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Adhd 13 going mental

May 17, 2015

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Adhd Gifts

In a world where distractions were long thought the enemy, one man befriends that foe and finds freedom and a shining object in her rock. Since then he has embraced the distraction and searches to know better in the epic battle against the norm. And now distracted with Mark Patey.
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ADHD Gift

Helping People with issues

In a world where distractions were long thought the enemy, one man befriends that foe and finds freedom and a shining object in her rock. Since then he has embraced the distraction and searches to know better in the epic battle against the norm. And now distracted with Mark Patey.

Mark: Hello and welcome again to the Distracted podcast, I am Mark Patey and I’ve got a wonderful guest today. Really excited. Her name is Christy Peck Kane. Christy Kane is a therapist. In fact she’s a CMHC – Clinical Mental Health Counselor. Oh my gosh Christy that’s a mouthful.

Christy: It is.

Mark: What does that really mean?

Christy: It means that I’m not a normal/typical therapist and I work on helping people face their issues without psychotropic medication to get healthy.

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ADHD Gift

Managing Life

Mark: Ah, you are not the pill dosing type of counselor.

Christy: Nope, I believe that just masks symptoms. And so I believe that learning how to accept yourself and manage your life the way you’re supposed to live your life equals happiness. Mark: Wow, you’re just absolutely crazy.

Christy: At times.

Mark: Okay, so you’ve seen that more and more though. Is it me, or people heading more and more the psychotropic medication’s just a solution for issues or are they…is the trend away from them and dealing with the issues as supposed to medicating the symptoms?

Christy: I think the trend has always been towards more medication. You know our medical and mental help area.

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ADHD Gift

How to properly deal with adhd

Mark: We’ve talked about a lot on this program. My concerns with the medication and I acknowledge and accept and have met plenty of people – you know when I go to speeches and conferences, a lot come up and say you need to know that for me, the medication was so helpful in the spirit of my life or a parent might say, for my kid, and we’ve dealt with that and I’ve recognized that there are those that need that. Hopefully it’s temporary. I have a very very very very big issue with that being what people try first. It’s almost, the teacher, you’re kid’s ADHD, take him to a doctor you can get him some medications and we’ll take care of it. Have you seen that? Is it just my imagination and what I’m seeing or are you seeing that as well?

Christy: Oh, we see it in society. Let’s just talk about the whole spectrum of the world today. We want a quick fix, if we can’t pay our bills, we want somebody to pay them. If our kid’s not acting properly in school, we wanna out them on medication. It takes more work to figure out what the problem really is and how to address it. Now I agree with you, there are times when medication is appropriate. But I think it should be temporary, stabilize and then allow us to really address the main issues so the eventually, if it is possible, a person can come off medication.

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ADHD Gift

Giving the right medication

Mark: Well, here’s my concern and I agree with you a hundred percent. My concern is this – the temporary masking of the symptom may become a permanent solution because the symptom is now gone. Or is it not a permanent solution? Does it…

Christy: I think what we find is that most of the time, unless it’s really clinical depression or a clinical mental health issue, it only masks it temporarily and the symptoms return unless we’re truly dealing with someone who has a lack of chemical. And then yes, there’s no other choice. Medication will only work if you’re lacking the chemicals necessary to stabilize but if it’s really emotionally based and environmentally based, the symptoms are gonna come up again. That’s why people are constantly increasing the doses of medication or changing the medication.

Mark: Now this is mental health and medications in general. Let’s pull it in to my audience for second. ADD/ADHD, and the gift and curse that it can be. Here, we really wanna focus on the gift. There’s plenty of radio shows and experts, and books, and articles that tell us how broken we are. And so, if people are looking to feel and get sympathy for broken ADHD brain, this is not the show. If they’re looking for a place to say I choose to look at the gift, and look at the cup half full, and magnify those gifts, this is where you come. This is that audience.

