Dr Stephen Lewellis

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: hello. Welcome to Beyond ADHD, a Physician's Perspective. I am Dr. Diana Mercado Marmarosh. I'm a family medicine physician practicing in rural Texas. I used to be hindered by my adhd, but I now see it as a gift that helps me show up as a person. I was always meant to be both in my work and in my personal life.

In the past two years, I've come to realize, That I'm learning some of my beliefs and some of my habits were just as important as learning the new set of skills.

Hello. Hello. I am so excited to be here today. I have a very special guest, Dr. Steven Le Leis and I'm Might have missed up, that please. Correct.

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: Yeah it's Luis. It's a hard one. All my patients get it wrong, so don't worry about it All ,

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: Dr. Leis. And I think I messed it up again, but don't worry about it.

I'm gonna call him Dr. Steven . No worries him for today. He's in a and he's an amazing husband, of course, father, and he's trained in NYU and Stanford. He's a board certified. An investor and outside of his medical practice, he's passionate about spending time with his family and in strengthening the collective voice of physicians on social media, educating fellow physicians about personal finance and life.

Planning and investing in private real estate. As you can see, he's multi-passionate and I love this about him. And so today we're gonna have an interesting discussion about what is going on with him. He shared with me that he recently came to realization that he has a D H D diagnosis. And as you guys know, in my podcast, I've interviewed many female physicians and a few male physicians and we were just having this discussion about, I would love to talk to everybody because it's so important to have the perspective of different voices cuz their matter, our stories matter and a is a spectrum.

So I'm so excited to have him here today. Would you share with us what's been going on in your life lately?

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: Yeah. Can I call you Diana? Is that okay? Yes, of course. Great. Or Dr. Diana I am very grateful to be here. First of all, it's really nice to be on your show and I'm really impressed with what you've built so far.

And I'm happy to tell you a little bit about myself. But as with a, we can get a little time tracking. A little warped for us. If I'm going too far, just cut me off and go down a line of questioning. But again, my name is Dr. Steven Luis, and I live in a relatively small town in central Wisconsin, wasa, Wisconsin.

I'm a practice here as a board certified medical dermatologist. Hi, . And I am at home as well with my wonderful and very supportive and lovely wife and two small children. So we have that in common. I have a three-year-old boy and a seven month old girl. So lot of changes recently, and my job was relatively new.

I've been there for a year and a half. Finished residency in 2019 right into the pandemic with kids and jobs. So a lot of changes happened at once and a lot of challenges, and that led me down a road slowly and a little bit painfully, but finally a road to really addressing some underlying mental health issues that.

Suspected maybe in the past, but never had the never was intentional enough to address them or was brave enough or whatever it was until it really reached a tipping point in 2022. Essentially, that was the year that I took charge of my mental health, and I've already seen dramatic changes just from that probably about a six month journey since I first asked my primary care doctor to help me with what I was

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: struggling.

He said hi to my daughter who just came and jumped in . And so if you guys are wondering who is he saying hi to ? Yeah, sorry. No. I, no, I'm just clarifying . But she's walking away. . But I wanted to ask you what do you mind sharing what you were struggling with? I, you said time blindness was one.

What else?

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: Sure. Yeah. Time blindness. I think we're We're the dreamers. We people often say so that was one thing I struggle with. Little things that I noticed about myself at work. I would be pretty overwhelmed with getting all the tasks done that I needed to, especially charting. I would always finish my charts on time cuz I I'm.

Pretty high achiever. So I wanted to get that done. I very much did not want to take charting home like I did in residency. So I made it a priority to finish most of what I could at work. But it was stressful. And if I was ready, getting ready to see a next patient and one of my staff members was presenting to me about the patient I would still be ha have half my brain on the chart that I was trying to finish.

And then I would. Asking them to repeat something they said five or 10 seconds ago. And I began trying to identify things that I may be doing that I was blind to. That may be really annoying other people in my life, whether it's people at work or people at home. And that was one of them my nurses and medical assistants and me.

