What is this feeling?

[sooverthisshit]

Please only reply if you have ADHD or experience of living with someone with ADHD and please ‘be kind’ because I am fragile at the moment.

I often get this feeling and will give an example situation below:

I was making dinner the other night and straightaway I was on the back foot because my DP hadn’t washed a piece of cooking equipment that I needed even though we’d agreed he’d do all of the dishes to let me cook without having to wash any first. Then I tried to make Yorkshire Pudding but it went lumpy so I thought ok I’ll try again and threw it away. Then I realised I only had two eggs left and the recipe called for three so asked a child to go and get some eggs, child asked me a silly question and I shouted. I then just said no dinner, it’s all too much. The combination of the frying pan, the lumpy batter and the child asking me the silly question just pushed me over the edge and I just went upstairs and refused to make the meal and left my DP to do it. It’s like my body/mind can only take so much and then I just crack.

That sound so ridiculous all written down and I know those things shouldn’t be enough to affect me but they do and other similar things do too like the kids arguing, I can only listen to so much and then I just need it to stop that very second, I cannot listen to another second of it. I’m not sure it’s anger though? Almost like a need to just run away.

I am getting this a lot lately, my tolerance for things is just so low and it is affecting the whole family really. Is it worth speaking to my GP? I am diagnosed privately and not medicated currently. I’ve been to my GP so many times about how I’ve felt over the years and I just don’t really feel heard by them. I’m just written off as yet another depressed, anxious, stressed out Mum.

Please don’t be too hard on me because I really do know that this behaviour is unacceptable.

Thank you.

Bookmarking to reply properly later, as have to go now. Definitely relate to your post op!

You had a plan, thought out in your head. Your plan got scuppered due to you not having what you needed when you'd relied on someone to provide it. Brain boom.

Yorkshires didn't work. Not enough eggs for second attempt.
Brain boom.

Now overwhelmed and anxious, can't cope with unexpected changes, daft question from child.

Complete overload, can't function, need time out and need it now.

This isn't unusual!

It's very familiar to me, but I don't know if it has a name!

I would guess it's probably something like executive function overload. Each subsequent problem needing solving was adding a burden to your executive function, and in the end it just hit break point and short circuited.

The other thing that I think contributes to this is what I think of as the stacked problem effect.

Many neurotypical people occasionally have issues such as a recipe going wrong and needing to start over, but with ADHD it's that all the problems stack and interact so it's one on top of the other all the time. It's kind of like a jenga tower. You have one issue, you remove one block and the tower wobbles but it doesn't fall down.

Now build in ADHD and rather than one problem, it's multiple problems. And on top of the frying pan needing washing and the recipe going wrong and running out of eggs and a child asking a question, there have probably been other things that day which have made your tower very precarious and wobbly.

Another thing to note is time of day. I tend to find by dinnertime/kids bedtime I'm pretty exhausted and worn out. Medication helps this and I'm not so drained. But the flipside of that is that medication can cause a rebound effect when it wears off, so depending on the dose I get a massive crash at about 4pm where I'm no use to anybody. I'm going to discuss this with my doctor at my next appointment.

Thank you for hearing me and understanding me! You are both saying more or less the same thing and are exactly right! It’s the stacking and the one thing after another feeling and eventually it just feels like too much. And yes, in the morning trying to get ready to get out and that horrible evening time is probably when I’m worst.

A lot of the time my reaction to these situations looks on the outside like anger but it isn’t anger. It’s a meltdown essentially?

Other than ADHD meds is there anything to help this? My poor children must just be waiting for my next outburst. Is there any point saying to my GP? Or will I once again be described as anxious …

I hate that I don’t fit into one of their neat little boxes.

I think the main things to help are to try and pace yourself throughout the day - have executive function breaks.

Easy to say, hard to figure out. I don't really know what an executive function break means or looks like! It's something I've been trying to think about recently as I am also prone to this random outburst of anger/rage. (I think this is what people mean when they say "Mom rage"??) But maybe this is a starting point for you to research too.

But also, ADHD can make emotional regulation difficult. We can sometimes feel like we go from perfectly calm to a screaming ball or rage in an instant. In reality, that probably isn't what is happening. There will be little signs and clues that the frustration is building up ready to blow, but a lot of people with ADHD have poor interoception (sense of internal body sensations) or alexythmia (lack of awareness of feelings) which can make staying aware of these signs hard.

I don't know if you have ever played the sims - you know how they have little percentage bars for their hunger, energy, bladder, social etc. If you keep an eye on the bars, then you can fulfil these needs before they drop too low, but if you let them drop too low, then they start shouting at you and wet themselves or fall asleep on the floor. Someone gave the brilliant description of interoception that they can't see the bars. They only get the pop up when they're about to crash from low blood sugar or fall over from tiredness. I feel very much like this and I think my emotional awareness is a bit the same.

However it can be something that you can work in in counselling/therapy/CBT I believe. And mindfulness can also help with this - if you can find a practitioner teaching certified MBSR - there's an online course but I dropped out of it - this is supposed to help you tune into your body and your feelings more, so that with the first annoyance you can kind of notice, step back and reset. Whether the reset is like just filling your bar up to max again so that you can accommodate some extra stress without freaking out, or whether the reset is a conscious action you take: OK, no frying pan, no dinner. Chicken nuggets will be fine. Because we can take actions like these to protect ourselves.

Some other things which have been useful - the Conscious Discipline framework by Becky A Bailey. This is supposed to be a classroom management framework turned parenting framework - what it actually is is a very accessible course on self regulation techniques which are simple to learn, simple because the idea is you teach them to the teacher/parent, the teacher/parent masters them and then passes them onto the children. If they are simple enough for a four year old to master, they can be mastered by an adult whose emotional development is past the level of a four year old (even with ADHD - it should stagnate somewhere around "teenager" and in theory you can get it to "early 20s" with practice)

Zones of regulation too - red/yellow/green.

Oh and also making sure that the basics are taken care of - enough sleep, hydration, food, not too much stress, keep clutter and mess down in the house, noise levels, pain/irritation (from things like uncomfortable clothing), etc etc.

And when those things are not possible, because they aren't always, just being aware that you are likely to need a bit more lenience because of that, and this isn't a failing, it's just life and it's OK.

@BertieBotts Brilliant posts. You've articulated so much of what I've always experienced, but have also provided clear pointers as to how to help reduce the impact. Thank you.

Yes, thank you @BertieBotts. Really helpful posts!

Echoing how helpful these posts are. Going to check out these resources!

Wow Bertie your posts are just so insightful and helpful! Thank you.

The Sims thing definitely makes sense! I am going to look into the therapy and course you are talking about.

With regards to the basics … well I know I probably don’t get enough sleep, don’t eat great, house is the most chaotic site you’ve ever seen etc. I do need to work on all of that but it’s almost a viscous circle isn’t it! When you’re constantly overwhelmed you don’t look after yourself or your surroundings but then that just makes things worse.

Thank you again. It really is so kind of you to take the time to post these replies and I can’t see that you really do understand how I’m feeling!

Well don't thank me yet because you still have to do it and that's the hard part.

Yes, I know what you mean about the chaotic spiral. Everything is hard, even reducing the things which are hard. I guess the only solution to that is to pick one at a time and really ONLY focus on that, ditching all the guilt about the fact the other things aren't quite right.

Easy fixes with big impact though are the ones to prioritise first, so if you can drop any responsibilities with immediate effect, if you can throw money at anything, if you can get blood tests (or even just buy any old random multivitamin, maybe one aimed at women's health).

Then pick one thing (house, sleep, food, mindfulness, whichever) and don't think about the others.