ADHD and Sleep Challenges: Why Falling Asleep Is Harder Than It Should Be
- Kaitlyn Boudreault
- Oct 6
- 10 min read
Updated: Oct 18
Sleep is a basic need for every human. On average, adults need roughly 7-9 hours of it per night.
But if you have ADHD, hitting this target can feel complicated. Despite wanting to get enough rest, you may experience sleep deficits and have trouble falling or staying asleep.
In fact, an estimated 25% to 50% of people with ADHD experience sleep problems, ranging from insomnia to secondary sleep conditions.
These sleep deficits may make you feel restless or fatigued. This fatigue can worsen your symptoms of ADHD, including inattention, impulsivity, hyperactivity, emotional dysregulation, and executive dysfunction.
As your ADHD symptoms worsen, these sleep issues intensify, and the medication taken to manage the ADHD can make it more difficult to get deep, restorative rest.
At Blue Sky Learning, we understand that sleep is a vital component of managing ADHD, and we provide neurodiversity-affirming therapy and ADHD coaching to help you explore why sleep is so difficult for people with ADHD and understand how to manage it.
In this blog, we’ll delve into what the connection is between ADHD and sleep issues, the common sleep disorders that are experienced by individuals with ADHD, and how to manage these sleep disturbances.
Why Sleep Is Harder for People With ADHD
If you have ADHD, sleep challenges can stem from a combination of neurological, behavioural, and environmental factors.
An Overactive Mind and Hyperarousal
One of the underlying hallmark symptoms of ADHD is hyperactivity, which can include an overactive mind. You may experience racing thoughts and heightened activity within the brain.
This hyperarousal, which involves being in a heightened state of alertness, can interfere with the natural progression from wakefulness to sleep. You could be attempting to sleep at one moment, and the next moment you could be thinking, “Did I reply to that email? Wait, what was that email about again? Or maybe “What if I reorganized my entire closet… right now?” These thoughts can make it difficult to wind down at night and fall asleep. Even though you want to sleep and may be feeling physically tired, you may seem to want to remain “switched on.” Its inability to switch off is preventing you from falling asleep.
Irregular Sleep-Wake Cycles
The sleep-wake cycle involves the 24-hour pattern of sleeping and being awake. This cycle is controlled by your circadian rhythm and sleep homeostasis.
Your circadian rhythm is an internal clock. It regulates alertness, sleepiness, and other bodily functions throughout the day. Sleep homeostasis is referred to as the built-up “sleep pressure.” This pressure to sleep builds up during the day, driving you to become more tired at night. It also reduces as you sleep, which leads to a balance between sleep and wakefulness. These two forces work together, with light that cues the circadian clock in your suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) to promote wakefulness and release hormones like melatonin that induce sleep.
But if you have ADHD, these circadian rhythms are usually out of whack, and you may experience inconsistent sleep-wake patterns. This may mean that you go to bed later because your body cues sleep at a later time than it does for others. You may also sleep in on the weekends or experience varying wake times. Such irregularity in your sleep-wake patterns further disrupts the circadian rhythm. Without a stable rhythm, even small lifestyle changes may feel ineffective.
Sensory Sensitivities
Sensory sensitivities are a core symptom for many individuals with ADHD. External stimuli, such as noise, light, temperature fluctuations, or the feel of the bedding, may prevent you from falling asleep. These sensitivities may also cause frequent awakenings because even subtle distractions, like a buzzing phone or light from a passing car, can be enough to disturb your sleep.
ADHD is often linked with emotional dysregulation. Those with ADHD may have a difficult time regulating their emotions. As a result, you may experience worries, rumination, and stress that could intensify at night when distractions from the day are removed. This makes it harder to fall asleep. These emotional symptoms may also trigger you to wake up at night and reduce overall sleep quality.
Co-occurring Conditions
There are several conditions that often co-occur alongside ADHD. These conditions include anxiety, depression, insomnia, restless legs syndrome (RLS), sleep apnea, and delayed sleep phase syndrome (DSPS). Each of these conditions, either alone or concurrently, can exacerbate your sleep difficulties. This creates a cycle where the symptoms of these conditions worsen your sleep, which worsens your ADHD symptoms. When your ADHD symptoms worsen, your sleep also worsens.
Sleep Disorders Commonly Found in Individuals With ADHD
Any one of us can have a bad night's sleep. But sleep disorders go beyond this. If you have a sleep disorder, it can make it difficult to fall or stay asleep or get deep, restorative rest. You may also feel impulsive or distractible during the day due to the lack of sleep. Individuals with ADHD tend to have higher rates of sleep disorders. But the symptoms of ADHD and sleep disorders often overlap, so the sleep disorder may go undiagnosed as a result.
The sleep disorder can vary among individuals with ADHD, but some of the common disorders to watch out for include:
Insomnia
Insomnia is characterized by difficulty falling asleep, staying asleep, or achieving restorative sleep. Studies indicate that individuals with ADHD are at an increased risk for insomnia.
