S2E4 - When ADHD Big Ideas Meet Autistic Structure: Our Podcast Partnership

In this episode of Black Girl, Brown Girl… Squirrel!, we talk about what it’s like to build a podcast together as Neurodivergent women of color with different brains. From ADHD creativity and big-picture thinking to autistic clarity, direct communication, and systems, we explore how our friendship, communication, and collaboration make the show work.

We also get honest about the challenges, the funny moments, and the care it takes to protect the friendship while building something meaningful together. 🐿️

TIMESTAMPS

00:00 Introduction and Episode Overview
01:21 Friendship Dynamics and Neurodiversity
05:00 Creative Collaboration and Idea Generation
07:11 Social Media and Digital Boundaries
10:10 Humor and Cultural References
18:52 Communication Styles and Conversation Flow
25:21 Expectations and Responsibilities in Collaboration
33:23 Navigating Friendship and Professionalism
42:30 Respect and Care in Collaborative Ventures

RESOURCES

ADDitude Magazine: https://www.additudemag.com/

Therapist and Mental Health Resources

• Psychology Today Website: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us
• National Institute of Mental Health Website: https://www.nimh.nih.gov/

CONNECT WITH US

Join our fan page at Fanlist.com/BGBGSquirrel and share your thoughts on this episode, ask questions, or share your story. 

IG: @BGBGSquirrel

Threads: @BGBGSquirrel

Email: BGBGSquirrel@Gmail.com

RESOURCES

Mental Health Resources

• 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline
• Therapy for Black Girls
• Inclusive Therapists
• Clinicians of Color

Neurodivergent Resources

• ADDitude Magazine
• Attention Deficit Disorder Association (ADDA)
• Association for Autism & Neurodiversity (AANE)
• The Color of Autism Foundation
•  Understood
• Job Accommodation Network (JAN)

CONNECT WITH US

Fan Page: Fanlist.com/BGBGSquirrel 

IG: @BGBGSquirrel

Threads: @BGBGSquirrel

Email: BGBGSquirrel@Gmail.com

Transcript

Shai (00:00)
It's your favorite squirrels, Shai and Lex. It's time for another episode of Black Girl Brown Girl Squirrel. Hey, hey, what's up squirrel?

Lex (00:11)
Hm, ⁓ wessop.

Shai (00:18)
So how you be?

Lex (00:20)
Be good. We back, friend. Episode four. We we in here. Look at us. We actually doing it.

Shai (00:22)
Yeah, right.

We are, we are. I'm I'm pretty excited. I I gotta ⁓ it's making me look at up and in my game on my other podcast 'cause I'm like, ooh, I'm doing things over here.

Everybody keep going, you aren't you still gonna do the other podcast? Yes, I am, I am. ⁓

Anywho's in. So ⁓ yeah, so we're back. So, you know, it's it's funny because you know, we we were talking last week about, you know, the history of our friendship. In fact, in a couple of episodes, we've talked about that a little bit. But one question we do get sometimes, and we kind of explored it ourselves, I thought it'd be kind of cool for us to talk about this week, is us podcasting together with different brains.

Lex (01:21)
Mm-hmm. Different personalities. How'd that go? How that work? Get that question.

Shai (01:27)
Often.

Yes we do. Yes we do. You know, it's not e people don't even question us when it comes to the age thing. It's really y'all are like opposites. ⁓

Lex (01:40)
That's so true. No one cares about the age difference at all. They're like, whatever, you're fine.

Shai (01:48)
No,

not at all. Maybe because I'm I'm not as mature as I thought, but ⁓ and you're much more mature than but yeah, so I thought, you know, why don't we why don't we dive into that? Because, you know, part of what we talked about in the last episode was that that those of us that are neurodivergent w we kind of get each other. We don't always have to explain ourselves to each other.

Lex (01:55)
Ha ha ha.

Shai (02:17)
I think there are times when we do, don't get me wrong. ⁓ and the funny thing is we said in the first season, we just kinda collect each other.

Lex (02:25)
Yeah, accidentally. Kind of drawn to each other. It just I the other day I was like, Yo, I don't have any friends who is regular. I just can't seem to get a regular friend. No typical friends. Can't find one. And all my friends keep being ADHD. Like y'all I keep having a bunch of people who can't remember nothing, don't know what time it is, and accidentally book too many things in a day. It I just don't understand why this keeps happening to me.

Shai (02:54)
Okay, why you gotta be attacking us that's all up here on the air?

Lex (03:00)
We did that for eighteen episodes. You could take another one.

Shai (03:03)
I sure can. Another hit. ⁓ but here's my question. Like, do you even do you have any friends, like, I don't mean associates and stuff like that or acquaintances, but do you have any friends that are on the autism spectrum? Or are all your friends like basically ADHD or AUDHD?

Lex (03:24)
So

There is a friend of mine who I'm becoming closer with, like slowly, who I'm pretty sure she's on the spectrum. I don't know if she knows. ⁓ but other than this one particular person, nah all y'all jokers, ADHD. Most of those friends either have ADHD or they're probably just neurotypical.

Shai (03:50)
Most of her

Got it. I was gonna say if it's the person that I'm thinking of, yeah, I think she is too. I've thought that from the moment I met her.

Lex (04:03)
And it's in her family a lot. And that's all I'll say to not put any more details out there. So I'll just say, Yeah, girl, got it. It's on you. It's on you too. But ⁓ Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Shai (04:12)
I got you.

