how do programmers with ADHD become successful?
Posted by JustinGames59@reddit | learnprogramming | View on Reddit | 80 comments
At one point, I was on top of my work last year. But then I stopped for a day, and it went downhill.
My exam is at the end of April, and I don't even remember what a while loop is.
My language is C, and I'm a 1st year ICT student.
Error-7-0-7-@reddit
What really helped me was getting a dual monitor set up. No joke having something playing in the background while I programmed helped me.
lskesm@reddit
Context switching is pretty easy if you can’t focus on one thing at the time for too long.
InnerWolf@reddit
Ahh yes…but be sure to consider all of the extra overhead
fudginreddit@reddit
By enjoying programming enough to stay focused on it.
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
ADHD can be a virus. I love to code, but it will literally pull you away, causing physical pain.
copingthroughlife@reddit
If you have something to help you stimulate enough to focus like music while doing programming.
Highly recommend.
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
recent i have been using HDHD Music, but that just gets rid of the headache
Krotekoker@reddit
I can’t stay focussed on anything. Only when shit hit’s the fan I can totally lock in. That’s why I always volunteer to be on emergency stand-by.
It’s the same when playing a game like Magic the Gathering. I play my best when there is something on the line, if it’s just for fun, I start thinking about anything except what’s going on in the game..
Never tried meds tho.
Sufficient_Duck_8051@reddit
Hyper focus + meds
e1m8b@reddit
Programmers still do weed or is it all pharmaceuticals these days? Exogenous substances use in technology and science isn't acknowledged enough despite the influence being obvious throughout the eras and the resulting focus areas based on the specific drug haha
Sufficient_Duck_8051@reddit
If you’re diagnosed with ADHD then meds are normal way of treatment , regardless of whether you’re a programmer or not
Witty-Afternoon-2427@reddit
Keeping things in small daily chunks and sticking to a simple routine matters more than motivation, even on low focus days.
curious_dax@reddit
speed of iteration is your moat when you're small. big teams can't move that fast. use it.
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
ok
curious_dax@reddit
I died laughing when I saw this comment
leviem1@reddit
ADHD here. Dropped out of college after my second year. My only decent grade was my CS classes because that’s all I could motivate myself to focus on because I enjoyed it
It took me a while to get my first job due to not having a degree but I eventually got one. A ton of my coworkers are also ADHD. Maybe not at larger companies, but the culture of the industry has also seemed to celebrate this. There are days I don’t get any work done because I can sit still at my desk. Other days I lock in for 12 hours straight and open 10 pull requests.
My biggest struggle has always been parallelism. If I have 5 different projects I’m working on, I have a hard time prioritizing them and keeping a steady velocity. I just try to avoid this by communicating with my managers that I prefer to focus on a smaller number of tasks even if they’re more complex.
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
everybody ADHD is different; I was watching One Piece straight, nothing else, but when I caught up with the dub and had to wait for the other batches to drop, it just became a pain.
It took me weeks just to watch 12 episodes, and i enjoyed every single one, it's just idk i cn't explain it.
I
Do you feel physical pain from your ADHD?
leviem1@reddit
The physical pain might just be from having to learn C
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
nah
it like your head is exploding. bc all at one, you remember all the things you have yet to do.
It likes tiny midlife crises
_bashimi_@reddit
This sounds like it could be physical anxiety which is really common along side adhd. People always think anxiety is just a feeling like fear or overwhelm but it 100% causes physical pain too.
It could also be something I call the wall. I think it is probably a different sensation for everyone with ADHD but I've found others who feel something similar too.
For me Its like there is an actual brick wall between me and the word, or concept, or thought I'm trying to latch on to and im physically pressing my head through it trying to reach the other side. The sensation actually feels like I'm pressing against it. It's completely a mental thing but still, it is one of my least favorite parts of my condition.
Best thing Ive found, and took me way too long to actually start doing this. Going for a walk. I had to force myself at first but just walking for like 40 minutes a day started clearing a lot of this up for me. You get the physical action of movement but you are able to simply think about whatever you need to. I think it just relaxes me enough that that blockage and anxiety falls away enough to get back to it.
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
nah, it's hot on the island.
No joke.
leviem1@reddit
I don’t get physical pain but yeah I definitely get overwhelmed and shut down. It actually makes me tired more than anything. I make a list. I had a whiteboard that was pretty game changing for me
A lot of the anxiety I’ve felt was entirely is self imposed. Yes you should take your overflowing trash out, but nobody’s gonna die if you don’t
I was so stressed about getting my first job, and then as soon as I got it I realized I never really thought beyond that and was then equally stressed about not having anything to stress about, haha! It was never that deep in hindsight
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
yeah.
leviem1@reddit
100% and I totally get how those phases come and go with no warning. Even things you want to do you can’t seem to. Just wanted to make sure it wasn’t anything deeper
Aside from a bad case of restless leg syndrome that’s slowly becoming a pattern of insomnia, no physical pain
You talking like if something lightly brushes your arm it almost feels sharp?
