Julie Legg speaks with Sara Thompson, PhD, a theatre professional and public speaking coach, about her journey with a late ADHD diagnosis and how it reshapes her understanding of lifelong challenges.
Together, they explore the impact ADHD and academia, the authenticity and confidence in public speaking, the influence of societal norms on ADHD traits, and the empowering role of creativity in navigating executive function struggles. Sara shares her insights on embracing individuality and turning vulnerabilities into strengths, offering inspiration and practical tools for thriving with ADHD.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
- Impact of Late Diagnosis: A late ADHD diagnosis provides relief and clarity, allowing individuals to reframe lifelong struggles with greater self-compassion. Sara reflects on symptoms she now recognizes as ADHD, such as difficulties with unstructured tasks and feelings of self-doubt in academia.
- Struggles with Traditional Education: Sara finds that the lack of structured deadlines in graduate school exacerbates her ADHD symptoms, fueling guilt and a sense of inadequacy.
- Public Speaking Coaching: Drawing on her theatre and performance background, Sara helps clients develop confidence and authenticity in their public speaking. She emphasizes embracing individuality over conforming to rigid expectations, encouraging clients to lean into their strengths and communicate with genuine passion. Sara uses techniques like voice modulation, body language, and breathing exercises to help speakers stay grounded and connect with their audience.
- Executive Function Challenges: Sara experiences overwhelm and paralysis when initiating tasks, a common struggle for individuals with ADHD. These challenges are often worsened by societal norms and rigid work structures.
- Community and Connection: Recognizing ADHD traits in others fosters self-compassion and a sense of belonging for Sara, reducing the isolation that often accompanies an undiagnosed condition.
LINKS
- Julie is the author of THE MISSING PIECE: A Woman’s Guide to Understanding, Diagnosing and Living with ADHD (Harper Collins, 2024)
- Sara Thompson – The Presentation Coach website
- Sara Thompson LinkedIn
- Sara Thompson – That Presentation Coach Facebook
- Sara Thompson – That Presentation Coach Instagram
TRANSCRIPT
JULIE: I’m Julie Legg, author of The Missing Piece and diagnosed with ADHD at 52. Welcome to ADHDifference. In this episode I chat with Dr Sara Thompson. She has a PhD in theater and performance studies; she’s heavily involved in the theater and is a public speaking coach. We talk about the power of performance, authenticity, confidence, and dealing with the highs and lows of a late ADHD diagnosis. Thank you so much for sharing your time with me today, Sara.
SARA: Absolutely. I’m excited to talk to you.
JULIE: It’s brilliant, it’s brilliant. We’ll go straight into things! Look being diagnosed as an adult can bring a mix of clarity and reflection. What were the key elements that lead you to seek a diagnosis and can you share your ADHD journey?
SARA: Yeah, it’s been you know like as it was happening, I was like “Oh my gosh, this is completely bananas,” but then it seems like lots of women my age have experienced very similar things. So I think all through, again now like in hindsight you look back and you’re like “Well, yeah. Like how did nobody notice this?” But the thing that really kind of put everything into stark relief for me was when Covid happened. Previously I had been working for a non-profit in a co-working space and when Covid started we all went to working from home. And I felt just completely paralyzed by overwhelm, feeling just a complete inability to get started on anything, absolutely an inability to finish anything. The slightest bit of kind of executive function that I was required, that was required of me, was just causing me to shut down to the point that I was like okay something something’s up here and I don’t know what it is but like I’ve got to fix it. I’ve got to try something. One of the reasons that I think so many people are getting diagnosed at this point is because now we have social media and like people are sharing experiences, and that’s exactly what I experienced. Somebody posted a meme to Instagram or something and I was like “Oh well that sounds exactly like me.” And so then I went down the rabbit hole and found out more and dove into specifically what the sort of key signs and symptoms are in women. Because that was my initial thing was like of course I’m not ADHD. I, you know, I can sit still and I don’t blurt out things at inappropriate moments. Again now in retrospect I’m like “Oh sometimes I do though!” So yeah like it just was a real, a really illuminating, a huge relief like you’ve said. Because suddenly it felt like things that I had been feeling for my entire adult life, so ever since kind of graduate school, I had