Key Takeaways: ParentMap ADHD is Awesome Talk

In partnership with ParentMap, St John Catholic School hosted a Talk with Kim and Penn Holderness on Sept. 24, 2026 

If you missed the live event, you can still watch the recording HERE

 

Resources 

From Kim and Penn Holderness 

• “ADHD Is Awesome: A Guide to (Mostly) Thriving With ADHD” — a resource to help you   understand your own brain or that of someone you love 

• “All You Can Be With ADHD” — a picture book for young readers 

• “Get It Done and Have Fun: ADHD Hacks for Awesome Kids” — practical strategies written for kids • Follow the family on Instagram 

Books and People Mentioned During the Event 

• “Too Sensitive: Rejection, Resilience, and the Science of Feeling Deeply,” by Sasha Hamdani, M.D.   — an accessible explanation of emotional sensitivity, with practical guidance for managing it. For  many people with ADHD and other forms of neurodivergence, this sensitivity may be recognized   as rejection sensitive dysphoria (RSD). 

• “Getting to Calm: Cool-Headed Strategies for Parenting Tweens + Teens,” by Laura Kastner,   Ph.D., and Jennifer Wyatt, Ph.D. — practical approaches to staying steady through the tween and  teen years 

• “The Calamity Club,” by Kathryn Stockett — the novel behind Penn’s failing-loud story (no time  travel, but a great book) 

More From ParentMap 

• Related articles: 

 • The Holderness Family Is Changing the Way We Think About ADHD  

 • Kids Are Turning to Social Media for Answers on ADHD. Should They?  

 • Inside the ADHD Brain: Why Trying Harder Isn’t the Right Answer  

• Coming up in October, our next ParentMap Talk, featuring Dr. Dana Suskind: Human Raised:   Helping Kids Flourish in the Age of AI 

• Register for the full ParentMap Talks season  

 

What does it actually look like to work with an ADHD brain instead of constantly fighting against it? In our conversation with Kim and Penn Holderness, moderated by Dr. Laura Kastner, the bestselling  authors and creators shared what they’ve learned from living with ADHD themselves, parenting kids  with ADHD and figuring out what helps in everyday life. 

Here are some of the ideas, strategies and resources worth coming back to. Thank you to Seattle  Children’s for making this conversation possible. 

5 Ideas We’re Still Thinking About 

1. It’s not a deficit of attention. It’s an abundance of it. 

The takeaway: Penn was blunt about it: “The name sucks.” ADHD brains take in more stimulus, not less,  and the challenge is directing all that attention. The same wiring that makes a kid drift off in class is  often where creativity, spontaneity and hyperfocus come from. 

What this might look like in real life: A child who can’t get through a 10-minute math worksheet may  spend three hours absorbed in building something. That’s not a willpower problem. It’s how interest driven attention works, and it helps to stop reading the inconsistency as proof they could do it “if they  just tried.” 

“It’s the same brain that everyone told me was holding me back when I was a kid.” — Penn Holderness 

2. Starting is the hardest part. 

The takeaway: For many people with ADHD, the ability to initiate a task is what breaks down, especially  when there’s pressure to get it perfect. Kim described a delay in executive function: A child may  genuinely not know how to begin a project that neurotypical peers can simply start. Breaking a task  into “offensively small” steps, and lowering the bar for the first attempt, gets things moving. 

Try this: Name the first four steps out loud: open the computer, open the class website, click your  name, click the assignment. For a paper or project, try “do the worst version,” a strategy Kim uses on  her own scripts and has worked through with her son. It works because it  

takes perfectionism off the table. Kim said she often won’t start something  

unless she knows it can be perfect. Deliberately aiming for bad removes  

that barrier, and it’s a little funny, which takes the edge off. Once you’re in  

motion, the hardest part is behind you, and editing a rough draft is far  

easier than facing a blank page. 

3. Connect first, then correct. 

The takeaway: When a child seems not to be trying, Penn asked parents to  

assume the opposite: an executive-functioning short circuit is happening,  

and the task is taking far more effort than it looks. Correction is where the 

shame comes from, and kids with ADHD can be paralyzed by shame. Connection doesn’t replace  consequences. It comes first, so the child can actually hear what comes next. 

For parents and educators: Try replacing “Why can’t you try harder?” with “I can see that you’re  trying really hard. What can we do to make this less difficult?” Then build the plan together.  Dr. Kastner noted that collaboration keeps it from feeling top-down, which kids naturally resist. 

4. No system works forever. 

The takeaway: Kim once hoped one picture checklist would carry her son through. Instead, the  Post-it note on the kitchen cabinet worked until he stopped seeing it, and his phone alarms stopped  registering too. ADHD brains respond to novelty, so reminder systems need refreshing. They also  stick better when the child designs them. 

Worth remembering: A routine is a living, breathing process, and changing it isn’t a sign it failed. 

5. Big emotions are part of ADHD, even though the name leaves them out. The takeaway: Emotional dysregulation is often the main reason families end up at the doctor, yet it  isn’t mentioned in the diagnosis. Penn described emotional regulation running a few years behind his  peers. Kids also come home depleted after spending a full day in a school environment that wasn’t  built for their brains, and that exhaustion can look like rudeness. 

