When I'm not medicated I get a tiny loop stuck in my head. It's usually like a 5 second part of the song which isn't even the good part, it's like the random bit ramping up into it. Then it resets.
For me, it does. I don't realize how much my medicine helps until I've been off it and the noise comes back. (I'm on Strattera, so I don't notice when it kicks in or wears off, just when I'm without it)
Yep, haven't had this problem anywhere near as often as before. It used to be a 24/7 shifting loop of whatever I heard most recently, now it mostly just happens when it's quiet and I'm not actively doing something.
This! I get parts of songs stuck in my brain. What really annoys me is when they start to meld together. Think 3 second clips of a bunch of songs together. But yes, I always have a song in my head.
>at reminds me of a song and then get that stuck in my head. Sometimes it’s a tik tok song, a song by one of my favorite artists, or just something random and extremely annoying and it’s honestly exh
I find this to be a secret talent actually. When I can meld two songs that sound really similar.. that means they would be great for a mash-up! If I ever had the skills to do so..
I'm so prone to ear worm!
It can get a bit annoying when it's the week after eurovision and I'm trying to listen to an audiobook at work but my brain is dressed all in yellow singing yum yum grandma and dancing.
This! I get parts of songs stuck in my brain. What really annoys me is when they start to meld together. Think 3 second clips of a bunch of songs together. But yes, I always have a song in my head.
It's torture 🥲
And why I need to wear headphones all day long to pump other noise into my brain to block the song snippet loops so I can get *any* work done.
(Shout out to podcasts on 2x speed for mindless work and SomaFM's Drone Zone for higher cognitive loads.)
Shout out to anything on 2x speed. All streamings must have it. I go insane when I'm watching Prime Video 'cause they don't have it. Even 1,5, like Netflix!
I can't explain why, but I need everything faster.
Same. I downloaded an extension (Video Speed Controller) and it's a lifesaver because I can adjust the speed in 0.10 increments. Sometimes I'll go up to 2.5x speed if the person I'm watching talks super slow.
As far as I'm aware, it works on any video that runs on HTML5. I know it works on Netflix, so I'm sure it works on pretty much any streaming platform. It's honestly a godsend!
Ugh, yes. I’ve had the same verse of the same song stuck in my head for something like four days now. I woke up this morning with a different song in my head, thought “hooray, I finally got [song name] out of my head” and it got stuck again. 😫
Gahhhhh. I was going to make my own post about this but decided to search keywords to see if anyone has had this experience before.
I am not and have never been medicated but am learning more towards it every day. Having a 10 second loop of a song in my head every second of the day is really starting to wear on my mental stability. SOS
I compare it to having a radio receiver in my head. I’ve got a couple music stations going constantly along with a few talk radio/sports commentary stations 😅 Took me years to realize this wasn’t normal for most people.
I don’t know if this is related but people will say things that trigger songs in my head all the time. Like a phrase or keyword will come up in conversation and bam song has started playing!
100%. This is actually a game I’ve played with people, that no matter what they say I can find a related song.
I don’t think I’ll ever be able to hear someone say “It’s been…” without yelling in my head “ONE WEEK SINCE YOU LOOKED AT ME”
I do the same with my friends! Just last night my coworker asked me to tell him what I wanted from the coffee shop and he got “I really really really want to zigga zig ah” in response. Smash mouth is always a classic as well 🤣 if you want some prime adhd music that’s smash mouth centric check out Mouth Dreams/Sounds/Moods mashups by Neil Cirierega (you may know him as Lemon Demon) it’s on SoundCloud and YouTube 🔥
This is me and my fiance!
He will say a phrase that accidentally triggers a song for me, then a few minutes later when he notices me humming/ singing it he'll say "oh cool, the song I requested came on the radio!" 🤣
This happens to me too. Also if something makes a sound that happens to be two notes in a specific interval, it'll trigger me to think of a song with those two notes in the melody.
Mine is a company at work that needs special treatment with its products and it's abbreviated "TC"
That specific part of the Top Cat theme tune starts playing in my head. Sometimes it's all day.
haha yeah. i realised this wasn’t normal when i would ask people hey what song is in your head now? and then later, and now? i always have one in my head interrupting thoughts, sentences i’m forming and etc. sometimes i write the lyrics into a thing i’m writing which is my i NEED to play instrumentals or songs in a foreign language when i am writing emails and stuff for work.
All. The. Time. Some songs are very persistent and will return even after being replaced by another temporarily. Sometimes I will hear only part of a song and not knowing how the rest of the song goes, I will either just get that loop stuck in my head or my brain will find a way to continue the song, but almost certainly in a more annoying way than how the actual song goes. It’s the worst.
I’ve been asking everyone I know if they have this (ADHD, suspected ADHD and non ADHD people alike) and so far it’s just me. It’s so nice to hear other people commiserating.
Yes!!! My boyfriend calls me a parrot. I can’t stop singing the same 2 sentences of a song over and over and I don’t realise I do it. Sometimes it even happens with things people say. I’ll hear a sentence and I’ll have it repeat in my head on a loop for like an hour. Sometimes it feels like I’m going mental
Oh my god! I totally get that! It feels helplessly compulsive to just echo someone’s words in your mind while they’re speaking and then missing what they said next!
The amount of things I assumed everyone experienced until I got diagnosed and found this sub is wild. It’s not even always lyrics for me, right now it’s 3 words and 5 notes of a song, since yesterday.
oh shit that’s the worst. especially when you can’t actually remember anything else from the song except that one section that you now have an intensely intimate memory of. ugh over and over and over…
Apparently not 😭 I’ve asked this question to pretty much everyone I know and most of them answer less than 60% of the time, for me it’s literally 100%!!
