Why Do I Always Feel Like I’m Behind?

by on Posted on

ADHD, AuDHD, overwhelm and the feeling that you are trying to catch up

2 Sept – written by Katrin Kemmerzehl – Blog

If you have ADHD, or AuDHD, you might sometimes recognise the feeling of having a lot going on in your mind while still finding it difficult to get through the things you want or need to do. For some people, this can leave them feeling as though they are always trying to catch up.

There might be a message you have been meaning to reply to, an appointment you need to arrange or some paperwork that has been waiting for your attention.

Perhaps there’s something small that you’ve thought about several times throughout the day, meaning to get it done, but somehow still haven’t managed to start.

Experiences like these can be part of the difficulties with organisation, planning, time and follow-through that some people with ADHD describe (Sedgwick-Müller et al., 2022).

Sometimes a deadline can change things. Someone is waiting for an answer. An appointment is getting closer. There is no more time left to put something off. Suddenly, you find yourself able to focus and get through something quickly.

And afterwards, you might wonder:

Why couldn’t I have just done that before?

For some people with ADHD, this is one of the most confusing parts of the experience. You know what needs to be done. The intention is there, and it may have been on your mind for hours. Yet somehow, getting started still feels difficult.

When knowing what to do isn’t the same as doing it

You might sit at your laptop with an email open, knowing that the reply will probably take a few minutes. Still, you find yourself making a cup of tea, checking your phone or deciding that you will come back to it later.

Sometimes you spend more time thinking about doing something than it would actually take to do it.

This can be especially frustrating when you know that you are capable of concentrating. There are things that can hold your attention for hours. You can become absorbed in a subject that interests you, lose yourself in a creative project or book, or get completely caught up in solving a problem.

Then there are the ordinary tasks that do not seem to offer the same pull. Getting started can feel much harder.

Research increasingly points to an association between ADHD symptoms and procrastination, with inattention appearing to be particularly relevant (Suriano, 2026). The reasons are likely to be varied and can involve executive functioning, motivation and emotional factors.

From the outside, it can look like putting something off. From the inside, it can feel like being stuck.

When life starts to feel overwhelming

One unfinished task is usually manageable. It can feel very different when several things begin to accumulate.

There is a message you still have not replied to. An appointment needs arranging. Some paperwork is waiting to be completed. The kitchen needs cleaning.

None of these things is particularly unusual. Together, though, they can leave you wondering where to begin.

You might make a list, hoping it will make things feel more manageable, only to find that the list becomes another reminder of everything you have not done.

You tell yourself you will sort it out tomorrow. Sometimes you do.

Other times, tomorrow arrives and there is still just as much waiting for you. When too many things compete for your attention, even deciding what to tackle first can become difficult (Mette, 2023).

If you are autistic as well as having ADHD, you may recognise some of this in a slightly different way. You might find that a preference for structure and predictability sits alongside difficulties with getting started, shifting your attention or following things through.

That can create a frustrating push and pull, knowing what would help, while still finding it hard to get there. And sometimes, there can be more going on beneath the surface.

A change of plans, lots of sensory input, uncertainty or simply having had a lot to adapt to during the day can all make things feel harder. When several things begin to build up, even a small task can start to feel like a lot to take on (Young et al., 2020).

And after a while, you are carrying more than the unfinished tasks. You are carrying the feeling that you should have dealt with them by now.

That can be exhausting. It can also start to change the way you see yourself.

The pressure of feeling that you should be managing better

This is often where ADHD becomes about more than organisation.

If you have repeatedly struggled with things that seem straightforward to others, you may start to question yourself. You might wonder why you can’t seem to keep on top of ordinary life when other people appear to manage it.

Perhaps you have heard comments such as, “You just need to be more organised,” or, “You know what you need to do, so why don’t you just do it?”

Maybe you have been told that you are capable of much more, or that you are wasting your potential.

After hearing messages like these often enough, it is understandable if some of them become part of your own inner voice (Beaton et al., 2022)

You might start thinking of yourself as lazy, unreliable, disorganised or someone who simply can’t get their life together.

A forgotten appointment or unanswered message can then feel like evidence of something much bigger about who you are.

