⚠️If you want all my tried & true options for mental clarity✨ on demand, pick up Finally Focused: http://christabiegler.com/focus

On this episode of the Less Stressed Life, we're diving into executive function with Dr. Sharon Saline as part of our October ADHD series. We talk about why everyday things like managing time, remembering appointments, and following through can be so challenging, and how these struggles can affect relationships. We also explore ADHD diagnosis, genetics, hormones, and the role shame plays in keeping us stuck. Plus, Sharon shares practical strategies for making everyday life a little easier.

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

🧠 Why ADHD can be missed in women
🧬 Genetics, trauma, and ADHD symptoms
🧩 Hot vs. cool executive functioning skills
❤️ ADHD, relationships, and emotional regulation
✅ Practical strategies for motivation and follow-through

ABOUT GUEST:
Dr. Sharon Saline is the author of the award-winning book, What Your ADHD Child Wishes You Knew: Working Together to Empower Kids for Success in School and Life and The ADHD solution card deck. She specializes in working with ADHD and neurodivergent children, teens, adults and families--helping them improve anxiety, cognitive and social executive functioning skills, resilience, self-confidence and personal relationships. She consults with schools, clinics and businesses internationally. Dr. Saline is an instructor at the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School, a part-time lecturer at the Smith College School for Social Work, blogger for PsychologyToday.com, contributing expert on MASS Live at WWLP TV, serves on the editorial board of ADDitudemag.com.

WHERE TO FIND GUEST:
Website: https://www.drsharonsaline.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drsharonsaline
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/@DrSharonSaline

SPONSOR:
Thank you to Jigsaw Health for being such a great sponsor. 💛 I’m sharing some pretty cool health pearls 💎 about vitamin K2, a misunderstood nutrient that goes way beyond 🦴 bone health, including its role in helping calcium get where it needs to go, ❤️ cardiovascular health, 🥾 performance and more. Save 10% on any Jigsaw Health order with code LESSSTRESSED10.

NUTRITION PHILOSOPHY OF LESS STRESSED LIFE:
🍽️ Over restriction is dead
🥑 Whole food is soul food and fed is best
🔄 Sustainable, synergistic nutrition is in (the opposite of whack-a-mole supplementation & supplement graveyards)
🤝 You don’t have to figure it out alone
❤️ Do your best and leave the rest

WHERE TO FIND CHRISTA:
Website: https://www.christabiegler.com/
Instagram: @anti.inflammatory.nutritionist
Podcast Instagram: @lessstressedlife
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@lessstressedlife
Quick Links: https://www.christabiegler.com/links
Cortisol Shop: https://christabiegler.com/cortisol-shop

✨Grab Cortisol Reset here: https://christabiegler.com/cortisol-a

❓Questions for Christa? Submit them here: https://www.christabiegler.com/questions

TRANSCRIPT:

[00:00:00] Dr. Sharon Saline: action precedes motivation. It's like- ... what you need first is momentum, so do anything. Take that big task. That's why coaches and therapists or whatever when they talk to people with ADHD, they're like, "Break that task down into smaller bits," because then when you achieve that small piece, you're like, "Oh, look at me, I'm making some progress." 

[00:00:22] Christa Biegler, RD: Welcome to the Less Stressed Life podcast. I'm your host, Christa Biegler, and we're in the ninth year of this show, and I just want to say thank you so much for being here. I'm personally in a season of wanting to pay it forward, to share everything I have learned from our clients over the last decade so that I can share it with as many people as possible in the next years, in the next decade.

[00:00:47] Christa Biegler, RD: I'd love to hear from you about what you want more of in the future, in the coming months of this podcast. Feel free to drop me a line at christabiegler.com/questions. 

ADHD Month Kickoff

[00:00:57] Christa Biegler, RD: Now, this month our theme is ADHD. I've become pretty interested in this topic in the last couple of years because I'm probably undiagnosed ADHD myself, so I set out to gather strategies on motivation, ADHD in women, conversations with therapists to bump up against the status quo, so to speak, diagnosing, improving executive function, and of course, one of my favorite topics, ADHD and nutrients.

[00:01:22] Christa Biegler, RD: I want incredible mental focus too, and I've found that when I'm supporting my body in the correct ways, I almost don't have some of those symptoms that usually come along with ADHD. I even created a small mini program on this called Finally Focused: Mental Clarity on Demand, because that's what I want when I need to focus.

[00:01:42] Christa Biegler, RD: Usually, you can only get it after you buy the Cortisol Reset, but it's on sale on its own for a limited time. The link is in the show notes. I thought it was only appropriate for ADHD month. You can get it at christabiegler.com/focus. Now, on to the show.

[00:01:57] Christa Biegler, RD: All right. Today on The Less Stress Life, I have Dr. Sharon Saline, who is the author of the award-winning book, What Your ADHD Child Wishes She Knew: Working Together to Empower Kids for Success in School and Life, and The ADHD Solution card deck. And next year, another book we'll talk about a, a little bit.

[00:02:13] Christa Biegler, RD: She specializes in working with ADHD and neurodivergent children, teens, adults, and families, which is a big, tall order I feel like the entire spectrum. Helping them improve anxiety, cognitive, and social executive functioning skills, resilience, self-confidence, and personal relationships. She consults with schools, clinics, and businesses internationally.

[00:02:32] Christa Biegler, RD: Dr. Saline is an instructor at the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School and part-time lecturer at the Smith College School for Social Work, blogger for Psychology Today, and contributing expert on a TV series that serves an editorial board for

[00:02:46] Dr. Sharon Saline: ADD Attitude Mag or something https://additudemag.com/ Thank you.

[00:02:48] Dr. Sharon Saline: Thank you. It's actually a webinar and they have a, they turn their webinars into podcasts. It's a great source- 

[00:02:55] Christa Biegler, RD: Cool ... of 

[00:02:56] Dr. Sharon Saline: information for- Yeah ... people who wanna know more about ADHD. 

[00:02:59] Christa Biegler, RD: Nice. I heard that we changed the term from, was it ADD to ADHD in the '90s? 

[00:03:06] Dr. Sharon Saline: Or- Yes. The term changed. think it's been changed a couple times, but in the last 10 years it's been pretty firmly ADHD.