really … because I was a fantastic student, did great things in high school, undergrad, like knocked it out of the park. And then I went to grad school and I was given far fewer concrete deadlines. I went to school in the UK. I went to the University of Birmingham and you know, there the instructional methodology particularly for graduate students is very much ‘go do some research and come back with a thing’ you know. And it was, that was the working that caused a lot of difficulty for me because again, as I’m sure you know and your listeners know, a large project is a lot more daunting than a tiny project, or like a small little thing, or like “Oh this homework is due tomorrow,” okay yeah sure I can do that. So from there I somehow managed to get through a master’s degree and kind of hung out, and had a blast, and enjoyed life in the UK for a while, and then started a PhD program. And once again these same issues were coming up of just having a lot of difficulty getting started on things, a lot of trouble finishing things, feeling like just crazy feelings of guilt and shame, and I am a garbage person who doesn’t you know … why did anybody accept me into this graduate program? Like what am I doing here? During that time I was diagnosed as clinically depressed because I went and said basically that exact same sentence to a therapist who was like “Hmm, okay. So this isn’t okay,” and then you know again it just in retrospect it all made sense of you know I really struggled writing my dissertation, my doctoral thesis, depending on where you are and what you call it. And now when I look back on it, again with a little bit of time, a little bit of grace, and like self-forgiveness, I do think “How did I do that? How did I get that done without knowing (a) what was going on with my brain or (b) having any sort of coping mechanisms in place. Like just flying by the seat of my pants, full of anxiety depression and ADHD.
JULIE: It is really remarkable and you know, your story is reflected in so many other women too. You don’t know what you don’t know. To still go through and achieve. And I think that’s the confusing thing, for so many women especially, that they’ve managed somehow to get through. And so in the eyes of their family or their co-workers or friends is “Well, you’re successful. You know, you’ve achieved a PhD Sara, you know. You’re overthinking things. Just relax and you know…” Oh gosh! But to be able to find a reason. There are lots of … there are lots of me duplicated all over the world. Yeah. You’ve achieved so much. You should be very proud of yourself … but learning about your ADHD, did that shape the way that you could look back retrospectively undiagnosed?
SARA: I think I am. I think it’s a constant struggle right because I think anybody who’s a high achieving person, anybody who is smart and driven is always going to be hard on themselves. [Yes.] I look back and I feel two things. One is gosh I can’t believe I did what I did you know while dealing with ADHD and not knowing, and then the other part of me which I know is also very common with ADHD folks is disappointment in myself, like that I haven’t achieved more. And like if I had known earlier, what could I be now? I struggle with that a lot and that particularly once I started taking some medication for ADHD earlier this year. I’d never taken anything before and I distinctly remember the first time I took it and I was working on something and had, as usual, my 43 tabs open in my web browser, and I was like oh I need the information on this tab. And I went and got it and for a second I saw the tab beside it and I was like “Ooh, Herman Melville!” or whatever. It was you know, like something completely random and unrelated, and my brain was able to go “Oh Sara, that’s not what we’re working on now. Let’s go back to this thing.” And like the moment of just realization that like the rest of the world does that just naturally and has always kind of done it, was a huge moment. And again, I think it is, I know that it’s not rare to like come up against those two things of like relief that I’m not the only one and there was a reason for this, but also kind of frustration, disappointment, sadness, grief, that I didn’t know sooner. I have a fantastic therapist who’s been you know incredibly helpful kind of working through this stuff and so anybody who isn’t working with a therapist and is dealing with those feelings I would highly recommend that. But yeah it’s complicated you know.
JULIE: It is, yeah yeah yeah. Yes, and that cycle of relief and grief and anger and validation, in no particular order, it’s very similar to a grieving process that one would experience with a loss. It you know, a loss of a loved one. It’s a loss of one’s own understanding. [I’ve never thought about it that way, from that perspective. Yeah.] And I’d love to know more about your PhD. So it’s in theater and performance studies.