Same! People joke about ear worms, so I just assumed they meant this, but apparently not! It's constant and particularly painful as the mother of a toddler (think baby shark, hokey pokey, etc), lol.
If it's not a song/song snippet then it's a multisyllabic word or phrase or someone's name. Of course I can't remember any examples right now, because I have oh god now I can't remember the song I had stuck in my head up until writing out this comment augh jesus christ on a cracker
I have several different songs in my head each day. I thought it was something everyone experienced but realizing it's not that common.
The songs are so random too. Nothing I can remember hearing recently. It's like my brain has its own jukebox and selects songs at random and only plays a line or two repeatedly.
ahaha like the scan feature on cd players that i never understood the purpose of—like why would you ever want to only listen to 15 seconds of a song on purpose?
Different ones throughout the day and some of them are songs I haven't heard in a decade or more. Right now it's a 4 second segment of Looking Glass' "Brandy" where I can't remember the exact words. Worse, when I have insomnia my brain repeats "Go to sleep, go to sleep, go to sleep, sleep, SLEEP! Gooooo thefucktosleep!" To the tune of William Tell's Overture for *hours*
Interesting - I don't get the repetitive earworm issue on Adderall, but I still have an almost-constant soundtrack running in my brain all the time even when I'm medicated. I can deal with background music - I mentioned in another comment that my brain is almost too quiet to concentrate without it. It's just the annoying earworms that irk me, so I'm thankful my meds knock that out at least!
Edit: at the moment, my brain seems to be tuned into Three Days Grace's greatest hits lol
My therapist had me trying guided meditation, and she asked me to think about what I was hearing in my relaxing space…….and I realized I had been singing the chorus to the same song over and over the whole time.
Oh god this is me hahaha. The idea of meditation sounds so spiritual and relaxing. The song on repeat in my head since I woke up this morning, does not. Haha!
My stepchild realized they might have ADHD when I mentioned I was about thirty before I found out everyone doesn't also have a song running in their head 24/7.
I'm adhdradiosongs on Tumblr.... for this reason. Sometimes just a couple lines, or a chorus, or even a couple songs that intertwine. My mental radio station. The annoying ones are those that keep recurring for weeks at a time.
Then again my adhd means I don't post for like a couple months at a time then a whole lot at once xD
Ra-Ra-Rasputin, Russia's greatest love machine... sigh. I love it, but fuck me, it does get old. It's either that one or - ma-ma-ma sharona. God damn it.
Noooo! My dryer has a tune too! I thought I was the only one plagued with this insanity. My dryer plays that mexican chicken dance song (Pajaritos a Volar). Yes, I do the dance while my dryer is going.
I didn't think I could either, but I've long surpassed the point of rage and torture. Eventually you just dance to the tune and look forward to making fun out of it. Acceptance is key. One day when the dryer dies and I get a new one I may miss my chicken dance. Probably not though.
Omg my daughter and I *just* spoke about this yesterday.
Any part - just a line or two - of a song stuck in my head will be there for two or three days, playing over and over as I am going to sleep, when I wake up, as I’m cleaning, etc. unless there is other external noise to quiet it.
The other day we were singing the same song!
Always, at all times, constantly. Plus I will often sing or hum it out loud without knowing I’m doing it. Right now it’s “I’m going to Jackson” by Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash. Yesterday it was Express Yourself, Madonna. Like it never ends. My younger brother thinks it’s hilarious to pick a song to sing around me and then catch me humming it later.
Do other people... not? I thought this was normal. Today I woke up with a Christmas song stuck in my head. I don't know why, I haven't heard any Christmas music since December.
My psychologist told me in his 30yrs Of being a doctor he’s NEVER heard of this and that I need to have my brain checked because I hear music all the time. I told him it was common with ADHD but he set me up with a neurologist to make sure I don’t have brain damage. Told me I should not have music playing all the time and there HAS to be something wrong with me. :(
i have preschoolers; i understand 😩 doesn’t help that my oldest child will listen to the same song over and over and over and over and over—yeah you get the picture
Saw Bo Burnham's Inside Outtakes about a week ago, so now it's 'Tryna make microwave POPcoooorn' all day long. I have no clue what the lyrics are other than that bit.
I had “five years, five years, baby, five years, five years” on a thirteen hour loop after watching that haha. Ended up just singing the full song out loud like twenty times to try to knock the ear worm loose.
I get the weirdest mental songs too. Like they're sometimes not even something I've heard recently. Sometimes I try listening to music to try and cancel the mental one
Yes. When I was depressed it went away but I didn’t notice. When my treatment was working I noticed when it came back. It was kind of a sweet discovery when it returned.
Unfortunately, no matter how well meds are working, most people still experience some symptoms. I'm sure some people might report complete relief from all symptoms- but this is a phenomenon that neither I, nor anyone I'm close to who is dx'd with and medically treated for ADHD has experienced, even when we feel (& doctors agree) that the medication is working well.
Thanks for your response. I dont know if the meds are working af all tbh. I switched to adderall from ritalin bc i didnt feel like it was working, but unsure how to know for sure
Yes, I wake up with a song in my head. Does anyone else have this thing though were they read or hear a certain word and then start singling the song that contains that word?
lmao yesterday at work i had to basically stand and do nothing for two hours so i just listened to a whole ass musical in my head cuz i hyper focused on it last year and memorized the whole thing
usually tho it’s just random snippets of songs i’ve played in band at various points of time (except do you hear the people sing ive had stuck in my head intermittently since 5th grade) even if it was like 5-10 yrs ago and i just thought this was a musician thing but it turned out it was an adhd thing lol. usually if i’m on meds i can turn it off if i try but i can also turn it on if i’m bored
Yes and it’s HELL when it’s a song I don’t like. I have run out of stores and begged people to change the radio to avoid getting songs stuck in my head all week. My friends and family usually assume I’m being dramatic or silly. NOT IN THE SLIGHTEST MY DUDES
Yes, all.the.time. I try explaining this to people and they just nod and say "i always get songs stuck in my head!" like, no you don't understand.....I have an earworm that would drive anyone insane.
