Episode 176: ADHD and the Black neurodivergent community — with Rickey Z

The episode transcript is below.

Carolyn Kiel: Welcome to Beyond 6 Seconds, the podcast that goes beyond the six second first impression to share the extraordinary stories of neurodivergent people. I’m your host, Carolyn Kiel.

On today’s episode, I’m speaking with Rickeya Ware, also known as Rickey Z, a Pre-K special education teacher who started her podcast management business in 2020. She’s a co-host on Woe Nelly Media’s Geekin’ Out and is in partnership with ADHD + Black, an up and coming organization whose mission is to provide support and resources for the Black neurodivergent community.

Rickey Z was diagnosed with ADHD at the age of 30 while in the process of coming to terms with untreated depression and anxiety. Rickey Z, welcome to the podcast.

Rickey Z: Thank you. Thanks for having me.

Carolyn Kiel: So happy to have you here today. So how did you discover that you have ADHD?

Rickey Z: It was very eye opening. So like you mentioned, I’m a special education teacher. So when I was 30, I was still working with K through 5 special education students. Interrelated is what they call it. So kids would be pull out to my classroom or I’d go into their classroom. And a few years prior, I was dealing with the aftermath of some untreated depression, anxiety, an episode where like I tried to get on medication for it. And then, thinking about my students that I worked with, many of which were like third, fourth, fifth graders, a lot of ’em were boys, but looking over like their paperwork and like the evaluations that they were given, and like a lot of it came up with like “executive dysfunction.” I was like, Okay, I’m looking at this definition and I’m seeing some of these symptoms, these traits. I’m like, I have that! Maybe that’s how a, a little boy in elementary school might have them, but it, it shows up.

And then I talked to my psychiatrist. And there wasn’t very much testing done for me. Or maybe it was testing and like my ADHD brain was like, Eh, what is this? It was one of those computer tests, those computer assessments where you had to like click on the mouse whenever you saw something or heard a sound. And sitting there and thinking about it, I’m like, Oh yeah, this is whatever. Apparently I didn’t do as well as I thought I did! Like, yeah, there’s some signs of inattentiveness. Okay, cool. But I was officially diagnosed by my primary care physician shortly after turning 30, and it was very eye-opening because there were parts of my childhood where I could clearly see like, yeah, that makes sense, thinking back about it now. But then it became so clear after having children. So I think like having post-partum depression really like kicked it into high gear.

Carolyn Kiel: Oh. Yeah. We mentioned in your bio that you initially had started the journey when you were getting treated for anxiety and depression. Was that around the birth of your children or was that sort of a lifelong thing that you were getting treated with?

Rickey Z: So it was shortly after having my second child. So I have two kids. One is 10 and my youngest is six. And so when my youngest was probably about three, I was dealing with a lot of the overwhelm of being a teacher and being a parent of two young children. And if you are a teacher, especially for a special education teacher, like there’s so much riding on like paperwork and data and like the legal aspect and you know, dealing with higher ups, that it was very stressful to a point where, like it, I had an episode to where I had to be treated. And coming to terms with that and getting the diagnosis of depression and anxiety, it made me realize that there were some other things, underlying characteristics that I had that contributed to that. And that just being a parent, becoming a mother really exacerbated those traits for me.

Carolyn Kiel: Mm-hmm. I’d imagine it’s the additional stress of, of caring for small people and it’s a big change in your life and your routines and everything.

Rickey Z: Yes, yes. Absolutely. And it’s crazy because even now, like my children are still elementary age kids and then like you’re working with elementary age children and then taking like two of them home with you and it’s like, it’s never ending.

Carolyn Kiel: Oh yeah, absolutely. Now that you realize that you have ADHD, kind of looking back on your own childhood growing up, I guess, what was it like growing up as a Black girl with undiagnosed ADHD?

Rickey Z: Thinking back on it, there’s many moments where I realize like the things that I do now for myself that people would consider positive traits were more like trauma responses, growing up. So the ability to be hyper independent. And I grew up in a, for the most part, a single parent household. And so that hyper independency, this kind of like, not necessarily feeling you can rely on the adults in your life to, to help you with certain things that you end up being like, “Oh, well you know what? With a little bit of research, I can figure it out and do it on my own.” And that’s become a thing for me throughout my life. And it’s been helpful, and then sometimes it’s been harmful.

