Episode #029 — Charting New Paths with Neuroqueer Coach Pasha Marlowe

Melanie Branch: Hello and welcome to another episode of Trailblazers Rising I am your host Melanie and I am so excited to bring to you my friend Pasha who we have been mutuals on social media for a little while now but y'all know that I don't understand the concept of time so I can't tell you for how long but she really speaks to the neurodivergent community in a broad capacity about understanding and accepting your unique neurotype.

So Pasha say hello tell them who you are and what you

Pasha Marlowe: do hello everybody thanks for having me melanie I I do a lot of things as we do

Melanie Branch: I'm

Pasha Marlowe: mainly work with individuals couples and groups neurodivergent adults I love working with couples like the interesting dynamics of couples in relationship with different neurotypes.

And I thoroughly enjoy speaking to organizations about neurodiversity affirming practices and being more inclusive and less pathologizing that is what I'm about and I and I talk a lot about neuroqueering the intersection of neurodiversity and queerness and and challenging norms neuro normativity heteronormativity social norms gender norms all the things.

I tell you what I have

said

Melanie Branch: this again I said this before and I'll say it again I am a strong believer that neurodivergence LGBTQI and those really cool witchy people we're all the same it's all if you tell me you are part of the LGBTQI plus community I'm in if you tell me you're neurodivergent I'm in.

I just think we're all one in the same and I really enjoy that intersectionality

Pasha Marlowe: yeah one of the things I tell corporations or anyone who's working as a doctor or a therapist with the neurodivergent community is or vice versa like if you work with the neurodivergent community you better be open and willing and able to work with the queer community and vice versa.

Absolutely

Melanie Branch: so it's funny you should say that my husband and I have been together for 9 million years actually we're going on 17 years and last night there was a funny little moment that we had he had started his load of laundry kind of later in the evening and because of where I'm at in my own energy cycle normally I'm in bed by 8 PM but I have about 2 weeks out of every month where during my follicular and my ambulatory Brian I'm.

I'm ready to fucking go I don't need a lot of sleep I feel great I'm hot shit right so I was staying up a little later and I looked at him and I was like Hey babe have you switched your laundry yet or something like that have you eaten your dinner have you switched we were just talking about that.

It was like 9 PM and he's like no I haven't eaten anything yet and I said What well why don't I go preheat the oven for a pizza for you and then you go switch your laundry and you know we'll just make this all happen and he said what did he say he said something to me like oh man I'm sorry you gotta tell me what to do.

And I said babe this is what I signed up for you you agreed to let me tell you what to do so I'm just gonna I am all about it so you know the way couples work in their relationship together is so intriguing what are some of the cool ins and outs and ups and downs that you've seen thus far on your journey of working with neurodiverse and neuroqueer people and couples?

Pasha Marlowe: Yeah well some of the dynamics that always show up 1 of them is a parent child dynamic and you might have just named it where 1 person and it's not necessarily a neurotypical person and a divergent person it's the person who is and I will just call it out usually the woman and if there is a heteronormative relationship or interfacing relationship and there's a man and a wife it's usually the wife.

Okay that ends up even if she is the 1 who is neurodivergent micromanaging taking on a lot of the emotional toll taking on a lot of the tasks all the to do list so she's overwhelmed already with her stuff potentially kids stuff and now all of a sudden also feels like she has a 3rd child 4th

Melanie Branch: child 5th child whatever and then there's that human giver syndrome.

And it's 1 of the 1 of the things I've been working on the most so I love that you're bringing that up and in that parent

Pasha Marlowe: child dynamic the person who's in the parental role takes on a tone of exhaustion and resentment and then the person in the child role which is sometimes and typically the person who is neurodivergent and often with ADHD.

Has a lot of shame and guilt kind of feels like they can't do anything right and there's this constant pattern of you don't follow through I try my artist well it's not hard enough well what do you want from me nothing I could do makes you happy well if you just do what I say and then there's just like cycle and continuous pattern of interaction that repeats and repeats.

So that's one of many very common dynamics that I see in

Melanie Branch: neurodivergent couples you know that's so funny and I've talked to other some of my clients who have been in long term relationships

Pasha Marlowe: whether they're

Melanie Branch: still in them or they've been broken up or whatever especially with a heteronormative woman man situation.

I am a strong strong headed determined person I'm a Taurus sun and I'm a Taurus rising and I'm an Aquarius moon for anybody who doesn't know those are all fixed signs so I I want my way and I'm going to do whatever I can to get my way and my husband has been the only person that I've ever met male or female that has been able to look at me.

And get me to act right like he's the only one that can brain me in when we're out and about it doesn't really happen anymore now that I don't drink but he's the only one that like he'll look at me and go that's enough and I'm like all right he's the only one I will listen to anybody else tells me that's enough.