I got you. Well, so let let's talk about this. So what do you think has been ⁓ some of the positives of us being able to work together and having ⁓ different brains?

Lex (04:30)
Okay. The thing I think of the most is because of how you think, you can think in big picture. You think in like so many ideas. If you didn't think that way, this show would not exist. You got this idea suddenly and quickly in the car. Like that is not a thing that everyone can do. I'm gonna tell you right now, it ain't something I can do.

⁓ is so like you have ideas like that. So you have it ideas for the show in general, like where we keep our list of things that we want to talk about. The majority of that list came from you. Whether it was from you using tools to help you generate some of these or just ideas you had, you did that legwork because that's something your brain is good at doing. You the creativity that you have is something that I think is admirable. Again, I don't think everybody has that.

I know I do not. And we can kind of like be in our

In our pockets of where we thrive, we work together on here. So the running joke is that I am chronically offline. So anything that needs to be done for social media is not happening from me. It's going to have to be from you, which is great because we're good at that.

Shai (06:08)
⁓ except for when she does go on those few times to post and then she just messes up the algorithm because

Lex (06:15)
Alright,

so here's the thing. Here's the and this is why I have deleted the app off my phone. Cause here's the thing. I love me some black threads. Black threads is a hilarious place to be. So I was just lurking, I was just lurking and scrolling in black threads. And I said, you know, this ain't your this ain't your threads account. It's the show's threads account. So Shag gonna open up his app and be like, Why am I seeing all of this?

this threads lore, but I'm not seeing anything about what this show is about. It's all good. And it I was spending too much time on it too. Like it's it's easy for me to get into a habit of something and it become like all consuming. And so I have to decide if it's like, nah, I have to just kind of cut this in like completely for myself. And so having social media on my phone is just too much. Like it

Shai (06:49)
It's I opened up you know.

Lex  (07:11)
I get into like a doom scroll thing and it can literally be for hours. And so like I put that off my phone 'cause I was having a good time scrolling and laughing and stuff. But it had it got to be too much in the last few weeks and I was like, I'm about to take this off my phone, it's too much.

Shai (07:27)
I got you. And I and I was telling somebody the other day, I was like, if I did not need to have social media for my business, more than likely I would not be on it. Cause I re I it took me years to get on Facebook. Like for real. It took me years to get on Facebook. ⁓ it took me years to get on Instagram. And the only reason why I jumped on on threads was because that was a platform everybody was kind of running to. Cause I was I

For my business, I was on Twitter, Twitter and like the I tried Twitter, I was like, no, this too much. This too much. I can't shut down Twitter. I I don't I'm sure my account is probably still active, but I was like, I I can't. And then ⁓ when you know the fallout from Twitter happened and everybody was running to a new platform, they went to threads, I'm like, okay, well let me hurry up and jump on threads and start building a presence because I needed a presence for my business.

⁓ and for the podcast and all my other podcasts and stuff. So let me just go on and jump on this while everybody's running over there. and I still haven't been on TikTok, but I think I'm gonna have to get there at some point. just because it's a good growth platform for the podcast. But if other than that, I wouldn't I don't think I would be on it.

⁓ because it is addicting, you can do scroll. You'll be like, I'm gonna be on here for a few minutes and look up and it's like an hour later, and you'll be like, dang, I could have did so much other stuff. Okay, well, let me keep Doom Scrolling because And I'm like, no. but I do have to say this. ⁓ so it may not even still be a a thing by the time that this episode airs, but I happen to go on my personal threats today.

Lex (09:02)
Ha ha.

Shai (09:19)
And most of the time my algorithm is giving me stuff like, you know, people talking about like K-pop. I got some about ADHD and some other things. But one of the I don't even know if I follow this person, but one of the things that popped up that was definitely trending on black threads was this whole ⁓ Usher Chris Brown concert and the alternative names that they've been given this concert. Utterly.

Hilarious. I'm not gonna go into them because ain't nobody finna sue me for defamation or nothing else. But y'all need to get on black threads and look at these names they give into the Usher and Chris Brown concert. I I read some to my mom and she was hollering so loud. I was like, we we funny. We we funny. We gon' we gonna laugh through tragedy and everything. We've some funny people. But anyway, going back.

Lex (10:10)
Thing had

me laughing No, I ha to say this. The thing that had me laughing the hardest recently, and it was right before I was like, You gotta take this app off your phone The Tyrese and Tank versus and Tank sing about Tyrese and that turtleneck. If you ain't seen that turtleneck song, shy.

Shai (10:32)
I'ma have to look that up. I got my phone right here. I'm have to look that up. So let me

Lex (10:36)
I was sitting at work just turtleneck just in my head. That was ooh ooh that was good. That was comedy. That was comedy.

Shai (10:47)
And now it's on black threads? Okay.

Lex (10:50)
Yes

it was.

Shai (10:53)
Tyrese versus Tank.

Turtleneck. ⁓ wow. You know it's it's th trendy. I need to feel ⁓ Lord. The first thing that pops up, bruh. Tank really singing it by Tyrese's turtleneck. Nah, this verse is getting out of hand.

