The moment I knew I needed help remains absolutely crystal clear in my memory.
My son, then two, was in his bedroom screaming and thrashing in his crib.
But I sat across the hall, frozen on my bed, tears rolling down my cheeks.
He had been up since six in the morning, but nine hours later he refused to take his nap again.
I watched to make sure he was physically safe, but I was completely desperate. I had nothing left in the tank to calm him down.
When he finally cried himself to sleep, I lay on my bed crying. Why was I so bad at motherhood?
The routines, the emotional intensity of it all, the endless juggling and organizing – it all seemed overwhelming at the time.
Other women I knew enjoyed motherhood in ways I just didn’t. Some had three or four children and were so calm and collected. It felt like my hair was on fire.
I was so desperate that at that moment I took out my laptop, found a private psychiatrist and asked if I could get on their waiting list.
When I finally got to the top of the waiting list, they said the cause of my problems was ADHD. I was 33 years old.
Other women I knew enjoyed motherhood in ways I just didn’t. Some had three or four children and were so calm and collected. I felt like my hair was on fire, writes Liz Lewis
While there is a lot of talk about how we raise children with ADHD, there is noticeably less talk about how women with the same condition cope when they become mothers.
In short: what consequences does it have for mother and child if the mother is the one with ADHD? And does motherhood itself worsen ADHD symptoms?
Today, 14 years later, I am an ADHD consultant and advocate – and have met thousands of women who struggle with their ADHD.
In women, ADHD is usually characterized by disorganization, a chronic inability to concentrate, time blindness, emotional dysregulation (which means you may overreact to difficult situations), and mental fatigue.
There is also, somewhat counterintuitively, a tendency for people with ADHD to hyperfocus on an enjoyable task, losing any sense of other responsibilities. Women are less likely to have the hyperactivity element of ADHD, which is more common in men.
All in all, there aren’t many characteristics here that match society’s ideal of the capable, multitasking mother.
Perhaps it’s not surprising, then, that I’m certainly not the only woman who discovered that her ADHD made mothering a nearly impossible task.
A Danish study, published earlier this year in the Journal of Attention Disorders, examined 363,904 mothers between 2010 and 2018 and found that ADHD diagnoses increased after childbirth above pre-pregnancy levels – with peak rates between two and five years after giving birth.
In other words, the mask that so many women with undiagnosed ADHD use to cope with everyday life slipped under the pressure of motherhood.
This matches my experience – as does one of the other findings from the study. The number of ADHD diagnoses dropped significantly during pregnancy itself – about 72 percent lower than in the pre-pregnancy period.
Part of the reason behind this could have to do with the way ADHD is linked to levels of estrogen, the female sex hormone, and dopamine, colloquially known as our happiness hormone, and strongly linked to our expectation of reward.
A 2024 review published in Frontiers in Psychiatry suggests that dopamine signaling is disrupted in the ADHD brain. This helps explain why people with the condition can be impulsive or have difficulty concentrating, as their brains are constantly seeking ‘rewards’ from daily activities. Grinding through organizational activities, like making sure the laundry is done, or that you have enough diapers, are not activities that provide that dopamine hit.
Estrogen, meanwhile, indirectly regulates dopamine by increasing the sensitivity of our dopamine receptors and improving the way it travels through the body.
This means that estrogen plays a crucial role in how ADHD manifests in women.
And so at times when estrogen is high – such as during pregnancy or at certain points in our menstrual cycle – some find that their ADHD symptoms are, for lack of a better word, tamed.
And when estrogen drops, such as after childbirth—by about 90 percent in the first 48 hours after delivery—symptoms typically return just when you’re feeling at your lowest point.
Looking back, I see the difficulties ADHD caused me in my late teens and early twenties. I felt like I had to work twice as hard as my peers to appear “normal” and competent.
Naturally, I developed strategies that helped me get to work on time and pay bills. I knew how to socialize at parties. But I also lived in fear that if anyone at work or in my social circle caught a glimpse of the real me, the messy me, everything would fall apart. That intense fear has stayed with me.
Ultimately, my son was born by emergency C-section, and I was placed on the operating table with my arms strapped to my sides – a sort of crucifixion style, which did nothing to allay my mounting fear, says Liz
While there is a lot of talk about how we raise children with ADHD, there is noticeably less talk about how women with the same condition cope when they become mothers.
I got pregnant in 2009. And looking back, I felt like my higher estrogen levels during pregnancy—estrogen levels can increase a thousandfold when you’re carrying a child, the journal Molecular and Cellular Probes reported in 2024—helped my then-untreated ADHD. My brain was less foggy and I made all my many appointments on time. There was a clarity that wasn’t there before.
That said, one problem that arose during my pregnancy involved heightened sensory awareness, which is linked to ADHD.
This is not good news for the sensory overload that pregnancy brings. Being poked and prodded, blood tests, listening to the heartbeat during scans… and that’s before you even arrive at the birth itself.
Having your cervix checked is both invasive and painful for someone with sensory issues – and because I was never fully dilated, there was a lot of cervical check. Every time I had a medical appointment, I felt stressed.
Ultimately, my son was born by emergency C-section, and I was placed on the operating table with my arms strapped to my sides – a sort of crucifixion style, which did little to allay my mounting anxiety. When they took my baby in for a check-up, I felt intensely dizzy and nauseous – something the doctors said was a panic attack. If I ever have to have surgery again, I will ask to be fully immersed.
Although it wasn’t common when I gave birth, I now tell ADHD women to consider hiring a doula to ease the transition. No matter how well you prepare, the shift from pregnancy to new motherhood is overwhelming, especially if you have ADHD.
This shift contributes to women with ADHD being five times more likely to have some form of postpartum depression, as discovered by Swedish researchers in 2023. I think even more women with postpartum ADHD will have intense anxiety, like me.
Some of this is related to the natural drop in estrogen after childbirth.
This significantly impacts dopamine levels even in neurotypical women, let alone someone with ADHD.
The fact that the mother brain goes through a profound rewiring process to prepare for the intense demands of caregiving is also significant. In a sense, motherhood and this rewiring is the best brain training an ADHD woman will ever have – there is no greater incentive to act, and not to hesitate, than a crying baby.
But at the same time, as my experience shows, neurodiverse minds struggle with change and transition. And there are few greater transitions than that of motherhood.
Certainly, I was overwhelmed. When my son slept, it lasted an hour at a time. He nursed constantly. I was afraid he would die in his sleep, and if he screamed I was afraid he would stop breathing and cry himself to death.
Around this time I sought help from a psychiatrist.
While the confirmation of my ADHD in 2014 helped to some extent – as did the medication I was prescribed – certain elements of motherhood remained difficult.
Things like remembering gym clothes for school, remembering field trips and permission slips, it all seemed like a mystery to me. More than once I forgot to attend parent-teacher meetings. Today, as my son is almost 16, I have forgotten the days when he was given an early discharge and when he was locked out several times.
Most mothers I counsel who have ADHD describe similar problems to mine, but the most common is a sense of failure in what society expects of a mother. I felt that motherhood was my personal job and even told my husband to go back to work two days after I gave birth.
Now that I’m 47, I see how futile the pressure to “do it all” is. Because without support, no mother will do well, especially not a mother with ADHD.
You’re Not the Problem: Lately Diagnosed ADHD Women and the Invisible Forces That Shape Us, by Liz Lewis, edited by Jessica Kingsley, is available now.
