In this video in his series on managing adult ADHD, Evan Lieberman, MSW LICSW LADC, breaks down all of the symptoms of ADHD as well as other symptoms not in the DSM that research shows impact individuals with ADHD. This is fascinating information any other with ADHD or a loved one with the disorder should not miss!
The presenter opens the series episode and explains they will discuss common struggles faced by adults with ADHD and preview the video's goal of breaking down related problems.
This section describes why everyday tasks like dishes, laundry, and tidying are hard for people with ADHD, how motivation issues and clutter increase stress, and cites a study showing many struggle with domestic duties.
The speaker discusses research linking ADHD to impulsive purchases and difficulty sticking to budgets, explains the dopamine-driven appeal of buying, and highlights how avoiding bills and mail can worsen financial stress.
This chapter outlines how ADHD affects job performance—struggling with organization, neglecting uninteresting detail work, and procrastination—using a real-world example of a clinician who left paperwork undone and accumulated stress.
Here the host explains that forgetting dates, lateness, and failing domestic responsibilities can drive partners crazy, increasing relationship stress and reducing overall life satisfaction when ADHD goes unmanaged.
This section links ADHD to difficulties maintaining nutrition, exercise, and routine medical care, notes exercise as a helpful strategy, and emphasizes a striking finding that ADHD is associated with a shorter life expectancy.
The presenter summarizes higher rates of anxiety and depression among people with ADHD, increased risk for other conditions and behavioral addictions, and explains how accumulated stress worsens emotional regulation and mental health outcomes.
The video concludes by reinforcing that ADHD's impacts are real and research-backed, then invites viewers to continue the series where the next episode will focus on strengths and solution-oriented strategies.
Hey folks, welcome back to my series on managing adult ADHD. And today we're going to be talking about some of the things that folks with ADHD struggle with. And even though you may have ADHD, you've known it for a very long time, I find that a lot of people don't fully grasp or understand how it can impact somebody's life. A lot of times some of the issues we have may not be exactly related to the symptoms in the DSM, but often they are correlated with having the symptoms of ADHD. So in this video I'm break down a whole bunch of the different problems and some of the negative poor outcomes associated with having the disorder.
One of the first problems I'm going to highlight is the way ADHD affects our ability to do our domestic duties. So if you're a homeowner and even if you aren't a homeowner, you know how much it takes just to live, whether it's doing the dishes or folding your clothes, doing the laundry. All these little responsibilities can be extremely difficult for those with ADHD. Our green light does not turn on very easily when it comes to being motivated to doing these things. Now, this could impact us on deeper levels.
Having clutter around, having the stress and anxiety of procrastinating some of these things we need to do at home could lead to more mental disorganization and stress. A study by the National Resource Center found that 70% of people struggle with doing domestic duties who have ADHD. One of the biggest things folks with ADHD struggle with is managing finances. Now, a journal of clinical psychology found that folks with ADHD are much more likely to spend impulsively and not be able to stick to a budget.
This makes a lot of sense because spending, buying new things is a novel, rewarding activity that gives us a lot of dopamine. So our green light turns on and that red light struggles to come on with these types of activities. Now, financial stress is one of the leading causes of stress among anybody. So folks with ADHD who struggle more with this tend to have more stress, whether it's bills piling up having to pay penalties, fines. People with ADHD don't love opening the mail, even looking at these kind of things.
So you can see why having struggles with finance and managing a budget could really impact us in a negative way. Now another big area folks with ADHD struggle with is in their jobs. Now a journal of attention disorders found that folks with ADHD struggle to organize at work and be able to stay on task. Work really highlights a lot of the struggles that we have because of the duties involved, sometimes not Everything we do is fun at work, right? We all have duties that we like and we all have things that we don't like doing.
So folks with ADHD often excel in doing the things they like, but then they completely neglect the things that they don't. And sometimes those are the more detail oriented things. And eventually they kind of get found out because they haven't been doing this for quite a long time. And that alone could cause a lot of stress and anxiety. I remember I had a supervisor who was an amazing clinician. She was so good. with clients, but she just could not manage to do certain types of paperwork. And she had charts just hidden all over her office from years and years piled up because she didn't want to go back and finish them.
So these are just examples of how having ADHD could affect our career and our ambitions. One of the really big issues folks with ADHD struggle with that has an extreme negative impact on their lives is their ability to manage their relationships, especially romantic ones. Now, we are very lovable people, But sometimes we drive people absolutely crazy, whether it's not showing up to things on time, forgetting dates, birthdays, that trouble with working memory, issues with domestic responsibilities really can create a lot of stress in relationships.
And when we have stress in our relationships, that creates a lot of stress and it impacts our happiness because the quality of our connections is one of the biggest predictors of happiness in life overall. So when we don't have our ADHD managed, the symptoms of impulsiveness or whatever else get in the way of those relationships, it has a huge profound negative impact on us. This next thing that folks struggle with ADHD, I found to be very fascinating for a lot of reasons, and that is struggles to manage our physical health.
There's a lot of reasons for this. Maybe it is impulsive eating, not being able to manage our nutrition or a diet, maybe things like exercise. One of the best things people with ADHD can do for themselves, and we'll talk about this later, is exercising. It helps in so many ways, but sometimes when we're disorganized, we don't have a routine or not feeling motivated to work out. That can really be a difficult thing for us to do. Now, another issue, just like managing finances or work, is we have to manage our bodies and our health.
And part of that is going to the doctor. If we have an issue, going to the doctor, taking medication, some of these things, these very routine and often boring things we struggle to do. And you can see how that can lead to poor health outcomes. So this fact absolutely blew my mind when I heard it. And it is one of the biggest things, one of the most extreme facts that highlights how real this disorder is and how real of an impact it has is that it lowers our life expectancy. So folks with ADHD have nine years less of life expectancy.
How crazy is that? So this is why it's so important for us to manage this disorder so that we could live a healthier and happier life in general. The next one is really accumulation of all the stressors folks with ADHD have and there may be a biological underpinning to why we struggle more with mental health and our emotional health in general. So for example, folks with ADHD, about 50% struggle with anxiety, about 30% with depression. For depressive disorders, you are three times more likely to have a depressive disorder if you have ADHD.
There are other comorbidities such as bipolar disorder, autism, and a huge one which we refer to is addiction. Not just substance addictions, but process addictions, right, behavioral addictions. Things like gambling or sexual compulsivity is a big one. These self-soothing behaviors that give us a lot of dopamine to make us feel whole, to make us feel normal. So you could see why all of All of these issues that we have lead to these stressors and lead to mental health issues, which cause even more stressors in our life.
ADHD is real and the struggles we experience are real. And another big problem that we're going to address is our ability to emotionally regulate. So not just having the depression or anxiety, but our ability to regulate our emotions. We can be a little bit more reactive, again, impulsive. So all of these things is so important to address so again, we could live this overall mentally and emotionally healthy life. All right, folks, I hope those facts were illuminating as we highlight the problems and showing why ADHD has such a real impact on our lives and that this disorder is real.
There's so much research backing it. Anyways, I want you to stick around. Now that we've identified the problems, the rest of the series is going to be far more solution focused. Now, in the next video to kind of combat the negativity of this video, it's going to do one of my favorites, and that is breaking down the specific strengths people with ADHD have because again ADHD is all about extremes so those extreme difficulties often lend to extreme creativity and talent so don't miss it.
Reactions and comments are for members. Joining is free and takes a minute.