Always laugh when I walk straight past the exam room that I'm supposed to go to because I, even though it's a short walk, I start thinking about something else and they just wait till I turn around and come back and we're all laughing. So little stuff like that, but also just feeling overwhelmed with the amount I needed to get done.

Another thing was I'm a dermatologist. They a lot of people in my field see a very high volume of patients and I have always felt very overwhelmed about the possibility of that or the prospect of that. Been difficult to grow into a higher volume practice. And I've wondered, is that just me or is there something that I could some coaching or counseling or medical therapy, whatever it is that it's not just me.

It's something that there's a reason for that. I feel like why is everyone else having such an easier time with this than me? So those are the, some of the things at work that I noticed. There were also things just with interpersonal relationships that just got to eventually got to a tipping point.

And I started questioning is there something about me that I need to address? So that I stopped getting in. These loops that we get in with certain people. And rather than trying to see what they're doing that's wrong, , and get introspective a little bit and get some help. So that, those are the general things that I noticed at work and at home.

But I think there was some tipping points in 2022 that made me get there as. I'm happy to be as open as possible on this show. I had a I have two brothers but one of them in June of 2022 unexpectedly passed away. And that was a pretty big shock and a trigger for evaluating some things in my life and just working through that trauma and that.

Led to some difficulties in other places and processing that and I, that's when I finally went to my primary care doctor, who I'm very grateful for. I have a wonderful family medicine physician at the place where I'm an employee an employee as well, and he just talked to me about what could be going on.

And we got down a road of trying to address a couple different things and happy to expand on that as.

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: Perfect. Thank you so much for sharing and of course, I'm sorry about your brother passing away. Thank you. It is, sometimes in, in those trialing moments in our life where of course we don't realize that we've been carrying such a heavy load.

And for some people it might seem. You're doing it so easily, , but they don't know. They're just seeing the tip of it. They don't know everything that you're magically doing underneath. To just stay afloat, . And and I'm so glad that you're highlighting both aspects of A D H D.

And I joke around too. I'm like, either you cry or you laugh. I think I'd rather laugh because it gives me dopamine, . Yeah. So then at least we're onto the right track. But like you said, it's not until you look back that you're able to be like, oh, that's been there all along. And it's, and like you just mentioned A D H D, it's so important.

It to be identified in different settings. If it's just, okay, it's just happening at work, or it's just happening at the house, or it's just happening, blah, blah, blah, then you wonder if it's really a D H D or you're just bored, then you don't wanna be there. Sure. But when it is happening in multiple places, and like you said When you start being curious instead of judgy.

Yeah. And you then can start to, to shift because you then start to see patterns that maybe were not obvious because you weren't looking for them because this is the way you've been all along. But yes. That's one of the things with adhd that. A lot of people think it's that we don't focus, but we do.

We sometimes we even overfocus whenever we are on a certain task, like you were saying, if you're trying to do your chart, you're like, yes, you wanna hear them, but you're trying to do your chart . . That was one of the things I had to learn too, and I think you're already onto it, that when people come and are telling you something, I have to on purpose and I got coached and told to do this and so I'll give you the tip if you're not doing it yet.

I tell them, gimme. Give me a minute. Let me finish my thought. Yeah. And then you can have my attention and it's, at first it feels really uncomfortable to have somebody standing right next to you for what seems like an eternity. Yeah. But it's really 45 seconds or less usually. Yeah. But you don't realize that in doing that you actually.

Save yourself at least five minutes. Because what happens is that somebody who doesn't have a D H D can easily jump from one thing to the other. But for us it's task switching. And so in the task switching, it takes us a little. To go back to where we were at, especially we didn't give ourselves a nugget, and so it, it sounds weird, but if you really do, just ask them for 45 seconds so that you can document what you were thinking and then you listen and then you document whatever else they were gonna tell you.

Yeah. Then it's gonna be so much smoother for you and it's gonna be so much smoother for them. They're like you just said, they're not repeating themselves five times and it less frustrating for them for sure. Yeah. Yeah. And they would rather sit there or not sit there cuz sometimes they're standing.