Try this: When a teacher described Kim’s son as “flooded,” the two of them turned it into visualizing  a wave they could surf. When the feeling rises, picture riding the wave all the way in and breathe  deeply until it comes back down. Dr. Kastner added the Jon Kabat-Zinn line: “You can’t stop the  waves, but you can learn to surf.” 

When Things Go Off the Rails 

Kim, Penn and Dr. Kastner talked through some of the everyday situations that can be especially  hard for people with ADHD. Here are a few strategies they suggested: 

• For homework: Use a “first, then” order: first the work that needs doing, then the thing your child  wants to do. Background music can help some kids tolerate “borture” (Penn’s word for boredom  that feels like torture), though Penn finds it distracting for focused work. 

• For mornings and getting out the door: Put things where they’re actually needed. The   Holdernesses keep a toothbrush in the downstairs powder room, and Penn keeps a pair of shoes  in the car.  

• For organization and forgetting: Try a whiteboard and change it up every week with new   pictures, jokes or colors so it keeps catching attention. Let your child write their own reminders;   the Post-its in the Holderness kitchen were their son’s idea, not his parents’. • For the after-school transition: Give kids time to decompress before asking about their day.   Kim realized her son wasn’t being rude or withdrawn when he said he was tired. He was fried  from a full day of holding it together. 

• For big emotions and back talk: Bring the temperature down first. “Let’s pause and come back  to this” is a complete response in the moment. Dr. Kastner suggested parents model their own   regulation out loud, whether that’s calm music, a walk or cold water on the face. • For sensory clashes at home: When one person needs quiet and another needs noise, say what  you need rather than criticizing the other person. “This is what my body needs” lands better than  “Why is your mouth so loud?” Noise-canceling headphones and separate rooms are fair game.

A Different Way to Look at ADHD 

“It’s possible that the opposite of shame is laughter,” Penn said in the conversation. Shame stays quiet  and inside. Laughing openly at your own mistakes means accepting them. 

The Holdernesses practice what they call “failing loud.” Kim told the story of their water getting shut  off because the city changed its billing system and she missed the letter. “I cried first,” she said, “and  then I laughed.” Penn spent 150 pages of a novel set in 1930s Mississippi waiting for time travel,  because he’d misheard Kim say the narrator “jumps around.” 

They share these moments with their kids on purpose. Dr. Kastner explained why it matters: Kids tend  to see their parents as close to perfect, and children with ADHD often read each mistake as proof that  something is wrong with them. Hearing “you would not believe how much I blew it today” helps kids  accept themselves a little more. 

Penn floated an idea worth stealing: alongside a daily gratitude check-in, try a daily “what I screwed up  today” chat. 

More From the Conversation 

Many of your questions came up during the talk and in the extended Q&A with Dr. Kastner afterward.  Here’s what we heard on some of the most common ones. 

• How ADHD can show up differently in girls: Kim was diagnosed with anxiety in college and with  ADHD only years later. Looking back, the signs were there: outsized emotions, a report card that  said “Kim struggles with transitions” and crying in the bathroom stall a few times a week. Girls are  often socialized to internalize their struggles, so their diagnoses can be missed. • Getting a good assessment: ADHD can overlap with or be mistaken for anxiety, depression, autism  or trauma. Everyone agreed that a thorough evaluation from a vetted professional matters more  than an online screener, if a family has the resources. Dr. Kastner added that a good assessment is  strengths-based. 

• Talking to a reluctant teen about an assessment: Dr. Kastner suggested leading with what you see:  “You’re struggling, and it doesn’t have to be this hard.” Invite their input, and let them know you  can change course if it isn’t helpful. 

• Weighing medication: Kim and Dr. Kastner both framed this as a personal family decision. Weigh  the risks of trying medication against the risks of not trying it, including the toll on a child’s   self-image. If you do try it, go slowly, and pair it with support and understanding rather than   treating it as the whole answer. 

• Supporting vs. rescuing: Penn shared that his mom did so much to keep him on track in high  school that college was a shock. Dr. Kastner described scaffolding as supports you put up, then  remove one at a time, putting them back only if needed. 

• Rejection sensitivity: Kids with ADHD hear a steady stream of corrections all day. When a child  says “everyone is against me,” don’t argue with their feelings. Acknowledge them, then steer   toward something you know helps, like movement. 

Questions to Keep Talking About 

Whether you’re a parent, educator or both, consider coming back to these questions after the event: 

• What’s one behavior you might interpret differently after hearing Kim and Penn? • Is there something you’ve been asking a child to do differently when the environment or   approach may need to change instead? 

• Where could you connect before you correct this week? 

• Which reminder system in your home has quietly stopped working, and how could your child   help redesign it?

• What strength in a child with ADHD might deserve more attention? 

• What’s a mistake you could share with your kids, and laugh about, this week? 

One Thing to Try 

You don’t have to overhaul everything at once. Choose one idea from the conversation that made  you think differently about your child or student, and try it this week. 

If you need a place to start, take the advice that lit up the chat: Do the worst version. It’s going to be  terrible, and that’s the point. Once you’re in motion, you can make it better.