SARA: Theater and performance studies, yes.
JULIE: I love it because creativity is such a wonderful, wonderful thing for ADHDers. And the fact that from an earlier start in life you went in that direction. I’d love to know all about it. What lead you to do a PhD and what was this thesis about? I’d love to hear.
SARA: Yeah, so I again I was a theater kid from early on, classic ADHD kid thing to be. And I so I did my Masters is in English Literature and it was, I was a Shakespearean so the University of Birmingham has a school called the Shakespeare Institute which is in Stratford-upon-Avon, so that’s where I was. And I had sort of when I went to college, I wanted to be an actor and sort of very quickly realized that that was … that’s a hard job being an actor and being kind of constantly judged on what you look like and all of these things that you don’t have a whole lot of control over. And I had been taking Shakespeare for classes for fun and my professor, when I was kind of re-evaluating, sort of said “Well why don’t you get a Master’s in Shakespeare?” And I was like well that’s a great idea. That sounds super fun. And kind of throughout that Master’s process it just became more and more clear that if I wanted to do anything with that I would need a PhD. And at the time of starting the PhD I wanted to be a university lecturer, professor. That’s what I wanted to do. So in theater and performance studies you sort of … you study like the idea of the performances, right. So you’re thinking sort of critical theory, looking at the history of something. So I originally started and my focus was on the history of Shakespeare and performance, and I wanted to look at early modern performance spaces, and specifically reconstructions of Shakespeare’s Globe. That’s what I started out looking at. Well then that changed into doing a biography of a particular actor. And then that changed! So again, classic. To where I … so what I ended up doing because I was like, I am not having fun. There, like this stuff is not lighting me up. I’m like dreading having to work on it so something’s wrong. And spoke to the woman who ended up being my dissertation adviser in the end, Professor Esther Kim Lee, and she basically was like yeah pick something that’s fun. And I had been sort of interested in subcultures and also Shakespeare in performance, and so I sort of developed this idea of like well what if we looked at kind of non-traditional Shakespeare performances by by small theater companies and how those theater companies could then market to what I called the ‘post-modern hipster’, who doesn’t super exist now because as happens with subcultures they get absorbed into the mainstream culture which is exactly what’s happened with hipsters. But at the time sort of young, adult, up to 40ish-45ish, who were interested in the Arts, literature, wanting to sort of be seen as creative, artistic, intellectual, and then also there’s obviously some fashion components as well to that movement. So yeah so I looked at the post-modern hipster and how theater companies, Shakespeare theater companies, could market to them. [Are you still involved in theater yourself now?] I am. So I work for a theater company here in Raleigh North Carolina. It’s called The Justice Theater Project and I do, I help them with community engagement events. So their mission is doing social justice related theater, so theater that is speaking specifically to the moment that we’re in, and is sort of making people think about social justice issues, whatever those issues may be. And so my role, I do … I plan like the pre-show discussions, and the talk-backs, and things like that. So I’ll organize those and then moderate them for the audience. So when I worked in theater, or when I do work in theater, I do it as it’s a role called a drama turg, T U R G, which is a very specific niche kind of PhD and theater kind of a job to do. because essentially, you’re the audience’s eye. And so you may be involved early on with the rehearsal process, sitting around with the cast and particularly like a Shakespeare play, they would bring in somebody like me to help the cast with understanding the text and you know making things read to an audience member and stuff like that. And then you go away and you come back once they’re like running the show, and you’re watching it thinking okay what is an audience member gonna have any idea what’s happening? That joke that you guys think is so funny doesn’t make sense to anybody who wasn’t in the rehearsal room when you came up with it, and so that kind of stuff. And then once the play opens, a drama turg is responsible for kind of the audience learning portion of things. So you might do a lobby display about the time period that the play was written, or that the director has decided to set the performance, but you also would organize pre-show and post-show discussions that help illuminate certain aspects of the performance that people are about to see. So it’s very nerdy and I love it and again it’s kind, it’s kind of a constantly changing subject matter. I get to learn about lots of different things. I think that’s part of what is so exciting about theater in general is that it’s always changing and different.