Lex  (11:14)
Okay. ⁓

Shai (11:19)
It's all so if you want to look this up, you have to go, you could type in Tyrese versus Tank Turtleneck, or you can go look at versus battle v-e-r-z-u-z battle, and it'll still come up. Is it is yeah. So I'll have to look at that later. Let me turn my

Lex (11:37)
gonna be old by the time this come out, but if you don't get still get that good laugh, something wrong with you.

Shai (11:42)
But you know what? That's the one thing that it's social media. It's gonna be on there forever. So you can just go in there when you need a good laugh and go laugh and stuff. So I'm telling y'all, this that that was funny. But going back to what we were talking about. So yes, I I'm the person that does the social media. What I appreciate about so when Lexa and I started talking about this.

At first we kind of we we kinda went with a goal with the the flow. Yes, we do we have a you know a partner collaboration agreement and all that stuff. So we did the the business aspect, if you will, of things. But then it was like, okay, well let's just go with the show and kind of go with the flow. Let's come up with how we what we want to talk about and all that kind of stuff. And so we kind of did that and then ⁓ you know, we set up our our email and did all this stuff. And Lex ended up being the organization

system person in that sense. Getting things organized on the back end. Love that. Because excuse me, I will put a bunch of stuff out there. and she just went in reorganized to set the spreadsheets upright and all this kind of stuff. So now we got all these little fancy drop down arrows and all these color coded things and it's just absolutely adorable. ⁓ and I'm like, great, 'cause I will do some of that, but then

I tend to not remember where I saved. If I don't have it specifically named a certain way, I will forget what is saved under. So I have to end up searching and typing the name. I often organize things in a way the way I visually see them or or or would seem to make sense to me. And then Lex goes in and puts it in in a different way. And I'm like, that does make a lot more sense. Okay. Yeah. I see why you I see what she did there. Okay. So honestly.

If I had the money, I'd hire you to organize my entire like electronic life. ⁓ she is extremely good ⁓ with emails. Like she puts on the Alexis voice. Y'all know that voice when she's typing emails. You know, any other time, Lex be like, y'all, and this and that and the

But there it she and don't get me wrong, that you know how we all do. We we intersperse our our slang and our our our personal talk with our more proper grammar, so to speak. No, Lex be a hundred percent with that voice in the emails. Like I'd be like, I was reading it, I was like, Did chat GPT rate this?

Lex (14:20)
Come on girl. Never that chat GPT is stealing my emails to write y'all stuff.

Y'all don't ever forget I work in corporate America. I went to university that was a PWI. The code switching is intense. ⁓

Shai (14:44)
Lord have mercy. But so we just so as time went on, one of the things I love about Lexus, like she likes to be really clear on things. And that's one of the things I appreciate about your brain. You're like, look, I cross the T's, dot the I's, but I need to make sure we're on the same page. So as we talk, ⁓ so she'll say, Let's have a meeting and we'll talk about X, Y, and Z. She always comes up with the agendas for our meetings. So I never have to worry about that. ⁓

And then when we're talking through things, if if I've jumped ahead because my mind is going to something else or something is getting triggered by something else, Lex is like, okay, cool. Let's circle back to this and finish this. and so it's much appreciated. ⁓ and I think that's where we found what works for us. As far as doing the show, you'll notice that I'm often the one taking the lead when it comes to starting the show. ⁓

sometimes guiding the conversation because Lex is like when I got something to say, I'ma say it. And when I don't, I don't. And it's like, okay. And so for our first season, a lot of the I should say, even for the first few episodes, because Lex was still kind of getting used to it and wondering if this was something she was going to feel comfortable with, you know, I did a lot of the talking. Now that her comfortable

Lex (15:46)
Ha ha ha.

Ha ha ha.

Shai (16:08)
She'd be like, friend, we only got so much time, I need you to stop talking.

So to speak. So no, but we it's you know, we had to get our own groove and see what works for us. And one thing, you know, I have actually I haven't told you this yet, I don't think, but I actually envisioned, and maybe I did tell you, but I actually envisioned like if we were like giving keynotes or like a TEDx somewhere, like you would say something like very to the point, and I would be the one to elaborate on it.

Lex (16:43)
Yeah.

Shai (16:44)
You know, and that would be like 'cause Lex is like one of the main reasons why she agreed to do the podcast was because we agreed not to be on camera. That's not at her comfort level. I'm cool with that.

So so that was cool, but we also recognize that as time goes on that there's going to be opportunities for us to speak with others. And so we've kind of we'll work out how that's gonna be when it's there, but we've kind of talked about it, but we we expressed what our comfort levels were. And that made it so much easier. And we just then we just naturally fell into this groove. And I know that that sounds kind of weird, but

You know, when you have two friends that are working together on something, first of all, ⁓ Lex and I see each other at least twice a week in person. At least. And that's not including if we decide to hang out on the weekends or take a trip. ⁓ so now you're talking about sitting down and seeing somebody even more than that and recording. And we don't talk to each other like all day, every day. Well, I talk all day, every day. She just don't respond. But

No, we have a group chat going on. And so I'm the one that works from home. So on most days and and our other friends may or may not be working from home and that kind of a thing. So I'm the one that there's times when I'm like, okay, I'm between a meeting, I'm a scroll, or I schedule out messages and things, you know, to make them smile or give them something to think about during the day, take their mind off of some of the stresses and stuff that they're dealing with.

⁓ but it's not like we have running conversation it's very rare where we're all talking to each other all day throughout the day. So the one thing that I wanted to make sure of was that we both did not tire of each other when we're recording and seeing each other and we have our group there at like, okay, I'm I'm I'm tired of talking to you. But we also both know how to turn everything off too, right?