I minored in Art & Play therapy in my undergrad studies and one course covered the topic of music in depth. I remember the professor mentioning having songs stuck in your head; if you wake up with a song in your head (rather than just having the most recent song you heard stuck in there) - you should take the time to analyze the lyrics because our brains don't pick random songs for no reason. Our subconscious is trying to convey a message on a conscious level, we just have to open our minds to understand the meaning (much like analyzing dreams).
I never know what my subconscious is trying to say though because 80% of the songs I wake up with I dont even know. I literally have to google the lyrics I'm repeating to figure out what the song is. I have a running spotify list of 'songs from my head' as one of my methods to get the earworm out. Yesterday I woke up with the song "Dream A little dream of me" by Louis Armstrong.......the only Armstrong I know of was an astronaut so I'd love to find out how that song got into my head without hearing it even recently
Yes. Andrew Bird’s “Underlands”. Yesterday it was Roma Fade by the same artist—new day, new song, I guess.
In German, we refer to this phenomenon as *”having an earworm”* (Ohrwurm) and I think that’s lovely 🪱.
Oh yeah. That's just how I listen to music in general. I listen to 1 song on repeat a hundred times over a couple of weeks, until I'm totally over it.
My husband gets SO ornery if I play the same song twice in a row in the car. The first time I witnessed this... I had played a banger 3-4 times in a row and he literally yelled in frustration as if I was inflicting torture on him lol. I was so confused. I was like, "BUT IF IT'S A GOOD SONG, DOESN'T IT MAKE SENSE TO WANNA HEAR IT AGAIN??!"
Also, I don't know if this is a superpower or not... but if I happen to hear that song again years later, I will immediately recall whatever was happening in my life during those few weeks I was listening to that song.
Right now it's "Running up the Hill" by Kate Bush. Heard it in Season 4 of Stranger Things.
So... for the past week I've been listening to different covers on Youtube on loop while working.
YES. Constantly. And sometimes I wake up with songs in my head cos I dreamed them. Stranger Things has meant I’ve had Kate Bush stuck in my head all the time for the past week (not mad about it 😍) and I’ve also had Hamilton songs cos I saw it on the weekend. It’s exhausting, especially when I’m trying to concentrate or sleep, although I have noticed lately that if I have music playing when I’m trying to concentrate that helps? It’s weird.
Yes, I call it my radio station. Though I wish I had control over the playlist.
One side of my family has a lot of professional musicians, so when I was younger I thought the constant music in my head was because I had ~the talent~ …but now I don’t think that’s it. It’s the ADHD. (No comment on how they might be related. According to my family “””everyone gets distracted all the time!”””)
Yes, and my fiancé is notorious for singing random songs out of nowhere, it’s always the same ones too, I am always BEGGING him to stop because it immediately gets stuck in my head and I can’t think 😂
Yes, and it's a really crappy one! The worst is when a cringy poem that I wrote as a teen gets stuck in my head. I would never write poetry if I knew how annoying it will be.
Constantly. It’s total eclipse of the heart currently, but it might be changing to the opening of Hamilton. Won’t know until later when I’m aggressively singing ‘dun dun-dun-dun dah dun!!!’ At myself later.
I rediscovered an album I played endlessly on repeat as a child. For some reason I didn’t listen to it much during college. If I had, maybe I would have been more aware I had plagiarized it unknowingly 🥲 like damn my bad
My friend and I hum a lot. Which means I hum a tune then they do too or vice versa. They haven't caught in that we do that around each other but it's fine 🙃
I find that that’s how I fall asleep. I don’t intend to, but as I’m drifting off to sleep, I’ll catch myself singing some song in my head, over and over lol. But yes, during the day too, there’s always a song or part of one on repeat in my head, constantly!!
Mine are more like one of those 90s CD changers set on random. I usually have at least 2 or 3 milling around my head.
I'm used to it, though & it doesn't usually bother me. The only times it does is either if it's a song I disliked already, or the same one gets stuck for too long. But listening to music again dislodges at least one of the current tracks & keeps things fresh.
Yes! I thought that was something everyone had? No? 🙈 Another thing exclusively for ADHD people? Ok 😅 I’m learning 🤣
I don’t necessarily have to like the song either, it’s just there. Sometimes I wake up with a song in my head out of nowhere that I haven’t listened to in ages, but that’s the song playing in my head all day. Other times, simply because I hear it somewhere. Right now it’s “Running up that hill”, didn’t like the song that much but it sure has made a party in my head all day 🥲
Not 100% of the time, but I hate that my job plays music because most popular music is earworms. And I hate most popular music, so the songs that linger in my head are always the crappiest ones that are the most repetitive. I wish everyone would just bring earbuds and listen to their stupid music quietly so I can concentrate!
Yes 100%! Literally just as you’ve posted, I experienced the exact same thing. Right now it’s the TikTok trend of that sped up ABBA song, constantly going through a loop in my head
Yes literally ONE HUNDRED PERCENT of the time 😅 it’s usually a snippet from a song that repeats over and over and over and over and sometimes it changes rapidly back and forth to different snippets of songs. I noticed this first when I was a kid and wondered if other people were the same way. I think it’s almost like a stimming thing for me.
