't know how to facilitate you don't know how to handle pushback, you don't know how to handle conflict, all these things you don't know how to handle, it becomes a mess, and now the person that brought you in could be fired because you were completely ill equipped for the situation, because you were worried about the check and not building the skill. And so I think it's a few different things. I think a it's ask yourself, Do I have the skill that's associated with receiving this check? And it's not that you have to be perfect, but I always like to think about like worst case scenarios. What's worst case scenario? If employee starts screaming at another employee, am I able to handle that? If someone starts cursing, if someone starts saying something inappropriate, like, Am I able to handle these type of things? And so that makes me think, okay, if I take this $10,000 can whoever hired me trust that they're going to keep their job and I'm going to keep that? That's what I always think about when people bring me on. I want to make sure that you are leaving, keeping your job, and that people still trust you for bringing me in. I think the second thing that kind of comes with the market value is So for instance, I was sitting at the intersection of race and sport for years, if you mentioned race and college athletic, you mentioned Jen Frye in 23 I pivoted to conflict and culture. That pivot means I have to introduce new information, also to new audiences. That being said, I can't charge my previous market value yet because. I'm entering a whole new just information, curriculum, identity, all these things and to new industries. So my market value changes in some aspect. Could I keep saying, Yeah, I'm going to charge 20,000 Yes, but the market at that time is not saying, we don't think you're worth it, and that's okay, and I have to build back up that market value. And I think another component of it is that if you've been doing this for a while, if you have you know all the media, the videos, the testimony, all that you can start raising your rates and to see what the market believes in. But you have to try the market tells you your value. And that's the thing that many people don't realize that I've had people who will come to me and be like, you know, I've done some panel discussions. I want to start getting paid, and I'm like, have you had to command a crowd by yourself for 45 minutes? No, okay, well, maybe you should do that a few times before you start getting paid. You being on a panel of four other people means you maybe talked a total of 10 minutes, and you had other people to protect you. Meaning, if I said something stupid, Katy could come around and be like, You know what? So and then you could go into another pivot and then pull the smoke away from me. If I say something stupid by myself, I'm up there by myself. It's a very different experience. And I think a lot of people think, because they've been on stage, that then they get to charge. I'm like, No, you don't. And so I've been doing a lot of work for free, but in that I don't feel like it's people pleasing. A, I'm deciding what work I'm doing. B, I'm deciding what value meaning, if I do this keynote for free, you are flying me out. You're paying for my hotel. You're giving me all the video. That video could be worth $5,000 right? So I'm saying, what other things can I get with it, versus just saying yes to everything? I'm being very intentional about the free things I do and the industries I'm going into.

16:56
Yeah, I think there's also something there. As you were talking, I was thinking about like, imposter syndrome too, which maybe that's what it is, not so much people pleasing, but that feeling of, like, when do you believe you have the right to be on that stage and charge that money? And I think that that's something, you know, there's a lot more kind of systemic stuff happening there, especially as women,

17:22
that's a better question of the rates I charge. Now that's where I've seen people who I'm like, you're only charging how much? Oh, I'm like, No, you need to raise that rate. That I think is a different aspect, because for some people, it's very hard to charge a lot. It's hard. And so what I tell folks is that if they're uncomfortable with that conversation, have a price sheet. So when someone contacts you about rates, just send them a price sheet and say, here, here are my rates. That way you don't have to talk, and then you can start having a conversation. But again, you get to determine what the price is. And if someone wants to come in and low ball you, you get to decide yes or no, because the one rule that I live by is, once I accept a price, I do not get to be mad about it. I've accepted that price. And I see a lot of people, you know, Katy will contact me and be like, Hey, will you do this keynote for $2,000 and then I, you know, begrudgingly, I'm like, Fine, I'll do it and then piss the whole time. I get to be pissed I accepted. I could have said no, and so that's why I tell people, is whatever price you accept. If you accept a carton of eggs and some cheese as your price, then you have to be happy with that. You do not get to be upset with the price that you accepted. You don't if you feel it's below your worth, you don't get to accept it and then be pissed off saying that they're paying you below your worth. That's not the way it works.

