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ADHD and brain fog

Little_Owl

Hi all,

I am struggling really badly with brain fog. Concentrating is basically impossible. I feel completely disconnected and can't think properly. I'm mentally exhausted. I am waiting on some blood tests but this is something that I've struggled with since my teens, it's just worse than normal. The only thing I have found helpful in the past is intense exercise (HIIT) - I think the dopamine helps to clear my head - but I'm so tired that all I really want to do is sleep or stare into space! I also have chronic fatigue syndrome so basically this high intensity exercise is awful but for some reason it's like my body and brain need to be pushed through an invisible pain / fatigue barrier to then feel human for a few hours. Does anyone else struggle with similar issues? How do you deal with it? Are there any less extreme ways of getting enough dopamine without going through the pain of intense exercise with chronic fatigue?

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Comments

MicMac

I bet the brain fog made it a challenge for you to write this. 😅

I struggle with it too, but I haven't found a good method to deal with it yet.

The most I can do for now is eat/drink something that gives me some kind of sugar or caffeine high, and then do as much as I can while I'm on that high. It lasts no time at all though, and doesn't even work that well.

Little_Owl

Just a bit! Takes a while to write something that makes sense. Thankfully it's easier if it something I'm already thinking about because it's kind of already in my brain somewhere!

Caffeine and sugar helps in the short term but it doesn't last long! Probably not great in the long term but I'm trying not to feel guilty about that at the moment.

pepe2024

I crochet . It’s very calming and repetitive it’s the only thing that calms my mind .If you want to give it a go Bella coco on utube does great beginner tutorials.Hope this might help .

Albus_Alumni

Heya @pepe2024 and welcome to the community. Thanks for the tip with crochet! I have a few friends with ADHD who call crochet their meditation, so it must be doing some good. 😊

66Mustang

I'm new to knowing I have ADHD (though knew I had something wrong for decades) so not too familiar with the labels of the symptoms yet

I don't know if this is the brain fog you describe but I always found my mind is super overactive but at the same time not able to be applied "usefully" to anything. The way I describe it is I have loads of concepts and ideas - productive things as well as worries, though inevitably the negative stuff somehow seems to win my attention - and they're all bounding round my head like ping pong balls. I can't grab hold of one of those things and concentrate on it

Like you said of yourself I often sit there looking calmly or like I'm daydreaming but in my head it doesn't feel like that at all

Something I've found is just, if my mind doesn't seem to want to focus on what I want it to do at a specific time, instead of trying to force it just go with it and either do something that's more in alignment with what my mind is "good at" at that time, or do something really untaxing but that's easy to consume your attention… for me it's reading about something scientific online

Obviously if you have a job and need to do something at a certain time, that's no help (unless you have a very accommodating employer) but it's just my coping mechanism 😊

Holly_Alumni

Morning @pepe2024 I found the same recently and had a blood test. I was low on vitamins so received a prescription which really helped. Also, same as you I do HIIT workouts and others at home when I can and they have the same impact. And drinking a good amount of water is really helpful ☺️