I've been dating my GF for 6 months now, and she is self proclaimed ADD (No treatment, but willing). We are very much in love, and so far I am willing to help her and us cope. I have picked up some slack on chores, and been more proactive with helping her remember details (meetings, appointments, etc...) to try to take some of the "load" off of her and relieve some stress. I will admit, part of the reason I want to take away some of the stress is so that she can relax long enough to focus on us. And that is where the problem lies. I tend to be the more romantic and emotional of the two of us (after reading this site that seems common), and after me being in a loveless marriage for 12 years, perhaps I need some more intimacy/affection/attention than normal.
As the hyperfocused courtship period of our relationship is wearing off, I find that she has been more apt to put other things first, making me feel less important to her. In doing some reading about how ADD minds work, it was suggested that the ADD mind has a hard time prioritizing tasks, meaning that all tasks have equal importance. My question is, if I am just a task that her brain is assigning equal importance with everything else, is it really possible for her to love me? Is she capable of love when the thoughts of our relationship are weighed evenly with some burden or chore she must perform?
We talk openly about a lot of things, however the conversations have never been ADD-focused as I was not aware of how much could really be attributed to it. Our normal conversation is that she is annoyed that I think something she is doing is because of me (her being angry, upset, whatever) so then she feels like she has to cater to my feelings, while I feel like she is always putting everything else before me and our relationship. Thanks to this site, I now see that there is a deeper reason for it and that she does in fact love me, but I must admit I am a little scared about this cycle.
Any insight as to how to approach the conversations and day-to-day dealings would be much appreciated!
Yes someone with ADHD can
Submitted by Normal Mom on
deleted, same reason as above
TryingToLearn
Submitted by Steph on
TTL, yes she probably does love you. In her own way though. If you can live that "in her own way" reality then ok. Think though, about the next 20, 30, 50 years and if children are involved or will be involved in the equation. Think long and hard about what life will be like for you and for them. Do you want to spend the rest of your life "picking up the slack" or constantly easing her burden? Will she do that for you? Is it a true partnership? What if you became incapacitated temporarily or God forbid permanently? What would happen then? Would you be able to rely on her?
You have a gift. You know in advance that your SO has ADD. Many of us on here didn't. Just do LOTS of research, read, talk to people, listen to those with experience and make an informed decision. Its not an easy road. Marriage is challenging enough, but marriage with an ADDer has a whole other world of challenges.
Best wishes!
Perfect time to work through this
Submitted by MelissaOrlov on
Thank you all for the
Submitted by TryingToLearn on
Thank you all for the encouragement, this site has already helped a ton, even if only for my own sanity.
We had a pretty good talk today about ADD in general, whereby I told her I was reading up on it. It became clear that she was never formally diagnosed, and has only done some cursory reading on the subject. As we talked, she was fascinated that a lot of what frustrated her about herself had an explanation. It gave validity to her and I watched her perk up. I too was fascinated to find that she had self-developed some very good coping mechanisms, and as such, she does not exhibit all of the symptoms described here. She is on top of her game at work, pays bills, is a responsible person, and would make a seemingly great mother. I think this is the first of many good talks to come.
Now, that being said, I find myself a little scared. I am in the paradoxical position of seeking attention from someone who is medically unable to give it. I know without a doubt that she loves me and will try her absolute best to work on us, and while I know that there are never any guarantees, I see a lot of pessimism on the boards. I am not willing to run for the hills just yet, as I want both of us to become more educated and aware, and see how our dynamic can change. The times when she is "there" is amazing, and makes everything else totally worth it. When she checks out, I need to learn to truly believe that it is not because of some inadequacy in me or a lack of love for me.
We did talk about how the hyperfocus stage of the relationship passes and it becomes unstimulating to her. She had an interesting take, she said that it is a big relief for her to be in this stage now. Before she would have to really focus and try to "be there", and it was exhausting. Now she can relax a bit. Hopefully through open communication she can still put forth that effort once in a while.
One other question for the panel here.....I have noticed that sometimes it is worse than others....bad when there is stress, like she is getting mentally overloaded, and good when we drink a little (presumably because it slows down the mind). Is this common to have it come in waves?
Again, can't thank everyone enough...for a critical over-thinker as myself, it's nice to have such a resource on hand!
