Can’t Get Anything Done? Why ADHD Brains Become Paralyzed Under Stress
To better understand why stressors are particularly paralyzing to ADHD minds, we can turn to relatively new concepts in the fields of behavioral neuroscience and psychology.
You have a million things on your to-do list. Yet, you’re in ADHD freeze mode. What’s going on?
The weariness you’re feeling is real. It stems from stress, which affects the alertness and arousal pathways of the mind; unique aspects of the ADHD brain further impair our ability to regulate those channels. Basic but effective coping mechanisms, however, can help us regain some footing.
Why You Can’t Get Anything Done: ADHD Brain Primers
Everyone experiences ADHD and stress uniquely. These are just some features of the ADHD brain that help set the scene for our responses to stress:
1. The ADHD brain struggles with emotional regulation. People with ADHD are easily flooded, tend to be highly emotional, and have a low frustration tolerance. In periods of heightened emotions, it’s no wonder that the emotional facet of our brains makes coping feel uncomfortable and overwhelming.
2. ADHD brains struggle to regulate arousal states. ADHD minds can sometimes be “hyper-aroused” or “hypo-aroused.” It explains why people with ADHD fall asleep when they’re under-stimulated — it’s not about fatigue at all — or freeze up when over-stimulated. Our arousal states are also drastically impacted by stress.
3. ADHD minds have a tendency to wander. In neurotypical brains, the default mode network — the background, stream-of-consciousness chatter — shuts off when engaging in a task. For ADHD brains, that switch doesn’t happen so smoothly, so our minds can get stuck wandering. When we’re in a space of anxiety, we can get ruminative, especially about something that’s causing us stress.
To better understand why stressors are particularly paralyzing to ADHD minds, we can turn to relatively new concepts in the fields of behavioral neuroscience and psychology.
[Essential Reading: ADHD Catastrophizing in Times of Crisis — What To Do When Fear Spirals]
An Integrated Model: The Polyvagal and Window of Tolerance Theories
The “Window of Tolerance” and polyvagal theories posit, in part, that we all inhabit neutral-like spaces in which we feel like we’re present, content, able to engage, and be our best selves. In so many terms, we are “on” in this optimal state, which also requires us to feel some level of safety and comfort. In the language of the polyvagal theory, this window is called the “ventral vagal state.” The vagal refers to the vagus nerve, which runs from the brainstem to the gut.
At each end of this window of tolerance are the zones of hyperarousal and hypoarousal. When we experience stress, we go into the hyperarousal zone. This is where our sympathetic nervous system is activated, and our fight or flight responses are triggered. In this zone, we feel anxious, reactive, irritable, and, above all, threatened.
When we spend more time in this heightened state and can’t seem to escape our stressors, as is happening now, we go into overwhelm — this is when we enter the zone of hypoarousal, or the “dorsal vagal freeze state.” We can look at this zone as a protective path of last resort. We become numb, we feel disassociated, and are unable to act. We effectively shut down.
The ADHD brain sure seems to bounce frequently between the two zones. We tend to gravitate to the hyperarousal space because it satisfies cravings for stimulation and because of our struggles with emotional regulation. We are often able to return to the neutral window, and we do our best to avoid the zone of hypoarousal.
But when faced with constant stress, it’s like living in a hyperarousal state for so long that we’ve passed it and merged almost semi-permanently into the hypoarousal. All we can do in this state is sit down on the couch, stare into space, and think, “I can’t.”
Finding the Way Back to Your Window of Tolerance
We can shift our stress responses back into our window of tolerance by developing a meaningful set of coping skills. The following mechanisms, while simple and potent, are merely suggestions and do not represent all the tools that can help.
Pause and Notice
Another name for pausing and noticing is mindfulness, which doesn’t necessarily mean meditation. As the saying goes, it’s “the space between stimulus and response” where choice lies.
The ADHD brain, as we know, does not automatically do well at putting on the brakes. But when we practice pausing, we are able to create the space to regulate and reason against stressors.
Create Safety
We feel safest in our windows of tolerance, so creating a sense of safety even when weathering the storm can help our minds regain some sense of control. There are three areas to focus on when thinking of safety:
Emotional and mental safety: As with pausing, creating emotional and mental safety means literally taking time and space to regulate. For example, it takes about half an hour on average for our nervous system to come down and “drain the flood,” so it’s crucial to work into our days fragments of time for ourselves — more so when uncertainty and unpredictability are at play.
Environmental safety: This means physically changing your space. That could be making a “timeout” for yourself at home, or setting boundaries around social media and news. It could be getting away from the stress at home, under the guise of running an errand, and sitting at a park bench or a parking lot.
Relational safety: We need to create time and space for ourselves without being tied to our children, roommates, spouses, or others. Doing so is hard, especially for women, as we’re socialized into being people-pleasers and keeping the peace when things get tough. But it must be done. Tell your kids, partner, and others that when you’re creating space for yourself, you’re not walking away from them, but helping yourself and your relationship with them.
Regulate Your Mind and Body
The following mind-body activities are based in somatic experiencing, or body sensations, that are proven to snap the stress response back.
- Take a cold shower
- Do a body scan — paying attention to how your body feels by moving in sections from the feet to the head
- Deep breathing — we want to stimulate the vagus nerve, so focus on strong exhales. Hold them for as long as possible; 7 to 10 counts if possible
- Ground yourself by doing sensory-stimulating activities like wrapping yourself in a weighted blanket or walking barefoot on the grass
- Practice gentle movement like dancing, stretching, walking
- Seek positive stimulation through cooking, gardening, painting, and the like. For ADHD in particular, it’s essential to keep the dopamine flowing
This article is based on Michelle Frank’s ADDitude webinar, “‘I Thought I’d Be More Productive!’ Why Women with ADHD Are Struggling While Staying at Home,” which was broadcast live on May 13, 2020.
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