Living with ADHD

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Living with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) can be quite the adventure…we struggle with maintaining focus (or focus too much on the wrong thing), keeping track of time, maintaining motivation, and staying organized. However, it is essential to understand and recognize that ADHD is a neurodevelopmental disorder. This means that it is a condition that has to be understood through both a biological lens and an understanding of the neurodivergent mind.

It is common for people to think of having ADHD as a limitation or a problem. The only time ADHD becomes a mega problem is if you choose not to manage it. In fact, Russel Barkley explained that when left untreated, ADHD reduces life expectancy by about 13 years (RB,2022). People forget that there can be a rise in the stress hormone cortisol which can cause many long term problems with the heart, stomach, and other essential parts of the body. The good news is that there are many ways to make ADHD your superpower!

The truth is that sometimes we have to “invent” ways to manage time and organize ourselves that are not usually thought of. A lot of successful people with ADHD use creativity and hyperfocus as a strategy to achieve wanted goals and productive procrastination to deal with the existential dread of having to do things that are tedious, boring or repetitive. Whether you need to do homework standing up next to a tree while swaying from side to side or use a giant calendar on the wall, what matters is that you develop compensation strategies that make sense for you. A neurodivergent therapist can help guide you through this process, but you have to want to do the hard work of controlling your ADHD. This may include digging into the past to understand the present, unlearn and relearn new ways of coping, finding the right therapist, making mistakes while practicing strategies, taking medication if necessary, and sometimes not feeling so good before starting to feel more like your true self.

Remember, having ADHD is just one important part of your identity and it can be an amazing positive life changing discovery…but it can’t be “Amazon primed!” Changes of self-take time so you have to be ready to invest the time and energy now to be able and manage things effectively later.