Some people call it the ADHD tax. It’s the late fee, the subscription you meant to cancel, the second bottle of dish soap because the first one vanished. Most of us quietly file it under “what is wrong with me.”
My guest, Jillian Ivey, sat down and actually added hers up. This episode looks at the ADHD tax for what it really is: a cost, not a character flaw.
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Why this conversation matters to me
When Jill described mail that stops existing the second it comes in the door unopened, I had to jump in. You do not want to see my kitchen table right now.
I’m also a night owl. My brain is quietest after everyone else goes to bed, and getting enough sleep anyway is something I actively work on with my therapists.
So none of this felt far away from me. What I wanted from Jill was the part most of us skip: looking at the bill itself, instead of the story we tell ourselves about it.
Meet Jillian Ivey
Jillian (Jill) Ivey is a writer and content strategist in Philadelphia who has ADHD. She’s not a clinician, and she’s not here as an ADHD expert. She’s here because she did the math on her own life.
Jill runs Jilletante Creative, a name that blends “dilettante” with her own. She’s also an editor, a yoga teacher and a voice actor, and she has worked for herself since 2017.
Jill’s Story Audit is a live 45-minute session where she goes through your business website with you and tells you whether it’s telling the story you think it’s telling. It’s built for business owners, and Vibers get $50 off with the code VIBE at checkout: The Jilletante Creative Story Audit.
Find Jill at:
- Website: jilletante.com
- Story Audit: $50 off with the code VIBE
- LinkedIn: Jillian Ivey
What is the ADHD tax?
The ADHD tax isn’t a real tax, and it has nothing to do with tax credits. It’s the everyday money that slips away when forgetting, losing things or putting things off costs you something.
For Jill, it started with a therapy subscription. When a therapist she saw left a big practice, Jill assumed the old membership ended too. A year later she spotted the charge still running on her credit card statement.
Getting it fixed meant an email, then a phone call, then a contract nobody reads. The practice refunded about 50 bucks out of several hundred dollars she’d paid.
And it just got me thinking about like, where are all of the other times where something like this has happened to me? And it’s a lot.
Jillian Ivey
Then the list grew. Missed bills buried in the mail. A rate change at her storage unit she never got to negotiate. A missed quarterly tax payment.
And so that now I’ve got to pay interest to the IRS, which is like, I feel great about where my tax money is going these days.
Jillian Ivey
ADHD and money: the costs we create ourselves
Some of the ADHD tax comes from other people’s systems. Some of it, Jill says, we create ourselves, usually by buying things we already own.
Before a plumber came over, she cleaned out under her kitchen sink.
I have six boxes of ant bait, six, six boxes of ant bait under my sink.
Jillian Ivey
She found three bottles of the same dish soap. The pantry held about 18 cans of chickpeas. And one flight cost roughly $300 more than it would have, because she kept looking at fares and getting pulled away before booking.
None of these are big on their own. That’s exactly the problem. Added up over a year, or a lifetime, it becomes real money.
Research backs up how big that lifetime number can get. One long-term study followed 517 young adults, 309 of them diagnosed with ADHD as children, through age 25. The ADHD group earned less and leaned more on family for money, and the researchers estimated they could expect to earn $543,000 to $616,000 less over their lifetimes (Altszuler et al., 2016, Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology).
That sample was mostly men who were diagnosed young, so it can’t describe everyone. But it makes Jill’s point in numbers: these costs don’t stay small.
Is the ADHD tax a systems problem or a character flaw?
Jill’s frame is that much of this cost is built into how the world works.
the world is not designed for us and that’s not, oops, we forgot to do this for these people.
Jillian Ivey
She’s not asking for much. If her hospital sent a text when a bill arrived instead of a letter, she says she’d pay it right away.
But there are lots of small changes that people could make in order to make things easier for those of us who have brains that work in different ways.
Jillian Ivey
Then I asked the question my audience always asks. If the late fee is the system’s fault, is there anything left for me to do? Where does naming the system stop being true and start being somewhere to hide?
Jill’s answer was one word: self-awareness. If someone calls it out, or she has already built a system that works and still isn’t using it, that’s where she stops blaming her brain.
I hesitate to call it a character flaw, it’s my behavior, not necessarily something that I can’t get around.
Jillian Ivey
I love that answer because it holds both things at once. The system is real, and so is your power to work with it. For more on that balance, my conversation with Brynne Conroy about why traditional money advice fails ADHD brains is a good next listen.
ADHD masking at work and the cost of looking professional
The second half of our conversation turned from money to masking. Jill thinks women carry extra pressure at work no matter how their brain works: to take the notes, plan the birthday parties and wash dishes they didn’t leave in the sink.
That one is backed by research too. In a set of studies published in the American Economic Review, women were more likely than men to volunteer for tasks that don’t lead to promotion, more likely to be asked, and more likely to say yes (Babcock et al., 2017, American Economic Review).
Add ADHD to that, and you’re masking your gender expectations and your brain at the same time. For Jill, the cost got so high that she burned out of job after job.
It wasn’t the work. I could do the work. It was all of the things that were around the work.
Jillian Ivey
So in 2017 she started working for herself. Most people can’t just walk away from a boss and a review cycle, and we talked about that too.
Her ask for managers is simple. Let the people on your team tell you what’s really going on, and give them the grace you’d want for yourself. If masking at work is wearing you down, I wrote more about it in ADHD masking at work.
What Jill wants you to take away
When I asked for the one thing she wants listeners to carry with them, Jill came back to the mask.
But I think that it’s really important that we allow ourselves to drop the mask and connect with other people as authentic human beings.
Jillian Ivey
She was clear that you don’t have to show every part of yourself to everyone. But to the extent you feel safe, letting the mask slip a little is worth it.
Key takeaways
- The ADHD tax is a cost, not a verdict. Late fees and double buys are a bill you can look at, not proof something is wrong with you.
- Small costs add up fast. One forgotten subscription or one unopened envelope can quietly cost hundreds over time.
- The system is real, and so is your part. Self-awareness is where blaming your brain turns into changing your behavior.
- Masking has a price too. Looking “professional” all day can cost more energy than the work itself.
People also ask
What is the ADHD tax?
The ADHD tax is a nickname for the extra money people with ADHD often lose to late fees, forgotten subscriptions, missed renewals and buying things they already own. It isn’t an actual tax. In this episode, Jill Ivey walks through her own list, from a therapy subscription she paid for a year too long to six boxes of ant bait under her sink.
Is ADHD a character flaw?
No. The National Institute of Mental Health describes ADHD as a developmental disorder marked by persistent symptoms of inattention, hyperactivity and impulsivity (NIMH). Jill’s take is that ADHD explains a lot, but once you know a system that works for you, using it is your behavior to own.
What are ADHD tax purchases?
They’re things you buy because you forgot you already had them, lost the first one, or waited until the price went up. Jill’s examples include three bottles of the same dish soap, about 18 cans of chickpeas and a flight that cost roughly $300 more because she kept putting off booking it.
Why is masking at work so exhausting with ADHD?