18:46
Yeah, I love when you talk about that in the book too, about just like, the existence of resentment, because I feel like I talk about that with my family too, when it comes to doing things and making decisions, you know, where I'm like, if there's resentment in any of this, then you're people pleasing. And so like, look for the resentment, and that's like a flag for you to see. Like, okay, what am I expecting that I'm not getting? And why did I expect that? And like, you know, a lot of sort of working backwards from the resentment, which I find is very helpful for me, because a lot of the time I don't realize I'm people pleasing until it's too late, which is another question I will have for you, but, but going back to I said, No, which is just a fantastic title for a book. I love it. Thank you. How to have boundaries and backbone while not being a jerk, like I said, as soon as I saw the title, I was like, I have to read this. It was fantastic book. I really love I mean, I think a lot of what you say, I wouldn't say I've heard it before, but it's like, I feel like there's so much that makes sense. I'm also just like, what is the disconnect between being able to hear it and be like, you know, what other people's opinions of me don't bear none of my business. Like I've heard all. Of that stuff so many times. But I was so curious to know from your point of view, like, Why, I guess even from an ADHD point of view, why do you think so many ADHD people specifically have such a hard time with boundaries and saying, No,

20:16
I think in some aspects, it's because they want the be, the end all, be all to everyone to prove that they can do it all. And so what better way to prove you can do it all is by saying yes to everything, and then to me, like you said, it falls absolutely within the people pleasing aspect, because when you say yes to everyone, now, everyone has a lot of these expectations on you that you feel like you have to do, and the second you say no, what? Why can't you? What's wrong? And now it becomes this cycle. You know, I think also a hard part about that is that when you teach people that you're always saying yes and you don't have boundaries, then what happens is that when you do set a boundary and you're like, Okay, I'm going to set a boundary with this thing, people don't know how to handle it. Like I say, people are habitual line steppers. They will consistently step over the line. And if you are a people pleaser, you might say, Okay, no, I can't do it. And then the first time they push back or step over the boundary, okay, yes, I can do it. I can do it. And you would rather wear yourself thin than the thought of saying consistently saying no to people. Because the reality of situation is that the first no is a lot easier than the consistent no's because what happens is, is that when you aren't consistently saying no, people will keep badgering you, and that's where folks get exhausted, is that they will just, I'll just say yes. It means a lot to you, obviously. Could you keep asking? So I'll say yes, versus it takes a lot of a person to consistently say no when they're being badgered by one person, or when it comes to family, how the whole family will start doing it right? They'll be like, Jen, just do it for Katy. You know, she's exhausted. And right now you have your cousins, your sister, your uncle, just do it. It's not a big deal. And so you're trying to say no to one person. Now you have to say no to six people and text messages and emails and and that's where people don't understand how hard is to start setting boundaries because of all the other pressure and boundary in some aspects that

22:26
occurs, oh my goodness, I just had such a visceral reaction to that one when I thought of my family and that, like, it's not a big deal, just do it, you know. Oh my goodness. All right, I needed to, like, recover from that one.

22:44
But can I go back to that? Katy real quick? Is that people don't understand how hard that family pressure is to break like they don't. And so it becomes the, like you said, city and the resentment. I'll just do it, even though I don't have time to drive 45 minutes across town to grab something for you. I don't have time. It breaks up my whole day because now I have five people on my butt about it. I will just do it to get everyone off my butt and the the setting of the first boundary, it's it's hard, but it's not going to be the hardest one. It's a consistent badgering to get you to break down, and in a way, for you to never set a boundary again. Because I'm gonna, if I keep, if we all keep badgering you, you learn really quickly, if you set a boundary, we are going to just, literally everyone's gonna keep it tacky until you finally stop doing it, and then you learn not to set any boundaries again.

23:39
One of the things that happened to me, and I've talked about this on the podcast before, like, you know, during the pandemic and lockdown, it was, I mean, it was, I think it was the first time in my life I felt regulated. It was a really amazing experience. I think I'm not the only one who just really kind of benefited from having the rug pulled out from all of the things I was in the middle of doing and and it really made me look at how much I had over committed myself. I was a chronic volunteer, and I would always complain about the fact that I would like join a board, and then I'd have my hand up, and then next thing you know, I'm the president of the board, and I was always just perpetually overwhelmed. I still am. But like, I sort of felt like, like you said that first no had to be much further further ahead, right? So I just was, like, I decided during the pandemic that I was not going to volunteer for anything until I could figure out how to have a better balance. And it really helped me to sort of say, like, Nope. That's just a solid No. And then like you talk about in the book, it's like, like, like you liken it to like reps at a gym, right? It's like, it's a muscle that you build the the no is a muscle in terms of it just got easier from there to say no to things, because I realized how important it was to not say no to myself. And. And that's what I was doing. And I feel like, you know that that idea of like, what is the cost of saying yes, is so important. But one of the things I find that I relate very much to in terms of ADHD is like, how do I say no to myself? I say that sometimes to people, and they look at me like, What are you talking about? But I feel like that's very common with ADHD, is the over excitement. I think there's a combination there of, like, time blindness, maybe, like, sure, I have time to do this, and a little bit of what you said earlier about, like, wanting to prove to everyone that I can do it, because there's, like, a lot of childhood stuff around that, right? And like, living up to your potential and be proving I'm good at things. But I also just have, like, like, this past weekend alone, I was like, I really want to take voice lessons. I really want to volunteer at the library. I want to do, you know, like, all weekend, Katy,

25:57
I was looking into flying lessons. I was looking into flying, right?

