You’ve been living with ADHD your whole life.
Maybe you struggled as a child to do your homework, stay organized, and pay attention. Diagnosed or not, you’ve been working to learn ways to manage ADHD. Perhaps you’ve even had some success.
Or maybe you just got your ADHD diagnosis and can now say, “OHHHH, that’s why I… (lose focus, get easily distracted, procrastinate, rarely finish projects, etc.)”
Either way, you’ve had ADHD all along and you always will. (I like to shatter myths and one is that you outgrow ADHD. Nope, it’s a brain-based condition. We don’t get to go to the brain store and get a new one installed as we get older!)
So I ask you to pause for a moment and take a quick check: How is it going? Do you need help with your ADHD?
How Do You Know If Your ADHD Needs Help?
Many of us are so used to the lifelong struggles that we just keep trying to push through. We don’t notice that our ADHD is impacting us and our families until it’s absolutely unbearable or the challenges of living with ADHD have gotten so high.
We wait till our marriage or our job is at risk or life is a complete chaotic mess. We think we can handle it until our finances are so out of control that we almost can’t recover.
Does everyone need help with ADHD? No. If you are truly thriving and doing well, then you’re probably fine. If you’re in the right career and have the right life partner and have the right environmental structure set up, you may be fine living with your ADHD.
However, if you’re following this blog you probably are struggling. And my mission is to help you live easier with ADHD.
So be honest with yourself: How much challenge does your ADHD have in your life? How hard are you moving around just to stay afloat?
Five Questions to Determine If Your ADHD Needs Help
1. Are you living your best life? You want peace, security, ease, success, fun, etc. You want to be someone people can rely on, trust, respect. Is that happening? Are you able to live that life with ADHD as it currently is? If your ADHD symptoms are blocking you from living the life you want to have, that’s a sure sign that your ADHD needs help.
2. Are you waiting for the other shoe to drop? When my ADHD was out of control, I was always waiting for the next financial / career / relationship crisis. It was hard to get a good night’s sleep because I woke up in the middle of the night worrying about what hadn’t been done. Or, who would find out that I was an absolute fraud faking my way through life. Living with impending doom is a hard, exhausting way to spend a life. If you’re always waiting for that next shoe to drop, it’s a sure sign that your ADHD needs help.
3. Are you giving up your goals because your ADHD gets in the way? Maybe you haven’t started a project or launched that new idea because you’re afraid you’ll fail (again). Or you stopped working toward a promotion because you had to work twice as hard. Or you decided you didn’t have the skills/systems/plans to do something you dream of. If you’ve let go of goals because your ADHD is out of control, then guess what…
4. Are you living in chaos? You can’t ever find what you need, remember what you need to do, or do those things you need to do. Perhaps you’re procrastinating. Surrounded by clutter. Always running late and losing things. Unsure how to start, what to do next, or finish a task. A sure sign your ADHD needs help is if chaos rules your world.
(One of my joys in leading the ADHD Success Club is when members share stories of how they’ve reduced the chaos. Life gets calmer and they have the know-how and support to start unraveling the chaos of their ADHD.)
5. Are you dealing with high emotional costs? Unmanaged ADHD brings on a world of shame, guilt, frustration, and fear. We know we’re not living to our potential and those emotions follow us. We know people notice we’re dropping the ball. Not doing what we say will do. That emotional cost is one of the saddest parts that I see in people who come to coaching. We wait so long to get the help that we need that digging out from that shame becomes a huge task.
If you answered NO to question #1 and YES to any of the others, it’s a sure sign that your ADHD needs help.
And I’m here to help because I want you to succeed. Don’t do what I did. Don’t wait so long that digging out from the mess of your ADHD life is a total hassle. And, perhaps you already are there. Don’t give up.
I invite you to check out the ADHD Success Club and join us for this final season. Sign up today and get the early bird discount of $147/month. This is a great way to get the training, accountability, support, coaching, and help for your ADHD.
Tired of struggling with ADHD? You’re in the right place. ADHD Success is loaded with free, practical tips to help you get organized, manage your time, and live more easily with Adult ADHD. Like what you read? Sign up for the newsletter now! No Spam. I promise!
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