Managing my time. School, I was always an okay student. It became harder in high school. Certain things that I enjoyed didn’t really interest me as much as it should have, to the point where like, I would struggle. College, I would do okay because of the newness of college when I was a freshman. But then when things started to pile up and bog down, like I would tend to crumble under the pressure and not do as well as I should have done. By the grace of God I graduated! But, but you know, that, that was something that, like, looking back on it, it made me think like, yeah, that should make sense.

And then as an adult, I struggle with managing my finances. I still do. Like even with this knowledge of having ADHD, like it, it makes sense for me now, but like having that knowledge, I’m like, Oh, this is why I’ve always struggled with this. And like impulses and impulse buying and forgetting that I have like this subscription to this thing that I had a free trial to like a year ago, and it’s, I’m still being charged for it.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah. It’s interesting looking back, I guess, and seeing like, like, oh, that’s how this all ties together!

Rickey Z: Right.

Carolyn Kiel: I imagine it kind of helps make sense in some ways looking back of a lot of things in your life.

Rickey Z: It is. And when I was officially diagnosed where it was not necessarily a load lifted off of me. It was more like a understanding that I’m not really lazy! I actually can be very motivated in certain instances. It’s just, it, it takes a different approach for me to get there. And it’s not like how everyone expects it to be. And that’s ok. And what’s been great about it and also kind of hard is that it, knowing this about myself and figuring out the things that work for me, it has influenced my, my teaching. How I interact with my students, how I work with my students, how I talk about my students with my colleagues that might necessarily not understand it. And not just like being someone with ADHD. But like I have lots of students right now that have autism and just any type of neurodivergency, like understanding, like there’s a reason why they’re having these struggles. And then it also makes me rethink my parenting as well. I see some traits in my oldest, my daughter, that I see in myself, and I have to really stop and think about how I respond to her and think like, don’t respond to her in a way that a typical parent, your parent, another adult in your life has ever responded to you. You need to do something differently for her, because those same traits that you see in her are in you.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And you had mentioned before that a lot of the special education students that you teach, you said a lot of them are boys, so I kind of wonder if that’s part of it too. I feel like boys, certainly when I was growing up, and maybe even now get flagged earlier or more often for, their own, you know, either neurodivergencies or other conditions than girls do. I don’t know if, is that still the case these days?

Rickey Z: Yeah, it, it still is. I can tell you right now in my, this is my eighth year teaching a preschool special education class. I live in the state of Georgia and so the state of Georgia has this program called Babies Can’t Wait. If a child’s been identified with certain delays before the age of three, they can receive interventions like speech, OT, physical therapy. And then by the time they turn three, they can be evaluated in their school district through another program called Bright from the Start. And they can start school or start going to school or receive special education services as young as three years old. So even now, I have seven students currently. It always grows. Right now there’s more boys than girls. There’s always been more boys than girls when I’ve taught K through five. There’s always been more boys than girls, and maybe like one or two girls and then the rest of them are boys.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah. It’s interesting because neurodivergence and learning disabilities and other conditions I think are probably much more evenly balanced across genders

Rickey Z: Right.

Carolyn Kiel: Than, than we see. So, Yeah.

Rickey Z: And I think because when you think about how boys are, are treated in school, like, it’s usually like a behavior issue. And yes, that affects them academically. But with girls it always seems it has to be even more extreme

Carolyn Kiel: Mm-hmm.

Rickey Z: a lot of the times for them to get noticed. Especially when, like, when you’re thinking like ADHD girls, the flighty, maybe talkative or super daydreamy type of child, that’s considered just a girl, a woman, girl trait. But it could be something deeper than that. And so a lot of times girls like myself get, you know, they go under the radar. And like I said before, like when I, especially when I was younger, like I was a pretty okay student, so there was no real cause for concern as far as school, but like everywhere else outside of life, there should have been some, some clue.

Carolyn Kiel: Mm-hmm. Yeah, exactly. So, knowing that you have ADHD, did it change the way that you treated or approached your depression and anxiety? Like was there any change in that once you had this realization?

Rickey Z: Yes. All the above. I had to really think about and understand that like some of the things that would be considered like part of my depression, it’s really likely executive dysfunction. So if I know that I’m not going anywhere and I’m really in a bad mood and I stay home, like taking care of myself tends to be harder, it’s a lot of steps to go through to get up in the morning, especially when you don’t have any motivation to get somewhere. So if I know it’s not a work day, like the steps of getting up, taking a shower, getting dressed, brush your teeth, you know, all those things seem like a lot, unless I have somewhere to be.