Here I find myself again,
Submitted by purplepansy24 on
Here I find myself again, feeling the need to say something... :-) I think what the most important things that you must ask yourself are these...Not if you can handle trying to get attention from someone who is incapable of sustaining it, but what KIND of person are IS she? ADD is NOT a curse! It can make a WONDERFUL addition to couple IF (and I mean if!) the person with ADD is very, very aware of how their mind works. I spent most of my life bouncing from one thing to another, but never gave up trying to figure out why I seemed to live in a fog. I finally figured it out and when I did, GAME ON! There was no WAY I was going to live in a haze anymore. That meant learning all about it, making sure I get exercise regularly, a creative outlet AND medication. I have gone from a woman that made everyone scratch their heads all the time, to someone who is a loving, attentive mother, friend, and spouse. Did I mention responsible? I'm that too. Dependable? Check! All of the things that people are afraid you can never be if you have ADD, are absolutely possible with the right treatment and the right attitude. So dinner is ready, there's groceries in the house, the homework gets done, and I DO pay attention to my husband....but I'm also the person who just sang Amazing Grace at a good friend's mother's funeral, and had an article published last week. Did I mention I have two in diapers? This is not self profession of greatness, as much as it would appear to be...I'm just trying to illustrate that the disorder (and I hate calling it that, because I LOVE some things that "tag along") does NOT have to make a person incapable of being a loving spouse or a responsible parent...It's how you DEAL with it that makes all the difference. And to anyone that thinks that people with ADD can't get their priorities in order..I assure you, it IS possible. My life (in general) and happy, well adjusted children are all the proof I need. My oldest son has been diagnosed with ADHD (suprise!) and when the diagnostic test was given the only area he DID NOT show any concern was in that of behavioral issues. He is loving, compassionate, and empathetic. He is very aware of the feelings of others, and living proof that there is a large capacity (Yes! Even in those with ADD!) to feel for others. I hope you make your decision based on the person in front of you, as opposed to fear. Fear will rob your freedom. Make an educated choice...based on what you know of your significant other AND ADD.
What the ADDer means by love is different from what we mean
Submitted by Sueann on
I posted on this exact topic, under someone's post "I am NOT responsible." I got some interesting responses, and you might want to check that out.
You may not "feel" like your girlfriend loves you, especially as you both get more comfortable with the relationship. Something to consider, especially as, like me, you seem rather needy. I fear you are setting yourself up for a lifetime of hurt.
variations
Submitted by arwen on
It's not uncommon for the degree of ADD behaviors to change with changing external factors, like stress or alcohol consumption (although "slowing down the mind" may not necessarily be what happens with alcohol). Hormones can also have an effect, so PMS (if your GF experiences this) can sometimes be a time when ADD behaviors vary. I've also known certain foods to make a difference to some (some foods like turkey have a lot of tryptophan, which is a serotonin precursor and if eaten in quantity can briefly boost neurotransmitter levels).
But aside from the things that directly affect neurotransmitters in the brain, please also understand that volume and complexity of information/issues/situations to manage can also have an impact on the degree of behaviors. The less my ADD spouse has to remember/consider/manage, the less troublesome ADD behaviors he exhibits. Even though the info/issues/situations may not be stressful, if there's more than a certain level of volume or complexity, it can still overwhelm the ability of the brain to process effectively, and this can lead to increased behavior problems.
For TryingToLearn
Submitted by MelissaOrlov on
Bravo for your efforts to work through this and to talk about things with your partner. You should know that ADHD runs along a spectrum - some people are deeply affected by it while others don't have as many problems. It's great that your partner has so many areas of success in her life and wonderful that you were both so encouraged by your talking.
I would like to reassure you. You mention that you are scared and that you are "in the paradoxical position of seeking attention from someone who is medically unable to give it." This isn't a true statement. People with ADHD are most certainly able to give attention, particularly when they are aware of the specific issues surrounding distratibility, ADHD and marriage. ADHD doesn't doom your partner to not being a good partner. Rather, it means that you both need to be conscious of not falling into the common traps that happen as a result of ADHD. One of those common traps is when an undiagnosed ADHD person and a non-ADHD spouse aren't aware of the ADHD and the ADHD spouse is distracted. In this situation, it is common for the non-ADHD partner to misinterpret the distraction as lack of interest. You, however, won't fall into this trap because now you know!
