ADHD in Adult Men and How it Affects Their Relationship
Life is just a matter of managing it efficiently for an adult but if you always find yourself being constantly late, disorganised, forgetful and overwhelmed by responsibilities then you may have ADHD. ADHD in Adult Men has been affecting a lot and its vast variety of adult attention deficit disorder symptoms can block you from having a successful relationship to staying on top of your job. Luckily, help is readily available and learning about ADHD is the first step to the best ADHD therapy. Once you understand the challenges you will learn to compensate for your weaknesses and start to take advantage of your strengths.
Maintaining a relationship is a challenge for most individuals. Being in a relationship with a man who has ADHD can lead to misunderstandings, frustrations, and resentments. Having ADHD can pose a lot of challenges especially when this disorder often makes them seem like poor listeners, distracted partners, and forgetful persons. This is mostly true for men who haven’t undergone a proper diagnosis of ADHD in adults or hasn’t been treated by an adult ADHD specialist. Sad to say, it is due to these such difficulties that even the most loving relationships falter and fail. Fortunately, you don’t have to worry that much since you can build a healthier and happier relationship by learning about ADHD and how both of you could choose to be more productive in responding to the challenges and prevent a broken relationship.
If you’re suffering from ADHD, you might somehow feel like being criticised, nagged and micromanaged. So no matter what you do, it would always seem that you haven’t pleased your partner at all. Oftentimes, you might feel disrespected as an adult. Having to deal with these problems might lead you to make your loved one feel ignored, lonely and unappreciated. When your partner starts to feel these things, your partner might feel like you’re unreliable or just doesn’t care.
Feelings these things would eventually lead to a destructive cycle in your relationship. Your non-ADHD girlfriend would constantly complain, nag and would somehow resent being with you while you would feel judged and misunderstood. Luckily, your relationship doesn’t have to suffer and it shouldn’t always be like this.
In order to transform your relationship into something worthwhile, you have to make your loved one understand the role that ADHD plays in your life. Once you are able to identify how it is affecting your interactions with your partner then you both could take your cues and learn better ways to respond and communicate.
ADHD in Adult Men That Often Cause Relationship Problems
Trouble Paying Attention:
If you are suffering from ADHD, you usually space out during lengthy conversations which would eventually make your partner feel like being ignored. More so, you repeatedly miss details or mindlessly agree to something that you would, later on, forget which would cause great frustration in your loved one’s part.
Forgetfulness:
Persons suffering from ADHD tend to forget things even when they seem to be paying attention to something being discussed.
Lousy Organisational Skills:
Your poor ability to organise would often lead to a difficult time finishing a task.
Impulsivity:
If you have ADHD, you might become tactless without thinking which would easily hurt other people’s feelings. This impulsivity would lead to irresponsible and reckless behaviour.
Here Are Some Tips That You Can Apply to Turn Your Relationship Around:
Put Yourself in Your Loved One’s Shoes
In order to turn your relationship around, one should learn to see things from a different perspective and that is through putting yourself in your partner’s shoes. If you have already been together for a long time and have been having the same fights time and again, then you might have an inkling as to where your partner is coming from.
However, don’t underestimate the easiness of misinterpreting your partner’s actions or intentions. You and your loved one might not be thinking along the same lines – especially if you are suffering from ADHD. Whenever both of your emotions run high, especially those with ADHD it would be awfully stressful to maintain objectivity and perspective.
The best way to deal with this is to look at it in your partner’s point of view, ask and then listen carefully. Make time to have a sincere talk when you’ve already simmered down. Allow your partner to describe her emotions without interrupting them or defending yourself. Once your partner is finished, then tell her it’s your turn. Ask her to do the same for you and keep an open mind.
Take Responsibility for Your Role
If you’ve already viewed things in your partner’s perspective then it’s time for you to accept responsibility for your role in the relationship. You would only start to progress once you’ve become aware of your own contributions to the problems that you both encounter. This goes out to non-ADHD partners as well.
Although your ADHD partner’s symptoms might raise an issue, the symptoms alone aren’t the ones solely to blame if your relationship is headed south. The way a non-ADHD partner responds to this disruptive symptom could either open the door for compromise or provoke misunderstandings which would hurt both of your feelings. If you’re the one who has ADHD, you would also be responsible on how you react to your loved one’s concerns.
Stop Fighting and Start to Communicate
Communication is very powerful and is essential for any relationship to grow and be capable of withstanding hell and high water. In order to improve communication, one has to listen closely while the other one is talking and address the deeper issue that you both are tackling.
Identifying the real issue would make the problem easier to solve. Don’t hide your emotions, square your shoulders and get your emotions out in the open where you can work it through as a couple.
Work Together as a Couple
Just because your boyfriend is suffering from ADHD doesn’t necessarily mean that you won’t be able to have a balanced and fulfilling relationship. The key to a successful relationship is in learning to work together as a couple. Ergo, it really needs two to tango. A healthy relationship involves giving and taking wherein couples participate fully in the relationship and look for ways to support each other and make it work.
Creating a Practical Plan
If you are suffering from ADHD, the most likely organising and setting up systems are not your strong suit but that doesn’t mean that you aren’t capable of following a plan that is in place.
Couples can start this by analysing the things that you frequently fight about like chores or constantly being late. Think about a practical thing that you both would be able to do to solve it. Consider treatment for attention deficit disorder.
Outlook
Surely, having ADHD could have a negative impact on your relationship but this doesn’t always have to be the case. You and your partner can start by mutually accepting both of your imperfections and it will definitely go a long way in terms of building empathy for each other. A relationship that involves someone with ADHD is never easy but is possible if both are willing to give and take.
At The ADHD Centre, we offer an Online ADHD Test for you to know or confirm if you or a loved one happens to have ADHD and if you would like some further guidance and support on managing your ADHD then please contact us at The ADHD Centre on 0800 061 4276 or via enquiries@adhdcentre.co.uk. We can provide you with an in-depth ADHD assessment to improve your understanding of the disorder and to know what treatment method is fit for you.
