FFP 616 | Is Your Menstrual Cycle Making Your ADHD Worse?
Fertility Friday | Fertility Awareness Mastery for Women's Health Professionals
Fertility Friday Radio | Fertility Awareness for Pregnancy and Hormone-free birth control
4.8 • 869 Ratings
🗓️ 6 March 2026
⏱️ 20 minutes
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Summary
In this episode of the FAMM Research Series, Lisa examines peer-reviewed research on the relationship between ADHD symptoms and the menstrual cycle, exploring how reproductive hormones may influence symptom variability in women. The episode draws on a study titled "Reproductive Steroids and ADHD Symptoms Across the Menstrual Cycle," which tracked salivary hormone levels and self-reported ADHD symptoms throughout participants' cycles. Lisa discusses key findings suggesting that the luteal phase — when progesterone is elevated and estrogen is comparatively lower — may be associated with a higher presentation of ADHD-related symptoms in women. She also highlights a secondary study on misdiagnosis, examining the specific challenges women face in receiving an accurate ADHD diagnosis, including patterns of being treated for anxiety or depression before the underlying condition is identified. Throughout the episode, Lisa connects these findings to the broader value of menstrual cycle charting as a tool for recognizing cyclical symptom patterns in clinical practice.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | You thought it would be easy. Teach them to chart their menstrual cycles. They said, help them learn to use the menstrual cycle as a vital sign, they said. And then you saw the charts. You saw things that you didn't even know were possible and you really don't know how to interpret them. Fortunately, I've created the perfect solution for you. I want to share with you our top |
| 0:23.0 | resource for women's health professionals how to interpret virtually any chart your client |
| 0:27.8 | throws at you. This new resource breaks down complex chart interpretation into an easy step-by-step |
| 0:34.0 | process. It will give you the tools you need to better support your clients. |
| 0:38.5 | Head over to fertility friday.com slash chart to snag your complimentary copy today. |
| 0:44.0 | That's fertility friday.com slash chart. |
| 0:47.2 | This is the Fertility Friday podcast, episode number 616. 16. |
| 1:09.2 | Today's episode is all about ADHD, and it turns out that not only does ADHD show up differently in women, but unsurprisingly, |
| 1:14.2 | symptoms do shift around the menstrual cycle. So in today's episode, |
| 1:22.8 | we are diving in to a study that looks at how ADHD symptoms change with the menstrual cycle. |
| 1:29.2 | And if you're noticing my horse voice, don't worry, I pre-recorded this episode, so you won't have to listen to my horse voice the whole time. So without further ado, let's go ahead and jump into |
| 1:34.8 | today's episode. |
| 1:40.7 | Today I'm sharing another brand new episode in our fan research series. This topic was actually brought to me by one of our fan practitioners who expressed interest in it. And the topic of ADHD, of course, I am not an expert in attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, but it was brought to my attention the potential |
| 2:03.7 | correlation between symptoms and the menstrual cycle. So in today's fam research series, we are |
| 2:09.7 | diving into a research article that looked at that specific question to try to determine if there |
| 2:16.6 | was a link between symptoms and |
| 2:18.9 | the menstrual cycle. So we're going to go ahead and talk a little bit more about the potential |
| 2:23.4 | link and how that could affect women who struggle with this condition. The title of the study |
| 2:29.0 | we're going to be diving into today is reproductive steroids and ADHD symptoms across the menstrual cycle. A bit of |
| 2:36.8 | background information about ADHD. It was once thought to be only a disorder that affected |
| 2:43.9 | males, leaving women and girls to kind of fend for themselves. And the ratio of boys to girls with ADHD in childhood is about |
| 2:55.3 | three to one, whereas in adulthood, it's actually closer to one to one. So when we look at the |
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