Latest / The Dr. Psych Mom Show with clinical psychologist Dr. Samantha Rodman Whiten / When Your Husband Has ADHD

Transcript

When Your Husband Has ADHD · The Dr. Psych Mom Show with clinical psychologist Dr. Samantha Rodman Whiten

0:05
Hi everybody, and welcome to the dr.
0:07
Psych mom show. I have a lot of people writing
0:12
in with questions which is great and I just had some new
0:15
subscribers so maybe it works to say it at the beginning.
0:18
If you're getting something out of this podcast, please
0:21
subscribe so that you can hear all the bonus episodes and then
0:25
one after this, I'm going to make a bonus episode.
0:29
Alright? So today I'm going to talk about
0:33
when women are married to guys. With ADHD.
0:36
So this is pretty common because I don't know if I mean you're
0:41
probably listening to this wondering, if your husband has
0:43
ADHD or maybe you're an ADHD husband yourself.
0:46
But when people have kids with ADHD, which is interesting lie,
0:51
when they frequently find out that they themselves have ADHD
0:54
because it's highly genetic. So, a lot of people will go get
0:58
tested, they'll get their kids tested and evaluated for school
1:02
purposes because the school is telling them the kid is in a
1:04
ton. Active or hyperactive or both
1:07
and then when they're filling out the questionnaire, they'll
1:09
either be like, oh my God, this is like me or oh my God, this is
1:13
like my husband. So when you find out or you
1:17
start to think that your husband may have ADHD is already
1:20
frequently too late for your relationship to be at its best.
1:25
Because for years, you have already been dealing with a lot
1:29
of things that people do not think relate to ADHD, which I'm
1:32
going to explore, but you can also go to the links that I give
1:36
you in my description because one of them is a book, The ADHD
1:40
effect on marriage that people swear by its very good book.
1:44
Oh, and she also the author Melissa orlov.
1:48
Also explains a lot about what ADHD looks like that.
1:51
People really don't know that it looks like and then there's
1:54
links from dr. Psych mom about people who've
1:57
written in with this problem and also a link to what I'll get to
2:02
later, which is that, if you don't try meds to fix this, then
2:06
you can say you're trying everything for your marriage.
2:08
A lot of guys are really against meds, they think this is just
2:11
their personality and their going to change in some bad way.
2:14
Usually the change in a pretty good way.
2:16
So we'll get to that soon. But that's just to tell you
2:19
about other resources. So what does a DHD look like
2:23
that? People really don't think it
2:25
looks like, well, it can really manifest as opposition ality
2:29
because of the ADHD brain. It can't be bored like it finds
2:34
boredom. Very very under stimulating to
2:39
the point of like pain and a version.
2:41
This is why tasks like managing the finances.
2:44
Or not good for people with ADHD and they can't really become
2:48
accountants or or admins or something like that because it's
2:53
really very hard for them to do things that are boring.
2:57
Their brains are wired such that when other people get anxious
3:03
because there's too much going on, that's when the ADHD person
3:06
thrives. So if you're an anxious Woman,
3:09
married to a guy with ADHD which is a very common pairing by the
3:13
time you You feel anxious and out of control, he is just
3:17
hitting his stride. So this is why he can focus on
3:21
like video games, but he can't focus on a discussion about the
3:25
relationship. A discussion about the
3:26
relationship is so boring, that it's like for you like listening
3:31
to, you know, show on, you know, I don't know.
3:36
Something that you find really boring history of the
3:39
Peloponnesian War, you know, he is so bored by things that are
3:44
Are just average that it's the equivalent of how bored you are
3:48
by like having to memorize a random number list for like
3:52
three hours. But something with a lot of
3:54
excitement and that releases a lot of dopamine, like video
3:58
gaming or like working at an, ER, or having your own business.
4:03
Common occupations. I see four guys with ADHD, when
4:07
other people are overwhelmed by stress.
4:10
That is, when they hit their stride, their adrenaline is
4:13
pumping and they That adrenaline if they're not unmedicated.
