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Dr. Lisa Marie Bobby is a licensed psychologist, licensed marriage and family therapist, board-certified coach, AAMFT clinical supervisor, host of the Love, Happiness, and Success Podcast and founder of Growing Self.
Have you ever looked around and thought, “Why does life seem so much easier for everyone else?” On the outside, you may look smart, capable, and creative. Inside, though, you might feel scattered, overwhelmed, and constantly behind.
If that resonates, there’s a good chance you’ve been living with undiagnosed ADHD.
In this episode of the Love, Happiness and Success, I talk with Shanna Pearson, Founder and President of Expert ADHD Coaching, about what undiagnosed ADHD really looks like, why it’s often missed or mistaken for something else, and how understanding your brain can change everything.
The Invisible Struggle of Undiagnosed ADHD
For decades, people believed ADHD was a “boy problem.” If you weren’t bouncing off the walls in school, you probably weren’t on anyone’s radar. That’s why so many bright, sensitive, and high-achieving children grew up being overlooked — or worse, mislabeled as lazy, spacey, or too much.
Instead of being identified early, countless people lived with the quiet pain of always feeling “different.” They were told, “Why can’t you just focus? Why can’t you just get organized?” Without an explanation, those questions turned into shame.
This pattern is especially common for women, whose symptoms are often more internal and harder to recognize. But undiagnosed ADHD can affect anyone, regardless of gender.
Why Undiagnosed ADHD Gets Missed
Here’s the tricky part: the symptoms of ADHD often overlap with anxiety and depression. Many people walk into a doctor’s office overwhelmed, exhausted, and convinced something is wrong with them — only to be handed an anxiety or depression screening tool.
Those tools don’t pick up ADHD. They flag restlessness, difficulty relaxing, irritability, and worry — which also happen to be common ADHD experiences. The result? Misdiagnosis, the wrong medication, and continued frustration.
A real ADHD evaluation is much more thorough. It includes your developmental history, cognitive testing (like working memory and processing speed), and a detailed look at how your challenges have shown up across your entire life. If your “assessment” takes only twenty minutes, that’s not a proper assessment.
What Undiagnosed ADHD Feels Like
Undiagnosed ADHD doesn’t always look like the stereotype of a hyperactive child. More often, it feels like:
- Racing thoughts that are exciting but exhausting
- Constant overwhelm, like 75 thoughts crammed into one chair
- Paralysis when everything feels urgent at once
- Struggles with follow-through, even on things you care about
- Living on a different “frequency” than everyone else
Sound familiar? If so, you are far from alone. And nothing is “wrong” with you — your brain just works differently.
The Hope of an ADHD Diagnosis
Getting an accurate ADHD diagnosis isn’t about slapping on a label. It’s about finally understanding yourself. Suddenly, the pieces fit together: your school struggles, your workplace frustrations, the relationships where you felt misunderstood.
Most importantly, a diagnosis opens the door to effective support. As Shanna shared in our conversation, ADHD is 100% manageable.
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Skills That Help You Thrive
Medication can be a helpful tool, but as Shanna says, “Pills don’t teach skills.” Stimulants might sharpen your focus, but they don’t show you how to focus on the right things. That’s where coaching, therapy, and supportive systems make a difference.
Here are a few strategies we talked about in this episode:
- Externalize your thoughts. When you write down the loud tasks in your head and put boxes around them, your brain sees separate items instead of one giant monster.
- Reality-test urgency. Ask yourself, “If this doesn’t get done today, will it really put me in danger?” This simple question helps break the spell of false urgency.
- Prioritize with compassion. Give yourself permission to separate what truly matters from what only feels urgent in the moment.
- Practice presence. Even five seconds of eye contact with someone you love can cut through distraction and deepen connection.
Making small, consistent shifts like these can transform daily life from overwhelm to clarity.
Unique Challenges with Undiagnosed ADHD (Especially for Women)
Although undiagnosed ADHD affects everyone, women often face unique struggles. They juggle multiple roles — career, parenting, friendships, caregiving — which multiplies the pressure. In addition, hormonal changes during perimenopause and menopause can intensify symptoms by lowering dopamine levels, making once-manageable systems collapse.
This is one reason many women first receive an ADHD diagnosis later in life. If you’ve been able to “get by” until midlife and suddenly feel like everything’s falling apart, you’re not alone. Your brain chemistry may be shifting, and undiagnosed ADHD could be part of the picture.
Reflect With Me
- Have you carried a quiet sense of being “different” without knowing why?
- Do you often feel overwhelmed by things that seem simple for others?
- What would shift in your self-concept if you saw those struggles through the lens of undiagnosed ADHD?
Resources & Next Steps
If you’ve ever thought, “What’s wrong with me?” I want you to hear this: nothing is wrong with you. Understanding your brain is the first step toward self-compassion, clarity, and lasting change.
If you’d like more support, you’re welcome to schedule a free consultation with me or a member of my team. Many of our coaches have advanced ADHD training, and we’ll connect you with someone who truly understands your challenges and can help you create systems that work for your unique brain.
I also highly recommend Shanna Pearson’s new book, Invisible ADHD. It’s packed with more than a hundred tools and strategies to help you navigate daily life with more ease and confidence.
And if you’d like to stay connected, I share weekly tips and encouragement on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. I’d also love to hear your thoughts, questions, or stories about ADHD. Your feedback always shapes future conversations on the podcast. Let’s talk!
You’re not alone in this. With the right support, you can move past the overwhelm, reconnect with yourself and the people you love, and start thriving.
xoxo,
Dr. Lisa Marie Bobby
Resources:
Attoe, D. E., Moghaddam, N., & Tickle, A. (2023). Miss. Diagnosis: A systematic review of ADHD in adult women. Journal of Attention Disorders. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1177/10870547231161533
Fu, X., Wu, W., Wu, Y., Liu, X., Liang, W., Rongchuan, W., & Li, Y. (2025). Adult ADHD and comorbid anxiety and depressive disorders: A review of etiology and treatment. Frontiers in Psychiatry, 16, Article 1597559. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2025.1597559
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. (2021). Impact of misdiagnosis, bias, and stigma. In Mental health, substance use, and wellbeing in higher education: Supporting the whole student (pp. 93–120). National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/26114
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