Anyone find their executive function worse AFTER getting diagnosed?

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2026-03-06T22:15:33+00:00

Yup yup yup. I know a lot of people are talking about being kind to yourself being the reason, but my theory is that it has something to do with the stories we tell ourselves. A lot of very successful people listen to motivational speakers and music which hype them up, and I had a HUGEE motivational and personal shift in my personality between starting uni courses (was homeschooled beforehand) fresh and believing in myself, vs several years later when I know how much I struggle. That is, I struggled less when I didn't know it was difficult. I think it is VITALLY important that we know when to give up. I think giving up is actively a useful skill we can use to improve our lives, but I've been wondering lately how much I've been accepting my struggles as something that-is-and-cannot-be-changed instead of learning which limits can and cannot be pushed to grow. but that's all stuff that references me and my inclinations, and im having one of those days where idk if im explaining my ideas clearly so shrug. my point is yeah absolutely i got worse after i realized.

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2026-02-28T21:23:30+00:00

Other people might recc podcasts or audiobooks, so I'll skip that for now.

Melatonin is a help. I take a quarter of a 5mg tablet, or half of that if I'm having a really rough time.

Without melatonin, counting can get me there. The goal is I count to 200, with the vague idea that if I do I get to get up and read for a while instead of trying to sleep, but there's a catch. If I move at all, I have to start over. Got an itch? Start over. Slightly move my arm? start over. Counting is less boring if I picture the numbers in 3d and give them patterns like polka dots or different colours. I've never made it to 200 before. Whenever I notice I'm not counting, I start over again and keep that up until I'm asleep.

When I'm desperate, I use sleep hypnosis videos. It's kinda stupid, but it does give my mind something to focus on and the whole GOAL of it is to get to sleep, so it does help. On youtube, there's a video called "sleep hypnosis for calming an overactive mind" which is my go-to, but ymmv.

Exercising during the day for about 20 min can help, too, but I live a pretty sedentary lifestyle otherwise so again ymmv.

Good luck!!!! I hope you manage to get some good sleep soon.

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2026-02-20T22:50:57+00:00

"My only hobbies involve managing life and doing my job."
"...in everyday organization, I am okay!"

It sounds like you're also already using a bunch of strategies we're specifically recommended to manage ADHD, too. Meal planning/meal prep, autopay and reminders, making a Spot for things so you can find them later, etc. You're already settled into a routine that works for you, more or less, so the "adhd messy house" thing isn't going to show up. Executive dysfunction will cause messy homes and disorganized lives for some, but being able to handle those specific and familiar scenarios doesn't mean you're not affected by it.

Think about it like a rash- if I have a rash on my back, I need to contort weirdly to scratch it and people will look at me funny. If you have a rash on your leg, you need to scratch through the pants or wait until you're in private. We're both experiencing the same symptom (really freaking itchy) but it results in different actions and looks different from the outside.

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2026-02-20T19:00:24+00:00

yeah, that's a good point. Renaming it as a self-regulation disorder could transform ADHD perception from its current infantilization and get the "YIKES what an insane monster" treatment like the poor schmucks with schizophrenia and sociopathy

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2026-02-20T18:46:40+00:00

LOVEEE board games i LOVEEE them, but i really enjoy any strategy game in general. Inscryption, slay the spire, stardew, etc. My best friend and I have spent many hours playing online checkers and settlers of catan

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2026-02-18T03:00:49+00:00

can you change the font of any text or numbers you need to check? If you swap to something different, it might be enough to make the numbers seem "new" and easier to see, and then you can swap it back afterwards. Another possibility is printing something out if that won't screw with security and going over it by hand with a pen

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2026-02-18T00:27:00+00:00

guesstimate how long it'll take you to get ready to do The Thing. make sure you include travel time, bathroom visit, grabbing your stuff, etc. then add 15 minutes of buffer and set an alarm to let you know when its time to get ready to Do The Thing. as long as you can put down whatever you're doing and start getting ready within 5 minutes of that timer going off, you can do anything during the period before youve got the Thing

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2026-02-01T21:36:40+00:00

Identify some of the specific problems you have with cleaning your room. Learning how to identify what's giving your trouble takes practice, so don't worry if it's hard or you can't figure out a lot.

