Kristy 0:06

Welcome to Unshaken, the podcast where unwavering faith is real life. I'm Christy, and together with my husband Tony, we dive into authentic conversations, offering biblical insights and sharing stories that inspire resilience, especially for families navigating the unique challenges of disabilities. Join us each week as we explore faith with family and the journeys that keep us grounded in Christ. Don't forget to subscribe so you never miss an episode. Let's stand firm together. Hi friends, welcome back to Unshaken. I'm Christy, and I'm here with Tony, my husband, and today we are talking about ADHD. ADHD, it's uh it stands for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. It affects your executive function. And what you see in somebody with ADHD is patterns of inattention as well as hyperactivity. A lot of times with adults who have ADHD, it's more internal. It's racing thoughts, it's internal restlessness. And then also impulsivity. So interrupting people, struggling with patience, you know, those kinds of things. That's what we're looking at. And uh here's how it relates to us. A few years ago now, probably five years ago or so, Tony and I were sitting at our dining room table, and he was working on whatever he was working on, and I was working on a paper. This was it was right about the middle of my doctoral studies. I had to do all of these um journal article analyses and compare and contrast and looking at different methods of research, and you know, all just there were so many criteria to look at. And these articles were really dense, just like super, super, I don't know, small print, no pictures, that kind of thing. And it was really intense. And um I remember just feeling so defeated. And Tony looked up and there I was sitting there just crying for about probably the 30th time uh in our relationship. He very gently, very lovingly said, Christy, I really think that you have some symptoms that look like they could maybe be ADHD. I really think you should get evaluated. And prior to this night, I had shut him down cold. Every time this came up, I'm like, there's no way. That has nothing to do with me. Uh-uh, not like me at all. And this night, it just sort of, I don't know, it just kind of washed over me, like, I think he's right because I can't do this. Up until that point, I had always been able to kind of make things work. I remember, even as a little kid, like a little little kid, grade school, certainly through high school, I always needed a deadline to get stuff done. If a teacher gave me a month to write a paper and I knew I could write it in a weekend, I didn't have anything to say until the weekend before it was due, and then I would knock it out. And that has been a thing for me all of my life. I think it took me until this point in my studies to get to a place where I just I couldn't, it was too hard. It was too much material, too hard, and I just couldn't do it anymore.

Tony 3:38

Yeah, something I want to mention here as we sort of dive into this episode is just the thing around shame, because most couples don't break because of a lack of love. If there's a break, it's because we we stubbornly I'm as guilty of this as as anyone else, but we stubbornly try to carry something on our own that we weren't meant to carry on our own. And I think in this process and in this journey, when there might be something with ADHD, there's still a stick a stigma around that. We have to get to a point where we can kind of walk together and and carry something like this together.

Kristy 4:26

For me, I don't I don't know that I would say it was around shame. I just really didn't think it had anything to do. I just didn't think that was me at all. Prior to that, I felt like I was pretty on the ball. I felt like I was a multitasker. Like, I don't know, I don't know where I got this. I don't know where I pulled this information from. I really, I was blindsided by this. I truly thought it wasn't like me at all. I did the I don't even know how many 160 questions and then heard the psychiatrist say to me, You have a textbook case of ADHD combined type. I was like, what? There we go.

Tony 5:09

There's also that relief once you kind of know, once you kind of have something to to name and something to now deal with. It's now not the invisible thing, right? You can name it. You can learn the tools that are out there to start dealing with whatever type of ADHD that you have, because I mean there's it's not just one thing. It's we've learned there's many combinations, you know, over the years.

Kristy 5:44

It can look any number of different ways, and there's lots of options, right? For me, the doctor suggested meds, and I was pretty desperate and just kind of willing to be led. I didn't know, I didn't know what to do. So I tried the meds, and I have to say, for me, it was an absolute game changer. I know, you know, it's not for everybody, and and people have to make choices that work for them. You can uh build in like behavioral supports for yourself, which is something else that, you know, I think we probably both do. Um, a lot of people pursue therapy, which is it's I mean, it's very helpful for a lot of people too. There's, I mean, there's any number of combinations of these things that that people do. But, you know, for me, meds were just a godsend. I guess the way I look at it, like God gave us, you know, intelligence and and tools and the opportunity to kind of steward those things as needed. And that's, you know, that's what that has worked for me really well. The other thing, though, is with the relief and the like sort of the knowledge that, okay, I'm not stupid, I'm not broken, like this isn't my fail point, this isn't where I just can't hack it anymore. Like, there's an actual issue and there's something we can do about it. Once I was able to process that and, you know, I had the meds and I was, I was doing like tremendously better, there was like a period of almost like grief. Like once I realized how I could operate, you know, with treatment versus without, I felt this whole like, oh my gosh, like what if I had known this 40 years ago? What would be different if I had had these tools back then? You know, and so that was kind of a piece of it for me too. I think my personality was shaped by it, like the the things that you know that you realize you're good at or not so good at, it really kind of shapes the way you interact with the world. That's kind of how it happened for me. And then, I don't know, maybe two years later, same dining room table, different seating arrangement.