Lex  (18:52)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, I so a f a couple of different things. So yes, you will hear that Shy carries most of the conversations, starting them, ⁓ as like in all seriousness as a function of my autism, knowing how to like jump into a conversation when the opening is for me is difficult. So I have to kind of

It just takes me longer to figure out when I can come in. And I just don't like interrupting people. It's always felt rude to me. And then interrupting people when we're like recording on basically a conference call like it's even more awkward and it gives me the PTSD of all the meetings at work and all the things. ⁓ but yeah, so it's just difficult for me to do that. And so I had to take time

To see what exactly is the flow of our conversations and seeing Shy talk in this setting as opposed to a ⁓ pure friend's casual setting. Because it is slightly different. And figuring out, okay, what would be the place? And then knowing, okay, is this thought gonna come back to something? If so, I don't want to interrupt it. ⁓ or is this thought gonna get us to five more thoughts? I don't know.

I won't know until we're on thought number three. And then I'd be like, okay. ⁓ as we was talking about before, 'cause you done lost me. I don't even know what we're talking about no more, friend. Cool. got it. So sometimes I have to just kind of sit in it so I can see what we have going on to know when it is time for me to speak. ⁓ I remember

Especially after like the first few episodes, you were like, Hey, I didn't know if maybe you just didn't feel comfortable but like I'll ask you a question and you'll just like answer it. And I was like, Well, yeah. What did you think I was going to? And you were like, I didn't know if maybe you didn't feel comfortable saying anything more. I said, Did you ask me to say something more? And you were like, No. I said, Well that's why I s that's why I ain't say nothing else, friend. Like you gotta if you are needing more from me from this or there's something else that you're trying to get at, you're gonna have to

Make that clear to me. Cause if you just ask me a question, my mind only sees how to get from A to B. I am not going to take a weird detour to F before I get there. I'm going to the answer. So if you're looking for more information for me, there's probably a particular angle, something that you're looking for. Maybe ask that instead of the other question or ask additional questions.

And as we talk more, yeah, I have more things to say. But for the most part, I am like a direct answer to the question kind of person. So that was just kind of funny in the beginning, because you were like, I didn't know if you didn't feel comfortable. I was like, I feel fine. I didn't know you needed anything else.

Shai (22:01)
Go make me choke.

Lex (22:02)
She's in a coughing fit.

Shai (22:06)
Mm-hmm.

had to back up and take some water on that. But ⁓ so that was the part of ⁓ the advantages of ⁓ sorry y'all

Lex (22:11)
Mm-hmm.

Maybe

cough that out and we'll start that sentence over.

Shai (22:32)
⁓ So that was the part of us really learning how to work together and understanding what the advantages were of each of our brains and how we come together. The other thing that I would say that I really loved about working with Lex is ⁓ she ⁓ it took her a minute to kind of realize this is like our thing.

Because she said, No, this was your baby. You started this. You came with this idea. You had this and you had that. And I'm like, yes, because I did a brain dump and organized it and said, This is what I envisioned. But now that it's the two of us, what is your vision? What do you want to bring to the table? ⁓ and how do you want this to look? So that also has taken time. And as she thought about it,

And she came up with some really good ideas and suggestions on, you know, what we can do and that sort of a thing. So we just really learned to understand each other mainly because of communication. So I would encourage anybody, if you're working with someone else that is also neurodivergent, whether their neurodivergence is you share the same one or it's different. Not everybody that has ADHD functions the same way.

Some of us are going to be very hyper-focused, while others may not necessarily be hyper-focused. We may be all over the place and completely distracted. ⁓ some of us are gonna have ⁓ the ability to think systems-wise, like my accountability partner. She has ADHD, but she's a systems person. I'm on the other hand am the creative arm.

So when we get together and we talk and we we start talking about our projects and things, she comes at it from a system systems approach and I come at it from the other aspect. So my point is that if you're learn communicate with your fellow ⁓ neurodivergent colleagues and friends and family, find out how they like to communicate, let them know how you like to communicate.

You'll often find there's a a a happy medium, believe it or not, and it makes life so much easier, you know. But there can be some cons to working together. So this is what I'm interested in finding out because I think I know what you're gonna say. I think I know what you're gonna say, but I would like to know what do you find as a con or a challenge to working with me and my brain?

Lex (25:21)
Okay, first of all, I'm afraid to answer this question first. Last episode I said something. Last episode I said something, it became cry part two. So maybe you tell me first. You tell me your con first. So I could then figure out where my con should be, like where where where we meeting at with the cons.

Shai (25:45)
my goodness. That's so funny. Yeah, we did cry a couple of episodes in a row. That's okay though. It's you know, that that's the reality of of life in the show. I would say that the cons for us and we're working through them is ⁓ one, I can't have too many ideas. I can be all over the place with my ideas. And it's not that they're bad ideas, it's just that I can see a bigger picture.