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ADHD Gift

Positive Force

Christy: They should do that in all aspects of life. One of the things I have a big issue with is this negative labeling. Where we take somebody who deals with whatever issue it is and says you’re broken. The minute we identify somebody with a negative identifier, we give them an excuse to justify actions. Where if we say no, that’s unique about you, how can you make that a positive force in your life? How can you use the skills you gained taking away from something like – let’s take someone maybe who’s abused as a child, and we wanna identify them as a victim. Why? We should identify them as the survivor and have them look at all the skills that they gained because they survived that and how they can use their skills in their life to be. Just like what you’re doing with people who have ADD and ADHD, you’re asking them, you say, look at your amazing qualities because you have these traits and tendencies now how can you use them as a positive force?

Mark: You mentioned depression and that was my struggle. And quite honestly, it still can be. I think everybody, no matter how successful or where they are in life, they still have those down moments. When I was young, I struggled. I put on the mask, I was the class clown, I got the laughter, I acted out, and was temporarily rewarded by my peers for being a good buff and being the ADHD kid. But those were a lot of times, inside I was hurting. I was the special ed. kid, I was in resource, I don’t know what they call it now. Not resource but it’s something new. I think it still is that.

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ADHD Gift

Adhd kid Label

Christy: It’s still called the resource, I know.

Mark: And that was tough, the label and all of that – sometimes I look at myself and I don’t know how I even survived that. I mean, kids are strong. Kids are – a kid can deal with a lot of pain and survive and my question is this, with what you’ve seen in all the counseling all these years dealing with this issue, which is worse? The ADHD brain itself and how it functions differently or the label with the ADHD? Which is worse?

Christy: The label. Because anytime we label…

Mark: The label. No hesitation. Just boom, the label.

Christy: Yeah, because we live to a label. Kids live to identifiers. You got these characteristics, this is how can you use them. Instead, we say oh you’re a bad kid. And teachers, I’m sorry but in the education system, they label kids. Oh you don’t want that kid in your classroom because he’s disruptive and so they teach to that level…

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ADHD Gift

Negative impression

Mark: Teachers, if you’re listening, and you’re offended, take an honest look at yourself because all teachers will say, no, no, no, no not me. But every parent and child in every conference that I’ve been to said “my teacher…”

Christy: Yeah, but society does that. On my radio program a couple of days ago we talked about the fact that why is it acceptable in society for someone to have cancer but is not acceptable for somebody who have depression? We rescue anybody that has cancer, we do everything we can to help but the moment they say oh they have a mental health issue, oh taboo. Something’s wrong with them, back away. It’s like a contagious disease, and it’s not. It’s because we have made that a negative identifier. And then kids buy into it. Oh, something’s wrong with me so I’m gonna act that way or I’m gonna give up. And that just perpetuates the problem.

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ADHD Gift

Mental Disease

Mark: See, and mental health – you mentioned contagious disease, and I have to say, I think it kind of is. There is a disease of thought. Mental diseases are contagious and the way you were saying and that I agree with you, people say, oh he’s got depression, I’m gonna stay away from him, he’s got a dead battery and he’s gonna hook up his jumper cables to me and suck me dry you know. And I have friends like that. Oh no, here comes Eore – the old cartoon Eore and I lost my tail, nobody loves me – and then they hook up their batteries and they hook up to your fully charged battery and suck your life out of you. And it’s not that it’s contagious, they just are dry and we should be giving more freely and I could do better but I wanna switch to where my mind went. My little distracted brain instantly went – mental thought is contagious. If you want to be successful and be happy, hang out with happy people. If you want to find success in business, work and hang out with successful business people in businesses you can. Because their thinking, their thought processes, it hands, it moves, it is kind of a viral thought process. You know, I’ve got four boys, and I always tell them, pick your friends wisely because if you think you’re gonna pick a friend that’s doing some questionable things, and you’re gonna help them, that’s great and noble but sometimes the noble deeds, it goes the opposite direction.

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ADHD Gift

Focusing on the positive

Christy: It goes the opposite direction.

