The Shit Show: When ADHD and Perimenopause Decide to Have a Party

Standing in your own kitchen, knowing exactly what needs doing, and you can’t start? Brain like wet cardboard, tired in a way you’ve never been before, and wondering what the hell is wrong with you?

In this episode I share what it looked like for me: the fog, the angry outbursts, the exhaustion, the recovery days, and the relief teaching day I couldn’t get through. I also talk about what I found when I read my old school reports.

Was it ADHD, perimenopause, or both? For me, it’s all tangled together. I’ll tell you what women report, what the research shows (it’s mixed), and what researchers think but haven’t proven. I’ll also explain why a late diagnosis doesn’t mean you’re making it up.

This is my experience and my thinking, not medical advice. If you’re struggling, a conversation with your doctor is a good place to start.

I’m collecting your bad days for future episodes. What did yours look like?

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Thanks for listening to The Shit Show.

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast and share it with someone who might need to know they’re not the only one figuring this shit out.

Find out more about InTune, the app designed to help women with ADHD understand what’s going on with your brain, hormones and daily life, and work out what you need today.

https://adhdmenopausehub.com/

Straight talk on ADHD and perimenopause on substack: https://daniellehodson.substack.com/

Tired at two in the afternoon, brain like wet concrete, and not sure whether you need a hug or the floor? In this episode, Danielle shares what she wishes her husband knew about living with ADHD in perimenopause: the extreme tiredness, the need for space, the hormone rage, the body changes, and why saying exactly what you need beats making your partner guess.

She also goes through what the research says about sleep, ADHD and perimenopause, and she’s upfront about where the research is thin or missing. You’ll hear a few things worth asking your doctor about, plus what helps in her own life.

This episode is a follow-up to the most popular one on the show, what women wish their partners knew about ADHD. It’s for women with ADHD going through perimenopause, and for the partners who want to understand.

This episode shares lived experience and general information. It isn’t medical advice, so please talk to your doctor about your own health.

If you’d like a shorter version for the Buzzsprout summary line, here it is:

Danielle shares what she wishes her husband knew about ADHD and perimenopause, from the exhaustion to the hormone rage, with honest research on what’s known and what isn’t, and what you can try.

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Thanks for listening to The Shit Show.

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast and share it with someone who might need to know they’re not the only one figuring this shit out.

Find out more about InTune, the app designed to help women with ADHD understand what’s going on with your brain, hormones and daily life, and work out what you need today.

https://adhdmenopausehub.com/

Straight talk on ADHD and perimenopause on substack: https://daniellehodson.substack.com/

Waking up hungover without a drink, aching like you’ve got the flu, and losing the ability to solve problems you once nailed? In this episode, Danielle shares her story of a brutal year and a half: grief, perimenopause flare-ups that landed her in hospital, and a late ADHD realisation at fifty-three. She then walks through the self-care strategies that have helped other women with ADHD, and what a clinician says about how ADHD and perimenopause overlap and what that could mean for treatment. If you’ve been wondering what the hell is wrong with you, this one’s for you. 

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Thanks for listening to The Shit Show.

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast and share it with someone who might need to know they’re not the only one figuring this shit out.

Find out more about InTune, the app designed to help women with ADHD understand what’s going on with your brain, hormones and daily life, and work out what you need today.

https://adhdmenopausehub.com/

Straight talk on ADHD and perimenopause on substack: https://daniellehodson.substack.com/

Grief, perimenopause, untreated ADHD and a few drinks too many: this is the story of my worst money stretch, and what the research can and can't tell us about it. I look at studies linking ADHD to impulsive buying, debt and difficulty waiting for a reward, and at the documented link between alcohol and online shopping. I'm also upfront about the gaps. I couldn't find research on ADHD, perimenopause and money together, or on grief and spending, so I share my wonderings as wonderings, not findings. I finish with what the evidence says might help, and what I actually do now: a simple three-column notebook, a 24 to 48 hour rule before buying anything, and no more lay-by apps. If you'd rather poke a fork in your eye than look at your finances, you're not broken, and this one's for you. 

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Support the show

Thanks for listening to The Shit Show.

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast and share it with someone who might need to know they’re not the only one figuring this shit out.

Find out more about InTune, the app designed to help women with ADHD understand what’s going on with your brain, hormones and daily life, and work out what you need today.

https://adhdmenopausehub.com/

Straight talk on ADHD and perimenopause on substack: https://daniellehodson.substack.com/

The girl who looks like she's doing fine might be working the hardest in the room.

I've been in education for more than 25 years. I can name plenty of boys I taught who had ADHD. I can't think of one girl. I wasn't looking for them, and I think that's partly because I was one of them. I hid my ADHD so well that I didn't find out until I was 52.

In this episode, I write a letter to teachers and parents about the girls who get missed: the high achieving, quiet, compliant, perfectionistic ones. I talk about:

• What a formal ADHD diagnosis actually involves (it's not an online quiz)
• Why "you don't have ADHD" is something high achievers hear a lot
• What masking looks like in real life, and what it costs
• Why anxiety, perfectionism and drinking were my coping strategies, not my diagnosis
• How perimenopause stopped my masking strategies working
• Three things I'd ask of every teacher and parent

I spent 25 years not seeing these girls. I'd love for you to do better than I did.

This episode shares my personal experience and isn't medical advice. Please talk to your own doctor about diagnosis and treatment.

I'm Danielle, and this is The Shitshow: When ADHD and Perimenopause Decide to Have Their Own Party. You can also find me on Substack.

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Support the show

Thanks for listening to The Shit Show.

