Short answer: an ADHD coach asks you good questions, listens properly, and helps you work out what suits your brain. They don't tell you what to do, fix you, or hand you a colour-coded planner.
What happens in a coaching session?
You bring something real that you'd like to change. It might be the pile of unopened post, a job that's swallowing you whole, or the feeling that you're always three steps behind everyone else.
I ask questions. You think out loud. Somewhere in the middle, you usually hear yourself say the thing you already knew.
We finish with a small next step that you chose. Not one I chose for you. A plan you came up with yourself is a plan you actually own.
Why doesn't the coach just tell me what to do?
Because you've probably had a lifetime of that already.
The kind of coaching I trained in is called non-directive. It means I work on the basis that you're the expert on your own life, and my job is to help you get at what you already know. Advice that worked for someone else's brain is often exactly the stuff that hasn't worked for yours.
What makes it ADHD coaching?
An ADHD-informed coach doesn't treat forgetting, lateness or going off on a tangent as a lack of effort. Sessions flex around how you think. If you need to walk about, fidget, start in the middle or come back to the same thing three times, that's fine.
One thing I don't do is teach you about your ADHD. I'm not qualified to, and yours won't be the same as mine anyway. I can point you towards resources that helped me.
Is ADHD coaching the same as therapy or counselling?
No. I'm not a counsellor or a therapist, and coaching isn't a replacement for either.
Coaching looks at the here and now, and at what you want to do next. It can sit alongside support from your GP, a counsellor or a therapist.
Is what I say private?
Yes. What you say in a session stays there. The only exception is if something suggests that you or someone else is at risk of harm.
So, is ADHD coaching worth it?
Honestly, it depends. Coaching tends to be worth it if:
- you have something you want to change, even if you can't quite name it yet
- you're willing to try small things between sessions
- you'd rather be asked than told
It's probably not the right thing if you're in crisis, if what you need is therapy, or if you'd like someone to hand you the answers. No judgement on that last one. I've wanted that myself.
If you're not sure, that's what the free 15 minute intro chat is for.
What does it cost, and can it be funded?
There's a self-funded rate if you're paying for yourself, and a standard rate if your coaching is funded by Access to Work or your employer. I had Access to Work coaching myself, so I understand what it's like from the client's side. Current prices are on the coaching page.
About my training
I trained with The ADHD Coaching Academy, in its very first cohort. It was a six-month course built around non-directive coaching, with lots of real practice and reflection, not just reading about it. Before that I'd spent over 20 years training and coaching adults, and I was diagnosed with ADHD at 51.
Find out more about coaching with me, online or face to face in Plymouth. Or get the newsletter for more plain-English posts like this one.