[00:03:12] Dr. Sharon Saline: Mm-hmm. And it's confusing because a lot of people don't identify with the hyperactive part. And they're like, "No, I have ADD, I have the distracted type," which- both under the same umbrella, I feel like whatever you wanna call it is fine with me. One of the kids I worked with said, "Awesome, delightful, happy dude."

[00:03:33] Dr. Sharon Saline: I'm like- ... "I love it." 

[00:03:35] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah, I love it too. It feels when we're, splitting hairs over what to call it, it's almost a conversation between men and women, right? Because women we don't always associate... It's different. I remember having a conversation with someone about distractibility and focus, and almost this introverted-ness and withdrawal- Yeah

[00:03:51] Christa Biegler, RD: which is a bit different than how we think about this with boys. So we have these stereotypes coming into this, and then we're in an entire month of ADHD, and it's interesting for me to sit in this chair and to interview people like you. A lot of this boils down to who do we reach out to, what comes up.

[00:04:07] Christa Biegler, RD: And so I interviewed one of your colleagues recently, and what was interesting to me is one, we come from different backgrounds. I can't wait to hear a little bit about how you got into this. And two, as I was preparing for this, I almost have to sort through a lot of crap on the internet to even find the foundations, right?

[00:04:21] Christa Biegler, RD: Because what I really wanted to, one of the bullet-pointed list things that I wanted to accomplish in this month was, there's so many people that feel that they have undiagnosed ADHD, and so I was like, "Yeah, what does diagnosis look like?" But it feels a bit ambiguous in, from what I'm hearing so far.

Adult Diagnosis and Hormones

[00:04:36] Dr. Sharon Saline: It's a really good question. There are a couple of things that you pointed out. So I think that one of the things that we wanna think about is that the diagnostic criteria was really based on kids. The diagnosis was based on children, and so you had to have six out of nine symptoms for, a period of time.

[00:04:55] Dr. Sharon Saline: Generally, it was, a minimum of six months. And then you would receive the diagnosis after, if you checked off a bunch of things, that you had this, that, or the other thing. Now the criteria's shifted a little bit that it's still six out of nine symptoms for kids under the age of 17, but if you're 17 or older, it's five out of nine symptoms.

[00:05:17] Dr. Sharon Saline: And they're also saying that if you are diagnosed as an adult, you have to have showed some symptoms of ADHD before the age of 12. Now, there's a whole, a group of international research experts and in, on ADHD who are trying to figure out, how can we change the diagnostic criteria for adults?

[00:05:40] Dr. Sharon Saline: Because there are adults who may not have met that criteria as children. And particularly women who may mask, have masked very well women who are bright who are... generally this is true for women and men, but because women's symptoms tend to be more of the internalizing symptoms, And we can talk about the difference between internalizing and externalizing in a minute.

[00:06:06] Dr. Sharon Saline: What, what happens is that we see the diagnosis coming later, and often around beginning with perimenopause. Mm-hmm. Because if we're gonna get into nerdy science here I think we really wanna think for a minute or two about neurotransmitters and the relationship of neurotransmitters to hormones.

[00:06:27] Dr. Sharon Saline: So we know some of the big neurotransmitters, serotonin and dopamine, and norepinephrine. Serotonin is often related to mood and dopamine is related to pleasure and reward and interest. Many people with ADHD have lower amounts of dopamine in their brains, often most people with ADHD.

[00:06:49] Dr. Sharon Saline: And then norepinephrine, which has to do with focus and sleep and alertness and things like that, and we'll see lower amounts of norepinephrine also in people with ADHD. Now, we don't necessarily know this because people are not while they're, like, living, testing out their brains.

[00:07:07] Dr. Sharon Saline: But we... MRIs have shown a lot of really interesting information. Parts of the brains can be smaller in ADHD due to underuse and some parts bigger, like the amygdala can often be bigger. And so I'm gonna go back to the hormonal piece. So acetylcholine is a hormone it's a neurotransmitter.

[00:07:27] Dr. Sharon Saline: It's one of the five, and it really, it has a lot to do with memory And also emotion. And it's fundamentally affected by estrogen. And so when estrogen levels vary, as they do during perimenopause it will affect not just acetylcholine, but kind of the soup of our neurotransmitters.

[00:07:47] Dr. Sharon Saline: I've left out glutamate, which is the fifth one. When people go through menopause, the fluctuations of estrogen and progesterone affect their neurotransmitters, and affect things that they used to be able to manage with systems or by their cognitive abilities.

[00:08:05] Dr. Sharon Saline: And so we see more women coming for diagnoses at that time like, what's wrong with me?" ... And then these older patterns might be revealed in some way. ... What I would say that, I was never given a diagnosis of ADHD. I'm not sure I met the criteria at all before the age of 12.

[00:08:24] Dr. Sharon Saline: But when I went through perimenopause, I had a very difficult time regulating my emotions. I was a little bit more impulsive, and my abilities to manage things based on my cognitive strengths weakened. And that led me eventually to diagnose myself. 

[00:08:44] Dr. Sharon Saline: Having diagnosed many people over the years.

[00:08:47] Dr. Sharon Saline: Just in the last, I would say, five years, because even when my first book came out, I didn't think I had ADHD- Mm-hmm ...... and there wasn't enough research about women with ADHD. That's changed. I do. I do now identify with that. 

[00:09:00] Christa Biegler, RD: I think this is a pretty popular topic, but it might be the lens I'm looking through.

[00:09:03] Christa Biegler, RD: I forgot to tell you we did a, an entire episode on this particular topic, perimenopause, Oh ... age of ADHD. So this is good though, because when we're talking about neurotransmitters, it's not like something we remember, right? So as the estrogen declines, and really with perimenopause, it does this roller coaster thing.

[00:09:18] Christa Biegler, RD: So it'll be up and down, and up and down, if other things aren't operating perfectly well in the body either. For me, I like to even think from the nerdy perspective really upstream, right? Before you can make neurotransmitters, you have to be able to use amino acids, and to have amino acids you have to be able to digest protein.

[00:09:34] Christa Biegler, RD: And this brings me back to, 'cause you're coming at this... You have this psychology background, is that right? I believe. And so I think about, and I love getting into... Thanks for coming into the nerdy stuff hot and heavy right away. I really appreciate 

[00:09:45] Dr. Sharon Saline: it. So happy to be there. 

[00:09:46] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. 

[00:09:47] Dr. Sharon Saline: It's one of the places I really like, and I don't get to hang out enough.