ZealousidealFudge851@reddit
Lists.
Frolo_NA@reddit
paige watson has several youtube talks and podcasts specifically about SWE with adhd
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69aVBkPYwKs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sEXqSEswtw
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
👍
BroaxXx@reddit
Go to codecrafters.io and just do whatever is their free project this month. It’s not meant to teach you how to program. It just gives you a cool project to focus your attention on and does some hand holding/decisions for you so you don’t get stuck with that initial paralysis.
The free tier even has a small bonus for people with adhd which is you don’t even need to spend energy choosing a project as you only got one choice.
I like it and I recommend it
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
W
Rachel666888@reddit
Welcome to the club. Half of the best senior devs I know are ADHD as hell.
The "downhill" feeling isn't you losing your brain; it's just you losing momentum. For us, momentum is everything. When the engine stops, restarting it feels like pushing a tank uphill.
The "5-Minute Rule" for your C exam: Don't tell yourself you're going to "study C." That's too big for an ADHD brain. Tell yourself you're just going to open the IDE and write one
printfstatement. That's it. Usually, once the barrier to entry is gone, hyperfocus kicks in and you'll find thatwhileloop again.JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
yeah i can see that working.
unknwnerrr@reddit
Adderall
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
i don't have any
PinnoAbdulRauf@reddit
Dopamine boost by solving problems, powered by great intuition
cyberbemon@reddit
Honestly you are not making it far without medication. I was undiagnosed until the age of 29 (I didn't know I had this) I paid for it dearly, with so many job switches, probation extensions etc. Once you get the meds you are able to follow through with your plans and what not. I recently came across this post and this sums up the best way to work with your ADHD and it's written by a software engineer. I highly recommend reading through this
https://borretti.me/article/notes-on-managing-adhd
Victor64@reddit
At the end of the day you still need to put in the work
Dont know what a while loop is? Google it! Its not a long read. Then try to write one out. Write out a few print statements in the loop until you do understand it
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
👍
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
👍
402erro@reddit
hyperfixate, burnout, rinse and repeat
_bashimi_@reddit
and don't forget to drink some water
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
ok. thx
Old-Cobbler1216@reddit
This is all anecdotal on my part, so take it with a grain of salt.
Personally I'm medicated for it, and that helps me to a tremendous degree but I still find myself coding when I'm not on my meds. The biggest difference there is that when I am medicated, I am far, far more willing to read books about software concepts and dig into source code than I am if i'm not medicated.
When I'm off my meds though, what keeps me engaged is just grappling with a problem in my editor that I have been bugged by for a while. When it takes real digging to figure something out that's when I can really absorb something and commit it to memory when I'm not medicated
_bashimi_@reddit
I'm surprised more haven't mentioned this too. Medication and forcing myself to start physically exercising were the two biggest game changers I ever found for my ADHD. And my brain fought against both of them for way too long lol After that sitting and tinkering with something just fuels the hyperfocus.
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
bro is just a theory programmer. lol.
ADHD is different for everyone.
mleclerc182@reddit
For better or worse it's my hyperfocus and I can't stop until I figure out an error or otherwise I will just be up all night thinking about it.
m0rgoth666@reddit
I have a thing where i put on extreme metal and it actually acts somewhat like white noise and enables my hyperfocus. Being able to do that pretty much made my whole career work out.
_bashimi_@reddit
Ooo this too. I feel like a lot of us have a genre that makes it easier to slip into HF. In college I couldn't study to save my life unless I had over ears on blasting shoegaze. Ive been using brown noise a lot lately too. Not as much risk of me swapping focus to the lyrics lol
someRedditUser3012@reddit
Came to say this. I've woken up at 1am with an ah ha moment and made it work (making the cd drive open in c++). Yeah, it was a while ago....lol.
Use your super powers man
ZelphirKalt@reddit
That reminds me of something ... When I was a little child with merely a MSDOS5 computer, with broken mouse, unable to expand directories in the directory tree view, one night I had a dream. In that dream I visually saw the tree view of directories of MSDOS in front of me and I said: "But I cannot click it!" (because my mouse was broken) and then a voice in my head said: "Well, why don't you press the + key?". When I woke up, I rushed to the old computer and tried it ... it worked! New DOS games unlocked ...
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
same
johnnybgooderer@reddit
I do my best pre deploy debugging in my sleep and then I fix it in the morning.
Emotional-Narwhal-24@reddit
ADHD dev here. Pomodoro timer (25min on, 5 off) was a game changer — the hardest part is starting, but once you're in, hyperfocus works for you.
Also: background noise. Silence kills focus, lyrics are distracting. I just leave marshmellow.live/code-radio running — free ambient stream, no decisions. One less thing for your brain to manage.
