Why have therapy for ADHD?
What even is ADHD Therapy? In order to answer these questions it’s important to understand what therapy won’t do, and why everybody would benefit from therapy.
Firstly therapy, short here for psychotherapy, will not cure ADHD (that’s impossible.) It will not make your life a breeze or offer a miracle cure ensuring lifelong happiness. Now that’s out of the way, what exactly IS therapy?
Psychotherapy, sometimes called talking therapy, is a collaboration between client and therapist that digs deep into thoughts, emotions and behaviours. The therapist will help unravel the clients thoughts, a bit like neatly laying out strands of spaghetti and examine them. This helps the client realise that their unhealthy thoughts that lead on to unhealthy emotions such as anger, guilt, anxiety, shame etc, are simply not true. We can then reframe the thoughts to develop healthy emotions. Unhealthy behaviours are also examined and change is encouraged through constructive and achievable exercises to further promote healthy emotions.
ADHD is a neurodevelopmental condition which means that the brain doesn’t develop in the same way as a neurotypical brain. In the ADHD brain several areas are subject to developmental delays which can affect time management, self awareness, attention, motivation etc, the effects of which other people might take for granted, deeming the ADHD brain, or a person with ADHD, defective or inferior. We are all expected to grasp basic concepts such as time. Also the planning of simple tasks or picturing in our mind where we’re going, holding in our mind words to say later on when the time is right, understanding how others view us and retaining focus? Well these are just some of the things that the ADHD brain is just not as good at as the typical non ADHD brain. Therefore we are just not as good at what society tells us we should be. A large proportion of ADHD traits lead to regrettable behaviours, intrusive and uncontrollable thoughts and then unhealthy emotions. Before we know it, through no fault of our own we can feel guilty, anger, shame, anxiety etc, all of which can feed each other promoting ongoing emotional problems.
Our thoughts, behaviours and emotions all affect each other, a never ending cycle.
Psychotherapy is very effective for people with ADHD if they are having a tough time with emotional problems, as it focuses on our thoughts and behaviours to dampen down or eliminate unhealthy emotions.
Take guilt as an example. We can only feel (emotion) guilty if we think badly about our actions (behaviours). If we feel guilty, we are likely to act (behaviour) in an unhealthy way such as sulking, hiding away, staying quiet, etc, and while we do we that we ruminate on (think about) what happened, and while we think about that we feel bad and sulk etc …..
If you are looking for help for ADHD, choose a therapist who is qualified and has all the necessary credentials to practice where you live. In the USA a therapist must be licenced, in the UK a therapist doesn’t need a licence, so to be safe look for someone with an accreditation to a recognised body such as NCP (National Counselling Society), BACP (British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy) UKCP (UK Council for Psychotherapy). Also ensure they are informed about ADHD and understand the unique way ADHD brains work.
Don’t think for one minute that ADHD only comes with disadvantages. The human brain is programmed to look for negatives, dangers, threats and not so good at looking for positives. I see ADHD like a magnifying glass. Yes, it can magnify our shame, our guilt, our anxieties, our frustrations and anger, our boredom our intolerance, but it can also magnify our creativity, our empathy, our abilities, our kindness and our care. At ADHD therapy we also focus on the positive side of ADHD, our unique strengths, our advantages helping you not just get by, but flourish.
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