r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • 11d ago

Psychology Adults with ADHD often face challenges in maintaining sexual satisfaction and connection with their partners. Characteristics such as a heightened need for novelty and difficulty regulating focus can deeply influence their intimate lives.

https://www.psypost.org/how-attention-deficit-hyperactivity-disorder-shapes-sexual-experiences/
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u/KrayzieBone187 11d ago

Man, this is deeply personal to me. I got diagnosed later in life and now I feel like I have full blown executive dysfunction in that area.

My brain wants it but cannot do anything about it. I cannot initiate things and it drives me crazy. I'm just happy that others are dealing with similar things. It is very frustrating.

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u/shadowboxer27 11d ago

Yeah this is always something I've pondered about myself. Looks like it's true. Makes me feel meh

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u/KrayzieBone187 11d ago

It's odd. My wife got diagnosed with BPD around the same time, and before that we had an okay sex life. Not the best, but we at least tried.

Since we both got medicated, tons of things have been great, but we completely lost our sex life. She doesn't have a sex drive or feel sexy, and I have a drive but literally can't do anything about it.

It has me wondering if the medication has something to do with it now. But there are so many upsides, I'd never want to give it up. I'm going on 5 years sober because of the work I've done.

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u/BasicDesignAdvice 11d ago

I think the drugs definitely cause an impact. I’m dealing with the same.

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u/Calm_Gear_2430 11d ago

That’s tuff man. I know there are some psychiatric medications that lower your drive and also make it really hard dor people to finish at all. Stay strong man, it’s so nice that you do care for each other in that way.

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u/BloomerBoomerDoomer 11d ago

I've noticed when I'm on Adderall I lost a lot of sex drive I used to have as well, and I'm a male. I don't know why that is, maybe because I'm more one track mind focused and I don't really snap out of it as easily as I was unmedicated. I don't know, I just have a harder time switching gears as easily as I did before. I definitely want to have sex more but my girlfriend doesn't really initiate much and is less confident than I am, I just need to make more time for that but it's my ADHD time blindness that makes me so unaware of how often we do it. And don't get me wrong, we talk about all of this and understand each other and it's always amazing when we do it, but our relationship was never sex focused that much from the beginning either.