And I'm like you think so okay but he tells me I said yeah so he's the only person that I can't bulldoze and he's been that way since the moment I met him and said Hey you're going to start hanging out with me so

Pasha Marlowe: it's good if there's some you know equality and some reciprocity and it's more collaborative where 1 person isn't just you know taking advantage of the other that works much better.

So it's good that you both can you know tell each other the truth and speak your mind

Melanie Branch: equally communication is so important and there has been such a big conversation on TikTok especially between the miscommunication that happens between holistic people which means non autistic and neurodivergent people.

Right and we know it's kind of like that game of telephone and that sort of thing but from what I've seen it has a lot to do with the fact that neurodivergent people are direct I am I am ADHD and autistic I have the persistent drive for autonomy don't call it the other PDA I'm not going to listen to you call it pathological demand avoidance that's bullshit.

But I have always been direct and I've always had people tone policing me and it's always kind of bit me in the ass that I'm so direct and we know with holistic neurotypical people that they're not as direct and so this huge drop off in communication and understanding happens and I think it further drives the wedge between neurotypical and neurodivergent.

But at this point I'm so I'm so preoccupied with surrounding myself with fellow neurodivergent people that I just don't give a fuck anymore

Pasha Marlowe: you've filtered the rest of the world out

Melanie Branch: I mean it's just like masking is what leads us to burn out yeah masking is changing ourself to fit in everywhere and we know it doesn't work.

So what if we all just radically decided to stop masking and doing this emotional labor for strangers cheers or people that we barely know and just go about living our lives what would change

Pasha Marlowe: yeah no I definitely I'm all about unapologetic unapologetic masking and I definitely want to surround myself mainly or solely with neurodivergent and queer folks.

And I also have family members that don't fall into either of those categories so I still have to figure out how to live and you know love amongst them so there there is still people that we have to deal with sometimes but but yeah in general I like to surround myself with neurodivergent folks so

Melanie Branch: how do you navigate those relationships that we have with friends or family members that sort of stuff that are committed to misunderstanding you or who are committed to keeping you in the mindset or the place where you serve them best right?

Because we know as entrepreneurs the first thing that happens when you start working for yourself and growing your own business is that most of the people that you call friends and family don't support you and if you continue trying to hold that relationship with them you can't be successful how do we

Pasha Marlowe: navigate that?

Yeah well the first thing that comes to mind is setting clear boundaries you know protecting our own self boundaries our own space and time around when we will engage with those people not answering the calls or the text if they come in like like initiating conversation when we're energetically aligned when we have the ability and capacity to speak with them and receive them.

And then I also this is where kind of therapeutic comedy comes in but I really like reframing and taking my power back through therapeutic comedy around family like I know what they're going to say I I can tell you what the conversation will be at dinner if I bring up a certain social or political view I know what they're going to say if I talk about autism or ADHD or trauma and then and then it's a game I play with myself about almost scripting it in my head and and not getting so frustrated when it keeps happening again like calling it out and like I knew that was going to happen.

And then I and then I just play with that it's a little more playful and light hearted than the heaviness of like are we fucking having the same conversation again are you are you actually responding to me like this again no matter how many times I've set the boundaries and said please don't say this or don't respond to me like this.

So it's just like yeah we can't change them I listen

Melanie Branch: the freedom that I experienced once I realized that I am not responsible for the way my family behaves I'm only responsible for the way I behave oh this gives me a lot more time this gives me a lot more energy

Pasha Marlowe: absolutely I have this thing I learned this from Rob Bell is a kind of spiritual mindset.

Delightful human and he talks about a converter like a like a machine but it's imaginary it's metaphorical and like if you feel jealousy you know put it through the converter of your mind and it's actually about desire you know it's like what do you desire and that's why you're jealous and if I'm angry I put it through the converter.

I'm like that's actually actually about shame and grief and it's like so sometimes I'll just go into a A conversation with somebody a challenging conversation and I'll start filtering through not just my own emotions and reactions but there's like isn't that interesting they're getting defensive because like what my my my freedom is reflecting their lack of freedom on them and I and I try to convert it in the moment.

I love

Melanie Branch: that you brought that up so I started my business a few years ago in 2020 and it took me about 6 months until I got my first client because I just said Hey this I'm going to be a mindset coach and this is what I'm going to do and I have a degree in business so why the fuck couldn't I do it?

And it's not some it's not the route that I recommend to others all right it's definitely not the quickest it's not the fastest it's not the easiest I do recommend working with a coach as quick hard and fast as you can however what I noticed is the more I grew as a person and a service provider and an entrepreneur and a person with ADHD and a mom and just a human in general the more I triggered people that were not growing.

