I have ADHD. My partner doesn’t.

Over the weekend we had friends round and there was a lot of laughter about the Scrub Daddy sponge that had been lying on the floor in the corner of the kitchen for three days.

My ADHD brain had seen it. But it never managed to divert enough neurotransmitters to actually picking it up. I know that at least twice I actively decided to deal with it (I’ll pick it after I put the washing-up away) and then again (I’ll do it once I have put the potatoes in the oven). By the time I’d done these, the sponge had ceased to exist in my mind.

My partner, meanwhile, sees it every single time he walks past. The sponge. The shoes by the door. The unwashed coffee cups. The laundry in the machine. He sees all of it, constantly, and his rage metre oscillates between frustrated and incandescent.

So there he was, appealing to our guests for backup. His position: these things aren’t his mess, they’re not his job, and if he keeps picking up after me I’ll never learn. (At 60, I think I’m rather past learning. But he lives in hope.)

I’d love to know where you sit on this one.

If you’re the ADHDer, how does your partner cope with the chaos? Do they pick up the sponge, or do they leave it as a small, passive-aggressive monument to your executive function?

If you’re the partner, are you the one seething quietly, or have you made peace with the sponge?

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When I was writing the book there was a lot of ‘stuff’ that I had to spend loads of time trying to figure out if it was too much info to include (thus producing the dreaded overwhelm.) One that I left out was the fact that there are two types of dopamine. Tonic and phasic.

Think of tonic dopamine as the steady, baseline level of dopamine that constantly flows through your brain. It’s like the ambient chatter of the crowd in a stadium before the band comes on stage.

In a neurotypical brain: The baseline crowd noise is at a perfectly healthy, medium volume. Because the background level is steady, the brain feels content, alert, and capable of handling ordinary, low-stimulation tasks (like doing taxes, washing dishes, or reading a long email).

In the ADHD brain: The baseline crowd noise is turned way down. The stadium feels practically empty and dead silent. Because this baseline is so low, the ADHD brain physically feels under-stimulated, bored, and restless. It feels a deep, urgent itch to “fill the silence.”

Phasic dopamine is a sudden, explosive spike of dopamine released in response to something exciting, novel, or urgent. It’s like the main act bursting onto the stadium stage with flashing lights, pyrotechnics, and blasting speakers.

What triggers it? Gaming, scrolling, eating something yummy, doing something risky or dangerous, panic over a deadline, or hyperfocus on a new hobby.

In a neurotypical brain, the background (tonic) and the spikes (phasic) work well together but because the ADHD brain has a chronically low baseline (tonic) level, it has to constantly hunt for spikes (phasic) just to feel awake.

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A big reason ADHD plans fall apart is our all-or-nothing tax. We miss a meal or skip a snack, then feel the wave of self-criticism, and decide the whole plan is flawed, so we abandon it and start looking for a better one.

But perfectionism often isn’t about high standards, it’s a sneaky way the brain uses to avoid the overwhelm of starting. So instead of fighting it, build imperfection into your systems.

Redefine the goal

Nutrition: Your goal is not eat perfectly, every day. Your goal is ‘I’ll eat well 80% of the time’. That’s just five days out of seven. That means you can stop at the fast food drive thru when you are running on empty, join friends for a meal out, have a Friday night takeaway… AND STILL BE ON TRACK.

The goal isn’t a freezer full of homemade prepped meals. A couple of decent options and maybe a portioned rotisserie chicken is enough. Anything else is a bonus.

Hydration: The goal is not drink 8 glasses. The goal is to keep water bottles nearby.

Exercise: The goal is not walk 10,000 steps. Make the goal to put on my shoes, step outside. If you come straight back in, you still met the goal. If you do more, brilliant. (Remember, motivation comes after we start. Make starting the goal, and see what happens.)

Practice ‘half-assing it’ on purpose

Lower the executive cost of starting. Tell yourself you’re only going to do the task for 30 seconds. Put one dish in the rack. Wipe one counter.

Once the ‘immobility’ is broken, the brain usually finds it easier to keep going.