Some individuals with ADHD may experience less hyperactivity during the day and then get a burst of energy at night. These energy spurts, alongside racing thoughts, can result in hyperfocusing on a project, which can interfere with sleep.
If you take certain medications for ADHD or have trouble sticking to a schedule, this may also increase your risk of insomnia. When you fall asleep (if you do), you may not be getting deep, restorative sleep due to sensory sensitivities and emotional arousal. This can be especially true if you have nightmares. For those who experience anxiety alongside their sleep challenges, the stress from not being able to fall asleep can make the insomnia worse.
Insomnia can result in daytime fatigue, irritability, reduced attention, and amplified ADHD symptoms.
Sleep apnea is a sleep disorder that involves stopping and starting breathing throughout the night. This sleep disorder disrupts the body’s oxygenation as a result and can also impact sleep stages, which can lead to cognitive impairment. The symptoms of this cognitive impairment often mimic or worsen ADHD symptoms. Some studies report that about 20-30% of individuals with ADHD experience sleep apnea, or sleep-related breathing issues, including snoring and interrupted breathing. Obesity rates tend to be higher in adults with ADHD, and this is a risk factor for sleep apnea.
Your circadian rhythm allows your body to make changes throughout the day to adjust to the amount of light or darkness within a 24-hour period. But if you have ADHD, your body may not be fully tuned to the normal 24-hour sleep-wake cycle. It may not release the hormone melatonin at the right time. As a result, you may have a difficult time falling asleep because your body doesn’t cue at nighttime when it should. If you have bright lights, especially artificial blue lights from your laptop or tablet, this can also throw off your body’s internal clock.
Delayed sleep-wake phase disorder (DSPS) is a type of circadian rhythm disorder that is commonly experienced by those with ADHD. Typically, those with ADHD who have DSPS experience a delay in the sleep-wake cycle of about 2 hours or more. It can make it more difficult to manage time-sensitive activities, such as work or school.
Restless leg syndrome is a condition that makes you have a strong urge to move your legs, often due to discomfort within your limbs. You may experience pulling, throbbing, aching, or itching in your legs, which causes you to move them. Restless leg syndrome is more common in those with ADHD. It occurs in about 44% of those with ADHD.
If you have narcolepsy, you may fall asleep suddenly during the day. This can make it difficult to sleep soundly at night. Although the link between ADHD and narcolepsy is not exactly clear, some research shows that adults with narcolepsy were more likely to experience ADHD symptoms as children.
Some underlying causes may involve the fact that the sleepiness in narcolepsy increases the risk of ADHD symptoms, or both disorders may stem from a genetic basis.
Challenges for those with ADHD and Sleep Disorders
ADHD burnout cycle
The ADHD burnout cycle involves a pattern of stress and exhaustion that occurs in individuals with ADHD, usually as a result of the challenges involved with managing ADHD symptoms and the struggles that those with ADHD experience on a daily basis.
Initial Enthusiasm: Individuals with ADHD may originally experience enthusiasm for the task at hand. But the task may require ongoing, sustained focus and effort.
ADHD Symptom Impact: ADHD symptoms, such as inattentiveness and impulsivity, can get in the way of staying focused.
Frustration: These ADHD symptoms tend to lead to frustration because you really want to complete the task, but your brain doesn’t seem to want to work with you.
Stress and Lack of Task Completion: The inability to complete tasks that you want to complete can lead to stress.
Overcompensation: You may overcompensate by staying up late at the office or working unpaid hours on the weekend.
Avoidance: The feelings of overwhelm make it difficult to focus and motivate yourself to complete the task, and you are more likely to get distracted. As you get more frustrated, you may engage in avoidance behaviours, and your brain may resort unconsciously to procrastination.
Exhaustion: This cycle continues, and you continue to feel a sense of hopelessness because of the lack of progress. You start to criticize yourself constantly, which can lead to burnout and exhaustion.
An individual with ADHD can cycle through any of these stages, even if they try their very best not to.
ADHD morning anger isn’t an officially recognized diagnosis. But it is something that is experienced by some individuals with ADHD and involves feelings of irritability or anger upon waking up.
There isn’t a specific cause for ADHD morning anger, but some of the common causes may include:
Sensory Sensitivities: The stimulation from noise, light, and other stimuli that may be more pronounced in the morning can cause individuals with ADHD to feel stressed. This stress could result in the secretion of the hormone cortisol, which can be associated with increased irritability.
Executive Dysfunction: Individuals with ADHD tend to face challenges with organization, planning, and time management. These challenges can make it difficult to plan out a morning routine, and mornings become chaotic. When you have a difficult time getting ready for the day, it can make you feel frustrated and irritable.
Emotional Dysregulation: If you have ADHD, it can be difficult to regulate your emotions. When you move from a state of sleep to waking up, it can feel overwhelming. This change can result in emotional outbursts.