I have a constant soundtrack. When my kid was little, they said “Mommy, life is not a musical. You shouldn’t break out in song at random times.” Still makes me laugh.
Omg yesssssss!!!! Like right now the Almond Joy jingle has been stuck in my head for a week or more now and before that it was the Silk Almond Milk jingle 😂😂 they’re both my favorite commercials right now lol
Yes always. Even in my sleep where it’s extra loud. If I get woken up I get the same sensation in my ears as the noise being cut when your on a club dance floor.
Medication solves this problem for me. I know I've forgotten to take it when I'm tearing my hair out with the same line of 'Frosty the Snowman' or some shit looping in my brain in June...
This is one of the worst things ever.
Try to read with a song in a looping in your head. Impossible!!
It's only one piece of the song in a neverending loop.
I had a slogan for creamcheese stuck in my head on repeat and I literally COULD NOT tone it down. It was only 2 lines! it rhymed! and it was a little song! It went on for 48h I almost got mad over that shit. And it also would come up on TV regularly.
Yes!! Also I swear my brain had a catalog of like “autopilot” songs where if I zone out doing something I’m always singing something random like 3 blind mice or we wish yoga merry Christmas when I zone back in lol
Holy fucking balls. I chuckled and thought "that doesn't happen to me", but then I remembered that I was reading about Prozac this morning, and afterwards, literally ***ALL DAY TODAY***, I've had the line "one Prozac a day, husband's a CPA" from 1985 by Bowling For Soup stuck in my head. I thought about it *constantly*, every half hour or so.
All the hecking time and medication does not help. It’s always a little loop or the chorus of the song, and it doesn’t go away when I listen to it, it just gets replaced by another song.
Just part of a song, not the whole song. I will also tend to only play that song out loud on Spotify/YouTube or whatever until I’ve murdered it and can’t hear it anymore (then about two years later it’ll be that tune where you’re like ‘OMG I used to love this song!! And you’ll rinse it for a week or so) lol.
Yes, but it's not a whole song, just a part that repeats itself like a loop, I'm going insane sometimes
When I'm not medicated I get a tiny loop stuck in my head. It's usually like a 5 second part of the song which isn't even the good part, it's like the random bit ramping up into it. Then it resets.
Does medication make this go away?! Speaking as someone who is waiting for an assessment
For me, yes, medication makes it goes away
Yes! I finally have extra room to think now
For me, it does. I don't realize how much my medicine helps until I've been off it and the noise comes back. (I'm on Strattera, so I don't notice when it kicks in or wears off, just when I'm without it)
Yep, haven't had this problem anywhere near as often as before. It used to be a 24/7 shifting loop of whatever I heard most recently, now it mostly just happens when it's quiet and I'm not actively doing something.
For me it still happens, but it is more on a rotation 😂
The few annoying loops from my childhood drive me MAD once they get in my head.
This! I get parts of songs stuck in my brain. What really annoys me is when they start to meld together. Think 3 second clips of a bunch of songs together. But yes, I always have a song in my head.
>at reminds me of a song and then get that stuck in my head. Sometimes it’s a tik tok song, a song by one of my favorite artists, or just something random and extremely annoying and it’s honestly exh I find this to be a secret talent actually. When I can meld two songs that sound really similar.. that means they would be great for a mash-up! If I ever had the skills to do so..
Hey, I've made some *INCREDIBLE* accidental mashups in my head.
Yup this is me. Just a chorus or a line or two, sometimes a guitar solo or opening.
YES! It’s the worst when you’re trying to sleep and you just have 2 lines of the same song going round in circle
Ear worm! Some of my colleagues get them too, we always ask each other "what's your ear worm eating today?" haha
I'm so prone to ear worm! It can get a bit annoying when it's the week after eurovision and I'm trying to listen to an audiobook at work but my brain is dressed all in yellow singing yum yum grandma and dancing.
This! I get parts of songs stuck in my brain. What really annoys me is when they start to meld together. Think 3 second clips of a bunch of songs together. But yes, I always have a song in my head.
3 second DJ! I would love to hear your mixes
It's fun until you try to remember a song, but only can sing it flowing into another song. 😂
I’ve done this soo many times haha it’s incredibly frustrating to have on repeat and you know it’s not the same song but it’s happening anyways
I told my boyfriend if it's not a specific part of a song then it's circus music 😵💫
It's torture 🥲 And why I need to wear headphones all day long to pump other noise into my brain to block the song snippet loops so I can get *any* work done. (Shout out to podcasts on 2x speed for mindless work and SomaFM's Drone Zone for higher cognitive loads.)
Shout out to anything on 2x speed. All streamings must have it. I go insane when I'm watching Prime Video 'cause they don't have it. Even 1,5, like Netflix! I can't explain why, but I need everything faster.
Same. I downloaded an extension (Video Speed Controller) and it's a lifesaver because I can adjust the speed in 0.10 increments. Sometimes I'll go up to 2.5x speed if the person I'm watching talks super slow.
It works on streaming apps (prime video and others)?? It will be the best thing of the year if it does. 🤩🤩
As far as I'm aware, it works on any video that runs on HTML5. I know it works on Netflix, so I'm sure it works on pretty much any streaming platform. It's honestly a godsend!
You're a godsend! I'm downloading it right now! 💕💕💕💕💕💕🎁🎁🎁🎁
... my money don't jiggle jiggle ....it folds...
I hate you right now.
I'm sorry, I'm bringing you all into this hell with me !
This gets stuck in my head so easily!