So the good news is this - by learning more about the common issues inherent in ADHD, by knowing how to correctly interpret symptoms, by learning how to support each other well, by treating the ADHD symptoms that are an issue - you will most likely have a very successful relationship. Please don't be scared - be happy that you have figured this out before deep damage was caused! You are blessed!
As for your other question - ADHD symptoms can be worsened by being tired, by stress, by lack of caffeine (if the person is used to drinking it), by lack of exercise and by poor diet among other things. So, yes, it can seem to come in "waves".
Stay in touch here - we look forward to hearing from you.
The stresses of life can tire
Submitted by Normal Mom on
deleted, see reason at this link
It honestly depends on the person
Submitted by Aspen on
My ADD husband is extremely loving and in the almost 10 years we've been together I have never once doubted that I am deeply loved. The attention issue is sometimes another matter, and it can be frustrating to think we're going to have a nice evening together and then find that he can't seem to pull himself away from the computer; BUT with that said he is absolutely capable of giving me the attention that I need and that our relationship requires. In our marriage we haven't come up against any *he absolutely can't do X or Y because of his ADD*. Perhaps because his ADD is not very severe, he is capable of doing pretty much anything a non ADD person can do, but it's often more work for him.
As other have mentioned it's often about communication. We tend to set a regular weekly date night & he is always there, present, romantic. When we fail as a couple attention-wise are usually times that he doesn't understand that is what I'm expecting & I think it is so obvious that we'd spend this time together that I don't communicate it. For example, we're helping someone move on our standing Fri date night, so I automatically expect him to make Sat a date night instead. I don't mention it for one of three reasons 1. it is obvious that is what we should do so I don't think it warrants a conversation. 2. I planned the last date night and it's his turn so any arrangements should come from him. 3. It's almost a test in my mind....he *should* want to spend this time together, so if it doesn't come from him without prompting then I don't want it. Just for the record, this is a simplistic example, but I think you can see the potential pitfalls. The easiest thing for me to do if I want to go out on Saturday is to say "I'd like to go out Saturday night" to which he will 99.9% of the time say "YES I do too", but that is where you get into relationship dynamics and expectations and each person making the other person feel special in a way that is meaningful to them.
The times we fight are usually because I had an expectation that I think I don't need to communicate because it is so *obvious* that I don't need to....plus I need him at times to do things for me that I don't have to ask for. For example, recently we both had about 10 days of absolute straight out work and distraction, so on our first evening home together with no deadlines hanging over us I thought it was going to be a romantic snuggly evening followed by sex. I thought this was so obvious that was how the evening would go that I didn't say a word just waited with a gleam in my eye for all that focus to finally be centered on me & us again........he spent the evening in his office on the computer "just decompressing". I was looking to decompress WITH him, and since I thought any loving couple would do the same, I didn't say a word to him and just assumed we were on the same page. He loved the idea of just being a blob aimlessly clicking away on a game or website online to decompress, and didn't understand why I was upset. He had the same idea I did about the last part of our evening, but he couldn't understand why sex was completely out of the question for me once he finally emerged from his office. Too much office/computer time and not following through on things he says he will do are our 2 big ADD challenges, so in these areas sometimes pent up frustration/aggravation go to work more than what the particular situation deserves.
You can learn you own ways to deal with the attention issue. Through many conversations I've learned that it isn't often just because my husband is in his office or on the computer, he isn't necessarily doing anything important--just like I'm often not. I might be clicking around while i wait for something else to happen & so does he. He usually lets me know when he's doing something important--working on a presentation, repairing something for us or a friend, research. Sometimes he remembers to tell me how long he'll be, and he's always willing to try to estimate how long he needs. When it's getting close to the time he said, sometimes I'll walk into his office with a smile and ask if it is getting close to snuggle time. Since he loves snuggle time as much or more than I do, he can usually tell me how close he is to done. Sometimes I will call a comment from the living room and he'll laugh and tell me how many minutes he needs.