Mark: You do have this kind of give and take in the world of ADHD. I found that the business owners that are ADHD and when I wrote the book Addicts and Millionaires, I interviewed the 50 drug addicts, 50 millionaires, and of the 50 millionaires interviewed, a vast majority of them were ADHD and we like to hang out. We are spontaneous, quick, kinda turn on a dime and oh there’s business idea let’s work something together, and that’s fun. And that success breeds success. And the things they’ve learned and the things I’ve learned amplify. And that’s where people with ADHD should be going. Unfortunately, they don’t. They go into a classroom with other people with the similar label that are struggling with their self worth the way I struggled with. And I’m gonna pick a crowd and I’m picking on a stereotype and I know I am picking on a stereotype and I’m certainly gonna offend somebody and I reserve the right to offend all people equally okay? It’s the Goth crowd. There is an image in that “I’m all in black”, the heavy makeup and the tattooed tear drop and the weirdest. World of Goth and it is contagious. I’ve seen people that kind of go in to there because they accept everybody but then that person it’s kind of…

Christy: They go in to fit in. ADHD 13 Going Mental

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ADHD Gift

Dark Culture

Mark: They go in to fit in and they just kind of adopt that dark culture.

Christy: Well, that’s all of society. People are looking for places to fit in. The problem is we make mental health and negative identifier of fitting in to instead of a positive identifier. And so when we label negatively, then we begin to destroy people’s self esteem.

Mark: So how do we turn that around?

Christy: We don’t do negative identifiers. You have ADHD, great! What can you do with it? You have depression, okay, what are the things you can do to be successful in dealing with depression instead we focus so much on what’s not right and what’s broken instead of focusing on what’s positive and can be done, the people buy in to that. It’s the same thing with…okay take the gay movement right now. We have more kids than ever before identifying with that because the minute someone’s a little different, we wanna give the identifier and it’s not necessary. It could be just the kid’s a little different, but they buy in to it. And especially with youth, you know we talk about education and kids, as adults sometimes we can back away from those identifiers because we’ve grown up a little bit. But kids and schools can be mean, you know that. Kids can be picked on and teased, and it’s so important in those time periods not to go with the negative identifiers.

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ADHD Gift

Label a kid is damaging

Mark: Here’s the other catch. For a child… for anybody, the more the person you’re looking to as someone that you should follow and respect – a parent, a teacher, an ecclesiastical leader, the more damaging the label is. If it comes from the parent, I mean, that’s just plain deadly but if it comes from a teacher, same thing because you’re looking up to them as the one that knows more and they’re so influential. They can be so easily influenced by these influential people. It’s one thing if a total stranger says “you’re a weird kid”, okay, whatever you know, and you’re a weird man. You can’t stress enough how important it is for our educators to back away from the label. But here’s the problem, we have to be realistic to what the teachers are going through because I was a nightmare for some of my teachers, I know some of my teachers like me because the teachers that liked me, I like them and then I was a great kid in their class. I was horrible in the very next class. Because I couldn’t get any reward or love from my teacher, but acting out, I could get all kinds of acting from my friends and peers, they’re laughing at the spit water, the rubber band game, and whatever tactics.

Christy: Well I think a point in educators, same with the feeling of ADD and ADHD, we have put too much in the classroom for the teachers to deal with one thing that shouldn’t be there. And so what we need to do is to just get back to the fact that teachers need to teach. Instead of being the religious figure, the moral value, the list goes on and on. ADHD 13 Going Mental

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ADHD Gift

Way of teaching

Mark: But the problem is our society is headed that way I mean, I would say our government is actually stirring it towards almost as if education system should raise the kids and the parents should stay the out.

Christy: I know, I understand that but it’s not gonna be effective because there’s no way the classroom, we have 30 to 45 kids and a teacher can’t do that. And so we end up teaching…

Mark: Nor can we have any hope that the teacher is actually gonna teach morals, good values, or more importantly let’s not say good or bad, your morals and your values which is your right. You should be doing it coz if you’re not, guess what? Your school system’s gonna look for you.

Christy: Yeah, so we have teachers that are overwhelmed, I understand that. We have teachers that want to teach differently but because there’s a certain curriculum required, they can only teach that way to all the students, and no kid learns the same. Really. Our educational system needs to allow students to learn according to how they learn best. But because the way stream lining education, creating standardized testing, we’re taking that away. And so I see why teachers say, okay this kid needs to go on medication because all they can do is teach the lowest denominator in the classroom. And most of the time, you know this, ADHD or ADD kids are brilliant.

