Submitted by TomInSpace on 03/02/2018.
Hi all,
I am new to this forum. I just want to get a sense from other people who have ADHD what their experience in serious relationships has been. I have had struggles understanding my emotions towards my first serious girlfriend (are the emotions big enough, am I excited enough?), and I am not sure how ADHD influences my struggles.
So I ask you. In you most committed relationship(s):
1. Did you have an initial period of infatuation towards your partner?
2. Did you have trouble maintaining interest in the relationship after this feeling went away or never happened to begin with?
3. What was the feeling you experienced before deciding to get married? Is it anything like infatuation?
Any responses would be very helpful. Thank you!
It’s so smart of you to
Submitted by Hopeful Heart on
It’s so smart of you to search for understanding about your current and future relationships. Have you ever eaten a new food and you liked it so much that you ate it all the time in huge quantities? Finally, you got sick of it and never wanted to eat it again. My husband has ADHD and he’s actually done that with different foods his entire life. He's also gone through a similar process with his relationships, as well. When he meets a new person, he just can’t get enough. He wants to spend every possible minute with them because it’s new and exciting. When it’s not new and exciting anymore, he just starts ignoring them.
Most of his life he didn’t know that he had ADHD. He didn’t understand what was happening so he blamed his extreme behavior on everything and everyone else. “I won’t eat that food anymore because it made me feel bad.” “I don’t want to spend time with my wife anymore because she quit being nice to me.” He had no idea that his brain was taking him through this roller coaster of “binge and purge”, so to speak.
It’s normal for all relationships to be less exciting after the newness wears off. However, people with ADHD tend to need the newness and excitement and are drawn to it like a magnetic field. It makes long term relationships harder to maintain. Only you can tell if it’s true love and if you’ll be willing and able to stay committed to giving your relationship the time and attention that it needs to succeed for the long haul.
Thank you
Submitted by TomInSpace on
Hopeful Heart thank you so much for your response. I admire your patience and tenacity to overcome and learn from the challenges that you have faced in your relationship with your husband. I’m afraid to trust my emotions given their erratic and misleading nature. This makes it really hard to evaluate affection for another person. I do love my girlfriend very much though and want to make it work.
What did you and your husband do when the newness and magnetic field calmed down? How did you maintain a strong relationship?