ADHD and Relationships

Earlier this year, I saw a post on Bsky complaining about someone with ADHD ‘treating them badly,’ by not contacting them for months. To me, a person with ADHD, that’s like criticising a blind person for being vision impaired. The post suggested that maybe that person should not be in a relationship with someone who has ADHD. Because they have zero understanding of how ADHD impacts that person, and they don’t know what they signed up for by being in that relationship. In this blog, I’d like to note some of my major ADHD traits and how they can impact my relationships. I hope this helps increase awareness among neurotypical people in relationships with ADHDers. And I hope it helps provide clarity for fellow ADHDers, for ADHD Awareness Month and beyond.

Time Blindness, To When I Last Saw You

The reason I said criticising a person with ADHD for not contacting you for say six months (which is not super long time for someone with ADHD), is because of time blindness. I can feel like I saw that person recently. It was a few weeks ago, or a couple of months, or three, or something like that. I don’t actually know how long it was. I’d have to almost literally get out a calendar and count weeks/ months. And yes, it WILL be longer than I thought, possibly double or even triple the time. I often simply do not perceive how much time has passed.

The other half of time blindness is when I work out that I haven’t called one of my parents for two or three months and have been meaning to. “I must call them,” I think. Then I get busy, distracted. Again, I think, “I must call them.” Its only a week I’ve been meaning to call them? Or was it two? Three? Oh dear, it might have been more like six!

Time Blindness, To Me

Its not that time doesn’t exist. To me its more like anything beyond a week is abstract and increasing vagueness. I can perceive the passage of two weeks, three, a month as if they are exactly the same passage of time. They feel it and I recall them the same way as each other. I can go weeks, even months without properly perceiving time.

So it may be that I’ve no idea if it was weeks or months since I saw you last. I feel like it was four weeks, but it could have been four months. Its not that I don’t care about you. Its that to me it hasn’t been much time at all. So I don’t miss you yet and I’m not rushing to my phone to contact you.

How Can You Perceive Months as Weeks?

Hyper Focus

I can only focus on and do one big thing properly at a time. I can teach students that day, or I can work on my novel that day. It doesn’t matter that I have three hours where I’m not teaching or running errands. I cannot hold all the teaching and student knowledge, and all my characters, world building and plot knowledge in my head on the same day. Or any of five working days of the week, when I was teaching full time. When its the working week; I am thinking about work. I barely give a thought to people I don’t live with, who aren’t relevant to work. There is very little space in my head for them too; my head is stuffed full.

ADHD Sensory Overload & Not Thinking of You

Another thing to be aware of for people with ADHD, is that we, as the psychologist who diagnosed me explained it; do not filter out excess information properly; ever. The extent to which we notice EVERYTHING, every moment, all day long, varies between people with ADHD (and energy levels etc). But in my kitchen, if I look at the floor, I perceive every single crumb, or tiny drip of whatever. All of them, all at once. When I’m in a room full of people, I hear every single voice. All at once. If people are standing close enough to me, I can partly listen to two conversations simultaneously. Sometimes its hard not to.

So as a primary school teacher, I spend my whole day aware of every child and their every movement. And the placement of chairs not pushed in, of objects not put away… around there I hit sensory overload. Sometimes students leave the room and THEN I notice they left rubbish on the floor. And that’s just the visual overload. Again, I can hear them all talking. I notice that child seems unwell. That one is tired and that one is upset. That one needs social support to work with their group, that one is too loud, that one is unfocused.
(Yes, I also have autism and it can be hard to tell the difference between ‘ADHD sensory and information overload’ and ‘autistic sensory overload,’ if such a distinction exists.)

ADHD, Cognitive Overload & Not Thinking of You

My entire day at work is an endless stream of excessive sensory information. And that doesn’t account for conversations. I hear everything that child said about why they struggled with the task, or to work in a group. And I notice their body language, and their word choices, and what they didn’t say. Then I inferred and I reasoned. I drew conclusions. And I might do this for at least one student, possibly three or four, every hour of all five hours I teach a day. (No, this is not the core focus of what I’m teaching or checking the learning of all twenty something students on, this is on top of that.)