ADHD 13 Going Mental

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ADHD Gift

Adhd Theraphy

Mark: Oh they’re bored in classroom.

Christy: But the teacher’s hands are tied that they can’t teach to that level that that student needs and so they have to teach to this denominator and so then what do they do? They recommend medications so that they can bring that student down to that lowest denominator and be able to teach in the class doesn’t work.

Mark: No.

Christy: But that’s what we’re doing. It’s socialized. Everything in society is becoming in the classroom, or by the government and it doesn’t work.

Mark: No because everybody’s asked to be really another brick in the wall. You need to be this certain definition of normal and that kinda leads and segues to our uneducated segment for our show today but we will leave that for now, so I wanna talk for a little bit more about your concerns and what’s happening in therapy with kids with ADHD. So setting normal aside, in ADHD and in the therapy world, when a parent brings a kid in and he has some ADHD traits that are negative, I hate to even say ADHD traits because I think they’re symptoms of the label and the negative self worth because it’s oppositional defiance.

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ADHD Gift

Taking care of kids

Mark: Let us say he didn’t fit in standard mold, parents are really having a hard time and in their attempt to control the chaos that is…

Christy: They can’t control it. I know.

Mark: Yeah, but that’s what society tells you. Control your kid.

Christy: I know that.

Mark: And you can’t let them lamp it because it wouldn’t be safe but I’m gonna say, in my family, I grew up in a family of 11 kids. And I know listeners, something you didn’t know about Mark Patey, he’s from a family of 11 kids all from one mom and one dad, which makes me either a good catholic or a good Mormon. I do live in Utah so you can figure that one out.

Christy: Take a guess.

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ADHD Gift

Earning freedom

Christy: Good advice by a mom.

Mark: If it’s not illegal, immoral or unhealthy, then you can do it. But there were constraints, if you weren’t getting good grades, your curfew went from midnight on a school night if you had straight As and that was not a hard set rule but school nights if you’re getting bad grades, your curfew at school nights get down by 7 o’clock or 8 o’clock you’re in and you’re done because and so in the Patey household, you had as much freedom as you earn and as little freedom as you earned.

Christy: And that’s not control.

Mark: And that’s not control.

Christy: No.

Mark: It did have boundaries but the boundaries moved as we demonstrated performance.

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ADHD Gift

Guiding Adhd child

Mark: And I was able to do just about anything. I could go home from school and do my homework or not do my homework. I could come home from school and if I was in the mood to build a go cart, out of an old lawnmower, I could go the garage and make a mess and try to build a go cart out of an old lawnmower and earn and grow and let the ADHD brain run wild. That was so healthy and so necessary especially for the ADHD brain, it needs to be allowed the freedom to get distracted.

Christy: Exactly. But society doesn’t, it doesn’t educated that way anymore because you use the word. Parents are told, you need to control your children. We can’t control anyone or anything. I know that society says that all the time. But reality is, we can guide, we can set boundaries but at the end of the day an oppositional defiant child, if they want to choose to be oppositional defiant, they’re going to.

Mark: And what’s interesting, the oppositional defiant child isn’t just oppositionally defiant to everyone it’s usually with a particular family member or particular teacher. And so is it the child or is it the family member or the teacher or is it both? And I would argue, most cases, both.

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ADHD Gift

Parenting and Teaching

Christy: Yeah. Often times you’ll have teachers because of how they teach and how they set up parameters. They can trigger behaviors. And also, there’s the responsibility of the individual to learn how to manage their behaviors in different environments. But that’s called the guidelines. You know, one of the things, especially when I’m dealing with parenting and teaching parenting classes and marriage and family relation classes or seminars, kids often times are being treated as though they shouldn’t have any input, any say and have no intelligence.

Mark: Yeah, they should be seen, not heard.

Christy: Yes. But the reality is the more you engage your children in the decisions and the process of the home, the more successful. Kind of like your parents did. They had guidelines, you knew what they were but you chose your freedom and the more you did the things they expected, the more freedom you gained. Mark: Right, and the more education. And I would argue with anyone that my education after school because of the freedom I had to get distracted and explore that distraction all the way ‘til I was bored with it, I learned more in those distracted moments after school than I ever did in my formal education.