26:02
And then it's also, like, impulsive shopping, right? Like, I like, I look at all of these things that are very much ADHD related, and I have to just be like, like, it's a full time job pulling back in terms of my own enthusiasm and my own desire and my own ideas, and I feel like that is like a very unique No. Like, I don't have as much of a problem of modeling boundaries and saying no to other people, but what I really struggle with is I feel perpetually just over stretched and like, every time there's like, something free, and in my calendar, it gets filled up like this, with something I've said yes to because I really wanted to. And I feel like I have a hard time distinguishing between like, what I you know that feeling of like, just because you can doesn't mean you shouldn't, and it's like, just because you want to doesn't mean you can

26:59
look for me, when I look at blocks on my calendar, I'm like, what else can I do? What can I fill it with? And I agree with you on kind of this overextending, the the way I think I can get through these lists. I'm like, Girl, ain't, no way. But I will make these lists and thinking I can do that, you know, I will all of a sudden be like, I wonder if I can, on a Saturday, just paint my living room walls like I just 100% instead of saying, like, just rest, it's okay if you have two hours or three hours or an afternoon, you can just rest. And it's completely okay. Everything doesn't have to be filled, like you said, just because the opportunity is there, and you don't have to pick up a new hobby because you have a weekend free. Like I literally was looking at flying lessons. I was like, how long would it take for me get my private pilot license? Jen, you do not. I told my Chief of Staff, she would murder me either. Why am I looking at private lessons for become a pilot? I do not need to be that. But like you said, I go down this rabbit hole and I'm like, how hard could it be? How long would it I do not have the time to learn how to be a damn pilot, and that's the problem, is that we think we have the time, and then we put ourselves in it, and then it just keeps going downhill that way.

28:16
Yeah, right, well, and that's where I sort of end up in a lot of situations where I have said yes to people, and then I either disappoint them or I disappoint myself because I am run ragged, and I'm kind of like, I don't even know where to put the boundary in. I guess it's like, you said. It's sort of like, look, at some point I have to just be like, you can't like, that's it. It's a hard no in terms of just like, do not agree to things. And so I do find that there are times where I'm just like, No, I'm shutting down my calendar. It's off limits, nothing more like but it does feel like a full time job, kind of pulling back from a lot of that stuff.

28:54
Well, I think the problem also with ADHD is that we go through rabbit holes so quickly, and we find stuff so interesting, and when we find something so interesting, we are just diving down the rabbit hole. It's hours into it, and then it's like, yeah, I think I could do that. I think I can learn Chinese in two weeks, right? Like, I like the stuff that we think about. It's like, No, you can't. No, you can't. You can't do all this. And so for me, I am a rabbit hole person. If I find something interesting, good luck, because, because you're not pulling me out from that. And if it means, if there's something now I have to buy to do it like, like, I have a love of Legos now. And the amount of Legos i because my friend bought me this cat up there. Oh yeah. And, and that was my downhill. And now I research all the Legos I bought right like the rabbit holes I go down because of my interest level. Like I said, my chief of staff can time block. She is very much like the and I am all over the place. But also, you know, one of the things I've learned that I have five degrees, I have two businesses I figured out. About, how do I under this umbrella of ADHD? How do I be Gen How do I get stuff done? How do I figure out my life and the part of getting stuff done? Because, like you said, the time blindness, I'll look at 7pm and be like, Oh, I still got, like, five hours. I'm good, and then 1am hits, and I'm like, what just happened? And so it really is figuring out, how do I continue to work within the parameters of ADHD, doing what I need to do. Like I said, one of my hesitancies in taking medicine is I don't know what it will do to my mind when I'm on stage, because I've been able to figure it out I can be on stage. I'm talking to a crowd of 500 people. I can look through slides to figure out what my next slide will be, what topic I want to connect it to, what thing I want to transition it will all at the same time. I am worried that I won't be able to have those ways to do it, because the only way you have to figure out if you can still do it is if you're doing it in the moment, and and then I don't want an audience to be my guinea pigs. And so for me, it's, how do I figure out, under this ADHD umbrella, doing the things I need to do in a way that also is healthy, meaning I'm not staying up till 4am doing stuff because I've gone down a rabbit hole. I'm able to say, okay, get your butt to bed. Now. There's no point of staying up. Yeah, well.

