ADHD Coaching, Community and Menopause
Finding Your People: ADHD Coaching, Community and Menopause
“A woman of a certain age.”
That insulting yet strangely enduring phrase seems to linger around conversations about the perimenopause and menopause like that awful winter cold that you just can’t shift. Throw ADHD into the mix and these ageist and sexist undertones rise to the surface. We’re told that we can’t possibly have ADHD, it’s just our age!
But the latest figures from the NHS suggest that these people are just plain wrong. As of July 2026, there was a 40% increase in ADHD prescriptions – and therefore, diagnoses – among women aged 50 – 59 in England and Wales when compared to the previous year. And that’s not even taking into account younger women who receive a diagnosis when they’re going through the perimenopause.
As a woman who received an ADHD diagnosis when I was perimenopausal, community support meant the world to me. Chatting to other strong, independent females who were navigating this next stage of womanhood whilst discovering the intricacies and nuances of our brains wasn’t just empowering; it enabled me to feel seen and heard in a way I never knew I needed to be.
To celebrate ADHD Awareness Week 2026, I want to explore the connection between the perimenopause, menopause and ADHD and shine a light on how coaching can support you to thrive during life’s next chapter.
Finding the Narrative
When I was a teenager, nobody discussed the menopause. If any woman around me showed even the faintest sign of a hot flush or a swell of emotion, she was just labelled as “having a moment”. Thankfully, we’ve made a little progress on that front but how much is a topic that’s definitely up for debate.
Physical, external symptoms like irregular periods and hot flushes get a lot of airtime in the media but there’s still stigma surrounding the internal, emotional symptoms like brain fog and anxiety. As women, when we bring these up with even the most well-meaning GP, we’re usually told that it’ll pass or just given medication to treat the symptoms rather than the underlying cause. If we’re lucky enough to find a GP who recognises the overlap between these symptoms and ADHD (or just gets sick of us turning up every other month with our symptom tracker in hand as I think was the case with me!), we’re often left in a state of limbo.
Without the language to describe what’s going on to our friends and family and with waiting lists for diagnosis growing by the day (if the service is even available in your area), it can feel quite lonely. You might even feel like you don’t fit neatly into the ADHD narrative but trust me when I say there are a whole community of women who have walked in your shoes.
Finding the Language
Now, I’m no scientist but I think a basic understanding of what’s going on in your body and the consequences is useful. That’s why we all had to sit through those biology lessons and see things that we could never unsee when we were mere children, but we seem to have forgotten all about this when it comes to menopause and ADHD.
We understand the basic principles of it all. Oestrogen plays a role in regulating dopamine, the neurotransmitter that ADHD brains crave and seek in our daily lives. As oestrogen fluctuates during the perimenopause and menopause, those typical ADHD traits that we’ve spent years masking like forgetfulness and difficulty concentrating resurface and become more difficult to manage. But what science can’t tell us is what all of this means for you.
This is where coaching can help you take that first step towards understanding what perimenopause and/or menopause with ADHD means to you. If you can pinpoint and name how it’s making you feel and the unique challenges that you’re facing, it makes it easier to explain to yourself and others what’s going on. It’s no longer a hum of low-level fear but something which is manageable and that in itself is empowering.
Finding Your Voice
Finding the language and understanding what’s going on inside is one thing, but finding confidence in your new-found voice is another thing. Without tooting my own trumpet too much, that’s where coaches with lived experience of ADHD and the perimenopause come in.
I get that finding strategies to fit your ADHD traits isn’t a one-size-fits-all exercise. Strategies need to work on your bad days as well as your good ones and they shouldn’t collapse as soon as the brain fog hits. It takes time and lots of experimentation to find the right strategies that can adapt to your fluctuating mind and body. As someone who’s been there, done that and is at least some way towards getting the very hard-earned T-shirt, I’m here to listen and support you through your journey.
I often find that once you’ve found strategies that work for you, confidence follows. The confidence to navigate the next phase, the confidence to put your story into words and the confidence to be the fabulous woman you really are.
Finding Your Community
Once you’ve found your voice, it can open the door to community by giving you the confidence to create authentic connections with people in the same boat. Before becoming a coach, my idea of community was sitting in a village hall, drinking tea and talking about the bin collection schedules!
But I’ve learned that community means so much more than just sharing a location. It’s about sharing experiences and more importantly, normalising them. Whether you prefer connecting with people in-person or online, there are plenty of supportive communities of other women navigating ADHD and the menopause waiting to welcome you.
Finding Your Next Steps
If you’re in the middle of this journey and don’t know where to start, here are a few pointers that might help you gain a sense of understanding and belonging:
· Find one person you can be open with about how you’re really feeling. It might be a friend, a coach, or even an online community but sharing the emotional load can help more than you might think.
· Start tracking your patterns – energy, mood, and focus. Yes, this can definitely support you in having your next conversation with your GP, but it can also help you gain an understanding of what’s happening right now and help you adapt.
· If you don’t feel ready to share your experience, write it down. The act of transferring your thoughts from your head onto paper means that you’re acknowledging what’s going on and are taking an important first step towards finding your voice.
ADHD and menopause colliding in the same stretch of life is a lot for any woman to cope with, but you don’t have to navigate the journey alone.
If you’d like to find out more about my ADHD coaching sessions, click the button below to book a free, no-obligation consultation.
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