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ADHD Gift

Exploring things

Christy: Just the same with Einstein. You know, they talk about him being illiterate and sometimes, in reality he was brilliant and so in his free time when he could do the things he wanted to do, he was able to explore…

Mark: When the guidelines are guidelines, and you can breathe in and out with the individual, that’s where real growth is. It’s not to remove barriers… it is to remove barriers, replace it with guidelines that have sense of flexibility. Now with ADHD, the problem we have, I see this is a theory. This is a Mark Patey theory and I am not licensed or given permission by the state or federal government.

Christy: You have a disclaimer.

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ADHD Gift

Mark’s Theory

Mark: Right, that’s my disclaimer. I do not have a permission to have an opinion but I have one anyway and here’s my theory – we are seeing a huge increase in the number of kids labeled with ADHD I believe that’s because we are seeing… I personally believe there’s a lot of reason for it but the main reason is because we are seeing a hug increase in the structure and control of the classroom, and if you imagine as you will, education system had a wall or guideline on the left and wall or guideline on the right, and it was a big wide road, and just about everybody fit in that world, an ADHD kid or the hyper-creative kid could wander back and forth across that road as long as it wasn’t clinging into the walls, everybody was okay with it. As our education system has squeezed down and said this is your common core curriculum. This is what you will teach, this is how you will teach it, this is what happens, those walls squeeze in and squeeze in and what happens is the more you try to control, and squeeze and narrow, the gifted ADHD creative genius the more it crashes into those walls and as it crashes into those walls, if they’re not flexible like a guideline but are a hard wall, the crash is hard, it’s violent, it’s painful, it’s moving down the highway an ADHD is, we’re moving down the highway of life at a 150 miles an hour. And we’re in and out and trying to figure things out, we’re having a great time, and they start squeezing that down and that’s when everybody fit in a tiny two lane road, stay on your lane, stay the same speed, don’t wander, just go right here, you’re gonna cause crashes.

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ADHD Gift

Dealing Adhd

Christy: What you’re causing is a lot more oppositional inappropriate behavior as to what people want to label it. And so, you’re gonna see more and more kids getting in trouble, you’re gonna see more and more kids looking at juvenile charges because you’re not allowing them to become who they were meant to be. And my argument with any mental health issue is when you try to walk in the shoes that were not meant for you to wear, you will be unhealthy. And so what you’re talking about common core, for example, common core is destroying genius. It’s destroying ability for people for becoming entrepreneurs, to be free thinkers

Mark: To even dream.

Christy: Yes. In some aspects, yes.

Mark: To think of a possibility that there is an unlimited level of success or possibility or creation. The ADHD brain it’s the greatest gift is its ability to go and free or five or ten directions all at once, and sometimes, 10 levels deep. That’s it’s gift and curse and to anybody that’s looking for you to stay on the two-lane highway and don’t run into the bumpers, all you’ll see is some crashing harder and harder and harder, but finally you medicate them, you slow them down, you put them in a different highway, in a different lane or you put them worst in a parking lot and say park right here and don’t move.

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ADHD Gift

Self Medicate

Christy: And then you label them.

Mark: You label them. They have to break free or break down. And that’s…

Christy: Unhealthy.

Mark: Yeah. And that’s it. Self medicate, suicide, you know, when you’re taken a race car, and put them in a parking lot, and say don’t you drive and don’t you move an inch and that’s the worst thing. And I’m a car guy so this analogy for me is – that’s what my life felt. And the thoughts of suicide, they creep in on anyone. And or self medicating for me – I was addicted to video games, I could get lost in a video game and turn off any and all responsibility, the life and the world and homework and just keep playing the game. And that’s not healthy.

Christy: Here’s what society doesn’t see and I know you’re talking about the ADD/ADHD brain we’re giving that to them and but we’re doing it to all brains.

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ADHD Gift

Thinking outside the box

Mark: To everyone.