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast and share it with someone who might need to know they’re not the only one figuring this shit out.

Find out more about InTune, the app designed to help women with ADHD understand what’s going on with your brain, hormones and daily life, and work out what you need today.

https://adhdmenopausehub.com/

Straight talk on ADHD and perimenopause on substack: https://daniellehodson.substack.com/

When did I become completely unhinged?

Have you ever looked at yourself and thought, “What the actual fuck is happening to me?” In this episode, I go down the rabbit hole of what happens when ADHD, perimenopause and the coping strategies you’ve relied on for years collide.

I talk about the story of a woman my grandmother used to clean for who was committed to a mental institution for eight years, and why it made me wonder about what we may have misunderstood about women’s experiences with menopause. I also get into the bigger conversation women are having about the way menopause has been treated historically, and ask the uncomfortable question: if men went through menopause, would we have found a cure by now?

Then I get personal. I unpack what I learned from my own ADHD assessment, including masking, hyperfocus, impulsivity, overthinking, brain fog, perfectionism and why my existing coping strategies became harder to maintain during perimenopause.

But this episode isn't just about what feels difficult. I'm flipping the script and asking: what if some of the things we see as ADHD weaknesses could actually become strengths when we put them in the right environment?

From hyperfocus and seeing systems differently to entrepreneurship and using AI to organise the chaos, this is about understanding your brain rather than constantly trying to make it behave like everyone else's.

Maybe we're not broken. Maybe we've just been trying to operate in systems that weren't designed for the way our brains work.

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Support the show

Thanks for listening to The Shit Show.

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast and share it with someone who might need to know they’re not the only one figuring this shit out.

Find out more about InTune, the app designed to help women with ADHD understand what’s going on with your brain, hormones and daily life, and work out what you need today.

https://adhdmenopausehub.com/

Straight talk on ADHD and perimenopause on substack: https://daniellehodson.substack.com/

What do women with ADHD and perimenopause actually wish their partners understood? In this episode, I move beyond my own experience and look at what the research is starting to tell us about relationships, emotional changes, brain fog, sleep, sex, communication and practical support. The research is still limited, but some clear themes are emerging and I unpack what we know, what we don’t know yet, and what partners can actually do to make things easier. 

Send us Fan Mail

Support the show

Thanks for listening to The Shit Show.

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast and share it with someone who might need to know they’re not the only one figuring this shit out.

Find out more about InTune, the app designed to help women with ADHD understand what’s going on with your brain, hormones and daily life, and work out what you need today.

https://adhdmenopausehub.com/

Straight talk on ADHD and perimenopause on substack: https://daniellehodson.substack.com/

Perimenopause and ADHD can make everyday life feel like a bloody shit show. In this episode, I share 10 practical strategies I've used to navigate the physical, emotional and everyday challenges, from brain fog, anger and body changes to movement, boundaries, relationships, self-care and giving yourself a bit of grace. These are things I've actually tried in my own life, not a list of perfect solutions.

Send us Fan Mail

Support the show

Thanks for listening to The Shit Show.

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast and share it with someone who might need to know they’re not the only one figuring this shit out.

Find out more about InTune, the app designed to help women with ADHD understand what’s going on with your brain, hormones and daily life, and work out what you need today.

https://adhdmenopausehub.com/

Straight talk on ADHD and perimenopause on substack: https://daniellehodson.substack.com/

In this episode, I’m talking about what happened in my own relationship when perimenopause hit. The anger, the anxiety, the brain fog, the hot flushes, the lack of connection and wondering what the hell was happening to me.

I also talk about discovering ADHD later on and realising that ADHD and perimenopause were basically bouncing off each other and having their own bloody party.

Most importantly, I talk about being open with your partner about what you’re experiencing, telling them what you actually need, using a bit of humour, and remembering that sometimes it really isn’t them. It’s you, your hormones, your ADHD and everything else going on in your life.

Send us Fan Mail

Support the show

Thanks for listening to The Shit Show.

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast and share it with someone who might need to know they’re not the only one figuring this shit out.

Find out more about InTune, the app designed to help women with ADHD understand what’s going on with your brain, hormones and daily life, and work out what you need today.

https://adhdmenopausehub.com/

Straight talk on ADHD and perimenopause on substack: https://daniellehodson.substack.com/

Why Am I So Fucking Angry All the Time?

If you've noticed that your patience has disappeared, your reactions feel more intense, or you're getting irritated by things that normally wouldn't bother you, you might be wondering what the hell is going on.

In this episode, I look at the connection between ADHD, emotional regulation, perimenopause, sleep and cognitive changes. We explore what the research actually tells us about emotional dysregulation in ADHD, what we know about cognitive and sleep changes during perimenopause, and where the research into ADHD and menopause is still developing.

I also talk about why the thing that triggers your anger might not actually be the whole story, and why understanding your capacity matters.

Most importantly, I finish with three practical strategies you can use to start recognising your patterns, create a pause before reacting, and know when it's time to talk to your healthcare professional.

This isn't about blaming everything on ADHD or hormones. It's about understanding what's happening, separating what we know from what we don't yet know, and becoming more curious about our own brains and bodies.

Send us Fan Mail

Support the show

Thanks for listening to The Shit Show.

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast and share it with someone who might need to know they’re not the only one figuring this shit out.

Find out more about InTune, the app designed to help women with ADHD understand what’s going on with your brain, hormones and daily life, and work out what you need today.

https://adhdmenopausehub.com/

Straight talk on ADHD and perimenopause on substack: https://daniellehodson.substack.com/