And then with the anxiety, I’ve had to learn that there are things that I can’t take home with me, particularly as a, a teacher. The teachers now they’re talking about how, like we work so much outside of our contract hours, and I had to make myself stop. Because number one, even the idea of bringing my work computer home would stress me out because I knew that there was so much I needed to get done on my computer and I would dread it. And then I’d feel bad cause I’d be too engrossed in trying to finish whatever the work was, and then I wouldn’t be able to finish it. And then I’d be stressed throughout the school week. And at some point I was like, No, I, I can’t. The fact that like these past couple of years I’ve been able to leave my computer at school, like on my desk, like, shut it off, unplug it, leave it there as is, it’s been so relaxing. It’s been so, like, it’s taken a burden off my shoulders just to be like, I have to leave my computer at school. I cannot take this home. Because number one, it’s gonna sit in my backpack. And the fact that I know it’s in my backpack waiting for me to work on it is, is too much for me.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah, having that strong division between work and home.

Rickey Z: And it took a lot like because, making sure that like I don’t stay at school two hours after my contracted time was hard to do because it’d be so easy just to stay there, work on stuff. I could put something on my smart board for my kids to watch while I’m working on something else, on the other part of my screen.

But no, I’m gonna shut off my computer like at best, 10 to 15 minutes after my contract hours, I’ll stay. But no, we’re going, we’re leaving now. We’re going home. We’re gonna spend time together. My kids have other things they gotta do after school. Like we’re, we’re not staying here.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah. It’s good to have that separation. Yeah. In, in some ways, even since like 2020 when a lot of us started working from home, I think we lost a lot of that separation. So that is a challenge to kind of bring that back and make sure you maintain it.

Rickey Z: Right, right. And the balance between, like not spending your time holed up on your computer while at home is, has been a struggle lately. But I think that like with, with the business that I’m doing, it’s easier to kind of just like spend some time on it and then step away, easily schedule some things to work on or post and then go be a real person out in the real world.

Carolyn Kiel: Mm-hmm. So you’re a special education teacher and you also have your own podcast management business.

Rickey Z: Yes, I’ve been spending the summer like trying to find better ways to organize my time or create systems for myself that allow me to work efficiently and not have to work twice as hard to get like the same amount of work done.

Carolyn Kiel: Mm-hmm. Yeah. I think just, you know, systemizing and, and automating and everything you can do to just try to conserve and preserve your time. Absolutely.

Rickey Z: Mm-hmm.

Carolyn Kiel: So what inspired you to start your podcast management business?

Rickey Z: Ooh, this was, this was a bit of a journey in like a short amount of time though, but it was a really great journey. I started off my business, so Rickey Z Social Media, wanting to be a social media manager. It went from wanting to be a virtual assistant, to focusing on social media. And then a college friend of mine, the founder of Woe Nelly Media, he had started his digital media business probably about not too far away from me starting mine. And he had a podcast, it was a video podcast and he had asked me to be a guest on one episode with some other people. And so from there, like we did the episode and we were like, this is super fun! And this is where we got the show that I co-host now, Geekin’ Out.

And so we would do that like every week. And I would help him with little things like creating graphics for the episode, creating audiograms and video highlights of each episode, and then like helping with production. And we use StreamYard to broadcast the live stream. And so like, I would help with the backstage stuff and I, and I love, love that stuff. And I love learning about that stuff. And so it went from me focusing on social media, which, you know, I still did the social media part, but nicheing in further into podcasting. And so from there I was like, this is, this is where I’m at right now. This is what I like doing. I love doing the production, the editing, the content repurposing, all that stuff.

Carolyn Kiel: Oh, that’s great. And when you started doing podcasting production with your friend, was that your first venture into podcasting?

Rickey Z: Yes, actually. Yeah. And it was, it was such a good time. It was just, it went for me just kind of being a guest to being a co-host, to practically be like in a production manager, and now like, I still have my separate business, but I work with him a lot with other projects. So we still have Geekin’ Out going on. I started working on another project for Woe Nelly Media called Scream Kings, where one of our co-hosts for Geekin’ Out and his friends talk about horror and film and TV and things like that. And it’s been really great to just like prerecord some shows and get to start editing and start creating more things like, And that show should be premiering October. So it’s been fun to like just be a producer.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah. Well that’s great. Yeah. All the behind the scenes and there’s so much that goes into putting together a podcast. I think if you’re not a podcaster, you may not realize it, but there’s quite a lot of things that go into it.