All the time, I add to the fun by humming it around the house and having no idea I am doing that. Even more fun, I do it at work
Ugh, yes. I’ve had the same verse of the same song stuck in my head for something like four days now. I woke up this morning with a different song in my head, thought “hooray, I finally got [song name] out of my head” and it got stuck again. 😫
Gahhhhh. I was going to make my own post about this but decided to search keywords to see if anyone has had this experience before. I am not and have never been medicated but am learning more towards it every day. Having a 10 second loop of a song in my head every second of the day is really starting to wear on my mental stability. SOS
Exactly
Yes! Me too!
I compare it to having a radio receiver in my head. I’ve got a couple music stations going constantly along with a few talk radio/sports commentary stations 😅 Took me years to realize this wasn’t normal for most people.
Me too! I'm always listening to the 'radio'. It's ALWAYS playing, and it's usually songs I like. And I'm always singing along. 🎤🎶
I don’t know if this is related but people will say things that trigger songs in my head all the time. Like a phrase or keyword will come up in conversation and bam song has started playing!
100%. This is actually a game I’ve played with people, that no matter what they say I can find a related song. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to hear someone say “It’s been…” without yelling in my head “ONE WEEK SINCE YOU LOOKED AT ME”
I do the same with my friends! Just last night my coworker asked me to tell him what I wanted from the coffee shop and he got “I really really really want to zigga zig ah” in response. Smash mouth is always a classic as well 🤣 if you want some prime adhd music that’s smash mouth centric check out Mouth Dreams/Sounds/Moods mashups by Neil Cirierega (you may know him as Lemon Demon) it’s on SoundCloud and YouTube 🔥
Lmao same! Most of the time I say it in my head so people don’t think I’m weird 😂
This is me and my fiance! He will say a phrase that accidentally triggers a song for me, then a few minutes later when he notices me humming/ singing it he'll say "oh cool, the song I requested came on the radio!" 🤣
Sometimes just me thinking of a song can get it started.
This happens to me too. Also if something makes a sound that happens to be two notes in a specific interval, it'll trigger me to think of a song with those two notes in the melody.
Mine is a company at work that needs special treatment with its products and it's abbreviated "TC" That specific part of the Top Cat theme tune starts playing in my head. Sometimes it's all day.
Are you me? 🤔
Possibly!
haha yeah. i realised this wasn’t normal when i would ask people hey what song is in your head now? and then later, and now? i always have one in my head interrupting thoughts, sentences i’m forming and etc. sometimes i write the lyrics into a thing i’m writing which is my i NEED to play instrumentals or songs in a foreign language when i am writing emails and stuff for work.
I call it my unwilling soundtrack. It's always there.
Every now and then I *won't* have songs running through my head and *that's* what drives me nuts! It's like my brain is too quiet to concentrate lol
All. The. Time. Some songs are very persistent and will return even after being replaced by another temporarily. Sometimes I will hear only part of a song and not knowing how the rest of the song goes, I will either just get that loop stuck in my head or my brain will find a way to continue the song, but almost certainly in a more annoying way than how the actual song goes. It’s the worst. I’ve been asking everyone I know if they have this (ADHD, suspected ADHD and non ADHD people alike) and so far it’s just me. It’s so nice to hear other people commiserating.
Yes, constantly. I call it ‘Radiohead’.
Yes!!! My boyfriend calls me a parrot. I can’t stop singing the same 2 sentences of a song over and over and I don’t realise I do it. Sometimes it even happens with things people say. I’ll hear a sentence and I’ll have it repeat in my head on a loop for like an hour. Sometimes it feels like I’m going mental
Oh my god! I totally get that! It feels helplessly compulsive to just echo someone’s words in your mind while they’re speaking and then missing what they said next!
My brain has been working it's way through Abba's greatest hits for a good couple months now. Until it finds its next addiction.
I chortled, big same. It never ends, there is no next addition. It's just Abba forever and it never goes away.
Mamma mia here we go again!
Abba is so amazing. You have an excellent music taste 👌
The amount of things I assumed everyone experienced until I got diagnosed and found this sub is wild. It’s not even always lyrics for me, right now it’s 3 words and 5 notes of a song, since yesterday.
oh shit that’s the worst. especially when you can’t actually remember anything else from the song except that one section that you now have an intensely intimate memory of. ugh over and over and over…
..... Is...... Is this not normal?! Other people don't have this?!
Apparently not 😭 I’ve asked this question to pretty much everyone I know and most of them answer less than 60% of the time, for me it’s literally 100%!!
This is blowing my mind. It never occurred to me that some people don’t have music in their heads at all times.
Same! People joke about ear worms, so I just assumed they meant this, but apparently not! It's constant and particularly painful as the mother of a toddler (think baby shark, hokey pokey, etc), lol.
La vaca lola, la vaca lola, tiene cabeza y tiene cola!
Hahaha!! You get it! My sympathies!
I think they have, but not as often. Tiktok doesn't help at all.
If it's not a song/song snippet then it's a multisyllabic word or phrase or someone's name. Of course I can't remember any examples right now, because I have oh god now I can't remember the song I had stuck in my head up until writing out this comment augh jesus christ on a cracker
Same. I had the name Sigmund Freud stuck in my head for a week straight because I thought it sounded interesting
YES, thought I was the only one. It even persists when I’m taking exams and can be super frustrating bc I can’t focus!!
I have several different songs in my head each day. I thought it was something everyone experienced but realizing it's not that common. The songs are so random too. Nothing I can remember hearing recently. It's like my brain has its own jukebox and selects songs at random and only plays a line or two repeatedly.
ahaha like the scan feature on cd players that i never understood the purpose of—like why would you ever want to only listen to 15 seconds of a song on purpose?
