Impulsivity is one of the core symptoms of ADHD and is characterized by the impulse to react to things quickly and without much thought. It’s driven by your emotions, rather than logic, and often involves a decreased sensitivity to immediate or long-term consequences. Impulsive behaviour can include everything from interrupting, to binge eating, to reckless spending and abruptly changing plans. If you’re looking for ideas to manage impulsivity in women with ADHD, we’ve come up with some awesome strategies to help.
What Does Impulsivity in Women with ADHD Look Like?
Impulsivity is one of the core symptoms of ADHD and refers to behaviours like acting without thinking, the inability to control urges, and making quick decisions without considering the consequences. Most people act impulsively every once in a while, but for people who have impulsive ADHD, these behaviours become persistent over time. Impulsive behaviour is driven by your emotions rather than logic. It looks different for everyone, but here are some examples of what it looks like in women with ADHD:
- Interrupting conversations or saying things you regret
- Acting without thinking- making quick decisions without considering the consequences
- Binge eating
- Impulse spending
- Abruptly changing plans
- Making spontaneous choices such as quitting a job without having a backup plan
- Difficulty with emotional self-regulation
- Having low patience and low tolerance for waiting
- Engaging in risky, self-destructive behaviour
- Impatient, reckless driving
- Going shopping for one item and coming home with bags of stuff
- Angry outbursts and fighting with friends and loved ones (often followed by guilt and shame)
7 Strategies to Manage Impulsivity in Women with ADHD
1. Identify Your Triggers
Typically, there are specific environments or situations that can lead to impulsive behaviours. For example, if you binge eat, do you usually do it at work? Or at home? Does it happen when you’re stressed or sad or bored? Or if you’re prone to impulse shopping, think about what usually triggers you to buy something. Are you highly influenced by social media ads? Or are you more likely to spend when you’re dealing with PMS symptoms? Once you figure out what your triggers are you can create a plan to avoid or remove them.
2. Understand Your Unique Impulses
If you really want to gain control of your impulsivity, it’s important to acknowledge your unique impulse control challenges. You can do this by making lists. List out recent behaviours you consider impulsive, list out negative consequences of recent impulsive behaviours, as well as positive ones. Identify places you become most impulsive and note down impulsive behaviours that could be dangerous to you or others. Once you understand how impulsive behaviours affect your life, you can work towards making changes.
3. Practice Active Mindfulness
If you deal with impulsive ADHD, you likely know the feeling of intense frustration if you have to wait in line. It can make you feel anger towards the people in front of you as well as the cashier. In times like these, mindfulness can be incredibly helpful. Being more patient takes a conscious effort to manage negative emotions, and mindfulness practices such as deep breathing and body scans, can help. It can also lead to reduced reactivity and help you cope with challenging situations.
4. Create a Delay
It can be difficult for individuals with ADHD to pause or slow down, but the more you can think things through before doing them, the better. For example, if you’re impulsive with online shopping, allow yourself to add items to your cart, but don’t buy them right away. If you still want them a week later, then you can click purchase. Again, this will take practice, but the more of a delay you can create the better. If 7 days seems impossible, try waiting for 24 hours. You can work on extending the time the more you do it.
5. Relaxation Techniques
Stress can trigger or exacerbate impulsivity. For example, you may notice you’re more likely to binge drink or eat or impulse spend when you’re feeling stressed out. Stress can also further impair executive functions and emotional regulation, which people with ADHD already struggle with. Relaxation techniques can help reduce impulsive behaviours by calming the mind and body, promoting self-awareness and easing stress. Regularly practicing techniques like meditation, yoga, listening to music, mindful breathing, regular exercise, muscle relaxation and walking in nature can help increase impulse control.
6. Assess Who You Spend Your Time With
It’s also important to be aware of the behaviours of the people you surround yourself with. Maybe you have a friend you love hanging out with but she’s an impulse shopper. Or you have a friend you know you’ll end up binge drinking with, even if you say “just one drink”. It doesn’t mean you have to stop hanging out with this person. If they bring value to your life, try suggesting other activities with them, such as going to a workout class or getting a coffee. It’s crucial to understand the influence others may be having over you and reevaluate who you bring to potentially triggering activities.
7. Seek Professional Support
Working with a professional therapist who has experience helping those with ADHD can help you control your impulsive behaviours. Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) can be particularly beneficial as it can help you identify and challenge negative thought patterns and behaviours that contribute to impulsivity and develop strategies for self-regulation and impulse control. It can help you determine your behavioural triggers and learn how to manage your responses. For example, if you often have angry reactions that are disproportionate to the situation, CBT can teach you different ways of processing anger when those feelings come up and how to channel your feelings in a more productive way.
If impulsive behaviours are negatively affecting your life, use these tips and strategies to get them under control.
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