Christy: Yes we are no longer allowing people to learn the process of how to think freely and to learn because it is an amazing skill to be able to think outside the box. I was talking to a guy on the phone the other day that was interviewing me and I thought it was one of the best compliments I’ve ever received and his compliment was, and so I think outside the box and he said no Christy, you think outdoors.

Mark: Ah, that’s nice.

Christy: And we’re taking that away. In our education system, in our society, we’re taking away everybody’s ability to think outdoors and we’re saying, think this way, do it this way, then you’re successful. Ah ah, there’s so many of us that don’t fit in to that, especially for people with ADD and ADHD, and the minute you say think this way, do it this way, their brain immediately either goes against it.

Mark: Yeah, it either fights for its freedom.

Christy: Or dies. ADHD 13 Going Mental

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ADHD Gift

Other side effect

Mark: Or it dies. And it’s one or the other. For our listeners, if you are in that kind of environment, get out. Get out of that school, find a private charter school, find somewhere that has the right kind of environment because it’s so deadly beyond just an academic level. The academic part of it is the least important. It means nothing that the failing grade is nothing that’s just the little other side effect of the fact that you destroyed somebody. You actually took their soul and killed it.

Christy: Well just take a moment, I have two different kids. My daughter qualified to be on all special and gifted talent in classes. And they weren’t based on fill in the blank. Her classes were free thinking, free discussion, free exploration. Straight A student. Why? Because her education taught her to think. My other son, who they identified struggling educationally, was in all class of regurgitation.

Mark: Yeah, you know what my opinion is and spit my opinion back out and adopt my opinion, or fail my class.

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Adhd a gift or curse?

Christy: and so he basically is learning put this in, and I pass. But if you look at your top Universities – Harvard, Stanford, even BYU, they’re not about regurgitation, they’re about a processing and thinking and coming up with your own solutions. That’s the type of education you want for ADD/ADHD people because they can do that. That’s how their brain thinks.

Mark: Okay, the last question I’m gonna ask you then we’re gonna go to our uneducated segment, ADHD as an expert with permission from the state and all of the authorities, because you have a license to have an opinion and all of us just have schmucks – ADHD, overall, gift or curse?

Christy: I believe it’s a gift if you are allowed to use it effectively but if you’re labeled it, it becomes a curse.

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Uneducated segment

Mark: Amen. I’m with you a hundred percent. All right. For uneducated segment of the day, we picked a fun one, and an easy one. It is – I just want to be normal, and I want a therapist that helps me get there. The whole world… so that’s… we need to uneducated people and I’m gonna ask you and for new listeners, and Christy for you to understand, uneducated is when you accept it’s true and factual and right and we try to uneducate you for you benefit because your education was just flat wrong. Believe it or not, we can learn things that are not true. The whole concept of being normal and finding some normal sea in life, it’s a crap. I don’t get it. When I hear people say – it’s usually when they’re depressed, and they’re hurting, they say I just want to be normal and I’m just going, what the heck do you want to be normal for and what’s normal? When do we ever meet somebody that’s quote unquote normal and the last you’re trying to do what I feel like our government and school is trying to do is narrow the lane in some highway in fact they put guard rails on each side of the highway so that even if there’s an emergency, you can’t escape the highway you’re on this road whether you like it or not and you can’t take an exit unless we tell you you can and then narrow it, narrow it, narrow it down trying to create a normal and people in society are actually buying in to this crap. And they’re telling themselves I just want to be normal, I just want a normal life, I just want normal situations – the only thing that is truly normal in life is chaos. And just trying to manage that, am I wrong? ADHD 13 Going Mental

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Mr. and Mrs. normal

Christy: No, as a matter of fact, often times, when clients say that to me, I tell them well I’ve never met Mr. or Mrs. Normal. They don’t exist. Normal is based on what you want to do in your life, and where you want to go. And as long as you can realize that you’re a good human being doing the best that you can and you want to be better. That’s normal. Mark: And the doing the best you can is all that matters. I don’t care where somebody is in life, I really don’t. What direction are you heading? That’s all that really matters because the only other variable is time. If your trajectory is up, who cares? Who cares? And normal, you’re right. Where are Mr. and Mrs. Normal? As soon as you’re trying to define and create a normal is when you really have created the brick in the wall. You’re just another brick in the wall. How depressing. I imagine socialism, I imagine communism, no rich, no poor, everybody’s equal, everybody’s normal and be okay with it. And I just go, the grandest human experiment ever in the history of man that I know of was this American Dream. The idea that you came to America and you were self reliant,

Christy: To become anything you wanted to be.