Masking means constantly managing how you come across, on top of doing the job itself. Jill found the work was never the problem; living up to everyone else’s idea of professionalism was. That steady effort is a big part of why she burned out of several jobs before going out on her own.
Final thoughts
What stays with me most is how freeing it is to call it a bill. A bill can be read, questioned and, sometimes, fixed. A character flaw just sits on your chest.
You can find Jill at jilletante.com. If you own a business, her Story Audit is $50 off with the code VIBE at checkout.
If this episode hit home, my guidebook Your Brain, Your Budget is the one I’d point you to next. It’s about money without shame, and that link takes 25% off with code VIBE25.
If you’re new around here, start here to find more conversations like this one.
If this conversation brought something up for you, my Mental Health Resources Hub is free, with no email required.
Follow The Vibe With Ky Podcast on Apple Podcasts so you never miss an episode, and leave a rating while you’re there so more people can find the show. You can also follow @TheVibeWithKy on your favorite platform.
Ky is a mental health advocate speaking from lived experience, not a clinician; nothing here is medical advice.
Much love. Good vibes. ‐ Ky
Full transcript
Here’s the full conversation with Jill, in case you’d rather read it.
Read the full transcript
Jillian Ivey (00:00)
And so there are all of these things where if you add it up over the course of a year or over the course of a lifetime, it’s a tremendous amount of money, not to mention the time and the energy that we’re putting into this.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (00:10)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (00:10)
And I think that, the world is not designed for us and that’s not, oops, we forgot to do this for these people. It is this need for all of the people like us to be able to fit into this world that makes nobody want to actually make those changes.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (00:28)
Welcome to The Vibe With Ky Podcast, the show where we talk openly and honestly about mental health and the beautiful mess of being an adult in today’s world. My name is Kyrus Keenan Westcott. Thank you so much for being here.
Today we’re talking about the hidden cost of ADHD, not the feeling, the actual bill, the late fee, the subscription that you meant to cancel months ago, the thing that you bought twice because you couldn’t find the first one. Some people call it the ADHD tax. Most of us quietly file it under.
What is wrong with me? This episode looks at it for what it really is. It’s a cost, it’s not a character flaw.
My guest today is Jillian Ivey, a writer and content strategist out of Philadelphia, my city, who has ADHD. She’s not here as an ADHD expert. She’s here because she sat down and did the math on what her own ADHD has cost her, and then she wrote about it.
And I think by the end of this conversation, you’ll look at your own bill a little bit differently. Once you see it as a bill, you can actually start doing something about it. Before we get started, if you want more mental health conversations and resources just like this, make sure you visit my website at thevibewithky.com or follow me at The Vibe With Ky on your favorite social media platform.
With that said, sit back, relax, and enjoy my chat with Jillian Ivey on The Vibe With Ky Podcast. Yeah, you’re you’re you’re in Philly. We’re in Philly.
I know you have some very strong opinions. about your cheesesteaks. I I I have
Jillian Ivey (01:59)
Yeah
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (02:00)
to I have to ask, where do you go? Where do you go to get your cheesesteaks?
Jillian Ivey (02:05)
Okay, well, here’s the thing. My actual strongest opinion about a cheesesteak is the cheesesteak is not it. I want a roast pork sandwich with broccoli rabe and provolone.
And I live so close to John’s roast pork. Like, it’s just, it’s right here.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (02:11)
That’s fine. I’ll allow it. I’ll allow it.
I I right. That’s fair. That’s fair.
You know what’s funny? people ask me all the time, like where I prefer to get my cheeses from. And my answer I think surprises people.
I will forever go to like those, like the street vendors, like the carts, all like on
Jillian Ivey (02:32)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (02:33)
the street on like market and stuff like that, because like it’s questionable. And that’s how I like my cheesesteaks. I want the ingredients to be questionable.
Jillian Ivey (02:38)
Yeah.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (02:40)
I don’t know when was the last time they cleaned that grill. I don’t know. I don’t ask questions, but it tastes good to me.
So I prefer I prefer that. Exactly. I’m t I’m tasting
Jillian Ivey (02:46)
You’re tasting history with each bite.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (02:51)
1776 for all I know.
Jillian Ivey (02:53)
There you go.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (02:53)
that’s that’s where that’s where I get my cheesesteaks from. So I I that’s why I I always so it’s it’s always nice to talk to another Philadelphia person here because I speak with people all over the world. So it’s nice to to have you
Jillian Ivey (03:04)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (03:05)
here. So thank you for hanging out with me today.
Jillian Ivey (03:07)
Thank you for having me.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (03:08)
Yeah, yeah. I w I want to start I want to start with your with your list here because it’s it’s a long one, right? So content strategist, writer,
Jillian Ivey (03:16)
Yes.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (03:17)
editor, yoga teacher, voice actor, and you even review theater sometimes.
Jillian Ivey (03:24)
I do.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (03:25)
and I’m a theater geek. I’m a musical theater geek. I have musical theater tattoos.
Jillian Ivey (03:28)
We’ll have to go see a show together sometime.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (03:29)
Absolutely. I’m I’m playing Sweeney Todd right now in in a show that opens up in a couple weeks. Yeah, I’m a musical theater fanatic. Yes, yes, I love it, love
Jillian Ivey (03:36)
I love Sweeney Todd.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (03:38)
it. and on top of that, you host a podcast about tabletop games. On top of that, you have a toddler and you
Jillian Ivey (03:47)
I do.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (03:48)
have all of these things going on. Somebody looking at that from the outside will probably land in one of two places, either This woman has it completely together and all figured out or
Jillian Ivey (04:00)
Ha
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (04:00)
something else is going on underneath of all of that. Which one which one is closer to the truth there?
Jillian Ivey (04:05)
it’s B. I think that this is like one of the things that maybe I should have realized earlier in my life that I had ADHD
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (04:11)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (04:12)
because I love to do so many different things, but I also need to fill my time because if my time is not filled when I’m idle, bad things can happen. So
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (04:22)
yeah.
Jillian Ivey (04:22)
I try to really keep myself busy, but I’m also like I am multi-passionate. The reason that my company is called Jilletante, it takes the word dilettante combines my name in it. love a portmanteau. But when I
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (04:31)
Yeah. Yes.
Jillian Ivey (04:33)
kind of started out on my own, I was trying to figure out, do I want to focus on the content strategy? Do I want to focus on the writing, on the editing? is it?
like, why not everything? Which is like the opposite of the advice that they give you to niche down. I’m currently in the process of
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (04:43)
Yeah. Yes. Yes.
Jillian Ivey (04:47)
revamping some things in my business, and I am trying to niche down a little bit. But
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (04:51)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (04:51)
I still do all of those things, even if I’m niching who I’m doing it for, because I like doing all of those things.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (04:57)
Yeah, yeah.
Jillian Ivey (04:59)
Life is short. Why do things that you don’t enjoy?
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (05:02)
Exactly. Exactly. I I want I want you to take me back to to this initial conversation, right?