Yeah. But it's gonna take them, those 45 seconds they can rearrange exactly what they're gonna tell you anyways. So that it's more effective for both of you. And I had to tell them later on, Hey, I'm not trying to be rude, it. I have h adhd and it took me a while to get to the dag to get comfortable to me to even say it out loud.

Yeah. But now I'm just like, there's an ADHD moment and I just laugh. Yeah. And like I tell them I'm doing this to help them with. and me with the communication. And so I use timers now, like you said, timeline is, yeah. So before I walk in the room, my nurses start the timer and then they'll come and they knock on my door, and then they ask Dr.

Marca, you need anything? And then I'll be like, yes, I need ua, or yes, I do, whatever. And so you could use that and be like, yes, I need a biopsy, or, yes, I need this, or whatever. And so now, I'm family medicine, so I do have a lot of patients with H adhd and I treat patients with adhd and I tell 'em, look, they're gonna come knock on their door.

They're gonna, this is my external cue. Yeah. So don't think that, it's just you e everybody's gonna get this external cue. And even though I've been using this trick and. The day that I forget to set it, oh my God. The, they're just are like, she's taking too long. What's going on? And then they go look at the timer, ah, she forgot it or something, and so now it becomes like a game with my patients. Oh, we have to meet the timer, hot dog. I'm like, yes, let's meet the timer. And I say this because you could make. Blind spots be something that you can enhance. So your pain points can become your progress.

And like you said, in this six months of you even getting this diagnosis , you've had some light bulb moments that now you're like, huh, okay. And yes, it can lead to a lot of misinterpretations with other people sometimes. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know if you know this or not, but like people with a D H D, the way we answer questions is how we're feeling sometimes in the moment.

And some other times is what we're thinking in the moment and how we're feeling and thinking. Sometimes they don't match up. . And so if I ask you the same question tomorrow, you might answer something different. And that's not a problem. I understand that. But other people who don't have a D H D, that's a big problem cuz they're gonna be like, but yesterday you said, and I'm like, yeah, that was yesterday,

And they're like, ah. And if you ask somebody without a d h, adhd, the same question, whether it's today or 10 years from now, they're gonna answer you the same exact way. And so that's just a little tip for you to know. Thank you. So that. You ever have a miscommunication with your wife if she doesn't have adhd or with a patient or somebody else, you could just be like, Hey, sometimes, We're all meant to change your mind.

So that's a, like not making it mean a thing, but at least be aware so that it doesn't lead us into trouble. Some somewhere . So that's a key for inter a key point for interpersonal relationships or communication strategy.

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: I like that. Just to your point there I. A lot of people on the outside who have not had experience with the diagnosis could see things as, using d h ADHD as an excuse.

Oh, that's my d h d, but or a reason to be. But I think the important distinction is that you are, we're talking about tips and things that we, no, we're not trying to change other people. We're trying to change our. To adapt to a world that is having certain expectations of us, and it is on us to make those changes and, but still have that, realize those things and take those actions rather than just saying, yeah I have adhd.

That's why I didn't, I asked you to repeat yourself, or that, that would be very frustrating. I think. It's certainly an important distinction to make in terms of people who are dealing intentionally with. Their uniqueness,

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: I guess. Yes, exactly. I think to your point, that's what I'm saying.

Like I feel like a D H D starts and ends with us. Yeah. What I mean awareness, right? Yes. Because when you are. Aware that this is something that you're working towards. This is something that on purpose, you are trying to make sure, quote unquote, I'm not annoying them, but I am respecting them, but I'm also respecting myself how I think, how I learn, how I do things.

So it's a communication strategy, not to say, oh, please excuse me, I have adhd, but it's Hey, I, because I have H adhd, this is how a tool that I'm trying to implement so that we both communicate better. And so it, again, it goes back to the awareness. And you don't even have to say you have h d if you don't want to.

You can just say, I have noticed that I work best when, and then you just say da. When I have a quiet environment, when I have my own Nurse when I have my own, ma, when you help me start my note. When you put the first sentence in my h p I, like you, you can just say, I work best, Quinn.