Rickey Z: And I think that also kind of like satisfied the, the dopamine chasing that I have! Because there’s so much to learn. My coworkers at the school that I work at, they call me the tech guru. I’m not really a techie person. I just, when literally left to my own devices, I learn to play around with stuff. And so, like, I just happened to know a few things here and there that help people out. So, being able to learn about editing and production and podcasting in general, it’s been a great entertaining, but also like, it’s ever growing. The industry is still growing. There’s so much to learn, so like, I’m kind of in my element.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah. I feel like, especially with my own podcast, it’s like, all right, I always have something interesting to do. It’s like, okay, there’s like 20 different things I could do. Pick like the one right now that is the most interesting and do that.

Rickey Z: Yes. The amount of like little courses that I take and like little groups that I join and like I’ve learned so much along the way, like I’m still learning and so it keeps it fresh for me. I think that that really helps with, with the ADHD. Like there’s so much that still is fresh and still for me to learn in the process.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah. And you also have, you know, as we mentioned in your bio, you have a partnership around putting together some podcasting, video programming around neurodiversity itself. So yeah, tell me about your partnership with ADHD + Black and the show that you work on with them.

Rickey Z: Awesome. Yes. Oh, ADHD + Black is an organization that was founded by a friend that I met via Facebook in another podcasting group. Her name’s Tara G. Noire. She’s out in Texas, so hey Tara! She had made a post on Facebook asking if someone with ADHD is interested in podcasts that could help her out and get her started. And what started from just that simple Facebook page like expanded to this whole friendship that we were working this organization. So ADHD + Black was gonna be this podcast. She started talking about her journey similar to mine being, you know, diagnosed with ADHD as a Black woman later in life. And we were just kind of, kind of getting her ready and getting her prepped for all that stuff.

And then I was thinking of something similar, but hers was gonna be more of an audio podcast and I was gonna do video. We’ve decided to kind of combine our efforts to create Black Girls Hyperfocus, which we started doing a little bit during the summer. We have about six or seven episodes right now, and it was really fun to get started on. So we did a lot of the graphics and promoting and topics in hand. And, you know, and most like with a lot of things with ADHD, like things kind of like peter out for a little bit because you just kind of feel like you’re overwhelming. There’s so much you can, there’s so many like options that she could do to make things work, that I think it was a bit overwhelming for the both of us! So we got like five or six episodes in and then we are on a pause right now. But what we did for that little while was great because it helped me better understand some of my own, like issues with neurodiversity particularly being a Black woman.

But the main part of ADHD + Black was mainly focusing on restorative justice for Black neurodivergence. Because being neurodivergent and Black does affect your life socially and how the world perceives you. And with that in mind, we’ll be thinking about things like police brutality and, and things like that. Like the consequences, the effects of being a person of color and neurodivergent can be almost fatal. And it’s really hard when you don’t have the resources to help combat that. And like we mentioned earlier, a lot of the times when we are thinking of people with disabilities, particularly with ADHD, like we’re thinking of the research that’s mostly about young white males. So that’s already the spectrum of that. And then you have to consider like when we think of like Black children that are being diagnosed, particularly Black boys, like they’re considered aggressive and trouble makers, the school to prison pipeline, things like that. And so when you consider what that means for someone who’s made it through school and is an adult now, it’s really stressful and hard when you don’t have the resources to help you out. So that was the point of ADHD + Black was to, for us to start curating more, more resources for Black neurodivergence.

Carolyn Kiel: Right. That’s great. There’s so much intersectionality with identities and neurodiversity, certainly with race and with gender and even with age because,

Rickey Z: Mm-hmm.

Carolyn Kiel: a lot of people grew up without realizing that they had certain conditions or they were misdiagnosed. The whole thing with Black boys being perceived more aggressive, I’ve heard that they tend to get more like an Oppositional Defiant Disorder diagnosis when it’s really ADHD or autism or something else.

Rickey Z: Yeah, and that’s been really conflicting as a special education teacher where you have that knowledge in the back of your mind about how a lot of Black boys are misdiagnosed. Or they’re quickly defined as oppositional defiant, and then that that label goes with them throughout their school. Like, think of how many children that are diagnosed or labeled with emotional behavior disturbances. And it’s really more complex than that.

Carolyn Kiel: Absolutely. Yeah. So it’s great that you’re starting to create and curate these resources for people to learn more about that, because there needs to be a lot more resources out there than there are now.

