ADHD Mums

The script sat in your handbag for three weeks. Not because you’d changed your mind, but because you didn’t know what you’d say when he found it.
Then you told him over the dishes, and he didn’t even turn around. ‘I’m not giving a seven-year-old drugs.’ He asked what was actually in it, and you couldn’t answer. Argument over.
If you’re weighing up ADHD medication for your child, and someone at home has read ‘amphetamine’ off the label, this one’s for you. A listener sent me this exact voice memo, and I see versions of it in our group all the time.
More on ADHD medication: the medication collection
https://tr.ee/medication
Mentioned in this episode: Expectation Creep Explained
https://adhdmums.com.au/adhd-podcast-episodes/when-school-feels-too-much-too-early-expectation-creep-explained/
If you want the plain-English version to hand to whoever’s asking the questions, A Guide to ADHD Medication is the one I wish I’d had at the kitchen bench.
https://adhdmums.com.au/product/a-guide-to-adhd-medication/
References
Volkow, N. D. & Swanson, J. M. (2003). Variables that affect the clinical use and abuse of methylphenidate in the treatment of ADHD. American Journal of Psychiatry, 160(11), 1909–1918.
Shaw, P. et al. (2007). Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder is characterized by a delay in cortical maturation. PNAS, 104(49), 19649–19654.
Quinn, P. D. et al. (2017). ADHD medication and substance-related problems. American Journal of Psychiatry, 174(9), 877–885.
📬 Listener Questions & Community
🎙️ Ask a Listener Question (voice)
Voice notes are preferred when possible — hearing your voice helps add context — but you’re very welcome to submit a written question instead.
Send a WhatsApp voice or written on 0403 457 313
All the top rated episodes sorted by topic
👥 Join the ADHD Mums Facebook Group
👥 Receive the episodes in your inbox

Have you ever been to a friend’s house where the kids walk around like they’re in a library, and yours are running like it’s a race car track? And on the drive home you’re already doing the maths on what she’s doing that you’re not.
If you’re parenting ADHD kids, you know the list. You’ve read the books. You do the warnings, the timers, the snack in the car. And the noise in your house still doesn’t match the effort. So is any of it working, or have you made a rod for your own back?
A listener sent me this exact question as a voice memo, and so many of you have asked it in the group.
More on parenting ADHD kids: the parenting collection
https://tr.ee/parenting
Everything I’ve made for mums in the thick of this is in the shop.
https://adhdmums.com.au/shop/
References
Agnew-Blais, J. C. et al. (2022). Mother’s and children’s ADHD genetic risk, household chaos and children’s ADHD symptoms: a gene–environment correlation study. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 63(10), 1153–1163.
Daley, D. et al. (2014). Behavioral interventions in attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder: a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials across multiple outcome domains. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 53(8), 835–847.
📬 Listener Questions & Community
🎙️ Ask a Listener Question (voice)
Voice notes are preferred when possible — hearing your voice helps add context — but you’re very welcome to submit a written question instead.
Send a WhatsApp voice or written on 0403 457 313
All the top rated episodes sorted by topic
👥 Join the ADHD Mums Facebook Group
👥 Receive the episodes in your inbox
Mentioned in this episode:
Free Resources
Free Resouces

Only 5% of the most-watched ADHD videos tell you what to do next. The misleading ones get millions more views.
You’ve saved hundreds of them. They all say the same thing: that’s me.
So does social media make ADHD worse? A listener asked me exactly that, and halfway through asking, she lost her own train of thought. I get into the question underneath it. Not what the reels make you feel, but what they’ve actually changed. Plus a 10-minute sort for the saved folder on your phone that you can do tonight.
And why one piece of anonymous feedback changed the whole direction of this podcast.
New here? Start with these episodes
More on moving past ‘that’s me’: ADHD and Survival Mode: How to Stop Trying Harder and Actually Thrive (with Rachel Few)
The lipoedema surgery I mention: The Real Cost of Lipedema Surgery in Australia
References
Sieferle, K., Guidi, T., Dorr, F., & Bitzer, E. M. (2025). Quality and perception of ADHD content on TikTok. JMIR Infodemiology.
Yeung, A., Ng, E., & Abi-Jaoude, E. (2022). TikTok and ADHD: a cross-sectional study of social media content quality. The Canadian Journal of Psychiatry.
📬 Listener Questions & Community
🎙️ Ask a Listener Question (voice)
Voice notes are preferred when possible — hearing your voice helps add context — but you’re very welcome to submit a written question instead.
Send a WhatsApp voice or written on 0403 457 313
All the top rated episodes sorted by topic
👥 Join the ADHD Mums Facebook Group
👥 Receive the episodes in your inbox
Mentioned in this episode:
Free Resources
Free Resouces