4:17
So a lot of guys with ADHD will use, Soda will use coffee and
4:21
may have in fact, used Adderall, and Ritalin during college to
4:25
study or to clean or whatever they had to do.
4:28
And finally felt like they were normal when doing that.
4:31
Whereas, when somebody that's more normal takes Adderall or
4:35
Ritalin, they feel like, whoa, I could stay up for like 24 hours
4:38
somebody with ADHD feels like, oh, I'm focusing, you know, ha,
4:42
this is what focusing is. Anyway, so that opposition ality
4:46
that I'm trying to discuss this is because people with ADHD
4:49
their brains are so bored. Most of the time that they
4:53
create drama subconsciously in order to activate their brain
4:58
and get moving so they may not in there deep Soul want to have
5:01
dramatic conflictual relationship but it's like they
5:04
can't even pay attention. Unless there's some kind of
5:07
little like fighting or debating or bickering, or what you would
5:11
think of as just opposition ality going on.
5:14
Now, they're also oppositional because they don't think feel
5:18
like can't and do not want to do that boring stuff and you don't
5:21
understand how a reverse of it is for them, so they will go
5:25
against you if you ask them to do some boring chore and instead
5:29
try to do some other big thing instead you think that they're
5:32
just being oppositional but they're literally saying my
5:35
brain cannot do that and they don't know why their brain can't
5:39
do it, they don't know themselves.
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So you know, they don't know how to tell you but Sides just to be
5:45
obstructive and say no or to be passive aggressive and just not
5:49
do it. So this inability of the ADHD
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brain to tolerate boredom, which, you know, the average
5:56
household is pretty boring, you do routines once there's kids,
5:59
there's a lot of routine, there's a lot of doing the same
6:01
thing over and over and that's why ADHD guys can really turn
6:05
into just the fun dad that's Hoops in takes everybody, tubing
6:09
or something. But can't do bedtime routine and
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this makes their wives very upset because they don't We
6:14
understand the ADHD brain and the guy can't really explain it.
6:18
Either that he only feels Awake and Alive and able to function
6:23
when there is stimulation going on.
6:26
So what medication does is it makes the brain stimulated, it's
6:30
like moves the set point. There's always stimulation going
6:35
on from the medication, so therefore, the guy can now focus
6:38
on what's boring. This is why ADHD meds can be
6:41
really transformative for marriages now for people Oh,
6:44
that's a there's downsides. There's down ties to everything
6:47
certainly with ADHD meds. It's a stimulant it's like
6:51
methamphetamine, you know. I mean it's you're going to need
6:54
more and more over time. But some people, they don't need
6:58
that much more over time and they can take little breaks from
7:04
it over weekends and stuff. And they can, they can get to
7:07
some level of taking the medication.
7:09
That means that they're able to function a hell of a lot better
7:12
at home and at work Look unless work is just a fire drill all
7:17
the time and they're running. From thing to thing that is
7:21
basically about to explode. There are guys with ADHD are
7:24
also going to see their work performance impeded because they
7:28
can't focus. They can do like the crazy thing
7:30
that they need to do the big sales pitch but then writing it
7:33
up afterwards and presenting it like to somebody you know.
7:37
Elsewhere. It's not such an exciting
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stimulating do-or-die format that's when they are going to
7:42
struggle. So even If your husband with
7:45
ADHD, doesn't tell you about work troubles.
7:47
Believe me, if he's oppositional with you, he's gonna be the same
7:50
way at work. He just not telling you, I have
7:53
so many women say, but he's so good at work.
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Why can't he be good at home? And then I talked to the guy
7:58
I'm, like, are you on time to all your meetings?
8:00
No, do you have emails? You don't respond to?
8:03
Yes, they just don't say this. Because this is a big point that
8:06
I'm leading up to hear God's with ADHD are embarrassed and
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ashamed. They have.
8:13
They've always been under achieve Everybody's always been
8:16
telling them. They're not living up to their
8:17
potential because they're smart, but yet they can do anything,
8:22
they could never do their homework, they're always losing
8:25
their stuff, they were talking, they're fucking around at
8:27
school, you know? And they don't know why, because
8:30
most of the time they weren't diagnosed.
