ADHD and money: why buying decisions work differently

“I do have the money. I just got a reminder about a bill that had been lying on the table for three weeks. Unopened.”

Next to it in the drawer are three identical pairs of earphones, because the first pair vanished, the second got stuck in some rucksack, and the third arrived in the post a day later than it was needed. On the bank statement there is a subscription to a language-learning app that was opened twice. In an online shop’s basket a camera is waiting, after fourteen comparison reviews have been read. And somewhere in the background is a feeling that anyone who has stood in this spot will recognise: how is it possible that a grown, intelligent person is so “bad” with money?

If this scene is familiar, this post is not a sermon about saving. People with ADHD usually know what would be sensible to do with money. Often better than others, because they have read more about it. The problem is not knowledge but the moment when the knowledge has to be used — and the fact that a brain with ADHD experiences that moment differently.

The “ADHD tax”

Among people with ADHD, a phrase has taken root: the ADHD tax. It describes everything they pay because of the way their attention works rather than because of anything they actually wanted: late fees, reminders, things bought twice, forgotten subscriptions, parking fines, food that went off in the fridge because it was bought for cooking that never happened, and the delivery ordered because there was no energy left to cook.

It is not a clinical term, and nobody has measured it precisely. But research points in the same direction. Theodore Beauchaine’s team, in a population study in Sweden where health and financial records could be linked, found that adults diagnosed with ADHD more often had unpaid debts, poorer credit histories and more financial distress than their peers. And this is not a small group of people: estimates gathered in a 2021 meta-analysis by Peige Song and colleagues suggest that around 6.8 per cent of adults have symptoms of ADHD in adulthood, while roughly 2.6 per cent meet the criteria for persistent ADHD that began in childhood.

It matters what follows from this and what does not. It does not follow that people with ADHD are irresponsible. It follows that everyday financial systems — bills in envelopes, deadlines you have to hold in your head, decisions made in the middle of tiredness — systematically cost them more. Only a psychiatrist or a clinical psychologist can diagnose ADHD; this post is not a test and cannot tell you whether you have it.

What happens in your head when you buy something

When people talk about ADHD, they often talk about dopamine. Often too simplistically, but the core holds: a 2009 study by Nora Volkow and colleagues found changes in the dopamine reward system in adults with ADHD — in the very pathways that decide what feels worth the effort and what does not.

What does that mean in everyday life? A brain that gets too little stimulation from dull, steady tasks looks for stimulation elsewhere. A new object, a new app, a new hobby with all the equipment that goes with it — for a few moments, all of this is intensely alive. Searching, comparing, waiting for the parcel: for a brain that otherwise struggles to wake up, it is like a light switching on. I have written more about why, for all of us, starting is more appealing than keeping going in Why starting is hard and keeping going is harder.

None of this is a weakness of character. If buying something feels good, you are not shallow. In that moment your brain got something it otherwise finds hard to get. The question is not how to forbid it, but how to make sure it does not get it only at the expense of your future self.

Why the future does not feel real

As early as 2002, the psychologist Edmund Sonuga-Barke described what he called delay aversion: for many people with ADHD, waiting is unpleasant in itself, so they choose a smaller reward now over a larger one later. A 2016 meta-analysis by James Jackson and James MacKillop confirmed that in experiments people with ADHD more often choose an immediate sum of money over a larger one that would arrive with a delay. Researchers call this delay discounting.

Why is it like this? Part of the answer lies in how ADHD changes the experience of time. Many people with ADHD say that only two periods exist: now and not now. A bill due in two weeks lives in “not now” — so it barely exists. Savings for next summer’s holiday are as abstract as a weather forecast for six months’ time. The camera in the basket, on the other hand, is very, very now. Why the clock runs differently with ADHD is the subject of the post Time blindness.

This also explains why advice like “think about whether you really need it” is so useless. At the moment of buying, the honest answer is “yes”. The problem is that the person who will be paying the bill in three weeks is not the one sitting at the table right now.