[00:09:49] Christa Biegler, RD: So you know what? One thing that comes forward, I wanna talk a little bit more about the neurotransmitters and nature versus nurture. But before that, some of the conversations that are still question marks throughout this month as I've been interviewing is, hereditary versus trauma induced.

[00:10:07] Christa Biegler, RD: It makes sense that there would be some genetic implications on neurotransmitter production. And it also makes sense that things going on in your environment could impact it. And the reason I asked, I'm glad I started with the diagnosis criteria, and thank you for answering that so well.

[00:10:20] Christa Biegler, RD: My impression is that there's almost a severity scale that maybe doesn't even exist, right? And so it's a little bit- Maybe it's sub- slightly subjective, right? I guess everything has a level- I- ... of subjectivity. I don't 

[00:10:33] Dr. Sharon Saline: know ... ADHD isn't like being pregnant or- 

[00:10:37] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah

[00:10:37] Dr. Sharon Saline: you're either pregnant or you're not. Yeah. 

Hereditary ADHD and Comorbidities

[00:10:39] Dr. Sharon Saline: But but ADHD is more like, I would say, comparable to diabetes. You might have a mild case, or you might have a more severe case. 

[00:10:47] Dr. Sharon Saline: And that has to do with first of all, understanding that ADHD is really hereditary.

[00:10:54] Dr. Sharon Saline: It's inherited. The rates used to be considered 55% when I wrote my book 10 years ago. Now, new research says it's so much higher, closer to 75 to 90% if you look at what Dr. Russell Barkley has been talking and writing about and it's true. When I interview people and I interviewed a lot of them for this book that I just completed many of them have a relative with ADHD, either a parent or a sibling or an uncle.

[00:11:22] Dr. Sharon Saline: It's in the family somewhere. And I think that's important to understand, that you're not creating this in some way. It's not because you're lazy or you're stupid, or you don't care. That's not what ADHD is about. It is a biologically based condition and I do think, from what I've read about alternatives to medication the things that we can take as supplements or digestion in terms of our diets, these are very important factors, for contributing not just to overall health, but to brain health in particular.

[00:11:57] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah, I think we can. I always love to look at any name, symptom, signal, diagnosis. I always look to look at it through the lens of a health triad, where it's like there's a nutritional chemical component of what's happening. There's an emotional, energetic component of what's happening.

[00:12:11] Christa Biegler, RD: There's structure and environment. I was listening to one of your interviews talking about helping kids study or something like that, right? And it was like, there's a lot of environment and structure going on there. Like, how do we manage some of the things that are characteristics of this overall?

[00:12:26] Christa Biegler, RD: And before we start to go toward some of those types of things, before we leave Nerdville with neurotransmitters, I want to talk a little bit more about nature versus nurture. So nature being, hey, we actually think that the rates are maybe 75% to 90% hereditary. And actually speaking personally about this, I think, if you're in a bottle, you can't really tell you're in a bottle, right?

[00:12:49] Christa Biegler, RD: So if your parent has ADHD, and that's normal to you, 'cause that's- ... what you're exposed to, you don't really think about it. And so bless my mother she is such a squirrel, and I love her to death. And for sure, I would guess that was... Like, it's I don't know all the diagnostic criteria, but I'm like, probably.

[00:13:06] Christa Biegler, RD: And I'm not particularly attached to the diagnosis for my personal benefits, but I want to ask about, you've been in practice for more than a couple of years, right? And so you've had some history to really see the spectrum, and I'm curious how you started to focus on this, which is normally a first question that I normally have.

[00:13:24] Christa Biegler, RD: But I'm curious how you started to focus on this, and what you think of... Like, it sounds like the landscape is ever-developing for you. For 

[00:13:30] Dr. Sharon Saline: sure. It is, and that's one of the, the fascinating things. So I started to become interested in ADHD because my nephew at age five was diagnosed. And then going backwards, my brother was diagnosed, which wasn't a surprise given my parents.

[00:13:49] Dr. Sharon Saline: And I found that a lot of the clients that I was started to work with, that this was something that was emerging a little bit more. And it was very interesting to me, because as a clinical psychologist, it- people came in with ADHD and. ADHD rarely travels alone. There's like an 80% co-occurrence with ADHD.

[00:14:12] Dr. Sharon Saline: Whether it's anxiety or depression or, a learning disability of some kind or a health diagnosis. M- I was thinking, eating disorders or substance abuse or bipolar disorder. I mean, There are a lot of things that come with ADHD, but mostly in regular life what we see is anxiety and depression and learning challenges.

[00:14:34] Dr. Sharon Saline: Learning ... And I use the word disability on purpose because that's how people can get services. ... Learning difference does not get you an IEP or a 504. And so It just became something that really I felt working with people with ADHD felt very familiar to me. And interesting, and that's how it got started really. 

[00:14:53] Christa Biegler, RD: Allow me to interrupt this episode to share about a misunderstood nutrient that has given me some really cool results, and that's vitamin K2. Now, most people only know about vitamin K1 because of its blood clotting abilities, but vitamin K2 is a totally different animal. Vitamin K2 is known for bone health, but there's also a number of studies that show how useful it is in cardiovascular health and improving cardiac output in athletes, so in other words, performance.

[00:15:18] Christa Biegler, RD: With those mechanisms in mind, I started vitamin K2 before a high elevation hiking trip and had zero altitude sickness. The other thing I've used it for is sluggish thyroid. For years, I've seen calcium stuck in the tissue on hair tissue mineral analysis testing with sluggish thyroid clients, including myself.

[00:15:36] Christa Biegler, RD: Vitamin K2 is one of the most important nutrients to help calcium get where it needs to go instead of impairing thyroid function. This is a very mineral-specific nuance that can make a big difference if you don't wanna have relapsing gut issues from the sluggish motility that comes along with this subclinical sluggish thyroid issue situation that is very rampant, very common.

[00:15:57] Christa Biegler, RD: Jigsaw Health has a vitamin K2 plus E complex marketed for bone health, but that vitamin E will support the cell membrane so the nutrients can get into the cell. So it's a very nice two-for-one product, but I would also do two caps of this product, as a lot of the health benefits associated with vitamin K2 are for 100 micrograms.

