This transition is a normal part of life, but it isn’t always easy. One of the best ways to handle these changes is by practicing healthy boundaries. 

The “Personal Bubble” Concept 

To understand boundaries, imagine that everyone has a personal “bubble” around them. Inside your bubble are your own thoughts, opinions, feelings, and actions. Every time you interact with someone, your bubbles come together. 

• Too Much Space: If the bubbles are too far apart, the relationship can feel cold or lonely. You might feel like you don’t really know what is going on in each other’s lives. 

• Overlapping Bubbles: If the bubbles overlap, one person usually ends up trying to “fix” or “rescue” the other. This can make the adult child feel smothered and the parent feel exhausted from solving problems that aren’t theirs to solve. 

• The Healthy Balance: The goal is to be close without overlapping. This means being supportive and warm while remembering that each person is responsible for their own “bubble.” 

Three Steps to a Better Relationship 

When you keep your bubbles close but separate, you create a stronger bond. You can: 

1. Acceptance: Acknowledge that your adult child is responsible for their own thoughts and choices. 

2. Set Limits: Give yourself permission to say “no” or step back to protect your own peace of mind. 

3. Collaborate: Have honest, respectful conversations where you work together as equals. 

Think of a boundary as a respectful bridge rather than a wall. It provides the space needed for a meaningful connection as your relationship moves into this new stage of life. Setting and maintaining health boundaries won’t eliminate every twist and turn of the emotional rollercoaster, but it can help smooth the ride. 

Do you ever forget why you walked into a room? Do you have trouble paying attention when someone is talking to you? Do you struggle to start or finish simple tasks? Do you feel disorganized or easily lose focus? These could be signs of ADHD. Around 140 million adults have ADHD. That number is growing. There has been a 42% increase in people diagnosed with ADHD in the last 8 years. 

ADHD can bring up difficult thoughts and emotions. One being anxiety. Often, those of us with ADHD wish we could do things that others take for granted. We wish we could finish tasks on time, stay organized, or focus our attention. We might get behind and face deadlines with little time left. So, we start to feel anxious. We begin to believe we can never do anything right. Our anxiety worsens as we feel less confident. 

How CBT Can Help    

Research shows that Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) can be one of the best ways to get help with ADHD. It helps us to change our thoughts, attitudes, and behaviors. This allows us to better handle tough situations and feelings that can come with ADHD. We can learn a number of CBT tools to help. We can learn how to relax our bodies. Tools like problem solving and time management are helpful in meeting our goals. And we can reframe or accept our thoughts to help calm our anxiety. Let’s explore a few specific tools that can help:   

• Progressive Muscle Relaxation (PMR) – A tool where we tense and then relax our muscle groups to relax our body and mind. 
• Thought Inspection – A method where we challenge unhelpful thoughts causing us stress, shame, anxiety, etc. 
• Active Problem Solving – A good way to achieve goals that helps us focus on what’s most important to us.   
• Present Awareness – A practice to accept noisy thoughts and feelings, bring us back to the present, and allow us to respond better to our thoughts and emotions. 
• Time Management – An approach where we make a daily to-do list and schedule the most important tasks into specific time slots.  

If you or someone you know struggles with symptoms of ADHD, using some of these tools can help to get past those struggles. They can help to accomplish day to day tasks as well as manage the difficult emotions that can come up.