Jo Whitton [00:00:00]:
It's really important to start with reducing the stress. So if you're living at this level of stress and it's just constant and you're running all the time and you're busy all the time, and you're forgetting your keys, and you're forgetting where you parked the car, and you're forgetting the lunchbox, and you're forgetting appointments because you're so stressed and there's so much in your brain. That's what's got to come first. Slowing that all down. Calming the nervous system. Finding ways to reduce the craziness in your home.
Sharon Collon [00:00:32]:
Welcome to the ADHD Families podcast. I'm your host, Sharon Collin, an award winning credentialed ADHD coach and consultant and mama and wife to a very ADHD family. I am seriously obsessed with making life easier for people with ADHD and those that support them. My business, the functional family, provides life changing support and strategies for ADHD. I particularly love anything that saves time, decreases conflict, and creates space for fun. Do you want a life with your beautiful family that is more functional, fun, and full of joy? Let's explore together the wonderful and sometimes wacky world of family life with ADHD in the mix. Years and years ago, I discovered this Instagram and Facebook group called Quirky Cooking. And at the time, I was very, very obsessed with my thermo mix.
Sharon Collon [00:01:31]:
I mean, I still am. I love the thing. I'm so up for tech that makes my life easier and creates less mess. And when I was following Jo from quirky cooking, I was getting inspirational ideas on how to, you know, feed my family beautiful, healthy food but also support their gut health. And I actually ended up going on her podcast to talk about ADHD years and years ago. And she actually came out in 2014 and talked about very beautiful, vulnerable story about her son Isaac getting diagnosed with extreme OCD and anxiety and what she did to support him through that journey. It is a wonderful story and I've got her on the podcast today so you can hear it and get some beautiful key takeaways on how you can support your family if you are facing similar struggles or supporting them to eat nutritious, healthy food. I can't wait for you to hear this conversation.
Sharon Collon [00:02:32]:
Welcome, Jo. I am so happy to have you on the podcast today.
Jo Whitton [00:02:36]:
Thank you. Lovely to chat with you again. It's been years.
Sharon Collon [00:02:41]:
I know, I know. Actually, I think that your podcast was one of the very first ones that I, what, you know, came on as a guest.
Jo Whitton [00:02:51]:
That's special. It has a bit of a special.
Sharon Collon [00:02:53]:
Place in my heart, actually. I've been listening to it for years. So I just love your style.
Jo Whitton [00:03:00]:
I'm trying to get back to it.
Sharon Collon [00:03:03]:
You know, these things come in waves, right?
Jo Whitton [00:03:05]:
They do it all. Yeah, exactly.
Sharon Collon [00:03:08]:
So I would love for you to let the listeners at home know a.
Sharon Collon [00:03:11]:
Little bit about you.
Jo Whitton [00:03:13]:
Okay. So I live in far north Queensland, up in the mountains behind cairns. Some people say middle of nowhere, but hey, I love it here. Very wet and rainforesty and waterfalls and lakes and outdoors. And that's how my kids have grown up. We just really love this area. I have four kids, two boys, two girls. I homeschooled.
Jo Whitton [00:03:36]:
I have a business called quirky cooking, which I started 15 years ago now. Well, it didn't start as a business, it just started as a food blog and I was sharing what I was learning about healthy eating and tweaking recipes, family favourites to make them healthier and to cope with our food intolerances and food reactions in the family. I grew up with a lot of food intolerances. Well, I just. I had, like, histamine reactions and I didn't cope with dairy and gluten, although I didn't know that at the time. Mould, illness, all sorts of things and that obviously a lot of that gets passed on to your kids. So as they grew up, they had a lot of health issues and food reactions as well. So probably for the last, oh, 25 years, I've been working, or even longer, I've been working on, you know, healthier options for the family and just helping, helping my kids to eat well so that it would be a help to our health.
Jo Whitton [00:04:44]:
And I've seen huge changes over that time. It's been a slow journey because when I first started out looking into healthy eating, there wasn't the help that there is now online. It was very much you had to go and dig, you had to find books, you had to do a lot of reading. The doctors and dietitians that I talked to when I was younger had no clue. And I was told things like, I had a lot of issues with my skin and with my hormones and I was really underweight when I was young. And the doctors would tell me, well, just eat lots of food and you'll gain weight eventually. Or eat lots of chops and ice cream, or take this medication for your hormones and for your skin. Go on the pill, take this enzyme whenever you have dairy, this tablet and then you'll be fine.
