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Shelf Help: "How to ADHD" by Jessica McCabe
- Jun 10
- 8 min read
A review by Anne James, LMFT, resident book nerd who listened so intently she missed her freeway exit
Welcome to Shelf Help!
I am a self-confessed book nerd who almost always has about four books going at once, and I have a hard time keeping a good one to myself. Shelf Help is my ongoing series of book recommendations, the ones I find myself talking about in sessions, thinking about on walks, and pressing into the hands of anyone who will take them. I listen to most of mine because I am an auditory learner and that is what works for my brain, but however you take yours in, I hope you find something here worth your time.
ADHD is an area I have taken a deep interest in, both personally and professionally, drawn to understanding how it presents, the very real challenges it brings, and the equally real strengths that often come with it. It is one of those areas where the more you learn, the more there is to learn, and I genuinely love that about it. I have gone deep into the research, sought out trainings, and collected a handful of books I find myself recommending to clients again and again. And then I came across this one, and it quickly became a favorite.
How to ADHD by Jessica McCabe is different from most books on the subject, and the difference starts with who wrote it. McCabe isn't a researcher or a clinician. She's a person with ADHD who started a YouTube channel called How to ADHD, initially as a way to understand herself better, and ended up building one of the most engaged and genuinely useful ADHD communities on the internet. She opens the book honestly, describing what ADHD actually looked like in her life: showing up late to everything, breaking promises, being labeled irresponsible or messy, carrying the weight of all the ways she didn't seem to fit the world around her. It's the kind of opening that makes you feel immediately less alone.
What began as her own learning journey became a conversation with hundreds of thousands of people who were figuring out the same things she was. That community, their comments, their lived experience, their hard-won strategies, is woven into this book in a way that makes it feel less like a self-help manual and more like a really good conversation with someone who gets it. She also brings in the heavyweights. If you've spent any time researching ADHD you'll recognize names like Russell Barkley and Ari Tuckman, two of my favorite ADHD experts, and McCabe references their work in ways that are accessible without being dumbed down. It's a rare balance.
Let's Clear Something Up First
One of the things McCabe does early and well is address one of the biggest misconceptions about ADHD: that it's a deficit of attention. If you've read anything in the ADHD literature you'll encounter this point over and over again, and for good reason. It's not that people with ADHD can't pay attention. It's that attention is dysregulated, pulled toward everything at once, or locked onto the wrong thing entirely, or completely captured by the one fascinating thing that finally caught its interest, whether that's a special topic, a passing thought, the clouds outside, a memory, a pet, a favorite fictional character, or approximately a zillion other things that are definitely not the task at hand. As a therapist I find this reframe essential, because once people understand that the attention is there, just not always where they need it to be, they can stop blaming themselves for a character flaw they don't actually have.
McCabe is also clear that there is no magic fix for ADHD. The MTA study, one of the largest studies ever done on ADHD treatment, showed that medication combined with therapy produces the best outcomes. But McCabe goes further than just pointing to that research. She makes the case for a full toolkit, because ADHD is not a behavior problem. As McCabe explains it, ADHD is a brain development and structure difference, which means that
behavioral strategies designed for neurotypical brains often don't work for ADHD brains, because the behaviors themselves are happening for completely different reasons. Punishment, she notes, is less effective for people with ADHD. Positive feedback and rewards work better. This is something I see consistently in my work with clients in my San Marcos therapy practice, and it's something worth saying out loud to every parent, partner, teacher, and employer who has ever tried to motivate someone with ADHD through criticism or consequences alone.
Relationships and the Social Stuff
McCabe writes about something I recognize constantly in my work: the way ADHD can make relationships complicated in ways that are hard to name. She describes what she calls an "I'll take anyone" or "I'll do anything" approach to relationships, where the fear of being unlikable or unwanted, often rooted in a long history of social struggles, leads people to stay in relationships that aren't good for them. This is something I see time and time again sitting across from clients. When you've struggled to connect, when friendships have fallen away because of forgotten plans or misread cues, the idea that someone, anyone, wants to be around you can feel more important than whether that person is actually good for you.
McCabe also writes about small talk in an important way. Many people with ADHD genuinely struggle with it, and she reframes it usefully: small talk isn't meaningless, it's actually how people gauge whether they want to go deeper. It's a filtering system. Socially, ADHD tends to show up in a few recognizable patterns. There are the people who overshare, who tell you their whole life story before they know whether you're trustworthy, struggling with what I'd call outward boundaries. There are the people who share almost nothing, guarded and careful while buzzing inside. And then there are the interrupters, the ones who look like they're practically bursting at the seams to contribute to the conversation because their thought will be gone if they don't say it right NOW. What almost all of them have in common is walking away from social interactions and hypercritically replaying everything they said and did or didn't say. The internal aftermath of socializing with ADHD is
exhausting in a way most people never see.
