*Difficulty sitting still at one's desk in school, in restaurants, and/or at home*
*Difficulty in particular with reading or struggling to complete homework (taking much longer than same-aged peers to complete homework)
*Note: Learning disorders and learning difficulties are more common in children with ADHD- early intervention can make a huge difference for working on these skills deficits 
*Often not listening when spoken to 

*Excessive talking (may be more notable if you have multiple children to compare frequency of talking) as well as tendency to interrupt and blurt things out

*Getting frequent comments on teacher updates about having to redirect often, or "is overly chatty"

*Being extremely forgetful- having to repeat yourself an excessive amount of time until your child complies (such as picking up an item or bringing their dish in)

*Difficulty completing tasks they start and only reading part of the homework items, leading to careless mistakes
*Child appears to be frequently day dreaming, perhaps asking you to repeat yourself often

If many of these symptoms are present, even during periods where your kiddo appears to not be stressed or agitated, an ADHD assessment may provide important information

In middle and high school, teens may start to find that the difficulties they experienced in childhood have become more noteable.

Difficulty with grades may become more apparent; however, not all students with ADHD receive failing grades. Many high achieving students are able to receive A's. It is important to know that a high GPA does not rule out ADHD

Teenagers with ADHD may start to notice more emotion dsyregulation difficulties (irritability, sadness, anxiety, depression)

*Teenagers may also struggle with reading directions, focusing at work, making careless mistakes in their work, not listening when spoken to, and start to dread completing longer/repetitive/boring assignments. 
*Procrastination is common in individuals with ADHD; many report report that having an imminent deadline gives them the final push to initiate work
*A messy room or tendency to leave items all over the house is not uncommon
*Forgetfulness in daily activities, difficulty remembering appointments, and forgetting to respond to texts, are also common
*Fear around being socially rejected, especially if the teenager experienced any bullying related to younger childhood ADHD symptoms

Many individuals reach adulthood and later wonder if their life experience has been impacted by undiagnosed ADHD. Many adults- particularly hard-working/motivated individuals, are able to compensate with the symptoms of ADHD for many years before realizing that things feel "harder than they need to be."

Common experiences may include: 

*A history of car accidents or speeding tickets that are related to not paying attention 
*Difficulty getting even basic house-hold tasks done
*Starting a task and getting immediately side tracked by something else on your to-do list
*Tendency to begin new and exciting things and later not complete them (either due to getting bored, forgetting about it, or finding a new exciting hobby/task)
*Difficulty managing your money due to impulsive spending or lack of organization

It is not uncommon for adults to come to us after years of being a “stellar student” - but once they are on their own without home structure- (either in a first job or university)- the day-to-day demands feel extremely difficult to keep up with. In some cases, these individuals who seek testing may be experiencing an undiagnosed attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder.

For some children, sometimes the deficits associated with ADHD may not show up until later- in college or even professional school, as the demands begin to outweigh an individual's coping abilities. Early diagnosis can support children in seeking accommodations (if needed) and learning tools to cope with executive functioning difficulties so that when the demands do increase, they are not completely blind-sided.

Early diagnosis in children may also allow access to additional resources at school, help parents understand their children better and provide additional executive functioning supports, and guide medication management (which is absolutely not mandatory, but helpful for some). Diagnosis in childhood allows your child to better understand their unique strengths and difficulties so that they can begin to find a structure that works for them as they grow older!

A common misconception about ADHD is that this means something about one's intelligence. While we know that ADHD can make learning and life skills more difficult, individuals with all varying levels of cognitive functioning can struggle with ADHD. This is why we often see individuals who were told when they were younger that they "couldn't have ADHD because they got A's in school" (another misconception).