Pasha Marlowe: Yes yes you're reflecting back to them like your radiance and expansion and their lack of

Melanie Branch: mm hmm and as an autistic person and I didn't know I was autistic back then I didn't find out about my autism diagnosis until this past year so I knew and I knew that that meant rejection sensitivity and a few other things but I really didn't know.

I didn't have the education that I do now about neurodivergence in general and as a undiagnosed autistic person I remember always saying to myself I don't understand why somebody would do this to me I would never even think about doing this to somebody else right like I saw somebody winning and was like Hey this is so exciting.

And then when I started winning people didn't like it and I didn't get it and now I see it you know from that spiritual woo perspective of the more you shine your light the more you are exposing their darkness and their unwillingness to grow and if you guys started in the same spot and now all of a sudden you're doing much better it's proof that they could have done the same

Pasha Marlowe: thing.

Yeah and this is why couples grow apart and often in midlife when there's a reclamation of our expansion our new desires our new awareness whether it's through understanding our brains better or tapping into our sexuality more or just starting to give less fucks and the other person in the partnership is not doing that growth.

It's very challenging to continue so

Melanie Branch: what would you recommend to a couple that finds themselves in that situation and wants to work through it what are the first couple steps to take when you're finding that one is doing a lot of work to get into alignment and grow and the other one is like wait what are you what are you doing?

Pasha Marlowe: I I need to know what's going on what do they do well to the person who's growing like keep growing keep expanding keep flying don't let anybody else you know hold you back and don't play small they can go find less if you if they need you to and to the person who is not growing as quickly please do not sabotage passive aggressively or just blatantly that person's growth in in all the ways that that can be done.

And and grow at your own pace and capacity and time and and try not for the person who's not growing as quickly it's it might take longer this is about different neurotypes too you know some people just don't have the very fast zest for research and learning and assimilating new things like some people don't thrive with change.

Some people do so allowing the relationship to sometimes frankly be complete not a failure just just done I mean sometimes that's where it goes and even in couples therapy and couples coaching like sometimes that's where it goes and it's not I mean obviously we we think about all the ways that we can work together as a couple but if one person is expanding and the other one's sabotaging it that's

Melanie Branch: not going to work.

You know I've recently had that realization with my relationship with alcohol and it was November of this past year that I literally just woke up one day and was like this doesn't serve me anymore and I come from a long line of partiers I come from a lifestyle

Pasha Marlowe: of

Melanie Branch: partying drinking I was a cigarette smoker for 15 years.

And then my mom got diagnosed with stage 4 head and neck cancer in 2018 and my husband was away he's in the Navy so he was away at the time and I called him and I said Hey we're quitting smoking you're quitting like you have tonight to continue smoking and like process this and then we quit tomorrow and that's it.

There will never be any more nicotine there will not be any vapes there will not be any stickies there will not be any dip there will not be any of that any and so that was 2018 and then in November of this past year I woke up with the hangover and I said I run my own business I love early mornings.

I love getting stuff done in the early morning so that I have time in the middle of the day to exercise work with my clients make content do the things that I really want to do and this is limiting my freedom but knowing that the only reason that I'm not drinking anymore is because I was able to appreciate it for it being a coping tool and mechanism that got me through.

A life that was not aligned for me right I was always overstimulated I was always stressed out I was always trying to accommodate other people I was always trying to fit in I was always trying to be the fun party girl and there's so many reasons why people with ADHD especially drink and people with undiagnosed autism drink.

And when we see the things in our life and the relationships in our life as stepping stones to forward movement sometimes letting go like you said is the only thing to do

Pasha Marlowe: yeah like had your husband not agreed to stop smoking or stop drinking and you knew that that was going to inhibit your growth your wellness and like that's that's a perfect example of it you know that you set a boundary and

Melanie Branch: that was your.

Pasha Marlowe: Boundary like if you don't stop smoking like we're not going to live together because I can't be around it anymore no that's not it's not not loving him or you you know it's like it's not about love it's it's about your choosing you know what you want what you need what you deserve for yourself and and yeah sometimes that means we don't continue.

Melanie Branch: So what do you see as some of the biggest challenges

Pasha Marlowe: for neurodivergent women

Melanie Branch: especially when it comes to and I hate this word but I don't have a better term for it yet but it's so important when it comes to self

Pasha Marlowe: care yeah yeah well the things that come like we know literally everybody who's listening to this knows what we quote unquote should do for self care what we could do for self care what we should eat what we should do.

And yet we find ourselves like well then why the fuck aren't I doing that right and that's what's really really frustrating and so I find that we often put other people's ideas of what self care looks like onto ourselves as expectations you know society's views or views you see on social media or even your friends like 1 person says you know walking and meditating.