Tony 8:00

Yeah, for me, it's really hard to initiate tasks. If I've gotta write something and I'm staring at a blank Word document, I'm like a deer in headlights. It is so hard for me to get going. Now, once I'm going, I'm fine. I can write all day, I can write pages, and I'm good to go. But procrastination is it's very hard, and I'm very hard on myself because I know I should be doing something, and I just am not able to bring myself to get there, and there were so many nights that I was sitting at that dining room table, 10, 11, midnight, knowing that I had a paper due in less than 24 hours, and I still was staring at a blank screen, even though I knew about the paper for weeks. The breaking point was realizing I just couldn't wing it anymore. And that came from me inside of my master's program.

Kristy 9:05

Interestingly enough, we've been doing this for years and not realizing that it was a thing, a a thing with a name that's really it's effective for a lot of people. And it's sitting at the table together. Uh, they call it body doubling. And it's a situation where you're doing something that's hard, and just by virtue of having somebody there, like just giving you some supportive vibes, like not even necessarily working on the same thing, but just the proximity of another person who cares about you, it just changes everything. In hindsight, how many times did we sit on the phone or on a FaceTime working on stuff before we even knew this? Or at that dining room table, like me working on my homework and you working on yours, or you know, ministry stuff or work stuff, grading, whatever. Like just the two of us at that table doing different things at the same time.

Tony 10:03

Yeah, the the two of us at that table were very productive, and I think we're still very productive whenever we're sitting at a sitting at a uh a table, whether it be Starbucks or or our dining room table or what have you. I we're just very productive when when we are both working on anything just at the same time. But you know what? It's funny because this is what it talks about in scripture about you know, bearing each other's burdens, because we're called to to carry each other's burdens for each other out of love and out of grace. We get this image of like that we're physically carrying something, but it's not always that way. Sometimes it's just simply being in the room with someone that allows that burden to become lighter so that it can be carried and done versus something not getting done because we weren't in the room. If I'm in a a good headspace, I can sit at a Starbucks on my own and grind it out and and and I can work for eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve hours and be extremely happy at the end of the day. But if I'm in a place where where I'm struggling to get started, I really need Christy to kinda sit there with me for ten, fifteen, maybe twenty minutes just so that I can get started. And then once I get started, even if she's gotta leave at that point, I'm good because I've gotten into a group, I've gotten into a rhythm, but a lot of times when when it's when it's heavy, you know, I really do need her presence with me so that I can just get get started and get going.

Kristy 12:00

For me, I think it's not so much the getting going, although I can procrastinate like nobody's business. But for me, I'm a list maker. So I have a list already today. I had a list on Thursday last week of the stuff that I need to have done tomorrow and this week. You know, a lot of the advice they say, oh, do something easy, knock it out, and then you'll get that little win, and that will give you the chemical to, you know, that will help you to continue on. For me, I would rather do the hard thing first because the the weight of having it just pending, it's, I mean, it's like crushing for me. It's all I can think about is this, you know, this hard thing that's pending. So I like to just knock that out. The downside of that is that once I knock out the hard thing, um, the easy things that were on my list after that, I'm like, oh, I did the hard thing, I'll get that later. And then those easy things don't tend to be as high priority for me, I guess you could say.

Tony 13:02

What ends up happening for me is I will bounce from task to task to task. So I'll touch probably a dozen things that I need to do, but it'll only be like one percent of each thing until I find that one thing that just hits right. I'll get that one thing completely done. But sometimes I can spend eight hours in a day just bouncing because I can't get into that groove. And those days are like so frustrating for me because I know that I've got to get things actually done and not just incrementally, but like I need to complete some things and get some things off of my list.