But we've got to do all the little things, so to speak, to get to that bigger picture. ⁓ you've got to do the little brush strokes. You can't just voila do one brushstroke and now you've got this masterpiece of a painting. It takes a lot. So ⁓ that's one of the things I think ⁓

not speaking for you, but that's one of the things I can see as being a challenge for us. And then I'm sure there's other things, but as much as I love the fact that Lexus the systems person as far as being organized, I think that's also a con because it's like, why do I have to take on this task? Not that she said that and I'm not saying that she feels that way, but I'm just saying it's like, why do I have to take on that task? For me, even though I love doing social media, I love doing the graphics and stuff. And I I sit sometimes and I'll be like,

Okay, now I gotta come up with stuff to put out there for the week or I've gotta plan this out and schedule it and blase blase. ⁓ those are I think those are sometimes some of the challenges because even though you may not mind doing certain things, ⁓ there's a times when you're just like you just you know, like with anything in life, I just don't feel like it today. But this is a venture that requires us to do the things we don't always feel like doing.

And then also doing some of the things we love doing, but also keeping those in perspective. So and of course she's gonna say I'll talk too much when it comes to the podcast, so

Lex (27:44)
Okay, I'm gonna start here. You were actually correct with first of all, I think it's funny that you said one of the cons and you said a thing that you do. That I thought you were gonna say something I do. I was really waiting for you to say a con working with me. But I do think that

What were you about to say?

Shai (28:09)
No, I was I when I was thinking about the con, I was kinda thinking of it from your perspective of a con of working with me. Not I I really don't have a honestly, I don't really have a con with you. I just I I don't. Okay. Well, so I looked at it as what would be huh?

Lex (28:28)
I said that's really cool for me.

Shai (28:31)
Yeah.

Lex (28:34)
No, ⁓ in all seriousness, no. So you do have huge ideas and they come rapid fire. And sometimes when we are having conversations, I'm like, whoa, hold on. That sounds great, but I would just we just need to record the next four episodes. Like that's that's really great, but we just gotta record the next four episodes. I'm not really thinking about

this opportunity over there because right now it does not exist. I totally see how you got there for like perspective things that might happen later. Totally with you. And you had had a whole idea for it and like, yes gotta make sure that you're prepared for that, to be on camera for this kind of thing, and talk about this kind of thing. And then we'll just figure out how to do this. And then you can say that and I'll say this to help you out. And I'm like, bruh

This is not a real thing. This is not happening actually. Don't worry about that. Don't even try to prepare me for this thing yet. Cause I'm not thinking about that because it's not happening right now. I think in linear. So I really can only be worried about the steps right in front of me. The big idea that's over there, it's like imaginary to me right now. And that's not to say I don't believe in you and your dreams.

Shai (29:50)
Understood.

Lex (30:00)
I'm just saying, I ain't we ain't even over there yet. So I can only get through the steps right in front of me.

Shai (30:09)
She said, I ain't saying I don't believe in you and your dreams.

Lex (30:15)
Cause you be doing stuff all the time. You be doing stuff in real life. And I'm like, that's crazy. I never even would have even thought to do that. So I believe that the things are possible, but we're not over there right now. U at Z and we are still trying to draw the A. We are we are trying to draw the A on the little piece of paper they gave you at elementary school with the blinds on it. This how you do the big A. Okay, now this how you do the lowercase A. This is where we at. Just give me a second. We'll get there.

Shai (30:44)
You are too funny. Okay. I take that and I own that.

Lex (30:51)
But it's not a bad thing. It's more like a hey, we gotta get back on the same page. Or it's more of a free yourself from even worrying about my comfort level for something that hasn't happened yet.

Shai (31:07)
Understandable. It's excuse me. I have a tendency that when I see

the potential in someone or the potential in something, my mind will instantly go.

And so I do need to be reined in sometimes. Like, okay, jot that down. Like I have pages of ideas for business and this, this, this, and that. Like, I don't know if I ever told you this, but one night, so my husband's family ⁓ years ago, they were trying to think of a business they could do together as a family. Most of them were educators. And so we were trying to think of businesses they could do as a family.

I stayed up one night easily all night long and I must have wrote up twenty different business plans.

Lex (32:03)
Mm.

Shai (32:04)
I handed him the notebook. And I was like, here you go. I'm gonna go to bed now and take a nap. And he looked through that. I don't know what happened to that notebook, but here we are, years later. And he's like, Do you have any clue where it is? Man, do you know how long ago that was? We left Florida 15 years ago. He's like, Man, I wish we had that book. And I was like, I don't know what happened to it, but yeah, no.

⁓ but I've always kind of been that way. I've had people come to me and say, I've got, you know, I'm doing this, this, this, this, and that, and I'm trying to figure out how to turn this into a business and blah, blah, blah. Give me 24 hours. I got you. And literally can give them all their multiple revenue streams within 24 hours. And this is not using chat or anything else. This is just sitting down and being able to see a pattern or a connection to things. ⁓ so yes, I constantly come up with big ideas. So

It's not necessarily a con, but it is a con, like you said, when we're trying to get things done and you're trying to handle business and you know, we have to come in focusing on things. Sometimes I'm coming in and sharing something because like right before we were recording, I was like, Hey, I met this person the other day. I think she would great. And Lex was like, You know that I'm about to shut down. I'm gonna need you to go on and let's record this and let's talk about that person later. I was like, Yep, bet, you're right.

Lex (33:23)
Ha ha ha ha ha.

Shai (33:24)
Because

we you know, and that that's the other thing. We have to recognize each other's ⁓ limitation. Did you have any other cons? ⁓ Let out, girl. Let out.

Lex (33:37)
And I'll say probably calling it a con might be even too strong of language for it. I think ⁓ going into this in the beginning, so you already had a podcast, you already know all the little steps and all the different things that go into making one happen. And all I did was listen to I don't know how to make none. So I was like, I don't even know what I'm gonna need to do for this. And also, because I wasn't sure about the time commitment it was gonna require, I recall

When we had our little meeting about it at your house, I said, So shy, what is it that you are expecting from me to contribute to this? Do you happen to remember what you said to me?

Shai (34:21)
Course not, but I know you do.

Lex (34:23)
Uh-huh. What you said was I just want you to just be my Lex and be yourself.

Shai (34:34)
Yep, I'm sure.

Lex (34:35)
Yes. I said, so you want me to just show up on the microphone and talk? Do you was like and just be yourself, yeah. That's really cute. That's like really nice. That is not actually what you needed from me. What you needed from me was to be handling all the administrative tasks. What you needed from me was to get into this email inbox and actually make it like workable.

To create folders for these things, to delete the spam emails, to put things in the categories, to respond to people for this, to create the Google Drive folder for this thing, to coordinate meeting times with our editor. This is what you actually needed from me. But what you said to me was again a big picture thing. Just be yourself. Be my friend. And I said, my dramatic theater person friend gave me the most beautiful answer that was not true. It was not It was not what she needed from me. That was not the full scope.

So what I learned from that is I have to ask much more specific questions. I thought, what do you need from me? What specific? No, it wasn't. It wasn't. I needed to be like, okay, but what tasks are you going to need me to do? But I didn't even know what task I would need to be doing because I'd never helped to make a podcast before. But I learned very soon. Like before we even

got to recording, I was like, Ooh, this what I gotta do. And then when we got to it, I was like, Ooh, yeah. When I first got into that email address, I said, my God. I'm a person who does not like to see it was so bad, friend. I'm not finna front on these people like this. It was bad. I'm a person who does not like seeing just a bunch of unread notifications on things. I'm like, if you're getting this many, do you need to un subscribe from something?

Shai (36:24)
Wait, wait, it was not that bad. It was bad because of how you like to see things.

Lex (36:33)
But since I'm the one doing it, my standard finna be the one we going off of and we'll look at you like that.

Shai (36:42)
You should see how she looking at me, child. Straight up.

Lex (36:44)
I looked the hood like girl bye. So

the the egos were all over the place. I'm like, do you just need to unsubscribe from something? Why you still getting this? Like, we gotta keep it so that we can know what's going on. So that if you do get an email about something that we need to see, we'll know it's in there. And not hiding amongst a bunch of notifications about something that we actually didn't even need an email to come through for. Those are

Shai (37:12)
I'm gonna say.

Lex (37:12)
Small

things though. Like again, this isn't a con. This is more of me learning, okay, this is what part I am playing in this and us working together on this. And I didn't know how you worked. I only knew you as a friend in like casual settings. So this is my first time seeing how you work, right? And seeing the ideas you have and how they come to be. So

When you get to see other parts of people, you get to see more strengths, and you also get to see other weaknesses that you didn't.

Shai (37:49)
We

call them areas of opportunity.

Lex (37:52)
Sure, area of opportunity to not get on my nerves. So whatever you want to call it, these are things to learn. Yes. And you saying that you don't have any for me, that is wild to me. But okay. Cool.

Shai (38:09)
You know why?

Honestly, I learned to meet people where they are.

And to accept them for who they are. So, ⁓ and I know you've done that with me, but it's there's still the difference of working with somebody and not working with somebody, right? And and like you said, this is you haven't seen me work, ⁓ you've never seen me train, you've never seen me do like my professional side of stuff. Right. and even though you've seen some aspects of this, you really haven't seen

curriculum I've developed, you know, all that kind of stuff. So it it is different. You know, you probably were like, I didn't even know you did all that. Cause some people say that too. My mama don't even know what I do half the time. But it's all right. She, you know, that's just something we've learned. But, you know, so yes, I can so for me, with you coming into this, I just wanted to bring I just wanted you to bring who you were. And we'll figure we'll figure out the rest later.

You are very much more of an organized systems person. So when I teach people about communication, one of the things that I teach them about is recognizing behaviors, which also helps us to understand how a person generally communicates. So if I went off of just your behavior in how you've handled the the organizational stuff, you're very much analysis driven. You're very much a thinker. You probably only use one color pen.

You might use two. And more than likely it's gonna be blue and black. ⁓ you either do when you write a checklist, it's either a dotted checklist or it's check marks something, but it's organized in a way that makes sense. You don't just write like most of us have written to do list. We write a to-do list of here's all the things that need to be done. You're probably writing a to-do list in the order of the way that you're going to do them. ⁓ you know, that's so when I analyze people's behavior.

And how they communicate. That also tells me I know that when we work together, when we have a meeting, when we get ready to start a show, I instantly know how you're going to want to do things. Now you will tell me, okay, here's the agenda, or like I put together an agenda, I'll look at the agenda and I'll say, Do you want to start the meeting? You'll be nope, you start the meeting. I already know you're gonna want me to start the meeting. I already know which topics now.

you're gonna want me to talk about versus the ones that you're going to want to talk about. And then we will go talk about if there's something that we have to ⁓ broach ⁓ the way we're going to approach it so that it's sensitive and timely. Because like I said, you know, like our podcast editor is also self-diagnosed, self-diagnosed autistic. So you are saying, okay, you're saying this

But what you're really trying to say is this. Is that correct? Well, yeah, and that what I said, no, that's not what you said, and that's not how I would have taken it. Okay. And then you will say, Okay, well then this is what I'm going to say. So we it took some time to work that part out, but having as as far as cons with working with you, no, I didn't have any because I was like, I just bring who you are to the show and we'll figure out the rest along the way.

My biggest concern was that you would start the show and then feel like, you know what, I really don't think I want to do this or I'm not comfortable doing this. That was it. So I figured if you felt comfortable enough to show up.

We're good. You felt comfortable enough to just like look, friend, here's an idea I got about X, Y, and Z. Or maybe we should approach it like this. How the show was structured, the ⁓ anything else, you was like, fine, bet, you do that. But when you got into it, I knew that when you start the first time that you said to me that you had an idea, I was like, okay, she's here for the long haul.

Lex (42:30)
That's so interesting that you thought I would like be like, Ugh, never mind, this ain't for me.

Shai (42:38)
Mainly because things sound good and exciting.

Until the work has to get done.

And it has to be done on a regular basis. And I've worked with enough people of all types to know that sometimes you don't mind doing the work. You just rather do the work by yourself. Other times you don't mind doing the work if it's with certain people. And then other times, yeah, I do mind doing the work and I don't want to do it by myself, and I don't want to do it with nobody else because I don't want to do the work.

So doing a podcast is work. And even though we I wanted it to be fun where we would enjoy each other and all that kind of stuff, I still wanted it to be something that you would enjoy and would feel comfortable bringing your full self to. And even though I know you're the type that when you make a commitment, you're gonna make a commitment, it still doesn't change the fact that okay, I made a commitment.

You know, we did one season that was cool, but friend, I feel like it's a little bit too much. It might have been a setback in your mental health journey. It could have been, you know what, we tapped into some subjects that I really just don't feel comfortable talking about anymore. And that might have been a part of the core of what we're talking about. Cause like we have not talked about, you know, a lot of things, but when you talked about some of your health challenges, you know, like PC.

PCOS and things like that. I was like, okay, she's cool. She's real comfortable. Not just that you're in for it, now you're comfortable. Now you're willing to take a dive and go deeper. So for me, I was like, I just want her to be able to do this and feel good about doing it and feel good about what we're putting out there. And I know that there was a concern, you know, ⁓ both of us had, you know, in regards to our parents and

You know, cause some of the things we talk about, it impacts them. And, you know, and it's not that it's that we're judgmental on our parents or anything like that, because both of us have excellent parents and they did the best they could with what they had. We also recognize that they weren't prepared for some of the challenges they were going to face raising a child who, for all intents and purposes, was beautiful and special to them, but also seemingly different in some ways. And it wasn't different enough where they felt like,

Hmm, you special. But like, well, that's just how they are. They'll grow out of it or whatever, you know? And then to hear some of our stories and our pain that they may not have heard before. So there was a lot of legit concerns there. And because I was already doing my other show, and have talked about some of those things. And because I even talked to my mom when I before I did that and said, Are you going to be okay if I talk about certain things?

And mom was like, Yeah, that's that's fine. That's your show. ⁓ so I felt like I didn't want anything that was gonna make you feel uncomfortable to the point where you'd be like, nah, friend, I can't do this no more.

Lex (45:57)
Hmm. I gotcha. ⁓ I what I do hear in that is is respect. Like respect for me and care for me because before any of this we friends, right? So if it was ever like the podcast, it is friendship. We'd be like, Well, I guess this podcast got to go, 'cause that's crazy. Not losing friends over no show.

Shai (46:25)
Exactly.

Lex (46:26)
So I hear respected that so I appreciate that for sure. but yeah, I w it was an unexpected thing that to find out you're concerned about that. I didn't was like, huh, really. Well I was worried in the beginning and it's probably why in the beginning I didn't do too much 'cause I was like, okay, this this is an idea she has and it's a good idea.

Is this a big idea that she got to, but is the dopamine gonna wear off and she's no longer interested in it? Or is this an idea that she's trying to stick with? So I'm like, well, let me see what she's doing first. Let me see how much she's invested in it first. Cause what I can't be is more excited about your dream than you are. So I need to know where are you at with this first?

Before I put any of my energy into it. And once it looked to be like really serious, once we was signing paperwork about certain things, I said, Okay. She for real, for real about it. Okay. Then I can see what we're doing then. That's where I was at.

Shai (47:42)
And you know what, that's a legit thing because

That that is one thing about those ⁓ that a characteristic that many of us with ADHD have, right? We were prone to starting something and not finishing it. ⁓ and it's not that we don't have the intention on finishing it. It either no longer, you know, like we say things no longer serve its purpose. Well, it's no longer giving us that dopamine hit, or it's no longer ⁓

Or we find out once we got into it, it was more challenging than we thought. And that's not what we were trying to do. It could be any number of things. But yeah, I can understand that. ⁓ and I'll be honest, it with my other podcast, I did kind of hit that wall a little bit. And what kind of sparked it back, much like what kind of keeps me going with this podcast is I know there's definitely a need for this podcast.

Now, with my other one, there's 50-11 million women out there talking about women's issues around whatever, and they doing wine, reading books, doing whatever, whatever. But what gave me my last ⁓ kind of like push to keep going was recently ⁓ a friend of mine, she's actually a a mutual friend of ours that no longer ⁓ lives in our state, but

⁓ she shared with me that her and her husband are going through a divorce. And I was like, whoa. And so we talked about it because she she's also like, we call each other ⁓ Seely and her sister. ⁓ you know, like we have this this

Lex (49:22)
Okay.

Shai (49:37)
Not not that either one of us looks like Seely, but we have this bond, right? This this really kind of special bond. We don't talk all that often, but we just connected. And so, ⁓ when she told me that I was really sad and I was devastating, she was sharing some things, and she said, You know, your podcast that you did about women and finance, that was really helpful.

I didn't even know she listened to the podcast. She never said. And I I said, the one with so-and-so, she was Yeah. And I was like, ⁓ She goes, That was really helpful for me. And I was like, Wow. And then somebody else mentioned it. And I was like, I didn't know you mentioned it. And then in fact, I got a Facebook message. Now, you know how like you're like friends of friends of people, so you get connected on Facebook or something like that, you know, kind of thing.

So she was friends of a a friend and I was connected to her mom as well as to her. She's a young lady, around your age, I guess. really nice. She sent me a message on Facebook and she said, I just wanted you to know I really enjoyed I really enjoy your podcast and I can't wait to listen to more episodes.

Lex (50:57)
Hmm.

Shai (50:58)
And I said, ⁓ okay. Now, normally when I post on Facebook, I'm posting on my business page and I'm posting my other podcast because it's a little bit more aligned to business. So I said, which one are you listening to? Are you listening to Coffee, Cocktails, and Clarity, or are you listening to Black Girl, Blonde Girl, Squirrel? And she goes, The squirrels. She goes, because I'm neurodivergent too. And I said, You are? I didn't know.

And I didn't know you were listening. Thank you for letting me know. And she said, Yeah, I really enjoyed. I can't wait for more episodes. And I said, at that time, I said, We're in the process of recording the second season. So you'll get some more episodes really soon. So that's the kind of stuff that keeps you going because you never know who's listening and who's being encouraged. And sometimes you're thinking, I'm doing this. And is anybody, does anybody really care? But I've had to learn, ⁓ which

you've seen with, you know, you keep track of our stats with the downloads and where people are all over the world listening to us, which still blows my mind. you know, the the reality is we never know how we're going to impact other people. And one of the things that I learned is your audience will be there. Your tribe will find you. Even though we didn't record for two, three months,

And even now, by the time all of this comes out, it will have been even longer. Our our audience is still there. People are still checking us out and downloading and listening and streaming. ⁓ same thing with my other podcast. ⁓ the YouTube channels. Now I'm not saying my subscribers have gone up substantially or gone down. Same here. We're not saying our subscribers have gone up substantially or anything. But the folks that are here are here because they want to be here and they will come back.

And even you taught me that. You know, you like there's some podcasts I listen to where they haven't been back in months and then they come back and I start listening to them again.

Lex (53:02)
Yeah.

Shai (53:05)
It happens. So that's what motivates me in when it feels like because we're human beings, life lives. Yes, we call each other squirrels and we laugh and joke about that and you know have a cute little squirrel logo. But the reality is is we are human beings. And so when life life and things happen, we've got to make sure our mental health is together. We have to make sure that we're able to come and give

An episode that is going to be worthwhile and resonate with people and help them. That's the only reason why we did this. We didn't do this just so we can sit and talk about this. We can do this anytime. We did this because we wanted to help. She's laughing at me because I said that. Because it's true. We could sit and talk about, we could sit and laugh and talk about ourselves all day long if we wanted to. But the reality is that we did this because we wanted to help other women out there that.

were like us and wanted a space that they could feel safe, that they can come and share their thoughts and feelings, that can hear other women who are, you know, working their way through everything and dealing with the challenges and still, you know, working through things. We don't have all the answers. We'll hopefully get some folks on here that'll have some answers, but ⁓ you know, not hopefully we will because we've got people lined up. But ⁓

Yeah. So

That's what keeps me going.

Lex (54:39)
Listen, I ain't gonna lie to you. I'm a little sleepy.

Shai (54:46)
Hey, it's all good. It's that time. Cause my my if you heard a little ring a ding in the back, that's my alarm going off saying it's time to go start getting ready for bed. So yeah, we're recording this in the evening time. Now you know. But ⁓ so we appreciate you being here. We hope you enjoyed the last couple of episodes where we talked about our friendship, how we got together and makes it work, how we meet in the middle and work with each other.

Lex (54:58)
⁓ Mm-hmm.

Shai (55:12)
Please feel free to have to to reach out to us. Don't hesitate. You can email us BGBG Squirrel at gmail.com. You can find us on fanlist.com forward slash BGBG Squirrel. We're on Instagram and threads at BGBG Squirrel. So come squirrel with us. Talk to us. Let us know what you're thinking and feeling. how's this show resonated with you?

we'd love to hear from you. And thank you all for being here and hanging in with us. And we can't wait to bring you the rest of the season. We have some really cool people lined up. I think you'll be excited to listen to and learn from. So with that said, good night. Peace out. Bye.

Lex (55:54)
Thanks for squirreling with us. Have questions? Want to share your experience or other feedback privately with us? You can email us at bgbgsquirrel at gmail.com. That's bgbgsquirrel at gmail.com.