My biggest problem with his ADD is that when he isn't following through like he should or is extremely distracted for long periods of time--it is an absolute complete turn off for me. Even when I understand and am not angry he finally emerges from an ADD induced attention drought, I still often won't feel at all romantic toward him at that time which he sees as a punishment for lack of attention and I see as a natural consequence of lack of attention. I think it is funny that a frequently mentioned positive of ADD is "spontaneity" when I feel that is one of the things you somewhat lose as a couple. Things have to be talked about, planned out, & scheduled more in an ADD marriage than most others that I know...course that could just be my perception. What you often find as a nonADD spouse, when your *spontaneous* spouse is deciding on the fly what to do with his time, it is seldom what needs to be done, what you'd choose to be doing, or choose to have him be doing.
And it takes a while...sometimes what seems to be an eternity...for the ADD mate to learn enough from the bad results of a behaviour to finally modify it. This weekend we had the same issue as mentioned above. I was gone 8 days and we were both really looking forward to my getting home, which ended up being about 2 hours later than planned. He was so excited to see me and helped with all my bags and it was awesome....and then he disappeared into the kitchen for what felt like forever when all I wanted was hugs and kisses. I asked what he was doing and we almost had an argument when he said he realized he hadn't signed a thank you note for my sister and was trying to get it done. I could feel myself tensing up and thinking *here we go again distracted by butterflies when I am FINALLY home* & then when he came back and started with the hugs and kisses, I just felt like it was crumbs of attention (unfair but it is a sore spot for me & I was tired and road weary). He is the one that stopped everything and held me on the couch and we just talked about how much we missed eachother and the mood came right back, but if he'd decided to make an issue of "IT ONLY 10 MINUTES" or I decided just to sit around feeling negative, we'd have had a lousy night and no one would have been happy...instead was very much the opposite.
I am coming to see ADD as neither positive or negative. I know a lot of people with the *positives* of ADD without ADD so you can't sell me on what a fabulous gift it is. I know a lot of people with the *negatives* and they don't have ADD so it is also not a curse in my mind--it is all in the person himself and how he chooses to deal with it (or not deal with it as many ppl here have unfortunately found). ADD is one aspect of your loved one & it isn't the most important part and it doesn't deserve all the attention (once you have a treatment plan in place of course!) We work with his ADD the same way we work with my tendency toward perfectionism--our individual qualities at times make it easier or harder to work on other issues, but that is marriage!
Love, at least for us, has absolutely never been the issue.
can you elaborate a little more
Submitted by brendab on
I think you need to take along look at what you expect from a relationship and decide if is realistic or not. Then decide if you can be happy with this woman, not because of what she does for you.
normal mom,
you make a lot of really good points in your posts. I am not add and struggle with this very issue. I believe that my main problem is that I need to alter some of the ways I think about ADD behaviors and my reactions to them. I have some conflict in deciding how much I should change my own thinking and what boundaries I need to fortify to create inner peace for myself.
One of the things that my former BF did that drove me crazy was making a plan and then changing it. he'd ask me to take off work, maybe spend a little money for the activity and then he'd go off on another direction near the time of the activity. I struggled with feeling as though we made plans and he didn't have the integrity to keep his promise. I didn't want to sit around using my vacation time waiting on him or end up losing the money I had spent on a reservation. I am a planner, very organized and follow through is very important to me. Because of the way I think and behave his "flexibility" seemed uncaring and manipulative to me.
But what I have discovered is that his flexible nature is more than happy to allow me to set boundaries about his latest plan. We are considering working together, no financial entanglements but more skill sharing. He asked me to take 2 specific vacation days for him because he is flying to visit. I reacted by remembering all the other times he had changed plans at the last minute. We had a few heated words because he does not see what the big deal is. So after i got off the phone I decided to experiment and find a win-win solution. I emailed and told him that I had requested off those two days. If he is in my town the night before I will be available to meet with him all day. If he is not in town the night before, I will go into work and he can meet me after work. He was happy with this compromise especially because he could have more flexibility on his trip and I would not get angry if he didn't arrive on time. Fortunately for me I can be flexible with my vacation days.
So I think that my problem is that I lack the boundaries that I need and I need to change how I tend to blame him for not being nonADD. I believe that it is possible to create these kinds of win-win situations if I can stop "reacting". I think that I was quick to blame him rather than take responsibility for building stronger boundaries. his behavior cannot harm me unless I allow them to. This is so easy to forget.
