ADHD at the Center: A Whole-Life, Whole-Person Condition

ADHD is more than the sum of its symptoms. It touches your life from the moment you wake up to the instant you finally nod off. (In truth, ADHD continues to work its influence while you sleep.) Your health, personality and preferences, friendships and relationships — and truly everything else in between — is colored by your ADHD.

It is there 24/7, 365 days a year, influencing every single part of you.As an ADHD coach with ADHD myself, I help people see how it is a whole-life, whole-body condition.

I help them connect the dots between ADHD and other areas of life, with the goal of encouraging personal awareness and understanding.Here, I present facts, observations, and questions to get you thinking about how ADHD is at the center of your life.

As you gain insight into your person and condition, please remember that you have your own brand of ADHD — and you deserve to be treated with kindness above all.Delayed sleep phase syndrome, defined by irregular sleep-wake patterns and thought of as a circadian rhythm disorder, is common in ADHD.1 The ADHD brain takes longer — about an hour longer on average (remember, that’s just an average) — to fall asleep than does the non-ADHD brain.2 That’s why it’s not uncommon for us to stay up late at night, and regret it in the morning.Suffering a sleep deficit with ADHD is like waking up to ADHD times two — or five.