You you had a therapist who had who you had been seeing for years,
Jillian Ivey (05:11)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (05:12)
and at some point she stops hinting and and and just says the words out loud. What what did she actually say to you and and what did you say back to her? How did you react to it?
Jillian Ivey (05:24)
So apparently she’d kind of surfaced it more directly a few times over the years. And I had been so resistant to it that I just forgot. those memories did not consolidate.
And then during the pandemic, when everybody was home and we were figuring out, like we were dropping our masks and we were figuring out that the way that we worked is different, the way that we interact with people is different. And maybe like the way that I had been performing in professional settings, the way that I had been performing when I was interacting with other people is not actually
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (05:48)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (05:49)
me. And. So that was starting to happen.
I had the luxury of having worked for myself and worked from home for a couple of years by that point. So
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (05:56)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (05:57)
it wasn’t so much that I was learning new things about myself, but as other people were learning these things about themselves, it made me get more introspective. a friend found out that they were autistic and a friend got diagnosed with ADHD. I had three friends come out as trans during that time. so we
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (06:12)
wow. Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (06:14)
were learning a lot about ourselves. And then around that time also, I think, I don’t know if I was spending more time on social media or if these accounts were just really starting to pop up, but I was seeing these ADHD meme accounts and they were specifically talking about how ADHD appears in women and how ADHD
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (06:30)
Yes.
Jillian Ivey (06:30)
appears in people who were diagnosed as gifted when they were kids, diagnosed being
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (06:34)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (06:35)
maybe the wrong term, but I was considered a gifted kid. I’m also an oldest daughter, so that plays into a lot of these things too.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (06:39)
Yes. yeah.
Jillian Ivey (06:42)
And so seeing these memes and be like, I don’t think I’ve ever related to a meme more in my life and that happening a couple of times. And I was talking to my therapist one day, just one of our normal sessions. And I’d said something about like, I saw this meme the other day about ADHD.
And it made me kind of wonder, she’s like, so you’re ready to have that conversation now? What do mean?
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (07:01)
so you’re like, okay. Yeah. Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (07:04)
So over the course of our next couple of sessions, we talked about it in more depth. And she said, here’s what I’d like to do. It’s very hard right now to get a formal ADHD diagnosis.
The process is very lengthy. It often needs to happen in person because they want to do observations. And
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (07:18)
Uh-huh.
Jillian Ivey (07:19)
there’s a big wait list for everybody right now because everybody’s sitting at home realizing this stuff about themselves. So what
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (07:24)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (07:25)
I would like to do as a first try here, and we’ll see how it works, is I just want, with your permission, to write a note to your doctor saying, I’ve been seeing Jill for several years. I suspect that she has ADHD based on the following criteria in the DSM. I think that she would benefit from pharmaceutical intervention.
And so my general practitioner. like not a biopharmacologist basically says,
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (07:46)
Right.
Jillian Ivey (07:47)
or a psychopharmacologist rather says, okay, what do you want to try? like the, you know, Adderall is the, I think Adderall and Ritalin are the brands that everybody knows. And so Adderall came to my
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (07:56)
Sure.
Jillian Ivey (07:56)
head first and I was like, sure, let’s, let’s try that one. And we decided to try an extended release because I’ve tried, I’ve been taking Wellbutrin for a long time. We’ll just throw everything out on the table. I love Wellbutrin. Yeah.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (08:04)
Same. Part of the yes, a part of the I am I’m I’m part of the Wellbutrin and Adderall family. Yes. Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (08:09)
Yeah. So, and probably that’s another reason that we didn’t find the right away because the Wellbutrin that I was taking for other things also kind of helped to flatline some of the ADHD
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (08:17)
Yes, yes.
Jillian Ivey (08:19)
stuff. So I knew that from taking Wellbutrin, I did well on extended release doses of this sort of medication. So we decided to try the extended release, Adderall, the generic.
So just had a bottle that said amphetamines sitting on my medicine cabinet.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (08:28)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (08:33)
But we tried that and it was like a switch being flipped.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (08:37)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (08:37)
The only other time that this has ever happened to me before was when I was getting high. just like, yeah, yeah. you know,
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (08:41)
Now we’re talking. Now this now the episode started.
Jillian Ivey (08:46)
like, let’s, it’s legal here. I had my med card, but it was
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (08:49)
Yes, yes. No, we’re fine. We’re you’re in you’re in good company. You’re fine.
Jillian Ivey (08:53)
just like when the drug kicked in, it was like I could feel things, certain systems power on and certain systems power down.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (08:58)
Yeah. Yes.
Jillian Ivey (08:59)
And so I was able to work in a way that I actually did, was able to work in naturally, but not maybe at the best time to do that.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (09:06)
Mm.
Jillian Ivey (09:07)
I’m a natural, let me pause there, because I just completely stumbled over my words. I am a natural night owl. I’m a natural night owl. I’ve
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (09:14)
Fine. Story of my life. Yes.
Jillian Ivey (09:17)
always been, I like to stay up late. I like to be in the quiet of the middle of the night. But that’s not always the most practical time to try and get things done.
So if my brain naturally wants to come online at, between midnight and 2 a.m. but the Adderall helped it kick on at 10 a.m. instead, that was very helpful for me as somebody who needed to
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (09:37)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (09:38)
run a business and needed to have a relationship with my husband and occasionally see my friends. at that time it was virtual, but we were still trying to see each other. And so it just, was really helpful for me in just kind of reordering these things and helping me find my hyper focus in a way that was a little bit more productive and a little bit less
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (09:58)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (09:59)
on, fixating on Wikipedia rabbit holes in middle of the night.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (10:03)
Right, right, right.
Jillian Ivey (10:04)
Because if I was focused when I was sitting at my computer, that was helpful. Now I will say occasionally I didn’t time the dose right and I would, you know, it would turn on when I was in the kitchen and be like, now it’s time to reorganize the cabinets. Right. no, I don’t like painting. But.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (10:15)
Yes. I think I do want to paint the bathroom tonight. Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (10:19)
I’ve done that. I don’t like doing that. But yeah, so it was really helpful for me to just have that basis for comparison to see what my brain was like without the medication and what my brain was like with. And
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (10:30)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (10:30)
then, so I was on it for a little while and then a couple of things happened. One was that I got COVID and I specifically got COVID at a friend’s funeral, which sucked. But I wound up with long COVID from that.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (10:36)
Hmm. yeah. Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (10:41)
so the way that. Long COVID was affecting me and you might hear it a little bit in the way that I speak. I stumble over my words sometimes.
I have very, very mild aphasia. And so I forget the words that I’m looking for sometimes. As a yoga teacher, it’s super fun when I’m trying to tell somebody to turn their foot out, but I can’t remember the word for foot.
And it’s like, your lower right appendage? But,
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (10:58)
Mm-hmm. Yes. Yes. Yes.
Jillian Ivey (11:04)
so my brain was kind of already shifting a little bit. And then I decided to make it worse by trying to get pregnant. And when I was trying to get pregnant, my my
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (11:14)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (11:14)
Adderall prescription was up and my doctor was like, not writing you prescription if you’re trying to get pregnant, amphetamines are not healthy for pregnancy. I cold turkey went off of the Adderall, stayed off of the Adderall through trying to conceive, being pregnant and then 14 months of breastfeeding. And by the time, know, so almost two years that I was, I was completely off the drugs.