Another person says celery juice another person says you know whatever like yeah you should be you should be intermittent fasting you should be massaging you should be

Melanie Branch: masturbating

Pasha Marlowe: every night like all those things might not work for you and if you're neurodivergent and especially if you have a lot of sensory issues and sensitivities hypo or hypersensitivity your self care of like oh just go for a walk outside is going to be filtered through.

Okay but like I don't have clothes that are comfortable and it's hot outside and the temperature and the sun is bright and I don't want to put on sunscreen because that doesn't feel good and that hurts my eyes and when I go outside I hear the barking of the dogs and then I smell the mold and then and then all of a sudden you know we get ourselves kind of stuck because somebody else said that that's what self care looks like.

Well your self care you know might look like okay lying on a couch with your fuzzy blanket

Melanie Branch: and reading a book and another person's self care might

Pasha Marlowe: be traveling the world it's like it's so nuanced and it drives me a little bananas

Melanie Branch: when when

Pasha Marlowe: there's like a This is what you do you wake up you make your bed.

Melanie Branch: Yeah God! Tell me how many nights have we stayed up late coming up with a perfect routine that was gonna save our life and business the next day and if you're ADHD you do not want to do the same routine

Pasha Marlowe: every day you will get bored and you will burn out so what what I like to do is like okay what at this moment is lighting you up?

Like and whether it's research or puffins or long baths like it doesn't matter like what is lighting you up at this moment delve into that until you don't want to like until that's born and then learn something new and try something new right like my self care used to be yoga and celery juice.

That's not what it looks like now you know things change and we have to adapt and be a little bit more like who like grace giving ourselves grace to be in the flow a little bit more of how our bodies change our energy change our capacity changes so many people are neurodivergent also have chronic illness.

So many who are midlife and neurodivergent are dealing with like the hormonal changes the facts of the medications don't work anymore their energy levels are down the libido is down you know all that our bodies have like morphed into what the hell is that and so we we have to like get creative and be a little bit more like playful and like this is like a a human school we're in and and it's and it's weird.

And you know the curriculum is set up by ourselves but sometimes it's like oh we're going to do that now okay we're taking a whole new course now

Melanie Branch: interesting right okay great I guess we signed up when did it start I remember cause I am a big proponent of going for daily or at least 5 times a week W.

A l k I can't say the word because of my 4 legged animals I'll get too excited

Pasha Marlowe: and it'll just be ridiculous so but they're

Melanie Branch: fix it they're starting to understand what I say when I spell it but when I wanted to do this right and I'm in Northeast Florida it is hot right so from mid June until October you cannot go out in the middle of the day and take a 3 mile WLK.

It's impossible it's unsafe it's you know we were getting text messages on July 4th and July 5th from our city saying hey heat advisory like we can't do this right and I remember when I was thinking about oh you know I would like to go for long walks and whatnot but I was so dysregulated in my nervous system that my first thought was what if I break my ankle and I'm three miles away from my house?

That is not a person that's going to be able to enjoy self care in the form of exercise

Pasha Marlowe: yeah

Melanie Branch: exactly so we got to we really got to get to the root of like how are you how are you feeling right now right let's figure out what the routine is based on your capacity yeah

Pasha Marlowe: and I mean in that situation where you're in Florida and it's hot but you want to move your body or maybe you're moving through trauma and you have a lot of energy pent up and you needed to go somewhere.

Like my thought would go to like okay can I take a cold shower can I dump like ice cubes down my shirt like what you know me meet yourself where you're at but also meet like life where it is the reality of life the heat and humidity where you're at you know and that's absolutely I also

Melanie Branch: have it's funny.

I have cause I am I don't like a routine I know we just said that you know a strict routine is not going to work what I what I like for consistency is my flexible systems that make it so you know if my goal is to take my makeup off at night that's either going to be a makeup wipe on a low energy day or it's going to be an eight step skincare routine on a high energy day either way.

I didn't go to bed with my fucking makeup on right so what I have been doing recently to make sure I can get in my movement for the day is I wake up early which I'm already up between 5 and 6 a m most days anyway

Pasha Marlowe: just because I don't know life of the entrepreneur but

Melanie Branch: I'm also in bed by 8:00 PM most of the time.

So sounds good I wake up early and this is what I did the other day I woke up early I went out I went for like a four five mile WA a LK came back showered and realized I was tired and I laid back down at 9 45 in the morning and slept till noon and then got up and like when my teenagers are getting up I'm getting up going oh hey I've already done half of my day.

I just seated and nap because I can't reverse those roles this these many months or for these many months of the year right so like a noon walk is not possible I think it's great for good and I love

Pasha Marlowe: what you said about you you have to take your makeup off and you could either do a quick wipe or you could do this long process.