I tend to play negative tapes in my head, blaming him for my problem. it may initially seem that way, but then I have to decide what I will do about it. If he will not change, how can I protect myself and get what I want/need? So off to think of all the ways that I tended to react to his behavior by mentally blaming him for upsetting me when in reality it is totally in my power to change the way I think and what I allow to happen in my life.
brenda
I can love and so can my ADD
Submitted by Clinging to Life on
deleted, same reason as above
Your post made me laugh
Submitted by Sueann on
Thanks for the day brightener. My husband NEVER matches his socks. If we're lucky, they'll be loose in the drawer and he'll just grab 2 (even if one is blue and one is brown). Otherwise, he picks dirty ones off the floor. I'm always fighting to get the ones with holes off his feet and into the trash. I just don't fight it any more. It's become somewhat of a joke between us. He's admitted he does it just to bug me.
But your therapist makes a valid point. Most people do attach meaning to behaviors. When we were first married, and he hung up on customers and got fired, right after I'd been diagnosed with an illness that required an expensive piece of equipment to treat, and I had to wait and suffer nearly 3 years until he got another job with insurance, I sure felt like that. I felt like "if he loves me, he'll do the job he was hired for, and keep insurance on me so I won't die." I can't apologize for feeling that way, and having that expectation. I know he loves me, and I love him, but I need to feel important in his life, and he just can't see the reprecussions of what he does on my life. I don't think he ever will, I just have to learn to make the best of it..
thought-provoking
Submitted by LeeAnonymou on
I do tend to attach meaning to most actions, lately especially. I'm constantly trying to "read" my husband, often to predict how I'm going to prepare myself for the hurt that's coming my way by his actions/reactions. (I'm non, he's ADD)
Sunday is an example. He went to his mother's help her with some household repairs @ 9:00am. Came home @ midnight after a few drinks, ostensibly with her (which is a possibility). But that's 14 hours without a word from him, not an email, a text, a call. His phone is off. No answer at his mother's house. "You knew where I was," was his response. Really? No. The weather was awful, he's just over a broken ankle, and the kids and I started to get a little worried after it got dark. With reason, because he drove home inebriated.
To me, that kind of behavior says, "Yeah, well, what I'm doing is none of your damn business, and I don't really care enough about you to check in with you, see if you're okay yourself."
When I asked him about it, he said, "my phone died," which it did, and he admitted it had not even occurred to him to call from his mother's phone.
So wanting to hear from him sometime within 14 hours might make me a control freak, and I do attach hidden meanings to that. The fact that he has cheated on me in the not-so-long-ago amps up the hidden meanings, believe me.
But what I'm hearing from you is that maybe there really is no meaning to be had from this, other than it really just didn't occur to him that I might want him to call me and check in? Maybe I need to drop the meanings and take things at face value?
My gut says, "Yeah, but how am I going to know the difference?"
Theres a difference betwen
Submitted by Clinging to Life on
deleted, same reason as above (boy, this is getting boring!!) :-)
Well, yes. We see the consequences of \behavior
Submitted by Sueann on
You said "Do nons have a hard time telling the difference between little stuff and big stuff? Its seem like everything is a big deal? Even socks that dont match!"
I am like that, and I'll try to explain why. This is what I've figured out from living with an ADDer for 5 years.
When ADDers do something (or not), it's just because they were distracted and not thinking about it. When we do something, generally, it's purposeful. So we tend to react to our ADDers' forgetfulness and assign it the meaning it would have if we did it.
Let me give you an example. He just doesn't feel like doing the dishes. When i see unwashed dishes or a counter that isn't cleaned, I am afraid of bugs. An exterminator once used too much stuff and it killed my cat, so when I see unwashed dishes, I'm afraid for my cats' lives. He wasn't thinking about the cats, or that I would rush in and do the dishes, he just didn't feel like washing the dishes. Or (I've shared this example before, I hope I'm not boring anyone) his car broke down and he just went home and left it. The city impounded it and I had to pay to get it out of impound with money for my tuition (instead of going to school that semester) and it will mean I graduate later. He was thinking "My car broke down, that sucks." He certainly wasn't thinking "I'm going to make Sueann wait another year to graduate" but that was the effect.