You have 3 weeks. That's enough for C fundamentals. Pick one topic a day, write 5 small programs, move on. Don't try to catch up on everything at once.
tz_2240@reddit
I take my amphetamine pills
OVO_Capalot@reddit
Do they work?
tz_2240@reddit
Very much so
OVO_Capalot@reddit
What do you take if you don’t mind me asking?
jrockerdraughn@reddit
In the event that you somehow don't recover from this and everything goes to shit (which isn't likely at all. You're gonna improve) I recommend the free Harvard cs50 course(s). David Malan, as you might expect from a Harvard professor, is a wonderful teacher. His lectures are on YouTube organized by semester if you don't want to actually sign up.
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
I'm not American.
And I think bro code will be easier for me. ADHD is not my only disability.
But yeah. thx
jrockerdraughn@reddit
American-ness.... Doesn't matter?
You seem to speak English; that and an Internet connection are the only things required. Just ftr
(I hope that didn't sound snappy. It wasn't meant to be)
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
all good g
Formal_Wolverine_674@reddit
Start tiny and stay consistent with short focused sessions because ADHD brains thrive on momentum more than motivation
lonewalker181@reddit
check out some of Primeagen's videos talking about ADHD:
Is ADHD Bad For Programming?
ADHD discussion
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
yeah
Geno0wl@reddit
Give yourself a project to work towards. Something simple like a bowling score tracker. I find learning through doing drills in how those concepts functionally work
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
yeah.
Own-Process6332@reddit
I find that work is easier for me than getting things done at home. I use the systems and tools I have for organisation as annoying as they can be. For me everything is a Jira ticket, inbox is clean, calendar is up to date, teams messages read and organised, misc notes stored in OneNote.
Sounds like a pain but it actually gives me more time to focus on code (I find I get locked in/hyper focused on fixing bugs or building features, as long as it’s a challenge). Your mileage may vary.
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
With ADHD, as long as you're happy and know what you're doing.
Life is really a breeze.
_bashimi_@reddit
Our brains need to get a dopamine kick more than other people from what we are working on and the best way to get it is to make something you can finish and see it work.
I had crashed out earlier today because I hit a wall in learning to code where I just couldn't stand learning bits and pieces that aren't connected to anything larger. I realized almost right away its just my weird little ND brain tripping over itself. Learning that way is terrible for me. I can do it for a time but eventually it becomes too much of a chore. I have to get back into building projects alongside it or I will just get overly frustrated and beat myself up.
Put together a small project or two you want to try. Something you can tinker with over the weekend and uses some of what you've learned. Work in a reason to practice loops, lists, dicts, whatever you've been covering. tinker with it. get it to work.
Building something start to finish, however small, will give your brain the reward it wants.
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
🦭
patternrelay@reddit
A lot of it comes down to reducing friction and making things really small and concrete. Instead of "study C", just aim to write one tiny program or review one concept like loops for 20 minutes. Consistency beats intensity here, and having a simple routine or checklist helps you restart even after a bad day.
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
i can just spend 45 min a day on code. Or 45 min 2 times a day.
But the hard part is actually doing it.
bc I did do it for a while, but once you go off it's hard to get back on.
Ok_Assistant_2155@reddit
for your exam specifically, don’t try to relearn everything perfectly
focus on high-frequency basics like loops, conditions, and simple programs
practice writing small code snippets daily instead of just reading
even if it feels slow, consistency over the next few weeks will matter more than cramming
you’re not starting from zero, you’re just a bit out of rhythm
get back into it step by step, not all at once
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
The exam is on structure or function idk.
All I know is that arrays and for loops will be there.
i just have to write 5 different problems every day.
SeparateBroccoli4975@reddit
By iterating on a loop that writes one line of code with a positive-feedback mechanism to keep everything moving in a meaningful direction.
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DTux5249@reddit
Make shit.
Have fun.
Learn by doing.
Keep projects small/manageable.
Don't be afraid to switch things up.
You will abandon projects. Be sure to write readable & modifiable code the first time if you don't like rereading.
Whenever you learn a new concept: write something simple that uses it. It's how I learned Design Patterns, and DSA.
DO NOT AI. I REPEAT DO NOT GPT.
JustinGames59@reddit (OP)
yeah i should do that.
Crumbsisnottobeeaten@reddit
A lot of programmers with ADHD become successful by building systems that help them work consistently(projects that piques your interest) instead of trying to relying only on motivation.
Since your exam is at the end of April, I would focus on getting back into small steps right away. Do not try to relearn everything in one day. Start with one basic topic, like while loops, and practice only that until it feels familiar again. Then move to the next small topic.
A few things that can help in the future:
Study in short sessions, like 20 to 25 minutes, then take a short break
Break coding practice into tiny goals, such as “write one while loop” or “solve one small problem”
Review concepts by writing and running very small C programs instead of only reading notes
Make a simple daily routine, even if it is only 30 minutes of practice
Success does not mean never struggling. It usually means learning how to restart after setbacks. Since you already did well before, that means you can build that skill again.
denerose@reddit
The actual job isn’t about memorising stuff. Get through this time with appropriate supports and don’t assume how or even what they’re teaching you is any indication of what the job will be like.
Your school will have mental health services and disabilities support. Go talk to both of them and make use of those services while you’re able to.