Jo Whitton [00:05:36]:
Or drink soy milk. And all of the things that they told me to do, I would try. I would just I'm a very rules oriented person, very strict. I would just like, yep, I'm going to do this. And I would dive in. And nothing changed. I didn't get better. I didn't gain weight.
Jo Whitton [00:05:52]:
My energy levels were shocking. I was always sick, always having massive histamine reactions and things. And then, yeah, as my kids came along, they were the same. So when my youngest was one, I started seeing a naturopath and a chiropractor in the same year. And that's when things started to change, and I started to learn about gut health. And that was a huge learning curve. Took me ages to really dive into it. Like, I just sort of dabbled around the edges at first and started trying to, well, I thought, well, if I do a gluten free, dairy free, sugar free diethyde, then that's all the bad things gone, and then we will be healthy.
Jo Whitton [00:06:35]:
It's a very simplistic way of looking at things. And I sort of had the idea that it was, you know, it was bad food. And so then, you know, nothing much changed. Like, reactions calmed down, but deep down, nothing was really changing. And. But I was, you know, sharing my recipes, and there was a lot of people in the same boat, a lot of people that needed help with healthy eating or with allergies and cooking for food reactions. And so my blog really took off. I had a cookbook that I got a cookbook deal, and it was all happening.
Jo Whitton [00:07:14]:
And then my 13 year old son crashed big time. And when I say crashed, he descended into severe OCD and anxiety and depression. And it was a real shock because, you know, I thought, I'm doing the right thing. I'm eating healthy. I'm not having these bad foods, you know, where I'm teaching my kids to eat well, and why is he so sick? And it was a big eye opener to me that it's partly that it's more than just food. There's a lot more to health than just your diet. But also taking away foods and limiting foods is a short term approach. It's not a root cause approach.
Jo Whitton [00:08:00]:
And I had to learn about really finding the root cause of our health issues and dealing with that, which was gut health. So then we did a deep dive into gut health. And, yeah, that was a big year. 2014, 2015, he got to the stage where I had to spoon feed him. At 13 years old, he was really just constantly in a state of fight or flight, constantly freaking out, constantly seeing things. Like, he would be staring over my shoulder, screaming and saying, the rocks are closing in. And throwing his arms around, and I'm like, what? You know, it was wild. He had, you know, like, if he picked up a knife, he would start having thoughts of, someone's gonna be killed.
Jo Whitton [00:08:52]:
And then I. He had to do certain rituals to stop that from happening. And, like, it was freaky stuff. It was. And I had no idea what was going on at first. I was like, what in the. Where is he getting all these ideas? And because him and I are very close, he would verbalize a lot of it to me and explain it to me, thankfully. And I remember one night, I was searching online, trying to figure out what was going on, and I was, as you do, googling everything, and I suddenly had the thought of, I wonder what OCD is, because I thought, I think it's just about germs.
Jo Whitton [00:09:27]:
But for some reason, something told me to search it. So I looked online and started researching OCD. And he had every single one of the symptoms, including a phobia of a little girl who was, like, five years old and lived up the street and didn't ever do anything to him, but he had an absolute phobia of her. If she came to our house, he would run in his room, slam the door, cry, tell her to go away, and, you know, that kind of thing. He had, yeah, all the. All the symptoms. And so, yeah, we off to the doctor. I was like, I think I know what's wrong with my son.
Jo Whitton [00:10:02]:
I had talked to her before, but we hadn't figured it out. And she went through the list of, you know, what to check if you have OCD. And he had everything. And she said, he needs to go onto medication. And I was like, really? You know, didn't want to go that route. But we were so desperate. I said, okay, but I'm going to do everything I can to heal him naturally as well. And she was kind of like, you know, looking sideways.
Jo Whitton [00:10:30]:
And so I really did heaps of research, talked to a lot of natural health practitioners, naturopaths, nutritionists, integrative nutritionists, integrative doctors, all sorts of people. And the advice that I got was to really focus on his gut health and that the gut brain connection is super important. And you can't heal the brain without healing the gut. It's connected. I was like, okay. So I started looking into different protocols and diets, and the gaps protocol really clicked with me. And if you haven't heard of that, it's basically, it stands for gut and psychology syndrome or gut and physiology syndrome. And it's a protocol that includes a very healing diet that's very easy to digest, getting back to very whole and natural foods that aren't hard for the body to break down, for the gut to break down, and then also things like time out in nature and rest and all sorts of things.