Bills that sit there, and purchases that take weeks

Impulse purchases are the most visible part of the story, but often not the most expensive. What costs more is what does not happen: the bill that is not paid, the returns form that is not sent, the subscription that is not cancelled, the warranty that could not be claimed because the receipt was nowhere to be found.

All of this takes executive functions — the abilities we use to plan, remember what we need to do, start a task and see it through. In ADHD these are exactly the functions under the greatest strain. Russell Barkley, one of the best-known ADHD researchers, therefore describes it above all as a disorder of doing, not of knowing: the person knows what to do, but the knowledge does not reach the action in time.

Paying a bill is a surprisingly demanding job for executive functions. You have to notice the envelope, open it, read it, log in to the bank, find the password, copy the reference number, check it. Each of these steps is small. Together they form a staircase on which attention can trip — and once it trips, the envelope becomes an object better left untouched.

Not every purchase with ADHD is impulsive, though. Often it is the opposite: someone spends three weeks reading vacuum-cleaner reviews, watching comparison videos, building spreadsheets — and in the end does not decide, or buys the most expensive one because it has been at the centre of attention for so long that it has come to feel essential.

This is the other side of the same coin: hyperfocus. When something catches attention, it can absorb it completely, and the time invested in the choice no longer bears any relation to the value of the thing. That can lead to decision fatigue and to the feeling that the purchase had to be “worth it” — that it was not all for nothing. People who have come to know ADHD through work will recognise the same pattern as with excitement about new projects; I wrote about it in ADHD and entrepreneurship: a gift and a burden at once.

Shame that costs more than the late fee

If money were just maths, the solution would be simple. But for people with ADHD, money often has a heavy emotional history. Years of remarks about being “scatterbrained”, “immature” or “hopeless with money” leave a mark. Every reminder becomes proof of an old verdict. And shame has a very predictable effect: it does not lead to action, it leads to withdrawal.

That is how the loop in the infographic above takes shape. A person feels bad about an old bill, so they avoid the banking app. Because they avoid it, they do not know how much they have. Because they do not know how much they have, they buy blind. And when the next reminder arrives, the shame is even greater. The key to leaving this loop is almost never more discipline. It is less shame — and systems that do not require you to pull yourself together every single time.

When buying becomes mainly a way of calming down after a hard day, that is not unique to ADHD. The post Shopping as comfort is about that pattern, in which a parcel stands in for a feeling. With ADHD the two often intertwine: the emotion arrives quickly and strongly, and buying is the fastest route to relief.

Money in a couple where one partner has ADHD

In a relationship, the financial consequences of ADHD rarely stop with one person. The partner without ADHD often slowly takes over all the bills, the insurance and the deadlines that need tracking. At first out of practicality, then out of tiredness, and finally out of mistrust. The partner with ADHD feels watched and childish; the other feels alone with the responsibility. This dynamic, in which one partner becomes a parent to the other, is described in more detail in ADHD in relationships: when one partner becomes the other’s parent; what happens to a couple when money becomes a question of power is covered in Money and power in a couple.

This is how a conversation many couples know might sound (composite, not a real person):

“Another reminder came. For the electricity.”
“I know. I meant to pay it.”
“You meant to pay it last month.”
“Don’t talk to me like I’m a child.”
“Then don’t behave like a …” She stops. “Sorry. I’m tired because I’m carrying all of this in my head.”
“And all I’ve got in my head is that I’ll forget something again. And that you’ll be disappointed again.”

Nobody in this conversation means harm. One person is exhausted from supervising, the other from being supervised. As long as the conversation circles around who is to blame for the reminder, it cannot move. When it moves towards the question “how do we set up a system that does not depend on your memory and my patience?”, space opens up for both of them.

Systems that remember for you

Because the problem is not knowledge, the solution is not more knowledge. Specialists in cognitive behavioural treatment of adult ADHD, such as J. Russell Ramsay and Anthony Rostain, stress the same point: instead of relying on inner motivation at the wrong moment, you arrange your environment so that the right action becomes easier than the wrong one. A few examples that people with ADHD often describe as useful:

• Automatic payments for everything that recurs, dated just after payday. A bill that pays itself needs neither memory nor courage.
• Two accounts: one for fixed costs, the other for what is available to spend as you go. That way the balance on the second account tells the truth without any arithmetic.
• Friction when buying: no saved cards in online shops, no one-click ordering. Every extra step is a space in which your future self can step in.
• A set amount for joy that you do not have to justify. A ban quickly leads to rebellion; a permitted frame does not.
• One box for paperwork somewhere visible and one short slot a week when you open it — ideally in company, with music or with a coffee.