Poor Sleep Quality: Sleep quality is associated with mood. Insufficient sleep could lead to fatigue during the day. As a result, you may be more irritable and have difficulty regulating your emotions in the morning.
Sleep Tips for Adults With ADHD and Sleep Problems
Boost Your Sleep Environment
Your bedroom environment plays a significant role in your sleep quality. It can help signal that it is time to sleep, or it may play a role in creating a distraction and making it more difficult to fall asleep.
To optimize the sleep environment, try the following:
Temperature: Keep your room cool (16–19°C / 60–67°F).
Darkness: Use blackout curtains or a sleep mask to maintain darkness. This helps to boost melatonin production and signal sleep.
Sound: Consider a white or pink noise machine to block external noise. Sounds like rain or ocean waves improve sleep stability.
Declutter: A tidy space reduces stress and creates a more inviting sleep environment.
Consistent Sleep Schedule
Individuals with ADHD often have a difficult time with routine, which can disrupt their sleep-wake cycle. To help you try to sleep, maintain a consistent sleep-wake schedule. It doesn’t matter when you do so, as long as it works for you and is consistent. This will help to anchor your circadian rhythm with your energy levels.
If it is difficult to try to get consistent with both your sleep and wake cycles, try to consider focusing on only one anchor point by waking up at a similar time every day. Since mornings can feel boring for the ADHD mind, focus on adding something enjoyable to your morning routine, such as coffee, taking a walk, or engaging in journaling.
Light Exposure
Exposure to natural light helps regulate the circadian rhythm.
Morning: Aim for 20 minutes of sunlight shortly after waking.
SAD Light: If it is winter and the amount of light in a day is lower, a bright “happy lamp,” which is also known as a SAD light, can simulate natural light.
Limit Screen Time Before Bed
Blue light from screens suppresses melatonin for twice as long as other types of light and can keep your brain activated at night. You should aim to avoid screens about 30 to 60 minutes before bed. If you need to use screens around bedtime, try to use a blue light protector and dim overhead lighting.
Exercise and Physical Activity
Many individuals with ADHD may experience stress around bedtime. Physical activity can help to reduce stress, anxiety, and hyperarousal. Attempt to engage in 30–40 minutes per day. It may help if this is done earlier in the day to avoid stimulating effects near bedtime.
Mindfulness and Relaxation Techniques
Mindfulness exercises help calm a racing mind and promote restful sleep. These activities could include:
Guided meditation
Gentle yoga
Calming music, brown noise, or sleep-focused podcasts
Warm Baths and Herbal Teas
A warm bath or shower relaxes the muscles and signals the body it’s time to wind down. Herbal teas, such as chamomile or passionflower, can also support a natural transition to sleep.
Lifestyle Considerations
Other factors can influence sleep quality in ADHD:
Caffeine: Avoid consumption in the afternoon or evening.
Nicotine & Stimulants: Limit use, as they can delay sleep onset.
Eating Patterns: Heavy meals close to bedtime may interfere with sleep. If you need to eat, lighter evening snacks may be preferable.
Treatment Options for ADHD-Related Sleep Problems
If basic sleep hygiene strategies aren’t enough, you may want to seek professional support to help with managing your sleep-related challenges. The following approaches may be of help:
CBT-I involves a structured program that helps you identify and change your thoughts or behaviours that may contribute to insomnia. It can be particularly effective for those with ADHD because it targets both cognitive and behavioural components of sleep disruption.
Medication Management
Medication is deeply personal. Some ADHD medications can interfere with sleep, while others may be beneficial. In certain cases, sleep-specific medications like melatonin may be recommended. Always consult a healthcare provider to balance ADHD symptom management with optimal sleep.
Need Support? Book a Free Consultation
Are your sleep challenges impacting your daily life?
If you’re ready to improve your sleep and manage ADHD more effectively, reach out to Blue Sky Learning. Our virtual clinic serves neurodivergent individuals globally. We provide personalized care to help you sleep better and live well.
References
https://www.webmd.com/add-adhd/adult-adhd-and-sleep-problems
https://www.additudemag.com/adhd-sleep-disturbances-symptoms
https://www.sleepfoundation.org/mental-health/adhd-and-sleep
Fadeuilhe, C., Daigre, C., Richarte, V., & Corrales, M. (2020). Insomnia Disorder in Adult ADHD Patients: Clinical, Comorbidity, and Treatment Correlates. Frontiers in Psychiatry. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2021.663889
Youssef NA, et al. (2011). Is obstructive sleep apnea associated with ADHD? Ann Clin Psychiatry. 23(3):213–24. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21808754/
Roy M, et al. (2018). Association Between Restless Legs Syndrome and Adult ADHD in a German Community-Based Sample. J Atten Disord. 22(3):300–308. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25555628/
van Andel E., et al. (2022). ADHD and Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome in Adults: Effects of Chronotherapy on Sleep. Journal of Biological Rhythms. doi:10.1177/07487304221124659
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