And when I was, I felt like I was ready to get back on something. I talked to a friend about Strattera, so one of the non-stimulant drugs. And it had never even occurred to me to try a non-stimulant, but it was like, let’s try it because Adderall has a pain in the ass to get.
Every three months I had to get a doctor’s appointment. It’s not
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (11:48)
Yeah. Yep.
Jillian Ivey (11:50)
always in stock. When it is available, the pharmacist might grill you like you are a criminal.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (11:56)
Yes.
Jillian Ivey (11:57)
And so I tried Strattera. And Strattera, I mean, it was better than nothing. but it wasn’t
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (12:01)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (12:02)
as good as Adderall had been. So was on it for a couple of months. Strattera also gave me terrible heartburn, which
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (12:08)
wow.
Jillian Ivey (12:08)
was not super fun. So
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (12:10)
Sure.
Jillian Ivey (12:11)
I tried that for, I guess about six months and it just wasn’t right. And so I talked to my doctor about it. She let’s put you back on Adderall right in time
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (12:18)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (12:19)
for the current Adderall shortage. So I have been off my meds for the last couple of months and I’m back to
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (12:25)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (12:25)
having to like find those moments of hyper-focus and lasso onto them like they’re a horse that’s just running right across the field because I need something. If I don’t lasso onto that, I might lose an entire day to, I don’t want to say being unproductive or being non-productive because I still get stuff done. It’s just not necessarily the stuff that needs to happen.
So, you know, so it is sometimes realizing that I need to work on something and I know that the only time I’m going to be able to be productive on it is after my son goes to bed. you know, I need to get in the right headspace before I get on a call or something. And the only way that I’m going to be able to do that is to produce my own dopamine.
So I’m going to go lift heavy things or go on a long walk or do
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (13:08)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (13:09)
some yoga.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (13:10)
Yeah. Yeah. I know that feeling.
I’m I am also a night owl, very, very much so. and for me,
Jillian Ivey (13:14)
Yeah, a lot of us are.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (13:16)
yeah, it’s it’s also honestly when my brain is just the most quiet, you know, like I I I don’t have people constantly texting or or needing my attention.
Jillian Ivey (13:26)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (13:26)
Like it’s just it’s just me. And I my brain it’s easier for my brain to focus at night because there’s just less things happening all around me,
Jillian Ivey (13:34)
Yeah.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (13:35)
which I which I very much and the sucky part is that, you know, if you stay
Jillian Ivey (13:39)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (13:40)
up till three o’clock in the morning, yeah, you are hella productive, but you also don’t sleep. and so that’s probably one of the biggest things that I work on with with my therapists is like, okay, I’m a night owl. I need to actually make sure that I get sleep because I feel like complete garbage when I when I don’t.
And the way that you were describing everything from from Wellbutrin to to the Adderall shortages, like I feel like we’re the same person. Cause like the I I during that Adderall short shortage, I was I I had to switch over to Focalin.
Jillian Ivey (14:10)
Okay.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (14:11)
good lord. It it Focalin is a lot shorter of of a dose. And so it it go
Jillian Ivey (14:17)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (14:17)
give me a kick for an hour and then it’s just like, okay, bye. Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (14:20)
yeah.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (14:21)
So like it just like I was so happy when I finally got back one to to my Adderall. And this is not me like saying, you know, drugs are the only thing that can work. I I always want to preface that.
But for me, it it changed my life to finally find
Jillian Ivey (14:36)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (14:36)
that good balance between my Wellbutrin and my my Adderall. And just like the daily work that I had to do with with therapy and just all the other sleeping and eating well, all that kind of stuff. and the and the reason that I wanted you in the chair s across from me today was mainly because you talk often about what all all of the stuff that we talked about, you talk about what this cost and
Jillian Ivey (15:00)
Yes.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (15:00)
not not just like emotionally, like quite literally in dollars in in late
Jillian Ivey (15:06)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (15:06)
fees, right? The the the subscription that you meant to cancel, 11 months ago.
Jillian Ivey (15:11)
Yeah. Yeah.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (15:12)
when when our ADHD is ADHD, that
Jillian Ivey (15:15)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (15:16)
can cost us things financially. the the the thing that you bought like the thing that I think about is like the thing that I I would buy twice because I couldn’t find the first thing. Like I lost it.
So I just bought it over again. You know, so so do me a favor, just walk us through that ledger. What what is actually the cost here?
What is the real financial cost of undiagnosed ADHD that nobody ever counts up.
Jillian Ivey (15:41)
So the cost is going to be different for everybody. And it’s been a while since I’ve actually crunched the hard numbers. But I can tell you what it looks like for me.
The reason that I wrote this piece to begin with was that I have my therapist, my husband has his therapist, we have our therapist. Our therapist had been part of a very large practice that had a subscription model, which we can talk about the ethics of somebody in the medical field having a subscription model to begin with. But that was the reality of the situation. They had a subscription model.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (16:08)
Yeah, that’s true. Yeah. Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (16:10)
And so every month we paid for access to our therapist, in addition to having to pay our co-pays to see our therapist. She at some point left, decided to open her own practice, had her own software. And I just didn’t really think about it.
I kind of assumed that when she left and took her patients with her, that those patients would be removed from the roster from the original practice, and we wouldn’t have to worry about it. So then, I don’t know, probably a year later, I’m looking at my credit card statement, and I see I have this recurring payment. to that original practice.
It’s like, no, that must be a mistake. And so I contacted them. And first of all, when you have ADHD, catching those things is a bit like, I don’t know many people with ADHD who are on top of looking at their credit card statements, right? Or balance their checkbooks or whatever.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (16:50)
Yeah. Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (16:51)
And then I send an email and then they’re like, no, you have to call us. And so there are all these barriers to entry that I have to remember to do and be okay with doing.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (16:57)
the friction. All that friction. Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (17:00)
And yeah, so much friction. And so I finally talked to them and they’re like, no, you needed to cancel with us. It was in your original member contract.
It was like, you mean that like accept all terms that you had to check when you signed up online that nobody ever reads?
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (17:14)
Right, right.
Jillian Ivey (17:15)
So they wound up refunding me like two months of service fees. So like 50 bucks
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (17:20)
Wow.
Jillian Ivey (17:20)
out of several hundred dollars that I had spent.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (17:22)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (17:23)
And it just got me thinking about like, where are all of the other times where something like this has happened to me? And it’s a lot. it is, I am, one of the ways that my ADHD manifests is, you know, the ADHD piles that we all get where we like, we have our piles and we get blind to our piles.
For me, it’s mail. Mail comes into my house and then
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (17:42)
Mm. Yes.