And that's sad, right? Like I said, it took me a while to say I have d h, adhd and you don't have to. But now I'm like, I say I have h adhd, like the sky's blue because it is blue outside. And labeling things can sometimes. For, and again, it's not an excuse, but it's just okay. It's just like saying, Hey, I have blood pressure and I shouldn't be having salt or something.

Or I have diabetes and I should be careful with how much sugar I have. And so I think it's, again, creating just an awareness. People with ad with diabetes have their bracelets as says, I'm a diabetic. And again, I'm not saying you should go walk around and see I have ADHD everywhere.

But the point is that, again, if, and I now use this for myself, if I am doing something that seems like it's overwhelming me or it's too hard or whatever, hard means, right? I take a step back and I'm like, where's my d h d? And hands in this or what have I not done? ? Have I eaten? Have I taken a break?

Am I trying to do three things at once? Just like what you do with a kid, right? Like when they're crying have they eaten? Are they have a poopy diaper? What's going on? The basic things because. something is causing us to feel like overwhelmed. , there probably is an easier path.

It's just that we might be trying to do the dreamy thing of doing 10 things at once with our A D H D, yeah. With that being said in terms of the volume that you were talking about, When I was, going back when I was a medical student in a resident I think like dermatologists would see something like, I don't know, like 30 to 50 patients a day or something like that.

And I was always like, mind blown because, as a family medicine doc, 20 and we're like, we're like choking ourselves or 2020, some people see 25 or something. Yeah. I don't know. But I was never one of those. And if I was seen like about 20 something, I was like dying and I was always like two hours or three hours behind and I'd be like, wow.

Still here. Why don't they wanna see somebody else? And then they'll be like, no, we waited three months for you. Or six months for you. Exactly. Yes. Yes. And then I was like, you

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: probably listened to them. You take the time you're, they lo they, and they're willing to wait for that. But it still weighs on you that you're Exactly,

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: yeah.

Yeah. So was that happening to you?

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: Oh yeah. The, that I've always intentionally kept my volume to a manageable degree, but I am trying to scale up right now and I'm trying to actively think of strategies for how I can do that rather than just do things the way I've always done and just try to do it more, more efficiently without actually putting in strategies to help that and systems to help that.

And I think this whole journey has. Making me a lot more open to that and excited to see more patients rather than dreading seeing more patients, which I would have been before. And that's, so I've been in a unique situation because I was, I worked at One place for about two years, right out of residency 2019 to 2021.

And then I changed jobs for a number of reasons and moved so I had to, I was building up a scaling up my practice and building up a panel of established patients. And it becomes a little bit more routine when you're not seeing so many new patients every single day. And then I started over two years and I started over, and now I'm about a.

And a half more than a year and a half into the new one and getting close to, seeing patients back again, which is great. But still seeing a lot of new patients every day. So that also makes it hard to scale up. Seeing someone back is a lot different than establishing a relation, brand new relationship with someone.

So I am being more intentional trying to think of systems and again, with the medication and with the just known knowing about these things about myself it makes it more exciting and more like a game and rather than something, rather than I'm running from a bunch of tigers or something.

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: Yeah. So important, everything you just said systems are, are the key. And that's what I teach in my, I have a 12 week c m e group coaching. And I, and exactly what you just said, it's all about systems. It's about realizing your strengths. It's about where do I delegate?

Where can I change, where can I keep what is working? Yeah. And where can I. Take away steps, right? So that, maybe it's not you who has to keep running out and to go. Form every single time that you wanna explain this skin condition to your patient, right? Maybe it's having a binder there already that you just pull out one from and you give, and then that's it.

Or can the instructions be given by the nurse afterwards? Where can you shave off a few minutes here and there You can work at the top of your game. And like you said, how can you make it fun? That's the first thing that we do when they come to my course. I'm like, okay, what do you do for fun?

And they're looking at me like, are you crazy? I just told you I don't have, I don't have enough time. And I'm like, I know. What are we gonna do for fun? Let's schedule that in first. And they're looking at me like, What? And I'm like dopamine we don't have enough. So if we have a dopamine menu, then we can pull out stuff.

