Is It You, Me, or Adult A.D.D.?

Metadata

• Authors: Pera Gina
• Full Title:: Is It You, Me, or Adult A.D.D.?
• Category:: 📚Books
• Read date:: 2025-09-17

Highlights

This book is “pro-medication” and makes no apologies for it. (View Highlight)

a few or many of these other difficulties: •   Losing track of priorities •   Arriving late to events and missing deadlines •   Having trouble initiating tasks and following through to completion •   Being chronically disorganized •   Managing finances poorly •   Losing their temper easily •   Overspending, smoking, video gaming, and other addictions •   Not being “present” in relationships (View Highlight)

Not to mention all the confusing ups and downs of selfishness and generosity, irritability and sweetness, brilliance and boneheadedness. (View Highlight)

All this work has left him exhausted, he’ll say. (View Highlight)

ADHD is considered a syndrome: a condition with multiple symptoms that vary among the individuals who have it. (View Highlight)

Many researchers suspect the true adult population with ADHD lies closer to 10 percent—and possibly as high as 16.4 percent.5 It all depends on how broadly the diagnostic criteria are applied. (View Highlight)

As for the parallel myth, that ADHD in children is overdiagnosed, one recent study confirms the general scientific literature in showing that, in fact, the opposite is true.7 Researchers found that of the 8.7 percent of U.S. children who met the criteria for ADHD, only about half had been diagnosed and one-third were consistently treated with medications. (View Highlight)

In other words, you often can’t see how your actions will result in predictable consequences, which instead seem to come out of nowhere. (View Highlight)

adults with ADHD seem to require higher-than-average stimulation to release brain chemicals that fuel attention, motivation, and self-control. (View Highlight)

Grasp the central challenge of ADHD: self-regulation. (View Highlight)

(In fact, it’s the mere anticipation of a reward that our brains find most stimulating; in comparison, the actual reward can feel like a letdown.) (View Highlight)

experts view ADHD primarily as a developmental disorder—that is, a condition that shows up early in life and interrupts or slows normal development of certain physical, emotional, and social skills. (View Highlight)

That part of the brain is thought to perform an all-important function: self-regulation. (View Highlight)

Genetics exerts the single largest influence on a person’s likelihood of having ADHD, making it almost as strongly heritable as height (which is highly genetic). (View Highlight)

When one child in a family has ADHD, a second child will also have it about 20 to 25 percent of the time (compared to 5 percent in the general population). (View Highlight)

ADHD symptoms reflect an inability to stop, or inhibit, undesirable behavior, as born out by more than 200 studies in the literature. The “mental brakes” just don’t grip very tightly. (View Highlight)

How do I know that he was trying to hit the brakes? Because now he tries and can, thanks to medication. He can even stop whatever he’s doing—and listen— without biting my head off. Conversation is not a problem. In fact, it’s a joy. (View Highlight)

She couldn’t understand what was ADHD and what was personality or family conditioning—or, for that matter, where ADHD ended and jerk began. (View Highlight)

Brooks advises that you try to start distinguishing essential ADHD challenges from common “red-herring” attitudes and negative mindsets. In other words, most adults with ADHD have lived for several decades not knowing they have ADHD; consequently, they’ve usually developed some counter-productive coping skills and distorted explanations to explain their challenges. (View Highlight)

The experts call the self-regulating set of brain capacities Executive Function (EF). In general, EF is the ability to plan, focus, activate, integrate, prioritize, and modulate effort. (View Highlight)

forms the very foundation of a mature and well-functioning personality. Moreover, the existence of this capacity is hard-wired, Gualtieri emphasizes. That means it’s based directly on the brain’s prefrontal cortex and its connections throughout the brain. In other words, you don’t learn this capacity. “The functions can be enhanced by learning and experience, but they are hardwired to begin with,” he adds. (View Highlight)

Barkley breaks out ADHD-related impairments of EF into five “mental modules”:

1.  Poor (“leaky”) working memory
2.  Delay in developing an internal voice
3.  Difficulty regulating emotion and motivation
4.  Challenges in pursuing long-term goals
5.  On-again, off-again performance (View Highlight)

“For the most part, I could live with the forgetting and distractibility,” Bob confides. “What did us in was my girlfriend’s attitude that compromising with me on anything, however trivial, was tantamount to selling her soul.” (View Highlight)

One night, Brenda’s boyfriend told her that he’s developing her voice in his head. As he goes about his day, he “hears” what she’d say, the decisions she might make. “When I realized he wasn’t being sarcastic, it freaked me out,” she says. “Now I understand that his internal voice just felt weak by comparison.” (View Highlight)

moods can change so quickly in response to external events that the less-than-savvy clinician often mistakes ADHD for bipolar disorder. (View Highlight)

What’s more, tempers might fly into action if you don’t respond— immediately—with whatever it is your partner wants. Furthermore, your partner might grow easily irritated with your shortcomings (the children’s, too) even while denying and minimizing his or her own. (View Highlight)

many ADHD traits can put a whammy on a relationship. Yet, any one of these three common patterns can prove particularly devastating: •  Insatiability—Being tough to please and seldom satisfied •  Rigidity—Uncooperative; either/or thought patterns •   Low capacity for or expression of empathy—Failing to think of others (View Highlight)

He calls this feeling of insatiability “inborn, part of the ADHD biology, and not easily quenched, leading to the perception that the world is unfair.” (View Highlight)

for many people with ADHD, the world can seem so chaotic and their focus so erratic, they don’t even know what they feel, much less what someone else feels. (View Highlight)

Most romantic relationships enjoy a honeymoon period where the couple lavishes each other with consideration and patient understanding. Researchers who study this type of thing say this period lasts from about 12 to 18 months before both parties start letting their hair down. With untreated ADHD involved, the timeframe accelerates. (View Highlight)