8:32
So kids now that get diagnosed early, they're ahead of the
8:35
game, but nobody used to get diagnosed so early.
8:38
So, these were smart guys and they just didn't know why they
8:42
just couldn't memorize. The shit that they were supposed
8:45
to do or why they could never study.
8:48
And later on some of these people will learn to cram and
8:52
cramming. Actually is really good strategy
8:54
for someone with ADHD. Because the knowing that the
8:56
test is the next morning, releases a lot of adrenaline,
9:00
that adrenaline is finally would help them Focus.
9:04
So their whole lives, they've been underachieving.
9:07
So then when you say something about how you're disappointed in
9:09
them, for whatever, it's just yet another entry into, like all
9:14
of Is that they've been disappointing everybody and
9:16
they're going to turn off to that and not want to hear it
9:19
because it's embarrassing and upsetting and they just don't
9:22
even know why they just keep disappointing everybody.
9:25
They just know that they do. So sometimes in ADHD, diagnosis
9:28
can be very clarifying and validating for a man who has
9:32
been struggling with this for his whole life.
9:35
Now, of course, ADHD is in women also, that's just not what I'm
9:38
talking about here. But women with ADHD are less
9:43
common and they They need to be more severe to be diagnosed
9:46
because they're usually not going to be running around at
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the same level as like a boy with ADHD is there's just gender
9:53
differences and how physical it gets like that, so they won't
9:57
have gotten into as much trouble while they'll be like, you know
10:00
and attentive and kind of wandering around or fidgeting if
10:03
they're hyperactive they won't be like throwing rocks through a
10:06
window, you know. Like like they won't be doing
10:09
like random crazy shit for like a kick.
10:12
The same way that boys will. The ADHD.
10:15
Now ADHD is also because of all of these reasons that it affect
10:20
school performance, it's also linked with Oppositional Defiant
10:24
Disorder and then later conduct disorder, because you kind of
10:28
get on like a bad path you're not doing well at school.
10:31
You know, everybody seems like an asshole because they all seem
10:34
to be against you, you know, because you're not doing well at
10:38
school and nobody understands why and they think that you are
10:40
just not trying. Meanwhile, you are trying but
10:42
you just can't think straight. Your kind of foggy because of
10:46
the ADHD that nobody knows about.
10:48
And then you just start to have, like, a real chip on your
10:51
shoulder. And some guys that are like in
10:53
their 40s and older, especially that had no idea what ADHD was
10:58
when they were in school, they had experiences like this where
11:01
they just felt the world without to get them.
11:03
There was no way to achieve its school.
11:05
So then they went in down alternate paths, you know,
11:09
whether that was like early anti-social criminal type of
11:12
activity or just cheating on Or just repudiating School
11:16
altogether and truancy, you know, there's all sorts of paths
11:20
here substance abuse is linked to ADHD highly because you there
11:26
sensation Seekers. So ADHD people need a lot of
11:30
stimulation, what provides more stimulation than drugs, right
11:33
and alcohol. And this goes a lot with
11:37
depression as well. And they anxiety for reasons
11:40
that I've said depression because they just don't ever
11:44
know. Why they're not really achieving
11:45
well anxiety, because they are always like, fucking shit up,
11:50
you know, they're always late, they're always missing
11:52
something. They're always disappointing
11:54
somebody. So they start to think that's
11:55
always kind of how it's going to be, and they can't get a handle
11:57
on it. So, and also, of course, there's
12:00
brain Imaging, studies, that show that the frontal lobe and
12:04
the executive functioning area is just different.
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And people with ADHD, you know, that it is in people without.
12:11
So these same brain areas can be implicated in other
12:14
Psychological disorders and we don't know fully everything.
12:18
There is to know about that the great Imaging studies do show a
12:21
definite difference with people with ADHD and people who don't
12:24
have ADHD so it's like real it's not just some made up thing
12:29
anyhow, so within marriage, you could see that all of the things
12:33
that I'm saying really do not make somebody with ADHD a very
12:37
reliable partner and there are subconsciously drawn to women
12:41
who are the opposite, who can keep their shit together who Who
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are these? These are really type A anxious
12:46
kind of women who then can overcompensate for the ADHD
12:50
guys, deficiencies in the areas of organization and executive
12:55
function and early on, this may make a woman feel good to be the
12:59
one who finally organizes things.
