Thread by @dustychipura

so I see a lot of people talking about struggling with exercise with #ADHD and I just wanted to talk a little bit about what has worked for me in cultivating a habit around physical movement:

keep in mind that all ADHDers are different so what works for me may not work for you, but I definitely was a person who, for many years, struggled to find ways of moving my body and getting exercise that felt enjoyable and sustainable and not like TOTAL DEATH

the first thing I had to acknowledge was that I was in a neverending cycle of body shame or guilt> frantically decide to start a new habit of being "fit" > immediately try to do too much (like working out 5 days or working out for an hour) >

create a totally unsustainable habit that didn't take into consideration any of my current reality (for example, did I have workout gear? was I super exhausted after work? did I really have time? > get frustrated that I wasn't seeing any progress > slip off the habit

decide "oh well, I'll try again next month" and then go right back to old habits that were opposed to the new habit I was trying to form (ie, a lot of sitting, being too busy to ever work out etc)

2 things changed this for me: #1 realizing that exercise is medicine for the ADHD brain because it boost dopamine production - instead of thinking of it as this obligatory "should", I started thinking of it as a non-negotiable like if I was lactose intolerant & couldn't eat dairy

#2. Realizing that before I could ever hope to become a person who was just 'fit' (whatever that meant), that first I'd have to learn to be a person who could be consistent with a habit.

LEARN.

I gave myself permission to *practice* consistency

I started realizing how many things were connected to effectively building a habit. I started getting curious about all the pieces that would need to be shifted or moved to make room for the new habit. I didn't have running shoes. I would forget my running shoes.

Before I can build the habit of going to the gym, first I need to build the habit of bringing my workout gear to the gym. But before I can do that, I need to build the habit of remembering to do my laundry so I have clean workout gear.

I know what you're thinking: "that already sounds exhausting and overwhelming". And yeah - thats the thing about real, sustainable habit change. It's rarely *just one thing*. It often involves A LOT of shifting and that takes time and emotional resiliency.

I coped by reminding myself that I was in the process and that focusing on just finessing my system of "gym clothes and shoes" was actually *a part* of working out-it relieved my guilt about not *actually* working out and helped me to feel encouraged that I was, in fact, doing it

Slowly but surely, I started nailing all the pieces *around* working out/exercising/moving my body. They were:

- having gym clothes and shoes and remembering to bring them/be able to change when needed

- remembering to think about exercise as a thing I would be doing during the week and to actually make room and plan for it

- Remembering to get enough sleep the night before

.. those were mostly it for me

So once those were in place I had to confront the biggest barrier: that to my ADHD brain, 'exercise' was boring. I would often quit, not push myself, or give up early when I was doing gym-related things because every second my brain was screaming at me, "THIS SUCKS"

Then I learned that the ADHD brain is intrinsically motivated by that which is interesting to it, and that novelty plays a huge role in what our brain *wants* to do. And I changed my whole approach to WHAT I was doing. I gave myself permission to use novelty to my advantage.

Instead of feeling guilty that I would sign up for a membership or class and fall off of using it after a few weeks or months, I started anticipating that drop off and gave myself permission to rotate. I changed what 'consistency' meant to me.

Instead of consistency = sticking with this one workout program for like, ever, I decided that if I more or less "consistently" did ANYTHING that counted as moving my body, that I would count that as a win. Because days, months and even years would go by without me doing that

Because guilt, shame and obligation made me lose momentum. So I lowered my expectation on myself and I changed the rules. I made a list of all the fun workout-y things I'd like to try and what places around me offered trial memberships or monthly memberships.

I started out with 30 Minute HIIT and I had a great time. Then, sure enough, at about the 2 month mark it started getting boring. So I switched to something new!

Eventually after a few rounds of this - at which point I'd been at least *somewhat engaged* with fitness for six months or so... the longest I had ever at least consistently TRIED/REMEMBERED... I decided to scale up. I switched it up by making a larger financial commitment.

Even though it felt scary and a little wasteful, I subscribed to two different class passes so that I could switch up what I was doing in a week; yoga and working out. I had that little voice in my head telling me "you always just end up not following through anyway!"

But I discovered that due to all the time I had invested setting my foundation (thinking about workout gear, making room in my week, getting enough sleep) and what worked for me (novelty, thinking of consistency differently), that it was what I needed at that time

(at this point let me acknowledge the privilege of being able to afford 10-class passes to 2 different things. I did have to move things around in my budget but there are times in my life where financial barriers further exacerbated my access to physical fitness)

I found that BECAUSE I 'had skin in the game' and had made a financial commitment, but also had the flexibility of being able to choose from different classes on different days, I was more likely to get at least one to two workouts in per week. Which was already like.. insane

that was more than I'd ever already done. So I could also use that success to keep going. Anyway - hopefully that's helpful to someone! I'll add more tweets about what I'm currently doing now.

So just getting to the point where for several months in a row I stayed engaged with the idea of building a habit and thinking of exercise as medicine for my brain rather than guilty punishment for not being a "healthy human" was a gamechanger

the result was that after about a year and a half of cultivating this mindset around consistency and "learning" to be the kind of person who could do physical movement and working with what actually worked, I had gotten to the point where I was working out 1-2x most weeks.

How I got there WASNT:

- being hard on myself
- just being more disciplined
- focusing on weightloss

How I got there was making my level of ENGAGEMENT and INTEREST in CONSISTENCY the barometer of my success.

I am shocked to say that looking back over the past weeks and months, I have in fact become the person who consistently moves my body, thinks about moving my body and isn't resistant to moving my body. How my body *LOOKS* really hasn't changed but how I feel has changed a lot.

I feel stronger. I feel more capable. I feel confident. I enjoy doing things because I can do them. Maybe there will be times when I don't do physical movement for long periods in the future, like weeks or months, but at the end of the day as long as it's not about obligation

and I keep making it about fun, I can keep finding a way to stay engaged with using physical movement to feel good. Sometimes the best way to reach a goal is to take like twelve big steps backwards, lower the expectations, and practice a lot of curiosity and self kindness.

If anyone is reading this thread and feeling hopelessness, despair, incredulity or frustration - just remember I am only describing what worked for me. I do believe that curiosity and experimentation are universal keys to success but your own journey to habit creation might look

really different from mine and that is totally okay!