It is also worth knowing that ADHD medication, when prescribed by a doctor, makes a difference for some people in how easily they can tackle dull tasks. That is a decision for the person and their doctor or psychiatrist, so I will not go into it here.

Exercise: a car park for purchases

This exercise does not need a budget, an app or a resolution that from now on you will be a different person. It only needs you to put some space between wanting and buying.

1. Choose a “car park”. It can be a note on your phone, a wish list in an online shop or a sheet of paper on the fridge. Everything you would like to buy that is not food or a necessity goes there first.
2. Add the date and one sentence: why do I want this today in particular? Do not judge the answer. “Because I’m bored” is a perfectly valid one.
3. Wait at least 24 hours. For more expensive things, a week. Waiting is not a punishment but time for tomorrow’s you to join the conversation.
4. When the time is up, read the sentence again. If you still want the thing and can afford it, buy it without guilt. If not, cross it out — and notice that nothing terrible happened.
5. Once a month, look at the crossed-out list. Not to congratulate yourself, but to see what most often sets off your wants. You may find that most of them come at the same times of day or after the same feelings.

Many people who try this notice that a large share of their wants dissolve on their own within a day. That does not mean they were wrong. It only means they belonged to the moment rather than to you.

Where this explanation does not apply

It would be unfair of me not to say where this story stops being true.

Not every financial muddle is ADHD. Impulse buying, putting off bills and avoiding bank statements are deeply human. They turn up with depression, burnout, anxiety, grief, or simply when someone is overloaded. ADHD is a developmental condition that shows up across several areas of life and from childhood onwards — not just with money. If you recognise yourself in this description, that is a reason to talk to your GP, who can refer you to a psychiatrist or clinical psychologist, not a reason to diagnose yourself.

ADHD is not an excuse for everything. An explanation helps us understand why something is hard. It does not remove responsibility towards the people our decisions affect. Quite the opposite: once you know where you get stuck, you can take responsibility more precisely.

When debts are growing, or gambling is involved, that is something other than absent-mindedness. ADHD is linked to a higher risk of developing addictions, including gambling, and that needs a different kind of help. There is more in the post Gambling: an addiction with no smell. If your debts have already gone beyond what you can manage, it also makes sense to seek professional financial or debt advice — psychotherapy does not replace it.

If thoughts that it would be better if you were not here come up around money, this is no longer a question of a bill-paying system. In Slovenia, call the crisis line Klic v duševni stiski on 01 520 99 00 (every day from 7 pm to 7 am) or the Samaritans helpline on 116 123 (24 hours a day), and in an emergency, 112.

What therapy can offer

Psychotherapy will not pay your bills or set up your standing orders for you. But it can help with the part no system solves: the shame that has built up over years, the roles families hand out to the one who is “bad with money” and the one who has to take care of everything, and what money means to you and what you learned about it at home.

In relational family therapy, in which I am training, we also look at how attitudes to money pass from one generation to the next. A mother’s fear of going without, or a father who spent when he was hurting, can settle quietly in us — and when ADHD joins in, it is sometimes hard to tell which is which. Once you can tell them apart, you can put something down.

What to remember

• With ADHD, the difficulty with money is usually not about knowledge but about the moment of doing — when the knowledge has to be used.
• Research links ADHD to preferring a reward now over later and to more financial distress.
• Shame leads to avoidance, and avoidance to new reminders. Less shame is often the first condition for more order.
• What helps are systems that do not need memory: automatic payments, two accounts, waiting before buying, a permitted amount for joy.
• A psychiatrist or clinical psychologist makes the diagnosis; with fast-growing debts or gambling you also need a different kind of help.