Rickey Z: There needs to be a lot more resources. There needs to be a lot more research done. there’s so much more that hasn’t been done. There’s some steps taken. It’s particularly like when you look at the research for women in general, you know, because ADHD in a lot of women doesn’t look like what it looks like for little white males, for young white males. So think about what that means for a young Black female or even someone in their thirties and they’re realizing, Oh wait, I’ve been, I’ve been coping for the majority of my life. This is why this is the way it is for me.

Carolyn Kiel: Absolutely. Yeah. So that’s great that you’re creating that and hopefully there is going to be more research on, you know, more than just the young white boys that we’ve been focusing on with ADHD and autism and pretty much almost everything in the medical model.

So what kind of response have you received from people who have listened to your shows?

Rickey Z: So with Geekin’ Out, of course, it’s very nichey. But with ADHD + Black, I feel like we’re tapping into something that a lot of people have not realized yet. Because you know, this whole idea of it’s being diagnosed later in life. And I kind of take it back to how people say they’re looking at TikTok, how a lot people realize that they were neurodivergent by watching TikTok and Reels, and it’s like, yeah, there’s a reason for that.

And so we’re kind of tapping into that area, but also with that niche of like, we’re looking at how it affects Black neurodivergence and how society kind of prevents us from getting those resources and then that treatment that’s needed or it just doesn’t really like match up to how we are culturally.

Carolyn Kiel: I think sometimes the TikTok algorithm is better at diagnostics than like some of the research that’s been done!

Rickey Z: It is! It’s crazy to think about. Because like even now, like it’s becoming more of a search engine than, than Google is sometimes.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah, no, really. There’s a, a lot of people, as you said, realizing that they’re neurodivergent on TikTok and other social media and building communities there as well.

I think that’s another thing with social media is that, you know, almost everyone I talk to who’s late diagnosed kind of felt like they were the only person who was going through this or who, you know, responded this way. And then you meet like all these people who have like very, in some ways very similar stories. So I think social media helps kind of bring everyone together, at least make everyone aware of each other.

Rickey Z: Yeah. And, and that was also part of the mission, is part of the mission of ADHD + Black is building that community to make sure that people feel like they’re not alone, they’re not the only ones, and there are people out there to help them. To help support them, give them guidance, resources. Like, they’re not alone. That’s the most important.

Carolyn Kiel: Yeah, absolutely. And I think you’ve already mentioned a few things here, but what are your goals overall for your shows and your neurodiversity advocacy in general?

Rickey Z: My goal number one is to support other neurodivergents, particularly people of color, even more so women, Black women in, in general. Understanding that they are not alone. That there are others there to support them.

I’m into sharing other stories. I want to be the one to back up the storyteller. That’s part of the reason why I, I love doing what I do with podcasting, doing all this stuff in the background. I’ll do all this stuff that, that you don’t find interesting at all, because I love it. And you can focus on telling your story and sharing your life with others.

Carolyn Kiel: Right. That’s awesome. Yeah, and those roles are so important because yeah, very different skill sets. So it’s just a great complementary skill and, and really gonna help a lot of people, make it easier for them to share their stories and connect. Absolutely.

Wow. Yeah. Well, Rickey Z, thank you so much for being on my show today. How can people get in touch with you if they wanna learn more about the type of work that you do?

Rickey Z: Oh my goodness. So you can find me on Instagram at Rickey Z, that’s R I C K E Y Z social. Also on TikTok as Rickey Z, R I C K E Y Z underscore, as well as on Twitch, R I C K E Y Z, underscore. Rickey Z.

Carolyn Kiel: Okay, perfect. I’ll put links in the show notes so people can find it there too.

Rickey Z: Thank you.

Carolyn Kiel: And yeah, as we close out, is there anything else that you’d like our listeners to know or anything that they can help or support you with?

Rickey Z: Oh, goodness. Be kind to your teachers out there, y’all! So I know we talked about podcasting, but like, as a, as a teacher, we’re all in there for the same reasons. We all want what’s best for our children, and also our children with disabilities just, you know, be kind to our teachers. We wanna be kind to y’all. And we’re, we’re all working towards the same goal.

Carolyn Kiel: Absolutely. Yeah. Rickey Z, you’re doing great work, one as a special education teacher, and as a podcast manager.

Rickey Z: I appreciate that.

Carolyn Kiel: Helping people so much. So that’s great. Yeah. Thank you again for being on my show today.

Rickey Z: Thank you.

Carolyn Kiel: Thanks for listening to Beyond 6 Seconds. Please help me spread the word about this podcast. Share it with a friend, give it a shout out on your social media or write a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast player. You can find all of my episodes and sign up for my free newsletter at beyond6seconds.net. Until next time.