Living with ADHD is already like juggling fire. Add anxiety, and suddenly the fire is juggling you.
When both are happening at once, your brain isn’t just distracted — it’s spinning in five directions and catastrophizing all of them. You’re overstimulated, frozen, spiraling, and pretending everything’s fine — all before breakfast.
This isn’t a blog about fixing it. This is a blog about recognizing it, living with it, and figuring out what actually helps without becoming another task.
💥 The ADHD + Anxiety Double Whammy
According to CHADD, up to 50% of adults with ADHD also experience an anxiety disorder. That’s… a lot of us.
They often feed into each other:
- ADHD causes missed deadlines → leads to anxiety
- Anxiety causes avoidance → makes ADHD symptoms worse
- You beat yourself up for both → welcome to the shame spiral
🪞 The Masking Trap
One of the most exhausting parts is masking — pretending everything is fine while your nervous system is in full DEFCON mode.
You over-prepare. You people-please. You hold it together in public and crash in private.
ADDA describes ADHD masking as the emotional labor of hiding symptoms — especially common in women, late-diagnosed adults, and high achievers who were “fine” until they weren’t.
Masking doesn’t just drain you. It delays diagnosis, support, and self-compassion.
😰 When Everything Feels Urgent (And Nothing Gets Done)
Sometimes ADHD looks like forgetting appointments. Sometimes anxiety makes you hyper-aware of everything you might forget. Together? You’re frozen, yet racing inside.
This is what my ADHD + anxiety combo feels like:
- Knowing I need to do something, but panicking too much to start
- Starting five things, finishing none
- Imagining catastrophic outcomes for sending an email one day late
- Avoiding tasks that I care about… and hating myself for it
🧠 What’s Helped Me (So Far)
Here are a few things that have actually helped me soften the chaos — slowly, inconsistently, and imperfectly.
1. Name What’s Actually Happening
Before I can help myself, I have to pause and ask:
Is this ADHD executive dysfunction, or is this anxiety hijacking me?
Am I distracted, or am I scared?
This doesn’t solve anything — but it gives me enough clarity to choose the next small thing.
2. Do a Non-Productive Brain Dump
When I’m spiraling, I grab paper (or my notes app) and dump everything out — not to sort, not to plan, just to see.
If I try to organize it, the anxiety gets worse. But naming the chaos helps me externalize it.
🔗 If you want to try this, I wrote more about it here: How to Use Brain Dumps with ADHD
3. Let Some Things Be “Not Now”
Not every coping tool works in the moment. I used to force journaling, breathing exercises, or CBT tricks when I was mid-panic… which just made me feel worse when they didn’t work.
Now, I keep a “not now” list. Things I can come back to later. This includes:
- Explaining myself
- Problem-solving
- Anything that starts with “should”
4. Get Curious (Not Judgmental)
I learned to ask:
“What is this anxious feeling trying to protect me from?”
“What does my brain think is at risk?”
And sometimes… the answer is “feeling like a failure.” Or “not being seen.” Or “being too much.”
This is where the self-reflection pages in my free ADHD self-discovery journal genuinely helped.
I used the prompts to figure out what calm actually feels like — instead of chasing what I thought it should be.
🔍 Hidden ADHD Symptoms That Feed Anxiety
We don’t talk enough about the non-obvious ADHD traits that fuel anxiety, especially in women and late-diagnosed adults.
ADDitude lists some of these overlooked signs:
- Emotional intensity
- Rejection sensitivity
- Perfectionism masking procrastination
- Chronic shame, even when things go well
If any of these hit hard, you’re not making it up — you’re making sense of it.
🌿 Gentle Reframes That Actually Helped
These aren’t solutions. They’re mindset shifts that gave me more space to exist with both ADHD and anxiety:
- I can rest before I burn out.
- Progress doesn’t have to look like momentum.
- Forgetting isn’t failing — it’s feedback from my brain.
- Avoidance is sometimes protection, not sabotage.
🧠 Related Post
Want to reset your weekends to feel more calming and less spirally?
🔗 Read: The Ultimate Weekend Routine for ADHD →
💬 Final Thought
You’re not broken because you feel everything all at once.
You’re not weak for needing slower mornings or longer recoveries.
If your ADHD comes with a side of anxiety (or vice versa), you deserve strategies that honor both. Not more pressure. Not more fixing.
Just more room to breathe — and be.