Give yourself solid permission to do draft versions.

• Move dirty dishes to the kitchen, even if you can’t wash them

• Eat eggs for dinner, leftovers for breakfast

If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing poorly rather than not at all.

A ‘badly’ cleaned room is still cleaner than a ‘perfectly’ dirty one.

The ‘none or one hundred’ reframe

When that voice says, “If I can’t do the full workout, what’s the point?” You already have your answer: The point is, one minute beats zero minutes. Always.

One minute of movement is better than none. One bite of food is better than nothing. You are training your brain that imperfect action still matters.

Reframe ‘Falling off the wagon’

There is no wagon. You can’t fall off something that doesn’t exist. You just do the next thing. Missed supplements today? Take them tomorrow. Didn’t drink water? Do it now. Ate crap for lunch? Have protein for dinner.

This may seem like lip service to the idea, and it will take practice (impossibly high standards is part of who you are) but keep reminding yourself that one choice doesn’t define the day. One day doesn’t define the week.

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Who am I and why should you care?

I’m a nutritionist who specialises in ADHD, and I have ADHD myself. I know what it’s like when cooking feels impossible, when you forget to eat, or can’t STOP eating, or when your brain just won’t cooperate. That’s why I wrote the book Nutrition for ADHD, and created this Substack: to give you recipes and nutrition advice that actually fit your life.

Every recipe is designed around key ADHD nutrients (iron, zinc, magnesium, omega-3, B vitamins, and more). Even better, recipes are sorted by energy level: No battery, low battery, and okay battery; because not every day is the same.

Some people don’t skip meals or forget to drink because they’re busy, they do it because they don’t feel the signal. Hunger, thirst, fatigue, or the need to move simply don’t register until things have already gone wrong.

If that’s you, waiting for cues won’t work. You need external signals instead.

Alarms can help, but they’re not the only option.

Let the schedule be the signal

Don’t wait to feel hungry, thirsty, tired, or achy. Eat, drink, move, and rest on a fixed schedule, regardless of how you feel.

7 am: Wake up

8 am: Breakfast (even if not hungry)

10 am: Snack/drink/move (even if not hungry/thirsty/sore)

1 pm: Lunch (even if not hungry)

3 pm: Snack/drink/move (even if not hungry/thirsty/sore)

7 pm: Dinner (even if not hungry)

9.30 pm: Bed

10 pm: Sleep

This isn’t about rigid rules. It’s about replacing missing body cues with something reliable.

Have a translation chart

Put a chart on your fridge/desk/phone that translates symptoms into likely needs:

Irritable/snappy/hangry? I’m probably hungry or thirsty

Brain fog/can’t focus? I’m probably dehydrated or low blood sugar

Headache? I’m probably dehydrated or need caffeine

Shaky/anxious? I probably need food

Exhausted but wired? I’m probably need sleep or food

If you notice a symptom, check the chart. It helps you decode what your body is asking for.

Let technology remember for you

If your brain won’t’t prompt you, outsource it and use apps/devices that track for you:

Smart water bottles that light up when you haven’t drunk in a while

Apps like WaterMinder that remind you to drink

Fitness trackers that prompt movement

Meal reminder or photo-log apps (such as Ate or MealLogger) so you can see when and what you last ate

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It’s a lack of reliable internal time feedback. Ten minutes and forty can feel the same. Add a glitchy working memory, and the planned sequence of the day is often held together by mental chewing gum and hope.

You can plan to load the washer, water the plants, take the supplements… but when that plan is interrupted (by yourself or by life), things fall apart. The plants die. The laundry goes mouldy in the machine. And the supplements? What supplements?

The thread really is that fragile, so of course, as an act of sheer self-preservation, it makes sense that we try to avoid interruptions.

Which brings us to the obvious suggestion everyone makes.

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“Just set an alarm.”

And they’re right, up to a point. Alarms can be a lifesaver. But an alarm that wrenches you out of the warm comfort of hyperfocus can be about as appealing as an icy shower on a winter’s day. Instead of helping, it becomes something you resist, mute, delay, ignore, or forget to set at all.

