Hey y’all - it’s Friday (thank goodness). If I’m honest, the last two weeks have been ✨ not the best ✨ for me for some unknown reason. My ADHD symptoms have been going pretty haywire and my body anxiety has been feeling out of control - it’s honestly a miracle I’m getting this out to y’all to be frank.

I wanted to share this since authenticity is really important to me - we can do all the “right” things and still experience symptom exacerbation. Life unfortunately works that way. I also loved hearing from some of you last week about your alcohol use and journey 🙂 I know I told you already, but I’m over here rooting for you and proud of you. It makes my day getting messages or responses about how the ADHD nutrition research has been impacting you!

That all being said, one of the things that I personally do to help when I’m like this (aka very much not myself) is drink green tea. Why? Let’s break down the research.

BUT before we get into the research, I want to remind you to stay tuned - the ADHD nutrition hub goes live NEXT WEEK! 😄 If you’re new here, hey, I’m Annika - I’m an ADHD nutrition research specialist with my master’s in Health Psychology. My goal is to be a science communicator on ADHD nutrition - but I can’t do that without support! This is why I’m launching the Nutrimind Community - your one-stop shop for my exclusive content, community chat, and monthly lives. For the cost of 1-2 coffees a month, you’ll get:

• A safe space for ADHD struggles: Connect with others who understand what it's like when your throat closes up around food or when you've gone hours without eating because you forgot. No judgment, just understanding and practical support.

• Beyond surface-level content: Skip the generic 'eat healthy' advice and dive into what really matters - like how specific nutrients interact with your ADHD brain, backed by research you can trust but explained in language that makes sense.

• First access to research: Get a 5-day head start on this newsletter and podcast episodes. No more waiting when your ADHD brain is excited and ready to learn - dive in while your motivation is hot!

Basically - it’s my entire private collection of nutrition research info, ADHD worksheets, recipes, and more: all in one convenient space where you can also connect with fellow ADHDers (oh, also me! I’ll be there moderating!). I hope you’re as excited as I am! ❤️ 

Green Tea and ADHD

If you’re deep into the belly of ADHD TikTok, you’ve probably heard the claim that matcha is a natural medication for ADHD.

Let’s do a full-stop here. It isn’t. There is no natural medication for ADHD - that’s because they don’t work to the levels of efficacy that actual medication does. If they did, then we could call them a natural medication. Even so, some of us are looking for more natural supports to ADHD than medication, whether that’s due to personal opinion or medical necessity (looking at y’all fellow POTS pals - you know the struggle of not being able to take ADHD meds, both stims and non-stims).

Now, lifestyle changes and consistency are two things that actually can help ADHD symptom management, but unfortunately they can be difficult when you have unmedicated ADHD.

Enter small changes that might help.

While things such as eating enough protein, chomping on salmon, and drinking green tea won’t help you manage your ADHD to the extent that medication will, they are things you can do to help yourself minorly reduce your symptom severity so that you can implement the bigger changes that will help even more.

Why green tea? I’m so happy you asked.

How Green Tea Impacts ADHD

I know I say this almost every time I share a research study, but this is one of my favorites. As always, we adore randomized, placebo-controlled (and preferably double-blinded) studies since they are the only ones we can infer true causality from. So, since it’s one of my favorites, you probably already know that this study is one of those RCTs.

The clear negative of this study is its small participant size, so of course with that being said we want to be wary of making any large claims. For you research/statistical analysis nerds, the power of this study was 0.75, which thankfully is close to the ideal 0.8 power. I’m hopeful for future replication studies to be coming out in the next two years so we can better control for Type I and Type II errors.

It also excluded women due to how hormonal shifts impact ADHD symptom severity. Of course, this is fairly annoying since we continue to have a lack of female representation in the ADHD literature; however, their research at least puts a foundation for future researchers to ask for a larger funding range.

Enough of the mumbo-jumbo - what does this actually mean for me?

Based on this research along with the other research on L-theanine, caffeine, and ADHD, we can assume a moderate effect of combination L-theanine + caffeine on ADHD symptoms. Essentially, it has significant promise in improving cognition, focus, and inhibiting impulsivity. This, coupled with how there’s plenty of research on anxiety (which many people with ADHD have) and L-theanine, I personally would actually recommend taking green tea to help improve ADHD symptom severity.

WHAT? Annika actually recommending a ‘supplement?’ I know, crazy right?

That being said, I do want to emphasize that your bodyweight will have an impact on its efficacy for you. Here’s a table that I whipped up to help you easily figure out how much green tea you’ll need to drink to experience meaningful results based on the current evidence:

Obviously, matcha has a greater impact than regular green tea. This is because it contains a higher content of L-theanine. This may be why a lot of people online have been praising matcha - it’s much easier to get your l-theanine from this tea vs. other green teas!

I also want to note that just because this is the effective dosage according to the literature, you may experience something different due to a fun little thing called “individual differences.” Test it out for yourself and see what works for you!

Thanks for reading!

If you have any thoughts, questions, or comments, be sure to shoot me a DM on Instagram @Nutrimindcoach or simply reply to this email. I LOVE hearing from you!

Don’t forget to tune into this week’s episode of my podcast: How Protein Impacts ADHD - It’s a solo-episode to break down the ADHD - protein connection that I’ve been chatting about on the socials! Be sure to listen to learn why and how protein affects your ADHD symptoms.