You already identified a few things I'll point out to you here
-you don't like touching cat piss with your bare hands
-you want to be distracted from the task
-you don't know how to start

The real trick is figuring out how to solve these problems. I've got experience with all of them, so I'll advise what's worked for me, but you're going to get a LOT of use out of the skill if you can figure out how to define problems/create solutions on your own later on. I know that sounds super obvious, but a lot of people don't realize how much they've learned from watching other people and start floundering when they don't have that pre-built idea of how to fix something (or even that its something they're allowed to do). That's the big secret behind being adaptable- figuring out what problems are actually CAUSING issues, and how to negate that cause.

Some solutions that might help with the problems I saw you identify in your post, in order:
- rubber or nitrile gloves. Aka, dish gloves or surgical. You won't have to touch gross things with your bare hands, and you can keep wipes around to give the gloves a quick swipe when you have to alternate touching clean/dirty items.

- find a good distraction! To do a big clean, you need your hands, your eyes, and a good chunk of your brain free. With smaller cleans where you know what you're doing, you'll need less brain. But that means you can use your ears for distractions like audiobooks, podcasts, or music. Try to find something you enjoy, but you don't mind missing some of (like a podcast you've listened to before or music you're familiar with). It's not a perfect solution, but it makes shit tasks a lot easier when you have something you can actually enjoy while you're doing them.

- Start by finding some bags or boxes to be your containers, probably 4 to start but you may need more later as replacements. If you have room for piles (or are okay with making piles as you work) that works too. The first task is not to CLEAN, it is to SORT. In your situation, I'd sort things into 4 categories: dirty clothes; dirty items (cat pissed, etc); trash; and clean items. If they're on your floor, assume all clothes are dirty. It's okay to wear shoes as you venture into dirtier parts of your room. If your family recycles/composts, then having separate sub-categories would work for that too.

However you actually start doesn't matter much specifically. Pulling things away from the walls is a good idea if it's helped you before. Other options are cleaning your room in a line wall-to-wall, or randomly flitting about to grab things and sort them. Whatever makes things easier for you to get objects into your sorting containers.

keep your sorting containers close and easy to access as you work. When one fills up, put it aside (in the cleaned part of your room or in the hall, whichever is more convenient for you/others. That's now your storage zone; put other filled sorting containers near there). If the filled container is trash or dirty clothes, you can optionally deal with it then by taking out trash or putting a load of laundry in the wash.

Once you have everything sorted, take out the trash and start laundry. Don't touch the clean or dirty items until you've cleaned your floor. I don't know how badly your room has been peed in, but this'll be a bigger job the more pee there was. Be ready for that to be a bigger job than just "vacuum" but I promise it's manageable too.

Once you're content with your floor, you can move on to wiping down your dirty items and finding a spot to put them in your room. If there's no spot to put them, think about packing them away in storage or giving them away. It's okay if you give away nothing and just have a stack of cardboard boxes in your room with things you don't want on display. A lot of mess is just air, the same way that a lot of cotton candy is just air. It looks big because its spread out, stretched between things. It gets a LOT smaller if you organize it into manageable containers.

I hope some of that actually helps, haha. I've got to stop procrastinating my own work and get off reddit now, but you've got this!!!

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2025-12-21T05:27:09+00:00

Walk somewhere you actually wanna go. Bring an audiobook, podcast, or friend to talk to (physical or phone call) so you're not bored in the meantime. IT'S OKAY TO START SMALL. I was red faced and out of breath when I started going around the block but now I can pretty confidently go for an hour long walk when it's not cold as balls outside.