Jillian Ivey (17:44)
I am aware that I got the mail out of the mailbox and unless I open it right away, it’s like it’s not there. Like I could have a, right, yeah, no, it’s, I know that I am not alone here. And so
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (17:50)
yeah. You don’t want to see my kitchen table right now. You don’t want to see it. Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (17:56)
because of that, you know, I miss like, a hospital bill or I miss
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (18:00)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (18:01)
a notification that my rate is changing for the storage unit that I use or whatever it is. And so I don’t get a chance to catch these things. I get charged late fees or I don’t get a chance to renegotiate my rates or I miss my quarterly tax payment.
And so that now I’ve got to pay interest to the IRS, which is like, I feel great about where my tax money is going these days.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (18:22)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. yeah.
Jillian Ivey (18:26)
So it just it starts to add up. then, yeah. So on top of all of that, those are the things where other people are charging you.
There are the things that we do ourselves. So I just had to clean out under my my kitchen sink the other day because we had a plumber coming over to check on something. And as I cleaned it out, it’s like I have six boxes of ant bait, six, six boxes of ant bait under my sink.
My my my fire extinguisher was in the back. corner where it was not going to be accessible. I had it like earlier that week.
It’s like, I think we have a fire extinguisher. I don’t know where it is. And I had put it on the shopping list.
I found three things of the same dish soap because I buy it. Sometimes I put it away. Sometimes my husband puts it away.
But then I don’t remember where it is or that I bought it in the first place. And I buy another one. Cleaned out our pantry recently.
We had like 18 cans of chickpeas in there because like. I like chickpeas. keep buying chickpeas.
Do I need chickpeas? I don’t know. I’m going to buy more.
So that’s another place where those costs add up. things like my sister’s getting married in Hawaii in a couple of weeks. And I kept looking up airfare and then getting distracted and doing something else and not booking my ticket.
So by the time I bought my ticket to go see my sister get married, it costs like $300 more than I did the first time that I
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (19:41)
yeah.
Jillian Ivey (19:42)
looked at it.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (19:42)
Yep.
Jillian Ivey (19:43)
And so there are all of these things where if you add it up over the course of a year or over the course of a lifetime, it’s a tremendous amount of money, not to mention the time and the energy that we’re putting into this.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (19:53)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (19:53)
And I think that, the world is not designed for us and that’s not, oops, we forgot to do this for these people. It is this need for all of the people like us to be able to fit into this world that makes nobody want to actually make those changes. And some
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (20:11)
Right.
Jillian Ivey (20:12)
of these changes would be very easy. Some of these changes, like if I got a text alert every time that I got a bill from the hospital rather than having something sent to me in the mail, I would pay the bill right away. They have the app. Sometimes the app alerts
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (20:22)
Mm-hmm. Right. Yes.
Jillian Ivey (20:26)
show up at the time that I’m looking at my phone. Sometimes they don’t. I don’t even see the notification.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (20:30)
Uh-huh.
Jillian Ivey (20:31)
But there are lots of small changes that people could make in order to make things easier for those of us who have brains that work in different ways.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (20:39)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (20:39)
and they choose not to do this and they choose not to do it repeatedly. People who are neuro-atypical have different opinions as to what their brain is counts as a disability for them. I generally don’t consider myself to be disabled, but I know that my brain doesn’t work the way that everybody else’s.
But until we determine that, we can’t say like, this needs to be covered under the ADA, right? We can’t say that you need your services to work for people who are. or autistic or OCD or whatever it is because there’s no consensus on whether that actually counts or not.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (21:12)
Right, right. I wanna I wanna ask something that I I know that my audience asks, you know, whenever they hear this type of conversation, obviously a lot of us frame this as a a systems problem as opposed to a character flaw, right? And I’m I’m
Jillian Ivey (21:27)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (21:28)
with you a hundred percent. And usually when I bring that up, I usually get, you know, there’s like a small contingency of people that bring up a an understandable point, right? There’s a there’s a version of of that.
That a person can hide behind, right? If if
Jillian Ivey (21:42)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (21:43)
the late fee is the system’s fault, then there is nothing for me to do about the late fee, and I can I can
Jillian Ivey (21:50)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (21:51)
just stop here. So in in your experience, where is the line for you? When does when does naming the system stop being true and start being just somewhere to hide behind?
Jillian Ivey (22:05)
So just to clarify, are you talking about hiding behind these conditions ourselves or that those people are hiding behind the rigidity of their systems?
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (22:10)
Yeah, yeah. So s yeah, so so we so we say this is a s this is a systems problem, right, for a lot of people and it’s not it’s not anything to do with you personally, but
Jillian Ivey (22:21)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (22:22)
what when when does it when is it like when does it stop being about the system and actually start being about the person themselves? You know, ’cause I feel like sometimes we’ll people be like, it’s the system, there’s nothing I can do about it and they’ll just kind of s like hide behind that, use that as I guess an excuse. in a way as opposed
Jillian Ivey (22:39)
Yeah, yeah.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (22:40)
to a reason. So so when when is it s where’s that line there in your experience?
Jillian Ivey (22:46)
I think it’s self-awareness. think that, you
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (22:48)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (22:48)
know, it’s very easy. This is something that happens like in abusive situations too, right? Where people use like the language of therapy to kind of justify the way that they treat other people in an abusive way. And so
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (23:01)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (23:01)
they can just say, you know, so sorry, it’s just my narcissistic personality disorder kind of makes it that I treat people like this. It’s like, yes, but
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (23:09)
Uh-huh.
Jillian Ivey (23:09)
you are aware that you have this. You probably have a therapist. You can do better.
And so for me, sometimes it’s like, you this is my ADHD. And at what point am I hiding behind my ADHD? It’s where if somebody calls it out to me or if I’m aware that this is something that I have worked on with my therapist or I’ve worked on some sort of system that I know works for me and I’m still doing the thing, then I think that’s where I can’t blame my, you know, I can’t blame my brain in the way
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (23:43)
Uh-huh.
Jillian Ivey (23:43)
that I Well, guess it’s always my brain, but I can’t blame my brain for being different. Then it
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (23:47)
Right. Sure.
Jillian Ivey (23:49)
just becomes like, I hesitate to call it a character flaw, it’s my behavior, not necessarily something
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (23:55)
Sure. Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (23:56)
that I can’t get around.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (23:57)
Yeah, yeah. And I I wanna I wanna I always ask this this next thing because I always wanna point out that like I am a man. I am a male.
Jillian Ivey (24:06)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (24:07)
a lot of my audience are people that identify as women.
Jillian Ivey (24:10)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (24:11)
and and like you you told me you know, how you got to your answer and and like it wasn’t, you know, necessarily through a front door. My audience is mostly women, a lot of them in their forties, fifties, sixties.
Jillian Ivey (24:22)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (24:22)
A whole lot of them either got their answer either very late when it comes to their mental health journey, particularly ADHD,
Jillian Ivey (24:32)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (24:32)
or they are like still standing outside of that door,
Jillian Ivey (24:36)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (24:37)
feeling as though they have no way to get in to that door. What do you think those women are carrying, whether it be mentally financially, whatever it may be, what do you think those women are carrying that nobody has, I guess, ever put a name on, that nobody really talks about?
