SHE the CEO | Beyond the Room: Is it ADHD or Nah? A Story of the Middle-aged CEO

I am Regena Hammock. I am 57 years old. I am the founder of two nonprofits, the co-founder of a veteran housing initiative, and the principal behind an LLC that operates multiple active business series and doing business as entities spanning real estate, transcription services, delivery, and my personal brand. I am a keynote speaker, a storyteller, an author, a real estate agent, and an affordable housing specialist. I built a senior programming initiative, a youth development program, a self-care product line, published books and journals and a children's book, and a speaking platform. I have sixteen websites on web platforms right now. Sixteen. One of them was for a dog boutique...and I don't own a dog.

Yes, I once built an entire online dog boutique and I do not own a dog. I have never owned a dog. But I saw the market, I saw the gap, and before I could talk myself out of it

the site existed.

That is my brain. That has always been my brain. And until recently I could not tell you why my brain works this way.

Here is what I can tell you: I have always been the person with a hundred ideas before breakfast. The person who starts something with everything she has and then finds herself three weeks later deep in something completely different, wondering how she got there. The person whose desk, whose phone, whose entire life looks like a creative explosion that only makes sense to her...and sometimes not even to her.

I've always been passionate. I've always had drive and thought it was just the creativity of being a visionary; but sometimes I felt I lacked follow-thru...I thought it was laziness.

Maybe it is all of those things. But there is a disorder that I align to over anything else...

ADHD.

Not the stereotype but the identifiable type for my characteristics. The thing that looks like a woman who built something remarkable while simultaneously working to execute her projects. The thing that looks like executive function challenges dressed up in ambition. The thing that looks like me.

Does every obvious thing need a clinical diagnosis? If I sneeze around every dandelion, I know I'm allergic.

I am not interested in a clinical answer...the writing is clearly on the wall or should I say, the hundreds of tabs stay open.

I know there are women who can relate but don't know what or why, while privately wondering why the simplest tasks sometimes feel impossible and why the build stays stagnant because it becomes too daunting. Why the calendar does not work. Why the brilliant idea from October morphs into a different venture by December. Why executing the thing is somehow harder than starting it ever was.

I was never diagnosed as a little girl because it was unheard of and who could recognize it. We were called creative. We were thought not to be doing our best when it was just someone who did not learn in linear mode. We were called too much and not enough in the same breath. We learned to mask it, manage it, and keep moving.

And then one day we looked up and realized we had been running a marathon in the wrong shoes for decades.

If you can relate, without a diagnosis, there's help in admission even if it's not ADHD. I am here to start a conversation that I think is long overdue in rooms where women like us gather. In corporate, boardrooms, social affiliations and every other corner.

Beyond the room where everyone sees the accomplishment, there is a whole other story. This is mine.

And I have a feeling it might be yours too.

Comment "It's me" if you agree.

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Regena Hammock is a keynote, motivational, and life and business speaker, storyteller, author, nonprofit strategist, and affordable housing specialist based in the South Suburban Chicago area. She is the Founder of Helping Elevate You, Sister Inc. (HEY, Sister) and the voice behind SHE the CEO. Follow her journey at regenahammock.com.