Jo Whitton [00:11:34]:
It's not just the diet, but the diet is a very big part of it. We started down that rabbit hole, thankfully. And, yeah, within weeks we started seeing changes. And within a few months, Isaac was so much better and so happy and so, you know, back to his fun loving, outgoing self. From a kid who couldn't barely leave the house and, you know, couldn't spend time with his friends, to a kid that was working at the supermarket on the checkouts, and everybody loved him and he was going to sleepovers and hanging out with friends again. And I remember saying to. He was also getting counseling with psychologists. And I said to her, so is this the medication that's doing this? Because I'm really worried that if it's just the medication and we take him off it, he'll go back to where he was.
Jo Whitton [00:12:26]:
And she said, it's not the medication. She said, by now, the doctors usually doubled the dose. It's whatever else you're doing. So we kept going, and within a year, he was off all medication. That was when he would have been 14 by then. He's now 22, never been back on medication. He's living in Brisbane, 2000 km away from me. He's working as an it person for a school as well as starting his own business in it.
Jo Whitton [00:12:59]:
He's studying languages. He's just doing so well and cooking his own meals, doing well with his food, and he's just so much better. And it's just been such a big life changer for all of our family. For me, my health completely changed. Within a year, I could have all the dairy I wanted. It was like, yes, before that, I just couldn't even cope with butter. We had, like, my weight became much more healthy, my skin, my hormones, my mood, my anxiety lifted, my energy levels, the histamine issues gone. Like, the kids, their health changed.
Jo Whitton [00:13:45]:
It was amazing. And that was within one year of really working on gut health. And it just continued to improve. And it's been. Yeah, it's been. Let's see, that was 2014, so it's been ten years since we really did the deep dive into gut health. And I just. Yeah, I love sharing with people simple ways that they can really make small changes at first like we did, and gradually build on those to really change their health and wellbeing, and the way that, the direction that their family's going.
Jo Whitton [00:14:21]:
Sorry, that was a long answer.
Sharon Collon [00:14:23]:
No, that was a brilliant answer. And I know that quite a lot of people that are listening because we have a saying, ADHD doesn't come to the party alone. It brings friends. Right. So OCD is one of those ones that it brings. Right. So, you know, I think that a lot of our community would definitely be want. You know, we were all learning about the gut brain axis and, you know, gut health and things like that.
Sharon Collon [00:14:46]:
A lot of us have integrative pediatricians on our team. Actually, I interview one of them quite frequently inside the program. So what I'd love to do is for you to talk through some of those small changes that you perhaps made at the start of the journey, because I don't know if our listeners know, like, I don't. I can't tolerate gluten. We've done the GATs protocol and, you know, had some success with that. And, you know, very much our household is still an ADHD household. I wouldn't actually have it any other way. I don't.
Sharon Collon [00:15:22]:
But, you know, it does help, especially with that real base note anxiety that comes through. But it is a lot of work. Right? So I want to be real about that. And so when you're talking about small changes, like how you worked into it small, I thought that was quite a good point to start off on.
Jo Whitton [00:15:44]:
Yes, for sure. Like, probably a lot of us have the tendency to go, well, I'm going to try this and I'm going to jump in and just do it all at once overnight. And I think that's, you know, a lot of us do that, and I am pretty much like that. And so, thankfully, we had already been eating gluten free, mostly grain free, dairy free and sugar, and we only had natural sweeteners usually. The thing is, my kids were at that age where they were out a lot, having stuff that they wouldn't usually have at home. And I feel like that sort of tipped things over the edge a little. You've probably heard of the overflowing bucket analogy. You know, you just keep adding little things and then suddenly it overflows.
Jo Whitton [00:16:30]:
That's how it happened with Isaac. But I did make the mistake at first of saying, we're going to do gaps, we're starting tomorrow, and just, boom, okay, no bread, no this, no that. You know, chuck all this stuff out. We're going to have meat stocks and soup for every meal for a little while. And I think that lasted about three days. Which is pretty usual if you start that way. And then I went, wait a minute, wait a minute. This is way too hard.