By the end of my work day, especially if I didn’t take my ADHD medication, hell on a busy day, even if I did; I am at sensory input overload. I am at cognitive processing of information overload. All I want is to come home, sit on the couch, or go for a walk and zone out. I need to rest and recharge. The last thing I am thinking about is that friend or family member I haven’t called, for I don’t know how long.

Object (& Concept) Permanence

Now you’ve got a clearer understanding of how overloaded I am when I come home from work, imagine how I’d react if the first thing you ask me is, “Did you do thing?” At this point I am so overloaded that I have no idea what you’re talking about. I don’t even remember that we own a bicycle. Why on Earth would I have thought to pump up its tyres?

People with ADHD often joke that we forget things exist, or that concepts, or social practices, even practical solutions for physical or digital problems exist. I cannot begin to tell you how many times I figured out the hard way to solve a problem. A big part of it is being so overloaded that all the sensory and cognitive information starts to overflow from my brain. I cannot hold onto it, I cannot be aware of it.

Worst case scenario, I’m so overloaded that I don’t even recall which strategies I already tried to solve the problem. I can alternate between attempting multiple already failed strategies, multiple times, and continue not solving the problem over and over. As you may imagine, the latter is overwhelming, stressful, FRUSTRATING and tends to lead me to autistic meltdowns.

Regular Overload =Regular Forgetfulness

When I am writing my novel at home, the sense of everything I need to recall about characters, and world building and plot is too much and is flowing out of my brain, which cannot hold it all, is my cue to take a lunch break. Or to go for a walk/ or exercise to clear my head. I hit this point regularly on writing days my twenties, and often in my thirties. It was part of my standard writing routine. I would write until I forgot who was where, doing what, why or what I intended to come next. I would write myself into a state of total cognitive overload, on a daily basis, on school holidays.

At that stage I cannot properly recall or think about anything. I’m in a state of increasingly worse ADHD brain fog and executive dysfunction. A state of extreme forgetfulness. Now is not the time to talk to you about anything that matters. I may not even make sense when I talk to you. And I definitely cannot meaningfully, let alone accurately, process what you are saying.

For me exercise works at this point because I allow myself to totally and utterly forget everything. Its like freeing up space on an overcrowded hard drive, lightening the cognitive load so my brain can function again. (At this point my autistic desire to stick to the plan, which is to finish the one big project for that day, kicks in, and I am still not picking up the phone and calling you. I attempting to write again. After that; I need rest because I have cognitively exhausted myself, again).

Overload, Stress & Cognitive Inability

Imagine you didn’t know all the above me. I’m so overloaded I can’t tell you half of anything I know about literally anything. I can barely think straight. And you make a demand of me. I might burst into tears, throw my hands up in the air, tell you to leave me alone or otherwise snap back at you. It may seem like an emotional outburst that comes out of nowhere. It isn’t (though it does resemble my autistic meltdowns, which are also usually caused by cognitive overload and me being unable to do something I REALLY want done, hours ago, because of it).

As a blunt autistic person I might tell you some of the above. I may straight out tell you, “I cannot talk about this thing now because my brain is not working properly.” It isn’t that you don’t matter. Nor is it that I don’t value you or the thing. It is that I cognitively cannot right now.

I would like to note at this point that I have been told by many people that I’m very articulate. I’m very able to say how things are for me and I have a very clear understanding of myself. Its likely that the ADHD (or autistic) person in your life, or you yourself, if its you! are not (yet/ ever) so clear. So I say all this to raise possibilities and make you aware of what could be going on, in your interactions with/ as an ADHD person.

Distraction & Routine -Still Haven’t Called You

Honestly, the only reason I don’t regularly go a year or more without contacting friends and family I genuinely like/ love/ want to spend time with, is because I’m a primary school teacher. Luckily in Australia, that means my working year is divided into quarters, with at least two week breaks between each. That means I have two weeks of not hitting sensory and info overload every work day. And I’m not spending every evening and most of my weekends recharging. So I can stop and think; who did I last see when? Who do I need to contact?

(This is also when I do personal chores that are not day to day, and periodic jobs like spring cleaning.) If my parents don’t contact me or organise something with me, and its left for me to initiate; I would see them four times a year.

