How my ADHD makes handling relationships difficult

19 aaronyarborough 12 5/5/2025, 8:53:44 PM aaronjy.me ↗

Comments (12)

rchaud · 1h ago
I wish this guy the best, but a "technology solution" is not going to be able to address the psychological burden of RSD, nor the executive functioning issues of ADHD. An Airtable sheet with a "Mark as Contacted" flag is something a business analyst would come up with after speaking to an person with ADHD.

RSD can't be solved 100%. At best, you can give yourself some guidance on how to resume contact with someone:

1) When was the last time I was in touch with this person?

2) How would I rate my relationship with them on a scale of 1-10 -- this is important because in adulthood friendships can fade even if nobody did anything wrong

3) Why do I feel they would not want to hear from me?

4) List 3 light topics of conversation that are low-risk, and choose one to reach out with. That can help reduce the internal resistance, which is a key factor in RSD.

aaronyarborough · 54m ago
Hey, I'm this guy :) And I think you're right. The technological solution was semi-serious (though I'm not sure that it came across in the write-up)

What I expect to get from it are hopefully new insights on the behaviours I described, not from my dumb Airtable setup, but from just putting _something_ new in to try and break the cycle. While setting it up (and writing this post), I was thinking about the problem in-depth, which is what's really valuable here.

Tip #4 on your list might work for me. I'm going to try that next time it comes up. Thanks!

a5c11 · 2h ago
Spoiler alert: building up notifications from the reminding app will end up just like building up notifications from messengers. The author basically proxied notifications, which won't help him with his issues.
jmathai · 12h ago
I haven’t been diagnosed with ADHD and this isn’t a particular weak spot for me but even I can relate. I find it most hard when there’s a mismatch in reciprocity.

I enjoy learning from posts like this because it can help identify patterns I might not have otherwise noticed. From there I can do something.

Something I do periodically is scroll my iMessages and see if there are conversations that have been dormant longer than I’d like. If so, I try to think of something to resurrect the thread.

rchaud · 1h ago
> I find it most hard when there’s a mismatch in reciprocity.

A sad part of life is acknowledging that in relationships, one person usually cares more than the other. This is why we're encouraged to build OK friendships with several people instead of putting all our apples in one really good friend.

a5c11 · 2h ago
Nothing worse than a conversation about nothing for a pure sake of having a conversation. That's one of my anxiety triggers - pointless talks. People seem to demand them, even love them, yet there's me hating those accidental talks without a subject. Double my anxiety when the conversation suddenly stops, and there's nothing in my head to talk about.

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astrange · 8h ago
> Recently I've been doing a lot of reading and thinking around developing mechanisms to help with all this, and I stumbled on another term that may be familiar to those familiar with ADHD, too: Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria (or RSD)

It should be noted that this is just a term one guy made up, and isn't medically accepted as an ADHD symptom.

Of course it is a legitimate thing that happens to people.

codelikeawolf · 3h ago
There might already be something out there that can help with this. I haven't tried it, but I've been meaning to: https://www.monicahq.com/
hcfman · 7h ago
It gets a lot easier if you trim down the number of relationships you actually want to maintain.

There's my partner. Heck, now I'm almost full!

znpy · 6h ago
> There's my partner. Heck, now I'm almost full!

Been there, done that, i can tell you it’s a bad approach, because relationships don’t last forever and aren’t always smooth 100% of the time.

Having friends is often also having somebody that you can talk about your issues (even about issues with your partner) and get a different opinion.

bravetraveler · 5h ago
Been there, done that. Most of the opinions I've sought - not just received - haven't been worth the time, opportunity, or oxygen they consumed. Winging it has gone well. It's a wash.

Opinions are like assholes, we all have 'em and they all stink. Take care :)

cornhole · 7h ago
I felt the same way until I took antidepressants and stopped giving a shit. It’s really amazing to see how the situations that gave me anxiety was not a big deal at all.