I Love You But I Don't Like You: Supporting ADHD Relationships #257
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You chose this person for a reason. You love them.
Aaaaand relationships are complicated. Sometimes you may not LIKE your partner as much as you love them.
Adding ADHD in the mix is more than another layer of complexity to your relationship, whether it affects you, your partner, or both.
As Valentine's Day approaches, here’s a clip from Successful Mama Meetups during our month theme "I love you, but I don't like you". I’m sharing supportive strategies for fostering strong, loving connections. Understanding ADHD's impact on your relationships makes a huge difference in how you interact together and stay together.
I’m adding a relationship twist on my three foundational principles: learning about ADHD, taking care of yourself, and asking for help. Strong loving relationships are possible for ADHDers, too!
Let’s discuss!
Links mentioned in this episode:
Get your copy of my Inattentive ADHD Symptoms Checklist here
Learn how to deal with your emotions with ADHD friendly skills you can teach your kids, too.
Rooted Group Coaching for ADHD Moms is enrolling for next month. Join here: patriciasung.com/group
Patricia Sung [00:00:00]:
It does not solve everything, but, like, most issues are made worse or made better with communication.
Patricia Sung [00:00:07]:
Are you overwhelmed by motherhood and barely keeping your head above water? Are you confused and frustrated by how all the other moms make it look so easy? You can't figure out how to manage the chaos in your mind,
Patricia Sung [00:00:20]:
your home, or your family.
Patricia Sung [00:00:22]:
I get you, mama. Parenting with ADHD is hard. Here is your permission slip to let go of the Pinterest worthy visions of organization and structure fit for everyone else. Let's do life like our brains do life, creatively, lovingly, and with all our might. When we embrace who we are and how our brains work, we can figure out how to live our lives successfully, and in turn, lead our families well. At the end of the day, we just wanna be good moms. But, spoiler alert, you are already a great mom. ADHD does not mean you're doomed to be a hot mess, mama.
Patricia Sung [00:01:01]:
You can rewrite your story from shame spiral to success story, and I'll be right here beside you to cheer you on. Welcome to Motherhood in ADHD. Hey there, Successful Mama. It's your friend, Patricia Sung. As we are coming up on Valentine's Day, I thought it appropriate to share this clip today with you. Last spring in successful mom meetups, we're talking about relationships. And our theme of the month was, I love you, but I don't like you. And we discussed all about how do we support relationships when ADHD is involved.
Patricia Sung [00:01:35]:
Now this might be when 1 person has ADHD, sometimes it's both people. So how do we love each other well and get through the tough parts so that we still like each other too? Before we dive into this talk on relationships, when you want help on your relationship and you know that it's being influenced by your ADHD, come join me in rooted. We have small group coaching just for moms with ADHD that I host every month. In fact, twice a month we meet, and I will help you get through whatever it is that's on your mind, whichever is plaguing you. And you come and you ask for support and you see that other moms are dealing with the same kinds of things. And know that you're not alone. I know that you have already tried 17 things to make life easier. You've read all the books.
Patricia Sung [00:02:22]:
You listened to the podcast. Hello. You may have gone to therapy or counseling. And you're doing all the things, and you're like, why isn't this coming together? Because on paper, I'm doing all the things that I should be doing, and this is still really hard. Now, motherhood is hard. Relationships are hard. These are difficult things in life. And just because we have ADHD doesn't mean we can't do them.
Patricia Sung [00:02:41]:
We can figure out how to live our life really well with ADHD. We can figure out how to work with our brains so that all these checkboxes aren't for nothing. When we tailor the way we do things to make sense for the brains that we have, all of a sudden it's so much easier. So when you've tried all the other stuff and you can't figure out why it's still not coming together, you know where to find me. Come join rooted coaching and hang out with other people who get it and find the way that makes sense for you. You can find all the information about rooted on patriciasung.com/group. When you're ready to join, if there is not an opening listed right there on the page to join immediately, send me an email, hello [at] patriciasung.com. I will take a look and see if there's any openings, let you know.
Patricia Sung [00:03:23]:
If not, you'll be the very first one to know as you'll be on the wait list, and we'll get you into the next group opening. So go check it out. Patriciasung.com/group. And if you don't see an opening right now, shoot me an email, hello [at] patriciasung.com. Let's dive into the episode.
