What’s the best ADHD emotional dysregulation treatment? Why is emotional regulation hard for people with ADHD?
People with ADHD often struggle to regulate their emotions. This means that if you have ADHD, you might find it harder than the average person to recognize the feelings you’re experiencing and moderate their strength.
Continue reading to learn how acknowledging your feelings can help you react appropriately in overwhelming situations.
Maintaining Emotional Equilibrium
Emotional dysregulation can be broken into three categories: emotional reactivity/negativity/lability (ERNL), emotional recognition and understanding (ERU), and empathy/callous-unemotional traits (ECUT). ERNL refers to the tone and intensity of emotional responses, ERU refers to the ability to read your own emotions and the emotions of others, and ECUT refers to high sensitivity or insensitivity to other people’s emotions. People with ADHD tend to struggle the most with emotional reactivity.
According to Phil Boissiere, ADHD emotional dysregulation treatment is recommended for numerous reasons—for example, strong emotions can lead you to act irrationally and impulsively. Having poor emotion regulation can also make you feel like you’re not in control of your feelings or actions.
For example, say you’re at a party with friends, and you start to get overwhelmed and frustrated trying to focus on the people you’re talking to because of all the conversations happening around you. Then, one of your friends makes a joking comment about your inability to stay focused on a single topic. Rather than taking the comment lightly or ignoring it, you react impulsively, raising your voice and getting defensive. Your heated reaction sparks an argument, and soon the party atmosphere becomes uncomfortable.
(Shortform note: Emotions are strong drivers of behavior because of how our brains evolved to process information. Our brains have to take in a huge amount of information at all times, and we don’t have the time to process it all critically. However, our brains still work through the information in the background, looking for anything concerning or dangerous. If our brain finds something alarming, we get an emotion that serves as a warning indicating that something’s off. This emotion prompts us to pay attention and may lead to physiological changes that help us deal with danger. However, if this system is faulty—for example, if the strength of the emotion isn’t proportionate to the situation—our resulting actions may not be appropriate for the circumstances.)
ADHD-specific struggles with emotion regulation connect back to the prefrontal cortex. The PFC is responsible for mediating the intensity of emotions, while the emotions themselves come from a part of the brain called the limbic system. Since the PFC doesn’t typically work as effectively when you have ADHD, the emotions coming from your limbic system run unchecked.
(Shortform note: In addition to experiencing these issues, some people with ADHD have a generally overactive limbic system. Limbic ADHD (sometimes called limbic ADD) is characterized by a pervasive sense of unexplained sadness along with the classic symptoms of ADHD. People with this type of ADHD may also have chronic fatigue, low self-esteem, and moodiness.)
Mindfully Acknowledge Your Emotions
Boissiere asserts that one way to improve your emotion regulation is by acknowledging and spending time with your feelings without trying to change them. When you fight or ignore a troubling emotion, you usually make yourself feel worse. Your anguish about experiencing the emotion compounds your negative feelings.
(Shortform note: Russ Harris explains why we fight certain emotions in The Happiness Trap. He says that we separate emotions into “good” and “bad” categories because we’re conditioned as children to think of some emotions as undesirable. For instance, crying children are often told to control their physiological reaction to sadness, giving the impression that sadness is unacceptable. We also judge emotions based on the sensations they produce in our bodies. For example, we might label guilt as a bad emotion because it makes us feel sick to our stomach. However, fighting an emotion signals to our brain that it’s dangerous, sending us into fight-or-flight mode and creating more negative feelings, such as anxiety.)
Instead of fighting negative feelings, Boissiere advises, simply recognize their presence and name them. Let yourself feel them fully without doing anything to alter them. Giving yourself the chance to move through uncomfortable feelings without judgment allows them to abate naturally, making you feel better.
(Shortform note: When you’re sitting with a difficult feeling, try to approach it with curiosity instead of judgment. Ask yourself questions such as, “What is this? What does this feel like in my body? What is this feeling trying to tell me?” Such mindful awareness of emotions will remind you that they’re separate from who you are (i.e., you’re not a bad person for feeling angry) and only temporary.)
You can practice this technique by thinking about something at work or home that’s been bothering you. Then, write a description of the situation in a notebook. With your eyes closed, picture the thing that’s been bothering you. As you’re picturing it, name a feeling that arises in response. Breathe in and out slowly and naturally, allowing yourself to continue feeling the emotion you identify. The longer you sit and breathe with the emotion, the more it should fade.
(Shortform note: Why do these strategies work? Research supports the idea that writing things down helps you to process both emotions and information. Therefore, writing a description of bothersome scenarios may help you clarify your feelings about them before starting the next step. Additionally, many mindfulness meditation practices similar to Boissiere’s ask you to close your eyes to increase your awareness and focus. Among other benefits, breathing deeply encourages mental clarity and balance by oxygenating the body and improving blood circulation.)
