ADHD - Emotional roller coaster

How I experience the ups, downs, and everything in between.

It has been said….Some studies say ADHD is misdiagnosed—especially in women. One of the most common misdiagnoses? Bipolar disorder.

At first, I couldn’t understand that comparison. I’ve known people with bipolar disorder, and their manic phases were so intense—like inhibition had evaporated completely. A friend of mine, for example, had ideas during a manic episode that bordered on delusional. She’d talk about becoming a millionaire, building an empire, becoming famous. She truly believed it she would begin to live like it was already happening, spending her savings, putting her small condo up for sale. She wasn’t dreaming, she wasn’t planning, she just was doing. Any attempts I made to gently bring her back to reality would be met with anger. Then the depressive side would hit with her: no phone calls, no getting out of bed, complete emotional shutdown a state of depression that was hard to watch and I’m sure much more difficult for her to live through. Bipolar, when untreated or undiagnosed is a serious mental health disorder and anyone should seek any help they feel they need by professionals.

When I heard in some ADHD, neurodivergent, and Mental health support groups, that ADHD is often mistaken for bipolar disorder, I thought, “Really? It looks so different.” But then I started examining my own patterns and emotional rhythms, and I can say that once I started learning more about the emotional changes that other ADHD individuals expressed and my own experiences I see how it could be mistaken as Bi-polar.

From what I have experienced and have witnessed in other friends of mine, that there are some ADHD emotional changes. I started to think about it and that’s when I came up with my own term for it: the ADHD Emotional Roller coaster.

It’s not the same as bipolar. But it is a cycle. A different kind of loop with twists and turns.

How It Feels: Not Highs and Lows, But Spins

Let me be clear: my experience isn’t universal, and I say this with deep respect for anyone who lives with clinical depression or bipolar disorder or any other different mental health. What I go through may resemble some aspects of those conditions on the surface—but it’s different underneath, and it deserves to be understood on its own terms. I share my story because it helped me when others shared their stories with me. Their experiences and their explanations of their lives made me feel more connected and helped me understand myself more as well.

So… in my case, I don’t experience emotional “ups and downs” in a predictable or scheduled way. There’s no pattern like, “Every six weeks, I hit a slump.” It’s random. Sometimes I’ll ride the roller coaster once a year. Sometimes seven. It’s not about dates or seasons, it just happens. It has some stages, although they never really start or end they just loop into each other. There are hyperactive phases, then a slow down, a lower feeling phase of higher struggling, then sometimes an upswing, but those upswings don’t always lead to the hyperactive spot sometimes they go down to a more struggling phase. It really is like a roller coaster just making loops, twists, turns, sometimes going upside down. So Let’s look into these phases.

During a hyperactive phase, it feels like the “H” in ADHD takes the wheel. I’m alive. Energized. Almost glowing. People around me might say I seem manic—and honestly, to someone who doesn’t know the difference, it could look like that. I sleep less, sometimes only 3–4 hours a night. I become intensely focused on projects. Excited. Inspired. Productive. Motivated. I feel unstoppable. I still feel reasonable in my thoughts and I don’t always have changes in my impulsive level. As someone with ADHD I do struggle with impulsivity but my level of impulsiveness doesn’t change with my emotional stats they are always kind of there. Like impulse shopping, in a hyper phase I’ll be focused on a new hobby and I’ll just impulse shop and buy everything possible for that hobby. But my impulsiveness is not MORE during this phase, I also impulsively shop when I’m in a lower phase, just buy different things.

In these moments, I feel like my brain is finally producing the right amount of “functioning chemicals”. I often say, “I wish there were ten of me!” I’m confident. High-functioning. Full of ideas. It’s not delusional, it’s more driven. It’s like all the perks of ADHD are paying out, the ability of multi tasking, being able to hyper focus and get things done. All the “super powers” that people say ADHD have (no I don’t like the term of superpowers of ADHD but thats for a different post). But whatever you call them, I feel like I’m cashing in on them like hitting the jackpot.

It’s so great! Things are wonderful….

And then……..

……..it fades.

