The Menu Problem That Has Nothing to Do With Food
You're not broken. Your brain just needs fewer choices, not better decision-making skills.
You know that thing where you’re staring at a restaurant menu and suddenly you can’t remember how to be a person who eats food?
Everyone else orders in thirty seconds. Meanwhile, you’re scanning the same twelve items for the fourth time, getting more anxious by the minute. The server comes back. You panic-order something you don’t even want. Then you spend the entire meal wishing you’d gotten literally anything else.
And the worst part? You can make massive life decisions without breaking a sweat. You’ve probably moved across the country on a whim. Changed careers. Made huge calls under pressure at work.
But ask you to pick between the salmon, the chicken, or the vegan option? Absolute meltdown.
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What’s actually happening here
You’re not indecisive. You’re dealing with a very specific problem that has nothing to do with your ability to make decisions.
You’re facing too many options that all seem roughly equal, with zero stakes to help you pick.
Think about decisions you make easily. When something matters, you lock in fast. When there’s a clear best option, you spot it immediately. When stakes are high, your brain engages and you’re decisive as hell.
But a menu? Every option is basically fine. Nothing terrible will happen either way. Your brain has no anchor point, no hierarchy, no reason to prefer the pasta over the burger. So it just spins.
It’s like asking your brain to pick a favorite grain of sand on a beach. They’re all sand. What do you want from me?
Why this keeps happening
Your ADHD brain craves novelty and hates routine, which means you genuinely want to try different things. So you can’t even fall back on “I always get the same thing” because that feels boring and Wrong.
At the same time, you’re probably worried about getting the “wrong” thing and then being disappointed for the next hour. That regret feels unbearable. So your brain tries to optimize, running simulations of how you’ll feel about each choice.
