Don’t Use These Organizing Strategies With ADHD

Are you neurospicy, or is there someone in your family with a brain based disorder? You can absolutely have an organized home. Organizing is a skill, which means anyone can learn how to do it. Neurospicy people are certainly capable of learning new skills!

Being organized not only means learning skills - it also means using those skills to set up and maintain systems that work for you and your household. Every family is different, and every family’s needs are different. When I work with clients, I make suggestions and try solutions that I think will work well for them, not strict rules that I think apply to everyone. It’s no different when I’m working with people who have a diagnosis such as ADHD. My job isn’t to know their disorder, my job is to listen to them and what they need, and provide them with solutions that will work for them.

That said, there are two super popular and aesthetic organizing strategies you’ve seen on social media that tend not to work for folks with ADHD. I’m not saying they’ll never work, I’m just saying that if you’ve tried them and weren’t able to maintain them, that doesn’t mean you’re a bad person or you did a bad job! It just means that these organizing strategies aren’t right for you.

If you have ADHD, I don’t recommend:

Decanting

Decanting is the organizing strategy of placing dry pantry goods (or craft items, or hardware) into clear labeled containers by category. Decanted pantries are gorgeous, and the clear containers allow you to see the contents. Videos of decanted pantries can be so soothing! But they’re not great for neurospicy brains.

Why? Straight up, it’s too boring. Many ADHD brains are always zooming on to the next activity, and looking for the most shiny object at any given time. Decanting consistent effort, and that effort is of the very boring kind. Each time you replenish a pantry item, you need to get out the container, open up the package, put the product in the container, put the container back, and throw away the package. You have to do this every single time you grocery shop, otherwise the system breaks down. Some people love the aesthetic so much that they’re willing to put in this effort - but neurospicy types are unlikely to find this interesting enough to hold their attention for the long term.

Instead, an organized pantry for a neurospicy person would keep all ingredients in original packaging with the front of the package facing out, so they can easily see and identify everything - and be inspired by fun ingredients and bright colors! We love using shelf risers and deep bins in pantries so that nothing gets lost in the back.

Opaque Containers

Organizing content is full of gorgeous opaque containers, with a special emphasis on baskets. The upside of an opaque container is that it hides the contents, making the space appear less cluttered and more calm. But this exact property makes them a poor choice for people with ADHD.

Why? Simply put, object permanence. For many people with ADHD and other diagnoses, if they can’t see something, it doesn’t exist. They won’t know they have it, they’ll buy a replacement, and the clutter will pile up.

Clear containers are a much better organizing solution for neurospicy people because they keep items contained and organized without obscuring them from view. In fact, I might even suggest a person with ADHD take closet or cabinet doors off entirely so they can always see what they have!

And finally, just some food for thought: some really interesting research has come out over the past couple of years showing that the symptoms of ADHD and sleep deprivation are exactly the same. If you are an adult woman who has just been diagnosed or who thinks she could be… how’s your sleep?

LMW