So when you forget to do the laundry, we are afraid we aren't going to be able to go to work because we don't have clean clothes. (It's happened to me.) You aren't thinking like that, you just aren't thinking about laundry, so you don't do it. If I didn't do laundry it would be because I didn't care if my husband had clothes to go to work, or because I was lazy. So if the laundry is your job, and you said you would do it and you didn't, it feels to us like it is because you didn't care if your husband had a clean uniform for work, when actually it was just because you got busy with a child who was having a meltdown and you forgot.
With socks that don't match, there isn't a real consequence, I've learned. My husband's co-workers and clients don't really care if his socks match. I've learned to laugh about socks. But I imagine your husband is afraid his boss will write him up, or your kids will be laughed at at school, or his mother will say something to him like "Is your wife colorblind or what? Look at her socks!" or whatever. So to him, unmatched socks become a big deal.
I've suffered so many consequences from my husband's ADD. It took me a long time to figure this difference in thinking out, and I still don't know what to do about it. Arwen has written a great deal about making natural consequences for her husband's actions, so he learns this for himself. I haven't had much luck with that.
I hope it makes sense.
create conditions for clearer evaluation
Submitted by arwen on
Lee, I think in a situation like this it's usually better to take it at face value -- as long as it isn't happening constantly. I found in my marriage it was better not to sweat the things happened once or twice and focus on the problem behaviors that recurred or that seemed to form a pattern -- and like Clinging so rightly suggests, not to sweat the stuff that really doesn't matter that much, either.
My experience has also been that if you can loosen up on the controls a little, it generally reduces the ADHDer's resistance level to cooperation (let's face it, nobody likes feeling like they are micromanaged -- I'm not saying that's what you do, but there's a fair chance that's the way your spouse feels you behave).
But -- you really can't just give him carte blanche, either, with his past history. And I understand very well your dilemma in evaluating his behavior. I found that the best way to finesse this was to try to set up perfectly reasonable and acceptable coincidental situations that would effectively help show up whether I was dealing with an off-chance situation or a not-yet-clear part of a pattern.
For example, in a situation like this one you've just had, I might have said to my husband before he left our house that I would like him to call me as he was leaving his mother's in case there was anything I needed from the store for that evening's dinner that he could pick up on the way home, in order to save me from having to make a special trip to get it myself (dovetailing my needs and activities with his and thereby inserting a legitimate need for interaction, but not in a way that created pressure). I might also have said that if it looked like he wouldn't be done before dinner, I would like him to call and let me know that, so I could run out to the store myself. I would have asked my husband to put a reminder into his PDA by such-and-such a time so that he would remember to make the call. And of course when he did call, I would be sure to thank him for remembering to call and let him know whether I did need something or not.
I realize this kind of setup doesn't guarantee a call! But it does create a checkpoint that you can use as a reference point, which is the real purpose of this approach. The purpose isn't to trap anybody or manipulate anybody, it's a technique to create reasonable and appropriate interaction and communication opportunities. If when you set these things up, he's constantly forgetting to call, you can have a discussion about that problem and get a feel for whether it's happening for legitimate reasons or whether there's something else going on. If he does make the calls, you may be able to get a sense from those conversations of whether there's any problem issue or not.
I'm not suggesting that you do this exact sort of thing -- this was an example to show how you may be able to structure the dynamic to provide yourself with better data. They key with this kind of approach is, you are not trying to exercise control -- you are just trying to get better data for evaluation of the situation and possibly make some progress in dealing with his behaviors.
I hope this makes some sense -- if not, let me know and I'll try to explain this strategy better. Good luck!
thanks---
Submitted by LeeAnonymou on
What you offer makes sense, but I think I have my answer, unfortunately. We have a huge snowstorm coming in---"storm of the century!" for our area--- and he TEXTED me this afternoon that he was going to go spend the weekend with his mother and take a break from me and the kids. This was never discussed, but it looks like he was planning it because he apparently took a bag to work with him in preparation. So he has left us to fend for ourselves and is not answering/has blocked our calls.
I think it's pretty clear he's had enough rope and this isn't a case of "oops, I got distracted." Thanks for the advice, however; I hope someone else reads it and can benefit from it.