31:26
And it also sounds like your chief of staff is a very helpful accountability partner, which I think, Oh my gosh.

31:34
So you will be like, we are shutting down your your calendar. Do not book anything on these days. I'm like, Okay, you sure? So she's, she's great with that. And my friends, it's funny because my friends all go to sleep early, and my best friend, he lives in Albuquerque, she'll go sleep at like 830 and she'll be like, Okay, you're gonna try and go sleep early today. I'm like, Yeah, okay, Sarah, I'll try. But I feel like I get my best work done once it hits like 11 o'clock. And I'm just like, now I can do everything

32:01
well, and even with spending money too. I mean, thankfully, I'm married to somebody who is much better with money than I am, and I kind of elected him as the budget person when we got married. And I I said, like, put me on a very strict budget, because I will keep spending money until I until it's gone. So if you keep me on a very, very strict budget. Then, you know, then when I'm done, I'm done. And people used to look at me like, What are you like? They were like, blink twice if you need help. Like they would always think I was in this terrible, dominated marriage. But I was like, No, I instilled that. This was long before I even knew about ADHD. But I was like, I did that for my own good. And I think it's that same idea of, like, looking about these ways in which we intuitively set boundaries ahead of time, knowing that it might be difficult in the moment to set those boundaries. Yeah.

32:52
I mean, it's funny because again, like, I am this big idea person, I want to do it all. And the way Dawn handles that now is she's like, I'm not doing it. Do you have time on your schedule to do it? And I'll be like, oh, never mind, no. And that way it right? She's like, I'm not doing this stuff. And so that's helped out a lot. Of like, do you have time on your schedule to do this project? And I'd be like, Nope, I don't. And so having people around that can help in that way, I think is so important, because I have so much going on on a consistent basis, and there you need people your life that can kind of put, put their foot down and say you're not doing that, like, No. And so that's why I tell Dawn, like you some of this stuff, just say yes or no. It doesn't bother me, because you you see my calendar, you know what it's like. She'll be like, okay, these days you're, we're closed. You're not doing anything else, but you need people to put parameters around you. For you. If it's your partner saying, like, Okay, here's your budget, and that's what works for you, then that's what works for you. It keeps you and your relationship healthy.

33:52
Yeah, I work with a lot of business owners who have that. I that micromanagement. I wouldn't say it's like, nefarious, but there's that, like, you were saying, like that, that feeling like, if we have an idea, it's up to me to do it, because I'm the one in charge, and we kind of have to unravel that, that micromanagement. I think there's a perfectionism element there too, of just like, if I want it done, I'll do it myself, kind of feeling that a lot of us have when we're, you know, really, that feeling of like, Oh, I wish I could clone myself, and a lot of those statements that you hear from perfectionists who, but I work with a lot of business owners who then feel like they have to do everything, and it's and it's very similar to what you were saying with your chief of staff, which is, like, you don't do anything, you generate ideas and you delegate, and that's it, right? But it's like starting from the beginning, just making sure that, like, if you need somebody else to do it for you, in order to give you the time to do the things that you actually want to do,

34:49
not really, I think for me, what it is is that it's this idea of, do you have time on your schedule to do it? Meaning, like, if we're going to take on because I. Hate to say this, most of my ideas are not small. Most of my I mean, I started a tech company like my ideas are not small. And so it's this idea of everything that it entails. Do you have the bandwidth to also do it and manage it? Because there's so much that is involved with it? Yes, you can say, I have this idea and then delegate. But there's so much of it that you have to be involved in to get off the ground. You have to get it off if I were to say, I mean, just a very big picture of, I want to start a shirt company. Well, I can tell someone I want to start a shirt company, but then I have to be the one to talk about what type of shirts, what color shirts, you know, what sizing do I want, what type of material I have to have, all of those things to be able for them to do their job well. And if I don't have all that information, they can't do their job well. And so that's what Don means, is like, do you have this on your your schedule, or do you have the ability on your schedule? Because if you can't do this stuff to get off the ground, you're going to make everyone else's jobs a lot harder. Yeah, and I and no way, am I a perfectionist? For me, my PhD was bees get PhDs, like I am a solid B level. I've had to tell Don we are. We are not perfectionist. We can't move fast with perfection. So that is one thing I can pride myself on, is that there is no perfectionism here. Bees get PhDs.

