The Times Magazine 41and that is a bit of a problem. “If it was the
other way around, nobody would question it.
“Successful men may get away with ADHD
better than women,” she suggests. “People
organise their diaries and write up minutes,
leaving them to shine in meetings. And then
they come home to a nice, organised house
with their very able wife, juggling gazillion
things, and dinner is on the table.”
What further compounds the difficulties
for women with ADHD is hormones. One
of the trademarks of ADHD is low levels
of dopamine, the “feel-good” chemical
manufactured in the brain that appears to
play a major role in things like attention and
inhibition. When you tackle a difficult task
or pay attention to a complex social situation,
you are essentially generating dopamine in
the parts of the brain that deal with higher
cognitive tasks. (Most ADHD medication
works by enhancing the impact of dopamine
in the body.) Alongside this, women’s brains
are affected by hormones. Oestrogen, for
example, produced in the first two weeks or
so of a woman’s monthly cycle, is a dopamine
booster. Progesterone, which surges in the
third and fourth weeks, suppresses the effects
of oestrogen, and consequently dopamine.
However, to an ADHD brain that needs
more dopamine, the depressing effect can
be intensified. “Fluctuating hormones can
make ADHD symptoms significantly harder
to manage,” says Beckett.
There is another, deeper implication for
women. Impulsivity, a common symptom
of ADHD, can lead to “sexual risk-taking”
according to studies – in other words,
unprotected sex, which can result in unwanted
pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases.
But things are changing. More women are
going public with their ADHD symptoms,
including Simone Biles, Liv Tyler, Mel B and
Erin O’Connor. Since Baskind launched an
adult ADHD service in Leeds in 2011, the
number of NHS clinics for adults with ADHD
in the UK has increased. “We are seeing
referral rates increase and that demonstrates
we are cutting through with other medical
professionals and also members of the
public,” Baskind says. Three years ago,
the clinic had 40 referrals a month; now,
it’s 40 a week. The problem now, of
course, is waiting times. At the Leeds
clinic it’s 15-18 months. In some parts
of the country, it reportedly takes
five years to be seen.
Consequently, people turn to
the private sector. “People go out
of desperation. They are very
much not the usual individuals
seeking private healthcare,” says
Baskind. It can cost £1,200 for an
assessment and hundreds more for
follow-up consultations.“There has been a big increase in private
providers over the past few years and that
is concerning,” Baskind says. “The more
providers you have, the more difficult it is
to monitor what’s going on out there, and to
have a consistent system to transfer people
back into the NHS.”Bianca Faricy, 48, lives in Brighton with
her partner, John, 44, a musician. Outwardly
she’s a success: an art teacher for 23 years
and head of department for 10 years at a local
secondary school. Inwardly, she sometimes felt
like she was having some kind of breakdown.
“I didn’t know what was wrong with me,”
she says. “People always made jokes about
me forgetting things, tipping things over,” she
explains. When she came home from work
her partner would say, “Just to let you know,
you left the hob on, the iron on and your keys
in the door.” She was dogged by brain fog
and exhaustion. She describes life as “micro-
pockets of shame from making mistakes and
not being able to do things”. She was, by turns,
diagnosed with candida and depression, and
was in therapy for seven years.
One day in the early winter of 2020, a
letter arrived from her cousin, who works in
special educational needs. It was a newspaper
article about a woman who’d been diagnosed
with ADHD in her late thirties. “It hit me like
a bus. It was like reading my diary word for
word. My head has been chaos all my life.
I just thought it was normal.
“ ‘Everyone feels a bit ADHD,’ friends
would say. And yes, most people at somepoint will feel disorganised, overwhelmed,
burnt out. But with ADHD, you experience
them all the time. That’s the weight of it.
It’s profound.”
Within three weeks of reading the article
she had a diagnosis and a prescription for
stimulant medication. “I was lucky to have
some PPI [payment protection insurance]
money. It’s changed my life. I can focus,
I am motivated, feel clearer-headed.”
Now she wants to improve the lives of
those in her classroom. As improbable as it
might seem, she used to mistake ADHD for
naughtiness. She has a timer – “You can’t
have opened-ended tasks” – and fidget toys:
plastic cubes and bike chains fixed in a loop.
“I give them something to fidget with. That
has been transformative.
“Students need to be understood, not
told off,” she says. “There needs to be less
focus on compliance and more focus on
child-centred education, wellbeing and
personal development.”In October 2020, Charlotte Mia and Jess Joy
set up I Am Paying Attention, an online
platform for people with ADHD and/or
autism. Billed as “the badass neurodivergent
community”, it offers advice, diagnosis
manuals, “anti-planners” (a dig at those who
suggest that all you need to get organised
and put life on track is a diary).
Membership costs from £3.99 to £7.99.
They have 1,000 members and 78,000
followers on Instagram, and sell at least
£100 worth of guides a day.
Under the banner of neurodiversity
they are declaring their ADHD
a rich identity, even if it comes,
says Joy, “with a healthy splash
of trauma”.
“The way we work
takes our ADHD brains into
consideration,” she explains.
“We work whenever we feel like
working. There might be one week in
the month when we work extremely
hard and produce lots. At other
points, we produce significantly less.”
They share their menstrual cycles.
“I feel really sad for people like
me who have grown up resenting
themselves or completely lacking
in confidence. My generation
feel very strongly about spreading
awareness, educating people and
being a lot less apologetic about who
we are. I’d really love people to see it
as less of a deficit.” n‘Fluctuating hormones can make ADHD
symptoms significantly harder to manage’
ADHD Continued from page 29Famous women
with ADHD: Mel B,
Erin O’Connor,
Simone Biles,
Liv Tyler
GETTY IMAGES. OPENING SPREAD: JESS JOY WEARS T-SHIRT, UNIQLO.COM; SKIRT, KITRISTUDIO.COM; BOOTS, HER OWN. CHARLOTTE MIA WEARS JUMPSUIT, HOUSEOFSUNNY.CO.UK; BOOTS, RUSSELLANDBROMLEY.CO.UK; BRACELET, EARRINGS AND RING, ALL MISSOMA.COM