13:00
We're going to get his finances on track.
13:02
I'm going to fix up his resume and he's such a smart guy.
13:05
And why doesn't anybody see this accept me?
13:08
Or if the guys higher functioning ADHD she'll just
13:12
say, oh yeah, he's real smart. He's fly by the seat of It spans
13:15
we're yin and yang. Well you didn't Yang doesn't
13:17
look so cute over time. So that, so over time is when I
13:21
see people come in and they're like, why have I been doing all
13:25
of the, basically been the brains and the CEO of this
13:29
household forever? And he just doesn't seem to
13:32
care. It's not that he doesn't seem to
13:34
care. It's that his brain doesn't
13:37
function in these routine and these kind of organized ways.
13:42
And so the guy with ADHD will Say, why doesn't she want to be
13:45
fun spontaneous? Why aren't we having sex?
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She says, we're not having sex because I'm balancing every
13:51
single thing in this family and these are the women who truly
13:55
are doing all of the emotional labor and everything else
13:58
because the guy can bring home a paycheck, but then it's almost
14:01
when he walks through the door of the house, he just all over
14:04
the place. He drops his clothes everywhere.
14:06
He leaves shit out, leaves the fridge open.
14:08
And so women take this personally if they have no idea
14:11
what ADHD is, and they think that Might act different if she
14:15
were different or if he prioritized your more, there is
14:19
a hyper focused courtship in ADHD where the woman is a novel
14:24
stimulus. So she is what releases the
14:26
dopamine and adrenaline. So these guys do act a lot
14:29
different when they're dating and it's not a bait-and-switch
14:31
just like it's not a bait-and-switch when women have
14:33
a higher sex drive, when dating they do with in, monogamy, as I
14:37
always discussed, it's literally that the woman is a novel
14:40
stimulus, which releases adrenaline and dopamine in a
14:44
three different way for the man then she ever will again.
14:47
She never going to be new again. In fact, sometimes though it
14:49
comes back, if she threatens to leave, then he gets a little hit
14:53
of adrenaline and is like good again and mr.
14:56
Romantic but then she stinks. Oh well then what I have to do
15:00
is threaten to leave these. It's only about drama.
15:03
Can't just rely on him. And this is true because once he
15:06
kind of gets bored not bored in an insulting way that he's
15:10
literally bored with who his wife is but board because it is
15:14
route. And it isn't new anymore.
15:16
Then he cannot function at the same level and then the woman
15:20
thinks that he's just taking advantage Etc.
15:23
And you could see how these interpretations are very toxic
15:26
and lead to bad things, right? So if you're in an ADHD
15:33
marriage, right? If if your husband has ADHD, one
15:37
of the best things to do is to get him a diagnosis and start
15:41
him on meds, even if he hates the meds.
15:44
He says that their side effects and whatever he will definitely
15:47
see that he can focus so much better on the meds that it
15:51
really kind of validates that there was an actual issue that
15:54
the diagnosis of ADHD is real and then they got to do some
15:59
research together or with the help of a couple's counselor on
16:03
what ADHD really is and all of these other things that I'm
16:07
saying it is, it isn't just that like you lose your stuff and
16:10
like you forget stuff and you you know, run around a lot.
16:14
Like a hyperactive kid. It's not that it's that you
16:17
cannot focus on what is boring to the point.
16:20
That it feels physically painful and you despite your best
16:24
intentions do not actually remember anything that isn't,
16:30
you know, something that puts your hair on fire immediately,
16:33
because it's so climactic. So, when people understand more
16:37
of what ADHD looks like within marriage, then they can become
16:41
the two of them on one side and the diagnosis of ADHD is on the
16:45
other side, something for them both to understand and to try to
16:48
work toward resolving not that this ADHD can be cured but
16:53
medication can help coaching can help literally only
16:57
understanding that. This is a problem is like
17:01
probably over 50 percent of the battle and somebody who has not
17:04
previously understood that this is what's going on.