Time Blindness Is Real, and It's Not a Character Flaw
One of my favorite sections of the book is her chapter on time, which she calls "How to See
Time." McCabe does a beautiful job walking through the concept of ADHD time blindness, the very real neurological experience of losing track of time, underestimating how long things take, saying yes to too many things, and disappearing into hyperfocus with no idea that hours have passed. Russell Barkley calls it being "time nearsighted," meaning the future doesn't feel real until it's almost on top of you. The time horizon at which things start to feel urgent is simply shorter for people with ADHD.
McCabe shares something I found both funny and deeply relatable: she always assumed the way she experienced time was the way everyone experienced time, and that other people were just better at "wrestling it into submission." She also addresses the practical consequences of ADHD time blindness that people don't always connect to ADHD: not accounting for the possibility that things might go wrong, not building in buffer time, not double or triple checking work because the brain doesn't naturally flag the need to. And she includes a tool I love and use myself: working backward from a deadline. Instead of thinking about when you need to start, you map every step from the end point backward to the present moment, including drive time, bathroom breaks, buffer time for mistakes, and the very real possibility that something unexpected will get in the way. It sounds simple, and it is if you have a neurotypical brain, but for an ADHD brain it might take some time and practice, and it is genuinely one of the most useful tools I have come across for making the future feel real enough to actually plan for.
McCabe also writes about how misplacing things more often is part of the package, not carelessness, but a brain that wasn't fully present when the keys got put down. And she manages to bring humor to all of it in a way that makes it easier to hold.
The Coach B Story
Research consultant and occasional guest on McCabe's YouTube channel, Dr. Patrick LaCount, shares a story in the book that I haven't been able to stop thinking about and have found myself bringing into therapy sessions. Imagine two coaches. Coach A, after a young goalkeeper lets in the losing goal, berates her, yells at her, and tells her she should have known better. The girl already felt terrible. She goes home defeated, and at the next practice or game she might say she has a stomachache and stay home. Coach B, after
witnessing the same losing goal, pulls her aside and says, hey, remember what we worked on? Here's what you can do differently next time. You've got this, he tells her, warm and encouraging, and while she still feels bad about the loss, she walks away with something she can actually use. When LaCount would ask his clients which coach they'd want for their child, whether for fun or for going pro, everyone chooses Coach B. Every single time.
I think about this story in the context of ADHD constantly, because so many people with ADHD have had far too many Coach A moments in their lives, at school, at home, at work, and have internalized that voice as their own. The goal of good ADHD support, in therapy, in parenting, in relationships, is to become someone's Coach B.
Strengths, Not Just Struggles
McCabe doesn't let this book become a catalog of deficits, and I love her for that. She writes about strengths, including hyperfocus, which is one of the most remarkable and underappreciated features of the ADHD brain when it's working in your favor. She also shares something that stuck with me about her experience waiting tables, how it was actually a surprisingly good fit because it didn't require planning ahead, just moving through tasks in order and keeping going. It's a great example of how understanding your brain can help you find environments where you thrive rather than spending your whole life trying to fit into ones that don't suit you. And she includes a quote I think applies to everyone, not just people with ADHD: "The most successful people aren't the ones who get good at what they're bad at. They're the ones who lean into their strengths." I'd put that on a wall.
Closing
What I keep coming back to is how much self-compassion is threaded through this book without ever feeling soft or avoidant. McCabe isn't asking you to make excuses. She's asking you to understand yourself accurately, or your partner, child, family member, or friend, which is a completely different thing, and a much more useful one. If you or someone you love has ADHD, or if you've ever suspected you might, I'd put this one near the top of your ADHD reading list. And if you're not quite ready to commit to the book, start with McCabe's YouTube channel, How to ADHD, which is free, genuinely warm, and one of the best resources available.
I also want to say that this blog only scratches the surface of what is in this book. McCabe covers just about every aspect of ADHD you can think of, including executive functioning, different kinds of memory, culture and intersectionality, relationships, advocacy, and more, and every chapter gives you something concrete to work with. It is absolutely worth the read or the listen.
If any of this resonates, I'd love to hear from you. I bring both lived experience and clinical training to my work with ADHD and neurodivergent clients in San Marcos and across California, and I understand this world from the inside out. Whether you are navigating ADHD yourself, supporting a partner, raising a child, or just starting to put the pieces together, I'm here and I'd be glad to help. You can reach out anytime at https://www.myriadtherapy.com/contact
McCabe, J. (2024). How to ADHD: An Insider's Guide to Working with Your Brain (Not Against It). Rodale Books.
You can find this title and more in the Shelf Help section of my resources hub at myriadtherapy.com.
This is an unpaid, unsolicited review. I was not contacted by the author or publisher and have no affiliation with either. Just a nerd with an opinion.
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