10 Tips for Managing ADHD: These Are My Coping Skills
Key takeaways:
Halle Buttafuso grew up experiencing things such as lack of focus, daydreaming, and constant fidgeting.
It wasn’t until she was in college that she was diagnosed with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
Since then, she’s learned coping skills to help her manage her symptoms. These are her tips.
Halle Buttafuso remembers growing up struggling with focus and concentration at school and at home.
It wasn’t until she was in college that she was diagnosed with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
“I never really understood that all the issues I was having with school were related to ADHD,” says Halle, a 22-year-old recent college grad and social media influencer and film editor in Virginia. “I’ve always had really good grades, but I had to work extra hard for them. None of it really came easy for me, especially math. I would have breakdowns every day.”
Sometimes, it felt like too much.
“You feel like the world is ending,” she says, “and everything feels so heightened.”
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At home, in Nokesville, Virginia, she and her mother argued a lot over her frequent mental lapses.
“She’d ask me to do something, and she’d think I was lazy or not listening,” Halle says. “But it was actually because I was forgetting every 5 seconds after she told me to do something, or I [was] in my own world.”
Halle developed self-doubt.
“I felt a lot of guilt,” she says. “Why can’t I get this done like a normal person? Why do I have to procrastinate with everything, or why does everything feel so difficult? Even small things, like making my bed or brushing my teeth. It was so difficult.”
She started to make sense of it when she was diagnosed with ADHD as a college sophomore at Old Dominion University. ADHD is one of the most common neurodevelopmental disorders and affects more than 300 million people worldwide. It is usually diagnosed in childhood and often lasts into adulthood. Those living with ADHD may have trouble paying attention, controlling impulsive behaviors, or coping with hyperactivity.
Halle creates TikTok posts about how she manages her ADHD. These are her top tips.
1. Consult a doctor
Halle’s first tip for anyone experiencing similar symptoms is to talk to a doctor.
“I wasn’t actually diagnosed until I was in my second year of college,” she says. “I was having a lot of trouble keeping up with my work and paying attention in my lectures, and it was just kind of getting to the point where I couldn’t even manage it.”
Once diagnosed, she recognized that her symptoms — like lack of focus, daydreaming, and constant fidgeting — were textbook symptoms of ADHD.
“I started with therapy. And then I also got put on some medication, but I was learning ADHD management tips along the way,” she says. “I watched videos to learn about it because it was all so new to me.”
2. Find a medication that works for you
Halle’s second tip is to find the right medication.
“They started me on Adderall. I was on 10 mg a day,” she says. “I noticed such a big difference just by starting with that. I finally felt like I could start doing stuff and be productive.”
But, as her body adjusted to the medication, she began crashing later in the day.
“We split it up into two doses, and I was taking 10 mg in the morning and 10 mg again in the afternoon,” she says.
But she noticed that if she took her second dose too late, it would keep her up at night. Or she’d forget to eat.
When she graduated from college, she stopped taking Adderall and decided to focus on coping skills instead. Today, she’s managing her symptoms through the tricks she’s learned.
3. Make lists
One of those tricks is making lists.
“If I’m not writing things down, making an agenda of what I’m doing on certain days and leaving myself time for error and procrastination, then I’m not going to get it done,” Halle says.
She employs written lists and online calendars. She particularly recommends the ADHD templates on Notability.
“ADHD makes tasks feel so overwhelming,” she says. “It really helps when you write things down. If you have a presentation, you can’t just put ‘presentation’ on your to-do. You have to put: ‘Go to the computer and sit down and research this topic.’ Only one small task.”
4. Stick to a wellness routine
Keeping a consistent daily routine and incorporating wellness techniques is important, Halle says. That means being disciplined.
Her routine includes going to the gym, eating a balanced breakfast (she’s researched foods that are good and bad for ADHD), waiting until she eats before consuming caffeine, and practicing yoga and meditation — which are two new additions.
Sticking to a routine “was really hard at first, but I think it makes me a lot more focused and makes my mind not race throughout the day,” she says.
5. Put away the phone
One of the most difficult components of Halle’s routine is staying off her phone until she’s completed the bulk of her daily goals. She says being on her phone increases her ADHD symptoms, and she’s intentional about staying off it in the morning.
“I had to get myself a lockbox for my phone,” she says. “You put your phone in the box and it’ll lock it for a certain amount of hours or minutes. If I really need to get something done, I just lock it in there, and then I can’t touch it.”
6. Get creative when it comes to tasks
Halle has two tricks she uses when it comes to completing chores. First, she writes different tasks on pieces of paper and throws them into a chore jar.
“These are different tasks that I need to do that aren’t necessarily urgent,” she says. “I pick them randomly each day so that I’m at least getting one thing done. That also forces me to do the tasks I wouldn’t want to do.”
The second trick she calls “Beat the Timer.”
“If there’s something I need to get done, whether it’s cleaning up my room or doing dishes or something like that, I’ll give myself 15 minutes to do it,” she says. “I set the timer, put my phone down, and see if I can beat the timer. It just makes it a little bit more fun.”
7. Reward yourself
To keep herself motivated, Halle frequently rewards herself.
“It could be coffee or having a fun drink,” she says. “If I beat the timer, then I can go sit down and play on my phone and drink coffee.”
8. Be accountable
Halle’s family and friends have given her tips on focus and concentration over the years. But she says nothing stuck until she decided to hold herself accountable.
“It wasn’t until I realized that I was the one who was going to have to make a change to get things done that I actually made the changes,” she says.
9. Be upfront about your condition
Had Halle known about her condition when she was younger, she says she would have been less frustrated with herself and asked for more help.
She says she’s better about communicating her needs, and she’s more open with people. It helps set expectations.
“I’m horrible at answering texts, and people could think I’m ignoring them. But it is really just because I looked at the text and thought I responded, or I just completely forget about it 5 seconds later,” she says. “I think it is smart to be vocal with others about what areas you struggle with so they are aware.”
10. Find a career with flexibility
A recent graduate, Halle is a freelance film editor for now. It works with her ADHD.
“I think a lot of people with ADHD end up being more creative and going into nontraditional fields because they struggle in other types of environments,” she says. “I’ve never really wanted a traditional job in an office. I’ve always seen myself either being an entrepreneur or doing something hybrid or from home where I can make a schedule that works for me.”
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