Dear Jana,
My husband often expresses that he misses the version of me from before my ADHD diagnosis.
When we first crossed paths, I was undeniably spontaneous. A plan for a quiet drink could seamlessly transform into an all-nighter, with dawn greeting us before sleep. My intense passion extended to our intimacy, which he adored.
Initially, I thought these traits defined who I was. However, that changed last year when I received an ADHD diagnosis. My psychiatrist recommended Vyvanse, a decision which has since brought me a newfound serenity and mental clarity.
No longer do I seek to transform every evening into an adventure. I find peace in stillness, no longer stirred by restlessness, nor do I wake up burdened with regret over my previous night’s actions or words.
I really like who I am now.
My husband, however, doesn’t. He says I’ve lost my spark and that our relationship used to be much more exciting. He particularly misses how adventurous I was sexually, and lately he has started making comments about me becoming boring since going on medication.
I’ve tried explaining that the woman he misses was often acting on impulses she couldn’t control, but he talks about that time like it was the best version of me.
A woman tells Daily Mail columnist Jana Hocking (pictured) that her husband is struggling to connect with her since started taking medication for her ADHD
Now I feel guilty whenever I turn down a big night or don’t want sex to become some elaborate event. Part of me worries that he only fell in love with the chaos.
How do I make him understand that I haven’t disappeared? I’m happier than I’ve ever been, but I’m starting to wonder whether he actually wants me well.
Still Me, Just Calmer.
Dear Still Me, Just Calmer,
Ah, yes… Vyvanse.
I’ve heard it referred to as ‘the divorce drug’ because some women swear that once the fog of undiagnosed ADHD lifts, they suddenly start looking at their lives, and their relationships, very differently.
In fact, I’ve had more than one girlfriend tell me that getting medicated made them realise they’d been surviving in chaos for years, and once life became quieter, so did their tolerance for unhappy marriages.
But it’s interesting that you’re experiencing the opposite effect.
‘Now I feel guilty whenever I turn down a big night or don’t want sex to become some elaborate event. Part of me worries that he only fell in love with the chaos,’ a woman writes to Jana. (Stock image)
When I read your letter, I found myself thinking, ‘Of course he misses that version of you.’
He got the adventure, while you carried the burden of feeling constantly overwhelmed. (And yes, undiagnosed ADHD sex really is a little… extra.) What you have is two people with completely different memories of the same relationship.
As someone who is also navigating an ADHD diagnosis, I understand what you mean when you describe your mind feeling quieter. It’s hard to explain to someone who hasn’t experienced it, but there’s something incredibly comforting about no longer feeling like you have to wring every last drop out of every weekend.
But there’s another thing that could be at play here.
I wonder if this isn’t just about your ADHD. I wonder if you’re simply arriving at a stage of life where staying in with a takeaway and an early night genuinely sounds more appealing than waking up wondering where your wallet went.
It happens to everyone eventually – no one wants to stay in that Peter Pan, never-grow-up phase forever. Although, I’ve dated a few men still stuck there, so maybe your bloke’s got a few more years to go.
I’d say two things have happened. First, you’re beautifully focused and clear-headed – well done. As a fellow ADHD’er, I know how glorious it feels when things finally click.
And second, you’re simply growing up. My party lifestyle has slowed down too lately – and that’s more than OK. In fact, it can be enjoyable. Who doesn’t love coming home, getting into their pyjamas and binge-watching an entire series in one go? It can be just as fun as a big night out – and a lot cheaper and less painful the next day.
I’d be asking one very simple question: what does your husband actually miss?
If he’s mourning the fact you no longer want to stumble home at sunrise every weekend, I’d gently suggest that time probably would’ve caught up with both of you eventually. No one stays 25 forever.
If what he really misses is feeling desired or swept up in the excitement you once shared, that’s a different – and much easier – conversation to have. Rekindling desire just takes a bit more intention than it did in the early days.
Relationships don’t stay frozen in time – that’s a good thing. Couples who go the distance are usually the ones who stay curious about each other as life changes, rather than longing to rewind to when they first met.
So, I’d sit him down and ask what a happy future together looks like. If he can embrace who you are now, there’s every chance you’ll find a new rhythm together.
But if he’s still waiting for the old version of you to come back, he’ll be waiting a very long time.
Dear Jana,
The first time my boyfriend mentioned it, I honestly thought he was joking. We’d had an argument a few days earlier, and he suddenly said, ‘Hang on, I’ve got the recording.’
I laughed it off, but he wasn’t kidding. He opened his voice app – and there was a recording of our entire fight.
I lost it at him because it’s such an invasion of privacy and I’m pretty sure it’s illegal. He told me that he’d been recording our arguments on his phone for months.
Apparently, he likes listening back to them afterwards because he thinks it helps him work out who was right. He also admitted he sometimes plays them to his therapist so they can go through the conversation together.
But not once did he ask if I was OK with being recorded.
