Perhaps parts of my story will feel familiar…
Late-diagnosed with ADHD and finally understanding why business has often felt so hard.
I’m Angela, a strategist, ADHD business coach and mentor. My work sits at the intersection of business strategy, ADHD-informed insight and self-leadership.
I was diagnosed with ADHD at 53. In the months after the diagnosis, so much of my life, and my business, finally made sense.
I began to understand how business-as-usual advice and expectations had kept me stuck in what I call Perpetual Potential, and I saw how much I had tried to force myself into ways of working that were never intended for a sparky brain like mine.
After I dealt with the surprise, relief, sadness, and anger, and moved into acceptance, I began to reshape my business, making adjustments to fit who I actually am, not who I thought I should be.
That’s where I am today, but the story of how I got there actually starts back in 2003, with a marketing agency that looked like a success from the outside.
Where it started
In 2003 my journey into business started the way it does for so many women: a great corporate job, then along came little people and I needed far more flexibility than the role allowed. I took my skills and began freelancing as a marketing consultant under “Ideas Into Action”.
Originally it was just me at the dining room table, with my first business card, my first laptop and the buzz of variety and new ideas.
Then it grew.
One casual staff member became three. I moved us to serviced offices, then an office of our own in Chatswood, where I soon had a fabulous full-time team and clients across three states. From the outside, it looked like I’d made it.
But as the business grew, it pulled me away from what I loved and was genuinely great at (ideas, strategy, innovation and client relationships) and into the parts my sparky brain was never designed for: managing people, payroll and processes.
A growing agency has expenses far beyond a freelance model, and that changed the nature of the services we offered and the clients we provided them to. My service suite “made sense”, but I didn’t pause to check if it was the right fit for me.
For years I kept my doubts to myself, pushing through with sheer determination and what I now know was masking. I thought I just had to work harder and sort myself out.
The First Turning Point: 2012
In 2012, I was standing at Sydney airport waiting to pick up my husband from his first offshore sailing race. He’d embarked on a whole new business direction three year earlier, purchasing a marine business, and these were now a regular part of his world.
When he jumped into the car, his eyes were shining, his face lit with utter joy. He'd just had one of those pinnacle experiences - the kind that reminds you what it feels like to be fully alive.
As I drove home listening to him describe the moonlit ocean and the island appearing on the horizon, something twisted in me. An increasingly uncomfortable question surfaced again: When was the last time I felt that way about my work?
When he turned and innocently asked me how my week was, I slammed my hands on the steering wheel and burst out, “I don't think I can do this anymore!”
Choosing a better business fit
That question that surfaced in the car - about when I'd last felt truly alive in my work - wouldn't leave me alone. Over the following weeks, I began to see what I'd been avoiding: I’d built the business in a way that that made sense given my background and what I’d seen around me, but it was held together by grim determination, not delight.
I couldn’t yet see how to change that. I was stuck in what I now call Perpetual Potential, and after 8 years it led to total burnout.
That’s when I chose to close the agency, hand most of my clients over to my team and keep a few myself.
I felt like such a failure.
It took quite some time and the benefit of Kindsight (my word for compassionate reflection), before I could see that decision for what it really was: the catalyst for my next chapter.
I moved into coaching and mentoring business owners directly, without staff of my own. It was a MUCH better fit for my style, my strengths, my values and the work I’m genuinely great at.
That experience, recognising when something successful is no longer right and having the courage to reshape it, became the foundation of the work I now do with clients. Because I’ve lived it, I understand that sometimes the business that got you here isn’t the business that will take you where you want to go.
Writing my next chapter
That transition in 2012 was a valuable business pivot, because I brought all of that experience with me and continued to build upon it, creating my most fulfilling and impactful business chapter to date.
Since then I’ve worked with hundreds of purposeful businesswomen - consultants, speakers, coaches, creatives and founders - helping them clarify their next chapters, redesign their business models and build the inner authority to back themselves fully.
Along the way I developed several proprietary frameworks that now guide my work with clients. The first was the Next Chapter Model of Change, which I share in my book, Your Next Chapter: Ditch Your Doubt, Own Your Worth, and Build the Business You Really Want.
This model has allowed me to better guide women to listen to their desires, make decisions in their best interests and build businesses that leverage who they actually are.
The Next Chapter Model of Change
But even though my new business was a far better fit for me, I still seemed to be in constant motion. I never seemed to be able to pause my busy mind. For years I’d half-jokingly called myself sparky-brained. Then, in 2022, I found out why…
The Second Turning Point: 2022
At 53, ten years after my business reset, I received an ADHD diagnosis soon after my then teenage daughter had hers.
