The ADHD guide to conquering “No Spend February”

Living with ADHD is a budgeting battleground where the seemingly simple idea of saving money can feel like a fight to the death against impulsivity and the ease of contactless payments. So, what else would be a better way to spend February than subjecting myself to a form of financial warfare and taking part in 'No Spend February'?

Image description of wallet, lying in the middle of a white table with a purple, £20 notes sticking out, surrounded by receipts, coupons vouchers and barcodes

No Spend February' is a challenge where individuals aim to limit their spending throughout the month to focus on saving money. Participants usually set a specific list of rules for themselves, such as avoiding eating out, limiting shopping to only essential items, or cutting out non-essential purchases like entertainment or luxury items. It can help people to put thought into their spending habits. Taking part in the challenge with my partner, we realised that the month wasn’t going to be as simple for our neurodivergent brains as it would be for a neurotypical couple.

For us the rules were simple: only food and essentials were allowed. This included groceries, utilities, and bills (payments for essential services like electricity, water, heating, and rent), transport costs like bus tickets and petrol, emergency expenses and prescriptions (unforeseen emergencies like urgent home or car repairs, or dentist appointments), and personal hygiene items like toiletries and sanitary products. But after an amusing anecdote from my partner about running out of pants during a lockdown where clothes were considered 'non-essential' and cordoned off in supermarkets, we decided that if we really needed them, pants or basic clothing replacements would be okay too.

Day 1 started off with a blow when some pending payments from January came out of my bank account adding up to £79.65 . For the average person, this might be easier to brush off, but ADHD comes with its own hidden weapons and an all-or-nothing mindset, meaning that this feeling of failure could jeopardize the rest of the month. Rejection sensitive dysphoria (RSD) is common in many individuals with ADHD and presents as an extreme emotional sensitivity to perceived or actual rejection, criticism, or failure.

RSD often comes out as perfectionism, but the feeling of failure or rejection comes with an overwhelming emotional response whether that be internal with feelings of guilt and shame or external where symptoms can manifest as intense sadness, anger, anxiety, or even physical pain. Where people without RSD may be able to keep going after what feels like a small mistake, for me this was very difficult to move on from. But we stayed strong and with a relatively clear calendar, the first week started to feel remarkably easy and my bank account was sitting happily.

I was aware that RSD might reek havoc in a challenge like this but as my calendar filled up with lectures, valentines day and meetings, something I hadn’t even considered before starting the challenge came to the forefront; ADHD tax – the infuriating financial hurdles stemming from ADHD symptoms.

ADHD Tax is not a like your typical tax but refers to the extra money that people with ADHD will have to spend as a direct result of their symptoms. This often includes time blindness, forgetfulness and impulsivity. Throughout the month, this became my main obstacle in the form of missed buses and forgetting to bring lunch, this is an all too common theme which the ADHD community relate to. Studies suggest that those with ADHD have dopamine imbalances in parts of the brain. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter that plays a crucial role in the brain's reward system. It's associated with feelings of pleasure and motivation which means individuals struggle with the intrinsic motivation to do repetitive tasks that do not give an immediate reward like packing a lunch box, not because ‘we can’t be bothered’ but often feeling physically frozen or completely forgetting altogether in the mixture of the typical ADHD racing thoughts. For me leading to a lot of guilt and some Uni canteen lunches, or more often, skipping lunch entirely.

Week 2 made keeping our diet healthy during the challenge a main concern for me and my partner. While eating disorders affect 1-3% of the general population, rates soar to 10-25% among those with ADHD due to impulsivity and executive function deficits. With a lack of budget I found it easy to slip back into very restrictive habits. While typical no-spend challenges restrict takeaways or dining out to promote cooking at home, we had to change tact to ensure this didn’t become restrictive for us, which would be an inevitable rabbit hole leading straight back to bad habits. This was a huge struggle for me, and although we decided that we weren’t going to mark any food as off-limits, I found myself feeling guilty for any food purchase outside of our big shop.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xFyDwZcMNY

Week 3 was full of temptation and showed one of my biggest weaknesses, Online shopping… which Is a surefire dopamine boost for everyone but for many fellow ADHDers can become addictive as it can be difficult to resist the dopamine hit of a next day delivery. Often enough to get a task going or complete a regular chore with the novelty of a new piece of equipment or a treat to keep us going (as we’re all guilty of)

Due to the hormonal imbalances in the brain, ADHD brains are motivated in 5 ways: interest, novelty, challenge, urgency, and passion (ImpactParents, 2025), without feeling one of these things it is impossible to start or finish a task. And the world of online shopping is full of novelty becoming a cycle where we need to spend money to get things done. Inevitably ending up with cupboards of impulse purchases which were used once or twice and then buried in a designated ‘h-idy spot’. But like many impulsive behaviours can come with a lot of guilt.

One of the core symptoms of ADHD is executive dysfuction. Which describes the difficulties with processes such as organisation, regulating emotions, managing your time and even starting task. Many people believe that everyone is born with the ability to do these things but ADHD disrupts these skills massively. Kaz Thomas East is an ADHDer and executive function coach. I interviewed her during week three to get an insight into her thought process around this dysfunction and found it quite enlightening which helped me get through a tough day.

Kaz said, “Like, people say I'm so late, or I'm so unorganised, I'm a really unorganised person and it's like, it's not a character fault.” Kaz shares her expertise as a coach and public speaker teaching Parents, Kids, Teachers and Professionals about the world of executive function skills and encourages her students to practice empathy and self-forgiveness. “They are skills that we can work on. And also, everyone has strengths and areas for development, it doesn't matter whether you're neurotypical or neurodivergent, you're also going to have things you're better at and things that could be improved” she said.

The final week brought back this feeling of novelty, and we begin to worry about the weeks ahead and returning to normal life with a more flexible budget. After restricting something for a month, an all or nothing brain is always likely to go to the other extreme and my student budget was counting on this not happening so I could make it through to my next student finance payment. We started to count up what we had spent and were proud of our achievement.

Overall we spent £100 on food and expected bills. £36.94 went on ADHD related costs like subscriptions I had forgotten to cancel and one taxi to an important meeting. Almost £40 which on my student budget Iof £164.12 to last me each month make or break the month.

The aftermath of the month-long battle was not as bloody as I had feared. But walking away from the front lines of frugality with my wallet intact was not the only victory! My newfound vigilance has not only kept my bank account in fighting shape but has given me peace of mind and a financial buffer that could get me out of a sticky situation if it arose. Leaving us standing victorious on the battlefield of budgeting. Until next month…

Sources:

Fidelity.co.uk. (2024). The ADHD tax: paying the price of neurodiversity. [online] Available at: https://retirement.fidelity.co.uk/news-insights/workplace-investing/saving/the-adhd-tax-paying-the-price-of-neurodiversity/ [Accessed 15 Jun. 2025].

‌Watson, S. (2018). What Is Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria? [online] WebMD. Available at: https://www.webmd.com/add-adhd/rejection-sensitive-dysphoria [Accessed 15 Jun. 2025].

ImpactParents (2025). Motivation Myths & the Magic of P.I.N.C.H. | Parenting Tips. [online] ImpactParents. Available at: https://impactparents.com/motivation-myths [Accessed 15 Jun. 2025].