So instead of you going for the twinki, like you go for a chewing gum or you do a two minute app of a meditation or something else, right? And they're looking at me like I'm crazy. And I'm like, yeah, and where's your time off? And they're like, what? And I'm like, yes. Where's your time off? I need to know where your.

You're sleeping, eating, resting, what are you doing? That and yeah. So I think it's so important, like you said, to approach it from like new lens, right? , like now you can step into it and say, how can I do more, but not working myself harder but smarter now. Yeah. Yeah.

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: Yeah. And it's.

It's definitely a game changer and I think a lot of physicians narrowing it down, a lot of physicians who bridge or branch into physician entrepreneurship. Certainly. I think a lot of the root of that is wanting to have a bigger impact and reach more people and we get frustrated in. how non-scalable our day-to-day work is.

And you just have to be there and there's only one of you, and you just have to be there for every patient. And there's just, I can't see 90 patients a day. I just physically can't see that. Maybe I could see 50, but I would be probably miserable. And my patients wouldn't be as happy. So there's a sweet spot somewhere.

So there is room for growth, but it's capped, certainly. And so a lot of people who are ambitious like yourself and want to impact people in a different way and have have a small business as well, or a big business are drawn to things like group coaching, things like online courses, things that are scalable, but still you're putting your heart and your passion into them.

But it doesn't. Every aspect of it doesn't rely on you being in a room with one person. So that's a trend that I'm seeing at least, and which is amazing because there's so many great people, great doctors out there now helping other doctors. And we're at such a critical point where so many doctors are struggling more so than in the past.

And it's it's not position healed by self. It. Is it other docs helping helping them? Cuz we have such a unique perspective and unique challenges. What you're doing is awesome. Just the other, I think some people at this point are like, oh gosh, another coach like that. I, it's such a cliche, but we could have.

10 people coaching on physicians with a D, adhd, and there wouldn't be enough, not this one. And I just love what you're doing and I think more and more people are gonna be doing it, but it's not gonna get saturated because it's such a need out there.

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: Yes. Thank you so much for sharing that.

Yes like you're saying coaching is such a new thing and yes, it seems like physicians are, I'm so glad that they're doing it. It's still, when you look at it, the ones that I know so far, maybe there's two. Hundred of us, at least the ones I know, but Huh. There's what millions of us who are positioned.

So again it just goes back to everybody is multi-passionate and like you are into real estate, like , a lot of us like run away from money, we're like, oh no. And so to you this is your stone of genius and who knows, maybe you would go into that or not.

Something that is so easy for you that you're like, why would people pay for this? People will pay for what they're not really your second one, , people would pay for for whatever their pain point is, right? Yes. So that's what it. What is important, but at the most important thing is like you just said, what gives you passion?

What would you do? What would you continue to do, like five years from now, 10 years from now? And how can you have a bigger impact? Because, you could easily set up a course on investing and like you said, that's scalable, right? Because you're now helping the masses and. would be so glad to be educated about something.

Or you can even set up a course about like, how to identify certain conditions. Even for physicians, like you could be like, Hey, this is for primary care doctors. Like this is the things you can do in the, in your office before you, you come and help me. Yes. And then how many more like. Patients in a, in you have taken care of, like indirectly, right?

. So like for me, like I feel like as I'm helping my A D H D physicians, I'm, he, I feel like I'm helping like thousands of patients because you are seeing all those other patients for me. So instead, I, like you said, there's only one of me and I can't see all of them, and yeah. So it's just so important to.

Leverage our MD degree because automatically we have credibility and automatically if we are aligned with what we're doing, like the money just flows. Yes, And that's something that obviously we need to get coached on because as physicians we're not used to like charging for all her advice that we give freely every day.

At the end of the day you serve and you earn, and then you're able to use that again to enhance the wellness of you, your family, and everybody around you. So it, it makes an impact long way. But we were also talking earlier I was asking you, in my in my coach I have 90% females in it, and I'm not really trying to exclude any males.

And so I was asking you do you think like coaching is something new that maybe that's why phy male physicians haven't flocked into it or we were just chatting you? You can be honest. You don't have to.