The Drop: Motivation Vanishes

Here’s where the roller coaster makes its sharp turn.

The “down” isn’t depression in the clinical sense. I don’t feel hopeless or empty. I still love the things I loved a week ago. I just… can’t bring myself to do them.

I go from high-output, hyper-focused mode to what feels like emotional quicksand. Everything slows. My brain doesn’t produce that same spark. I sleep more—not a troubling amount, just enough that it feels like a shockingly more amount to me, I mean compared to the 3-hour nights I had before I am now sleeping 7 or 8 hours. My motivation disappears. I start missing deadlines. I avoid people.

But I’m not avoiding them because I don’t care or sad. It’s more like I’m hiding. I feel ashamed. Frustrated. Embarrassed. I don’t want others to see me failing—especially after they just saw me thriving. These feelings can cross over with others I have talked to about depression, but when they speak of their depression I feel like its slightly different. I don’t often feel the crushing weight that many of them have described to me. But I do feel like I’m slowing down and I feel more angry and frustrated with myself then sad or unhappy.

It’s like watching someone perfectly land a cartwheel one day, then fail to complete a somersault the next. It’s not just frustrating. It’s infuriating. And the worst part? Knowing you’ve done it, you have the proof that you were successful, you’ve done it before you know you’ll be able to do it again some day but you can’t seem to control the success, its the challenge of not being unable to repeat it.

That’s the emotional weight. It’s not that I don’t care. It’s that I care so much and can’t make my body or brain cooperate. This slow down tends to cause a lot of feelings of pain, especially if you have RSD (which I have spoken about in other posts). I physically feel hurt.

The Withdrawal Phase: Grieving the “High” Me

This is when I spiral inward, not because I’m struggling with the outside world, but because I hate how others might see me in this way. I lose self-esteem. I replay the high phase in my head—wishing I could get back to it. I grieve the version of myself who was firing on all cylinders just days ago.

This down phase can really be a struggle for me to get out of, this phase doesn’t always lead back to a positive hyper phase, it sometimes if I’m lucky can bring me to a more stabilized phase. Sometimes it brings be back down.

Eventually, things stabilize. I re-enter what I call the “baseline” phase. I’m functioning, but not soaring. I’m managing, but not thriving. Catching up on all the things I dropped. Patching holes. Playing productivity whack-a-mole.

And that, inevitably, leads to burnout.

This can be really hard to manage, when people see you being very productive, and then they see you being down or struggling, many times they can understand that but then when you seem to get back to a basic functioning level because you are better then your worse, but you are nowhere NEAR your highest. People have set a bar or level of expectations that really isn’t what is manageable. But its hard for anyone else to see that those peek performance levels that’s not your set bar. It should be a bonus. It’s not what it is understood.

The Call for Understanding

I’m still learning how to recover from this cycle in a healthier way. I don’t have the perfect solution—but I do have clarity. And I believe the medical community needs more of it too.

I wish there were more research on this. I wish doctors could study ADHD brains in the moment—during the hyperactive surges and the motivational lulls. Run blood work. Do scans. Learn what’s firing and what isn’t. Not because I believe ADHD needs to be “cured,” but because the better we understand it, the better we can support people who live with it.

We talk about how ADHD is misunderstood. How it’s invisible. Well, one way we make it visible is by telling the truth. And this is mine. It’s hard to have others understand it, its even worse when you are in school or at work. People, friends, family, they can sometimes forgive you for being less then your peek. However, teachers, bosses, co workers, classmates, they don’t seem to understand as much. And if you have “wow”ed them at your peek periods. Nothing that matches that will ever be good enough. And they do expect more form you. You can’t blame them because you did prove to them when you are on fire, that you could do it. When your fire goes out. You’re just like them.

So if you’ve been riding the ADHD merry-go-round too—if you’ve felt the thrill of the climb and the frustration of the fall—you’re not alone. And if you don’t have the words to explain it yet, feel free to borrow mine.

Because you’re not broken.

You’re just wired differently.

And sometimes, differently is exactly what the world needs.

Remember to Slay it Your Way

Sheena Shay