ADHD talk that aims for 10% better, not perfect.
Brendan Mahan introduces himself as an ADHD professional with more than a decade in the field, and he talks with coaches, authors and peers about friendship, creativity, goals and fatherhood. The tone stays loose and practical, and his sign-off keeps coming back to one modest target: improvement over perfection.
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ADHD Essentials is a conversational podcast about living with ADHD, hosted by Brendan Mahan. He introduces himself as an ADHD professional with more than a decade in the field, a board member of the Men's ADHD Support Group and the author of Overcoming the Wall of Awful. The talk is relaxed. Words like 'dope' and 'tally ho' sit comfortably beside serious points about burnout, school and feeling rejected. Guests bring much of the material. ADHD coach Bradley Smith II makes the counterintuitive case that fewer options can make a person more creative, and he uses Dr. Seuss as his example. He also names the grief of letting go of the ideas, hobbies and projects an ADHD brain keeps producing, which is more than any one life can hold. Caroline Maguire's conversation about friendship for neurodivergent adults takes up rejection sensitivity, described as the story a person tells when they already feel vulnerable. It also covers the everyday skill of reading the room. With Cate Osborn and Erik Gude, the subject is a book they wrote together, including a list of small ways to ask for help that they labelled, without apology, big and disorganized. Mahan's own family runs through the show. His sons, Nate and Gavin, find loud concerts overwhelming, and he describes how outdoor venues and earplugs became the workaround. In a fatherhood conversation billed as a DadDHD SimulPod, he recalls asking one of his sons what he needed after a slip at school, and hearing that he just needed to see it. The solo episode 'Thoughts on ADHD & Goals for 2026' is franker still. Mahan explains how two goals he set when his sons were born, a black belt in Kempo and a book, were reached eleven years behind schedule. He links the long stall at brown belt to the years when his teaching career ended and he rebuilt himself through ADHD coaching and a second master's in counseling, and he tells it as a round of Storytime with Mr. B. The show also travels. 'ROUGH CUT: ADHD Con 2025 Day 1' is a group debrief recorded at the ADHD Conference. The microphone, which is really Mahan's laptop, passes among friends including Jessica McCabe of the HowToADHD YouTube channel and psychotherapist Inger Shea-Colsey. It is as unpolished as the label promises, and one participant calls the conference a once-a-year benchmark for checking their own growth. Asking for help comes up more than once, from the list in that book to a conference voice admitting how hard it is to accept help and put things down. The sign-off thanks the listener for staying focused all the way through and restates the show's working motto: improvement over perfection, because 10% better is all you need.
Made for: Suits a listener managing ADHD in their own life or their family's who wants practical, good-humoured conversation instead of clinical instruction. It also fits anyone who prefers advice aimed at steady progress over perfection.
What sets it apart: Mahan sets his own life next to the expert advice, from his sons' struggles with loud venues to goals that ran eleven years late. The show has also taken its microphone to an ADHD conference for loose, many-voiced debriefs.
In ADHD Essentials, Brendan Mahan, M.Ed., M.S. interviews parents, teachers and experts to get their views on ADHD in childhood, and how it affects families.
Brendan Mahan treats a failing essay as a problem to solve; your inner critic could use office hours.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A grounded conversation about friendship as practice, mutual accommodation, and the quiet win of showing up.
Friendship comes across here as something people can practice, not a mysterious trait some adults simply have. Caroline McGuire's approach, centered on making friends as a skill for neurodiverse adults, gives the conversation a practical frame as it moves through rejection…
A thoughtful conversation about ADHD-friendly reading, clearer communication, and learning to trust one's own words.
Brendan Mahan's conversation with Katie Osborne and Eric Goud treats The ADHD Field Guide for Adults as more than a useful book. It opens into a grounded discussion about reading, communication, and the small but real confidence involved in trusting what one means.
A fatherhood conversation turns teaching habits into a practical lens for parenting with curiosity.
ADHD Essentials gives this episode to a DadDHD conversation where Brendan Mahan links fatherhood with a teacher's habit of asking what a child is missing before judging the struggle.
A thoughtful ADHD conversation about creative limits, grief, and ambitions that can change shape.
Restrictions do not usually feel like an artistic gift, but this episode finds a useful tension in having fewer choices. ADHD coach Bradley Smith and host Brendan Mahan talk through limits as a way an ADHD mind can work with itself, moving from Dr.
A loose ADHD conference debrief finds its value in candid talk about support, community, and accepting help.
The episode begins as a casual ADHD conference debrief, with Brendan Mahan gathering friends around a laptop for takeaways while the event is still underway.
Jonquilyn Hill chases one listener question per episode to the experts who can answer it.
Hard conversations, patiently held, with room to laugh.
Care, culture, and the choices shaping Black women's lives.
Host Brendan Mahan interviews Amanda Morin about neurodiversity, ADHD, and the impact of long COVID on executive functioning.
Brendan Mahan and Dr.
Brendan Mahan interviews Caroline McGuire about her book on friendship skills for neurodivergent adults, discussing social challenges and strategies.
Host Brendan Mahan interviews authors of an ADHD-friendly book about reading and support for adults with ADHD.
Brendan Mahan interviews parents, teachers, and experts about ADHD in childhood and its effects on families.
Host Brendan Mahan interviews ADHD coach Bradley Smith about how setting restrictions can enhance creativity and manage ADHD symptoms.
Brendan Mahan shares his delayed personal goals of earning a black belt and writing a book to discuss ADHD-related challenges with goal-setting.
Jessica McCabe breaks down over-functioning, under-functioning, and the advice to "name the pattern."
Dr. Jones' weekly teacher-signed progress report decided whether the family took an outing: "Either everybody goes or nobody goes."
Dr.
Tamara Rosier, author of 'You, Me and Our ADHD Family,' tells Brendan Mahan that important family discussions should happen only inside the 'window of tolerance,' since hyper arousal (fight) and hypo arousal (flight and freeze) undermine them.
Brendan Mahan interviews Dr.
Brendan Mahan interviews parents and experts about ADHD in childhood and offers coaching to improve family relationships.
Brendan Mahan discusses how adult intervention can inadvertently reinforce anxiety disorders in children, then introduces the podcast's focus on ADHD management.