Why Sleep Is Always An Issue For Your ADHD Brain & How To Solve It

You're exhausted all day, then suddenly wired at 10pm. That's not random. Research suggests it's tied to a delayed circadian rhythm that's common in ADHD.

In this Research Recap, Skye and Will unpack a paper examining ADHD as a circadian rhythm disorder. This isn't a list of sleep hygiene tips. It's a look at what's actually different in the ADHD body's clock, and why typical advice misses it.

Understanding the delay changes how you plan your day, not just your bedtime.

What We Cover:

• Why energy peaks late even when sleep is the goal
• Daytime melatonin levels found in kids with ADHD
• How light therapy and timing affect circadian reset
• Melatonin dosing research (less works better than more)
• What ultradian rhythms are and how they differ from circadian ones

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 P.S. Losing work because the admin layer around your business can't keep up with you? Invisible Systems is a 90-day done-for-you sprint where I (Skye) extract the processes from your head, build the operating layer, and find the right person to run it. Six spots left at the founding price, book a call at https://www.unconventionalorganisation.com/

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

73 to 78% of people with ADHD are experiencing this delayed sleep-wake cycle. We have this uh shifted melatonin. In this episode, we're going to be discussing a paper called ADHD as a circadian rhythm disorder: Evidence and Implications for Chronotherapy. This is a prospective paper looking at the available research on circadian rhythm dysfunction in ADHD and what works for correcting some of that dysfunction. As we get into it, I think a great place for us to start is to talk about what a prospective paper is, because it's a little different than what we usually take on.

SPEAKER_00 0:29

Before we get started, if you're a business owner making over 100K in a service business and you know that your ADHD is stopping you from getting the results that you want, then it might be time to build an operational layer. We do it for you, for your ADHD brain. We find people, install people, get operators set up. Just click the link down below to do a free business build-out with me to see if you're a fit and we'll get started. Yeah, I mean the biggest difference is that this is not a paper that has a method section or results section. Well, it kind of is examining a bunch of different papers, but it's not doing it in that meta-analytical way. Instead, it's it's yeah, looking at the accumulated evidence.

SPEAKER_01 1:09

And it's like an opinion piece, but it's not like a blog article. Like everything has to be evidence-based, it has to be grounded and supported by the existing scientific literature. So it's a more rigorous opinion.

SPEAKER_00 1:23

Yes, exactly. I will say I didn't know that blog pieces weren't that, which is probably why I ended up being read a lot when I started writing my articles. Because yeah, this is what you would expect. It's it's an academically rigorous article, basically. They really looked at this idea of okay, what is happening with ADHD in sleep? Because for those of you who don't know, there is something happening with ADHD in sleep. If you're like, my sleep is strange and people don't, you know, I I've noticed it, maybe you haven't said it, maybe you just assume it's a bad week, bad day, bad life. But in reality, there are some very specific differences that we can see in people who have ADHD and how they sleep both on a behavioral level, but also on a more of a neurological level and what they're seeing in that. So, do you want to take us through what some of those are?

SPEAKER_01 2:19

Yeah, so they were like looking that, you know, like 73 to 78% of people with ADHD are experiencing this delayed sleep-wake cycle. We have this uh shifted melatonin. So naturally, for humans, when things get dimmer, we start developing melatonin. This just like this is what the circadian rhythm is. It's our connection with the sun, our 24-hour clock, and it is often set by light. And so they found that with ADHD, that's delayed for us by 45 minutes in children, about 90 minutes in adults, which is a huge deal. When everyone else is getting ready to go to sleep, we're not feeling those same hormones going through our bodies.

SPEAKER_00 2:54

In fact, anecdotally, I've heard from a lot of clients and experienced it myself. We can have a second wind.

SPEAKER_01 3:00

Yeah, because uh one of the things to understand about a circadian rhythm is it's you know, like it's energy level going up and down throughout the day, and it's also related to ultradian rhythms, which are like 90-minute cycles. Having your circadian rhythm off and does not necessarily mean your other bodily rhythms are gonna be off too. So you can have energy when you're supposed to be asleep.

SPEAKER_00 3:21

Mm-hmm. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. And they also found so they found different sleep circles uh issues. So with the melatonin, they also noticed that um some studies found abnormally high levels of melatonin during the day in children with ADHD. And I thought that was really interesting because a previous episode, you and I had talked about the idea of daytime sleepiness, and now what we're seeing is some real physical evidence that daytime sleepiness is occurring, which feels a bit chicken and egg, because in that article that we listened we read before, that wasn't part of the conversation. It was just like, is it that they didn't get enough sleep the day before, etc. etc.

SPEAKER_01 4:05

Yeah, but if it's specifically that your circadian rhythm is off, that explains a lot of that.