I think that's

true

Melanie Branch: for everything especially for people with ADHD you need

Pasha Marlowe: variety and especially if anyone has like PDA in their identity it's like we like choices like we don't want to be told what to do even by ourselves and so it's like we have a menu like a menu not like you're going to do this.

You have a menu you're going to like in the morning I'm going to eat

Melanie Branch: either

Pasha Marlowe: oatmeal or eggs but I'm not going to be like tomorrow morning you'll eat eggs or it's not a good you know all the choices even if it's between two things like I could go for a WALK or I could dance in my living room you know that always options.

Yeah there's always options

Melanie Branch: questions are really helpful as well so in terms of affirmations in terms of self care and any of those things right if I already have an internal dialogue that's popping off and I got to keep my imposter syndrome who I named Piper you know simmer down and quiet and towards the back.

Right I literally and this is what I describe in my energy optimization planner I just am constantly asking myself what's going to make me feel my best right now right so like even on those low energy days I know on the first two days of my period that I will feel so much better if I get up and I make a protein shake first thing in the morning.

Like I just know that there's a few supplements I can take and a 20 milligram Or whatever 20 grams of protein protein shake yeah is it a couple steps that I don't feel like doing you know taking those vitamins out and swallowing them and making the shake yes but is it going to make a world of difference in the way I feel?

Yeah so I'm going to go ahead

Pasha Marlowe: and do it yeah that's a good that's a good question sometimes I'll say like who do I want to be who do I want to be today you know

Melanie Branch: So what is your opinion on being the best version of yourself I am very pro becoming the best version of yourself it's not in terms of being better than anybody else and like having to push yourself to an unnatural limit.

It's really just about like how can I show up for myself today yeah I was worried you were going

Pasha Marlowe: to say like we're to your best potential because I think what happens a lot for neurodivergent people because we have a lot of abilities and a lot of strengths and a lot of parts of like we're genius in so many ways but we tend to try too hard.

And so the only thing I was going to say is if if the best version of my like is the best version of myself that I'm a global professional speaker speaking about neurodiversity affirming practices In society's views yes because that would be the most profitable in my own truth and capacity is that the best version of myself?

No because it doesn't honor my my current capacity and energy and so I think it's just yeah being the best version of ourselves and allowing it to change every day cause sometimes that means like being a zombie on the couch and watching TikTok and taking a long nap say it

Melanie Branch: louder for the people in the back!

I was just talking to one of our students at the Neurospicy Academy about this yesterday she's in Australia I love her to death and she's like you know I really hate it when I Get stuck to the couch and I'm you know scrolling and I'm watching a show and all of a sudden eight hours have passed by and I said Okay well like it's just like it's just it's not productive.

I waste a lot of time I said okay well like what would have not been a waste of time what would what could you have done with that time that wouldn't have been a waste of time she's like well you know I did a puzzle the other day and I said I think a puzzle's a fucking waste of time what at least if I'm on TikTok I have made my algorithm so I'm learning shit and then I'm going to go Google things and I'm going to write things down and I'm going to get inspired to come up with ideas for my own social media but like a puzzle.

Yeah and she was like Oh and I said so you see what it is rest comes in many different forms and if you don't appreciate it while it's happening whether you feel like you're dissociating on the couch for six hours maybe your brain and your body needed that time

Pasha Marlowe: yeah yeah and for one person they're deep rest and deep quiet is the puzzle for another person that is not fun or pleasurable nor restful or healing.

And I and I the only other thing I would kind of like note or challenge in that is if we call it wasting time or killing time that will be our mindset around it like so what if we took the violent terms out of it and the negative terms out of it and we're you know We're spending time we're on our own time we're enjoying time.

We're using whatever like I mean we are

Melanie Branch: wasting time we're killing it we're

Pasha Marlowe: we're you know ruining everything you know sometimes it's how the words we use sometimes matter

Melanie Branch: what you know so I know there's excuse me

Pasha Marlowe: okay that was an energetic movement and I feel better now thank you everybody for listening.

Melanie Branch: You know our inner critic is so harsh and there's a a figure floating around outside that are around that I hear a lot of people refer to on tick tock and it's like an undiagnosed ADHD child here's the word no or like you're wrong or stop that 2 000 times more than a non neurodivergent child.

There's it's some crazy ass number and we've heard it over and over and over again so of course we're going to be rejection sensitive of course we're in it's ingrained in our very being to change who we are yes

Pasha Marlowe: I have a big beef with rejection sensitivity dysphoria definition because it says real or perceived rejection.

It's not perceived it's based on real experiences of being actually rejected yeah you know the the the insidious cycle of the RRSD rejection sensitivity dysphoria is trauma like real actual trauma somebody somebody did reject you somebody did criticize you somebody did say you're not working to your full potential.