Jo Whitton [00:17:02]:
We had a wedding to travel to in the northern territory. We had parties to go to. We had, how do you do that when you're traveling, when you've got big family gatherings, when you've got all these things going on? And so I said, wait, okay, let's pull back, reset. We're just going to start slowly and we're going to work on reducing the amount of stuff in our lives and in our calendar for a while until we get to the stage where we're ready to start. So for about a month, we just started adding in healing foods where we could and reducing the harder to digest the refined foods, basically, and the starchy foods, really trying to reduce those, but not doing anything to hardcore for about a month. And my main focus was calming things down with our life, our crazy life. So homeschooling, it's busy, but at least you're at home, so you can sort of slow down. Probably a bit easier than if you're at school doing all the things.
Jo Whitton [00:18:06]:
But even if your kids are at school, you can do things like reduce the amount of after school activities, reduce the amount of times that you're going out. And if you are going out, make it something like going out into nature. So if you've got friends that, oh, we want to catch up. We want to do something. Well, let's have a picnic at the lake or the river or the beach. Let's be outdoors. So we started working on being outdoors as much as we could. Going for walks every day, getting sunlight exposure.
Jo Whitton [00:18:40]:
If the kids wanted to do something with their friends, it was usually like a sport. Like they'd go and play futsal or something and then we'd have their friends over to our house for a meal and then they would eat what we ate of and they always said they loved it and they enjoyed it, so that was good. But it's really important to start with reducing the stress. So if you're living at this level of stress and it's just constant and you're running all the time and you're busy all the time and you're forgetting your keys and you're forgetting where you parked the car and you're forgetting the lunchbox and you're forgetting appointments because you're so stressed and there's so much in your brain, that's what's got to come first. Slowing that all down. Calming the nervous system. Finding ways to reduce the craziness in your home, getting to bed earlier, that is a huge one. Just getting to bed earlier, having low lights at night, just slowly changing things so that the household is calmer and there's more time to just be quiet and there's more time to relax and, you know, when the kids start losing it, taking a blanket and putting it outside under the trees with some books and some pillows and some snacks and just saying, let's just hang out out here for a while.
Jo Whitton [00:20:03]:
So we started doing things like that and sort of just reducing the amount of things that we agreed to for the next few weeks. So instead of saying, yes, we'll come to this, no, I'm sorry, we're going to have some family time for a while, and that's okay. People can cope. And then once we've done that, we started really adding in meat stocks. So that's the first healing food that is most important to add in when healing the gut. And a short cooked meat stock is basically chicken soup, you know, made with meat on the bone, or lamb shank soup, or a beef stew with the soup bones and the marrow bones in it. Or, you know, you can do a pork belly hot pot, or any of those kind of soups and stews where you're cooking the meat on the bone in water. You can have it plain with just salt and pepper, or you can have it with other things and make a soup, and it's just cooked on the stovetop or in the slow cooker, but not for a long, long time, just until the meat's cooked and done.
Jo Whitton [00:21:08]:
And then that is really high in the amino acids that heal the gut lining. So plenty of those kind of meals. We're coming into winter now, so it makes it easier. We're coming into winter soon, so that does make it easier to have those warming, comforting soups and stews and stocks. And they are so, so important for healing the gut. They help to mend the gaps, the holes in the gut lining, so that your food digests better. And that is the base of, you know, so many health issues. If your.
Jo Whitton [00:21:49]:
If your gut is leaky, you've probably all heard that term. If your gut has little gaps and holes because of your diet and because of stress and all the different things that affect the gut, undigested foods and proteins can escape into your bloodstream, and then you've got all the food reactions happening. So just mending the gut lining with good quality stocks and amino acids, having the proteins, the meats and eggs, and if you can have cheese and things like that, that's okay too. So that you're giving the body, you're giving your cells what they need to repair. So that's the first step and that's, sorry. The first step is reducing the stress. And the second step would be adding in those meats stocks. And then we just slowly added in other foods like egg yolks, which are also super healing for the gut, for the brain as well.
Jo Whitton [00:22:41]:
Really good for the brain. You need good fats for the brain to be healthy and really reducing the sugars and refined foods, putting the good fats into meals. So instead of having, not that we were having refined seed oils like canola oil or vegetable oil or grapeseed oil or rice bran oil, but if you are pulling those out of the diet and using things like butter, ghee, tallow, olive oil, macadamia oil, the natural oils, but especially cooking with animal fats because they're very high smoke point, they don't oxidize and go rancid like a vegetable oil. And they help with gut healing. Yeah, that's where we started. Just small steps like that and then gradually changing the diet. So, yeah, there's a few little steps. I hope that's good.
