An ADHD-friendly meal plan has changed my damned life, and it’s not as hard as many would think to put together. To round out this ADHD Nutrition series, it’s time for me to share with you what I’ve been doing, how I’ve been doing it, and how it’s left me. As always, you can watch it instead if you go here, and you can listen to it by searching for the AdhDONE. Podcast on your preferred platform, or by listening on the player below. If you want to simply see what my main points are, you can head to the Takeaways part of this piece.
The Backstory
Don’t worry, I’ll keep it brief, but I want you to understand where my sudden interest comes from.
Back in July, I went with my husband to a nursery/orchard that was pretty large. I’d only been walking through there for about an hour, if that, before I started to feel faint and sick. At first, I was terrified that my Chronic Fatigue Syndrome was resurging; then I asked myself what I’d eaten that day.
The answer: Almost nothing. I’d had an egg and a piece of toast that morning, and had eaten nothing else. As you’d imagine, this isn’t exactly the best to start with when you’re supposed to be giving your body the energy to get through a busy day.
Later, I checked into how many calories that even was, and it was a little less than 300. A healthy adult is supposed to eat around 2,000 calories a day; I need about 13-1500 a day for my personal weight and activity level. I was, at that point, consuming maybe 8-900 a day. It was no wonder I was so tired.
The Method
I wanted to try to really improve things here, so I not only changed what and how often I ate, but I also decided to add in vitamins that ADHD brains may be in more need of than the average bear. This included:
Magnesium Citrate
Vitamin B6
Vitamin C
Iron
Omega-3 (I got this mainly from eating more fish.)
Eventually, I stopped the iron, as I didn’t feel it was changing anything, but I’m still taking the rest currently.
I didn’t exclude anything from my diet, and I took weekends off from worrying about it. I also didn’t exercise, but I’m trying to make my choices stick and changing everything at once is a baaaad idea.
My biggest focus, as Coach Dre suggested, was to focus on my macros, specifically my protein intake, since protein seems to be responsible for neurotransmitter production.
Meal Planning when you have ADHD
I eventually realized that the reason I don’t eat more healthily or more often is because there are too many choices in my kitchen, and it causes my executive dysfunction to go haywire. It seems like too much, so I wind up picking the closest, easiest thing, which often isn’t the best thing for me. I knew what this meant, and I didn’t like it.
It meant that I needed to meal plan.
After doing this for the past month, I can tell you we think about meal planning completely incorrectly. At least, where an ADHD-friendly meal plan is concerned.
So, when we think about meal planning, we tend to think about making brand new dishes every night, meal prepping a whole week’s worth of meals on Sunday, and massive grocery bills. For some, that might be what is needed. But for us, simpler is better.
Instead, pick 6-8 foods for breakfast, lunch, and dinner that you’ll regularly rotate throughout the week. Don’t try to reinvent the wheel or be incredibly different; you can do special things as one-offs, but this is how you’re planning on eating every day.
To help me come up with dishes, I used the Eat This Much app (that link gives you AND me a free month) to get me started. Once I had a strong understanding of what basics I needed to include to keep healthy, I started putting my own stuff together without it most days.
Another amazing resource for ADHD-friendly meal planning is Grapes Lauren, a site run by an ADHD chef who gives amazing suggestions on meals and on how to plan according to your energy level. I’ve personally worked it into my own routine, and I have about 2 foods per meal that I can throw in when I have zero energy or time.
And this is how it all worked out:
Week 1
I noticed a difference in everything very quickly. I went from getting depressed and sluggish midday to having a very steady level of energy from morning til afternoon, and it wasn’t anywhere near as much of a struggle.
I used the MyPlate App to get a good look at how much of each macro each part of my meal had, so I could keep a good eye on how much of each thing I was eating. For example, I assumed that a bowl of oatmeal is an amazing source of protein until I got a look at how much it actually has. It’s honestly not that great an amount, and I had mornings where I was still feeling rather tired after having some.