Another factor in this is routine. Somewhere along the way (the habit was damaged by several years of chronic illness after long covid), my routine became contact and catch up every school holidays. Try and keep an eye on time and not go more than two months without seeing, or at least calling my parents. When those routines/ habits are disrupted, ADHD distractibility keeps me busy.

Distractibility -Its not That You Don’t Matter

I can’t tell you how many times said I would do something for someone, and then did it hours or days later than I said. And that’s possibly with reminders from them because I totally forgot (multiple times).

In-the-moment things other people want of me, that I cannot immediately do, are a CHALLENGE to recall the existence of, let alone actually do. (Yes, even if I did take my ADHD meds that day.) For example, the little request a child took five seconds to make of me immediately gets pushed aside by five other students needing things I take thirty minutes to provide them with. The five second request doesn’t even enter my short term memory (unless I write it down). I ‘recalled’ it no longer than it took the student to say it, and me to think, “I must do that thing.”

For bigger, more important things, it could be that I fully intended to help plan that holiday with you. But I was busy, and sensory and information overloaded during my working week. There wasn’t enough time away from that, to exercise and clear my head. To dump out the work stuff and properly think about and help you plan that holiday. Yes, including on the weekend. You matter, the holiday matters; so I want to plan it properly; when I’m focused. Not when overloaded and with my brain split in multiple directions to meet other deadlines.

Responsibility and Realistic Expectations

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying, “I didn’t do this because ADHD, therefore its fine and nothing more is required of me.” I am saying how hard it is. How much energy, effort and discipline, and ultimately sheer stubbornness it takes to work around sensory overload, around cognitive overload, and time blindness, to stop hyper focusing on the big important thing I really need to get done… to pick up the phone and call you. Its a ‘small, simple thing’ and the straw that broke the camel’s back. Or I manage to set aside my cognitive load and make that call, but it takes A LOT of effort. It takes time to meet my deadlines, finish other big things and give you/ the thing you want done my full attention, as I wish to. It will happen, with me organising us catching up, but less often than you may anticipate or want. Guaranteed.

If that doesn’t work for you, if you cannot accept that, then you cannot except me the way I am. And I do not think it is constructive for us to be in a relationship. It will only hurt you, or frustrate you, and strain our relationship. And I will feel bad, and frustrated at myself for letting you down, or frustrated at you for expecting me to wave a magic wand to instantly meet your expectations. Or mad because you think its fine to expect me to push myself to my limits to overcome all of the above obstacles, to ensure I call you fortnightly (hold your breath waiting for that and you will die!) Especially when it appears I’m putting in triple the effort to what you are, and you feel entitled to my two thirds of extra effort.

Final Note On Feelings & Positive Relationships

I’m lucky; I’m stubborn. And pig headed. I know exactly what I will and will not stand for. But a lot of neurodiverse people can be the opposite. Autistic and or ADHD people can very be sensitive to how our cations impact others. A lot of ADHD people can anxious about if they stuffed something up, or put the other person out. Both my GP and psychiatrist paused during my diagnostic appointment to note how unusual it is that I don’t struggle with anxiety. That is very much the norm for people with ADHD.

And while I have calmly, and perhaps bluntly and articulately told you how many of aspects of my ADHD can impact me in my relationships; other ADHD (and autistic) people will feel differently. Many are likely to behave differently. Anxiety and stress are common responses to living with ADHD, particularly when overload hits, and or when you forgot that a super important thing you didn’t do yet exists.

My big point here is what you see of an ADHD person in your life/ of yourself, especially if, like me, you diagnosed late in life; may be the tip of the iceberg. Assume there is more going on than you can see (in your relationship with all humans, period!) There may be more going on than the ADHD (or autistic) person in your life is aware of themself, or is able to articulate, including how they feel about it. If you value them, and your relationship with them; be prepared to navigate that, to some extent, together. Be prepared to ask questions, to get answers, or not. And for God’s sake, check in on each other’s feelings!

Related Reading

I Think I’m Neurodivergent: ADHD?

Starting ADHD Meds & ADHD Struggles

Managing My ADHD

40 ADHD Hacks by ADDitude

Writing Diverse Characters Part 2: How to (Write Disabled and Neurodiverse Characters Tips)