Sharon Collon [00:23:39]:
So tell me about some of the families that you've worked with or you've seen, because you've got a program that sort of steps you through this. Can you talk to me about some of the transformations that have happened?
Jo Whitton [00:23:53]:
Yeah, one lady sticks in my mind. She was 20 something young lady. She had not had a period for eleven years. She had been really underweight, really low energy, chronic fatigue, massive food intolerances and issues with reactions to foods, bloating, pretty sure constipation that usually goes with it. Candida, she'd gotten parasites when she was overseas, which when she was young, which probably didn't help, although that's a whole other story. Parasites. But yeah, she had so many health issues. But what sticks in my mind is the hormonal issues, just massive hormonal issues.
Jo Whitton [00:24:42]:
So she started working on, on our gut. So I have a gut health program that I do with a nutritionist who's a guts practitioner, gut health practitioner. And she started just doing the. This is how we start in. Our program is first calm the stress, you know, work on really reducing stress and calming the nervous system and getting earlier nights and all of that kind of thing. So we worked on that first and then the meat stocks and then adding in other healing foods little by little. And so she did that program for eight weeks, and then she eased into gaps. And within seven months, her period came back.
Jo Whitton [00:25:21]:
And that was after eleven years, all her bloating went away. Her candida went away. And that was without going on a really harsh detox diet. If anyone is interested in the parasite side of things, don't do those harsh parasite cleanses. It will just wreck your gut. And the reason parasites are there is to mop up heavy metals. And so as you heal the gut and the metals start to detox, the parasites will go. And you can help them gently with herbal things as you work on your gut health.
Jo Whitton [00:25:55]:
But it's a very gentle approach that we take, and she saw major benefits from that. I've also had people say that their kids would refuse all the good veggies and they just wanted to focus on white food or, you know, chicken nuggets and all that kind of thing. And they were like, there's no way I am going to get my kids eating like this. There is no way they're going to have a heap of vegetables and stock and soup. And so we'd say, that's okay. Just start with putting a few drops of stock on their food. And then also use the sort of a rewards approach where they'll have a teaspoon or a little syringe of stock, build it up one mil at a time. Like start with one mil.
Jo Whitton [00:26:44]:
They have that. They get a star on their chart. When they get so many stars, they get a certain reward that, you know, whatever it is, that's their thing. Trip to the park or whatever. And little by little they start getting this meat stock in. And it was amazing to see the changes within weeks of people saying, oh my goodness, my son is asking for soup. My son is asking for a cup of stock or some vegetables or, you know, my assistant who has worked with me for about nine years, Emma, her boys were really unwell with massive eczema type stuff going on and rashes and underweight and the swollen tummy and what else was there? There was other things going on as well. And she did gaps with them, and she ended up writing a book about it called I'm a gaps kid.
Jo Whitton [00:27:42]:
And it's just really amazing. It was amazing to see the changes. And they'd go to a restaurant or something and the kids would ask for things like Brussels sprouts and broccoli, and the waiter would be like, what? Yeah, it just completely changes the taste. And probably, you guys know that when there's a lot of gut issues happening with kids, certain foods will taste very acidic. And so they'll scream and throw the food and freak out and won't eat it. And it doesn't matter how much you try to make them eat something that it's like a protection mechanism in there that's like telling them, don't eat that. It's bad for me, it's acidic, and a lot of times it's a the gut that is the cause of that. And as that microbiome changes with the meat stocks and little bits of fermented foods that you add in, very slowly, that whole taste and aversion to foods changes, and it's just mind blowing to see.
Jo Whitton [00:28:44]:
It always makes me so happy to see.
Sharon Collon [00:28:47]:
So I am picturing our parents at home who are pretty much under the pump, you know, like, I mean, you would understand, but if the parent also, like, the primary caregiver also has ADHD, and there's a whole sequencing, sequencing of executive function that has to happen to get these things on. Like, and, you know, yes, work with an ADHD coach, please people to build these, you know, to help support you going through these journeys as well. But for the people that are struggling at home with, like, time executive functions, you know, like, we've got to do task prioritization and a lot of planning for this sort of thing. What kind of tips can you give them to make it easier for them to get some of these foods into their kids?
