Embrace your unique sparkly brain and create career impact on your terms
Hi, I’m Erica
I’m an ADHD coach, career and leadership coach, educator, researcher and speaker. I help high-achieving neurodivergent professional women rediscover their sparkle and create careers that energise rather than exhaust them.
But 10 years ago? My light slowly started to dim until I could barely see it.
How did I break free from the performance that was dimming my light?
For over a decade, I perfected the art of high achieving performance in academia. Like a lyrebird I mastered mimicking neurotypical expectations — exceeding many performance metrics like publication targets, conference presentations, grant funding applications, student supervision and teaching, and volunteering on boards and committees.
On paper, I was succeeding…
But underneath? I was trapped in performance loops that were dimming my authentic sparkle.
What I now call The Lyrebird Loop describes me masterfully mimicking neurotypical expectations while my authentic voice gradually grew quieter. I was also caught in The Bowerbird Loop — obsessively collecting every glittering opportunity, constantly rearranging my professional achievements, but never feeling satisfied and completely overwhelmed.
Despite doing “all the right things” for my self-care, I kept cycling through ADHD burnout, becoming mentally and physically unwell. My sparkle had dimmed so much, I couldn’t perform anymore.
The turning point
At 52, nearly 10 years after my ADHD diagnosis I finally began to fully understand my neurodivergence and started to rediscover my sparkle and my authentic voice.
When first diagnosed, I thought I understood what support I needed. I naïvely thought I could continue to be a high-achiever just like everyone else. But I didn’t realise the long term impact of the performance loops I was starting as an early career academic. It wasn’t until I started working with my own ADHD coach that everything changed.
Suddenly, the persistent struggle made sense:
The constant mimicry? My neurodivergent brain trying to fit neurotypical systems and expectations.
The compulsive collecting of achievements? Searching for validation in all the glittering things that weren’t my gold.
The bone deep exhaustion and suffocating overwhelm? Years of masking and performing in systems that weren’t designed for sparkly minds like mine.
Since then, I’ve dedicated myself to understanding ADHD and neurodivergence and dismantling the loops that kept me trapped.
I transformed from surviving to thriving more often
— now I help other high-achieving neurodivergent women
professionals do
the same
I see you so clearly because I’ve been where you are
Through my research and lived experience, I recognise the unique strengths of high-achieving neurodivergent professionals feeling trapped in suffocating systems:
Your deep commitment and passion for meaningful work gets channeled into endless performance metrics instead of real impact.
Your ability to see connections others miss becomes scattered across too many glittering opportunities rather than focused on what makes you sparkle.
Your intense curiosity and love of learning drives you to excel – but in systems that demand conformity over creativity, leaving you exhausted from performing rather than energised from creating and connecting.
You’re not struggling because you lack capability. You're exhausted because your brilliance is being misdirected – channeled into mimicking neurotypical success instead of creating your own measures of success so you can *sparkle*.
Qualifications
Certified ADHD-Informed Coach (Gold Mind Academy)
Certified Level 1 Organisational Coach (IECL)
Doctor of Philosophy, Psychology (CSU)
Bachelor of Social Science (Psychology, Honours – CSU)
Bachelor of Health Science (UNE)
Diploma of Botanical Medicine (Australasian Collage of Natural Therapies)
Certificate IV in Workplace Training and Assessment
Affiliations and credentials
Member: International Coaching Federation (ICF)
Member: The Institute of Executive Coaching and Leadership (IECL)
Member: Public Health Association of Australia (PHAA)
Working towards accreditation: ICF Associate Certified Coach (ACC)
Adjunct Fellow: University of Technology Sydney (UTS)
I abide by the ethics and professional standards of the ICF.
I am committed to reflexive practice and have regular supervision, mentoring and coaching.