JULIE: Perfect for an ADHD brain just to be, you know, new material, new projects to get yourself … yeah you know.
SARA: And yeah different stuff to have to like, when I’m interviewing an expert in something like then I get to do some deep diving into that their expertise so that I can ask intelligent questions and sort of guide that discussion.
JULIE: Talking of which, asking questions, you’ve helped so many people find their voices through public speaking. So tell me about your That Presentation Coach side of things? Yeah tell me about what services you offer and how people benefit from some public speaking coaching?
SARA: Sure, thank you for asking because I, because this is if you thought I was getting nerdy about drama turg to you, just you wait. I started again while I was doing the PhD, my assistant-ship was teaching various classes. And the Theater Department needed someone to teach the oral communication course for just general education requirements for the University, and I was like oh yeah I can do that, you know. I can teach kids how to put together other slides and make eye contact with an audience. And I very quickly realized like yes there’s some basic stuff that people need to know about presenting but that’s the easy part, and that so much more of it is about confidence in yourself and being willing to authentically share yourself with your audience and that really became a passion of mine. And I started to, from the first day that a student would walk into my classroom, to the end of the term, was like a vast difference in abilities to express themselves and that just really, that was it for me. I knew that that was something that I was passionate about and it also again made a lot of my past make sense as far as how I got to where I was, and why I had done things that I had done, and all that kind of stuff. I felt like … I feel like the public speaking coaching and consulting really puts the puzzle pieces together. Because the other part of it is that all my clients are completely different and I’m working with them on completely different kinds of speeches and topics and stuff that they’re prepping for and so it’s always changing. I’m always learning new things that I would never otherwise know about. [Wow.] I have a client right now who’s like a neuroscientist doing Parkinson’s research and you know, somebody else who’s an attorney. So I’m like, it’s just cool and exciting and fun. And the big thing, I finished the PhD and then I was working for a non-profit for many years but I was coaching on the side, just as like a side hustle, make some extra money kind of a thing, and I always knew that I wanted it to be my full-time job whenever I could make that happen. The organization I was working for did some restructuring, laid off the full-time employees, and so that was when, that was almost exactly a year ago, and that was when I was like okay well this is it. This is the full-time thing. When I’m working with clients a lot of times they come in thinking what we’re going to work on is how do I put together slides and how you know, how do I stand up straight and that sort of thing. And we do work on that of course, but the biggest most kind of foundationally changing parts that we work on are the confidence, are the things like giving yourself grace, not getting hung up on tiny mistakes that nobody but you is going to notice or think about. And the changes that I see in clients are really just so gratifying. And I love hearing back from somebody that because I say my goal is for you not to need me. A good public speaking coach, you shouldn’t need me after a while. I’m always here if you’ve got something specific that you’re working on but the goal is that we have some sessions together and then you can go off and apply the things that you’ve learned. And that these things build up over time and so when I do hear from a client who, you know, somebody who was afraid to speak in a meeting who comes back to me because they’ve been invited to be on a podcast and they’re gonna do it, kind of thing, that’s just so so exciting. I love helping people share their vision, their voice, their perspective. And I think it’s super important to seeing the changes that I want to see in the world, which you know involve things like more women, ERS, and more people of colour in positions of leadership. So doing this work with those sorts of populations who have sort of historically been marginalized or told that leaders look and sound like one thing, which is not what they look and sound like. And so getting to kind of figure out okay well, but how do we … how do we do leadership like you, is just gratifying, fun, exciting work for me.
