I used to think every ADHD kid was wired like me.

Last week, my friend proved me wrong while explaining why it's a fight to get his son to hockey practice.

The kid has ADHD. He's been playing for a while now, but every practice is a struggle. As he told his dad: "It's too fast. Too loud. Too white."

My friend had that look every ND parent recognizes. The quiet worry. The "please don't melt down on me" tension. He wanted to know if he should push through or back off.

I had no idea what to tell him.

Because sports were the only place my brain ever made sense. Didn't matter what sport—basketball, football, hockey, whatever. I could play in front of crowds and not register a single face. The noise, the speed, the chaos—it didn't overwhelm me. It sharpened me. Instant flow.

His son walks into that same environment and his nervous system slams the panic button.

Same diagnosis. Opposite reactions.

That's when I realized: I've been thinking about ADHD based on my wiring, not his.

Here's the mistake—my mistake, and probably yours:

Thinking ADHD means one set of traits. One profile. One playbook.

It doesn't.

Neurodivergence isn't a personality type. It's a label slapped on a thousand different nervous systems.

The difference isn't toughness. It's wiring—how your brain handles sensory input.

Some of us turn chaos into information. Others can't filter fast enough. Every input hits at full volume with no hierarchy.

That's the gap between me and his son.

And here's the twist: I get overwhelmed by noise and chaos too—just not in sports.

Put me in a crowded mall or a noisy restaurant and I'm scanning for exits. Too many inputs, no purpose, no assignment.

But sports?

Sports didn't just work for me. Sports regulated me.

A field or court gave me something everyday life never has: bounded chaos.

Clear role. Fixed rules. Immediate feedback. One job to do.

Everything in a game has meaning.

Skates scraping = someone cutting behind you. Crowd noise = momentum swing. Whistle = freeze.

The chaos organizes itself into pattern.

And when that happens? My brain drops into a gear most people never see: tunnel attention, emotional calm, fast decision-making. Sports activate the same circuitry as emergencies. The "THIS MATTERS" system. Dopamine. Norepinephrine. Hyperfocus.

Stress doesn't shut me down. It locks me in.

His son walks into the same rink and nothing organizes. His brain gets hit with everything at once.

Here's what I didn't understand: we both hear everything equally loud. Most ND kids do.

Every sound at full volume. No automatic filter. No hierarchy. Everything demands attention.

The difference?

His son doesn't get that hyperfocus override. He hears everything equally and has no mechanism to block it out.

And that "too white" comment? That's a real sensory experience.

A hockey rink is visually brutal: bright lights bouncing off white ice and white walls with constant motion in every direction. His visual system gets snowstormed with input faster than he can make sense of it.

Add slower visual processing and cognitive switching to the sensory flood, and you get overwhelm before he ever has a chance to find rhythm.

By the time he registers one play, three more have already happened. He can't predict. Can't anticipate. Can't get ahead of the game.

What feels like flow to me feels like rapid-fire threat cues to him.

And because ND nervous systems often run in mild fight-or-flight at baseline, a rink's cold, loud unpredictability pushes that simmer into a boil.

He's not dramatic. He's not soft. His wiring simply can't sort the world as fast as it's hitting him.

And he doesn't have the hyperfocus override I get from sports.

Here's where I screwed up:

I thought because sports saved me, they'd save any ND kid.

"Sports were good for me, so they'll be good for him."

But that's not how wiring works.

Structure helps a Motor Warrior like me trigger hyperfocus that compensates for sensory gating deficits.

But for Sensory Sentinels—kids whose nervous systems take in every input at full blast without a compensating mechanism—structure doesn't matter if they're already flooded.

Push a kid like that long enough and you don't build resilience. You build shame.

They don't think, "I'm overstimulated." They think, "I'm failing."

And they're not.

Their nervous system just speaks a different language.

Not avoid. Not force. Not “tough it out.”

Just meet the wiring.

Most ND kids don’t need the world softened for them. They need the world explained to their bodies before they walk into it, supported while they’re in it, and dialed back down afterward. Think of it like a warm-up, a spotter, and a cool-down for their nervous system.

Before a chaotic event, the goal is simple: give their body something predictable before it meets the unpredictable. A few minutes of heavy movement, a compression layer under their gear, something to chew, a short heads-up about what to expect. None of this is coddling, it’s calibration. It raises their sensory threshold so the world hits a little softer.

During the event, talk less and observe more. When kids are overstimulated, language becomes another demand on a system that’s already maxed out. A calm presence does more than a pep talk ever will. Offer short breaks that don’t feel like quitting; a hallway lap, a two-minute breather. It’s not escape; it’s reset. Those small breaks prevent the full-system shutdowns that look like “behavior” but are really survival responses.

After the event, the work isn’t over. ND nervous systems don’t bounce back on the drive home…they stay hot. The right move isn’t to interrogate them (“What happened out there?”). It’s to let their body downshift.

Quiet ride. Low lights. Warm shower. Weighted blanket. Space.

Let their system land before their mind reflects. The conversation comes later, hours later, when they can actually access language and insight.

And here’s the part most dads skip: end with calm, not critique. Kids remember the final emotional note of an experience. Ending in calm, competence, or connection rewires the memory in their favor. If they leave an overstimulating environment feeling safe with you, that’s what gets stored; not the overwhelm.

This isn’t about shielding them from difficulty. It’s about giving their nervous system the same advantage sports once gave mine: a fighting chance to stay regulated long enough to stay in the game.

I wasn't stronger than my friend's son. I wasn't braver. I wasn't tougher.

My brain just had a compensating mechanism his doesn't. Sports triggered hyperfocus that let me use the sensory flood instead of drowning in it.

His brain sends him a different message.

And as dads, our job isn't to force our kids into the environments that shaped us.

It's to understand the environment their wiring needs and guide them like it matters.

Two kids. Both ADHD. One finds flow in the chaos. One gets buried by it.

Our job is knowing the difference. And leading them accordingly.

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