Patricia Sung [00:03:39]:
Being in a relationship with ADHD, whether it's you, your partner, both of you, even if ADHD is in the mix in terms of your kids, like, it definitely has an effect on what's going on. So my 3 key points are, like, my 3 staples of whenever people ask me, what do I do about this? I'm like, these are 3 things. 1, we learn about our ADHD and understand how it affects us or how it affects our partner, in this case, since we're talking about relationships. So learning about the ADHD. Two is we put on our oxygen mask first, so making sure that we're taking care of ourselves and, in this case, also taking care of our relationship. And then number 3, how do we ask for help, get support both from each other and perhaps outside help so that we're all working together towards the same goal as a partnership. So when we think about the first one learning about your ADHD, like, let me put on disclaimer of, like, you know your relationship best. I don't know all the inner workings of what's going on in your family.
Patricia Sung [00:04:38]:
So whatever I'm saying, like, take what you need, leave the rest. You are the authority and know best about any of this. So everything I say may not apply to you, and that's okay. And I don't expect you to. So you know best. Okay. So first one is, you know, take with a grain of salt. Take what you need.
Patricia Sung [00:04:53]:
Leave the rest. Okay. So when we think about learning about our ADHD, we wanna think about how our ADHD affects our relationship. So we're looking for those patterns, and we're looking for both the positive patterns and the struggle bus patterns. So it's not just, oh, let me boohoo about all the things that make ADGs, makes everything hard, blah, when we don't wanna focus just on what's the struggle bus. There's a very good chance that your lovely qualities and the way that ADHD shows up in your life also are part of the reason that your partner fell in love with you and the reason you fell in love with them. Like, these are good qualities too. It's not only the hard thing.
Patricia Sung [00:05:28]:
So, reminding ourselves of those things of, like, the, you know yeah. Being spontaneous when you have kids is a lot harder. But before, you were spontaneous, and you were fun. Like, those pieces of you that your ADHD makes you a great partner too. It's not just the hard parts. So where do you see those patterns of the things that are really fun and make your relationship enjoyable? How does the ADHD come into play there? And then also, of course, where it's making thing hard. The more that you understand how your ADHD affects you, the more that you'll see where it comes into play in your relationship. And if you have a partner who also have ADHD or autism or whatever, like, it's it's never just ADHD.
Patricia Sung [00:06:09]:
I think it's, like, the important part to remember too is, like, there are all couples struggle. All relationships are hard. It's not just because we have ADHD that things are difficult, so we're not gonna blame it all on having ADHD. There's 2 people in a relationship. There are so many factors of what makes you a human. So it's not just 1 thing. So we're not gonna just, like, poo poo dump on ADHD and all. It is the cause of all the problems.
Patricia Sung [00:06:35]:
It's not. I always like to use the analogy of, like, it's like a filter on a picture. It doesn't change the picture, but it definitely affects everything in the picture. But it is not the picture. So where are the ways that when you understand your HD, you'll see where those patterns apply? So, like, when I think about my relationship, like, 1 of them is that I I'm constantly running behind. I am significantly better than I was, but my husband's one of those people that, like what's the phrase? What's that saying? Like, if you're late you know, you're on time, you're actually late. And if you're you know, to be early is being on time. He's 1 of those people.
Patricia Sung [00:07:08]:
Not. I am not. And so, like, that kind of patterning is, like, when I know that this is a thing that is a struggle, focusing in on that as a like, a problem that we tackle together, which I'll get to in a second, makes it easier to start to find the solutions when we can start to see where the patterns pop up. Because a lot of times, it's like, well, this feels really hard. Our relationship, we don't feel connected. Like, when we get overwhelmed, we start to generalize and get real vague. And it's like, everything is hard because our brain is, like, not capable at that moment to, like, be like, oh, what's actually hard here? And when we can dig into where the patterns come up and we start looking for the solutions that actually matter. And a lot of times, there are pieces of problems that make the bigger difference.
Patricia Sung [00:07:54]:
Like, if you think about, like, when you line up all the dominoes, if you can knock over the first domino, it knocks over all the dominoes. So looking for those key pieces that will then play out in making all the other things better. So when we can look for, like, what are those patterns there instead of everything's hard. Okay. If we can hone in on 1 thing at a time and look just at 1, it can be a lot more doable to look at. So that's point number 1 is understanding your ADHD, understanding what's going on with your partner, and then how do we look for the patterns there and see where they're coming in. That's number 1. Number 2 is always put on your oxygen mask first.
Patricia Sung [00:08:33]:
So how do we take care of ourselves so that we can take care of other people? How do we take care of the things that we need from ourselves? How can we take care of things that our relationship needs? And knowing that, like, when we talk about, like, in things in Lighthouse, when we talk about, like, boundaries, those are all things that are for us and knowing, like, how we're taking care of ourselves. Our boundaries are not for other people. It's the boundary of, like, what am I willing to do? Where am I willing to extend myself? Where am I not willing to extend myself? And how do I take care of me so that I am capable of showing up in my relationship well? And part of that care also is having conversations with your partner when everyone is less than a 5 on the stress scale. So if you've been in Lighthouse or you've been basically, in any time, we talk about stress. When we are in a good space, we're here at the top in the sunshine, the trees are blowing in the wind, everything's lovely, and we're in a stress level like 0 or 1. And this is when we're in our, like, safe and social ventral vagal state where, like, no stress. Everything's lovely. I can frolic in the sun.