36:18
Was there anything specific that led to the creation of the book, or the Genesis,

36:24
you know? So I think the first thing is, is, I got done with my dissertation. Everyone just kept asking, so you're gonna write a book? And I'm like, I just got done with the 403 page dissertation. Can you give me, like, point, two seconds to breathe, and then a book has always been in my mind, but I didn't know, like what that even entailed. And most of the big projects I take on, I don't realize that until I'm in the middle of it. And so when I move topics to conflict and culture, the idea is, if you want to get on bigger stages, you have to have a book. Unless you are like a celebrity or have some type of disability or you're missing a limb, you have to have a book. And so once I knew that, okay, if I want to get to next level, I want to have a book, well, I had to think about, what does this what is this book going to be? And one of the things I think, when you're writing a book that is nonfiction that involves parts of your lives, you don't realize, like, how personal it actually is to write and then understanding that the stories you tell about people in your life that that's going to be the reader's only image of them. So you have to be a little bit more thoughtful about it. So it there's there's stories about my mom and my family members, and it's like, okay, how do I want this person who's going to read this book who has never met them? What image do I want to leave them with about my mom? And so for me, just starting to think about writing this book, was like, Okay, it's there's going to be a personal element to it. What do I want to leave people with? And the first title was actually called kind asshole out of the backbone boundaries without being a jerk. But then people were just kind of pushed back. They're like, if you want to go into colleges, you can't have a cuss word and all that. And so the next title that came up to me was this idea of I say no, because that tends to be one of the biggest problems that people have, is that ability to say it. And so it was like, if I want to get on some big stages, I want to have a book and but then also, what do I want this book to be about? And so I would say that for the first time writing, it was a really cool experience to do this. I self published. I didn't go through traditional publishing again the ADHD, I ain't got time. Like y'all are supposed to release this book in two years. No, I'm gonna be on book number three by then, baby, like I ain't got time to wait this time. And when I want to do something, I want it done immediately, like there's no waiting. And so for me, once I started seeing that with traditional publishing, you have to do proposals and you have to farm it out, I said, I'm doing it myself. And so I was able all in to do my book from beginning to end. Was $2,500 and I went on Fiverr and found some phenomenal editors. I did so Vistaprint has a company that's an offshoot called 99 designs, which designed my whole cover and did a phenomenal job. They you send in all your information, they do a contest. So I had over 100 people put in designs for it. And so it was just such a great experience from beginning to end. So now I know exactly what's a part of it. So for my next books, I already have an idea that if I do do hybrid or traditional publishing, I have an idea of what the process is and where my involvement needs to be.

39:46
Yeah, that was great. Yeah, I had a similar experience again. I didn't know I had ADHD at the time, but I self published my first book, and it was very similar. It was like it was all done very quickly and and I rode the hyper focus wave. And yes, yeah, I don't. I can't imagine having to sit and wait for for two years.

40:05
Girl, I literally, like I said, I wanted to have my book written the first draft by the end of 2024 and so, you know a lot of people, when they are talking about writing books, they're like, Okay, clear your desk, set your intentions, you know, put your candles on, and I was like, I ain't got time for that. So it would literally be me in the car like this, dictating to notes. Yeah, that's how I wrote my whole book, with like this, talking to it when I'm driving. And for me, my best ideas are in the shower when I'm driving long distances. So I would just keep reading and saying everything. And then from that point, did the editing and line by line, but that's how I wrote the book. But when people are like, Yeah, I'm looking at my book coming out in 2026 2027 girl, what? That's in two, I'm going to be on Book Three by 2027 like, I couldn't even fathom sitting there and just waiting for x a year or two, absolutely not. No way. No how.

41:05
I love the fact that your initial title was kind of asshole, because you do talk about the difference between being nice and being kind, and a lot, you know how so many of us feel like if we have boundaries, if we say no, it means we're not being nice. And you know, that doesn't happen in a vacuum. A lot of the time. It is, we're told straight out, right? Oh, 100% so, so explain in your own words. Then now, like, what is the difference between niceness and kindness?