JULIE: Absolutely it would be, definitely. It’s interesting because with a neurotypical, or with ADHD, I think when it comes to public speaking, and I’ve done a few author talks and I I get through them, but there’s always nerves. And I think with ADHD particularly, this is perfectionism and fear of judgement, or our you know, the criticism and rejection and … How do you go about dealing with that or is that all wrapped up in your coaching? And the confidence, is that all …
SARA: So it’s partly wrapped up in all of that. I do regularly say to my clients I am not a therapist. I recommend therapy to everybody. Just because there are certain things that I can’t, I’m not qualified or trained to touch and work with, but we do get into … okay well, what are your fears? Like, what is scary about having to get up in front of people and speak? And a lot of times just having an outside voice, like an outside human being look at you and say “Okay, that thing that you’re really stressed about, I didn’t even notice. Other people aren’t going to notice it.” And so a lot of times I feel like what has happened is that people have internalised these things. They’ve decided that everybody thinks they’re a bad speaker and then when I ask questions like “Okay well what feedback have you gotten from people that tells you that?” And then they haven’t gotten any, or contradictory, the feedback that they’ve gotten has been really positive but they just don’t want to believe it. So one of the big things that I do with folks is working on challenging those limiting beliefs, challenging those things that come up for them, because I experience it too. Like, I get nervous. I have rejection sensitivity to things. Like, I do presentations all the time and I am always a little bit nervous when I start and beat myself up afterwards about the little things that went wrong. But I also have tools in my toolbox to remind myself to focus on the good things, the things that went well. The stuff like, what is the real evidence that I have for how I’m feeling about this presentation that I just did? And so reminding clients of that is really really key. Again neurotypical or neurodiverse, those are things that they feel but again I do think that neurotypical folks are … sorry, neurodiverse folks are more likely to feel those things a little more intensely. But again, like we spoke earlier, talking about like sort of the symptoms and signs of the ADHD, I think once somebody can validate that for you and say yeah that thing that you’re feeling, that’s real and that’s hard. And that you know, so how can we work with it and figuring out techniques for working with it. And then the other thing that I do want to touch on is that nerves are okay. It’s okay to be nervous. Part of where we get in trouble is when we feel nervous and then we’re going “No no no I can’t be nervous. It’s terrible that I’m nervous. Being nervous is a sign of weakness or it means I’m not good at this.” No, it means you’re a person and you’re about to like stand up in front of people and expose yourself to potential judgment. It’s completely normal. And so finding ways to (a) accept that … could you, I mean just imagine Julie, the difference between you’re going up to give an author talk and you’re feeling nervous and there’s one Julie, like the little devil on Julie’s shoulder is going “Oh my gosh, you’re so nervous. How are you nervous Julie? You’ve done this so many times! You know what you’re doing. Julie everybody’s going to know!” Okay, so that’s the one person, but then the person, like the little angel Julie is going “I’s completely normal Julie. You just … you’re a little bit excited. That’s a good thing. You can use that energy to your advantage. It just means you care.” So if you’ve got the two Julies, one is going to result in a more positive experience for you, and the other one is not.
JULIE: You work with clients online as well as in person, and for a particular project? So people can come to you saying “Hey I’m going to give this one presentation, can you help me out?” Are you … you’re able to do that worldwide?
SARA: I am able to do that worldwide and have done it worldwide. So again, since Covid that has really opened up all kinds of possibilities and clients for me and I love it. So a lot of times I work with folks who have a specific presentation coming up. So maybe they’ve got a conference presentation, or I’ve had attorneys prepping for a big case. I’ve had folks who are doing job interview prep and things like that, that I’ve worked with them on. But then I’ve had random clients who come to me and they say “I am so afraid to speak in a staff meeting. Can you help me?” and I think a lot of public speaking folks don’t necessarily do that kind of work with people. It’s because it’s easier to have like a concrete “Oh you’re working on this speech, great. Let’s work on this speech.” Like that is an easier process than a more sort of amorphus, I’m just afraid to speak in meetings kind of a thing. And so we do that kind of work too. It’s all based in the same sort of ideas of confidence, authenticity, and preparing as much as you can.
JULIE: I love that too, that it isn’t necessarily this huge speech, Ted Talk necessarily, that just everyday life you know, with a helping hand. Back to you as a creative, how do you stay on track with your creativity with your ADHD? Have you got … what personal strategies do you use so your ADHD challenges don’t conflict with the successes that you can have as a creative?
