Exercise is hitting. My brain gives up way before my body does. Even when I try and listen to music or watch shows while exercising, I just can’t keep at it.
Has anyone found an ADHD friendly way to exercise?
Does running up and down the stairs repeatedly because I keep forgetting things upstairs count?
For me I can’t really exercise for exercise sake. I have to do an activity that happens to involve exercise, like a sport, swimming, or hiking.
Things I have tried and enjoyed:
- net sports like badminton and volleyball
- trampoline park
- a martial art
- roller skating/blading at a rink, similarly ice skating
- a hobby that involves having to hike, brain want hobby reward so will put up with endless trudging…barely
- swimming / surfing / snorkeling / diving
- VR games (fr, quite the workout)
- having a dog and using dog as motivation to walk more
- amusement park or fair (because I will get my damn money’s worth and walk for like 10 hours straight)
Extreme social anxiety, covid, money, and no longer being in college with “free” or cheap access to things have ruined most of these for me but my point was to do a THING that happens to need you to move your body. Not just exercise (bleh). This is how you trick your traitorous brain.
This is totally it.
I don’t exercise I put the three kids in a truck tyre and drag them to school. (MUSH Daddy!)
I don’t exercise I walk to shop for milk, get home, realise I forgot the damn bread, think I can make bread, look up how, get distracted, make healthly wraps for lunch.
I don’t exercise, I just lose the thing I just put down, queue marathon of reorganization (it’s not cleaning) until I get the point of lifting heavy machinery to look under and give up, hammer on a worn 3/8 socket. Bonus cardio if the 10mm was in your other pocket all along.
As with many things, it didn’t stick for me until it did and once I was in the habit, it’s actually harder to skip than to just go. Even if I’m not thrilled about the workout, I still end up going because it’s wired in now.
That said, I do listen to podcasts almost exclusively at the gym and that can make it kinda exciting if there’s a good one coming up.
But how did you get to that point? Weeks of grinding out the task? Reminders? Alarms?
When I had kids I decided that I was going to live a healthy lifestyle to serve as a good example for them. Finding ways to exercise with them has been a lot of fun and then it just snowballed into me exercising on a very regular schedule and now I’m in the best shape of my life. Now it feels really weird if I have a day where I’m not doing some kind of exercise activity.
The same way you build any habit. The last two can be helpful but the first is the only essential piece. You make yourself do whatever it is you’re trying to start doing until it feels weird to not do it.
Are you aware of what sublemmy you are in, lol? Or are you some kind of magical adhd-er who can actually form habits like neurotypical people do? If so, I am so, so very jealous
Run directly away from home, when you get bored, you’re 50% done. Run home if you want it to be over faster
I’ve found success with HIIT type exercises because you’re switching your motion every minute with rest in between. It’s easy to stay focused because of the variety and how quickly it changes.