[00:16:15] Christa Biegler, RD: So two caps of Jigsaw's vitamin K2 plus E is gonna get you there. You can get 10% off of any order at jigsawhealth.com with the code LESSSTRESSED10. Any time, any place, repeat orders, code LESSSTRESSED10.

[00:16:31] Christa Biegler, RD: so two things I wanna cover next. One would be these characteristics challenges with motivation, maybe follow through is not the right word, but those very specific most common traits.

[00:16:43] Christa Biegler, RD: And then I wanna come back to dopamine and just what you're seeing in the landscape, and maybe we'll start there actually. As this has changed over time, and you see maybe an increase this is something that I should've done more recon work before we got here. But if we're talking about a decrease in dopamine overall- there are probably things also in our environment that can be impacting that as well, right? Like even the way we utilize- But 

[00:17:04] Dr. Sharon Saline: it's not, It's not a decrease. You're- Okay ... basically has to do with what your brain is actually producing. And so i- your brain makes less dopamine.

[00:17:15] Dr. Sharon Saline: Your brain naturally makes lower levels of norepinephrine. And you can own-- You can sort of acknowledge that, and you can set up systems to help you manage that, and you can take medication, or you can take alternative supplements that will, assist your in strengthening the connections between neurons and the process of myelination.

[00:17:38] Dr. Sharon Saline: But it's not something that, you know, sort of increases or decreases over time. 

[00:17:43] Dr. Sharon Saline: As we age, there are natural changes in our brain that I actually don't feel qualified to speak about, but I know that things kind of- ... reduce over time. But think that what happens in the environment is something actually that you mentioned, and you mentioned a personal account, which is your mom's like squirrel, always doing a little bit of something.

[00:18:05] Dr. Sharon Saline: And so when you are born into that, you think that's actually how the world works. That's what normal looks like. I certainly did in my family. My mom was never on time for anything, I mean nothing, and always juggling, and being in motion, and doing things. And my dad, had his own attention challenges.

[00:18:27] Dr. Sharon Saline: So I, I think that in a way, the question is like, can you, have ADHD by osmosis almost in your environment. And I would say no. I would say what you have are learned behaviors, habits, and routines- ... that look like that, but you would not meet the criteria for a diagnosis.

[00:18:49] Christa Biegler, RD: More directly in our current environment, it's different than it was 10 years ago with our- ... exposure to screens and blue light, et cetera. Does this play a role in neurotransmitter function as well? 

[00:19:01] Dr. Sharon Saline: I can't say if it plays a role in that, but it does play a role in how our brains are functioning and what we're acclimating to.

[00:19:09] Dr. Sharon Saline: And so what we see, we've seen over time, are shortening of attention spans- based on what people are receiving on their screens. That people need more stimulation, that people need shorter they can only focus for shorter amounts of time in general. So there's been some studies that have come out recently, do screens worsen ADHD, or can screens make it look like you have ADHD?

[00:19:36] Dr. Sharon Saline: And the answer to both of those has been yes. 

[00:19:39] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. That makes sense. 

Neurodiversity and Executive Skills

[00:19:40] Christa Biegler, RD: Okay, so speaking of naming conventions, we were talking about ADHD and ADD, but there's also, our language around this is evolving- ... as well. Yeah. And so in more recent years, there are some newer terms that, for me, they're newer.

[00:19:53] Christa Biegler, RD: For you, they've probably been there for a long time and they're being used more commonly. But we use neurodivergent and executive function. Will you talk to us about what's Yeah ... the umbrella of executive function? 

[00:20:02] Dr. Sharon Saline: I'm going to go back first. Sure, please. The first one, because the the second is subsumed under the first, okay. In the late '90s, a sociologist named Judy Singer basically identified an umbrella term- And this term was neurodiversity, okay? Under that umbrella, there was neurodivergence and neurotypical. So neurotypical are people who think and process information in what we would consider, quote-unquote, "standard ways."

[00:20:31] Dr. Sharon Saline: Neurodivergent are people who do that in ways that are different or a- atypical or unusual. In common parlance, neurodivergent and neurodiversity have become interchangeable- ... even though they're actually technically different. 

[00:20:49] Dr. Sharon Saline: Now executive functioning skills are something that we all have. If you're listening, put your hand, or you're watching, put your hand up to your forehead because in your brain, in the prefrontal cortex of your brain, which is behind your forehead, this is really where the seat of executive functions live.

[00:21:08] Dr. Sharon Saline: And executive functions manage and direct how we process and understand information and emotion, and take that and integrate it and combine it so we can execute tasks, so we can execute the things we

[00:21:26] Dr. Sharon Saline: need to do to live every day, and to manage our emotions, and to pull up memories, and apply them to what's happening in the present.

[00:21:35] Dr. Sharon Saline: And there are two types of executive functioning skills. There are hot skills, and those are conscious, and often what we consider to be external. You see them. 

[00:21:47] Dr. Sharon Saline: Okay? Then there are cool skills, and those are considered to be unconscious. And so the hot skills include things like impulsivity inhibition.

[00:21:57] Dr. Sharon Saline: We would call it inhibition, so being able to manage your impulses. Emotional regulation, organization sort of motivation, It's what we call it initiation, so being able to get started on something. Time management and sort of goal-directed persistence kind of has a foot in each one because you set the goal consciously, but whether you persist on it is more of an unconscious thing.

[00:22:22] Dr. Sharon Saline: Can you stay focused on something? So the unconscious thing skills are working memory sustained attention, focus, that goal-directed persistence, and then we have something called metacognition. Which is generally a cool skill, but as we mature, it becomes a little bit more conscious.

[00:22:44] Dr. Sharon Saline: And it's really it's not just thinking about your thinking, but it's about self-evaluation, being able- ... to understand yourself in a situation, to perceive the effect you're having on others. If you walk into a room or a party, and there's people you know in a conversation, if you walk right up to them and you're like, "What?

[00:23:03] Dr. Sharon Saline: What? What are you talking about?" That probably does really go over super well because there's, you're not managing your impulses to connect, and you're interrupting others, and you're not aware of the effect that has on others. And so over time, you would learn when you come into a group and people talking, you just go up to the group and you listen for a while, or you ask if you can join, that kind of thing.

[00:23:30] Dr. Sharon Saline: So I think I've covered them all. I'm embarrassed to say I might have missed one, but I hope not. And I think that, the hot skills, the conscious skills, are the things that are pretty much easier to address with programs and plans and interventions and structure and... The cool skills are a little bit harder, and they can be addressed in the same way, but they're often also linked to emotion.