At the same time, there may be a great deal of effort happening that other people never see. Lists, reminders, alarms, plans, mental rehearsals and constant attempts to get yourself back on track can take up a surprising amount of energy.

Someone else may only see the thing you forgot. You are the one who knows how much thought went into trying not to forget it.

This is one reason the emotional side of ADHD matters. The practical difficulty might be that you keep finding yourself catching up with things. But around that can come shame, frustration, anxiety or disappointment in yourself. (Bodalski et al., 2023)

Over time, those feelings can begin to affect something deeper: your confidence in yourself.

When being behind starts to affect how you see yourself

If you have spent years feeling that you are always catching up, you may begin to lose trust in your own intentions.

You make plans and wonder whether you will follow through.

You agree to something, then worry that you will let the other person down.

You promise yourself that next time you will start earlier, remember the date or keep up with the system you have created.

Perhaps you have developed lots of ways to help yourself stay on track. Then life gets busy and things pile up again.

It can be tempting to see that as another personal failure. But there is something else worth noticing in all that effort. You keep looking for ways to make things work.

Over time, you may have become very good at finding your own ways around the things you find difficult. You have probably learned a great deal about yourself in the process: what helps, what doesn’t, when you need more time, and how to get yourself moving when something feels hard to start.

Someone might think you are organised because you arrived early, remembered an important date or completed something before the deadline.

They may never see the thought, planning and mental energy that went into making that happen. It may mean you have been working hard, often without anyone noticing.

And perhaps that is worth recognising too. Not just the things that are difficult, but the resourcefulness you have developed in finding ways to keep going.

When urgency becomes the thing that gets you moving

For some people with ADHD, a deadline can create a level of focus that was difficult to find before.

A task is due tomorrow and suddenly it feels real.

You can concentrate, work quickly and get through something that has been sitting untouched for days.

And afterwards, the familiar thought returns:

I can do this. Why do I always leave it so late?

Adults with ADHD can experience differences in aspects of time perception and time management. Research is varied and the picture is often more complex than the idea time blindness suggests (Mette, 2023; Metcalfe et al., 2024).

For some people, something that is due next week does not feel particularly immediate until the deadline gets much closer. Once it does, the pressure can make it easier to focus.

You may even come to believe that you work best under pressure. There may be some truth in that. But relying on pressure all the time can also be exhausting.

It can mean rushing, staying up late, carrying anxiety about what still needs to be done and spending much of your time waiting for something to become urgent enough to begin.

Perhaps you care more than it looks

One of the more painful parts of these experiences is that difficulty following through can sometimes be mistaken for not caring.

A reply to someone who matters gets forgotten.

Something important gets put off, even though it has been on the mind all day.

Someone may be waiting for a response, a decision or a task to be done, while getting started somehow feels almost impossible.

From the outside, this can be difficult for other people to understand. And sometimes, the gap between caring and being able to follow through can be difficult to understand from the inside too.

This is where it can be useful to become curious about what happens between the intention and the action. Ramsay (2020) describes this as the gap between knowing what you want to do and being able to turn that intention into action.

Maybe the task feels bigger than it looks, and you’re not sure where to start. Perhaps you’re worried about getting it wrong, or you’re not sure how much time or energy it will take. Sometimes, looking at what is happening in that moment can help you understand what is making it so hard to begin.

Rather than asking, ‘Why can’t I just do it?’, another question might be: ‘What was getting in the way?’

What happens when you stop treating every difficulty as a character flaw?

If you have spent years telling yourself that you need to try harder, it can be difficult to step back and look at what happened with curiosity.

Instead of thinking, “I should have been able to do this,” another question might be, “What was making this difficult for me at the time?”

You can recognise that something may have affected another person, while also giving yourself some space to understand what got in the way and what might help next time.That kind of curiosity can make it easier to learn from what happened and find a different way forward.

Perhaps you needed some respite and time to yourself first. Maybe the task needed breaking down, or something about it needed to be more visible. It might be easier to begin when you are alongside another person, or when there is music, movement, a change of surroundings or a clear deadline to help you get going.

These discoveries can be valuable and finding the right supports can make everyday tasks more manageable (Kooij et al., 2019).