Jillian Ivey (24:57)
I think there’s tremendous pressure on women across the board, matter what their neuro profile is, to behave in a certain way in certain environments. And I think especially like in professional settings, there’s this expectation that you will be the note taker. You will be the one who organizes the birthday parties.
You will be the one who, like if you’ve got a communal kitchen in your office, you’ll be the one who helps to like. clean the dishes, even though you’re not necessarily the one who left them in the sink, right? So we already have all
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (25:25)
Uh-huh.
Jillian Ivey (25:25)
of these expectations on us. And then there are the behavioral expectations on top of that for how you comport yourself. And we have learned over sometimes decades of doing this.
I’ll be 43 next month. So I’ve been out of college.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (25:38)
Happy early birthday.
Jillian Ivey (25:39)
thank you. But I just had my 20th reunion at Penn. So I’ve been out of college for 20 years, 20 years in the professional
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (25:44)
Yeah. Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (25:46)
world. And I realized that there were certain expectations that were put on me in terms of how I behaved that were, first of all, not expected of the men that I was working with. And secondly, just so unnatural to me.
And part of that is like I’m a little bit of a rebel at heart. I was raised by conservatives who still thought that I should do better than any man. And so.
So I really, know, part of it was like, well, why do I have to do that if he’s not being asked to do that or whatever it was? But also just the way that if I spoke too loud or too much in a meeting, if I was a little bit too enthusiastic over something that had happened, whatever it was. so women more than men in general have to learn to mask these behaviors.
And then if you add that level of neuro-atypicality to it, there’s even more that we have to move. It’s not just the things that are associated with gender. It’s the things that are fundamental to how we are.
Those base instincts that we have, the lizard brain, the parts of our brain that are so reflective or reflexive. And we are returning that off.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (26:54)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (26:54)
it is like at a certain point, the cost becomes so great. So I started working for myself after like burning out on another job, right? I was 2017, so I was 34 years old.
And I had all but one job I had had since college. I had burned out on in some way or like flamed out gloriously. So it was like, maybe I shouldn’t have a boss because I’m brushing up against this need to be myself.
and I’m burning out, it is the constantly having to live up to other people’s expectations of like what my professionalism is, what my comportment is, that that was the problem. It wasn’t the work. I could do the work. It was all of
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (27:39)
Right.
Jillian Ivey (27:39)
the things that were around the work. And so after that pattern several times, my husband finally was the one who said, maybe you just need to try working for yourself and see how that goes. And
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (27:48)
Mm. Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (27:50)
I think that’s something that also women are more afraid to do than men.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (27:55)
Yeah, yeah.
Jillian Ivey (27:56)
is that taking that step out, working for themselves. I’ve met, so throughout my career, I’ve worked with a lot of startups and I have worked with, think, two female founders of all of these startups that I’ve worked on in a couple of decades. And so I’ve seen with my own eyes and the numbers are there too.
There are people who study this and the number of women who are in entrepreneurial roles is just so much smaller than men. And so I think that’s something too, where we we’ve learned to mask. our ADHD or our autism or whatever it is, we’ve also learned to mask or to suppress these natural behaviors that are seen as unwomanly or unfeminine.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (28:30)
Mm.
Jillian Ivey (28:31)
And that combination of things makes it very hard for us to feel like we can step out onto the stage on our own. That was a very long answer to your question.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (28:37)
Yeah. I w I wanna go back to no no no no it’s I think it’s I think it’s perfect because I I I wanna dive into something that that you talked about like in regards to to professionalism because there there back in twenty twenty one,
Jillian Ivey (28:50)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (28:51)
you talked about professionalism and
Jillian Ivey (28:53)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (28:54)
you talked about how professionalism, working nine to five, the dress code, the commute.
Jillian Ivey (29:00)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (29:00)
None of that actually mattered. We just collectively agreed that it did. And and that one traveled. So
Jillian Ivey (29:09)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (29:09)
now it’s 2026. It’s five years later. Most people have gotten dragged back into the building, right? the pets
Jillian Ivey (29:16)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (29:16)
are off the zoom calls for a lot of people now.
Jillian Ivey (29:18)
Yep.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (29:19)
Five years later, do you still believe that?
Jillian Ivey (29:23)
I still believe it. The problem is
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (29:24)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (29:25)
capitalism is not structured for it. We, one of the biggest things, and we saw this in Philadelphia with like the Comcast building, Comcast major, one of the biggest corporations in the country is based in Philadelphia. And everybody started working from home and they were doing great. Like the company was doing well
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (29:40)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (29:41)
and the employees were doing well. The quality of life was better. And they decided, no, we want everybody back in the office full time.
They didn’t even move to hybrid. It was just like, you are all coming back. And the reason was not because they were worried about people being unproductive or anything else.
The reason was they had two high rise buildings in Center City Philadelphia that were empty. The two biggest buildings in the city were empty.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (30:00)
Two the two biggest buildings in the city. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (30:05)
so, we found ourselves in a, in a, we found ourselves in this world where the realities of the economy and the realities of our personhood are completely at odds with each other. When we were, in a situation where we were forced to work from home, not counting the essential workers who, thank God for the essential workers, were still going to
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (30:27)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (30:28)
their places of work every day. We all learned a lot about ourselves. And we learned that, hey, my brain does not really turn on until 10 o’clock in the morning.
And there is no reason for me to have to rush to the office at 8 a.m. when the office is down the hall. So, you know, I’ll be online at 9 a.m.
checking my email, but I won’t take any meetings until 10 and there’s no reason to. Or we
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (30:49)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (30:49)
learned that, hey, is a lot of people had their kids home during that time too. So it was just like, I can’t work during normal work hours because I’ve also got a parent. I’ve got to now be a teacher too.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (30:59)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (30:59)
And so people were getting online after dinner, after their kids went to bed and doing their work then and realizing I’m actually more productive when I work during these times. Or
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (31:08)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (31:09)
I feel better sitting at my computer. If I’m going to be sitting all day, I want to sit and be comfortable in sweatpants and not have to worry about like. dressing in uncomfortable professional clothes for nobody to see me behind the closed door of my office or in my cube farm or whatever it is.
And so we all learned these things and the numbers in terms of productivity, the numbers in terms of economic growth stayed constant if not improving throughout that time that we were in lockdown. And then things started to open up, we got vaccinations, the infection numbers started to go down and everybody’s like, but I have a real estate portfolio.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (31:46)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (31:46)
So they made people start coming back to work and dealing with commutes that we know made them miserable and working in office settings that we know made them less productive. And so I still strongly believe that. The other thing that I think happened is during 2020 and 2021, when we were all mostly at home and working from home, we got used to chatting with each other in non-traditional ways.
We were not speaking face-to-face at the water cooler, right? We were sometimes on
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (32:10)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (32:12)
Zoom. but we were also on Slack or we were on Teams or whatever it was. So we got used to typing to each other a lot more.
