Anxiety and attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are two distinct mental health conditions. Anxiety involves excessive worry and fear that disrupts your daily life, while ADHD primarily affects your ability to focus and makes it difficult to complete tasks and stay organized.
But they share several common symptoms, too — and it’s not always easy to distinguish between them. Many people who have ADHD also experience anxiety, and vice versa. Understanding the overlapping symptoms can help you seek the right diagnosis and treatment.
Our team at Boston Neurobehavioral Associates is ready to help. We specialize in therapy and medication management, and here we present four common symptoms that often overlap between anxiety and ADHD.
One of the most common overlapping symptoms of anxiety and ADHD is difficulty concentrating. Anxiety can make you preoccupied with worries, which makes it hard to focus on tasks or absorb information. And if you have ADHD, your brain may struggle to filter out irrelevant stimuli, which makes it difficult to stay focused and complete tasks.
In both cases, the mental overload can disrupt your cognitive processes. You might find yourself constantly getting distracted, unable to complete tasks, or becoming frustrated with your inability to concentrate.
Restlessness is another symptom common to both anxiety and ADHD. If you have anxiety, you might feel uneasy, on edge, or unable to relax. This sense of restlessness can be accompanied by a feeling of being overwhelmed or fearful, which can exacerbate the urge to move or fidget.
ADHD can also make you feel the need to move constantly, fidget, or have trouble staying still. This restlessness is often physical, but it can also be mental, where thoughts are constantly jumping from one idea to another.
Impulsivity is a core symptom of ADHD. It means acting quickly, without thinking about the consequences, and it can manifest as interrupting others, making hasty decisions, or engaging in risky behaviors.
Anxiety, particularly in cases of panic or heightened stress, can also lead to impulsive actions. For instance, someone with anxiety might abruptly leave a situation they perceive as threatening without considering alternative responses. In both conditions, impulsivity can make it hard to maintain stable relationships and manage daily responsibilities.
Sleep disturbances are common in both anxiety and ADHD, though they can manifest in different ways. If you have ADHD, you may struggle to fall asleep or stay asleep because it’s difficult to quiet your body and your mind when it’s time to wind down at night.
Anxiety can also lead to trouble falling asleep, because you might find it hard to stop thinking about your worries and fears so you can sleep. In both cases, poor sleep can exacerbate other symptoms, like difficulty concentrating and irritability, and create a vicious cycle that’s hard to break.
If any of these symptoms sound familiar, it’s important to seek a professional diagnosis. Anxiety and ADHD can share some similarities, but their underlying causes and the ways they affect people can differ significantly. Proper diagnosis is the only way to get an effective treatment plan, and our therapists can help.
We offer therapy, including cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT), to help you learn coping strategies to manage both anxiety and ADHD symptoms. Along with therapy, medication management can help minimize symptoms to help you strike a balance and improve your mental health. Ready to get started? Contact us today.
