Until I couldn’t.
You may recall my previous article on burnout, where I came to the realisation that I actually had nothing left in the tank to draw on.
In February this year, I was diagnosed with ADHD — sure, I’d suspected it over recent years, but I hadn’t really explored things formally until, post-burnout recovery, I was still finding it hard to motivate myself to get things done.
A couple of friends of mine who are ADHD — one diagnosed recently and one since childhood — suggested I might be one of them. I think it was the 100 tabs open on my screen that gave me away to the latter, and a particularly frazzled conversation at a conference with the former.
A three-hour trip down memory lane with a psychologist — who also interviewed my family and pored over my school reports — and I was off to the psychiatrist for a script.
See, I’d always thought ADHD was just a hyperactive person bouncing off the walls. A behavioural problem that, through mind over matter, could be disciplined out.
But after a bit of research, some things sounded really familiar: focusing on many things at once, or becoming so overstimulated you can’t focus on anything at all; hyperactive conversations — jumping topics within a breath and losing everyone along the way; hyperfocus when something has your attention — including wandering through your daily motions in a distracted state; intense boredom and lack of motivation for things that don’t interest you — like housework.
ADHD isn’t just a brain thing — it’s a dopamine thing. Dopamine is the chemical that motivates us to start something and rewards us with that feel-good hit when we enjoy it.
People with ADHD have a deficit, which means we don’t have enough of it to push through the boring, everyday stuff. We literally can’t make ourselves do it without extraordinary willpower or clever systems.
That’s why we can look hyper one moment and catatonic the next: when something is interesting, it’s really interesting — the dopamine spike feels like a drug, and when it wears off, we crash.
I can wake up at 5am and spend every spare waking moment obsessed with my latest project. Right now, it’s admin process automation and data visualisation.
In the last couple of months, I’ve built new software for our anodising system using an AI no-code platform, taught myself Python, integrated our ERP system into Microsoft Power BI and built an entire maintenance programme into Slack.
Yet I still feel lazy. Why? During hyperfocus, I’ll literally have my head in the clouds and have tuned out all else. Much to the chagrin of Alex and Fin, who catch me and roll their eyes:
"Mum, Mum, Muuuuuuum.
"What are you doing on your laptop, Mum?"
"Teaching myself to code on AI."
"Good one (eye-roll). What’s the time? Is dinner ready?"
It’s ironic — I can manage a company and directorships (most of the time), yet I can’t be organised enough to defrost stuff for dinner (or even have stuff to defrost, to be fair).
I literally folded 52 pairs of socks in the weekend and counted another 89 unmatched socks in the lost-socks bin. I constantly forget the washing, so I just buy us more socks with the groceries.
Anyway, back to the point — I’ve come to realise that ADHD is not a brain disorder, but a superpower. It’s a different kind of brain than the mainstream.
Sometimes it’s a secret weapon, other times — when I’m trying to conform to a world where I don’t fit — it feels like a massive barrier.
I didn’t conform at school. And hormones seem to play a huge role in aggravating ADHD. Thus the rise in teenage diagnoses — it’s not just rampant hormones making young people crazy, but an until-now manageable ADHD being given steroids to run wild.
Which brings me back to the present. I’m 44 — apparently in the early stages of peri-menopause too. Makes sense really: the last time my life went off the rails and my brain fell out was puberty at 15-17. And now I’m at the other end of it, and the ADHD has gone rampant again.
I love the Māori definition of ADHD — aroreretini: "Attention goes to many things". Or the blog post I found by Associate Prof Byron Rangiwai — Flighty like the pīwakawaka — describing how the fantail’s agile, unpredictable movements serve as a symbol for ADHD, highlighting adaptability, creativity, responsiveness and resilience rather than seeing it as a deficit.
I’ve also been listening to the podcast ADHD for Smart Arse Women — fantastic, and not just relevant to women. One early episode calls the ADHD brain an "elite hunter-gatherer brain" not suited to modern society — but with competitive advantages in hyper-vigilance, curiosity and exploratory skills. Handy for entrepreneurs, not so much for a repetitious office job.
You can tell when you meet another ADHDer — it’s hectic, you’ll talk non-stop, go on a rollercoaster of stories and really enjoy it. Whereas some neurotypical people find it too intense and might think you’re self-centred for always bringing things back to yourself.
For an ADHDer, you’re actually just trying to show you relate and empathise by drawing similarities. To others, it can look rude or self-absorbed.
It brought a whole new perspective to where conversations have gone wrong, when people seemed to be slowly. Backing. Away ...
As to where I’m at now, I’ve been trying medication for the last six months. It’s not a forever thing and I don’t take it on weekends or when I’ve got lots of fun work on.
But it has helped enormously with feeling calmer and more able to manage stress without overreacting or ruminating. Like managing my washing, remembering groceries, establishing a better routine at work, paying the bills and getting on top of emails.
Anyway, I hope this article has helped anyone else out there who feels a bit overwhelmed — whether it’s ADHD or not, it isn’t simply about mind over matter, but about understanding your own mind that matters most.
• Sarah Ramsay is chief executive of United Machinists.