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Adhd Country

Mark: Do what you want, how you want, and there was almost a complete lack of structure. I would argue America in its early days. Not today. But it’s in it’s grandest days the greatest generation of America and all the inventions and everything that comes from this grand social experiment was when there was less structure and control. America was this is gonna be the Mark Patey quote of the day, America was the ADHD country. It was the, there was no box to think out of. We can’t find the box this is just be you and you have the freedom to be the you you want to be. America came from nowhere. We’re the youngest country in the planet. And the most successful and wealthiest.

Christy: And became the greatest nation. And normal, here’s the thing, the moment you begin to label, I want to be normal, you become abnormal any way you can to have mental health issues. Because you then label yourself with something’s wrong with me. And the reality is there’s nothing wrong with anybody as long as you’re striving to be the best you can be. Yeah we have problems, yeah we have bad days, we may have depression, we may have other things, but we are okay.

Mark: Yeah and it’s okay to be any and all of the above. ADHD 13 Going Mental

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ADHD Gift

Being Normal

Mark: The only real curse is when someone buys in to the idea that there is a normal that they should have strived to obtain.

Christy: Because it limits their potential. The minute you say, I want to be normal, you’re saying you want to be less than you can be.

Mark: You know I was gonna end it there but you made me think of one thing, the idea to be normal is the idea to fit in we’re social creatures, we want to fit in everything and I see people that they buy a Harley because they want to be part of a group a crowd, and I’m gonna prove my independence and my independent nature by getting a tattoo like everybody else. And I get that I’m an aviator, I love that aviation camaraderie and that group and I’m proudly part of that group and proudly part of other social groups, but as long as you’re going to those groups, you truly love it, not just because you wanted to be a part of a group. The tattoo one is the funniest one for me, I get a tattoo to show how independent I am, but I’m like every one of your friends has a tattoo. You are the symbol of independence. People who have tattoos, send your hate mail to ihatemarkpateysfakeemail.com.

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ADHD Gift

The real dysfunction

Christy: But you’re simply saying, I want to be who I want to be because it’s who I’m meant to be. Not because I want to be who I want to be because I have to fit in with someone else. That’s what you’re saying.

Mark: Well yeah, I have a niece that actually showed me this tattoo, maybe it’s just a sticker or something, she showed me a tattoo she ha and it’s a feather and it’s because of a family member that had passed on and it was an angel wing feather that reminded her of that loved one and I thought, what a gorgeous tattoo and why she did it. It wasn’t to be part of something it was a statement of who she was and so there’s my…tattooed people, don’t hate me. Anyone who’s buying a Harley because they’re just needy, you’re buying it for the wrong reason. If you’re getting a tattoo for the same reason, wrong reason. There’s no such thing as normal or the biggest dysfunction in the planet is any individual person, family or worst of all, government, it tries to make everyone normal. That’s the real dysfunction.

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ADHD Gift

Shell Cracking Leaving the Past Behind

Mark: That’s the end of our show today, thank you so much for listening, please like us and share us with your friends, and If you have a call in and you want to ask us a question, you can always call 855-ADDGIFT. That’s 855-ADDGIFT. By leaving the message, you agree that we might play it on the air and have permission to do so and if you wanna get more information Christy Peck, you’ve been wonderful. Sorry, Christy Kane. Christy Peck Kane, you can get her email, you can email her directly at [email protected] and she’s got a book out that is wonderful, and it’s called, Shell Cracking Leaving the Past Behind, I hardly recommend it go out and get it and get a piece of this wonderful woman’s mind in your head. It’s healthy. Thanks again for listening to the Distracted program, we love you.

ADHD 13 Going Mental