17:08
So if you are somebody who is in a relationship like this and who
17:13
struggles, If feeling that your husband is just lazy or he just
17:17
won't prioritize your relationship or he's just acting
17:20
like so difficult and oppositional and child like you
17:24
really want to think about ADHD. If there are really any other
17:28
symptoms, you could Google the symptoms as well as I can just
17:31
look up DSM, criteria for ADHD. You're gonna see some other
17:36
stuff and it's really unusual for somebody with a th oh, and
17:41
by the way, adult ADHD, this is a conflict.
17:44
Jewel controversial diagnosis because most people think that
17:50
you really have to have childhood ADHD in order to have
17:53
adult ADHD and it doesn't just come in adulthood and usually
17:58
that's true. It just hasn't been diagnosed in
18:01
childhood because usually the person was too smart or too
18:05
capable at like, working around it, so that these symptoms
18:09
really didn't get noticed, or there was a bigger fish to fry
18:11
in the home, sometimes even just a sibling with ADHD.
18:15
So then the one with ADHD where they weren't failing out wasn't
18:19
thought to have ADHD at all you know.
18:21
So if you think that like a partner has adult ADHD I mean
18:26
you can call it whatever you want but it's likely that they
18:28
had childhood ADHD as well. In my opinion, it's pretty
18:33
essential that they did to for it to be thought of as ADHD.
18:37
Now unless there was some sort of massive like a brain problem
18:42
or like an injury or something later on.
18:44
Usually they those Concord childhood ADHD, even if
18:48
undiagnosed predicts these same symptoms in adulthood, it can be
18:52
exacerbated, though. And what sometimes happens with
18:55
adult ADHD is ADHD, that was their gets exacerbated by
18:58
something like depression or by anxiety or use of substances and
19:05
then it becomes more flagrant. So hopefully, this was helpful
19:10
in allowing some women potentially to understand.
19:14
Their husbands either diagnosed or undiagnosed ADHD better now.
19:18
Couples counseling can be very, very useful here in also
19:22
repairing some of the ruptures and trust and respect that are
19:29
frequently consequences of a marriage that has ADHD in a
19:34
partner. Because over time, the non ADHD
19:38
partner has presented this narrative to themselves about
19:43
that. This guy just doesn't give a a
19:44
shit. He doesn't care selfish and
19:46
lazy. And there have also actually
19:48
been many empathic ruptures where he's just forgotten to do
19:52
something. Or he has created some drama,
19:55
albiet unintentionally or whatever.
19:58
And resolving empathic ruptures is really key.
20:01
If you want to have a loving marriage, that continues because
20:06
empathic ruptures which again, is when you want somebody to be
20:09
there for you and they weren't can is add the, I talked about
20:13
this in my why women? She ate divorce podcast,
20:15
unresolved empathic ruptures such as something like, your
20:19
husband has ADHD. So he told you that he would be
20:21
on time to your kids first birthday party.
20:24
And then he was an hour late and you thought what a huge asshole
20:28
and he didn't know why he did it.
20:30
So he at the time, blamed it on marital problems because that's
20:34
all he could think of because he doesn't even know why he was
20:37
late things like this happen all the time and couples counseling
20:42
can really help both the ADHD partner.
20:44
The non ADHD partner understand each other better.
20:47
And as I said, the non ADHD partner can frequently be
20:50
somebody with their own issues of anxiety, and being really
20:54
rigid. Because this was the yin-yang
20:57
thing where they were attracted to each other subconsciously
21:00
because of their differences and how they could, you know, pull
21:04
each other out of their comfort zones.
21:06
But then, over time this turns into something pretty bad.
21:10
You know where each person feels that the other one is way too
21:14
expensive. Stream the couple becomes
21:15
polarized and they're basically caricatured as she is this like,
21:20
rigid martinet and he is this complete Manchild and nobody
21:26
deserves to live in a relationship like that where
21:29
they are, where they feel maligned and mischaracterize and
21:32
misrepresent it. So hopefully this was helpful,
21:35
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