For years, I wondered why I get ‘stuck’ in places, even places where I do not wish to be! If I was reading as a child, I’d read all day and all night until the book was finished, even hiding under the duvet with a torch that would quickly get turned off when mum did the rounds. I’d lie on my nan’s bed, eating Rich Tea biscuits, reading and reading all through the afternoon, until my elbows hurt, my neck had a crick in it and I actually wanted to go out to play but couldn’t stop reading.
As an adult, I notice it in my work, especially admin, which surprisingly I don’t mind, although I do unfortunately make hundreds of ‘silly mistakes’ as they were called at school, due to squirrel moments in the brain.
When I’m doing admin, I am usually in a chair, either in a therapy room where I am working in my charity job, or on my sofa at home, laptop on my knee, as I am right now. I do my admin: answer enquiries, respond to emails, make sure my diary is ship-shape, save notes in the correct places, and then close my laptop like anybody else, shuffle around the house a bit, do some other jobs or go out to meet friends and have a sociable time. No – the last bit was a fantasy. What I actually do is this. I do my admin, then sit on the chair in the office, or my sofa at home, and start scrolling through social media, messaging people, watching pointless reels, dehydrating, getting hungry, needing the toilet and developing back pain. And all this time I am completely unable to move. It’s as though somebody has pinned me down and refused to give me permission to move any part of my body, which gets heavier, and tireder, and more shut down until I’m practically comatose and frustrated at this ridiculous situation.
It can happen in a therapy room that is half-dark. It can be snowing outside. I can be telling myself that I need to get home. I want to get home. The room is very dull. I hate being in it now. But I’m stuck! Learning more about the wonders of ADHD has brought me to the understanding that this is ADHD Task Hyperfocus Paralysis and it comes in three different flavours.
Flavour One: Hyperfocus
If this was actually a flavour, it would be syrup. Nice to start with, drizzled all over popcorn or icecream. It makes time disappear. It’s so easy to get stuck in its flavour that nothing else matters. But when it becomes impossible to stop, it’s uncomfortable. Somebody interrupting with a request, or an email popping up that needs an urgent response, or it snowing outside and inconveniently needing (and wanting) to go home, feels like being yanked out of a trance. The reason for hyperfocus is dopamine related.
ADHD brains are thought to have difficulty transmitting dopamine to the parts that relate to executive functioning – getting shit done. So when interest, urgency or a challenge triggers a dopamine surge, like getting on top of my admin does for me, the brain locks onto it. The task becomes the only source of reward and everything else becomes ‘greyed out’; in fact, switching feels like losing oxygen! Our prefrontal cortex (PFC) has to juggle priorities, time, context, consequences and interruptions, but during hyperfocus, it stops juggling and locks on to that one thing. Even things like eating, moving, replying or stopping don’t register as things that need acting upon.
Flavour Two: Task Switching Paralysis (executive dysfunction)
This is the crossover point for me, where I’ve actually stopped the hyperfocus but now can’t do anything else. It’s the ‘stuck’ feeling. If it were a flavour, it would be very boring, maybe porridge (some people like it, I know). It’s highly unpleasant to be wishing and willing oneself to move onto something more enjoyable, and just being unable to. But this is where dopamine and norepinephrine are required by the PFC to switch tasks. By the time the hyperfocus has ended, it’s as though the brain slumps into total inertia. Even going to the loo or standing up feels like a task.
Flavour Three: State Inertia
This one happens when there isn’t necessarily a task-switch required. It’s just a case of the brain getting stuck in a particular state. What we are doing might be boring, like scrolling through pointless reels, or watching a rubbish series, or ‘rotting’ through a pyjama day, which is all fine if you like that sort of thing. But many ADHDers get chronically bored, almost depressed, doing nothing, but still do nothing. It really is a kind of paralysis. The brain settles. In terms of the autonomic nervous system, this is a parasympathetic state, but not the comfy, calm, relaxed version of it: more of a ‘bleurgh’, a ‘bottoming out’ of the comfort zone and into a miserable slump. It tastes of mud. Or pondweed.
Somatic Strategies
But what to do about these challenging states of existence? I would absolutely love to have some fixes for this, and I’m not sure I’m qualified to dole out advice, given that I have dealt with not being able to get off the sofa by writing this instead of physically moving from one room to another to start dinner preparation. However, I am mostly able to function, eventually, by engaging in the room around me and slowly returning my body and brain to the present moment, where I might notice my cat purring and padding next to me, and reach out to stroke her (no big effort required). I might see a branch waving about by the window, hear a car outside, smell my strawberry scented ice-cube fidget, and maybe start to imagine the taste of a refreshing cold drink or a comforting warm mug of tea, providing some motivation to take some small actions. A deep breath into the belly is activating, watching the belly rise and fall, imagining it as a balloon, doing that again, taking in several big lung-fulls of air, making a slight shift, wriggling the toes and stretching the arms high above the head. Personally, I like to breath in as I raise my arms up then out as I lower them down. It gradually brings me back to the ‘here and now’ where I am in space and time, a physical, living entity rather than a slumped zombie.
It needs to be somatic rather than more thinking, (which results in more thinking, more and more time in cerebral mode, and less time physically changing our physical state). So, a splash of water to the face, a fidget toy, a really big old stretch, putting on some music and moving to the rhythm, standing up for 3 seconds and swaying or shaking it off. These actions are ridiculously hard to take but, once taken, they begin to shift the paralysis.
It’s easy to feel embarrassed about hyperfocus paralysis, especially when it leads to neglect of other daily tasks. Like everything else ADHD-related, it’s really important to understand that, while we are responsible for our actions (or inactions), we are especially impacted by factors beyond our control. I recommend self-kindness wherever possible, reminding ourselves that we do have a reason, not an excuse. We’re not lazy, undisciplined or otherwise morally deficient. We have a unique brain that gets stuck in particular states and this can lead to incredible results in our area of interest or specialism. It can make us excellent at our work or hobby, knowledgeable in particular special interests, passionate about what we believe in and fiercely determined to make a success of what we set out to do. We have a tendency to be hard on ourselves, believing ourselves difficult to live with. Yet those who love us often love our passion, drive and hyperfocus. We can, with the right support, learn not only to manage it, but to love it, too.