When Anxiety Takes the Wheel: Making Values Based Decisions as a Neurodivergent Adult
Have you ever made a decision, felt relieved for about an hour, and then realized it wasn't yours at all?
Someone asks you something. Do you want to go Saturday. Should we open things up. Can you take on this extra project. Are you okay with your partner's new date staying over. And your body answers before you can. Chest tight. Stomach dropping. Thoughts going in six directions at once. What if they're upset. What if I say the wrong thing. I should be able to handle this. Everyone else seems fine with it.
So you say yes. Or you say whatever you think the other person wants to hear. Or you say whatever a reasonable, normal person would say, the one you've been quietly studying your whole life.
And then later it hits. Sometimes it's an hour. Sometimes it's three weeks. That wasn't me. I don't even agree with that. Now there's a commitment on your calendar, an agreement in your relationship, or a version of you out in the world that doesn't match what you actually believe.
I see this all the time with my neurodivergent clients. I know it from the inside too. Anxiety and I go way back.
When anxiety gets loud enough, it takes over the whole system. You can't find your preferences. You can't find your opinions. Sometimes you can't find where you end and the person next to you begins. In that state, the easiest option available is the script: whatever a neurotypical person is supposed to do, say, or want in this situation. You grab it because it's there.
You can't make a values based decision from the middle of an anxiety flood, so the first job is getting yourself back to neutral, and the second job is asking what feels right to you.
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What happens when anxiety takes over
When your nervous system reads a situation as a threat, it prioritizes getting you safe, fast. The parts of your brain that handle reflection, nuance, and long term planning go quiet. That's useful if you're being chased. It's a lot less useful when the threat is a text from your partner that says "can we talk later."
For a lot of neurodivergent folx, the threshold for this flood is lower and the recovery takes longer. You're often already carrying a full load before anything happens: sensory input, the effort of following conversations built for a different kind of brain, and masking. Masking means hiding or suppressing your natural traits so you'll fit in, things like forcing eye contact, rehearsing small talk, or holding in a stim. It's exhausting, and it eats the reserve you'd otherwise use to stay steady.
So when the anxiety comes, your thoughts turn into a conglomeration of "what ifs" and "I shoulds." What if they leave. What if I'm being unreasonable. I should be more flexible. I should be over this by now.
Neither of those is a value. A "what if" is fear projecting itself into the future. An "I should" is usually a rule you absorbed from a parent, a teacher, a partner, or the general culture, and it's been repeating in your head so long it sounds like your own voice.
Why the neurotypical script feels like the safe choice
Many neurodivergent adults grew up being corrected. Too loud, too blunt, too intense, too sensitive, too much. You learned early to scan the room for what was expected and then do that. It kept you out of trouble. It kept people from looking at you funny.
That habit doesn't disappear in adulthood. Under anxiety, it gets louder. The script promises predictability, and predictability is exactly what an anxious neurodivergent nervous system is starving for. Do the normal thing and nobody gets upset. That's the deal the script offers.
The cost shows up somewhere else. A lot of my clients describe feeling lost, like they've been running someone else's life on autopilot. And many of them describe merging with someone they're close to. Merging is when another person's preferences, moods, and opinions fill the space where yours would normally be, and you lose track of which is which.
Merging can look like:
You don't know what you want for dinner until your partner says what they want, and then suddenly you want that too.
You agree to a change in your relationship structure during a hard conversation and later can't remember actually choosing it.
During kink negotiation, you agree to a scene or move a limit in the moment, and afterward you realize your yes was about keeping the other person happy.
You take a friend's side in a conflict, argue it hard, and then feel strange about it once you're alone.
Your partner has a bad day and you absorb the whole mood, and you can't tell whether you're upset or just carrying theirs.
If you're neurodivergent and also practicing ethical nonmonogamy or kink, you've got more people, more negotiation, and more conversations with real stakes. That's more chances for anxiety to sign you up for things you never chose.
Why values hit harder for neurodivergent folx
Many neurodivergent people have a deep sense of justice and fairness. You notice when something is off. You can't let it go. You'll replay an unfair moment for days, sometimes years. Researchers sometimes call this justice sensitivity, and it shows up a lot in autistic and ADHD adults.
That means acting against your values costs you more. For some people, going along with something they don't agree with is mildly uncomfortable and then it fades. For a lot of neurodivergent folx, it sits in the body. It feels wrong in a physical way. It keeps you up. It turns into resentment toward the other person, or shame directed at yourself for going along with it.
And there's a slower cost. Every time you override what you know is right for you, it gets a little harder to trust your own read next time. You start to doubt your instincts, which makes you lean on the script even more, which takes you even further from yourself. It's a cycle, and anxiety keeps it spinning.
