Let’s Talk About Perimenopause and ADHD

Perimenopausal women with ADHD feel abandoned by healthcare. Few clinicians are knowledgeable about female presentations of ADHD, so women are left to untangle a messy knot of hormones, ADHD symptoms, medications, and lifestyle factors on their own.

And science offers little help. Fewer than one percent of all brain imaging studies focus on female-specific health factors, revealing little data on how hormonal shifts impact ADHD.Even with so little research, we can help perimenopausal women with ADHD make sound medical decisions by arming them with vital information to share with their doctors.

Start here.Estrogen regulates the effects of neurotransmitters implicated in ADHD. When estrogen is low, dopamine and serotonin are affected, which can have a negative impact on attention, memory, mood, decision-making, sleep, emotional regulation, and other executive functions.

As estrogen vacillates wildly in perimenopause (the years leading up to menopause), many women find that their ADHD symptoms grow significantly worse.[Read: How Changing Hormones Exacerbate ADHD Symptoms][Watch: A Patient’s Guide to Talking with Your Doctor About ADHD and Menopause]To make the most of your doctor’s visit, arrive with the following information:Lotta Borg Skoglund, M.D., Ph.D., is an associate professor at Uppsala University in the Department for Women’s and Children’s Health and leader of the pioneering research group GODDESS ADHD.SUPPORT ADDITUDE Thank you for reading ADDitude.