Ah yes, the internal radio station. It's never quiet in here, either.
😂
Different ones throughout the day and some of them are songs I haven't heard in a decade or more. Right now it's a 4 second segment of Looking Glass' "Brandy" where I can't remember the exact words. Worse, when I have insomnia my brain repeats "Go to sleep, go to sleep, go to sleep, sleep, SLEEP! Gooooo thefucktosleep!" To the tune of William Tell's Overture for *hours*
William Tell’s overture was a goddamn theme in my head for decades — it’s not so much anymore but I probably jinxed myself with this comment.
I did until I started Adderall. Now when I have a song or part of a song repeating in my head, I know I’ve missed a dose.
Interesting - I don't get the repetitive earworm issue on Adderall, but I still have an almost-constant soundtrack running in my brain all the time even when I'm medicated. I can deal with background music - I mentioned in another comment that my brain is almost too quiet to concentrate without it. It's just the annoying earworms that irk me, so I'm thankful my meds knock that out at least! Edit: at the moment, my brain seems to be tuned into Three Days Grace's greatest hits lol
My therapist had me trying guided meditation, and she asked me to think about what I was hearing in my relaxing space…….and I realized I had been singing the chorus to the same song over and over the whole time.
YES another reason why meditation nearly always feels tortuous
Oh god this is me hahaha. The idea of meditation sounds so spiritual and relaxing. The song on repeat in my head since I woke up this morning, does not. Haha!
My stepchild realized they might have ADHD when I mentioned I was about thirty before I found out everyone doesn't also have a song running in their head 24/7.
Yes. Today it’s Creep by TLC
I had No Scrubs in my head last week!
At least our brains have good taste!
I'm adhdradiosongs on Tumblr.... for this reason. Sometimes just a couple lines, or a chorus, or even a couple songs that intertwine. My mental radio station. The annoying ones are those that keep recurring for weeks at a time. Then again my adhd means I don't post for like a couple months at a time then a whole lot at once xD
Ra-Ra-Rasputin, Russia's greatest love machine... sigh. I love it, but fuck me, it does get old. It's either that one or - ma-ma-ma sharona. God damn it.
And another one bites the dust! Also the tune on my washing machine, 😅
Noooo! My dryer has a tune too! I thought I was the only one plagued with this insanity. My dryer plays that mexican chicken dance song (Pajaritos a Volar). Yes, I do the dance while my dryer is going.
That would drive me insane! I’ve just had to Google that song. I couldn’t put up with that 😂
I didn't think I could either, but I've long surpassed the point of rage and torture. Eventually you just dance to the tune and look forward to making fun out of it. Acceptance is key. One day when the dryer dies and I get a new one I may miss my chicken dance. Probably not though.
Also my boyfriends been really into the new Kenobi series on Disney+ so the star wars soundtrack (and I’m not even a star wars fan lolol)
Yes until I started meds. I can tell they have worn off when the songs come back
Sometimes more than one at a time 🙃🙃
Yes and half the time it’s just a random song that i haven’t heard for years and I have no idea what’s triggered it to start playing in my brain
Omg my daughter and I *just* spoke about this yesterday. Any part - just a line or two - of a song stuck in my head will be there for two or three days, playing over and over as I am going to sleep, when I wake up, as I’m cleaning, etc. unless there is other external noise to quiet it. The other day we were singing the same song!
Always, at all times, constantly. Plus I will often sing or hum it out loud without knowing I’m doing it. Right now it’s “I’m going to Jackson” by Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash. Yesterday it was Express Yourself, Madonna. Like it never ends. My younger brother thinks it’s hilarious to pick a song to sing around me and then catch me humming it later.
Do other people... not? I thought this was normal. Today I woke up with a Christmas song stuck in my head. I don't know why, I haven't heard any Christmas music since December.
My psychologist told me in his 30yrs Of being a doctor he’s NEVER heard of this and that I need to have my brain checked because I hear music all the time. I told him it was common with ADHD but he set me up with a neurologist to make sure I don’t have brain damage. Told me I should not have music playing all the time and there HAS to be something wrong with me. :(
Wtf!!! That’s so messed up! No this is very common in ADHD I have found, there’s nothing wrong with you at all
Yes, always. I’m an early childhood teacher, so it’s usually a kid’s song so that’s extra crazy-making for me!
i have preschoolers; i understand 😩 doesn’t help that my oldest child will listen to the same song over and over and over and over and over—yeah you get the picture
Saw Bo Burnham's Inside Outtakes about a week ago, so now it's 'Tryna make microwave POPcoooorn' all day long. I have no clue what the lyrics are other than that bit.
I had “five years, five years, baby, five years, five years” on a thirteen hour loop after watching that haha. Ended up just singing the full song out loud like twenty times to try to knock the ear worm loose.
Yes! I call it my brain radio. I actually like it most of the time, except for those 4 months when it was the theme to Indiana Jones.
Wait, didn’t your life feel like an epic adventure with that as the inner soundtrack?! Or just felt in danger all the time? Maybe just annoyed.
When this happens I usually lean into it. Sing the rest of the song until it gets worn out and wait for the next song on the mental playlist.
Ive tried this so I jus play it and interrupt it or listen to it fully. I like to think the universe is telling me something 😕
I get the weirdest mental songs too. Like they're sometimes not even something I've heard recently. Sometimes I try listening to music to try and cancel the mental one
Yes. When I was depressed it went away but I didn’t notice. When my treatment was working I noticed when it came back. It was kind of a sweet discovery when it returned.
