from the director's chair

Artemis Director/ADHD coach Tara Carman-French shares sentiments about being on the other side of ADHD coaching​

Recently, my husband and I were out at a concert at a local venue we adore. It’s a 100-year-old downtown theatre that they have updated and renovated into a beautiful concert and theatre space. As a recovering thespian, I have worked in numerous theatres, all of them having their own beauty and scars. My favourite was a renovated theatre in Calgary. Another 100+ year old space where they had kept amazing parts of the original and incorporated them into the new site. I have a significant soft spot for old theatres. It has been almost 15 years since I worked in theatre, and I miss it. I love what I do now, but I still miss my old life.

On the stage screens, during the intermission, the theatre announced that they will be closing in December 2024. We were devastated. For a moment.

Then my entrepreneurial, ADHD brain kicked into high gear. What if we bought the theatre? My husband and I discussed this, jokingly, until the band started up again. Then, I spent the first few songs running the numbers and working through how I could actually make it work. It stopped being a joke and I wanted to figure out how to make it a reality. I missed out on some good tunes, but I became unreasonably excited about the prospect of running a theatre. It was a dream of mine for so long!

The idea ran around in the back of my mind for the remainder of the weekend. It took a backseat on Monday when I finally got back to work and greeted my staff and started working with my clients.

Eventually, after seeing a few of my clients, I realized there is no way that I am walking away from this work.

My job is to work myself out of a job. My clients aren’t supposed to work with me forever. I help them to learn to manage their ADHD on their own and how to establish a strong toolkit of skills that will enable them to achieve their goals on their terms.

It is bittersweet when a client “graduates” from working with me. I am so excited to see them move on, but I will miss them. We have established a wonderful working relationship, and I will miss hearing about their life, their struggles and their successes. It is a joy to hear from clients who touch base after having graduated from our sessions.

I also remembered that my work has an added, unexpected, and unplanned benefit for me and my clients.

I wear an Oura ring. Among other things, it monitors my stress level during the day. When I first received it, I noticed that at many points during the day, I was in a restorative state. Even if I was in a stressed state, suddenly, I would move to a restorative place. This just happened to coincide with my coaching sessions. I realized that when I am coaching my clients, they often arrive in an elevated state. They may be excited or stressed, or they may need to have a “brain dump” before they can begin effective work. The information from the Oura clearly shows that I naturally move to a restorative state so that I can be fully present for my clients. My calm, open, and fully present state offers them the space to decompress, find their centre, and create effective change.

My work with my clients helps them heal while helping me heal! This is truly rewarding work on all levels.

I loved theatre. The majority of young people who start out in theatre end up moving on to other work due to the stress, alongside poor remuneration. There is a reason they call them “starving artists.” I could be a starving artist again. I could give owning and running my own theatre a try. There are literally TONS of things that I could be doing to make a living. I’m neurodiverse. I am interested in a MILLION professions.

I would grieve the loss of client interaction. I would miss the satisfaction of watching my client’s blossom. I would miss my staff and watching their joy as they work with their clients.

Sometimes, it takes us a long time to find out where we belong. A friend who spoke at my wedding compared my life journey to a labyrinth. It sometimes looked as if I was walking backward and pretty much everyone doubted me, but I have been moving forward this whole time. Perhaps this is why I can hold restorative space for my clients. I viscerally understand that we can trust their intuition on personal journey. A