Managing Adult ADD/ADHD
San Antonio Counselor Shares Management Tips and Tricks
Adults living with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) can be impacted by so many things as they navigate adulthood. Paying the bills on time to maintaining social demands can all feel like swimming in a sea of overwhelming odds. This leads to frequent concerns over your well-being and ability to interact with others in a health way. ADHD symptoms may lead to extreme procrastination, distress over meeting personal or professional goals, and thoughtless behavioral patterns. Moreover, individuals with ADHD often find themselves isolated because their peers may not understand their difficulty in completing common daily life tasks.
Luckily, years of research and implementation of the findings have led to various strategies to help you deal with the inner chaos ADHD causes and lead a more productive lifestyle. By doing simple steps to improve daily habits, one can recognize and adapt their proven strengths to incorporate techniques that provide more proficiency.
Change is a process; it requires dedication, practice, and consistency, which are often difficult for those with ADHD to maintain. However, the first step in any change is understanding what those changes entail. Enacting strategies requires patience, positivity, and giving the “self” grace when there are hiccups. Change is playing the long game, and with the right amount of perseverance, one can adopt control and enhance their self-worth.
What’s the big issue with having ADHD?
Those with ADHD are plagued by distractibility, often creating disorganization in the wake of their daily life. Edging back to the feelings of drowning, attempting to get organized can create great apprehension and often significant stress.
Tasks like organization can often be defeated by learning how to break them apart into smaller, more accomplishable tasks. Use daily planners, bubbles of ‘to-dos,’ project boards, etc., to help strategize and organize your process.
Create Structure & Consistency
To organize any room or area, start by categorizing your objects and deciding which are necessary and which can be stored or discarded.
Label Bins. Grab three (3) bins and label them Keep, Toss, TBD (to be determined). Use this as your first step to creating structure and identifying your things.
Create Space. Ask what’s needed daily and find storage bins or closets for things you don't need in the immediate future. Create areas for items you need readily available, like keys, bills, and other items that can be lost.
Create a Reminder System. Stay organized by hanging post-its of tasks to do on the inside your front door or refrigerator. You’ll see it several times a day, and you can use it as an incentive; complete a task and reward yourself with a snack.
Deal with it now. Avoid forgetfulness, clutter, and procrastination by filing papers, cleaning up messes, or returning phone calls immediately, not sometime in the future. If a task can be done in two minutes or less, do it on the spot rather than putting it off for later. Reward yourself for being successful in completing tasks.
Arrange Yourself for Success
Impulse control is a frequent and difficult struggle for those who have ADHD. The flight of fancy from one task to another, never fully completing them, is a problem that creates havoc in a home and issues in employment. Further, the larger the task is, the more daunting completing it may seem; therefore, try these tips to help power through the lack of motivation.
Where to Start. Identify the most important task that you need to accomplish, and then order your other priorities after that one. If you struggle with picking a top priority, then randomize your selection and start on any task.
One Step at a Time. Break down large projects or jobs into smaller, manageable steps.
Focus on the Task. Avoid getting sidetracked by sticking to your schedule and using a timer to enforce it if necessary. Put away phones or anything else that may pose a distraction and stop you from getting the task done.
Helpful Ideas for Disorganization
· Carry a colorful wallet, so you can find it quickly in your bag.
· Find a friend to help you sort clutter into four piles: “keep,” “toss,” “donate,” and “age.” Revisit the “age” items three months later and now make a decision on whether to keep, toss, or donate,
· Create a folder or area on your desk called the “hot spot” for time-sensitive documents. Place up to five papers there, each representing a different task that needs to be attended to within the next 24 hours.
· Stay organized by hanging post it notes of tasks to do on the inside of your front door or refrigerator. You’ll see it several times a day, and you can use it as an incentive; complete a task and reward yourself with a snack.
· Store items that are used together near each other, so you don’t have to run around to get the things you need to do a job.
· Clean up in stages. Don’t try to force everything into one session. Break it up into smaller parts throughout several days of the week.
· Write important things down on brightly colored paper. It’s easier to find an orange or green to-do item if and when it’s misplaced it.
Helpful Ideas for Getting Things Done
· If you’re not a fan of list making, use colorful sticky notes strategically placed to create a “path of reminders”
· Try having one notebook that you write everything in.
· Smartphones are great brain backups! If you struggle with paper organizers, take pictures of things you want to accomplish or catch your interest instead of dropping what you are doing to attend to it.
· Use a Passion Planner. It’s a regular pen-and-paper planner, but it has monthly “check-up” questions to see how your month was. You can assess how you managed your time and get positive quotations to inspire.
References
Segal, R., & Smith, M. (2022). Tips for managing adult ADHD - HelpGuide.org. Help Guide: ADHD. https://www.helpguide.org/articles/add-adhd/managing-adult-adhd-attention-deficit-disorder.htm
