Brendan Mahan

Anybody just not wear their glasses on the weekend and during the summer?

(This is a post about ADHD meds.)

Most of the time when you clean a room, the mess gets worse before it gets better.

This post is both literal and a metaphor. Use it as you see fit.

Most of the time when you clean a room, the mess gets worse before it gets better.

This post is both literal and a metaphor. Use it as you see fit.

Does that mean that if you take your kid to watch women do professional wrestling you can be arrested?

In this episode of the ADHD Essentials Pod, I interview Bradley Smith II about how restrictions help ADHD & creativity thrive. We discuss the nature of creativity, ways that ADHD can lead to small scale mourning, and how to set useful limitations.

www.podbean.com/eas/pb-x2g8c...

Crush Your ADHD Summit Want more highly effective yet simple insights and strategies to help you be empowered and successful this year? Join the Crush Your ADHD Summit!

The 2026 "Crush Your ADHD Summit" starts tomorrow and runs all week. 25 experts, myself included, will be presenting on topics that are useful for adults with ADHD.

Mine talk is on how we can use planning for things beyond just productivity.

www.alanpbrown.com/a/2148208829...

Please do, because you're giving enough information to make me curious, but being so vague that I have no idea what you're talking about.

In which I discuss taking 16 years to accomplish not one, but two! five-year goals.

And share three takeaways from the experience.

www.podbean.com/eas/pb-zfemu...

I hear you. I was there nit that long ago, as you know. (And got hit with a stomach thing on Monday.) I'll try to be as light as lift as I can for you. Seems like we're gonna coast downhill for a bit anyway.

There isn’t a secret bonus final episode of Stranger Things, and you don’t hate the ending as much as you think. You’re just sad the show is over. And that’s okay. You’re allowed.

Thanks! I try to be.

Maybe take a picture of a few of them, and the use the picture you like the most? Let the pic decide?

Idea to stop doomscrolling:
Take a picture of what you'd rather do than doomscrolling - the book you want to read, the place you'd rather walk, whatever - then make that picture the lock screen on your phone.

It’s a short-term fun, but you can keep going back to it.

Got a Zipstring for Christmas. It’s a very ADHD-friendly toy. Surprisingly meditative.

This seems like the beginning of a thread?

We might have some Dr. Who cards we could ship you.

oh! I misread it. Congratulations!

When is your test?

Me too! Part of the test was to name our favorite form and least favorite form. I went with 4 pinion and 2 pinion, relatively. But I almost called 11 combination my least favorite as a joke. 😁

When my sons were born, I set a goal to earn my black belt and write a book by the time they turned five. Stuff got in the way and now they’re sixteen.

That said, I earned the black be yesterday and the book comes out in September.

Keep moving forward.

Most of us know we should make a plan for the workday should look like in the morning.

But how many of us plan for what the time at home in the evening should look like at the end of the day?

It's a good idea, and helps to transition to home life.

It was my absolute honor to moderate a panel on authorship at ADHD Con 2025 with my friends Alan Brown, Caroline Maguire, @adhdjesse.com, and @howtoadhd.bsky.social.

My parenting philosophy boiled down:

Under respond to the little stuff. It's just a problem to solve -
If we over-respond to the little mistakes kids make when they're little, they'll be less likely to tell us about the big problems they encounter when they get older and we won't be able to help.

There are different kids of bandwidth. Cognitive, Social, Emotional, Physical - Emotional bandwidth bleeds into everything.

How do you build and spend your various bandwidths?

I was a DM for about five years before I went back to school to become a teacher. I quickly realized that DMing taught me as much if not more about what my professors wanted me to do than they would. The overlap in skills between education and running a TTRPG game is immense.

This isn’t good.

Will you be joining us or are you going to stay in Canada?

Agreed. As a kid with ADHD just trying to keep putting one foot in front of the other, Wolverine's ability to persevere despite the struggles in front of him really spoke to me.

My job got easier when I decided that I didn't get paid for the stuff I enjoyed doing, I got paid for the stuff that was hard for me to do. It made the struggle feel more worthwhile.