Alarms work best when

• They are expected (so they don’t feel like an ambush).

• They’re a signal, not a demand.

• They’re paired with a low-cost next step, ideally something rewarding

For example:

Alarm rings:- Stop playing (ugh). Now start cooking (bigger ugh). Hard no. Ignore.

Instead try:

Alarm rings: - Stop playing (ugh). Now have a cold glass of something yummy and start fav podcast (good, I could do that). Now start cooking (fair enough). Do it.

ADHD brains are supremely grateful for immediate rewards that result in a little uptick of that precious dopamine. So, if a task itself isn’t rewarding, pair it with something that is; taste, sound, novelty, or a mini game (streaks, bingo, tracking). Let the reward pull you through the transition.

Create ‘soft-landing’ alarms

These alarms don’t come out of nowhere; they politely escort you out.

Before you start a task, set a timer. “I will set aside 90 minutes to do this”. Next, create a bridging alarm. For example, at 85 minutes the alarm goes off, But, instead of a jarring sound, it plays music you like, or brown noise, or a familiar sound, and it runs for five minutes before the real stop time.

This helps your brain surface gradually instead of being dragged up and out all at once.

If sound is too jarring, make time visible instead. Use a visual timer, or a progress bar. Egg timers can be great. These act as quiet, friendly partners rather than interruptions.

If alarms work, but only go so far, put the alarm in another room where you HAVE to get up to go and switch it off.

Front-load the interruption

Do the important things before you get absorbed in other jobs, particularly if those jobs are a hyperfocus catnip.

Once hyperfocus kicks in, stopping to eat, drink, move, or rest is genuinely hard, so don’t rely on stopping.

• Move first - do the yoga/gym/swim/ morning walk first.

• Eat or drink first.

• Take the supplements first.

Then let yourself disappear into whatever you’re doing.

Hijack transitions that already happen

You actually transition all day, whether you notice it or not, so piggyback on them.

• Bathroom breaks (you can’t avoid these)

• Coffee/tea refills

• Picking up kids from school

• End of a meeting, answering the door, taking a phone call

Stack health actions onto those transitions, but decide in advance.

• Every bathroom break, I’ll drink a glass of water (post-it on the bathroom mirror)

• Every coffee refill I’ll eat a handful of nuts (kept in canister next to coffee)

• When I pick the kids up from school I’ll park 20 minutes away so I have to move

You’re already paying a transition cost, adding the extras becomes a tiny additional action, not a whole separate transition.

Use gateway activities

If something easy or enjoyable already has your attention, use it.

When you feel the legitimate need for a mental break (to check social media, read a quick article), that’s your transition window.

A rule might be: “Before I open Tiktok, I will stand up, stretch, move” or “Before I grab that cup of coffee that’s calling my name, I will do my stretches.”

You’re already changing state; use that transition energy for your health goal first. The ‘reward’ of the break still follows.

Make the rewards immediate

ADHD brains don’t respond well to distant benefits. “Future-you will be glad” doesn’t move the needle. If a pay-off is distant and abstract (I’ll get a promotion in six months) it’s not going to be on board.

• If the goal is eating or drinking, make it taste delicious.

• If the goal is movement, make it playful or rhythmic.

• If the goal is consistency, make the reward now, not later.

  Thanks for reading! If you know someone with ADHD and think they might find this article helpful, feel free to share it.

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If it matters, make it smart.

Maybe you forgot to take your supplements, but you didn’t ‘forget’ to drink. Or eat breakfast. Or make lunch. You kept getting little nudges, little mental reminders, telling you to do these things, but you chose to ignore them.

It drives you mad. You ignore nudges all the time, and it causes so self-inflicted pain. Not understanding why you do this makes it even worse.

And this is usually where, as usual, we turn on ourselves, decide it our fault, but what’s actually happening here is far more mechanical than moral.

To understand it, we need to look at what it costs your brain to respond to a nudge in the first place.

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