Jo Whitton [00:29:33]:
Yeah, there's. I would probably focus on one thing at a time. Like, don't try and do, like I said earlier, don't try and do everything at once because it's just too much. You know, whether you've had, whether you have ADHD yourself or not, it's just too much to try and do it all at once. So you might start with just meat stock. Once you're getting to the food side of things, like you're working on the sleep, you probably are already working on those things. But once you start with the food, start with the meat stock and just start with making chicken soup and something like that once a week, or making a big pot of stock, freezing it in ice cube trays, and just adding a cube of that to meals, wherever you can, bolognese, whatever their favorite meals are, you can just about add stock to anything. We've added it to jellies, we've added it to smoothies.
Jo Whitton [00:30:30]:
We've added it to all sorts of things, but any kind of sauces or like a casserole or a soup or a stew, obviously, just add a little bit, but also get them to take a little bit that they know about so that it becomes a normal thing. So that's where you do the little bit on a spoon or in a syringe, and you might need a reward system. So that's a really good way to get started and just focus on that for a little bit. Focus on building that up, and maybe you'll spend a few weeks on that until it becomes so natural that it's not hard anymore and then you're ready for the next step. And I think that's probably my biggest tip, is if something's really hard, then maybe it's not, you know, maybe it's not the time to go and add something else. Like you've probably heard of habit stacking. If you've got a habit of, for instance, as an adult, getting up in the morning, walking into the kitchen and straight away turning on the kettle for your coffee, maybe habit stack and go, okay, before I turn on the kettle, I'm going to have a spoonful of stock or, you know, warm up some stock for the family and teach the kids. When you come in for breakfast, before breakfast, you get one spoonful of stock.
Jo Whitton [00:31:49]:
So however it works for you, it might not be morning, it might be before dinner. Find a way to add that into your everyday routine. And then once that's just part of the routine and it's not a big deal, then add something else. And, yeah, that's sort of how we recommend in our program.
Sharon Collon [00:32:10]:
Love that. Now, there couldn't be many more parents that are busier than you. Like, I just want to give the listeners at home a bit of an idea here. So you've got a fully functioning business, right? Like, it's big and you do lots of things. Retreats, cookbooks. Like, there's. There's a whole lot of things. And then you've home, you know, you homeschooled all your kids and there's a lot of them.
Sharon Collon [00:32:37]:
And, yeah, so can you, because, you know, as a busy working parent that also is managing, you know, a house and all that sort of stuff. What, what time saving parent tips can you give us?
Jo Whitton [00:32:52]:
Get to bed early? Do you know? I just do not. My. It blows my mind when I see parents with kids that are still up at 10:00 p.m. i'm just like, how do you cope with life? I couldn't. I taught my kids from when they were really young to get to bed at a good hour. I mean, by the time they were teenagers, it's a lot more difficult and they have to take responsibility, and that's different. But even if you've got teenagers, then you get to bed early and just model it for them. And if they won't do it, well, at least you're, you know, they will eventually.
Jo Whitton [00:33:29]:
But the young ones especially, just slowing things down at night, having dinner, I think having dinner early enough makes a big difference too. Like, if you're still trying to get everybody finished with dinner by 08:00 p.m. it's just too late. Then you've got to clean up, you've got to do baths, you've got to get everyone sorted for bed. It's just too late. Like, if you can have dinner, bye. By the, you know, 530, that's awesome because then you can have the kitchen cleaned up by 630 or seven, you can have some reading time and everyone can be in bed by 730 or eight, you know, even you, if you want. And I just find having that, you know, a bit of a routine, well, a good routine so that you've got structure and you've got the kids know what's coming up next.
Jo Whitton [00:34:20]:
That always helped with my kids, for them to have a flexible routine so they knew what was happening. And this is the time you're expected to be in bed. But be in bed by and then getting up before the kids, I find, was always really helpful if you can manage it. Some people have kids that wake up at the crack of dawn and depends on their age, really. But if you can manage it, get up before the kids and have some time to yourself because that will just help you, help you cope. If you can't do it first thing in the morning, if you've got a crying baby or whatever, find some time early in the day where you can have five or ten minutes on your own. And I find getting outside, even when the kids were really little, I would say to them, I need some mum time. And I'd say, you sit here and play with these toys and I am sitting outside with my cuppa and you're not allowed to bother me for five minutes.