Have you ever looked at your two children — one whose needs are loud, out front, impossible to miss, and one who just gets on with it — and quietly told yourself the second one's fine? Have you ever not gone looking, because who goes hunting for a problem in the child who seems okay, when the other one is taking everything you've got?
The quiet one learns to need nothing at all. And it can cost her for years before anyone notices. Emily Jade O'Keeffe was that child — the good girl next to the brother everyone could see — and she didn't spot it in her own daughter until someone else did.
RESOURCES & REFERENCES
Free Resources
The Quiet Exclusion Kit — for the child who copes, complies, and slips under the radar — https://adhdmums.com.au/product/quiet-exclusion-kit/
After Your Diagnosis Kit — for the grown 'good girl' who's just realised it was her too — https://adhdmums.com.au/product/adhd-mum-after-diagnosis-kit/
Paid Resources
ADHD Reset Workbook — Values, Energy & Planning — for the one who learned to need nothing, working out what she actually needs now — https://adhdmums.com.au/product/adhd-reset-workbook-values-energy-planning-for-adhd-mums/
ADHD Mums Shop — https://adhdmums.com.au/shop/
Related Episodes
ADHD and Marriage: We Separated for 18 Months. Then He Got Diagnosed — with Emily Jade O'Keeffe — https://adhdmums.com.au/adhd-podcast-episodes/husband-adhd-diagnosis-saved-marriage/
Uncovering the Subtle Traits of Autistic Daughters — with Eliza Harris — https://adhdmums.com.au/podcast_episode/episode-62-uncovering-the-subtle-traits-of-autistic-daughters/
About the Guest
Emily Jade O'Keeffe is a Gold Coast broadcaster who's been number one on breakfast radio for years (102.9, weekdays 5–9am), and she hosts her own podcast, Move Over Mama, with her 14-year-old daughter Millie — interviewing people about who they were as teens and what shaped them. She grew up the eldest of five in a neurodivergent country-town family, and came to her own diagnosis as an adult, after her husband and children.
https://www.moveovermama.com/
📬 Listener Questions & Community
🎙️ Ask a Listener Question (voice)
Voice notes are preferred when possible — hearing your voice helps add context — but you’re very welcome to submit a written question instead.
Send a WhatsApp voice or written on 0403 457 313
Send a SMS voice or written on 0403 457 313
👥 Join the ADHD Mums Facebook Group
👥 Receive the episodes in your inbox
Mentioned in this episode:
Free Resources
Free Resouces

She mentioned a friend called Kel. That was it. That was the whole thing. Twelve seconds, and you'd filed her under no vacancy, decided your kids didn't match, and worked out she already had a Tuesday person.
Then the term ended and you didn't sign up again, and she probably has no idea any of it happened. This episode is about the forecast you make in the first few seconds, and whether it was ever true.
Related Episodes
Every RSD episode in one place → https://tr.ee/RSD
Navigating School Pick-Up & Social Settings — how ADHD and autistic mums read social situations, how neurotypical people do, and how to bridge the gap → https://adhdmums.com.au/product/surviving-school-pick-up/
References:
Erhardt & Hinshaw 1994; Blachman & Hinshaw 2002.
📬 Listener Questions & Community
🎙️ Ask a Listener Question (voice)
Voice notes are preferred when possible — hearing your voice helps add context — but you’re very welcome to submit a written question instead.
Send a WhatsApp voice or written on 0403 457 313
Send a SMS voice or written on 0403 457 313
👥 Join the ADHD Mums Facebook Group
👥 Receive the episodes in your inbox
Mentioned in this episode:
Free Resources
Free Resouces