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: I think this is a really interesting point of discussion. Could be. Few episodes in and of itself, probably or a great panel discussion actually with a couple women coach, a couple female coaches, a couple male coaches discussing it.

And first of all, the numbers are obviously skewed anywhere on social media women towards men and I we're, I know we're talking binary right now. It's just for the ease of conversation. But it's certainly skewed. I think women. In general better at putting themselves out on social media.

I think a big one is that women are much more supportive of one another and eager to work in a group that's a very comfortable for women, at least what I've seen to be in a group of other women because of what they've. From, the patriarchy and it's a, may feel like a safer space.

And your group is not only for women, you're saying, how do I get more men? But there are a lot more groups for women only than there are for men only that I've come across in terms of coaching and things like that. Another thing is I think men are less likely to seek it out. We. Just typical I have a lot of patients, men who are there for a, 60 year old guy who's there for a skin check.

And the reason is my wife told me to go . I never have a woman who's in for a skin check who tells me, my husband told me to go. That never happens. So that's another thing. It's that vulnerability thing. It's the met weather, it's the machismo that you just don't want to admit it or just, Whatever it happens to be.

But I definitely don't think that, like you had mentioned, someone told you that, eh, no. Men may be better at delegating or something like that. Definitely not. I think women are in general, especially. Women who are professionals, who have families burdened with mu many more tasks. And we call it emotional labor, if you will than men typically.

Certainly that's how it is in my relationship. And so women will naturally get more overwhelmed and actually seek help because they are, they hold themselves as such a high standard, especially when they're trying to, when they're a. A mother and a wife. And a professional. So that's in a nutshell why I think those things are, and maybe it's part of the marketing, but I don't think that's the core root of it.

And I find myself, I don't know why, but I am drawn to female voices in this space. Most of the podcasts I listen to, and I guess that's because most of them are women. But I will listen. There's several podcasts that I listen to that are. Exclusively marketed to women whether it's coaching or investing.

And I just like their voices. I like the way that they work together. And I'm a little bit turned off by like the. The Instagram ad I'll get, that's all of a sudden in my face is this macho guy on his private jet telling me how he has this hundreds of thousands of dollars of passive income coming. And that's just I kind of scroll by and it's, but that's just me.

There are plenty of people who are drawn to that. But I'd love to talk about this more. I think it's fascinating and there are a couple male coaches that I know, physician coaches who are awesome. And I think we need a lot more. It will balance eventually, but it's a area to a disparity that.

Is ripe for

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: something to trust. Hey, maybe that's an opportunity to step into, to be a male coach or a realtor. Here I am putting words in your mouth. But the point is that I think you having that perspective can also help you later on with whatever you decide to do because you have that insight.

And yes, I. Think that collaboration is key in, in, in entrepreneurship. Like I was just having this discussion yesterday with my husband because I was like, no, I am gonna do ethical marketing. And then he's, we were just going back and forth and he's be ready to be eating alive. And I'm like, I don't care.

I go this is how I do my business. I do it from a place of integrity. I want feedback. And then he's Some people don't work that way, like it's cutthroat. I'm like I don't have time for that type of stuff. I go, they're not working with me if that's what they're expecting, and so we were going back and forth on that and he's you are in your own little la land when it comes to business.

And I'm like, and so if it's working. Yeah. And, but we were just having that discussion about how sometimes marketing can tell you one thing and then you get into it and you're like, no, I don't feel like I. That, and so I was like, I'm gonna give feedback on that.

And he's you don't do that. You're cutting yourself out. And I'm like, I want feedback. If my shit's not what I'm saying, it's gonna be, I wanna, he's you're different . He's not everybody wants to know that. And I'm like, oh.

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: You're, yeah, you're attracting your people your customers are out there and yeah, I think, like your husband mentioned, being in la land like that, to me that's the same as saying you're being authentic to yourself and that's why people are drawn to you.