I don’t think it’s a coincidence that in 2022, ChatGPT launched and all of a sudden we are talking to these bots as if they were real people. And
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (32:30)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (32:30)
that also is affecting what we see as professionalism and what is or is not appropriate in the workspace and the expectations of people in terms of their productivity.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (32:39)
Yeah, yeah. I it’s funny, but th as you were talking about the the buildings in Philly,
Jillian Ivey (32:44)
Yeah.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (32:44)
and I I can’t help but think about what the city was like before COVID. You’re right. Like it I mean
Jillian Ivey (32:50)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (32:50)
it was it was a the the way that we I f I feel like it’s a double-edged sword. Like I feel like it’s a blessing to curse be it’s a blessing because it’s created this technology that we’re able to have these types of conversations more easily now than we ever would have had
Jillian Ivey (33:05)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (33:05)
before. but to your point. It has changed the way that we communicate with each other. But I think the thing
Jillian Ivey (33:14)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (33:14)
that remains the same, and this is something that you talk about, is is the masking part. whether it’s in person or not, we still find a way to, there’s a certain way that we have to mask in order to
Jillian Ivey (33:25)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (33:26)
survive in the corporate world. And I know earlier earlier you were talking about you’re like, okay, maybe I should go work for myself, which is something that you ended up doing. I know that there’s a lot of people out there that listen to this that Can’t do that, right?
That that are not able to just go into the business on their
Jillian Ivey (33:43)
Sure.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (33:43)
own. they have a boss, they have a review cycle, and
Jillian Ivey (33:47)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (33:47)
I I guess I guess a very real sense that the mask that they use every day is the
Jillian Ivey (33:54)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (33:54)
only reason that they even still have a job. So,
Jillian Ivey (33:57)
Yeah, for sure.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (33:58)
so what would you say to somebody whose paycheck depends that they feel depends on? having that mask.
Jillian Ivey (34:06)
So the first thing I’ll say is it is important, again, whether or not these conditions count as disabilities or not, that is up for debate. But if you have documentation of this with your employer, with your HR, if that mask starts to crack and you start to struggle at work, it’s not going to be the sort of infraction that can get you immediately dismissed. the way that it might be if you did not have documentation of this. Now, I’m not an attorney. My
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (34:35)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (34:35)
husband’s an attorney and he’s in employment law and so he’s
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (34:38)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (34:38)
clued me in on some of these things. But if you have a note from a doctor that you send to your boss and you have filed with HR that says like, this person has ADHD and they work best in these conditions or they need these accommodations,
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (34:51)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (34:51)
that just creates a little bit of a safety bubble. for you. So I think that because we all know we’ve all had the experience where that mask cracks, you’re too tired or something
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (35:01)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (35:02)
really sad has happened in your life or you had a fight with your spouse or your
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (35:05)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (35:06)
kid just really you kept you up all night or threw a tantrum on the way to daycare or whatever it is. And it makes it so much harder for us to maintain that mask. And sometimes
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (35:14)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (35:14)
you just need to sit at your desk and cry or you just need to
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (35:17)
Yeah, sure.
Jillian Ivey (35:18)
say, hey, you know, this meeting should be an email. Like I’m not in a position to be in person with. with what is going on in my life.
And so if you have that documented accommodation needed, it’s much easier to say the mask needs to come off right now. Like this is just
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (35:33)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (35:34)
not a good thing that’s happening. At the same time, like there are times where we really do need those masks. If you’re interviewing for a job, you can’t let your ADHD freak flag fly, right? You just need to keep it checked.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (35:42)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (35:46)
because there are certain expectations of what you’re like. And then the minute you get
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (35:49)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (35:49)
hired and that contract is signed on both sides, then you can be like, by the way, guys, here’s what I’m asking for. I
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (35:54)
Sure. Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (35:57)
think the other thing is, again, the experience of all of us literally seeing inside each other’s homes for two years. I saw
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (36:04)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (36:05)
all my clients’ pets. I saw a lot of my clients’ kids. I had one client whose kid, was bath time, and the kid just came running, and mommy, mommy, like, like, yeah.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (36:13)
no.
Jillian Ivey (36:15)
right across the camera. And so, yeah, yeah.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (36:17)
You’re like, no, no, no, no, no.
Jillian Ivey (36:21)
And so, you know, we all got this dose of humanity that it’s we’re five years out now, but like I want us to still hang on to that and to remember that we are the people that we are working with are people like I am not a number. I am not a cog in a wheel. Like I am a person before I am anything else.
And then there’s a big list of things that I am before I am like a worker. But If you are somebody who expects that mask from other people to give them the grace of their own humanity, because that’s what you would want for yourself too. And so to say,
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (36:54)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (36:55)
like, hey, it is okay if you tell me what’s actually going on, you, my person that I am managing, the people on my team, it is okay if you are honest with me, to give them that safe space and to give them the grace that like sometimes people fuck up. Sometimes people just are having a bad day and
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (37:09)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (37:12)
We understand that because I am a human talking to another human. that’s actually yeah, I know, it’s crazy. But I’m not AI.
And that’s actually like a foundational aspect of the work that I do now is I’m
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (37:16)
What? You’re a real person you’re not AI, you’re real? What? no Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jillian Ivey (37:27)
working with professional service providers, helping them to tell stories in a way that they relate to their prospective ideal clients as people, not as a list of accomplishments, not as your resume told in paragraph form, but
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (37:40)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (37:41)
using this relationship between you and me as a way of figuring out how we can work together.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (37:47)
Yeah, yeah. I wanna play a little game with you. it’s called overrated,
Jillian Ivey (37:50)
Yeah.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (37:51)
underrated. so
Jillian Ivey (37:53)
boy, okay.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (37:54)
what’s gonna happen is I’m going to say one line. I’m gonna say one thing,
Jillian Ivey (37:57)
Mm-hmm.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (37:57)
and you’re just gonna say overrated or underrated, and you can give your take on it. Easy enough, right? Okay, here we go.
Jillian Ivey (38:02)
Okay, all right, love it.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (38:04)
First one, here go. Nine to five. Overrated, underrated.
Jillian Ivey (38:09)
The movie or the song?
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (38:10)
Just in general, working nine to five. Rest in peace, Dolly Parton. I know, I know,
Jillian Ivey (38:12)
Dolly Parton died last week!
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (38:15)
I know. Rest in peace, Dolly Parton. The the idea of of nine of working nine to five.
Yeah. Yes, no, not not our queen, not our queen. Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (38:18)
So the idea of working 9 to 5, not St. Dolly, the idea of working 9 to 5, completely overrated. The movie, the song, underrated.
Like, you cannot, I cannot hold those up high enough.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (38:31)
Yeah, okay, fair enough. next one. Camera on for every meeting, overrated or underrated?
Jillian Ivey (38:37)
God, overrated. I’m not always pretty. You
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (38:39)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (38:41)
know, sometimes I go straight from like a strength training workout to a call with somebody.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (38:47)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (38:48)
like, I’ve got my hair is greasy and it’s at a top knot. I’m not wearing any makeup. I’ve got pit stains.
Like, camera off. I can still communicate with you just as well without you being able to see all of that.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (38:51)
Yeah. It’s like you don’t want to see any of this. Yes.