SPEAKER_00 4:12

And let's let's let's break this down for a second because like if you think about this as just as a rational way, right? Let's say maybe, and I have no idea, some people are evolved to like be have different watch and sleep cycles, you know, for whatever reason. If you were somebody who stayed up later, as a general rule for whatever reason, it makes sense that you would also be somebody who'd want to take an afternoon nap because you'd be tired because you stayed up later. So it's weird that in a world where we take out the school, we take out the work, we just let people do whatever feels natural for them, people with ADHD would still be getting enough sleep because they'd be sleeping in the afternoon and staying up later in the evening.

SPEAKER_01 4:56

Now, with that in mind, they also did talk a lot about light therapy and its effect on this melatonin release and how that was incredibly effective at helping move you back into the right circadian rhythm.

SPEAKER_00 5:10

Yes, exactly, exactly. So they were looking at light therapy in the morning and then obviously the melatonin like supplements as well, as two things that could be very, very helpful.

SPEAKER_01 5:20

And just a note for people that are thinking considering melatonin supplements, less is better. They were looking at 0.5 milligrams. I, you know, if you go into the grocery store, you might see something that's like five milligrams of melatonin. That's way too much. It's not gonna work, and it's gonna be uh less effective than taking a s lower dose. Also, there is other studies that show that just getting like, you know, the over-the-counter melatonin can be really hit or miss on your dosage.

SPEAKER_00 5:46

Interesting. I was gonna ask if you've ever taken melatonin supplements because I haven't, and I do know people who have, but I haven't really heard a lot about the effects. So this was an interesting study for me to kind of get to grips with what this looks like.

SPEAKER_01 6:00

Yeah, I take a like one milligram supplement going to bed, and I do help find that it helps me like. I don't know if it's actually the melatonin or the ritual.

SPEAKER_00 6:10

Yeah, interesting. That's really interesting. Yeah, I have three children, four and under, so I don't need melatonin right now to go to sleep.

SPEAKER_01 6:19

Yeah, so and I think that it's you know, something that we really do need to consider is, you know, when we're thinking about the sleep effects and stuff, and specifically with circadian rhythm, is are we doing things that are go are hurting our circadian rhythm or not? And specifically a lot of the like light exposure late at night versus actually getting like sunlight in the morning or using a light therapy machine, uh, although those are expensive, and you can get like an app on your phone that will like measure light output of something, uh that because it's measured in luxe, and then you can figure out hey, is this actually really bright, or is this you know just I feel like it's really bright?

SPEAKER_00 6:57

Yeah, yeah, that is interesting. And I will say I I yeah, I don't do the melatonin, but I am a big proponent of like turning off all the overhead lights at a certain time. I have an alarm that goes off and I try to turn off all the overhead lights at that point, and I find that's really helpful with going to bed as a family, even if we're not going to bed right now, and and quite frankly, maybe the TV's still even on. If everything is everything is turned off, all the overhead lights are turned off, um, and then we tend to keep our TV on quite dim, just in general. And then the next day, yeah, going outside and standing outside in the morning, even if it's not a super sunny day, it's still a lot brighter in terms of luxe than you think it is. I do think those things have helped.

SPEAKER_01 7:43

So much bright, like even like a my Washington state super overcast days out in the morning, I like a pop out my like luxe meter. I'm like, that is still plenty of light.

SPEAKER_00 7:52

Yeah, yeah. It just doesn't feel it's not the same energy, but but uh it but it's funny, I I do feel a bit like you. I'm like, I'm not sure if it's working or if it's the ritual, because again, with ADHD, it's all like it's now or it's not now. And if I'm outside in the morning and the birds are like doing their thing, or I'm turning off the lights in the evening, it is it is very much part of the routine and the ritual, which is so important for ADHD as well.

SPEAKER_01 8:19

And another thing for uh evening light too is I've put some like dimmer things on some of the lights in my house, and I don't know how dimming the lights makes me so sleepy sometimes, but I'll just be like, oh now it's dim and I want to go to sleep. I'm very, very sleepy now.

SPEAKER_00 8:34

It is true, it is true, and then sometimes occasionally someone will turn on an overhead light and I'm like, no, what did you do? I'll be up for hours.

SPEAKER_01 8:43

Well it's funny too, like having all the lights off, not not a huge uh aspect of making me really sleepy. Because I'm like, it's darkness. I expect it to be dark, but really dim, my body's like, oh, it's slowdown time.

SPEAKER_00 8:56

Yeah, yeah. No, I'm a big fan of like lamps and things. If the kids can't break them, which is always the problem.

SPEAKER_01 9:02

So I yeah, I guess some things just to mention with this paper. So again, it's perspective paper. This is not there's nothing being measured in this paper or anything. It's just looking at the science that's available, but it does have, you know, a fairly compelling argument that doing some chronotherapy things, light exposure, melatonin, and other aspects of like trying to affect your cr circadian rhythm are is an effective way to help treat some of this circadian rhythm disorder that is apparent with ADHD.

SPEAKER_00 9:31

Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the ADHD Skills Lab. If you liked it, leave us a five star review. It helps other people learn more about us. And thank you so much to our wonderful team for making us sound good, look good. We couldn't do it without you.