Patricia Sung [00:09:41]:
And then as soon as we get stressed out, we start moving down this ladder. And I think of, like, 1 of those sewers where you take the circle, like, manhole cover off, and then the the ladder goes down into the depths. And once we get down to about a 5 and our head is below ground, like, nothing good happens after a 5. It all goes down after that. So, like, even when we put our feet on, like, level 2, if we're a little bit stressed, then things are hard. We're already entering fight or flight stage. So we can function when our person is still having their head above ground, but once it gets below a 5, nothing good happens. And down here, like, here's the water line.
Patricia Sung [00:10:20]:
In the sewer, like, once you got your little guy here, little star person is down at the bottom. Like, this is when we're in, like, freeze, fawn. The dude who's hitting the fan. Anytime that we've got part of ourselves underwater, nothing good is happening happening there. So, like, when we're having these conversations with our partner, we wanna make sure that we're at 5 or above. I think 1 of the main things that I've learned in doing marriage counseling for probably the last year and a half is that communication solves 80% of problems. It does not solve everything, but, like, most issues are made worse or made better with communication. The problem is if we are past a 5, we don't usually have the capability of communicating in any kind of useful way, nor do we have the ability to receive information in any kind of useful way.
Patricia Sung [00:11:10]:
So knowing that we wanna have these conversations with our partner when we're less stressed and more stressed. Are we ever gonna be no stress? No. We're moms. But there's never gonna be no stress. But when we have less stress, that means that our prefrontal cortex is online. We actually can make complete thoughts. We can use all of our problem solving, and we can access all the tools that we have learned and all those books that you've read and all the podcasts you've listened to and all of the, workshops that you've gone to and the great conversations that you've had with your friend. All these tools you actually have access to when you're less stressed.
Patricia Sung [00:11:41]:
So having those conversations when you're in a place to actually communicate well, receive information well, really does make a big difference.
Patricia Sung [00:11:52]:
Are you curious if you have ADHD? Like, you're still just not quite sure. Is this me or not? Maybe you're getting ready for your diagnosis appointment, or maybe you wanna bring it up with your GP, but you're not quite sure how to talk about it. I put together a checklist of symptoms. That's not your average boring list of symptoms. It's the Patricia take on, from what I've seen of working with thousands of women, ways that I see these symptoms actually showing up in real life. I put it all together in a downloadable checklist, and I want you to go get it. Download the checklist. Go through and check off, here are the things that show up in my life, and there's space in there for you to write in where you see these things showing up in your life.
Patricia Sung [00:12:31]:
And then you can take that list to your doctor's appointment and show them, like, when I say I'm being forgetful, here's what I mean. When you ask me, like, are you hyperactive? This is how hyperactivity shows up in my life, in my brain, so that you have concrete examples and you don't freeze up. When it comes time to talk about it, you have your preparation there and you feel confident and capable in talking about you because you know yourself best. So head over to my website, and you can download the free checklist at patriciasung.com/adhd-symptoms and that'll go right to your email and you can take that with you and be prepared for that tough conversation. Again, that's patriciasung.com/adhd-symptoms
Patricia Sung [00:13:19]:
So when we talk about putting in the oxygen mask mask on ourselves and on our relationship, it's knowing that, like, it's okay to schedule hard conversations. And if you're having a bad day or your partner's having a bad day, it's okay to reschedule the hard conversations. But having that communication really does make a huge difference. Because when we have ADHD, we a lot of times think all the things in our head. We think about them. We mull them over. We toss them around. We tease them apart.
Patricia Sung [00:13:47]:
We put them back together and and all of this thinking happens in our heads, and we don't say them out loud. This is 1 of my, greatest and worst talents is having the conversations in my head and not explaining the words to my husband and being able to explain why I'm upset about something or what it is that I'm actually needing makes a big difference. And, like, we talked about this today in the coaching, in meeting 1 with, Kylie and about how a lot of times, like, when we're asking our partners for help, we think that our job is to tell them what to do because we think they can't figure it out themselves because a lot of times, they act like they can't figure it out themselves when actually it like, yes. Sometimes it helps to get them started. But, really, your partner is someone who is capable of also doing all the things in your family. It may not be the way that you want to do them, and it's not the way you wish they would do them. But a lot of times where we get into that confusion is that they are trying to do the thing the way that we want to do it. And, like, when we were working through today with Kylie, like, we talked about the conversation is about explaining to her partner that what she needs during dinner time when her 2 year old is screaming is not necessarily to come up with a 7 step plan for him to take care of the screaming 2 year old, but for her to let her partner know, like, what I actually need from you right now is just to create less chaos.
