How Movement Can Make You Focus Better if You Have ADHD
Do you find yourself bouncing your knee or tapping your hand? How about twirling your hair? Maybe you’re a pen clicker. Any of these things can be fidget mechanisms evident in ADHD. Living with ADHD, or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, can cause difficulty focusing or even sitting still. You may have a hard time concentrating on homework or work tasks. This struggle can make everyday responsibilities that much harder.
Movement to the average person may seem distracting, but for those with ADHD, this movement can actually increase attention and focus, despite what it looks like on the outside.
Does ADHD Cause Increased Movement?
Symptoms of ADHD vary from person to person, especially the severity of the symptom. Fidgeting, however, is a pretty common symptom for someone with ADHD. It is hard to sit still, so movement in the form of various fidgets results. Your attention almost needs to be earned, and when you become under-stimulated by a task, your body fills that void with movement. One explanation is why movement occurs in excess amounts. In scientific terms, those with ADHD have reduced cortical thickness in the front area of the brain responsible for motor control.
Does Fidgeting Help Concentration?
By giving your body an outlet to move, whatever that means for you, you can potentially tolerate sitting or focusing on a task much longer. Effective movements don’t require you to put much thought into them and don’t necessarily take away from the true task. Purposeful movements have the ability to increase the neurotransmitters in your brain that specialize in attention, thus prolonging your attention span. Movements wake up your nervous system, stimulate your brain in a secondary way, and improve your level of alertness. As long as the movements or fidgets are respectful, it truly can help you have better outcomes for the task at hand. In this instance, multi-task away.
Strategies For Helping Improve Your Focus
Use an elastic band, specifically around an area where your feet are. You can bounce your feet and legs with some resistance added to help your mind focus.
Along the same lines of bouncing, yoga balls have been well received as ways to get that added movement while trying to complete work. There are even desk chair replacements with a yoga ball for this reason. Disclaimer: if you have poor balance to start, this may not be the option for you as it could be more of a distraction.
Maybe you need a little more movement while you work. An option can be to set up “workstations” that will allow you to be mobile while you work. When your system needs a boost during a task, you can move on to the next spot. Depending on your setup, you can also try a bike pedal machine under your desk or even invest in a treadmill desk. Or just take a movement break when you find yourself utterly distracted, then come back to your work once you have jolted your system.
The Takeaway
People who live with ADHD have an added challenge when it comes to the rote, daily, sometimes monotonous tasks for school/work. Because of ADHD, your system isn’t able to modulate arousal properly. Movement or fidgeting can help compensate for this dilemma. Whether it’s something small like a fidget tool or doodling or something larger scale like needing a full-on movement break to segment your tasks, giving your system what it needs is absolutely ok.
If you are having difficulty attending to tasks because of your ADHD or believe you may have undiagnosed ADHD based on your symptoms, reach out for a consultation today for ADHD treatment.