Adults with ADHD often do notice when their mates are in pain, Brooks explains, yet they seldom know how to deal with it. So they dismiss it or push blame on their mates. (View Highlight)

“People who have ADHD should not use a diagnosis as an excuse, because it’s up to them to learn more effective ways of dealing with it.” By the same token, Brooks emphasizes that understanding your ADHD partner does not mean accepting or giving in to poor behavior. “Instead, understanding the behaviors is a jumping-off point to learning how to change them.” (View Highlight)

Poor mindsets lead to poor coping strategies (View Highlight)

Keep in mind that to you, your ADHD partner’s actions and attitudes might scream “poor coping strategy,” but your partner might not have a clue. (View Highlight)

“For some individuals who have ADHD, it simply becomes a feeling of overwhelming pressure where the overriding thought is, ‘My partner wants me to be someone I can’t be,’” Brooks offers. (View Highlight)

medication consultation is indicated,” Brooks advises, “but new skills need to be developed, too (View Highlight)

When ADHD does create significant sexual problems, it usually falls into two categories: The ADHD partner initiates sex all the time or almost never. (View Highlight)

Another common complaint is constantly being awakened from a sound sleep—when they have to be at work early the next morning— because their ADHD partners come to bed late and can’t get to sleep without sex. (View Highlight)

New highlights added 2025-10-13

For example, the support group occasionally hears about the father with ADHD who has gotten so engrossed in a computer game, he loses track of the toddler encharged to his care. (View Highlight)

When the biochemical tidal-wave ebbs, as it eventually must, passion rolls out with it. Yet, don’t expect the adults who experience this phenomenon to always verbalize or even recognize this explanation. All they know is what their body tells them, he warns. They no longer physically feel in love; therefore, they must not be in love. They simply can’t fathom that new-love euphoria does not last forever and that deeper, calmer roots must take hold for courtship to mature into a more sustaining bond. (View Highlight)

New highlights added 2025-10-17

ADHD Partner Survey respondents who reported an improved sex life after their ADHD partners started taking stimulant medication attributed the uptick to a better domestic life in general—co-parenting, employment, driving, managing finances, and the like. In other words, increased good will and cooperation outside the bedroom often translates into better intimacy and vice-versa. (View Highlight)

“Since I started living with Michael, I am so anxious I’ve become a nervous wreck.” (View Highlight)

The “Following You Around Like a Puppy” State (View Highlight)

The “You Have ADHD, Too!” Phenomenon (View Highlight)

your partner stays on “best behavior” with everyone else—and flies the freak flag only at home. On the other hand, your partner might not realize (or remember) when others actually do register complaints about his or her behavior. (View Highlight)

Making transitions is another factor in ADHD challenges—shifting focus from work to home, work to fun, or work to chores. To summon the adrenaline necessary to meet that challenge, some subconsciously pick a fight. (View Highlight)

This apparent desire to be angry, and to provoke an angry response in others, can result from the ADHD partner’s biologically based need for stimulation, according to psychiatrist Daniel Amen. (View Highlight)

“My thoughts are more terrible than yours” More than half of the ADHD Partner Survey respondents agreed with this statement: “Nothing’s ever about me. If I had a bad day, my partner had a worse day.” (View Highlight)

He’s coined the term ANTs for these automatic negative thoughts and warns his patients that self-stimulating with negativity is a dangerous and isolating game. (View Highlight)

“I say the first thing that comes to mind” (View Highlight)

Many of Amen’s patients with ADHD proudly proclaim they are “brutally honest.” That’s nothing to brag about, he reminds them, because relationships require tact. This behavior might initially spring from impulsivity, but it then becomes a feel-good habit. “It’s as though my boyfriend gets a charge out of the shocked look on people’s faces when he blurts out these things,” Trina says. (View Highlight)

Don’t Take the Bait! (View Highlight)

You needn’t be your ADHD partner’s “medicine” (View Highlight)

When provoked, delay and cool down (View Highlight)

New highlights added 2025-10-19

Discoveries in brain science have shed light on “personality traits” previously thought unchangeable—for example, self-absorption, difficulty reading social cues, and low empathy. We now know that these and other common ADHD characteristics sometime spring from brain biology and can improve greatly with treatment. (View Highlight)

your partner might criticize you for not doing more to help or, the opposite, for being a control freak. Surprise! You might get slammed with both accusations at once. (View Highlight)

If I leave, is that like leaving a physically ill spouse?” (View Highlight)

learning from mistakes is a key ADHD challenge. (View Highlight)

When Jake’s mother finally told her he’d had ADHD as a child, Tina tried to talk with him about it, to encourage him to seek treatment again. He adamantly refused. With great sadness, she walked away. (View Highlight)

New highlights added 2025-10-29

It’s probably best to acknowledge right now that some relationships affected adversely by ADHD are impossible to salvage. (View Highlight)

What about adults who know that they have ADHD and that it’s creating pain for their loved ones and still they do nothing about it? “That’s unacceptable behavior,” she says. “They need to learn about it and do everything they can to change the behavior and give comfort to the people they love.” (You’ll learn more about getting through denial in the next success strategy.) (View Highlight)

Do not tolerate physical or emotional abuse It’s not surprising that brain-based challenges in controlling mood, impulsivity, and frustration lead some ADHD partners to lash out verbally or even physically. ADHD Survey respondents reported the following: •   Their partner has been verbally abusive to them (37 percent). •   Their partner has been both verbally and physical abusive (25 percent). •   They experienced neither behavior (35 percent). (View Highlight)

• Take a break; get some time away from your partner Maurice: “Even if all you can manage is a weekend away to the calm house of a friend or relative and must barter for child-care, it might be just the thing to detach from the chaos and plan the next step.” (View Highlight)