Understanding ADHD is partly about finding what works for you, rather than trying to edit yourself to fit what is expected.

There is also another question worth noticing: What happens emotionally when things do not go to plan?

When the inner critic gets involved

When you have been disappointed in yourself many times, self-criticism can become almost automatic.

You forget something and immediately think, ‘Things will never change.‘

You miss a deadline and tell yourself that you should have known better.

You have a difficult week and feel that you are back at square one.

The critical voice may feel as though it is helping by reminding you how important everything is and that you need to do better next time.

But criticism can also leave you feeling ashamed or overwhelmed, making it harder to approach the things you are already struggling with.

Research involving people with ADHD has found that lower self-compassion is associated with poorer mental health (Beaton et al., 2022). This suggests that the way how we respond to ourselves during difficult moments is important.

It can also mean noticing the stories we tell ourselves about who we are, and how those stories can quietly shape the way we understand our lives and ourselves (Gottlieb, 2019).

Being kinder to yourself does not mean ignoring the things that have been difficult. You can recognise when something hasn’t worked and think about what might need to change, while still giving yourself some space to understand what happened and what might help.

Over time, self-compassion can offer something different: a kinder way of understanding yourself that still leaves space to grow, learn and make changes.

What if you don’t have to spend your life catching up?

Perhaps there is a bigger question underneath all of this. If you have spent years trying to become more organised, more consistent and more productive, it can be worth pausing to think about what you are actually trying to catch up with.

Whose expectations are you measuring yourself against?

What does “having it together” mean to you?

And what kind of life do you actually want?

An existential perspective can give you space to consider these questions. It allows you to look beyond getting more done and think about the life you are trying to create (Yalom, 1980).

Perhaps you have been measuring yourself against people with different circumstances. You may begin to notice that some of the standards you have been trying to meet are not necessarily your own.

The things that matter to you can still have a place in your life. You might just find your own way of getting there.

Learning to trust yourself again

For some people, one of the harder consequences of living with ADHD can be losing confidence in themselves.

Plans are made with good intentions, then the worry starts that they might not happen. You might promise yourself that next time will be different, only to find yourself back in the same situation again.

Over time, this can affect your work, relationships and everyday decisions. It can also shape the way you see yourself.

Getting to know yourself a little better can make a real difference. You might begin to notice what feels realistic to manage, what tends to make things easier, what helps you get going.

And most importantly, you can start to find a kinder way of responding when things don’t go to plan. These small discoveries can build confidence that comes from understanding yourself better, recognising what you need and trusting that you can find your way forward.

You can be yourself

Living with ADHD or AuDHD may always involve some degree of distraction, forgetting, difficulty getting started or losing track of time.

There will probably still be messages that sit unanswered longer than you intended. There will be days when the house gets away from you. You may still occasionally find yourself doing something at the last possible moment.

You don’t have to become perfectly organised. Moving forward can be about getting to know yourself a little better and noticing what helps, recognising when things are becoming difficult and finding ways of doing things that work more naturally for you.

There is room for responsibility and self-compassion. It’s okay to care deeply about the people in your life while also recognising that staying connected may sometimes be difficult.

And perhaps, over time, instead of constantly trying to catch up, you can find your own pace, understand yourself with a little more kindness, and build a life that feels more like your own.

How counselling can help

If you’re living with ADHD or AuDHD, you may sometimes find yourself feeling overwhelmed, frustrated or unsure of yourself. Having somewhere to slow things down and make sense of what’s going on can make a real difference.

Perhaps you’re trying to understand why certain things take so much effort, or why you can find some parts of everyday life easier than others. If you’re AuDHD, there may also be experiences around social situations, sensory demands or adapting to what is expected that you’d like to make more sense of.

Counselling can offer a space to explore these things at your own pace, with room to understand yourself a little better and discover what works for you.

Sometimes, having that space can be the beginning of feeling more confident in yourself, more at ease with who you are, and a little more hopeful about where you’re going. If you would like to explore this together, you are very welcome to get in touch.

References

Katrin Kemmerzehl
I’m a qualified counsellor based in Newcastle upon Tyne. Please get in touch if you’d like to arrange a consultation.

Post authorWritten by