So getting decisions aligned with your values matters a lot for neurodivergent folx. It's how you stay recognizable to yourself.
Getting back to neutral
When a client comes in flooded with anxiety and their neurodivergent traits are showing up strong, I don't start with the decision. I start with two questions.
First, what are you actually worried about? Spoiler alert: it's very often about needing to know what to expect. Uncertainty is rocket fuel for anxiety, and a lot of neurodivergent brains run on predictability. Once we get specific about the worry, the next question is usually what information is missing. What's the plan. Who's going to be there. How long will it last. What happens if I need to leave. What exactly is my partner asking for.
A surprising amount of anxiety drops once you have that information. And asking for it is completely reasonable. It's an accommodation, and you're allowed to have accommodations in your relationships, your friendships, and your work.
Second, what soothes you? This is where people get very different, and that's the point. There is no template. Every person I work with works differently. What soothes you might be:
Medication, worked out with your prescriber
Movement, like dancing, walking, lifting, or shaking it out
Creative outlets, like drawing, playing music, or listening to the same song on repeat
Big release, like screaming into a pillow or crying hard
Connection, like venting to a friend who gets it
Sensory reset, like a weighted blanket, a cold drink, a dark room, or your favorite stim toy
The goal is to reach neutral. Neutral is the point where your thoughts stop being a pile of "what ifs" and "I shoulds" and you can think in full sentences again. You don't have to feel great. You just need enough room to hear yourself.
One note on this. Many neurodivergent people have trouble with interoception, which is your ability to notice what's going on inside your body, like hunger, thirst, or rising stress. If you can't feel the anxiety building until it's already huge, start with outside clues. Are you snapping at people. Is your jaw clenched. Is your skin hot. When did you last drink water. Those count as data. You can also try showing how you feel through a playlist, a drawing, or a meme you send a friend. Words don't have to come first.
Finding your values once you're there
Okay, so you've soothed. You're at neutral, or close enough. Now you can actually reflect on what feels right.
Some questions I use with clients:
If nobody would be disappointed, what would I choose?
What would I tell a close friend to do in this exact spot?
Which option would let me look at myself tomorrow and feel okay?
What matters most to me here? Honesty, fairness, rest, loyalty, autonomy, care for someone else?
Where's the "I should" in my head, and whose voice does it sound like?
That last one is a big one. A lot of my work draws on Internal Family Systems, or IFS, an approach that treats you as a whole cast of inner parts instead of one single self. There might be a part of you that's terrified of upsetting anyone and grabs the script every time. There might be another part that knows exactly what's fair and keeps getting talked over. The anxious part has a job. Usually it's protecting you from rejection, conflict, or being seen as too much. Getting curious about what it's afraid of, instead of fighting it, often gives the quieter part room to speak.
You might find your values pretty fast once you're calm. You might find you need a few days. Both are fine. The difference is that now the answer is coming from you.
Putting it together: four steps back to your values
Here's the process in order, for the next time anxiety tries to make a decision for you.
Name the worry. Get specific. "I'm anxious" is a starting point. "I'm worried my partner will think I'm controlling if I ask for a check in text during their date" is something you can work with.
Get the information. Ask what you need to know to feel less in the dark. Plans, timelines, expectations, what happens if things change. Predictability is a reasonable thing to request.
Soothe to neutral. Use whatever works for your body and your brain. Medication, movement, art, a pillow scream, a friend. Wait until your thoughts slow down enough to follow.
Check your values. Ask what feels right and fair to you, and notice which thoughts are values and which are borrowed rules. Then decide from there.
You'll notice the decision comes last. That's on purpose.
What to say when you need time
The hardest part of this process is often the moment someone wants an answer right now and you're nowhere near neutral. Buying time is a skill, and it gets easier with practice. You can use these word for word:
"I want to give you a real answer. Can I get back to you tomorrow?"
"I'm feeling pretty flooded right now. I need some time to think before I agree to anything."
"Can you tell me more about what this would look like? I do better when I know what to expect."
"I said yes earlier, and I've realized it doesn't sit right with me. Can we revisit it?"
That last one matters. If you already said yes from the script, you can go back. Agreements can be renegotiated, especially when the original yes came from anxiety. People who care about you generally want your real answer more than your fast one.
If this sounds like you
If you keep finding yourself agreeing to things and then wondering who made that choice, you're in good company. This pattern shows up constantly for autistic, ADHD, and AuDHD adults, and it gets even more tangled when you're navigating multiple partners, power exchange, or both at once. You can read more about how I work with neurodivergent adults, ethical nonmonogamy and polyamory, and kink and BDSM.
The better you know yourself, the better partner you can be. That includes knowing what you need to come back to yourself when anxiety hits.
Maya Attia, LMFT, license 139693. Talk With Maya Therapy offers online therapy for adults throughout California.
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