That's why your customers are drawn to you like Kevin Kelly this several books, amazing journalists and Techn. I think I think he ran Wired for a while. If he doesn't still has a very famous blog post called 1000 True Fans. And that's the sort of gist of it is that's all you need. That is it's very much less about having 6 million Instagram followers than those.

100 people who are your people and though who very much feel like you are authentically serving them. And that's why they say the riches are in the niches and all those sayings and stuff. You can, the, I could have a course on helping dermatologist with a D H D. Find their first rental real estate property and like that.

And that's just a joke, but it's also not Yeah.

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: And I don't, I dunno where to invite you to find your people . Yeah. Because again, like you said, I am part of an A D H D physician only group that like, I'm so grateful to be there. There's a thousand of us. And you wouldn't think that there's like a thousand of us, right?

Because again, some of us don't talk, but. When you are there, like you should just see the memes that are there, , some like somebody posted last night. In that group, they said the question was asked by the interviewer, are you somebody who works hard? And then the person answered, of course, I work hard.

All the time, more than I need to and should, in all aspects of my life. , yeah. And again it's just a funny joke, but at the same time, it just goes back to sometimes we're doing it harder than it needs to be, and can we slow down? Can there be any better way? And can we laugh about it and be like, huh, okay, let me backtrack and let.

Do it in a different way or knowing, okay, no, this is what works. I'll just gonna do it this way or not, right? But yeah. Yeah. So thank you for having this insightful discussion and I think I am so glad to be catching you, like you said, on an earlier stages of your diagnosis, but I do wanna point out, like you said, it was, Probably having two kids around like a seven month old adds more responsibilities than what we were used to.

Plus you having your practice, plus working towards scaling it plus unfortunately your brother passing away, it, it was just like, The perfect, beautiful storm . It was, yeah.

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: So bridging into trying, finally really committing to doing things, entrepreneurial things as well. And I, the one thing I didn't mention, but it's it somewhat obvious from her age, my, my daughter was born on May 23rd.

My brother died the first week of June and we closed on the first investment property the first week of. So that was a lot and it was a combination of wonderful, joyful things and awful things. And I probably mo couple months after that ended up in my primary care doctor's office, sending him a pretty desperate message one night and then we had a good conversation the next.

Day or something cuz he's really responsive and he got me on a journey with some help of other people to a what feels like an entirely different person. And I have to work through that as well because other people in your life, when you're transforming yourself in a positive way that feels positive to you, you could feel you could appear foreign to other people and.

Intentionally working through that right now. Because it's a dangerous zone for sure. They're like, who are you now? What the I'm more myself. I'm a better version of myself, but I'm appearing very different and it's a shock and it can seem inauthentic.

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: Yes. Oh my God. Like you said, this is a whole other conversation that we could probably dive into.

I know you're, you wanna close it off three or four episodes, but thank you for pointing it. Because like I said, yes, oh my God, we could definitely go into it into so many things and so many stories and so many conversations that I'm happy to be back on some other time I don't. Yes, of course. Yes.

I could definitely jump on on that. But again, it's the key of awareness of that. I think you're so ahead of the game and staying intuitive and in perspective and if like you just stay on the same thing thinking this is. Growth. Think about it like, to become a butterfly, like you have to be a caterpillar at some point, right?

And and growth hurts

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: growing.

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: Pains all that. Growing pains. Yeah. And but the people that are gonna appreciate what you're going through. Yeah. Or those that obviously are always gonna be there. But sometimes the people that We're benefiting from our lack of boundaries sometimes.

Yeah. Interesting. They have the hardest time because they're so used to you being three people, and and now you're like, no, I'm trying to set healthy boundaries for me and for my family and sometimes it it can appear like you're cold or indifferent. Things like that. But it's so insightful again, that you are having these conversations and that you are working through that because it becomes important.

And so let's let me just ask you, where can people find you if they wanna chat with you?

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: Yeah, sure. I am becoming more active on LinkedIn. I'm really enjoying interacting there and offering some perspectives both in terms of general dermatology matters, as well as kind of personal finance and real estate.