Kristy 13:53

Something I would add to that is it's I think it's kind of whatever is your nemesis, right? For me, like the writing and that kind of thing, I don't have such a hard time with that. For me, it's if I'm cleaning, if I'm gonna like go through a closet or even like deep clean a room, I need somebody to sit on the bed and chat with me or ignore me. I don't know how many times I had our youngest kiddo just sit on the bed and do homework in my room so that I could sort clothes or fold laundry or whatever I had to do in there. Or poor Tony. It's the same. Like he'll sit in the recliner in the bedroom or in the living room, wherever, and I'm buzzing around like a lunatic doing every little thing around the house, and he's just sitting there being a bot body double for me, you know, working on his thing, and I can't be still. I'm just, you know, everywhere. Because that's the thing that's the hardest for me is I don't know if it's the organizing or just kind of the overwhelming feeling of like this is never gonna get done. Probably both.

Tony 14:56

We're not trying to like Chrissy's not trying to turn me into her, and I'm certainly not trying to turn her into me. It's about helping each other and helping each other be better by being in the space so that we can both be productive and both be able to get things done, and we've learned that that we just have those different tools that we can use just to help us be um more productive with our days. When it comes to the tasks that we both do, I am very process focused. I'm gonna focus on okay, how are we going to do this? And then I'm gonna do it until it gets done.

Kristy 15:44

For me, it's about the people. How does this affect the people? You know, it's always it always comes back to that. It always is about making something relatable or practical. Like it's all like user experience for me. Time, that's another one where we're we're very different. I can tell you, like, probably within seconds, how long it's gonna take me to do anything. Like, I'm pretty good at that. I would say Tony is the opposite. If I would ask him how long do you think it's gonna take you to do this, he'd be like, I don't know. Why are you asking me that? But he's very, very good, very aware of, you know, time is passing, Christy. And he's oh, he's so sweet. He never comes down like like the hammer, right? It's never, Christy, what are you doing? Get up, we gotta leave in 20 minutes. He'd be like, Honey, I just want to make you aware that it's 245. I'm like, what? Thank you so much. But he's so loving about it and so gentle.

Tony 16:46

When it comes to projects, I will work on a project until it is either perfect and complete or very near perfect and complete. A tornado could like tear through the house. I am gonna be focused on whatever it is that I am doing. I I'm just able to have that sort of laser focus when I am working on a project. Christy is more of a she's gonna throw throw a project together, and if it's messy or if it breaks, she'll jump back in and fix it later.

Kristy 17:28

What else? We'll fix it on the back side. I just for me, it's more about like it's about motion. I like it drives me nuts to sit around and keep planning and keep making it perfect. I'm like, oh my gosh, we could be using the we could be five miles up the road, halfway decent by the time we get started, perfect. I and I just I value the motion so much more than the perfection.

Tony 17:54

And so and so this this next part should not make anybody surprised, but but there's a I highly value precision. So I it is like to to know that that something that we put in that we put into effect is going to work. And and it's gonna work from the from the moment that we say go. Like that is so that's so high value for me.

Kristy 18:23

Yeah, that's not in me at all. Not at all. Like, uh, we'll fix it on the backside. I don't know how many times I say that in a in a week's time. We'll fix it on the backside. Let's just get it started.

Tony 18:36

But Christine has also never met a stranger. Uh Christine will chat up the deli guy, so chat up the person that that is looking at a can of uh tomato soup, so chat up a lady that she feels like is in a really pretty dress. And for me, I smile and nod. I'm always gonna be nice to you, be polite and and all of those things, but I'm just gonna give you give you that nod. And and the the guys that are listening to this, you guys know what I'm t what I'm talking about. I'm just gonna give you a nod and keep going. That's just not how Christy rolls.

Kristy 19:16

Those are my friends, they just don't know it yet. It's just another way that we're that we're different, we're complementary. I'll say this. I am so very visual and spatial. I'm all about like, you want to know how the furniture would look if we moved it? I can tell you exactly how that's gonna go. I can tell you if it's gonna fit. I remember stuff by seeing it, by reading. I color code literally everything. Like, I can't express to you the extent to which I color code. And that's just how my brain works. It's how I file. I don't even file, honestly, alphabetically. I file by color a folder. I write in a different color pen every day because then I can remember. I can't remember which day it was, but I remember I wrote it in hot pink or I wrote it in bright St. Patrick's green, and then I flip through my legal pad and you know, there it is. I learn by writing. That's how I pay attention, and it's how I remember. If I'm in a meeting, I am writing as fast as my hand will go. If we're in a, you know, a webinar or a seminar, a training, even at church, I'm writing as fast as they're talking. I'm writing it down. And that's it keeps my brain engaged, and then I can remember it later because I wrote it, but I need to be able to read it, write it. It doesn't do me any good to hear it, to watch a video. And before we go any farther, I know this is a skill that I can work on. I want to be very clear that our learning preferences are malleable. I am the complete opposite.