Somebody did tell you're lazy or you're worth more whatever and then you people please to try to either fit in or impress or get praise or find

Melanie Branch: love and then you burn out

Pasha Marlowe: because you did too much you work beyond your capacity beyond your skillset and then because you've burnt out let's say in a job or relationship now you have to leave that job or you lose that relationship.

Now there's actual rejection and then the cycle starts all over again trauma people pleasing burnout rejection trauma people pleasing burnout rejection yeah

Melanie Branch: I see it manifest a lot too and my clients you know I work with coaches and practitioners and Healers and and consultants and that sort of service providers really.

And they're so afraid to ask for the sale right or like how many times have you been in a text conversation a DM conversation whatever it is with somebody and back and forth back and forth back and forth and then when you're like okay well like do you want to know what it looks like to do coaching with me?

And then you don't hear from them for a little bit and you're like it's too much I'm an asshole I'm crazy why do I do this and you spiral and then they come back and they say Oh my god I got so busy at work I would love to talk to you about that and then you just had to experience rejection that didn't even fucking exist.

Pasha Marlowe: Yes yeah because sometime or other in your past somebody didn't get back to you you were rejected as a coach at one time or another so we're filtering it through those experiences and we don't we go to the worst case scenario really fast and we spiral out

Melanie Branch: what are you talking about

Pasha Marlowe: really fast.

That's the first place I go yeah and so if somebody makes the comment or doesn't make a comment in the silence like we go Huh wonder why they said that wonder what that means that probably means I'm not good at my job that probably means I shouldn't work at all that probably means I'm worthless.

This probably means nobody's going to love me turns out I'm unlovable it's like and we just didn't hear back from somebody in an hour like yeah that's the best

Melanie Branch: yeah my mom used to say especially when I was little apparently I had I had speech impediments and stuff that I had to work really hard and in school to get over and whatnot.

But I I used to I guess be a little kid and walk around and go you should probably think about else mom is like instead of saying something else so my mom used to always say to me if I was brooding or ruminating on something she'd go Mel why don't you go think about else E L T S E and I was like I will go think about else

Pasha Marlowe: you are.

So right and

Melanie Branch: then I would go do something physical or something like that right or my mom used to always say to me maybe you'll feel better after a shower right because she knew one of the first things she told my husband when we when she met him I was 19 years old when I met my husband and he was 27 and I brought him down to Naples because I went down there.

I lived in Tampa when I met him and then my mom lived in Naples so it's like a two hour drive and I went to go visit my mom almost every weekend right so I brought him down there one of the first things she told this man she goes you know you don't really tell Mel what to do and I I saw this whole thing go down and I looked at him and he goes oh yeah I know that

this is it I already knew it but this is it right so then when you reflect back on your life through the now lens of undiagnosed neurodivergence let's talk about the grief that

Pasha Marlowe: comes with that yeah a lot of grief a lot of anger a lot of like oh my goodness would my life have been so much easier why didn't people know?

Were people not watching me or caring for me

Melanie Branch: enough teachers parents

Pasha Marlowe: Would I not have been so hard on myself would I have accepted myself what would I what could I have done and what would I have been had I had you know love myself more and accepted myself more you know but I feel so stuck now.

Yeah all the

Melanie Branch: levels and it's like too you think about there are things that I do now that are glaringly ADHD or glaringly autistic that I've done my whole life and I'm 37 years old and you're just like it was right there how did we not see this what are we talking about here right but that grief is so true with any part of growing and evolving as a human on this planet.

Right and it's 1 of the reasons why a lot of people choose not to grow

Pasha Marlowe: yeah cause when you grow when you start moving through your trauma when you start to realize your neurodivergence you literally become more traumatized and more neurodivergent like all of a sudden like now that I know I'm autistic I'm stimming more.

Now that I know I'm ADHD I'm forgetting things more like what the heck

Melanie Branch: is that why am I moving through my trauma and feeling more traumatized well everything's coming up to the

Pasha Marlowe: surface all the awareness we've been masking and masking and pushing it down and hiding it and suppressing it to just fit in or surprise survive and now it's all coming out.

So there's going to be a period of time in the healing it's sometimes called a healing crisis where you feel like you're like worse before you get better or you feel like things are like completely chaotic before you start to settle into your new mind and body and abilities but there's like that's frankly where it's a great time to hire a coach or you know or.

Neurodivergent friendly

Melanie Branch: therapist because that's a that's a

Pasha Marlowe: journey is a journey to self awareness and rediscovery of who the heck you are and finding your truth is a beautiful thing but it's also really painful because you're peeling back all those layers of grief and shame from

Melanie Branch: probably decades.

