Why Is It so Hard to Rest When You Have ADHD?

Image by @marcolastella via Unsplash

We tend to talk about ADHD in terms of productivity. When you get an assessment, one of the first things they’ll ask is whether your symptoms impact you at work. But when it comes to your condition impacting your daily life, work isn’t the only thing that matters. 

ADHD can make us bad at leisure, too.

We don’t talk about it much, since we diagnose ADHD based on how much it inconveniences others, not how much it impacts the person who has it. But yes, it’s hard to rest when you have ADHD. 

Which makes sense, seeing as restlessness is one of the symptoms. But even when you’re not feeling particularly restless, rest can be hard. If you’re bad at leisure, you’re not the only one. Based on personal experience, here are some reasons why ADHD makes it hard to rest. 

People with ADHD Can’t Rest because We Don’t Know How 

Want to know what I looked forward to most when I started my ADHD treatment? Nothing. 

Literally, I looked forward to doing nothing on purpose. To finish my work at the end of the day and just be caught up enough to chill out, instead of frantically catching up on the five or six things I’d inevitably fallen behind on. 

And it happened! As soon as I started treatment with ADHD stimulants, I was finally able to catch up. For the first time in my life, I genuinely had time for leisure. 

And I didn’t know what to do with it. I literally had to learn how to rest — not just sleep, but rest — as an adult. Up until that point, I didn’t know how. 

We Feel Bad for Resting because We Think We Haven’t Earned It 

“What do you mean you didn’t know how to rest? I have ADHD and I rest all the time! I rest even when I’m supposed to be working!” 

Ah, but do you really? Are you resting, or are you avoiding a task? Because those are two different things. For most of my life, I did a lot of things that probably looked very restful…from the outside. But on the inside, my mind was full of all the things I “should” have been doing. 

The reality of untreated ADHD is that you are never caught up. There is always something you’re behind on. And if you’re never caught up, you’re berating yourself for it, even when you’re “resting.” We learn to feel guilty every time we sit down. We tell ourselves that we should wait until we’ve “earned” it by finishing the task that our brains won’t let us do. 

Our brains create a link between rest and guilt. It’s not easy to break that link, even when we finally have time to enjoy ourselves. 

Focus Isn’t Just Finite. It’s Also Time-Sensitive 

Every person on earth has a limited amount of focus. Including neurotypical people. That’s one of many reasons why we need to rest. When we’re tired, we lose focus. When we rest, we regain it. 

In theory. 

But for those of us with ADHD, focus isn’t just limited. It’s time-sensitive. If we have focus right now, and we stop whatever we’re working on, we have no guarantee that focus is going to come back. 

Even if we can’t articulate it, we intuitively know that a 10:00pm burst of focus is confined to 10:00pm. Going to bed won’t put that focus into storage so we can use it later. With ADHD, focus and motivation are “use it or lose it” things. So we don’t always rest when society says we should. 

Well, Now What? 

Honestly? I don’t know. Would it help if I told you it can get easier? I’ve had treatment for my ADHD for a few years now, and I will say that I’m learning to rest. It’s a process, but I’m much better at it than I used to be. 

One thing that helped was broadening my definition of rest. For example, bouncing on my mini trampoline may not look “restful” from the outside, but the movement does help me rest my brain. As long as you enjoy the activity and it’s refueling you, then it counts as rest.