Tony 20:52

I love to watch videos, I love to listen to anything. Like 90% of my day, I've got earbuds in my ears. Where this kind of gets me into trouble is when people are talking to me. Because sometimes I'm not looking at them, but I'm hearing everything that they that they're saying. I can recite it back to you, I can tell you everything that you just said because I can hear you. But so many are like, man, you didn't even look at me. Huh? How did how did you pay attention? I can still hear you. For me, that's a big thing. If I can hear it, I can learn and I can remember it. I'm such uh an audio processor.

Kristy 21:37

Uh this is something that I wanted to kind of bring up, and it kind of fits right here. So I'm gonna jump in with it. We've just told you how we're different and how we're both so very rigid in the things that we prefer. And I would just like to call out that Tony is actually a little more flexible than he lets on. I would say that in the past, so To maybe nine months. And guys, it's it's this podcast, I think, that has done it truly. Tony's flexibility has really grown. I spend my entire life like wandering around thinking up ideas. Like so many times I come to him and I'm like, what if we did blah, blah, whatever? A year ago at Christmas time. If you were looking at, we were talking about the possibility of everything. And he was talking about how he might structure the website. And he's like telling me details. And my I am not listening to anything that he's saying, like, not a word of it sunk in. Because in my brain, I was like, my, it was just like spinning this. And finally, I, you know, I was like, hold, just hang on a minute. We could do that, but like, what if we did this instead? And I'm laying it out and telling him, I'm like, I don't know what it would look like, but this is kind of like I'm like, these would be the headers, and these would kind of be the little pockets underneath. And then I have to say a whole bunch of words until he understands what I'm talking about because I don't even have the vocabulary to talk about what I'm wanting to do, but I can see it in my brain, right? And so I tell him, and then good luck to him, man. Then he has to figure out how to make it happen. And he's just phenomenal. Like he has this beautiful way. He keeps asking questions until he gets it. He'll show me a draft and he's like like this, and I'm like, ah, this is, I would do maybe a little something different here or whatever. I'm like, no. How did you get that from what was in my brain? You know? And some sometimes, and probably 70% of the time, I'm like, yes, that's exactly it. That's exactly what I was looking at. And he just has this wave. He has this incredible way of figuring out how to make stuff happen. And I'm here to say that takes tremendous like open-mindedness and flexibility. And like this is a skill set that, you know, a year ago, 18 months ago, I think we both would have said he he just didn't have. But he does. I mean, he really does. I'm crazy grateful and really, really proud because if it had been left to me, none of this would have happened. Like it just would never have happened. I would have thought it up and then it would have died right there. I think we've we've mentioned before that in starting all of this, um, you know, the unshaken ministries, the brand, the umbrella, the part that made sense to me and the part where I was able to jump in is the media. Like we started talking about this, and I'm writing. Like my fingers are flying, and I'm writing like chapters and chapters and chapters and devotions and you know, all kinds of stuff. For Tony, he leaned into the tech and he didn't, I mean, like, he didn't know how to do this. And like, I mean, he never recorded a series of podcast episodes. I mean, like, it was new to both of us. And he just jumped in and he learned it like from scratch, like literally doing the research. What do we need? How does this work? You know, how how do you manage the recording? What do you do with it? How do you distribute it? He learned it all and he just, I mean, he just did it. But it's one of those things where because his heart is in it and he's all in on it, it's exciting. And so, like, he, I mean, he can stay with, I mean, for hours, for hours, 12 hours, 15 hours, he'll work on this stuff and he never gets sick of it. Mad props, Tony. I am so like I'm blown away by you with this stuff. Like, you are so flexible and so creative, and you're figuring out how to make it work. That's I mean, it's just mind-blowing to me.

Tony 25:43

It's been neat to be able to bounce ideas off of each other, and it's been really fun to to hear your ideas and to to figure out how to make those ideas come to life. But it's also been fun for me to just come up with ideas. As we started to really talk about Unshaken, like before we even before it was even named, I looked at you and said, what if we did a podcast? You know, you looked at me like I was crazy, and and if you guys have been with us for a while, you guys kinda know that story, but it is just something that what we bring to the table, it's not an obstacle, it's an asset. So the things that Christy brings to to the table and the things that that I'm able to bring to the table, they they just compliment each other. I think that one of the beautiful things about how God's plan works.