And you know we have my business partner Christina hi Christina she's part of the editing team hi anyways she and I talk about the trauma drive right and how when it's the tiger chasing you that is the external force motivating you to show up right and then the tiger goes away and we have to become internally and intrinsically motivated to achieve the things that we want to do.

But then there's this disconnect this friction that happens because when you're driven by trauma you can do a lot when you're driven internally you can't do as much like I used to I tell people all the time I used to wake up at 6 am to get my kids to school go to the gym for an hour and a half come home do my schoolwork cause I was getting my business degree.

Go to work at a restaurant from 5 p m to 10 p m go out for drinks with the girls after that wash rinse repeat do it again right every night was meatless monday is at my fucking house come on kids I'll cook I'll do this la la la and now I can't even go to Walmart and Target in the same day nope it's exactly right because you're

Pasha Marlowe: like Oh that was hard.

I was running on fumes I was running after the tiger I was coming from that trauma place or that anxiety place and I don't need to do that anymore nor can I nor should I and and it's all of a sudden like it's just coming into our it coming into our truth and so much of the shame that I hear from midlife late diagnosed or late discovered self diagnosed neurodivergent people is just like I used to be so fill in the blank productive successful energized and now.

I can't even go to the grocery store or anything else like more than one thing a day and it and it's like our it's an honoring of our it's an honoring of ourselves and and you know kind of back a little bit into the parts work but like being like loving the part of ourselves back then that just worked on hyper speed and really loving on the part of ourselves now that is like needing a rest.

And needing to slow down and going on like Melanie time now going on like Pasha time now not not not the world time or social time or clock time like

Melanie Branch: Melanie time you know and if time is all just a matter of perception right and we can prove this right so like every vacation you ever went on that you had a great fucking time that was over in a in a blink.

In the blink of an eye a three day vacation is over and now all it is is a memory right as opposed to trying to get your ass to the DMV that's gonna be days weeks long years right but it's actually It's you know it's a short period of time but because we are not enjoying ourselves we're stressed out we're in pre meltdown mode and you know pre overload and that sort of stuff it's not enjoyable.

But when you are having a good time that shit's just gone like that right so if we understand that time is all about perception slowing down is where your power

Pasha Marlowe: is absolutely you can you can slow time down you can make it go faster and you could slow it down you could disconnect and disassociate and numb out and you can make it you can make the day pass.

Or you can or you can sit with it and it might be uncomfortable at times but you can sit with it and slow it down you can be like all right you know and by the way with ADHD the more time you have the less you get done there's that whole Parkinson's law so like if you tell yourself I'm going to go to the grocery store between now and 7 PM you will take the entire day to go to the grocery store and probably we'll do it close to 7 PM but if you say I'm going to go to the grocery store before noon you'll do it before noon.

So sometimes it's nice to give yourself a little bit of structure because structure equals freedom a little bit of discipline or routine however you want to call it so that you so that you don't feel like you have looked back and I won't say wasted but like Like it's like a a void like Yeah what just happened today?

I wasn't even present I wasn't even here yeah I was just like saving my spoons or saving my energy to go grocery shopping and in doing that like I don't even know where I was yeah yeah yeah the

Melanie Branch: PDA are in me always says like when I'm making plans there's a method to the madness right so for example my system for grocery shopping I have a almost 15-year-old son.

I have a 13-year-old son I have a husband and I have two male dogs okay that is the home that I live in everybody is always eating or asking about food okay so my method to the madness is for he for getting to the actual grocery store because I can't order my groceries they never get me the right things I don't want to pay all those extra fees I don't want to have to answer all these text messages when they can't find the things I've ordered pepperoni before like the stick of pepperoni and the guy brought me a frozen pepperoni pizza.

So all right so I'm not going to sacrifice my mindset my mental wellbeing for to have somebody I'm just going to go so it's sunglasses it's headphones it's knowing my route getting my stuff is it a big day is it a small day that sort of thing and I will only go to the grocery store when everybody's home because then when I come home I'm not unloading anything I am now I am maxed out.

So I get in the driveway I honk the horn everybody comes out they get everything out of the car and then the men have to put everything away and this is also so that they know what the fuck I got yeah yeah right so systems and strategies like that are what get you in the way of the right routine right?

So when you wake up in the morning you go okay so I know I need to go to the grocery store I know I have a call at 11 with Pasha I know I have a call tonight with my client at 7 based on the temperature that is outside when somebody is going to be home to help me with all this stuff I have to go grocery shopping at this time.

And then my brain and body are able to be like that makes total sense we're behind you we're going to support this we're going to do it

Pasha Marlowe: yeah that's that's beautiful yeah I love that idea and I really love that you delegated or had a conversation I assume with the family about you know,

conversation you know argument whatever it looked like but this is the way it's going to be you know in a lot of partnerships it's like okay there's silos or like there's like okay you're always going to do the yard stuff and I'm always going to figure out like the kids camp you're always going to do dishes and I'll always clean up.