And then on Instagram, I am not as active, but a great place to connect with me as well at Lou. Md just my last name, then MD and I also have a smaller account for my real estate investments that is Happy Monday Real estate on Instagram. And that name may be obvious why I chose it, but I'm just, that's part of the reason I bridged into entrepreneurship and other kind of establishing horizontal levels of income.

And other, adding pillars to my financial table because it's really, I want to look forward to Monday and I wasn't always looking forward to Monday. And I, and now it's much easier already because I've identified some things I was struggling with, but I want it to be even better in the future.

So those three places are the main areas to reach out to. Thank you.

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: So as we've been talking about when we are in our zone, we sometimes space out . So if my audience just started paying attention right this second. Yeah. What is one takeaway or two takeaway points you would want them to take away from this episode?

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: I would say it's never, I have two. Number one is it's never too late to ask for help. I received help just in 2022, was my year of help mental health. And I received help with both chronic anxiety, which I knew I was struggling with, and adhd, which I did not know I was struggling with.

And both addressing both of those has changed my life already. And the second would be that there are tipping points and watch out for those tipping points. And if you go through something and all of a sudden things are falling apart you may be you may be at a tipping point where you need some help.

And investing in the expertise of others investigating real time and money and the expertise of others. The one of the best investments you could make.

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: And one last question. What do you do? What do you see yourself doing for fun in the next three years? For

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: fun. I would, so I'm excited for my son.

He'll be next winter, he will be four years old and we're gonna have him on our local ski mountain here. We live in a small town, but we're very lucky to have a pretty darn good ski resort. So he'll be up on skis and I'm so excited to just see him doing that and my wife. Love skiing as well. We lived in Utah for a year and that was incredible.

So I'm excited to get back into that because we have gone away from that with the two very little kids. So that'll be fun. I'm just excited to have, yeah watch my son do gymnastics or dancing or skiing or whatever he happens to love. And spending more quality time with my wife and family as.

And able to get a control on the things that were stopping me from being, owing them, the very quality presence that I was not giving them until until I learned to get a handle on the things I was struggling

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: with. Thank you so much for sharing, and as I shared with you, fun is the key.

Yeah. Keep having fun and keep striving to what's to towards what's meaningful for you so that you can practice medicine in your own terms. And so you can be, like you said, present for your family, because that's why we do what we do. We wanna be available in all the relationships in our life, whether it's with our patients, with our clients, with our family, right?

Relationships are always key. So thank you again for coming. So great to have this discussion, and I'm sure we're gonna have multiple other discussions because these are important conversations to have because not until you realize that, oh, this is a D H D thing, or this is a interpersonal thing, or this is a thing that people are just not discussing.

Can we start to have shifts and we, and awareness is the first step, and then you can go forth.

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: Yeah, the A awareness you just mentioned and I the one book that many of your listeners might know of, but it's a book called and it's really meaningful to me cuz it's the last book recommendation that my brother gave me before he passed away.

But it was one, it's one called What Got You Here Won't Get you There. And it's all about identifying in high achievers. You got to medical school, you got through residency, you got that. , but what got you there is not gonna get you to that next very different place. And it's all about identifying the things about yourself that may be really annoying to other people or grading or just holding you back in certain ways.

And it's it's much harder to do that introspective work and identifying that, yeah, there are some things about you that aren't so great and you can address. So I think that is a great one for people who. Looking for personal growth to check. Even though you didn't ask for a recommendation,

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: No, thank you.

That's actually one of my models, so thank you for pointing that out. How crazy that we have solve these serendipities. I

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: I heard you mention it before. Yeah. And it

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: triggered, it reminded me of it. Good. Thank you so much and again, it was a pleasure having you.

Dr. Stephen Lewellis: Likewise. Thank you very much for the opportunity and I wish you all the best with your practice medically coaching podcast, all of that.

I hope we can keep in.

Dr. Diana Mercado-Marmarosh: Bye bye-bye. Thank you for spending your time with me. I really believe that time is your most valuable asset. Please subscribe to the podcast, share with your colleagues, and don't forget to check out my website at A D H d.live coach.com. Where you can find out about my upcoming coaching group classes, as well as free master classes and other exciting events that are happening.