Reddit reviews The ADHD Effect on Marriage: Understand and Rebuild Your Relationship in Six Steps

I've been reading The ADHD Effect on Marriage: Understand and Rebuild Your Relationship in Six Steps with my girlfriend and I think it has been helping. It addresses things both partners can do and illustrates some of the destructive cycles couples with an ADHD partner sometimes get in and how to avoid them.

Check out this book The ADHD Effect on Marriage written by a non-ADHD wife to an ADHD husband. It's very insightful for common issues in non-ADHD/ADHD relationships.

Meds are not necessarily required to stop the cycle of fighting. It sounds like you both say mean things to each other, sort of reactively. Yes, ADHD makes us more likely to fly off the handle, but this can be lessened with deliberate practice. You also both sound like you're under a lot of stress. Have you tried meditation? Or a vacation together?

Oh trust me it is far more common than you realize.

Two books

Book 1 by Gina Pera

Book 2

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>He on the other hand has a reoccurring cocaine addiction

If he has a recovering stimulant addiction than you should probably be very specific on what medications you try.

1. The nonstimulant ADHD medications Strattera (one class of medication), and Intuniv and Kapvay (another class of ADHD medication) both have no addictive potential, will treat ADHD, and will actually help him exercise self control making it harder to relapse
   
   
2. If you do a stimulant for ADHD you want a stimulant that is very weak when you start it, but get stronger several hours later for this has less addictive potential. You also want a stimulant you can't smoke, inject, or inhale. The goal is a slow and steady dose, big sharp spikes of a stimulant is actually what causes the addictive potential and rewarding effects, but also when these sharp spikes occur your body notices if you are a former addict and it is easier to relapse.
   
   

• Of the amphetamine class of stimulants, you want the drug known as Vyvanse. How this drug works is that is a macromolecule which has amphetamine but it is bonded with another molecule called lysine. It will not work until an enzyme in your body separates these two molecules and then the amphetamine starts working. This enzyme is rate limited so your body can only separate so much of these macromolecules into its smaller components per hour. This type of drug where your body must do something to make the drug work is called a prodrug.
  
  
• Of the methylphenidate class (ritalin, concerta, etc), the best medication with the least addictive potential is Daytranna, a skin patch. It is the less addictive for two reasons.
  
  
• Different methylphenidate meds have different amounts of instant release, and different amounts of extended release where the medicine activates later. Daytrana has none of the med that activates instantly and instead releases the drug at a steady rate per hour. See this chart I made. Pretty much Daytrana is weakest in the morning, quillivant xr and concerta is next, ritalin LA is strongest in the morning and will be the most "rewarding" sensation to him. Here is a drug release curve that illustrates the plasma levels of these drugs, same info but with less drugs on the same graph but easier to read. Now compare the drug release profile for Daytrana. Notice is it is like you took the first image and then reversed it in the mirror. Thus if he is on a stimulant of the MPH class (Ritalin, Concerta, Daytrana etc) it is probably best he is on Daytrana. Still though try the non stimulants first.
  
   
  
   
  
  >terrible ODD.
  
  Now all ADHD medications can help with oppositional defiant disorder.
  
  Second ODD can have different manifestations and different components. If he has the smart alex where he has an instant comeback without think of it, all the ADHD medications can help but one med to try is doing intuniv alone, or adding intuniv to his stimulant if he is on a stimulant.
  
  Why it helps is complicated and I will not explain all of the parts of how the drug works.
  
  But when you are stressed your body does a surge of adrenaline and a surge of norepinephrine. You have something called adrenergic receptors which determine what is happening with the norepinephrine and adrenaline and do different things depending how much norepinephrine and adrenaline are released and whether it is long sustained released or whether you have an extreme microsecond SURGE and pulse.
  
  Well the surge and pulse aspect of norepinephrine and adrenaline where you got such an extreme surge all of a sudden causes a feature called cognitive capture where your brain just focuses on one thing and all other things are tuned out, even if they are important. Sometimes you are emotional you probably experience it, where you hear what someone says but it just does not register, it does not computer, but the emotional reaction and your first instincts just take over.
  
  Well Intuniv treats ADHD in multiple ways but it helps prevent these sudden surges from taking over, while at the same time helping emotional control, reigning in impulsivity, and help prefrontal function. As an analogy imagine installing a levy / water wall around a town where you have a defense against water. A waver of water can surpass the levy but most of the time it can't. Now besides the levy you can also instead marshes / flood banks where if a 100ft high, the wave still hits, but the flood banks cause the 100ft water to be broken up pre-emptively and now you have the same amount of water but it is not so high.

UPDATE

Hello everyone.

Since making this post, and having received all these thoughtful, helpful, insightful posts from everyone here, I have been thinking a lot to myself.

It's been busy days in my brain the past two days, as I've had an entire mind shift. I realize now that a lot of what I said in my original post was wrong, and selfish.

I feel that I've been degrading her as a person with ADD, as well as ADD/ADHD in general. I didn't know much about ADD, she's told me about it, tried to explain things to me and I believed I understood them very well, but I was very wrong in that regard.

I decided I don't want to lose her, I love her to the bone and everything that comes with her. I am not ready to give up and let things go.

I started thinking deeply, and I now realize I was at fault. I believed I understood everything about her, but in reality I never put myself in her shoes, in my mind. I started reading up about ADD/ADHD, and a lot of things for me too were an 'aha' moment. There's so much clarity now, and now that I understand a lot more (but far from how much I want to!), looking back.. I feel like I have been degrading her quite a bit, saying the things that you would normally say to someone to make them feel better. But with someone with ADD/ADHD it just makes them feel degraded, annoyed and undervalued.

Yes, ADD/ADHD has their set of 'problems', but these problems can be just as good as solutions to things as they could be problems. There are so many things about her character and ADD now that I can understand are very positive, she can deal with any upcoming expected situation, she's so easygoing and she is able to focus on one thing at a time so well, all things that I could never dream of doing.

It was extremely wrong of me to question her medicine, and when I did she got very defensive, and very understandably so.
It was selfish, and it's something she needs to cope with certain things. I should have never questioned it.

We still aren't as close as we used to be, but things have been going much better. I have told her and proved to her that I am doing my absolute best to recognize the problems that ADD is causing her, and she was extremely happy and appreciative towards that approach for me.

I realize now that you cannot have a relationship with a non ADHD and an AHDH'er, unless you learn everything there is to learn about both people in the relationship regarding the thoughts they have on these things. AHDH'ers and non ADHD'ers both have symptoms in a relationship, these need to be understood by both.

I am in the process of understanding everything there is to understand about her (or, at least I'm doing everything I can to do so.)

Currently reading this book: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005MRBEAG/ref=kinw_myk_ro_title

There are negative sides to ADHD/ADD that I now recognize, but thanks to that there are just as many positive ones that make the other person exactly who they are, and are the very reason I was attracted to her for.

Things have been going better, and I hope they'll only move forward from here on out. However, I'm still having difficulty gaining her faith in the fact that I see her 'problem' as something just as positive as a solution.

Thank you all for your words and messages, it's truly been a tremendous help.