Kristy 26:44

So in all of this, I mean, just to bring it together, for me, hardest to easiest. A lot of other people I think might choose easiest to hardest. I hate to make phone calls. Tony makes phone calls for me. If it was up to me to like schedule the guy to come from Spectrum, we would never have internet. If like I'm telling you, I would just go to Starbucks or something and use it, we would never have it. Because I like it's almost impossible for me to make that call, schedule the thing. Like it's overwhelming, and so I just don't. But Tony does. Tony, I think for you, body, I mean for both of us, but really body doubling.

Tony 27:25

Yeah, I mean, body doubling for me is is a game changer. Just being able to have Christy in the room, and I don't need to trap her for twelve, fifteen hours. I just need I just need her in the room for, you know, a good 20 minutes or so so that I can get going. And then once I'm going, once I've got a groove in, she can see it on my face. That's that's the other that's the other amazing thing. Like she can look at me and she knows, okay, you're good. You're not even paying attention to me anymore. I'm gonna go fold some laundry or go clean the kitchen or something. And I'm fine because I know she's still she's still in the area.

Kristy 28:07

It just works for us. What you just said is like the crux of it. Whatever it is, whatever you do. Um, I mean, when you have ADHD, you just have to design your life around what works for you. You gotta figure out those like behavioral structural things, setting alarms, maybe, or body doubling if that, you know, if that's your like whatever, whatever the the tricks are. And really that's what it is, right? I feel like I'm forever setting up like traps to trick myself into getting stuff done the right way. But I think you just learn, right? You learn over time what works for you, what works for your person, what works for one of us doesn't necessarily work for the other one in terms of treatment. You know, again, whatever works for you, works for you. There's options. And you can talk to your healthcare provider about what those options look like and what they look like in combination, you know. You got to do what works for you. I think that's the the crux of it all. Fidgets are huge for me. It is, if I have something in my hand that I can just lately I've been liking having like a worry stone that I can just rub in my hand. Tony bought me these really cool, they're um, they're like, so here's me gesturing with my hands, like you guys can see me. Um they're these wooden crosses, but they're the pieces are curved so that it's like cupped toward like toward where the the bars of the cross meet. And it's cute. There's a little heart right there. And I just it my thumb fits right in that little spot. And I just hold it. I can hold it in my pocket, I can hold it like on my lap in a meeting when I'm on the phone. Even when I'm driving, sometimes I just want to have something in my hand. You know, that's if that's not a thing for you, you know, no sweat. It helps me a lot. It helps me to pay attention, to stay focused. I mean, that's it, right? You just figure out what works, kind of what works for you. And at the end of the day, God really got this right for Tony and me. We are we come to the table with opposing strengths. And I think that together we are far more than the sum of our parts. It's multiplication, if not addition, when the two of us are together working on something. You know, if you pull your gifts, you you everybody goes in on the thing with what they can bring, you know, and it all comes together. We are just so much more effective, so much stronger together than we are as individuals. And I would say, like, if you are, you know, if your brain is wired differently than your spouse or your kiddo or your friend, your office mate, you know, that's okay. It's different. We've been talking about in recent weeks, like the body of Christ needs all different parts. So maybe the goal isn't, you know, change or or judgment. Maybe it's learning how to sit at the table together and do what works for for each other, you know, in that sense. Bring what you got, pull the benefits.

Tony 31:18

You know, God is faithful in in the ordinary. You know, we've talked about the dining our dining room table a lot. I want to just be very clear that the table is not just where work happens, but it's where grace shows up. Because it's where we are able to and and all of us are able to come to the table and just be gracious to each other in the strengths and and the weaknesses that we're all going to bring to the table. And so it it leads me to a piece of scripture that uh Christy and I talk about a lot, and it's in Ecclesiastes uh chapter four verse twelve. Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. Of course three strands is not quickly broken. And I think that is how God truly wants us to look at things in terms of our marriages and our families, you know, as if if we come together and bring all the strands together, we're going to be able to stand firm together. I think that's where God wants us to to align ourselves. So I'm gonna pray us out. Father, we come before you and uh we're just so thankful for the unique ways that that you have designed each and every one of us. You've given us gifts, strengths and and and weaknesses, and you designed us exactly the way that we would need to be to be able to complement each other as we came to your table, your banquet table, and truly came together as one family and one body in Christ. And so, Father, thank you so much for the way that you have uh designed us, and we especially are so thankful for your son and and everything that he gave in order to restore the relationship that we can now have with you because of your son. We love you, Father. And it's in your son's name we pray. Amen. Amen. Alright, guys, we'll see you guys uh next time. Thank you guys so much for hanging out with us today, and uh we'll catch you later. Have a good one. Thanks, you guys.