41:34
I think a lot of it. Niceness gets weaponized to us to keep us submissive. You know, you're not being nice, Katy, you're it means to me that you're willing to do whatever for anybody just to make sure that you don't rock the boat. How many times when it's like, just be a nice girl. Just be nice. You know, I know he said something mean to you, but, but be nice, and to me, it just means being completely walked over. Kind means you, you self advocate, you have boundaries. You stand up for yourself. You understand that. Part of that is that people will be upset with you and you're okay with that. I think so many people, especially women in society, the fear of not being thought of as nice will have them doing and being in horrendous positions, coming from working in college athletics, the amount of young ladies that put themselves in horrible positions because they didn't want to seem like they were mean, that they didn't want to seem like they weren't nice, they would, they would be in places where, like you saw them, they're doing drugs. These things are happening. Why didn't you want to leave? Well, I just if people wouldn't think I was nice if I did that girl, what? And so they leave themselves in horrible predicaments. And so for me, we have to disseminate the kind of dispel this idea that be nice is good. I think, like, I tell people I am not nice, I'm kind, I am not nice. I do not want people to weaponize that against me, because if I say no, I don't want people be like, no, just be nice. Absolutely not, absolutely not my No. Like, I tell people I go and try to tell someone else to do stuff, because you're not gonna tell me. Like, I do not fall to peer pressure at all, like I'm the worst person to try that with. And so I wish so many women would stop worrying about being nice that they would just have that out of their vocabulary. They stopped telling their daughters to be nice and telling them to be kind, and the things that come with being kind mean. You hold people accountable. You push back on things that people say that are problematic. You hold yourself to a different standard and be nice. None of that occurs. I just think niceness is weaponized way too much against people.

43:43
Yeah, well, I mean, in hindsight, like when I met my husband, we were, I'm actually four years older than he is, so I had four more years experience in the field. We were both met at the same job as journalists at the same newspaper. And, you know, there was, like, in our 20s, and I watched him, a white guy, get promoted over and over and over again and make more money than me. And oftentimes the reason was never, oh, well, you know, there's misogyny and sexism in the workplace, which is what should have been said. But oftentimes I was told it was because I wasn't likable, you know, or I needed to be nicer because I wasn't, you know, I was very blunt, and I was very like, roll up shirt sleeves, and I never took bullshit. And I kind of that was like, I couldn't be any other way. But it was often told that the reason why I wasn't getting promoted was because I had this, like, you know, bristly personality, and, yeah, and so I feel like there is, like, that's what I mean. It doesn't happen in a vacuum. I think there are a lot of women who, you know, we we prove our worth by how many plates we can spin and how much we can do and how many people we can appeal. To and be likable to and and, you know, and with an ADHD diagnosis in adulthood, like, I think a lot of the time, one of the things I love about getting older is the fact that I give less of a shit every year what people think about me. And so I think a lot of women, you know, get diagnosed with ADHD in their 30s and 40s, because they get to that point where they're like, I'm sorry. Like, I'm done with this house of cards, and I'm not doing it anymore, and I'm not going to be like, Holt trying to do everything for everybody. I'm really struggling. And like, you know, and then it all falls apart. And that's kind of where they start to see the ADHD elements come through. And so, you know, I know you talk about, like, aggressive, assertiveness versus aggressiveness, and like, a lot of the way, but I feel like it's really easy to say, like, don't worry about how you're being perceived, but it's also a reality too. And how do you what kind of advice do you give to women who feel like you know, they may have gone further in life or in their career. If they were nicer,

46:06
they think it's always very easy to romanticize and to romanticize, had I been nicer, had I kept quiet, I would have gotten further. But you don't really know that. What in reality, could have happened is that you got 10 more duties under the same title with the same pay. That's more than likely. What would have happened is that you being nice would have been like, okay, Katy, can you take on John's work? John's not feeling well. Can you also take on Steve's this, and now you're carrying everyone's work because you're so nice, you're leaving at 8pm because you have all this stuff to do, right? Like, I think we romanticize the Promotions we would have gotten if we were just nicer. And I just pushed back on that. Niceness has not gotten women a promotion. Niceness has got a woman way more work with no title upgrade and no salary increase. It hasn't gotten anything. And I think the thing about it is, is that you have to be ready with the consequences of not being thought of as nice. And if someone tells me you're not being nice, I'm like, okay, Anne, like, what's your point? Okay, like, it doesn't bother me. And I think, like I said, niceness is weaponized. If I can say, Katy, you're just not being nice, I can get in your head to think, you to have you think, Okay, well, I'll just be nice this time. I don't want to be thought as mean and all that. And that's just not true. Women the whole like, just work harder. You'll get the promotion. We don't get that. We just get more duties. We get more put on us. And so I want if women are sitting there saying, like, my career could have gone x, y, z, if I just would have been nice. No, it wouldn't have. You're just romanticizing that they would have given you the promotion and all that, though, they would just give you more work. That's all