[00:23:59] Dr. Sharon Saline: And when I say they're linked to emotion, they're linked to self-esteem. 

[00:24:03] Dr. Sharon Saline: In fact, I think all the skills together are. So in my particular work, when I work with people with ADHD, and I think Dr. Tuchman does the same we're good friends, so I think I feel safe saying that, is that there's a little bit of a dance between the, sort of cognitive behavior, structured interventions.

[00:24:22] Dr. Sharon Saline: And for me, looking at what are some of the obstacles, the self-esteem, the self-talk patterns that are getting in your way negative beliefs that you have about yourself. 

[00:24:34] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah, I've never heard anyone use the terms hot skills and cool skills, so that was quite fun. I enjoy that.

[00:24:42] Christa Biegler, RD: What's coming up a bit here, you've given some good practical examples, is the effect of ADHD or neurodivergent tendencies, hopefully I'm getting that correct, in relationship. This is really, in a way I think this probably has been a thread through your work, because the book on the shelf there is about ADHD in children, which is interesting, because as many things go with children, there's a lot of mirror work being done for an adult.

[00:25:12] Christa Biegler, RD: It's like you got this small version of you or someone that learned things from you in other places, and it's quite a mix of things. But it's interesting because it's about children, and yet, 75 to 90% of people are coming from a hereditary version, right? So it's fascinating, and so it actually makes sense that

[00:25:29] Christa Biegler, RD: I think I heard you say on an interview that there's 11% of children diagnosed with ADHD. Is that correct? And 4-ish percent of adults? No, 

[00:25:38] Dr. Sharon Saline: between 10 and 11%, and something like 4 and 

[00:25:41] Christa Biegler, RD: 6 adults. That's bonkers, honestly. So- That's a lot ... 

[00:25:44] Dr. Sharon Saline: it's bonkers that's in the United States.

[00:25:47] Dr. Sharon Saline: But I think that what happens is that kids are flagged You know, earlier, or they're struggling. And particularly, so there's the elementary school years where- . We might see it more in boys, but we might see it in some girls. But then in middle school is where we will start to see more diagnosis of girls and of even boys whose, cognitive abilities they're, were able to manage elementary school okay.

[00:26:13] Dr. Sharon Saline: But then when they have to switch classrooms, and manage different teachers, and different schedules, things start to unravel. And so in my book it's interesting 'cause it's about children and adolescents, and what happens is that kids grow older. And I'm now working with people, some people that I've had in my practice I've seen for 14 years- 

[00:26:35] Dr. Sharon Saline: Who have started, and matured, and left, and come back. And so I think that's really fascinating for me, and it's grounding for them. It's like, "Oh, you already know all my history, so I don't have to go over that. We can just- ... start with where I am now or where I'm struggling." And one of the reasons I like to differentiate the executive functioning skills as hot and cool skills is it's something people understand.

[00:27:00] Dr. Sharon Saline: And even kids can understand that. I understand what hot is, I understand what cool is. So you know, I'm like a jumping bean, and here I'm just I'm zoned out. And I think that's part of why I use those terms. 

[00:27:11] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. Okay. 

Executive Function in Relationships

[00:27:12] Christa Biegler, RD: So we started by talking about children- in a relationship, you gave a couple of examples already where sometimes you might come into a conversation and that impulsivity, which is under the executive function umbrella, might come in, and then you learn- 

[00:27:26] Christa Biegler, RD: Maybe I'm gonna listen first or step in, tiptoe into the conversation instead of jumping in. Just thinking about other places that this affects relationships, you mentioned your mom was never on time, so I'm thinking about the executive function skills, and I have a list from an interview, and I did- wasn't listing, so I'll just talk through them a little bit, right?

[00:27:44] Christa Biegler, RD: Okay. So impulse control, the motivation, staying interested in something. You said Working 

[00:27:49] Dr. Sharon Saline: memory. 

[00:27:50] Christa Biegler, RD: Maybe organization, all of this is, 'Cause one of the conversations, part of this is what are those practical examples people have all the time, right?

[00:27:56] Christa Biegler, RD: Like losing their keys, not being able to find those. And I'll just mention also my conversation with Dr. Tuchman, one of the main takeaways was that these executive functioning skills are something we all have to work on, and for ADHD- Yes ... they're more amplified overall. So th- Right ... no matter what, no matter what, these are skills for humanity.

[00:28:12] Dr. Sharon Saline: I forgot to say that, and thank you so much for reminding me, because everyone has executive functioning skills, because we all have prefrontal cortex. 

[00:28:19] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. 

[00:28:20] Dr. Sharon Saline: And we all have executive functioning strengths and challenges. It's just that for people with ADHD, those challenges usually outnumber the strengths, or the intensity of those challenges overwhelms your strengths.

[00:28:34] Dr. Sharon Saline: So if we're thinking about ADHD in relationships and th- thinking about in romantic relationships or friendships, there are a couple things that stand out. One, organization. Can you make a plan with someone and stick... and show up- ... and stick with it?

[00:28:49] Dr. Sharon Saline: What ways are you remembering things? So I set on my phone, I have a notification for everything. Not for my clients, because I'm in my office and I pretty much know what's happening, but if I have an appointment or something unexpected, I set a notification because I need that little cue.

[00:29:07] Dr. Sharon Saline: I'm a little bit older. My memory works a little bit slower. I don't wanna miss it. So that's something that can happen. Another thing that can be important in relationships, and I'm thinking partnership relationships here, is if you're having a conversation with your partner and they're asking you to do something, write it down.

[00:29:24] Dr. Sharon Saline: Because one of the things that we really need to think about with ADHD, and Dr. Russell Barkley's done a lot of research about this, is emotional dysregulation. I don't think we talk about it enough. It's really important, and it can throw you because if you're having a conversation with your partner about things you need to do, you might feel a little anxious about whether you're gonna remember it or not.

[00:29:48] Dr. Sharon Saline: Did you write it down? Do you have a cue for when you get to the hardware store to actually get the thing that was on the list for the hardware store and not something that's not on the list? So that's one thing. 

Follow Through and Time Blindness

[00:30:00] Dr. Sharon Saline: I think the other thing that we want to talk about is that follow-through because you say you're gonna do something, but you don't quite get to it, or other things interfere, and that can erode trust.

