Tyler Dorsey assists children and adults with an ADHD diagnosis develop personalized skills and strategies.
Kentucky has the highest diagnosed rate of attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) for children ages 4 to 17, according to a 2011 study from the Centers for Disease Control.
Tyler Dorsey was diagnosed with ADHD at the age of 11. In May 2018, she started a business, called Focus Forward LLC (focusforwardlex.com), to offer life coaching for kids and adults with ADHD, workshops for families and schools, and tutoring services for students. She is also a public speaker on the topic. “There are a lot of business owners out there who have ADHD themselves and they are examples of how we can thrive.”
In part, Dorsey seeks to clarify and to quantify a long-misunderstood diagnosis. In 1902 a British physician referred to children with behavioral issues as having an “abnormal defect of moral control.” For the past six decades in the U.S., it’s been termed “hyperkinetic reaction of childhood” and “attention deficit disorder” with various qualifiers. In 2013 the DSM-5 (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5th edition) changed ADD to ADHD, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, with three subtypes: inattentive, hyperactive, impulsive or a combination.
“The obvious one everyone knows is attention,” Dorsey said. “It’s also management of time—understanding the realm of time and how time works.” Impulsivity is another subtype of ADHD that can present as wanting to throw something across the room or seeing something shiny and wanting to touch it. “Or having trouble getting your task done from start to finish,” Dorsey said. “ADHD is unique to each individual.”
A native Lexingtonian, Dorsey graduated from Lexington Catholic High School and attended Thomas More University in Northern Kentucky. She started as a forensic chemistry major but graduated with a bachelor’s degree in psychology. “As I got to know myself better ... I thought maybe there’s a profession with ADHD I can get into,” she said. She reached out to the staff at Lexington Catholic and asked for an internship during her senior year in 2014. That spring she interned with LCHS’s newly established “High Marks” program. In the fall she was hired at the school to mentor students with learning differences and provide consulting for teachers.
As much as she enjoyed her academic employment at LCHS, Dorsey knew she wanted to start her own business to help people with ADHD. “I grew up with parents who were entrepreneurs and had that mindset,” she said. “I wanted to see what I could do on my own.”
She chose the name Focus Forward because she wants her company and her clients to focus attention on moving forward. “Focus is the most common aspect of ADHD and the one that’s the most difficult,” she said.
With office space on the south side of Lexington, Dorsey and her staff of seven offer tutoring for students in middle school, high school and college in chemistry, calculus, Latin, math and all the sciences except physics. Dorsey has also created focus sessions for students who know the academic content but can’t seem to put words to paper for their homework. “My kids with ADHD just need help organizing words and processing the material,” she said.
“Those of us with ADHD are just as capable, if not more, than every other person.” — Tyler Dorsey
Dorsey’s goal is for tutoring to represent 10 to 15 percent of her business. “I would like 85 percent to be focused on the ADHD resources I have to offer: coaching, educating, teacher training and working with other ADHD coaches to help them create their coaching business.”
The most prevalent misconception for kids with ADHD is “thinking they’re bad children because they’re unable to control impulses or sit still in the classroom,” Dorsey said. “For adults with ADHD, they may seem to not have it together; they’re not adulting right.”
As an ADHD coach, Dorsey helps her clients create a path to success and figure out how to reach goals on their own. “I’m asking questions and helping them become more aware and have more self-empowerment,” she said. For some clients it might take a handful of one-on-one sessions; for others she provides a monthly accountability process.
“We need to have a different set of skills,” she said. “Those of us with ADHD are just as capable, if not more, than every other person.”