47:50
it is. Yeah. I mean, I remember when Hillary Clinton lost to Trump in in 2016 right? I mean, even my own mother at the time, she's passed now, but I remember her saying, like, I'm not against a woman as president. It's just they didn't like that woman. You know? It was just like, I don't know. There was just something about her. And I was like, What are you talking about? She's literally the most qualified female politician ever. Nobody is more qualified than her. And then with Kamala, it was a lot of the same stuff, right? Which is, like, she's just, I don't know she's not like, friendly enough, right? Like, it's just like, and I don't think the answer is, we need friendlier women, right? But, like, I also feel like, you know, it's this different, I guess the glass ceiling, right? Of like, at some point. I think there's just a limit to where you get in certain arenas as a woman, whether you're nice or not.

48:51
Well, I think it's funny, because it's like, Kamala is like, Hillary, they need to be nicer in the U of Trump, who's like, okay, immigrants, everyone was like, yeah, right, exactly. It's like, what? But like you, you can't have a person running the country and all you're focused on is niceness. Like they're responsible for millions of people. They're responsible for this whole country. Yes, there has to be a level of kindness. But if them being nice is what you're centering you're looking at the wrong thing. And I mean, the reality of it is that, is it going to be that people look at women differently because we are not nice? Yes, and I want women to sleep well knowing that they didn't have people just running amok on them because they let them. I want women to be able to say someone didn't like this, but I'm also going to sleep well because I wasn't their pack mule, right?

49:52
Yeah, absolutely, and I agree with you. Like, I don't think the idea is to be nicer, but I do think that there's i. A formula, I guess, to like ability that assertive women usually, especially assertive women who are marginalized, right? I mean, you talk about the black, angry black woman trope in the book too. It's very real. But like, I feel like there's, there's a difference there in terms of likability and marketability and having a backbone.

50:24
Yeah, there, there was some articles on that. Like, what you're talking about was, like, ability. There's a Forbes article I just looked up about the power of likability. And so 100% that is a big thing with women, is the power of like, there's so much stuff on, like, likability tests, there's so much on that of a likable person is going to go farther than someone who gets shit done, right? Like, let's be honest, if you're like, you will go farther. And I think there's also part of it, how far women get if they act like men? It we just we sit on this. It's not only a tightrope. Katy is a piece of dental floss. Like we sit on a piece of dental floss, trying to massage both sides at all times, and it's exhausting. And the only person that loses in that is us.

51:22
I agree. I'm not sighing because of you. I'm just sighing because of society right now. And it's a lot. It's a lot. And I think, you know, what I think I took from your book to heart was, you know, at the end of the day, when there are so many things that feel out of your control. The most important thing for us and our mental health and our spiritual and physical health is like living authentically and saying at the end of the day that, like I was true to myself, and I think that that's something that a lot of us, and I actually feel like an ADHD diagnosis for me really helped me get to that point, which is like I read that realization of how much I wasn't living authentically, how much I was masking, how much I felt like I was trying to control how people viewed me, or, you know, environments. And there was like a letting go in a lot of ways, in terms of, like, I need to focus on my own boundaries. I need to focus on my own like, I said, not saying no to me, you know, really, like, I can't disappoint myself, so I'm gonna have to live as authentically as possible. And I really, I really appreciated that part of the book, I guess. What do you hope most people get from reading the book,

52:39
that you're worth it, that it's hard, let me preface, is hard as hell to set boundaries, to say no, to self advocate, especially if you've never been trained that, like many women have not been trained in those skills. So it's really hard at the beginning to start doing it, but you're worth it. You are worth learning how to handle people pushing back and being habitual line steppers. You are worth just say no, and even if it's you, just sit in your office and do nothing rather than do that thing, like you are worth it. And I think so many women are taught that they're not worth it, and that's what hurts my heart, is like you are worth saying no and setting boundaries for any other reason, but just for yourself. Yeah.

53:19
Well, this has been wonderful. Thank you so much. What's next for you? I know you do a lot of speaking engagements, and you're promoting the book, and when's your next book? That's a joke because I like, I know people say that immediately it's like, you don't get time to rest.