Patricia Sung [00:15:16]:
Can you please help me figure out how to have less noise, less screaming, less people running around my feet while I'm trying to cook dinner? Like, can you help me create less stimulation here? So whether that's it be quieter, there not be so many people running around, less people telling me things, less people asking me things, like, how can you help me lower the overstimulation that is happening here? And so in that case, like, it's not her job to figure out here's the 7 ways that he could calm this 2 year old down. It's to let him know the goal here is for less stimulation because the example she gave is, like, then her husband will put on music thinking it's calming, but, actually, she's like, now it's just noisier in here. Like, this does not help. So, like, when we can communicate to our partner, like, I appreciate that for you, music feels calming. And for me in this moment, the music is like nails on a chalkboard, and I can't with more noise. That way then your partner knows, like, these are the parameters of which the goal is to have less noise. Like, to him calming down means music. And to her, she's like, that actually wasn't the goal.
Patricia Sung [00:16:21]:
The goal wasn't calming. The goal was less chaos. So then music didn't add to that. So being able to explain those, like, differences because in our head, if we think about what's less chaotic, for some people, it is. Oh, well, let's play shoot. I think you're I think you should see, like, Eric Clapton or something. And she's like, yes. Some people find Eric Clapton to be lovely.
Patricia Sung [00:16:43]:
I find 2 year old screaming, Eric Clapton, not assistant. Like so these kind of things were like, we can come like, communicate with them what it is that we actually need. So it's not our job to tell them how to do it, but to let them know, like, actually, what I'm struggling with is this. Item number 3 is always ask for help. So how do we create support in this relationship? 1, reminding ourselves, like, we're 1 team. It's us against the problem. It's not me versus you. Because when we're in a partnership, a lot of times it becomes me versus you.
Patricia Sung [00:17:12]:
And how do we come back to you, like and, again, assuming that you're in a healthy relationship, like, how do we come back together to be like, yes. We are working for, like, in 1 team, us against the problem. Using that communication to explain, like, how it is that you think or what you need. And also the communication of that, like, being able to understand and listen to them, like, what's their perspective in the situation as well. And then looking at, like, how can you support each other. Like, maybe when your partner comes home from a long day, they're like, I don't wanna help you wrangle kids with dinner. I need fifteen minutes to calm down. And when you know okay.
Patricia Sung [00:17:46]:
I'm in, like well, I think Kylie called it, like, the Super Bowl. It's like the two hours between getting dinner ready to bedtime. It's like, this is when I need the most help. So if your partner's coming in and saying, I need space, and you're like, I need help, it's like, how do we come together? And instead of it being me versus you, I want help, I want space, It's okay. How do we together work on the problem? And knowing that there is a solution for us to both get what we need, maybe not in the same timing that we had hoped for. It's not ideal unicorns here on the situation, but, like, there is a way to come up with the solution when both partners are saying, this is what I need. This is what I need. How do we bring them together and come? Us against the problem.
Patricia Sung [00:18:27]:
And knowing, like, it's not gonna we're not gonna have the answer right away. We're gonna try some things out and, like, maybe solution number 1 was Eric Clapton in the background. They were like, that was not helpful. Thank you so much for helping. That was not it. Like, can we have this conversation? Again, when we're not over 5, how do we come together and be like, okay. I appreciate that. That did not help.
Patricia Sung [00:18:49]:
Can we try something different tomorrow? But knowing that, like, a lot of times when we're in relationships, we have these patterns that we have developed over the months, years, or decades that you have been together, and sometimes we don't even realize that we're falling into those patterns that we don't have to be stuck in and that we can work through and knowing that there is hope. The whole point of having a partner is for things to be easier. So how can we come together and find that? So I can literally talk on this for another seven hours, but I'll review. The same pre principles I say quite often is learning about your ADHD, case how it affects your relationship, putting on your oxygen mask first. So how are you taking care of yourself, but then also how are you putting the oxygen mask on your relationship and creating that space where the relationship is being cared for too, which is, like, you know, no small feat when you have kids, especially, like, 5 or, at all. And then support. How do you guys support each other in in coming together as 1 team?
Patricia Sung [00:19:48]:
For more resources, classes, and community, head over to my website, motherhoodinADHD.com.