ADHD hyperfixations on negative thoughts

[Catscoffeeandsleep]

I really need some help and advice.

If I don’t have a positive big hyperfixation, my brain latches onto a really negative, triggering hyperfixation instead for weeks on end, it's usually things I can’t control. I then ruminate on them constantly and it can take over my life and can make it hard to even leave the house because I believe these things. I can’t seem to think my way out of it; it only really stops when a new big positive hyperfixation comes along, then the cycle repeats.

I do exercise and eat well, but sometimes these negative fixations make it hard to even do the things I enjoy. It gets in the way of my entire life, it becomes my life.

I’m wondering if anyone else experiences this and if you’ve found anything that helps, I thought the medication might help but it starts coming back in the evening.

I have had CBT (not for ADHD as I was undiagnosed at the time)

I get this too, though it sounds like you have it more severely.
I should say that I'm not daignosed but am textbook ADHD together with some autistic traits. It's only in the last few years (I'm now late 50s) that I've started to really understand what this means for me. It explains so much about my life.

There's often an overlap between ADHD and OCD, particularly OCD which focuses on obsessive, ruminative thoughts, rather than compulsive behaviours.

I too get completely overwhelmed by often very specific negative thoughts which quickly develop into a downward spiral. I'm still not good at realising when this is starting; by the time I do I'm already quite far down. I'm in one those phases at the moment and it's hard to tell what part of my worries are rational and which aren't.

Like you say, it's only having a massive positive obsession that manages to counteract the negativity and they're often in short supply. Otherwise my mind very quickly latches on to something upsetting/worrying and runs with it. One thing that does help me is trying to read a little each day. I've never been able to use reading as an escape, but something about the way the print on the page engages my brain helps to regulate my thinking and emotions. It gives me something else to latch on to, rather than my mind turning in on itself and causing havoc.

Sorry, I don't have much actual advice. I'm not on any medication. But I just wanted to say that I understand how distressing this kind of thinking is.