[00:30:10] Dr. Sharon Saline: And that's something that can, over time, become toxic in a relationship. And those are some things that I would really think about, and then time management. I'm good with time management, but I always think I can do more than is humanly possible in a given amount of time, and so this- 

[00:30:28] Christa Biegler, RD: Likewise.

[00:30:29] Dr. Sharon Saline: Yeah, so this leads me to being late to things- ... even if I don't want to because I'm, like, doing other things. And this past weekend, my husband and I went to a wedding, and we had to catch a ferry to get to the place to get there, and we left in a little bit of chaos because I was running a little bit late.

[00:30:46] Dr. Sharon Saline: I didn't manage enough-- I didn't leave enough time between my swimming when we were leaving. And he sat in the car. He said, "This is, does not work for me. I need you to do better." So when we were at the wedding, the whole time we were there, I was on time for everything. I was even early, and every time we got in the car to go to one of the events, I was like, "I would just like you to notice that I was on time and even early."

[00:31:09] Dr. Sharon Saline: The thing is that, and we laughed about it, but as someone who struggles with time and who mostly feels ashamed about that- ... I need to hear from my partner "I saw you doing it well." I know we're gonna wrap up whenever, but I want to say something about shame- 

Shame and Self Esteem Loops

[00:31:25] Dr. Sharon Saline: Because it's the thing we don't talk about a lot. 

[00:31:28] Dr. Sharon Saline: And when you grow up with a neurodivergent brain, you are told or shown repeatedly- That you're doing something different in a way that is not okay. 

[00:31:42] Dr. Sharon Saline: And, or you're worried about the next time you're gonna mess up when you didn't know you were making a mistake.

[00:31:47] Dr. Sharon Saline: And so there's a sensitivity and a high sort of likelihood that you'll feel more ashamed when you have these executive functioning challenges than someone who doesn't have ADHD. And some people are better at- whatever, sloughing off the shame. But for a lot of people, it sits deep in their gut.

[00:32:07] Dr. Sharon Saline: Yeah. And that's one of the things that really is important to work on if you're someone with ADHD and you're in therapy. what is the role of shame in your life? When does it come up? How do you deal with it? Because you can go down the shame spiral into the pit of dejection pretty fast.

[00:32:25] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. I'm glad you brought that up. That was something that became really interesting to me over the last few years. So in the last handful of years I started using some coaching modalities with clients, and what came up for me was, oh, we are actually so similar, right? Humans are just so similar.

[00:32:41] Christa Biegler, RD: We have a lot of the same emotions, so- Yeah ... probably stuff you're dealing with all day long. But some of those particular emotions were very especially difficult, especially painful. And I'm lucky to have, different friends that are quite aware, and I remember one of them saying that, "Oh, that's shame."

[00:32:58] Christa Biegler, RD: and I remember this is one of the most painful emotions that there is. And to speak-- to kind of underline some of the things you said, and even in your story with your husband, is that not only you said that people may experience more shame if they've been told their whole life something is different and not okay.

[00:33:15] Christa Biegler, RD: Yes. And part of this, I think, is, if you've been chastised your entire life, right? If the challenges have outweighed the strengths and you've been constantly course-corrected it makes a lot of sense. It's like there's a lot of conditioning that's been done. A lot. That muscle's been very developed to beat yourself up.

[00:33:30] Christa Biegler, RD: And I think that shame is not a word we necessarily identify at the top all the time. I think it might look like I'm embarrassed because of this thing that happened in this relationship, or we use different words. Yeah. And then when you get down to it, it's like, "Oh, this is the thing that's underneath that," and it's hurts.

[00:33:49] Christa Biegler, RD: It's so painful. So I think that's really interesting- ... 'cause you talked about the importance of self-esteem how would you describe that where you mentioned something about self-esteem being this huge, paramount, keystone thing with ADHD.

[00:34:02] Christa Biegler, RD: It is. 

[00:34:03] Dr. Sharon Saline: It is. Because we, humans, have to accept ourselves. Yeah. That's, we have to be kind to ourselves. We have a growth mindset, expecting you're gonna stumble, regrouping, and trying again, right? That's what builds resilience. That's what helps us- grow and learn and become who we are.

[00:34:27] Dr. Sharon Saline: And we want to share who we are, but we don't want to feel that who we are is fundamentally flawed or broken because we do things differently or we think about things differently. And I think that's something that many people with ADHD grow up with. "What is wrong with me that I can't blah, blah, blah?"

[00:34:49] Dr. Sharon Saline: Or, "I do this too much." And different people cope with that, people cope with that in, of course, different ways. But that fundamental sense of this false belief that you're somehow less than.

[00:35:04] Dr. Sharon Saline: It will interfere with your ability to learn tools and strategies to help you deal with your executive functioning challenges.

[00:35:14] Dr. Sharon Saline: Yeah. And to stick with them. many times I've been working with families and couples for my whole career, They'll try something for a week or two, they'll hit an obstacle or an old pattern will come up, and they'll say this isn't working. 

[00:35:28] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. 

[00:35:28] Dr. Sharon Saline: And I'll say, "Actually, it is working.

[00:35:30] Dr. Sharon Saline: We just have to change your response to the obstacle." Yeah. Because the obstacle is giving you an opportunity to try it again in a different way. 

[00:35:39] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. I think of this like bumpers at a bowling alley sometimes when you're working- Yes, 

[00:35:43] Dr. Sharon Saline: exactly ... 

[00:35:44] Christa Biegler, RD: with someone. Yeah. It's like I think it's this, and as the clinician, you get to say, "I respect your insight on that, and I'd like to show you some other possibilities that might be more likely as well to be-" a little bit of a bumper to help you stay, to get down the bowling alley so you don't just go off into the gutter. And I was writing, I like to write as I'm talking to people, and I was thinking, I literally wrote, and you said it right afterwards. I wrote down if your self-esteem is low, it'll impair your ability to make changes, right?

[00:36:13] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. So it sounds like this will never work for me, or that I tried this and it didn't work. that's probably the hardest thing, as someone who wants to help other humans, is that's the voice of self-sabotage, right?

[00:36:26] Christa Biegler, RD: That is rooted, right? What is like, what is the root of these things sometimes, right?

[00:36:29] Christa Biegler, RD: What's the common thread? And we can call it- Sure ... different things, but that makes makes a lot of sense. And I think that's one of the hardest things for us to witness is someone giving up on something- ... that could be better for themselves, right? Because we just want to see people thrive.

