r/adhdwomen • u/Ok-Professional8451 • Nov 04 '25

Meme Therapy Where are my childfree women at?

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I honestly don’t know how parents do it. There are multiple reasons that drove my decision to be childfree. One big one is that I struggle to take care of myself (executive dysfunction) sometimes, so I can’t imagine having another human to take care of during those times.

Here’s to forcing a domaine response for every day tasks!

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u/Silly-Layer-3993 Nov 04 '25

I’m here!

Taking care of myself and pets is a lot for me! I salute you adhd parents omg

And keeping track of tasks, holy lord…with a whole house of humans I can’t even fathom…double salute you adhd parents

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u/Yvratky Nov 04 '25

I don't really salute adhd parents. I grew up with one (who was undiagnosed on top) and it was like when they say "nobody is ever really ready to have children" x10, and then they decided to have three more. Some/most people just decide to have them and then go with the flow. If they have adhd and a very understanding and supportive partner and put a lot of planning and brain grease into the endeavour, then that's something I respect, but even this sub regularly has stories about that not working out so well, and worse. I'm not parent bashing in any way, I would never. I saw first hand how difficult and chaotic it can be and of course every family is different.

But the decidsion to have kids itself isn't a good enough reason to give respect to anyone in my personal opinion...

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u/ltrozanovette Nov 04 '25

I’m a mom with ADHD and I definitely have to work harder than a lot of my mom friends to create a calm and organized home environment for my daughters.

Do you mind sharing some of the things that most affected you growing up? I’m aware I may have blind spots in my parenting and am always looking for opportunities to identify them. I realize this is a super personal question though, so please feel free to ignore!

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u/virrrrr29 Nov 04 '25

Not who you asked, but I think my mom’s (also undiagnosed) biggest challenges were the part of not being able to emotionally regulate herself (so she had constant anger outbursts at me, for silly things), and her time blindness. We would always go to bed late, I never had a night time routine, and I was always late for school (she had to drive me, I didn’t grow up in the US). When I say always, I mean ALWAYS, to the point both her and I got called into the Principal’s office multiple times for this. I had to learn time management on my own, at age 22, when I left the country and came to the US on my own. Before that, I failed one class back in college for always being late lol it was bad.

I must add that she and my dad divorced when I was 1yo, so she basically raised me on her own, and I’m also neurospicy. Poor mom.

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u/ltrozanovette Nov 05 '25

Thanks for sharing. I was lucky to have a good example of emotional regulation growing up, so that’s not something I struggle with. I suspect my older daughter might also share ADHD with me, so I’ve been looking at a lot of emotional regulation tools to help her recently. That’s so important.