Here’s a classic scenario I hear from a lot of ADHD women, and experience myself.
You’re going about your day, you think you feel pretty good, when all of a sudden you have a big emotional response to something.
Maybe you burst into tears at a TV commercial.
Or you snap at your spouse.
Or you suddenly LOSE IT with your kids.
Or you find yourself in an absolute tailspin of self-loathing.
Emotions can be super confusing for ADHD women!
Here’s why:
ADHDers notoriously have challenges with a brain function called interoception.
Interoception is your ability to feel your body’s internal sensations:
- Perceiving you have to go to the bathroom, for example.
- Perceiving you’re tired.
- Perceiving you’re hungry.
- Or perceiving that some part of your body is in discomfort.
Now, here’s the thing to understand about emotions:
Emotions originate as SENSATIONS.
Culture teaches us how to interpret those sensations.
During childhood, context clues and direct teaching from caregivers help us learn how to interpret our inner sensations, and correlate them with emotional states.
(If you’re curious about this, check out a wonderful book called “How Emotions Are Made” by neuroscientist Lisa Feldman Barrett.)
Can you see how this process gets short-circuited if you have challenges with interoception?
If you don’t even perceive the sensation, you can’t interpret it!
You’re much more likely to be blindsided by emotions–you don’t feel them creeping up until they are very powerful.
And there’s another wrinkle as well–
We live in a sexist society. And in this culture, women are often not allowed to feel or express emotions that are not wholly positive.
As little girls, we are encouraged to “play nice”, be seen and not heard, “be a good girl”, etc.
Little girls and women are not often encouraged to be competitive, to feel ambitious, to set boundaries, to feel angry or frustrated, to speak up in the presence of injustice.
This is true for all women, but the more marginalized identities we have, the LESS our wider culture encourages us to have strong feelings and speak up about them.
I have some good news for you though.
You can get better at feeling your feelings.
You can get better at noticing and reprogramming your culture conditioning. And you can strengthen your interoception!
This is something I help my ADHD clients with on the daily.
If you’re over the emotional rollercoaster, let’s talk.
You start by booking a Discovery Call with me.
I can’t wait to meet you!
Warmly,
Emma