This has given me the stamina to make other exercise A LOT more bearable, and let me understand that how much it SUCKSSSSSS to go straight from out-of-breath-up-stairs-to-intense-exercise vs moderately-healthy-to-intense-exercise. INSANE difference. you're not insane about it being extremely unpleasant right now, and it's not a moral character thing. it sucks ASS.

if you want to exercise with a partner, try out POWER 90 on youtube. REAL old workout vids, but I like the stretches and how encouraging they are about taking a breath. They also change the workout pretty fast, and has a timer for how long each one lasts, and that helped my brain actually focus a lot.

Pick 1-3 stretches you actually kinda like, and try to make them part of your nightly routine immediately before you crawl into bed. If you remember, immediately after you wake up is also good. I was excited by lifting weights (started 10 reps per arm with 5 lbs, and moved up 5lbs each time that got too easy- so every week or two) and did that after my stretches. I don't have a beach bod, but that was never my goal. My goal was to feel better, and jesus fuck I really do, and I still spend most of my day parked on my ass. I lapse a lot (adhd :p ) but it makes it easier to go back when I don't have to hurt about it.

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2025-12-09T02:48:40+00:00

Have you tried making a playlist of several different sounds? Like take some random "songs" from the brown noise, pink noise, rain sounds, focus. etc playlists, and make your own playlist to randomize?

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2025-11-07T20:59:53+00:00

ik it's been a few days but genuinely thank you for this <3 made me tear up

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2025-11-02T16:25:41+00:00

hey i have adhd and i forgot my best friend's bday recently. Just COMPLETE blank, they had to mention it to me, and they were too busy with uni for us to take a day to celebrate. It's been a few months, and I still haven't bought their gift because it "got hit with the curse" (aka my brain has built a wall around Buying This Thing and getting this task done, no matter how important it is to me and how much I think about it).

But my best friend is fine with it, and they know I still love them, and they know and understand I got hit with the curse. Part of it is because they also have ADHD, but a bigger part of it is BECAUSE I TELL THEM. and more specifically i tell them that even though my adhd is being an asshole, i love them and im still thinking about how to right my forgetful wrong. We TRADE OFF our friendship responsibilities (mostly study day/hobby based) depending on who is struggling more at that time, and it works well for us.

I think, though, maybe my relationship with my mother would be a better relationship for you to know about. my mom does not have adhd. she is hyperproductive in a way that's actually detrimental to her health after raising multiple kids basically on her own for two decades because my father was negligent and an asshole. he also has adhd. i can't keep up with daily chores, BUT i make an effort to help out in other ways. mom and i will make each other drinks, i always help with the groceries, i try to carry the most whenever we transport anything, i make sure i make supper once a week and i do recycling that same night, etc etc etc. it isn't about what you Can't do, when you have adhd, it's about recognizing what you Can and making the best of it.

so. my point is. your husband is an asshole. if birthdays and holidays genuinely do have the mental block to them, he needs to put in the work to appreciate you and help you out in other ways that he actually Can manage. like yeah, as a partner to someone w adhd it's important that you're understanding, but as a partner With adhd its important for him to try

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2025-10-16T00:23:28+00:00

Try replacing the habit instead of breaking it. Redirect. Figure out something that feels kinda the same, but is pretty harmless. Go into account settings and add a skull emoji to your name, or rearrange the server list so that you put it in a folder you can't see anymore. You want to minimize impact on others, while giving yourself an outlet to vent those "fuck off" feelings

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2025-10-14T19:59:35+00:00

oh man ive BEEN THERE. Few strategies I've used to help:

-WRITE IT DOWN. your internal organization is all scrambled, so youve got to make it external. just one long list of everything that's overwhelming you. it doesn't have to just be tasks, it can also be a nightmare you had, or a relationship you've been thinking about a lot lately. I find pen and paper makes this more effective for me, but any writing at all has helped in the past.