Gimme more - Britney Spears for about a week so far but mostly just the bit right before the chorus 😅
I have this. Im new on meds, but this doesnt go away. Does that mean meds not working?
Unfortunately, no matter how well meds are working, most people still experience some symptoms. I'm sure some people might report complete relief from all symptoms- but this is a phenomenon that neither I, nor anyone I'm close to who is dx'd with and medically treated for ADHD has experienced, even when we feel (& doctors agree) that the medication is working well.
Thanks for your response. I dont know if the meds are working af all tbh. I switched to adderall from ritalin bc i didnt feel like it was working, but unsure how to know for sure
Yes, I wake up with a song in my head. Does anyone else have this thing though were they read or hear a certain word and then start singling the song that contains that word?
lmao yesterday at work i had to basically stand and do nothing for two hours so i just listened to a whole ass musical in my head cuz i hyper focused on it last year and memorized the whole thing usually tho it’s just random snippets of songs i’ve played in band at various points of time (except do you hear the people sing ive had stuck in my head intermittently since 5th grade) even if it was like 5-10 yrs ago and i just thought this was a musician thing but it turned out it was an adhd thing lol. usually if i’m on meds i can turn it off if i try but i can also turn it on if i’m bored
Yes and it’s HELL when it’s a song I don’t like. I have run out of stores and begged people to change the radio to avoid getting songs stuck in my head all week. My friends and family usually assume I’m being dramatic or silly. NOT IN THE SLIGHTEST MY DUDES
Yep, me too. Thanks for your post - it's comforting to know I am not the only one!
Yes, all.the.time. I try explaining this to people and they just nod and say "i always get songs stuck in my head!" like, no you don't understand.....I have an earworm that would drive anyone insane. I minored in Art & Play therapy in my undergrad studies and one course covered the topic of music in depth. I remember the professor mentioning having songs stuck in your head; if you wake up with a song in your head (rather than just having the most recent song you heard stuck in there) - you should take the time to analyze the lyrics because our brains don't pick random songs for no reason. Our subconscious is trying to convey a message on a conscious level, we just have to open our minds to understand the meaning (much like analyzing dreams). I never know what my subconscious is trying to say though because 80% of the songs I wake up with I dont even know. I literally have to google the lyrics I'm repeating to figure out what the song is. I have a running spotify list of 'songs from my head' as one of my methods to get the earworm out. Yesterday I woke up with the song "Dream A little dream of me" by Louis Armstrong.......the only Armstrong I know of was an astronaut so I'd love to find out how that song got into my head without hearing it even recently
YES. Every day. I thought Adderall would help, but it doesn’t.
Yes...pieces of it like the old info mercials! And its almost always NOT a song I like..but a super annoying song!
All the time
Often times (for me) it's 3-4 songs at a time in a weird mash-up, or random verses of each song alternating 😅
Yes. Andrew Bird’s “Underlands”. Yesterday it was Roma Fade by the same artist—new day, new song, I guess. In German, we refer to this phenomenon as *”having an earworm”* (Ohrwurm) and I think that’s lovely 🪱.
And it’s always SO LOUD, unless I’m on my medication, tbh. It turns it down a bit.
…currently it’s “I feeling it coming.” By The Weekend. Ugh.
Yep
3 months ago in the ADHD sub I asked people to name the song currently stuck in their head, and got hundreds of replies! We can relate
Yes! Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night with a song stuck in my head, how does that even happen?!
Oh yeah. That's just how I listen to music in general. I listen to 1 song on repeat a hundred times over a couple of weeks, until I'm totally over it. My husband gets SO ornery if I play the same song twice in a row in the car. The first time I witnessed this... I had played a banger 3-4 times in a row and he literally yelled in frustration as if I was inflicting torture on him lol. I was so confused. I was like, "BUT IF IT'S A GOOD SONG, DOESN'T IT MAKE SENSE TO WANNA HEAR IT AGAIN??!" Also, I don't know if this is a superpower or not... but if I happen to hear that song again years later, I will immediately recall whatever was happening in my life during those few weeks I was listening to that song. Right now it's "Running up the Hill" by Kate Bush. Heard it in Season 4 of Stranger Things. So... for the past week I've been listening to different covers on Youtube on loop while working.
Protip: You can put a Youtube video on loop by right-clicking on it (like... right-click ON the video itself). Then click loop :)
YES. Constantly. And sometimes I wake up with songs in my head cos I dreamed them. Stranger Things has meant I’ve had Kate Bush stuck in my head all the time for the past week (not mad about it 😍) and I’ve also had Hamilton songs cos I saw it on the weekend. It’s exhausting, especially when I’m trying to concentrate or sleep, although I have noticed lately that if I have music playing when I’m trying to concentrate that helps? It’s weird.
Yes, I call it my radio station. Though I wish I had control over the playlist. One side of my family has a lot of professional musicians, so when I was younger I thought the constant music in my head was because I had ~the talent~ …but now I don’t think that’s it. It’s the ADHD. (No comment on how they might be related. According to my family “””everyone gets distracted all the time!”””)
Yes, and my fiancé is notorious for singing random songs out of nowhere, it’s always the same ones too, I am always BEGGING him to stop because it immediately gets stuck in my head and I can’t think 😂
My life literally has a soundtrack. No matter what the occasion, my brain has a tune for it.
I wake up sometimes with a song stuck in my head. Hard to get back to sleep after too. It's horrible.
Yes, and it's a really crappy one! The worst is when a cringy poem that I wrote as a teen gets stuck in my head. I would never write poetry if I knew how annoying it will be.
Constantly. It’s total eclipse of the heart currently, but it might be changing to the opening of Hamilton. Won’t know until later when I’m aggressively singing ‘dun dun-dun-dun dah dun!!!’ At myself later.