Now every disagreement feels completely different. Instead of saying what’s on my mind, I find myself wondering whether it’s being saved somewhere on his phone to be replayed in six months’ time.
He genuinely doesn’t understand why I’m upset. As far as he’s concerned, he’s not sending them to friends or posting them online. He says they’re private and for self-improvement, and, if anything, they make him a better partner.
Am I making too much of this, or would you feel violated too?
On the Record
Dear On the Record,
Dump that man.
I’m kidding… mostly.
Look, I know plenty of people who are determined to prove they’re right during an argument. Even I’ve been guilty of whipping out an old text message or two.
But secretly recording your partner so you can replay the argument later is a level of commitment to being right that I’ve never encountered.
To be blunt, it’s odd behaviour.
Legally speaking, secretly recording private conversations can be unlawful, so I’d promptly remind him of that.
However, I’d be focusing more on your partner’s fixation with always being right.
I’ve dated men who refused to admit they were wrong – even when caught red-handed. One tried to convince me I’d imagined an entire conversation from the day before. But even he never thought to start a podcast called ‘Jana’s Greatest Mistakes’.
I would want to know why he’s carrying every disagreement forward instead of letting it go. Most couples have a blow-up, sulk for a bit, apologise (usually after someone gets hungry or horny) and then move on. The fact your boyfriend seems to be collecting evidence for a trial is, like I said before, odd.
So that’s the conversation I’d be having. OK, maybe don’t call him ‘odd’, but tell him the recordings make you feel uncomfortable and have to stop.
Not because you’re trying to win this particular argument or take away some advantage he thinks he has, but because you don’t want to spend the rest of your relationship wondering whether every vulnerable moment is ending up in his voice notes.
If he wants to unpack an argument with his therapist afterwards, fine. That’s healthy. Therapists have heard one-sided versions of relationship fights since the beginning of time. They’ll cope.
I’d tell him to stop turning your arguments into cross-examinations. Relationships are emotional – you’re allowed to get your words tangled or say something silly without fearing it’ll be used against you months later.
That’s just being human. Being with someone obsessed with always being right will wear you down, until one day you just call it quits. Ask him if he’s willing to risk that.
Dear Jana,
I think my fiancé has disappeared down the biohacking rabbit hole.
It all seemed to start around his 50th birthday. One minute he was joking about getting older, the next he was determined to outlive us all.
It started innocently enough. A few supplements here, an ice bath there. I thought it was great that he was taking an interest in his health.
Fast forward a year and I feel like I’m engaged to a human podcast.
Every morning starts with a lecture about sleep scores or fasting. We can’t book a restaurant without him asking what oil they cook with because he’s become convinced seed oils are poisoning us all.
Last week he made the waiter check the ingredients in the salad dressing while I quietly considered crawling under the table.
He’s forever reading the back of food packets, listening to longevity gurus and trying to convince me that the key to living until 100 is giving up everything that makes life enjoyable.
I miss the man who’d suggest fish and chips on the beach without needing to know whether the chips were cooked in beef tallow.
Am I being unsupportive, or is there a point where ‘optimising your health’ starts getting in the way of actually enjoying your life?
Engaged to a Biohacker.
A woman who is engaged to a man obsessed with biohacking asks Jana for advice. (Stock image posed by model)
Dear Engaged to a Biohacker,
Oh girl, I feel for you!
Here’s what I don’t get: with all this talk about living longer, do these health nuts forget you could get hit by a bus tomorrow – and those ice baths and bland, dressing-free salads would be for nothing?
Sure, I get wanting to give yourself a shot at a long life, but for every marathon, I see nothing wrong with having a beer waiting at the finish line. So trust me, I’m with you.
But all that aside, let’s look at what’s really going on here – because I don’t think this is actually about seed oils. Turning 50 can make people feel their own clock ticking for the first time, and some men respond by buying a motorbike or having an affair with their secretary.
So, if anything, be glad yours is handling it in a much milder – if slightly boring – way, trying to outsmart mortality one fasting window at a time. If you had to sum it up in one word, it’s fear. And that usually fades once he’s proven to himself he’s still got a few good decades left.
That said, you’re allowed to have limits, and it sounds like he’s reached yours.
I suggest telling him exactly how you feel. He may have absolutely no idea that this health kick has become all-consuming. From his perspective, he’s simply looking after himself, and probably hasn’t given thought to how it’s affecting others around him. Specifically, you and waiters!
So rather than asking him to give up the cold plunges or the supplements, ask him to leave them at home every now and then. Tell him, for at least one night a week he has to give the ranting a rest.
And if all else fails, perhaps remind him of billionaire biohacker Bryan Johnson.
The poor bloke has spent years treating his body like a science experiment in the hope of living forever, only to recently reveal he’d been diagnosed with autoimmune gastritis – a condition where the immune system attacks the stomach lining.
I certainly wouldn’t wish that on anyone, but it does prove one thing: you can do absolutely everything ‘right’ and life still has a funny way of keeping us humble. So loosen up a little.