Jo Whitton [00:35:22]:
And I would sit there with bare feet in the grass in the sunshine with my cuppa. And they knew that that was mum time. And you'd train them to give you that time. And there's lots of tips for how to do that. I also used to teach parenting for ten years, parenting classes. But there's lots of really good ways that you can teach your kids. For them to have alone time is important too. And then if you've got that, if you've got that time to think everything seems easier.
Jo Whitton [00:35:57]:
And then you can do a brain dump. Have you heard of a brain dump where you just write everything down? That's pull the monkey brain stuff, just get it on paper and then figure out what is actually important right now. And only put two or three things on your to do list at a time and work on those. And then if you still have time in the day, you can go back and look at the brain dump. But it's all there. You won't forget it. And I think that's. Sometimes the overwhelm is mostly in our minds.
Jo Whitton [00:36:26]:
It's just like, this is a constant. Like there's. I've got to remember this. And I. I'm in the bathroom having a shower, but I'm like, oh, no, I forgot about this. I've got to remember this. I got to remember it. So when I get out of the shower, I've got to write it down.
Jo Whitton [00:36:39]:
You get out of the shower and you forget. So having that time each day to think and just jot down your thoughts, I find is really helpful. And also with meal prep, I think that's a big one if you can prep more than one meal at a time. So if you're. If you're making a family favorite that's freezable, double it, triple it if you can. It's not that much more time to double a meal and then get one in the freezer. And if you do that as often as you can, you build up a bit of, you know, a bit of meals in the freezer. And then on the weekends, if you've got time, do a few things at once.
Jo Whitton [00:37:18]:
Yesterday I posted on my stories. I got home and it was about 430, and I felt like I had a bit more time to cook dinner. So I cooked two meals at once and I did a stew in a big pot, just the sort of thing where you just chop everything up, chuck it in, put the lid on and let it simmer so it's not hard. And I put sausages in the oven to bake, and then I made a quick batter, poured them over the sausages for a tote in the hole. It's a grain free version that I do. I made a potato mash and I cooked up some mushrooms. And at the same time I was talking to a friend in England on the phone. So, you know, it's kind of learning to do more than one thing at one time, which we mums are generally pretty good at, but with meals as well, if you're going to be chopping up carrots for dinner.
Jo Whitton [00:38:07]:
You may as well chop up carrots for the next meal as well. Like, try and do a few prep things at once if you can, or even two meals at a time.
Sharon Collon [00:38:19]:
Love that. Love that. So before we go today, and thank you so much, Jo, because you have helped us with so many cool little practical tips that we can incorporate, you know, some elements of what you do into our busy lives, which I've been really grateful for. Can you tell our beautiful listeners at home where to find you?
Jo Whitton [00:38:41]:
Yes. Instagram's the most fun place. I love Instagram. I post little snippets in my stories most days of what I'm cooking or little tips or this is how you can make the edges of your crackers straight without going crazy. You know, just all sorts of things. Okay, that's not important. But also things like tips for why sunlight exposure is good and how to get that into your day and what I'm cooking for dinner and what I'm eating for breakfast and all those sorts of things on my stories. And I do share a lot of recipes and cooking videos on my Instagram and Facebook page.
Jo Whitton [00:39:24]:
So quirky cooking. You can just look it up on there. And I have a YouTube channel where there's lots of. I have a podcast on there that I'm, like I said, a little bit slack with, but there's lots of videos on there. There's cooking videos, there's podcasts, there's chat. Then also, my newsletter is quite handy because I send out meal plans and things like that in there. So, yeah, I'd probably check those out. Amazing.
Sharon Collon [00:39:52]:
Thank you so much for your time today, Jo. It's been such a pleasure to have you on the podcast.
Jo Whitton [00:39:57]:
Thank you. Thank you for having me.
Sharon Collon [00:39:59]:
Thank you for listening to this episode of the ADHD Families podcast. If you loved it, please share it on your socials. I want this to start a conversation about ADHD. If you want to make this mum do a little happy dance, please leave a review on iTunes.
Sharon Collon [00:40:16]:
If you would like to know more.
Sharon Collon [00:40:18]:
About what we do, check out thefunctionalfamily.com.
Sharon Collon [00:40:22]:
I truly hope that you enjoyed this podcast and you use it to create.
Sharon Collon [00:40:26]:
A wonderful, effective, joyful life with your beautiful chips.
