[depressionalt]

ADHD has certain symptoms that can lead your significant other to believe you're a (socio?)psychopath:

- First, folks with ADHD tend to lack empathy. It's ironic because we also tend to be very sensitive to others' emotions, leading us to think that we are feeling empathy. It's not.

- Second, we have an absentmindedness that leads non-ADHD spouses to tear their hair. They often feel you're deliberately ignoring them. We often cover up for ourselves with pointless, white lies. Spouses can come to believe that you are perpetually dishonest.

- Third, we're impulsive. That leads us to do things we shouldn't. We also can't help ourselves from doing many things our sig others ask us not to do.

Besides that, our impaired executive function means we have extremely poor awareness time. On a short time frame, folks with ADHD are almost always late to every type of event. On a long time frame, we can be very poor savers and bad at planning for far-in-the-future events like retirement. Untreated, someone with ADHD will unfairly burden their spouse with all the planning in the household.

I found that a combination of medication, practicing mindfulness, and even having a mere awareness of your tendencies wins you 90% of the battle.

I've been in a relationship and now marriage for almost 15 years now – I cannot imagine what it would be like maintaining this thing without acknowledging the gravity of ADHD on many aspects of the relationship.

[pseudalopex]

> First, folks with ADHD tend to lack empathy. It's ironic because we also tend to be very sensitive to others' emotions, leading us to think that we are feeling empathy. It's not.

This is a misconception. It's much like the misconception autistic people lack empathy. Some people without the condition lack the empathy to imagine any other explanation.

People with ADHD miss non verbal signals more often. They're more prone to difficulty putting their feelings and thoughts into words. They're more forgetful on average. Those things strain a relationship for sure. They aren't lack of empathy though.

> We often cover up for ourselves with pointless, white lies.

This isn't inherent to ADHD. Many people without ADHD do it. Many people with ADHD don't.

[kawfey]

My wife had the "oh that makes a lot of sense" realization when I brought up that I thought I had ADHD, but getting in line for a psych eval is a long process.

The lack of empathy, absentmindedness (emotional object permanence), the clutter I'd leave in places, and the nuclear levels of frustration I get when I'm interrupted during a session of hyper focus / flow state (on something probably entirely pointless) was a huge grind on her. She would tell me that she misses feeling loved, but I sucked at love language, since my mind is basically a stream of shower thoughts and unimportant nonsense amid a constant internal dichotomy of 'tell her you feel loved' but not actually doing anything. She would have problems at work and I would come up with like, the most obvious solutions, and that would make her even more distressed (learning to JUST listen is hard for ADHD people).

On the bright side, our personalities are almost polar opposites, so turns out we mesh really well. Basically, she wants control. She's a manager at her work. She loves to plan, and I can't/hate to plan (e.g. I'm planning her birthday party and it's driving both of us crazy). She lays out the household budget and keeps everything paid with YNAB...I only save money because she tells me to put #% of my paycheck in our 401K). Fortunately I'm unusually punctual (I never forget about and often arrive TOO early to appointments, lol). Control makes her happy, but it's not controlling - she is highly supportive of my hobbies and pursuits, and I return the favor by giving her my time in her pursuits and enjoyments (traveling, homemaking, complaining about work, etc).

Over the 4 years I've worked out a lot of coping strategies, mantras, conditioning, etc to avoid problems before they start, and she's learned a lot about what I really mean when I say xyz or do abc.

Like now, I can't stand clutter. In lieu of my workbench clutter are dozens labeled boxes. Everything has a home. I can't focus on doing work or personal activities until the sink is cleared. I put the banana peels straight in the compost bin before even eating it.

If my wife is lamenting her shitty day, I just say, "that really sucks" and hug her and give the emotions time to settle before even thinking about making a suggestion (even though internally I'm emotionally blank and thinking of said suggestions lol). If I'm in a flow state, and my wife enters the setting, I prepare myself - take a breath, disengage slightly, look at her and smile. Even if she isn't there to say something and is just walking by, it grounds me and totally stops the frustration meltdown I get. She can also tell if I'm in a stoic, focused state and has knows when to break in.

Mindfulness is still a struggle for me. The moment I take a second to be mindful, the moment I remember that one thing.

But overall, it really takes a strong bond, and/or really good couples therapy, for ones significant other to make changes to their mindset and lifestyle to adapt to the discovery of ADHD. I can easily see the reason for why divorce rates are high wherein men in heterosexual relationships are so commonly attributed to inattentiveness and lack of empathy, that's it's a trope of like every Sunday comic or boomer facebook meme. If only they knew...