Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) limerence refers to the intense, consuming need for another person’s approval and attention when you live with ADHD. It’s not an official diagnosis, and limerence is not a psychological state limited to ADHD.
ADHD limerence isn’t a formal medical condition or diagnosis. It’s a term that describes a common shared experience among people with ADHD that combines ADHD’s hyperfocus and emotional regulation symptoms and the psychological state of limerence.
Limerence was first described in the 1970s by psychologist Dorothy Tennov as she conducted interviews on the experience of romantic love. Tennov found a group of participants who described a similar manifestation of “love,” which they said was involuntary, almost always unreciprocated, and featured an overwhelming longing for another person’s positive attention or regard.
While people typically associate limerence with romantic feelings, someone can also experience it across other types of interpersonal dynamics, including friendships, mentorships, and public figure idolization.
There’s limited research on limerence in ADHD, but certain features of ADHD may increase the likelihood you’ll experience limerence.
ADHD is a complex neurodevelopmental disorder. It can affect everyone differently, and for some people, it means living with hyperfocus in addition to symptoms like inattention and hyperactivity.
Hyperfocus is a state of deep concentration. In ADHD, it’s not always something you can control and comes from the same underlying challenge with regulating attention span that contributes to more common experiences of inattention.
Hyperfocus in ADHD naturally makes you more likely to focus intensely on specific people, objects, or tasks.
In addition to hyperfocus, impulsivity in ADHD may make you more likely to emotionally latch on to someone quickly without thinking things through. And because emotions are often difficult to regulate in their intensity when you have ADHD, this can create a rollercoaster of highs and lows that keep you locked in on the person in question.
Why do people without ADHD experience limerence?
Limerence isn’t only seen in ADHD. As an area of psychology with limited study, its exact causes aren’t clear. But similar traits may predispose other people to this experience.
Hyperfocus, for example, is not ADHD-specific. Hyperfocus can be found across several other conditions, including autism spectrum disorder (ASD), and may also be a natural part of your personality.
The same can be said of impulsivity and emotional dysregulation. These are challenges anyone can experience for different reasons.
As a shared experience and not a formal diagnosis, no standardized set of symptoms exists for limerence in ADHD.
Common signs include:
- intense, persistent thoughts about a person
- inability to focus on other tasks, thoughts, or areas of life
- a deep, overwhelming desire for that person’s attention, validation, or affection
- heightened sensitivity to perceived reciprocation
- emotional highs and lows related to that person
- idolizing the person
- compulsive checking for messages and communication from the person
- having extravagant fantasies about being with the other person
- thought rumination about the person
- feelings of low self-worth when a person doesn’t reciprocate feelings
There are no therapeutic guidelines for the treatment of limerence.
According to a scoping review from 2024, therapies that may be beneficial include those, like medications, that help regulate the brain’s reward system. Also interventions that focus on helping a person identify unhelpful thoughts and behaviors and take ownership of their actions.
A case study from 2021 found cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) was helpful in managing symptoms of limerence during a 9-month follow-up period. CBT is a psychotherapy framework that aims to identify and restructure unhelpful patterns of thinking and behaving.
In ADHD limerence, managing symptoms of ADHD may help counteract limerence that stems from symptoms of hyperfocus, impulsivity, and emotional dysregulation.
People could manage their ADHD through a combination of medications, behavioral therapy and counseling, lifestyle adjustments, and environmental supports.
Can people with ADHD succeed in relationships?
Living with ADHD doesn’t mean you can’t have deep, meaningful relationships. ADHD does not affect your capacity to love or be loved.
Certain features of ADHD can make relationships challenging, but being aware of these challenges and actively working to adapt and manage ADHD can lessen its impact on your daily life.
ADHD limerence is a non-diagnostic term that describes intense, deep, and consuming feelings for another person when you have ADHD.
While limerence isn’t limited to ADHD, symptoms of hyperfocus, impulsivity, and emotional dysregulation may increase the likelihood of ADHD limerence.