You're always going to do the laundry dirty and I'll do the folding whatever and then if and if there's times where you feel like why am I doing all the things and you're not doing any of the things then come back to the table and like renegotiate and maybe try like swapping or maybe try like something that you haven't done before or change the pattern or do something that's different because one person's gonna become just so overwhelmed and bored and present.

Resentful resentful yeah and exhausted and so yeah you don't have to do things the same way all the time you know you certainly don't have to do things the way your parents or your friends or social media tells you ever

Melanie Branch: yeah hold on I have a kid Gabby will you make sure five can get in please?

Go out back make sure he's in anyways they'll cut that out or maybe they won't who knows so when it comes to Working with you Where can people find you what is your favorite social media platform for them to get in contact with you or follow you and you know what can they expect when they work

Pasha Marlowe: with you?

Yeah well all the cool neuropeep neuroqueer people live on tik tok as I'm finding TikTok is where I originate my content and then I kind of repurpose it from there so TikTok I'm at NeuroQueerCoach you can also find me on Instagram at NeuroQueerCoach and I have other platforms but that those are the places I spend most of my time.

My the working with me looks like individual or couple's work which is over zoom or in person if you live in Maine and it's it's a lot about what are the patterns that are happening now what's a constant pattern that keeps repeating repeating repeating no matter what details or context you put in it.

Let's look at the form of your patterns the form of your arguments and how can we interrupt them and change them and it looks like that with individual and couples work and then in group coaching I call it neuro community and it's meeting once a week for a group coaching and once a week for coworking.

And every week we talk about a different theme related to being neurodivergent yeah yeah so those are the ways that most people work with me that sounds so fun oh and my

Melanie Branch: website

Pasha Marlowe: my website has everything pasha marlow.com I know so this is so A DHD and like oh yeah I have a podcast neuro Caring Neuro Caring podcast.

And oh yeah I have an online course same bed different brains and oh yeah

Melanie Branch: different brains hold on I got to write that down yeah

Pasha Marlowe: it's an online course probably most useful for ADHD ADHD autistic or couples moving through trauma very very queer or straight friendly and and then I wrote a book called My Next Husband Will Be a Lesbian talking about queerness and just the reclamation in midlife that happens when we start to reclaim our desires.

I don't know I've probably done other stuff too but yeah my next husband will be a lesbian I

Melanie Branch: tell you I say that quite frequently I say no but I do quite frequently say you know if and when my husband kicks the bucket I am not really looking for a partnership ever again I think I'm just looking for somebody who I can pay to cater to what it is that I want.

I'm a Taurus sun and I'm a Taurus rising I know exactly what it is that I want how to get there what I need from you for it and I don't need anything else really so like instead of you know embarking on another like partnership

Pasha Marlowe: partnership Yeah I just don't know if I'm ever gonna do it again.

Yeah yeah fair that's that's how how you want it You know and they'll be people to accommodate that as long as you're up front there's consent I'm all for

Melanie Branch: it I am a master manifester I can make absolutely anything happen I had a realization the other day while I was on one of my WALK's That I am exactly where I am right now because of the size of my previous

Pasha Marlowe: dreams Hmm.

Nice so

Melanie Branch: instead of being in a multi million dollar home I am in my I'm in a dream home right because we're in a hundred year old beautiful historic neighborhood historic home that sort of stuff but I could have been bigger if I had let myself dream bigger

Pasha Marlowe: so I I'm not worried about anything ever holding

Melanie Branch: me back.

I'm going to get absolutely everything I ever want in this life and it'll happen very easily

Pasha Marlowe: absolutely you you are a manifester it's true we all have that ability to do that and honoring what it is is that big successful beautiful life could look very small and simple and quiet for some people.

Yeah absolutely absolutely yay! I'm so

Melanie Branch: glad I got to be on the show tell me tell the for the neurodivergent gender non conforming queer wonderful amazing people listening that are entrepreneurs running their own business trying to navigate this life and make it as fantastic as possible what parting words do you want to leave them with?

Thank you so much.

Pasha Marlowe: Take a piece of paper out and draw a picture of yourself with your non dominant hand and then look at that picture of that sweet flawed imperfect being and talk to that person instead of the person that you are used to talking to in the mirror and see what transpires aww

Melanie Branch: I feel like I could be really a lot easier

Pasha Marlowe: on that person.

Yeah that's a sweet little nugget there who deserves

Melanie Branch: a lot of kindness sweet little nugget yes! so much for that! Alright everybody I love you all equally and for different reasons do your research and take care of yourself and we'll talk again really soon okay bye!