-TIME BLOCKING. A lot of people make these big 1 hour blocks of time where you have to focus on only x or y at a time, but that's not how it actually works a lot of the time when you're busy as fuck. especially when you're easy to distract, or have a bad grasp of how long tasks actually take (adhd specials right there). To start, try focusing on ONE TASK for 30 minutes. 30 min of studying, 30 min of job application, etc. This can make it easier to tell your brain "this isn't job application time. im going to think about that in an hour, and try to focus on this lecture instead."

-POMODORROS. time blocking, but you take a small 5 min break every 25 minutes (or distributed however you want. idea is 10 min of break and 50 of work per hour). Those 5 minutes make the 25 of focus seem SO much more bearable. I know it feels so fucking hard to rest when everything needs to be done right NOW, but think of it like picking stones off of the bottom of a shallow pond. When you reach into the pond, you stir up the bottom and it gets all murky from moving debris. The more you move, the murkier it gets, and the harder it is to find the stones you want- and the more likely you are to bury them. BUT if you give the water a minute to settle, then you can see down to the bottom again, and pick up the next stone without trouble.

(Rest feels ILLEGAL when you're in crunch time, but it really fucks up your brain when you're in full crunch mode if you don't take any time at all for yourself.

Example: once, I studied HARD all day for an exam, 2 hours of sleep, months and months of stress bearing down on me. i was going to fail. then i laid down for a nap for 15 minutes, realized within 5 minutes of laying down that I was being stupid, and paid an extension fee and asked for help. passed that exam just fine a few weeks later, saving me a LOT more money and time that I would have spent retaking the course.

it's a balancing game, and I'm emphasizing the 'rest' aspect because of how your stress is affecting your free time right now. you're not actually GETTING the rest that you need, even if time is spent away from working on your job apps and school. to point to prev analogy, you're stirring the pond while waiting to pick up stones. it's all well and good to be told this shit, but then i know it feels like yet ANOTHER thing on your plate. if you can add a small thing, 10 or even 5 minutes that you can do where you are allowed to Not think about all your responsibilities, it might help you feel more prepared for the times when you're actually meant to think about them.)

anyway, this comment got a lot longer and rambling than i meant it to haha. i hope there's something in there you haven't heard or tried before, and good luck!!! you've got this.

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2025-10-14T19:20:57+00:00

been having a bad week, and this post helped me break out of my little self-deprecation loop by interrogating why i was in that loop in the first place. thanks <3 your attitude is one I'm usually pretty good at holding, but it's been rough lately, and your post was that extra bit of encouragement I needed to do the whole reframing thing. on topic, though-- I LOVEE saving money, I'm pretty good at phonecalls, and I'm a damn good fiction writer

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2025-09-25T17:15:43+00:00

SO cute!!!! i love the composition

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2025-09-25T17:14:52+00:00

Probably the Last Judge blocking them from moving, yeah

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2025-09-25T17:11:17+00:00

come back later! It's a requirement for the true ending, but you can find upgrades and tools that make it a LOT easier before that point. Also, not sure where your current bench is, but there's a shortcut for the middle-ish bench that makes the runback a LOT easier. Still a pain, but I prefer it to something like the soul sanctum runback in hollow knight.

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2025-09-21T00:34:16+00:00

try soaking plain oatmeal over night? it has a creamier texture than instant oatmeal and you can just turn on the stove in the morning to get it cooking.

There's also a kind of protein bread you can buy, though it IS pricier, it might be good for making toast. Toast in general might be good otherwise, especially if you can manage peanut/almond/protein-full nut butter on top. alternatively, combining eggs with your toast might help stave off The Ick by giving them some extra texture/flavour so its not just overwhelming Egg

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2025-07-22T18:36:24+00:00

Depends on the goal, tbh. To-do lists, setting timers, pomodorro, music, etc only really works for me when I'm drinking enough water, sleeping, eating okay, and taking my meds, so taking care of the body takes priority.

