Parenting with ADHD? I hear you. 🥴 And I'm not talking about parenting a child with ADHD (that's for another article), I'm talking to YOU, the parents with ADHD.
It was my journey into motherhood that made all my coping skills go to hell, and helped it become glaringly obvious that I had ADHD. Taking care of humans is hard for the average person, but when you have ADHD? Let's speak some uncomfortable truths here: wrangling a tiny, squirmy, yelley, boundary-testing, sensory-overloading child can feel like mission impossible for the ADHD parent brain; It's an entirely overwhelming, rage-inducing, impossible feeling, experience.
And let's not even talk about the inheritability of this type of neurodivergent wiring...but I digress (again for another blog post).
So many of us find ourselves wading through those beautiful ADHD/parenting crosscurrents every damn day. Treading the clash of impulsive decision-making, emotional turbulence, and chronic distractibility in a blissful haze of dismay, snack detritus, and lost fucks can lead to some seriously chaotic days. Or, you're on the other end of the spectrum and have become so rigid and rule-bound that
Let's rip the mask off and get radically real about:
Here are the vexing things...
BEING CONSISTENTLY INCONSISTENT Do as I say, not as I... squirrel! Establishing healthy routines and following through with consequences is basically the equivalent of paddling upstream for us neurodivergents. One minute we're dodging tantrums by offering to buy the entire Disney catalog on Amazon Prime, the next we're finally bearing down with steely focus...for approximately 2 minutes before our overstimulated ears and nerves snap. Yeah, that kind of SNAP-you know, the rage?
EMOTIONAL SHOCKWAVES Helloooo emotional impulsivity! Our neurodivergence comes encoded with emotional damns that can rupture at any given moment. One second, you're crushing conscious de-escalation with your kiddo (parenting trophy unlocked!)...the next somebody dropkicked a Lego across the room and bam. Frantic yelling, tears, shame spirals thick enough to drown in.
CLUTTER DISASTERS Your kid's bedroom is ground zero for hazmat levels of -- retch -- toys everywhere, unwashed muggies groaning under beds, fossilized Pop-Tart rubble strewn about like scarlet letters of shame. Meanwhile, the living room looks... well, like a grenade of throw pillows and board books done blasted through the place. And there you sit, completely paralyzed, overwhelmed, and unable to even...figure out where to start.
CHORE DOOM LOOPS Walk into any room, forget why you're there before escape velocity kicks in, emerge hours later feeling inexplicably guilty for crumbs accumulated...in our bra? Only an ADHD parent knows the vortex-y pain of chore paralysis and walking around the house in an endless scattering pattern like a very easily distractible shark. Dishes pile up to biohazard levels as you fall down a TikTok rabbit hole for the 27th time today. Woo, party!
HYPERFOCUSING ON IRRELEVANCIES Fixations are just one of those cute endearing ADHD quirks we neurodivergents love to lean into...until our burning curiosities about stop-motion animation history absentmindedly consume entire evenings while our progeny quietly feral themselves. Or worse, overexplain random factoids until their sweet peabrain curricula go kabluey thanks to our maladjusted novelty-cravings. Hey, at least they'll dominate their kindergarten bee competition!
PLANNING PARALYSIS Need to buy a week's worth of groceries, chart your kid's snazzy dress-up itinerary, and somehow negotiate that witchy agenda minefield known as the PTA? Cool, cool. My advice? Get your affairs in order now because the ADHD parent brain officially exits the premises the moment eight ball-scrambling decisions pile up. Don't come for us if your little cherub ends up in an ice cream-dyed tutu at the dentist's office.
Listen, being an ADHD parent is a dysfunctional firehose of adrenaline, derailed intentions, and panicked Googling about whether your latest partner/life/weekend plans are single-handedly scarring your poor child for eternity. Yeah, I do that too.
But behind the spiraling clutter-showers and emotional gymnastics, there's also such profound beauty. While the ADHD parenting gig ain't no Walt Disney fairy trail, it's still a wildly inspiring marathon of resilience, goofy joy, and beaming courage. What other parent gets to enjoy Lego as much as their kiddo does?
Parents with ADHD unite. Let's double down on getting radically honest and compassionate with ourselves (shoutouts to Brene Brown and Emily Amen on that tip). Swapping tips and trauma-free chuckles as we course-correct those beautiful shipwrecks, vowing to parachute in more novel self-care regimens for our glitchy mindscapes. Nudging closer and closer each day towards that elusive parenting crock of gold.
And if anyone tries persuading you our ADHD whirlwind is somehow "less than" the exhausting normie narrative, I give you full permission to punt them directly into the nearest black hole -- no apologies required.
Because while our wiring might feel messy, feisty, and high-octane sometimes, there's nothing quite so magical as neurodivergent parents.
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Keywords: parenting with adhd, parents with adhd, mom with adhd, dad with adhd, neurodivergent parents, neurodivergent family, adhd parents, adhd overwhelm
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