Question for Readers: How do real Neurodivergent people exercise?
Hi, neurodivergent friends, especially those of you with ADHD/executive dysfunction, or dyspraxia. Do you regularly exercise or move your body? If so, what do you do? How often? How do you stay consistent, or deal with being inconsistent?
Knowing how real neurodivergent people exercise (not just neurotypical influencers/self help types) would help me immensely. Just like with cleaning and organizing, we often have to do things in a different way, and it doesn’t necessarily look like what you see in magazines and the like. I want to broaden my mind to the full possibilities of what exercising can look like.
I’m no longer young enough for my body to stay basically functional without regular physical exercise. I need to do regular physical activity that involves bearing my own body weight and raising my heart rate.
I need to build up my endurance and develop some arm muscles so basic life tasks like grocery shopping don’t wear me out.
I also need physical activity to reconnect me to my body. Pretty much everything I do (like reading, writing, and interacting with friends online) keeps me still so long I forget I have a body, and then it’s hard to start moving again.
I also need physical activity that involves going outside, and people watching or even interacting with people, to connect me to the world and remind me that I’m real. You know, all those mental health benefits of moving and being in nature.
I also need a way to burn off those intense emotions that can stick around for hours, instead of distracting myself from them. And perhaps, burn off some anxiety/restlessness/hyperactivity, while I’m at it.
I like walking at a moderate pace and could do for hours.
I love yoga, especially of the slow paced type where you focus on how you feel in a pose and intensify it to the maximum point you can stand.
I love dancing to music, including fast paced songs with a strong beat.
Low endurance, physical weakness: I need something low impact and appropriate for someone with low endurance and something like exercise induced asthma.
ADHD Inconsistency and Discouragement: I need goals specific enough to actually do the exercise, yet flexible enough that I won’t get discouraged and stop. I need to either not trigger my perfectionism, or work around it.
Executive Dysfunction: I suck at building habits, especially keeping them consistently. These days, I’m so discouraged from years of frustration with trying to build habits that I rarely try at all. Also, I have difficulty setting SMART goals around exercise especially because I’m not very knowledgeable about what’s healthy and realistic (and am exhausted by the prospect of wading through “bro science” to find useful info).
History of dyspraxia; lack of confidence in my physical body and embarrassed about being physically unfit in front of other people.
Heat sensitivity – it was almost painfully exhausting going outside last summer, which limited the opportunities I had to exercise.
How would you deal with challenges like these?
If you have similar challenges, how do you deal with them?
Any ideas for what sort of exercises to do, how often, etc.?
I will try any suggestions that seem promising. So, you might be able to help me.
I plan to write about what works for me, what doesn’t, and why. Maybe that information will help someone else in a similar situation. If so, you might help other people, too.