What To Do When You Are a Neurodivergent “Over-Thinker”
How EXCESSIVE, REpetitive, negative thinking can be part of the Autistic/ADHD experience & one strategy for coping with it.
If you are anything like me, the neurodivergent urge to hyper-fixate can be a pathway to either heaven or hell, depending. When you are caught up in a process of learning, creating, experimenting, or exploring, a so-called “over-active mind” can be exhilarating. However, under more stressful circumstances, a brain that latches onto a topic and will not easily let it go can be a terrible burden. Excessive worry, rumination, and perseveration can sometimes consume your energy while producing few practical solutions or productive insights.
Here are a few ideas for coping with excessive and negative repetitive thinking, written with autistic and ADHD folks in mind.
First, do people with ADHD and autism “over-think”?
The topic of how we focus our attention is a big one in neurodivergence research. Hence, I will only scratch its surface in this post. But suffice it to say that there is indeed a growing body of research linking autism, ADHD, and other forms of neurodivergence with “repetitive cognition” (Dwyer et al, 2021; Keenan et al, 2019; Williams et al, 2022). People in this group do tend to worry, obsess, fixate, and travel around in mental circles. I can personally attest to this!
Furthermore, repetitive cognition is associated with depression (Keenan et al, 2019) and anxiety (Dwyer et al, 2021). Of course, we know that individuals with autism and ADHD are markedly more likely to suffer from anxiety and depression than neurotypical people (Hollocks et al, 2019).
So, does the repetitive cognition cause the anxiety and depression or does the anxiety and depression cause the repetitive cognition? The research is not completely clear on this. But, speaking speculatively as a neurodivergent individual, I feel that these factors drive each other bi-directionally. To put it more simply, the anxiety and depression inspire the over-thinking and the over-thinking also drives the anxiety and depression. It is difficult if not impossible to say what comes first. Also—again, just in my opinion—it does not matter. It is enough to know that these factors work together in a system, making each other stronger.
A strategy for breaking free
One strategy for coping with the negative side of hyper-fixation is drawn from meta-cognitive therapy. Briefly, meta-cognition is the ability to think about one’s thoughts, and it is associated with many mindfulness traditions.
First, I realize that recommending that you “think more” about your over-thinking probably comes across as counter-intuitive, if not nonsensical. But allow me to explain, using an example.
Imagine an AuDHD person who has suffered a big relationship loss. They are not sleeping at night. Instead, they review the end of their relationship in minute detail, trying to understand exactly where it went wrong. Now, to a certain extent, this kind of thinking is “normal” when you are grieving. But this particular person has been caught up in these patterns of thought for almost two years, and their health is starting to suffer. They realize that their repetitive thinking never takes them anywhere new, and, so far, it has not helped them to recover from their loss.
To let go of these ruminations through a meta-cognitive, mindfulness-based approach, this person might:
First, recognize that rumination probably does not serve a purpose other than exhausting them and make them more likely to suffer from post-traumatic stress (Wisco et al, 2023).
Practice detached mindfulness as they first recognize that their thoughts are not their self and that they can cultivate a decentered relationship with them (Wells, 2005).
Engage in attention training when they notice worry and rumination crop up, choosing to refocus their attention on whatever brings them peace and joy instead (Wells, 2005).
Use situational attentional refocusing by actively remembering the signs of people showing them love and support—a strategy that is also tremendously effective for reducing social anxiety symptoms (Vogel et al., 2016).