[00:36:43] Dr. Sharon Saline: We do and it's hard sometimes when you've received a lot of knocks- 

[00:36:48] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah ... 

[00:36:48] Dr. Sharon Saline: over the years to believe that something can turn out differently- Yeah ... or to value small changes. 

[00:36:56] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. 

[00:36:57] Dr. Sharon Saline: We're not looking for... a huge win is great, but for me, in my work, I'm looking for small wins that get the ball rolling. In fact, research that I've been looking at is that it actually, action precedes motivation. It's like- ... what you need first is momentum, so do anything. Take that big task. That's why people tell that's why coaches and therapists or whatever when they talk to people with ADHD, they're like, "Break that task down into smaller bits," because then when you c- achieve that small piece, you're like, "Oh, look at me, I'm making some progress."

[00:37:34] Dr. Sharon Saline: So there's also a piece about how we talk to ourselves and, maybe I can come back or we could have a whole session on that self-talk connection self-esteem and how that affects our stress. When we criticize ourselves or we tell ourselves, that we're not doing it right, or that not enough, or other people are better, and we get into compare and despair, it's gonna be very hard to move forward.

[00:38:00] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. No, I think that these are part of the human experience, and I think... I almost wonder if this dance is between conscious and unconscious because when you are used to doing something so much, until we're stopped in our tracks or like we're called out of the routine, you don't see it.

[00:38:16] Christa Biegler, RD: And I was just thinking about how this is like reticular activating system 101, where ... what we look for is more of the same thing that we already believe, right? So if we believe something, we look for more evidence about that. To my clients, I describe it like that is the easy way for our brain to work.

[00:38:33] Christa Biegler, RD: It's like the marble going the most natural direction down a slight curve. And it's a little harder to make the marble go a new spot, to look for a new thing. But you get to say "What do I want to believe instead, and how do I look for evidence and actually accumulate that evidence every day?"

[00:38:51] Christa Biegler, RD: And sometimes that evidence looks like failure- failure somewhere where, right? Yes. It's like, "Oh, that option didn't work, which is fine. Now I'm just like one step closer to the thing that I wanted," right? Overall. Which I'm sharing this as even a reminder for myself, right? 'Cause it's not always the norm for us to be looking for evidence for what we want to believe.

[00:39:09] Christa Biegler, RD: But really, like life is a- a compilation of our thoughts around ... what our beliefs are, right? And we all think that our beliefs are true, unfortunately. 

[00:39:17] Dr. Sharon Saline: We do. And there's a lot of new research and evidence about self-talk that's come out in the last few years that's really fascinating.

[00:39:26] Dr. Sharon Saline: Dr. Ethan Kross from the University of Michigan has done some great work on this. And I think it really is, it's not just about ADHD when we talk about it, but I think that the negative self-talk can be exacerbated when you grow up- ... with neurodivergence. 

Trauma Overlap and Brain Changes

[00:39:44] Dr. Sharon Saline: And earlier you mentioned the idea of trauma.

[00:39:47] Dr. Sharon Saline: And there are different types of trauma. There's acute trauma, there's chronic trauma and complex trauma. And some people believe that living with neurodivergence is a form of complex trauma- ... because there could be an acute incident That would have a lasting effect.

[00:40:07] Dr. Sharon Saline: There could be chronic sort of negative feedback, and those combined really create complex trauma. But some of my friends who are experts in the trauma world say, "No, I'm not sure, blah, blah, blah." But I think what we really wanna think about are these adverse childhood experiences- that many neurodivergent people have that then set the stage for living with what we would consider to be complex trauma. 

[00:40:36] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. I'm a human that's like a never say never, right? It's let me consider all of the possibilities. I have been told already this month "No, it's not trauma," whereas there are some thought leaders in the brain space, like the true brain health space, right?

[00:40:50] Christa Biegler, RD: So I think it's Dr. Amen. They do lots of brain scans, right? And so- 

[00:40:53] Dr. Sharon Saline: Yeah ... 

[00:40:54] Christa Biegler, RD: another type of trauma that I don't think you mentioned is physical trauma to the brain, right? 

[00:40:58] Dr. Sharon Saline: Oh, yes. You know Of course. Like a- Yes, of course ... 

[00:40:59] Christa Biegler, RD: concussion. Re- very like- ... all of these head trauma things. And so I think that's what he's saying with...

[00:41:05] Christa Biegler, RD: I feel like I heard a clip of him in an interview, and it got my brain rolling, and then it's been interesting 'cause different people have different opinions of course, as they do. And so it's is it hereditary? Is there potentially a trauma impact? And if you think of, it would make sense if there was brain damage that you- of course

[00:41:21] Christa Biegler, RD: would not produce things. Of 

[00:41:22] Dr. Sharon Saline: course. So I was thinking outside of the brain damage category. Yeah, makes sense. But of course with brain damage, yes.

[00:41:27] Christa Biegler, RD: But isn't if you have complex trauma, if you're having trauma in general, aren't we seeing shrinking of things in the brain anyway? Yes. Isn't some of that same stuff happening regardless?

[00:41:38] Dr. Sharon Saline: Yes. Actually, there's been some studies. There was one, sort of famous study maybe 20 years ago, of children who were raised in Russian orphanages. Like around the age of two to five maybe or something there, that there, there were brain scans of their brains and scans of children with ADHD.

[00:41:56] Dr. Sharon Saline: And, they had some similarities in areas of the brains that were smaller, including the corpus callosum, which is like what I call the super highway that connects- ... the left and right hemispheres, and really manages the integration of details and how we understand the gestalt of something, the overall sense that combines both sides of our brain.

[00:42:18] Dr. Sharon Saline: And there are other areas as well. So I think that's something that we see, too, that sometimes trauma can look like ADHD, and sometimes ADHD and trauma overlap. 

[00:42:30] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. Yeah. I think the bottom line is we're all out here trying to survive. 

[00:42:34] Dr. Sharon Saline: We all are. 

[00:42:36] Christa Biegler, RD: And we all have executive function.

[00:42:38] Christa Biegler, RD: And we've covered quite a lot. I really appreciate how you've covered it. We talked through some of what's happening in the brain and the neurotransmitters to start. We talked a little bit about the difference between males and females and how that presents a bit. We went all over the place with executive functioning skills and making sure we unpacked...