And what struck me wasn’t just the personal recognition, it was the realisation that I’d already been building my business around this experience without knowing it.
I began to understand why so much conventional business advice had never felt like a natural fit for a sparky brain like mine. The tools I’d developed, the way I naturally worked and many of the women I’d attracted all began to make sense through this new lens.
The 101 ideas? My supercharged, divergent thinking brain at work.
The self-doubt? Years of trying to fit into systems that weren't built for how I think and work
The constant pivoting? My gift for seeing endless possibilities, waiting to be harnessed.
It was a revelation.
It also changed how I saw the agency. Looking back I could finally see that I hadn’t failed at business. I’d built the business I thought a successful agency was supposed to be, and every decision made sense at the time. I’d just never stopped to ask whether it made sense for me. The fit was wrong, and that meant the burnout that eventually showed up was close to inevitable.
Since then, I’ve spent time understanding my sparky brain and reshaping both life and work to fit me, not the other way around.
This shift has changed so much.
Embracing self-leadership allowed me to stop chasing external validation and gradually anchor myself in inner authority. I’ve rebuilt my self-worth, learned to trust my decisions, and reshaped my business to leverage and amplify my natural strengths.
What a difference. What a relief.
This second turning point didn’t just help explain my past - it deepened my commitment to helping ADHD and sparky-brained women build or reshape businesses to fit them, leveraging who they genuinely are rather than who they think they should be.
Where Business Fit comes from
Business Fit is the work I wish someone had done with me back then: a deliberate look at whether your clients, services, pricing, business model and marketing actually fit how you think, what you’re brilliant at and the life you want your business to support, before the gaps morph into burnout.
It sits at the heart of The REwire Method™, the thinking and action behind all my work.
Curious whether parts of your business need some proactive reshaping? I have a quick exercise I’ve developed to get you started…
Patricia Falcetta
Founder of Social Living Solutions
"I believe every female business owner who is neurodivergent needs you! You're the first coach I've ever felt real synergy with because you're a kindred spirit.
I've invested so much in the past and have never moved or progressed as far as I have with you. You're worth every cent!"
How I can help
Business strategy and ADHD support are often treated as separate worlds.
I sit at the intersection of both.
Together, we’ll untangle your thinking, clarify what matters most and reshape your business around your strengths, values, natural working style and the life you want it to support.
At the same time, we’ll strengthen the self-leadership that helps you trust your judgement, make deliberate decisions and act on the strategy we develop - without expecting you to mask, contort yourself or follow another formula that was never built with your brain in mind.
I know what can change when your business is finally the right fit for your sparky-brained self - that’s the work we do in The UPLift through the REwire Method™.
Sarah Denholm
Public Speaking Coach
”I hired Angela to get an expert outside perspective on my business and help me to refine and streamline my offerings. She’s given me so much more than that! It’s been such a relief to have someone “in my corner” to bounce ideas off and to offer clear suggestions for improvement. Angela embodies what she promises, is truly generous with her time and resources, and does it all with warmth and energy".
A little more about me…
Born in New Zealand, I married my "Ex-Brit", Graham, in 1995. We have two adult children - Cameron and Charlotte - and split our time between Sydney, Canberra (where our son lives), and various golf courses from the Blue Mountains to the Central Coast.
I've been alcohol-free since 2006, a decision that profoundly shaped my understanding of self-worth, resilience, and the courage it takes to face change and maintain momentum.
When I'm not working with clients, you'll find me reading, colouring in whilst listening to fantasy and historical fiction audiobooks, hosting dinners with interesting people, or planning our next travel adventure.
Keeping my skills sharp
Alongside my work with women in business, I’ve also co-run SailTime Australia, a member-based sailing business, with my husband since 2009. I was also the strategic marketing consultant for an accounting association with firms across Australia and New Zealand for 14 years.
I hold diplomas in Marketing and Positive Psychology, accreditation in Strengths Profiling and training in Facilitation, Neuroscience and ACT. I trained as an ADHD-informed coach through the Gold Mind Academy (UK) and I’m listed with the Australasian ADHD Professionals Association (AADPA). All of it is complemented by more books, podcasts and short courses than I could possibly count!
You know you’re capable of more.
And if you need to, you can borrow my belief in you until you have it for yourself.
After more than two decades of supporting businesswomen, many of them sparky-brained, I know that when you combine strategic clarity with inner authority, you don’t just deepen your impact - you finally align what you do with who you are.
And growth doesn’t always mean BIGGER - it can mean deeper. The women I work with aren’t usually looking to build business empires. They want to be well paid for impactful, meaningful work.
If that resonates with you, I’d love to be part of your support team.