This also gave me a good look into how much a healthy breakfast really consisted of. Like I knew that I should be eating more, but there’s something about seeing that the breakfast you’ve always shoved into your mouth is worth only 200 calories that makes you plan things a bit differently.
And hey…just a pro-tip, but whatever changes you make, make them slowly and gradually. Because I, being the dingus I am, packed way too much fiber into my day at one point, and wound up finishing that day in the fetal position, feeling stuck between throwing up, pooping myself, and having a panic attack. Thanks to a little checking around (including bothering poor Michelle in the middle of studying for an algebra exam), it turns out that too much fiber can do that to you. So….be careful.
Week 2
Here’s where those changes really came in handy, at least energy-wise.
Within two days of each other, I wound up tasked with running and cleaning up after my son’s birthday party because my husband had food poisoning, and then I wound up suddenly in charge of the entire household because my husband contracted COVID and my son got sick at the same time. I was stressed to hell, and I suddenly need to be able to run a whole household by myself with ZERO help.
And, to my surprise, I did fine. The mixture of a better diet and what I don’t doubt was panic-induced adrenaline, I got through each day with very steady energy. I did crash directly after my husband told me he was better, but I suspect that was more from exhaustion than anything else.
Week 3
In a rather frustrating and bittersweet turn, this was the week where I got to feel how sharp the difference between my energy lately, and how my energy had been, could be.
My period was a week out, and my hormones basically took everything over without mercy.
I have Premenstrual Dysmorphic Disorder, so when my hormones fluctuate, nothing works. Not my meds, not caffeine, and damn sure not a simply better diet. I struggled so hard this particular week, and while that frustrated me after I’d been doing so much better, it did give me two positives to hold onto. Namely:
- My diet was obviously helping when there wasn’t anything interfering, and
- I had the motivation I needed to finally start figuring out how to help my hormones. I am still working on this, so for now, I can’t say anything more. But let’s just say I’m attacking this problem with a vengeance. That’s what it gets for ruining my fun.
Week 4
So here we are. My fourth week of following my ADHD-friendly meal plan.
I don’t think you caught that: I’m still following it. I stuck with it. Not because I have more discipline or anything, but because it was easy.
I didn’t fill it with shit I didn’t like. I didn’t stack it with things I’d have to spend ages making. I didn’t treat it as if it were a rigid plan, and I made sure that I kept those low-energy/low-time options in my back pocket at all times.
After a while, my brain kind of just knew what my snack options were, what my breakfast might need to consist of, and what I might need to fill gaps with.
I now eat every two hours, and I try to ensure that EVERY meal has protein in it, even if it’s a little. I try to ensure that I get some form of Omega-3’s throughout the day, and I also try to keep my caffeine intake to just what I need to get started.
I don’t meal prep at all. If I forget to sit and plan, I usually can wing it at this point for a day, until I’ve made my choices.
Honestly, I feel awesome. I haven’t seen what my cycle will be like this month yet, but on a regular day, I don’t feel as ready to fall asleep, I don’t get depressed midday, and I even seem to be waking up with more energy every day.
Next, I hope to start putting movement into my day.
But y’know…one thing at a time.
Takeaways
- When making an ADHD-friendly meal plan, the point is SIMPLICITY. Figure out what meals/foods will best satisfy your nutritional needs, figure out your favorites, and then rotate those through the week. While you may have your own stuff in mind already, feel free to also download this list of ideas that I have for you if you need help getting started.
- Plan according to energy and focus, too. Have 1-2 low-effort meals that you can suddenly reach for if you don’t feel up to making anything that will also give you energy and focus – that is, whatever energy and focus you might be able to pull from the air that day
- Change slowly. Don’t try to overhaul everything at once.
- Keep in mind that other things can affect your symptoms; this will help, but it won’t fix everything – not even close.
- Realize that all changes take time, but that feeling good is worth it.
Take care of yourself, and reach out if you’d like me to help you get comfortable.
Top ,.. top top … post! Keep the good work on !