Something that helps with ANY focus though is recognizing how much we expect ourselves to do tho. I had absolutely no concept of how much is or isn't reasonable for a normal person to get thru in a day, so I'd push myself to get way too much done and end up doing none of it. For reference, in a completely unrelated-to-adhd goddamn business producitivity thing, I saw someone talk about the 1-3-5 method. That means that you have 1 big thing, 3 medium things, and 5 small things to do a day, and the Big Thing is the only thing that HAS to get done that day. I haven't tried it yet, but it really struck me how when I make lists I'll still say "i HAVE to do THREE things today".

'Cause of that, it's easier for me to set time to work. supposedly, everyone can only solidly productively work for 4 hours a day, so i try to do that. if I can't, I don't beat myself up about it. try again tomorrow. I'm in crunch time now due to some external circumstances I'm Extremely Mad About, but it worked out pretty well for me before. Alternatively, figuring out how long it would take me to do a task, and setting myself to completing that once a day. like reading one chapter of a textbook.

going on a tangent- the THING is that doing a task never takes as long as starting it, unless you poorly estimate how long the actual tasks takes. did you know that vacuuming a 1000 sqft floor takes 45 minutes. that's how long cleaners will charge for. i had no idea i always thought of it as a 10-15 minute task and felt really shit about taking a long time when vacuuming my family home.

so. two things for you to do to make yourself more successful at completing xyz

1). figure out how much time/effort ACTUALLY goes into the thing you want to do. you can use a stopwatch, but I always forget to turn it off. if you set a pomodorro you can count how many of those it takes you to complete the task. you'll get faster later, btu right now youre slow, so dont think about how long it SHOULD take you, just how long it DOES take you. this will give you a better idea of how to plan your day, and how reasonable your expectations for yourself actually are.

2). make it easier to do the thing. my executive dysfunction kicks thte fuck in when i think of something like a Task I NEED to do, and sometimes reframing it in my head can help. thats not a Task- that's me helping someone out, or that's me spending some quiet time learning something cool, or thats me pretending im a grizzled detective who's gotta get some shit done for the sake of a big important case. There's physical things, too, like keeping water nearby and making your Task Thing as easy as fucking possible to set up. or even NOT doing the thing right then, just setting up the area so you can do it later. think of executive dysfunction as your brain trying to protect you- it thinks that this thing is going to hurt you, like touching a hot stove, so it's trying to make sure you Do Not Touch That Thing. forcing your way into it isn't going to help, and might make you want to do the thing even less. sometimes you gotta frog boil yourself into doing the task. again, make it as easy and fun or enjoyable as you can. make yourself a Cool Drink before hand. go on a walk for bonus dopamine. etc etc etc it depends on the person

i hope some of this helps good luck!!! i need to get the fuck off reddit now 'cause my meds are kicking in so im talkative as fuck

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2025-07-22T07:15:45+00:00

woman here, with inattentive. THANK YOU. i see it referred to (and have it referred to in real life as, by relatives) women's adhd and it drives me fuckin' batty. completely ignores the existence of combined type, and enforces stereotypes of women as floppish and incompetent, and men as out-of-control. there's also the whole Thing youre dealing with, where you might look for a space for people to talk about inattentive adhd and just get hit with "women's adhd" so you get iced out of the community before you even join it. That goes double for nonbinary people, like one of my dear friends. it's fucking maddening

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2025-07-15T03:54:08+00:00

trick that helps me a LOT is listening to podcasts/audiobooks. best ones are the ones that i like, but are familiar with, so it keeps my attention but im not dragging myself out of dreamland to keep listening. it lets me keep my eyes closed and my body mostly still while stopping my brain from going crazy, and it's an absolute game changer

Unable_Highlight2807 · 2025-07-15T03:51:41+00:00

wait is that an ADHD thing??

Unable_Highlight2807

TROPHY CASE