Fair. Yeah. Okay.
The next one. when you’re on a meeting and they somebody says the phrase circling back, overrated or
Jillian Ivey (39:07)
haha
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (39:07)
underrated.
Jillian Ivey (39:08)
That’s also overrated. Although I think that it’s potentially underrated in non-professional settings because it’s
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (39:15)
Yes, yes.
Jillian Ivey (39:17)
just one of those things where if you say to a friend, like, yeah, you want
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (39:21)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (39:21)
to make plans? Let’s circle back on that. Everybody pauses and just like, huh, OK. it
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (39:24)
Yeah, yeah.
Jillian Ivey (39:28)
takes you out of it. Sometimes adult friendships are stressful, right? And scheduling is stressful.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (39:33)
That’s true. Yes.
Jillian Ivey (39:34)
And I play D&D and have a D&D podcast. And scheduling D&D is notoriously stressful. So
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (39:37)
Yeah. I’m sure.
Jillian Ivey (39:40)
if we say, let’s circle back on scheduling, it gives everybody a laugh because we’re acknowledging we are all ridiculously busy. This
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (39:43)
Yes. Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (39:47)
is not work. And so sometimes we can have a little bit of fun with that. I think that in general,
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (39:50)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (39:51)
using corporate jargon in non-corporate settings can be really fun. Yeah.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (39:54)
It’s the best. I think it’s the best. I think it’s the best.
I I think one of the one of my there’s a certain phrases that just I feel like have entered into the world now that
Jillian Ivey (40:03)
yeah.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (40:03)
because of COVID, the amount of times that I hear I’ve heard somebody say, Can you see my screen? Like I can’t even tell you how many times I’ve said it myself
Jillian Ivey (40:09)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (40:15)
and how many times I’ve heard it. But it’s just like one of those things that’s that’s just part of our life now, you know?
Jillian Ivey (40:20)
Well, mean, the lexicon changes like that frequently, right? we we adapt
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (40:24)
Yes.
Jillian Ivey (40:25)
phrases. And now we’re seeing
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (40:26)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (40:26)
with with AI to where we’re becoming accustomed. Now, I was trained on good writing and I will defend
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (40:32)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (40:32)
my use of the dash until my dying breath. You cannot take that away from me. no, I still use it.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (40:35)
I I will too, but I can’t use it anymore. I feel like even even even when my Word document automatically when you put two things next to each other and it automatically goes from the en dash to the dash, I’m like, nope, nope, can’t do it. I can’t let anybody think. Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (40:47)
No, still use it. Really, you will pry it out of my cold dead hands. there are certain things, really, there
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (40:55)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (40:57)
will be em dash on my tombstone, mark my words. But there
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (41:00)
Yeah. I love it.
Jillian Ivey (41:01)
are certain tells that we’ve kind of seen
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (41:04)
Uh-huh.
Jillian Ivey (41:04)
with AI output. I don’t even want to call it writing, but like with the output from an LLM that has
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (41:07)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (41:11)
been trained on a lot of what it was trained on was professional writing, right? So it was
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (41:15)
Yes.
Jillian Ivey (41:15)
business writing that is then coming back. so if you’re trying to, I don’t know if you saw the story the other day, there’s some hikers who tried to book or to plan their hike through, I think it through Gemini and they wound up getting stranded because the Gemini assured
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (41:28)
goodness gracious.
Jillian Ivey (41:29)
them that this hike was going to be no problem and told them what to pack and how much water to bring. And it was all wrong. Like they had to call 911.
But so if you were to go to Gemini and be like, hey, you fucked up. You sent me on this death march and Gemini was
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (41:42)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (41:43)
like, you’re so right. Here’s where I made a mistake. And so
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (41:45)
Yep. Yep.
Jillian Ivey (41:46)
we’ve seen that term so many times, which is something that we would send in an email to somebody. If I sent the wrong attachment or if the data analysis is wrong or whatever it is. 10 years ago, I might have sent an email saying, you’re so wrong.
Here’s where I made the mistake. Let me fix that for you. But because that business writing went into the systems and now it’s being pushed back out.
We’re seeing that in everyday conversation too. I hate it. I hate it.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (42:09)
Right. Right.
Jillian Ivey (42:11)
so seeing that business jargon like enter the non-business realm, that
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (42:16)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (42:17)
is a pattern that we’ve seen through different ways that language gets affected and gets put out into the zeitgeist through
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (42:24)
Yeah.
Jillian Ivey (42:24)
centuries. I think we’re just seeing a lot more of it now.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (42:26)
Yeah, yeah. I have one more question for you.
Jillian Ivey (42:29)
Yeah.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (42:30)
and this is the the same question that I ask all of my guests at the at the end. And that is, if there’s one thing that you would want the audience to take away from our conversation today, what is that one?
Jillian Ivey (42:41)
I think that it is really important to represent yourself authentically. The mask exists, and sometimes the mask keeps us safe. The mask is something that we do to protect ourselves and to protect.
Sometimes it’s our jobs, sometimes it’s our hearts, sometimes it’s just whatever situation we’re in to make us safer. But I think that it’s really important that we allow ourselves to drop the mask and connect with other people as authentic human beings. even in professional settings, possibly even now when we’re seeing AI overtaking so much of the work that we do and the work that we
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (43:17)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Ivey (43:17)
see. Marketing is completely transforming because of AI. I think it is so important for us to say like, no, this is me.
This is how I write and how I talk and how I act and who I am. And allow that to be something that really speaks for you that you can stand on and that feels safe and feels good to you. It doesn’t mean you have to show every facet of who you are and what you do and what your personality is to every single person you meet.
There are contexts for this. But to the extent that you’re comfortable, maybe just letting the mask slip a little bit, if not just ripping it off completely and letting your ADHD flag fly.
Kyrus Keenan Westcott (43:53)
A huge thank you to Jillian Ivey for being a guest on The Vibe With Ky Podcast today. One quick note before you go. Jill isn’t an attorney.
And what she shared about documenting ADHD with HR comes from her own experience. If your work situation sounds anything like what we talked about, talk to an employment attorney where you live. and as for me, I’m not a clinician, and I’m just someone who lives with this.
So your doctor decides. What’s right for you. If you enjoyed Jill today, be sure to check her out at the website that I included in the description of this podcast.
And if you own a business, she put together something just for you. Her Story Audit is a live 45-minute session where she goes through your business website with you and tells you whether it’s telling the story you think that it’s telling. Use the code VIBE V-I-B-E at checkout for $50 off.
Just know that the Story Audit is built for business owners. All of these links are in the show notes of this episode. If you enjoyed the episode today, make sure you visit my website at thevibewithky.com or follow me at The Vibe With Ky on your favorite social media platform for even more conversations and content just like this.
And if you haven’t already subscribed so you never miss an episode of The Vibe With Ky Podcast, and make sure you leave a review so more people can find the show. Thank you so much for watching and for listening. As always, my friends, much love.
Good vibes. I’ll catch you next time. Bye.
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