Establishing and maintaining routines can be difficult for individuals with ADHD. They are also especially prone to being thrown off easily by deviations from routine, and often experience increased trouble getting back on task.
Routines unravel with great frequency and frustration thanks to a very Catch-22 truth about ADHD: Daily habits make ADHD easier to manage; at the same time, ADHD symptoms and executive function challenges make it inordinately difficult to establish and consistently follow routines.
Having a routine can benefit your child with ADHD and the rest of the family. Structure is beneficial for several reasons: Provides external control: The symptoms of ADHD lead to problems with self-control. As a result, children with ADHD need more external controls (i.e., structure) to help them manage symptoms.
Dopamine levels in the brain are positively correlated with our level of interest in a task. If a task is inherently boring to someone with ADHD, dopamine levels are so low that their brain is unable to “activate” to do the task. They can't pay attention even if they want to. They are in a state of hypofocus.
For many adults with ADHD, executive dysfunction brings weak prioritization skills, time blindness, and an inability to orchestrate concurrent tasks — all critical for managing daily life, and even the simplest of tasks.
Differences in emotions in people with ADHD can lead to 'shutdowns', where someone is so overwhelmed with emotions that they space out, may find it hard to speak or move and may struggle to articulate what they are feeling until they can process their emotions.
In ADHD children, overwhelm can lead to meltdowns or a fight, flight or freeze response. Similarly, in adults overwhelm may lead to a flood of strong emotions that are released in different ways, for example, anger or crying. ADHD overwhelm paralysis or 'shutdown' is also a common reaction.
Procrastination is an avoidance behavior. Imbalances in motivation can occur in people with ADHD, as they tend to hyperfocus on tasks they deem interesting but procrastinate over tasks they deem tedious. People with ADHD may also experience a resistance to taking action due to some emotional conflict with the task.
Boredom and dopamine
Unfortunately, ADHDers typically have lower levels of dopamine, impacting our ability to stay interested in tasks. Consequently, people with ADHD don't get the same fulfillment from completing tasks.
Some people are naturally neat. They keep their things fairly organized and try to avoid making a mess. But many kids and adults with ADHD are the opposite — they're messy most of the time. And it can cause problems at home, school, and work.
These may include hyperfocus, resilience, creativity, conversational skills, spontaneity, and abundant energy. Many people view these benefits as “superpowers” because those with ADHD can hone them to their advantage.
People with ADHD will have at least two or three of the following challenges: difficulty staying on task, paying attention, daydreaming or tuning out, organizational issues, and hyper-focus, which causes us to lose track of time.
“The hardest thing about ADHD is that it's 'invisible' to outsiders. It's not like other conditions that people can clearly see. People just assume that we are not being good parents and that our child is a brat, when they don't have an idea how exhausted we truly are.” —Sara C.
Struggles with reading, writing, and math are common among students with ADHD. Use these strategies and tools to help your child overcome these and other learning challenges in core school subjects.
ADHD boredom intolerance can cause you to seek stimulation when faced with boring activities. You may find yourself acting out, drifting off in your thoughts, or getting bored much more quickly than your peers. And when you get bored, you may have more trouble stimulating your brain and getting motivated again.
People with ADHD have less diffusion of dopamine in the brain's synapses than do people without ADHD, so they do not get the same degree of satisfaction from doing ordinary tasks. That lack of satisfaction is felt as boredom, and it saps a person's motivation to continue.
Additionally, the stress that ADHD may cause can feel exhausting, especially if a person's symptoms are not well controlled. Missing deadlines, forgetting school work, and not meeting household demands may feel overwhelming or exhausting.
When confronted with a task, people with ADHD may struggle to make decisions about how to begin and how to monitor their progress. They might leave the task momentarily only to get distracted by something else. All of these factors mean that tasks keep getting put off, sometimes until the last minute.
ADHD Is Associated With Short-Term Memory Problems
Although they do not have problems with long-term memories, people with ADHD may have impaired short-term — or working — memory, research shows. As a result, they may have difficulty remembering assignments or completing tasks that require focus or concentration.
When a person has ADHD, it is common for her to engage in negative “self-talk,” a constant stream of thinking that is self-critical. This can lead to or aggravate depression, anxiety, or feelings of hopelessness. Learning coping strategies like self-compassion can help to more effectively manage thoughts and emotions.
ADHD burnout is often something a little deeper. It refers to the cycle of overcommitting and overextending that leads to fatigue in people with ADHD. It involves taking on too many tasks and commitments, and then the subsequent exhaustion that happens when we're unable to fulfill all of our obligations.
Some signs that you might be understimulated include: Lack of motivation. Physical hyperactivity. A sense of unease, making you feel "flat" or irritable.