53:34
But the funny part is, I told my Chief of Staff whenever I'm like, so there's this thing I'm doing, she's like, what now? Yeah, so I'm actually in the process of writing two books at the same time. So one of them is, I come from college athletics and youth sports right now. So I come from college athletics. I coach youth volleyball, but in youth sports right now, there's so much conflict. Parents don't have any skills. Kids don't have skills. Coaches administer, no one. So I'm writing a book for parents on navigating conflict of being in these Facebook groups and seeing what are the big problems that parents keep coming up with. So I think that's one of the books I'm doing like simultaneously, and the other one is called the courage of the pivot. I think in my life, there have been several points where I've pivoted, and folks talk about pivoting, but they don't talk about the mouth courage. It you need to leave the thing you know, to go to the thing you don't know, and you have no clue how it's going to work out at all. And so for me, those are two books I'm kind of writing at the same time, which is all ADHD, right? That's epitome of ADHD. Let me write two books at the same time. So in my notes, I just am speaking the different chapters. And so that's I'm doing right now is these two books. That's I said, by 2027 baby, I'm gonna be three books in, yeah, and so I got stuff to do now that I know the way to do it, like you couldn't have given me the keys to the key. Them now I understand. So, yeah, so that's what I'm doing right now, is writing those two books, because I think parents need to think about conflict and their kids in a different way, and I think I have the the skill set and knowledge to help them with that.

55:13
Yeah, right. And I think, you know, something touching that you said about your mom too in the book, that like, like, that desire to kind of keep the peace, but also, the conflict avoidance is very different than conflict resolution.

55:29
Yeah, the 100% you can't have harmony without conflict, and people just don't realize that. Like you. Whenever people be like, I'm dating and we've never had a fight, and I'm like, oh, good luck. It's about to be World War Three like that. Just, it's not rational to think you can date this person that's totally different from you. And there's no arguing that's just not rational.

55:50
And even the courage to pivot. I mean, that's, I don't even know if it's courage for me or if it's just lack of interest, when I just, like, you know, suddenly move into a new field and a completely new, I mean, I've had so many different jobs that I used to have a lot of shame around, right? Where I was like, Oh, I can't hold down a job. I'm always doing this. I'm like, you know, I can't finish things. I used to hold a lot of shame around that I think a lot of women do, especially ADHD women. But now I'm kind of like, Oh no, this is just like, I'm moving where my I'm following the dopamine, right? And I never really think about the courage it takes to do that. And so I like that reframe. You know that it, yeah, there is really courage there, and not just kind of flakiness.

56:32
Well, there is, I think there's two things. First, I think that college volleyball gave me the ability to talk about changing jobs, because you can, I had like, four different jobs of four different years, because that's just college volleyball. You go, you're someone gets hired and they want you, or your whole staff gets fired. Like college volleyball is a very different beast when it comes to hiring and firing than other people. And so because of that, going to jobs, I can talk about that really well. I think that when it comes to pivoting, I don't think people realize how much courage it takes. It's really easy to sit in a job you hate because you don't want to leave it. It's very easy. And I think we can talk, we can think about people who have been in jobs for 1020, 3040, years, who they hate because they didn't want to leave. And so for me, it takes all courage to say I hate this job more than I hate what could potentially be on the other side.

57:28
Yeah, awesome. Well, thank you so much. It's been delightful to talk to you. I will Jen fry talks.com. Is the website that's where people can find you, and I'll have links to all of your social accounts too in the show notes, as well as a link to I said, No, I'll probably even put a link to the Forbes article on likability in the show notes there. But yeah, thank you so much for your time. This has been really great and really appreciate this conversation.

57:56
I just appreciate you for having me on here and having this podcast and talking about things that women tend to not think it's acceptable to talk about. So I appreciate you, friend. Oh, thanks.

58:12
There you have it. Thank you for listening, and I really hope you enjoyed this episode of the women and ADHD podcast. If you'd like to find out more about me and my coaching programs. Head over to women and adhd.com if you're a woman who was diagnosed with ADHD and you'd like to apply to be a guest on this podcast, visit women and adhd.com/podcast guest, and you can find that link in the episode show notes. Also, you know, we ADHD ers crave feedback, and I would really appreciate hearing from you the listener. Please take a moment to leave me a review on Apple podcasts or audible. And if that feels like too much, and I totally get it, please just take a few seconds right now to give me a five star rating or share this episode on your own social media to help reach more women who maybe have yet to discover and lean into this gift of neurodivergency, and they may be struggling and they don't even know why. I'll see you next time when I interview another amazing woman who discovered she's not lazy or crazy or broken, but she has ADHD, and she's now on the path to understanding her neurodivergent mind and finally, using this gift to her advantage. Take care. Till then you.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai