ADHD Women's Wellbeing Podcast

This Isn't Working: ADHD, Purpose, Ambition and Finding a Better Way with Meghan French Dunbar

ADHD Awareness Month 2026: What Actually Helps? This October, I'm putting community, real experiences and practical support at the heart of ADHD Awareness Month. There are live conversations and ways for you to share what actually helps in your own life. ⁠⁠Visit the Events page⁠⁠ to see what’s happening and get involved. Understood.org's The ADHD Channel for Women features three shows hosted by three different hosts, unpacking a different side of life with ADHD. They cover everything from sex, dating, and relationships to deep dives into where neurodivergence meets the biggest news stories, like how a newly discovered gene variant could change the way we treat ADHD. There's also an ADHD coach who answers listeners' questions. Check out The ADHD Channel for Women ⁠here This episode from The ADHD Channel for Women is called 'I’ve never felt like a good woman...' You'll hear a complex conversation about ADHD, femininity, gender, and why talking about the hard stuff is important. Cate sits down with Rae Jacobson, host of Understood.org’s Hyperfocus podcast, journalist, and a producer on this show. They talk about something they’ve both struggled to name: the collision between ADHD, femininity, and gender expression. They dig into what it felt like to watch other girls “get it.” The tidiness. The calm. The effortlessness. All things that executive dysfunction made feel out of reach. They talk about the pressure to be nurturing, organized, and endlessly available — and what happens when your brain doesn’t cooperate with any of it. And they look at the research on outcomes for women and girls with ADHD." This week’s episode is sponsored by Understood.org, the leading nonprofit dedicated to empowering the millions of people with learning and thinking differences, such as ADHD and dyslexia. For all things ADHD Women's Wellbeing, including the podcast, resources and events, head here: www.adhdwomenswellbeing.co.uk Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

ADHD Awareness Month 2026: What Actually Helps? This October, I'm putting community, real experiences and practical support at the heart of ADHD Awareness Month. There are live conversations, Instagram Lives, podcast events and ways for you to share what actually helps in your own life. ⁠Visit the Events page⁠ to see what’s happening and get involved. If you've ever felt shame about what you eat, how you forget to eat, or why your safe foods feel so necessary, this episode is going to be a genuine relief. On this week's episode of The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Podcast, I'm delighted to welcome back Dr Miguel Toribio-Mateas, clinical neuroscientist, applied microbiologist, nutrition researcher, Honorary Research Fellow at Cardiff University and Senior Lecturer at the University of West London. Miguel has just published his brilliant new book, ADHD Body and Mind: A Compassionate Guide to Rewilding Your Nervous System with Neuroscience, Nutrition, and Gut-Brain Health, published by Jessica Kingsley/Hachette. His research has appeared in leading journals including the BMJ and BMC Psychiatry, and his work is known for translating complex science into something genuinely human and accessible. This is one of those conversations that covers a huge amount of ground while never once feeling overwhelming. We talk about why the ADHD brain is wired for resilience and what that actually costs us, why the gut-brain connection matters so much for neurodivergent people, how to approach nutrition with compassion rather than perfectionism, and why your safe foods are not something to be ashamed of. We also get into the language of science, why terms like comorbidity matter, and how researchers like Miguel are slowly shifting the field towards a more neuroaffirmative approach. Advertisement⏐Try AG1 now at ⁠http://drinkag1.com/adhdwomen⁠ and get £20 off your first order + 5 AG1 Travel Packs for on the go, a bottle of Vitamin D3+K2, and the Welcome Kit for FREE. No risk with the 30-day money-back guarantee. Find all details about the health benefits in the link. Study results are on file with AG1, 2023. In this episode, we cover: Why compassion and kindness are at the heart of Miguel's approach to ADHD, nutrition and the nervous system How the ADHD nervous system forms in high alert, and what that means for resilience and hypervigilance Why ADHD is far more than a dopamine deficiency, and how hormones, gut bacteria and the nervous system are all part of the picture The gut-brain axis and why looking after your gut has a direct impact on your ADHD brain Why the language of science still creates problems, including terms like comorbidity and healthy cohort, and how researchers are starting to push back How to read ADHD Body and Mind in whichever way works for your brain, whether that's cover to cover or jumping straight to chapter nine Why understanding the why behind your ADHD behaviours is the keystone to change, even when it doesn't fix things overnight Miguel's approach to nutrition: keep your safe foods, add rather than subtract, and never shame what nourishes you Why safe foods are doing an important job for your nervous system, and why being pushed out of your comfort zone too quickly never lasts The circle approach to expanding your diet gently, starting from your anchors and building outward Why a hot bath is an act of self-compassion backed by neuroscience, and why you don't need to get into cold water to support your nervous system The self-kindness toolkit at the end of the book and what it covers Chapters: 00:00 - Welcome and introducing Dr Miguel Toribio-Mateas back to the podcast 02:00 - What's at the heart of ADHD Body and Mind, and why compassion comes first 05:00 - Why the ADHD nervous system is wired for hypervigilance and resilience 08:00 - ADHD as more than dopamine: hormones, gut bacteria and the full picture 11:00 - The neuroaffirmative lens in academic research and why language matters 15:00 - How the gut-brain axis connects to ADHD and emotional regulation 19:00 - The awareness and repetition model: why understanding the why is the keystone 23:00 - Nutrition without perfectionism: how to approach food with kindness 27:00 - Safe foods, anchors and adding rather than subtracting 32:00 - The circle approach: expanding your diet gently from the inside out 37:00 - The ADHD cookery school: creativity, condiments and cooking without recipes 42:00 - Hot baths, cold water and why softness is sometimes the braver choice 46:00 - The self-kindness toolkit and what the book offers neurodivergent readers and clinicians Links and Resources: Find my popular ADHD Women's Wellbeing workshops and resources on my website ⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠. Follow the podcast on Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠@adhd_womenswellbeing_pod⁠⁠⁠ Get my book, The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Toolkit (also available in ebook and audiobook) ⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠ Join the More Yourself membership community ⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠ Visit Miguel's website Connect with Miguel on Instagram Connect with Miguel on LinkedIn Get Miguel's book: ADHD Body and Mind: A Compassionate Guide to Rewilding Your Nervous System with Neuroscience, Nutrition, and Gut-Brain Health Kate Moryoussef is a women's ADHD lifestyle and wellbeing coach, author of The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Toolkit and EFT practitioner who helps overwhelmed and unfulfilled newly diagnosed women with ADHD find more calm, balance, hope, health, compassion, creativity, and clarity. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

ADHD Awareness Month 2026: What Actually Helps? This October, I'm putting community, real experiences and practical support at the heart of ADHD Awareness Month. There are live conversations, Instagram Lives, podcast events and ways for you to share what actually helps in your own life. ⁠⁠Visit the Events page⁠⁠ to see what’s happening and get involved. If you've ever wondered why some days feel manageable and others feel completely impossible, even when nothing has obviously changed, your nervous system is trying to tell you something. Welcome to this week's More Yourself Monday episode. Today I'm sharing a clip from one of my workshops on the nervous system, polyvagal theory and how understanding both can genuinely change the way you move through your days with ADHD. This is not a clinical lecture. This is a simple, accessible explanation of why your nervous system behaves the way it does, what the polyvagal ladder actually means in real life, and how you can start to work with your nervous system rather than against it. I also introduce the concept of glimmers, those small micro moments of safety and joy that can shift your entire day when you learn to notice and actively seek them out. The full workshop is available on my website, and the link is below. In this episode, we cover: What it means to feel grounded, connected and safe in your nervous system, and why so many of us rarely get there A simple explanation of polyvagal theory and why it matters so much for neurodivergent people The three states of the polyvagal ladder: ventral vagal, sympathetic and dorsal vagal, and what each one feels like from the inside Why the ADHD brain so often operates in fight or flight mode, and what that costs us over time What the dorsal vagal shutdown state feels like, and why it shows up as fatigue, numbness and withdrawal The window of tolerance: what it is, what opens and closes it, and why ADHD narrows it The difference between hyper arousal and hypo arousal, and why each needs a different response What glimmers are and why they matter as much as knowing your triggers How to identify your own personal glimmers and actively harness them across the day Why regulating your own nervous system is not selfish but has a ripple effect on everyone around you The role of co-regulation and why our nervous system state affects the people we live and work with Links and Resources: Find my popular ADHD Women's Wellbeing workshops and resources on my website ⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠. Follow the podcast on Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠@adhd_womenswellbeing_pod⁠⁠⁠ Get my book, The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Toolkit (also available in ebook and audiobook) ⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠ Join the More Yourself membership community ⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠ Get the full nervous system and polyvagal theory workshop series here with a 10% discount for Podcast listeners Kate Moryoussef is a women's ADHD lifestyle and wellbeing coach and EFT practitioner who helps overwhelmed and unfulfilled newly diagnosed women with ADHD find more calm, balance, hope, health, compassion, creativity, and clarity. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

ADHD Awareness Month 2026: What Actually Helps?This October, I'm putting community, real experiences and practical support at the heart of ADHD Awareness Month. There are live conversations, Instagram Lives, podcast events and ways for you to share what actually helps in your own life. Visit the Events page to see what’s happening and get involved. Content note: This episode contains references to suicide and family bereavement. If you are struggling, please reach out to a trusted support resource. In the UK, the Samaritans can be contacted on 116 123. In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Hotline is 1-800-273-8255. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is on 13 11 14. Hotlines in other countries can be found here. You can also check out the Campaign Against Living Miserably here What if the traits you've spent a lifetime apologising for are actually the source of your greatest ability? On this week's episode of The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Podcast, I'm joined by Laura Day, New York Times bestselling author, teacher and intuitive consultant who has spent four decades working with individuals and some of the world's largest companies to help them identify and achieve their goals. Laura's new book, The Prism: Seven Steps to Heal Your Past and Transform Your Future, is the book she describes as an ADHD manual — a practical, evidence-informed framework for building the scaffolding that helps neurodivergent brains thrive. With two New York Times bestsellers to her name and a 40-year teaching community, Laura is also someone who has lived with ADHD her entire life, and this conversation is one of the most honest, warm and genuinely surprising I have had on the podcast. We talk about Laura's childhood in a household where neurodivergence was everywhere but unnamed, why girls of her generation were never allowed to act out and what that suppression cost them, how she built a career advising billion-dollar companies using her intuitive mind, and why the ADHD brain is uniquely suited to intuition, just not always in the way we expect. In this episode, we cover: Laura's diagnosis at 10 or 11, and why girls of her generation were never treated Growing up in a household where neurodivergence showed up in multiple family members, often with devastating consequences How Laura used survival, focus and necessity as her prosthetic scaffolding before she understood her own neurology Why the ADHD brain is the intuitive brain, and how to make that work for you rather than against you Why intuition is not something you tap into but something that is always downloading, and how to structure it usefully The difference between the voice of fear and the voice of intuition, and why documentation matters more than belief How Laura advises billion-dollar companies using intuitive methods, and why business and science do what works regardless of belief Why Laura says you are your own worst intuitive, and why community-based intuitive practice is so powerful The shame and blame pages: a research-backed tool for releasing what no longer serves you Why doing just the next thing is one of the most powerful strategies for ADHD brains How Laura built scaffolding for her household without knowing it was for neurodivergence Why vulnerability is not a weakness but the source of extraordinary ability The Prism: what it offers neurodivergent people and why Laura considers it her ADHD manual Timestamps: 00:00 - Welcome and introducing Laura Day 02:00 - Laura's diagnosis at 10 or 11 and why girls weren't treated in her generation 05:00 - Growing up with neurodivergence all around her, and what it cost her family 08:00 - How she used her role as oldest child to create focus and structure 10:00 - Spatial difficulties, irritability and the compensations she built over decades 13:00 - Why the ADHD brain is the intuitive brain 16:00 - How intuition actually works and why it is always downloading 20:00 - Documenting intuition and building a feedback loop with the world 23:00 - How she works with billion-dollar companies and why they don't need to believe in it 27:00 - Social dynamics, masking and forgetting to say hello 31:00 - Emotional regulation, overstimulation and learning to step away rather than snap 35:00 - Generational patterns, self-awareness and raising neurodivergent children 40:00 - Just do the next thing: why this is the most powerful ADHD strategy 44:00 - The shame and blame pages and the research behind letting go 47:00 - The Prism: seven steps, and why Laura considers it her ADHD manual 50:00 - How to find Laura and join her teaching community Links and Resources: Find my popular ADHD Women's Wellbeing workshops and resources on my website ⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠. Follow the podcast on Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠@adhd_womenswellbeing_pod⁠⁠⁠ Get my book, The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Toolkit (also available in ebook and audiobook) ⁠⁠⁠here Join the More Yourself membership community ⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠ Visit Laura's website: lauraday.com Get Laura's new book: The Prism: Seven Steps to Heal Your Past and Transform Your Future, also available as an audiobook narrated by Laura herself Kate Moryoussef is a women's ADHD lifestyle and wellbeing coach and EFT practitioner who helps overwhelmed and unfulfilled newly diagnosed women with ADHD find more calm, balance, hope, health, compassion, creativity, and clarity. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices