Why High-Achieving ADHD Women Keep Burning Out: a Regenerative Conversation with Pippa Grange

I'd love to hear your thoughts, feedback and insights on what could improve The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Podcast in this short poll - it takes 2 minutes, and as a thank you, we'll send you a little gift! Have you spent years pushing through, overriding what your body is telling you, performing at full capacity, and wondering why you keep burning out? For so many women with ADHD, the drive to do more, prove more, and be more is relentless. We have the passion, the ambition, the energy. But when that inner motor collides with a nervous system that desperately needs rest and renewal, something eventually gives way. This week on The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Podcast I'm joined by Dr Pippa Grange, a doctor of performance psychology, culture coach, author, and the psychologist behind England's renaissance World Cup campaign of 2018. You may also know of Pippa Grange through her portrayal in the recent Dear England, played excellently by Jodie Whittaker! Pippa has spent 25 years working with elite athletes, teams, and leaders across sport and industry, and her new book, Life Reclaimed: Find Freedom from Chronic Overperformance, is the culmination of everything she has learned, including from her own experience of burnout. Pippa's framework for what she calls regenerative performance feels like it was made for our community, and it challenges everything we've been taught about what it means to be "successful". In this episode, we explore:

Why chronic overperformance is so prevalent in neurodivergent people and what keeps us stuck in it

The ecological lens Pippa uses to understand performance and why nature is the master teacher

How elite sport prioritises not just performance, but also rest and renewal to optimise output and prevent burnout

The power of honesty to reduce masking and burnout

The four principles of regenerative performance and listening to your needs

Moving off autopilot and learning to check in with your nervous system by asking what it needs, rather than pushing through

Why diversifying your modes and speeds is especially powerful for ADHD brains

Why pulling back is not a failing, it's a smart performance strategy

What Pippa learned from her own burnout and how she works differently now

Three types of honesty and the subtle ways we are unfaithful to ourselves without realising

Why "wholebeing" matters more than wellbeing

Pippa brings a rare combination of elite performance experience and genuine human warmth to this conversation. For those of us with restless minds and high ambitions who keep burning out despite doing everything right, this episode offers a completely different way of thinking about what sustainable success can look like. This week’s episode is sponsored by Understood.org, the leading nonprofit dedicated to empowering the millions of people with learning and thinking differences, like ADHD and dyslexia. Their podcast, AHA Aha! Shared candid stories about ADHD realisations, including the unexpected, emotional and even funny ways ADHD symptoms can surface! The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Live Event Recording is here! My first-ever ADHD Women's Wellbeing Live event sold out, and now the full experience is available to you wherever you are, whenever it feels right. Alongside three neuro-affirming experts, we spent four hours exploring the questions that matter most to late-diagnosed women. Get lifetime access here! Inside the ADHD Women's Wellbeing Live Recording, you'll find:

Kate Moryoussef on post-diagnosis growth and her gentle framework for what comes next

Dr Hannah Cullen on the neuroscience of ADHD and why your brain works the way it does

Hannah Miller on reconnecting with purpose through a neurodivergent lens

Adele Wimsett myth-busting on hormones, HRT, progesterone and perimenopause

Understand yourself more deeply, feel less alone, and finally access the expert knowledge you deserve. Because every woman with ADHD deserves access to the knowledge, expertise and understanding that for too lo