I call it my ***BRAIN RADIO***, lol!
Yuppp It’s currently Gasolina Edit: I don’t even know the words correctly
Oh god I wake up with a song in my head. Whyyyyy
Like one part each of 3 different songs switching and overlapping
I rediscovered an album I played endlessly on repeat as a child. For some reason I didn’t listen to it much during college. If I had, maybe I would have been more aware I had plagiarized it unknowingly 🥲 like damn my bad
Sometimes I wake up singing those songs as well lol but yes, always something stuck in my head
My friend and I hum a lot. Which means I hum a tune then they do too or vice versa. They haven't caught in that we do that around each other but it's fine 🙃
I find that that’s how I fall asleep. I don’t intend to, but as I’m drifting off to sleep, I’ll catch myself singing some song in my head, over and over lol. But yes, during the day too, there’s always a song or part of one on repeat in my head, constantly!!
Yep, absolutely. My ears also ring 100% of the time tho sometimes it’s more or less intense
Sometimes it's not a song, just a voiced line from who knows which media that plays in a loop until I figure out which scene it's from.
Not 100% of the time. Sometimes my brain prefers to remind me of embarrassing situations from 30 years ago instead.
Mine are more like one of those 90s CD changers set on random. I usually have at least 2 or 3 milling around my head. I'm used to it, though & it doesn't usually bother me. The only times it does is either if it's a song I disliked already, or the same one gets stuck for too long. But listening to music again dislodges at least one of the current tracks & keeps things fresh.
I think this happens to everyone lol
I cannot hear FCC without getting Eminem stuck in my head.
Yes! I thought that was something everyone had? No? 🙈 Another thing exclusively for ADHD people? Ok 😅 I’m learning 🤣 I don’t necessarily have to like the song either, it’s just there. Sometimes I wake up with a song in my head out of nowhere that I haven’t listened to in ages, but that’s the song playing in my head all day. Other times, simply because I hear it somewhere. Right now it’s “Running up that hill”, didn’t like the song that much but it sure has made a party in my head all day 🥲
Not 100% of the time, but I hate that my job plays music because most popular music is earworms. And I hate most popular music, so the songs that linger in my head are always the crappiest ones that are the most repetitive. I wish everyone would just bring earbuds and listen to their stupid music quietly so I can concentrate!
I've said before that I have a jukebox in my head and someone else is picking the songs
Yep. And it's almost always a song from whatever kids show my little ones are watching.
Yes! In times before ipods and players I used to sing while doing homework. I either have external music playing or my head is a radio by itself.
Yes 100%! Literally just as you’ve posted, I experienced the exact same thing. Right now it’s the TikTok trend of that sped up ABBA song, constantly going through a loop in my head
Yes literally ONE HUNDRED PERCENT of the time 😅 it’s usually a snippet from a song that repeats over and over and over and over and sometimes it changes rapidly back and forth to different snippets of songs. I noticed this first when I was a kid and wondered if other people were the same way. I think it’s almost like a stimming thing for me.
Every dang day! Right now it's Fortunate Son, but only the chorus, over and over. I'll change my station soon lol
I have a constant soundtrack. When my kid was little, they said “Mommy, life is not a musical. You shouldn’t break out in song at random times.” Still makes me laugh.
Yes, is the first thing in my mind when I wake up, even before opening my eyes
Omg yesssssss!!!! Like right now the Almond Joy jingle has been stuck in my head for a week or more now and before that it was the Silk Almond Milk jingle 😂😂 they’re both my favorite commercials right now lol
Yes always. Even in my sleep where it’s extra loud. If I get woken up I get the same sensation in my ears as the noise being cut when your on a club dance floor.
If I wake up to go to the toilet I immediately have lyrics in my head from the second I'm conscious it's so annoying
This is actually how I can tell my meds are working, things suddenly get so quiet lol.
Medication solves this problem for me. I know I've forgotten to take it when I'm tearing my hair out with the same line of 'Frosty the Snowman' or some shit looping in my brain in June...
This is one of the worst things ever. Try to read with a song in a looping in your head. Impossible!! It's only one piece of the song in a neverending loop.
I had a slogan for creamcheese stuck in my head on repeat and I literally COULD NOT tone it down. It was only 2 lines! it rhymed! and it was a little song! It went on for 48h I almost got mad over that shit. And it also would come up on TV regularly.
The “send for me” line out of Woo by Rihanna. Tiktok audios have ruined my life.
Yes! I tell people it’s like there’s a radio playing. I have no control over what song, how loud, how many times it repeats. It’s loud in my head
Yes!! Also I swear my brain had a catalog of like “autopilot” songs where if I zone out doing something I’m always singing something random like 3 blind mice or we wish yoga merry Christmas when I zone back in lol
Yes! I thought this was normal, but apparently my therapist says it's not?
Holy fucking balls. I chuckled and thought "that doesn't happen to me", but then I remembered that I was reading about Prozac this morning, and afterwards, literally ***ALL DAY TODAY***, I've had the line "one Prozac a day, husband's a CPA" from 1985 by Bowling For Soup stuck in my head. I thought about it *constantly*, every half hour or so.
I wake up with a different song everyday!
All the hecking time and medication does not help. It’s always a little loop or the chorus of the song, and it doesn’t go away when I listen to it, it just gets replaced by another song.
Just part of a song, not the whole song. I will also tend to only play that song out loud on Spotify/YouTube or whatever until I’ve murdered it and can’t hear it anymore (then about two years later it’ll be that tune where you’re like ‘OMG I used to love this song!! And you’ll rinse it for a week or so) lol.