SARA: Yeah yeah and I, you know, I have a long list of things that like hobbies that I got really into and did for a month, and then there’s one year I made a bunch of Christmas wreaths. Spent a lot of money, made a bunch of wreaths, and then put them away and never, I’ve never made a wreath since. So it’s you know, that sort of thing where like I’ll find something and I’ll get really into it. Strategies that I find incredibly helpful are things like body doubling, making a plan or an appointment with a friend, or use you know, there are all kinds of like online co-working spaces now that it helps motivate me (a) to get started and (b) to continue working for like an hour or whatever, if I know that there are other people doing the same thing. So that’s originally when I started doing an in-person co-working space, that was why I did it, was so that I would go to a space where other people were working and it would make me theoretically, hopefully, not always but lots of times, it would make me sit down and actually accomplish something. And that I started doing while I was doing the PhD, there was a Graduate Studies School, the School of Graduate Studies would set up these sort of co-working retreats. Like so you would just go and everybody there would be working on their dissertation, or an essay, or whatever, and I found that incredibly helpful and that’s something that I have continued to implement in my life going forward. Having outside accountability is really key for me. So telling someone like “Oh I’m going to do this thing,” is … makes me much more likely to actually do the thing. Because … and saying to a friend or somebody like that, “I’m going to do this thing. I want you to ask me about it because if you ask me about it, I know I’m going to do it.” Those are just real strategies that work for my brain and get me to actually do things that I want to do. But also intentionally putting myself out there to try new things and to not let myself get stuck in the ruts that a lot of times I get stuck in, of like “Oh this is my hyperfocus. I’m just gonna focus on this,” and like specifically carving out time for that is the key. And then other time that I can spend doing other things and being productive in other ways.
JULIE: Wow. And what would your advice be to those also going through that late diagnosis journey in the creative field? Because there’s a lot. There’s a lot of creative ADHDers out there, undiagnosed. Are there any words of inspiration or advice that you could give them after going through that process yourself and still being an inspired creative?
SARA: Yeah I think again … it makes complete sense that you feel that feeling of grief that we already talked about, and the ‘what might have been?’ and ‘what if I had known this sooner.,’ I think is all completely normal and to be expected. And so like leaning into that, allowing yourself to feel those things and process those things is incredibly important. But the other thing and it’s almost a cliche that like ‘ADHD is my superpower’ but for a creative? Like, I know, I know that I have done some of the things that I’ve done, and that I have the unique perspective that I have because of the way my brain works. And having conversations with neurotypical friends, literally just this weekend I was hanging with friends and I said something and a friend of mine looked at me and she goes “The things that you say! I would just never have thought of that but I’m glad that you thought of it and said it because it makes me think about something in a completely different way.” So the other thing is surrounding yourself with people who will listen and not judge, you know, who are accepting of you and who you are, and the way your brain works. And not just like folks who put up with you but who enjoy that about you. You know, now I look at my friends group, again a realization looking back and I’m like “That’s why I’ve always loved the weirdos. Like, that’s why … like give me those folks to hang out with all day long! I would much rather hang out with them than anybody else.”
JULIE: Absolutely, Sara, we will for the listeners, we will have your contact details in the copy of this podcast. So anyone needing assistance with presentations, and public speaking, and general confidence with their voice, definitely will send them your way. [Appreciate that.] Yeah that’s brilliant, that’s brilliant. I’m sure there’ll be lots of people that can benefit big time from that.
SARA: Yeah and I’m also happy to just talk to, you know, if somebody is vaguely interested or just wants to hear more like absolutely reach out. I’m happy to talk to you about it. I talk to organizations so not just individuals, but I also do trainings for groups. If you’ve got a sales team that needs to work on their pitch or whatever, I do that stuff too.
JULIE: Wonderful. Sara, thank you so much for your time today. It’s been lovely chatting to you and no doubt we will chat again soon. [I appreciate it, thank you.]