[00:42:55] Christa Biegler, RD: I think this is the best version of unpacking that diagnosis and why it can feel like I'm sorting through stuff to come up with it. 

Daily Tools and Final Wrap

[00:43:02] Christa Biegler, RD: I think what would be maybe supportive and helpful, I was listening to an interview, and you were talking about something, little things helping with executive function specific to children, but I actually think it's specific to all people, and I think you've given examples along the way.

[00:43:15] Christa Biegler, RD: But one of them that stuck out to me, as we do when we listen to something, it's is there something that resonates with me here? I heard you talk about, studying in the same place. And it was really interesting for me, because I had a sort of a weird phenomenon where this is- it's a silly thing, but I was trying to get work done at our Airbnb cabin, and I was like could not do it.

[00:43:36] Christa Biegler, RD: I was really struggling. And the person I was working with at the time was like, "Oh, that makes sense, 'cause your brain does not associate this place with doing that work overall." And so it stuck out to me. And so would you leave us with just a few things, since we all have executive function, will you leave us with a few things, maybe you've already discussed some of them, around helping people improve?

[00:43:54] Christa Biegler, RD: Just practical things they can do daily- Sure ... that can support them for improving executive function. Of 

[00:43:57] Dr. Sharon Saline: course. So I mentioned a few of them. Making lists is very helpful. But what isn't helpful is if you do a brain dump, and you have a list of 20 items. I'm looking at one in front of me.

[00:44:07] Dr. Sharon Saline: That is not that helpful, even though I tell myself I shouldn't do it, but I do it anyway. I put everything out there, and then I'm overwhelmed. I'm like, "Ugh, how am I gonna get all this done?" So what you wanna do is do that brain dump, make your list of 20 items, and then take the top three and put them on another piece of paper, or a different tab, or a different note in your phone, and do those three things.

[00:44:29] Dr. Sharon Saline: And then go back to the main list and take the next three. And the - the three things that you're gonna take have to do with time. What is the nearest deadline? Those are the things you have to address first. The ones that are a little bit further away, you can probably put off. So that's the first thing that I think would help.

[00:44:48] Dr. Sharon Saline: Oh, I forgot a very important executive functioning skill, I'm so glad. Prioritization. Oh, my goodness, planning and prioritizing. That is the one. I was like, "I knew I forgot one," and that was the one. And so I've just given you one of my interventions for that, which is that idea that you do that brain dump, then you prioritize what based on urgency, and then you go back to your list.

[00:45:15] Dr. Sharon Saline: Oh, phew. I would not- Yeah ... wanna end this interview with forgetting that. 

[00:45:19] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. 

[00:45:20] Dr. Sharon Saline: The second thing dealing with, working memory or forgetfulness. I think if you can - give yourself a voice memo or to remember something, or in the midst of a conversation, if you're concerned, write it down, or if you, the person lets you record it.

[00:45:36] Dr. Sharon Saline: That can be helpful. But the other thing is making sure that you set up alerts, alarms, notifications for places you need to be, things you wanna do. You don't rely on yourself to do that organically. And then the third thing is if you are having trouble getting started on a project then that means that the task is too big.

[00:45:58] Dr. Sharon Saline: So you have to chunk it. And a lot of people roll their eyes like, "Ugh, I hate doing that," but it really makes a difference. So in one of those tasks, those three tasks, are there elements to each task that you wanna identify rather than the whole task, which you might not be able to do at one time?

[00:46:16] Dr. Sharon Saline: So those would be some takeaways. And then the last thing would be about improving that self-evaluation metacognition. So to ask yourself, "How am I doing right now?" "What's going well? What might I like to change?" You can do that in the midst of a quiet moment. You don't wanna do it in the midst of a party or a gathering or an interview because you're gonna drift off and not pay attention.

[00:46:43] Dr. Sharon Saline: But to be able give yourself some acknowledgement of things that went pretty well or well enough, and one thing that you might wanna change, without making a list of 10 things you wanna change, so that there's a little bit more balance. Dr. Barbara Fredrickson and her colleagues at the University of Pennsylvania around 2010 did a lot of research on positivity, and what they found is that the ideal ratio In all environments would be three positives for every negative.

[00:47:11] Dr. Sharon Saline: John Gottman and his colleagues said in romantic relationships, it needs to be five to one, but I'm sticking with the three to one, 'cause it's a little bit easier. And to remember that we need that. We all need that. Whether you have ADHD or you're neurodivergent or not, that sense of validating what's going well and what's working.

[00:47:31] Christa Biegler, RD: Yeah. I think sometimes it's easy to skip over that part, right? And part of it is because I think a very common human tendency is to only evaluate something when it's not going right, and I just see that from working with humans. I notice- ... I'm like, "Oh, yeah, actually, you're not even filling out your eval forms until something's not okay."

[00:47:46] Christa Biegler, RD: It's like- ... it would be cool if we did it at regular intervals, guys so we can actually measure what's going well as well. And then I always ask them to pull out... It's so common, so human, for us to only pull out the negative and never pulling out the positive there. So all of these things, to reiterate, ADHD exacerbates these things, makes them hard, but these, this is actually a topic for all of us all the time.

[00:48:08] Dr. Sharon Saline: It really is. It is, and I, it, I think because we share what Dr. Kristen Neff calls this common humanity. 

[00:48:17] Christa Biegler, RD: I like that. I like that a lot. Dr. Saline, where can people find you online? What would you want to leave people with today? 

[00:48:25] Dr. Sharon Saline: You can find me on my website, https://www.drsharonsaline.com/. Sign up for my newsletter.

[00:48:32] Dr. Sharon Saline: It comes out twice a month. I don't sell my emails to anybody, and it's just about, there's always a blog on a related topic and some things that are going on in my world and in the ADHD world. And check me out on socials. It's @drsharonsaline, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn. You can find me in all those places.

[00:48:55] Christa Biegler, RD: Perfect. Thank you so much for coming on today. 

[00:48:57] Dr. Sharon Saline: Thank you so much for having me.

[00:48:59] Christa Biegler, RD: Thanks for listening to this week's show. For all the links mentioned in this episode, from submitting your questions and comments to picking up The Cortisol Reset or Finally Focused: Mental Clarity on Demand, you can find all of those links in the show notes below this episode. See you next week