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Post by hermitical on Nov 16, 2017 22:24:50 GMT
As I understand it a criteria for diagnosis is symptoms appearing before 12.
I was a very quiet child and as I recall (though my memory pre-12 is patchy to say the least) I didn't struggle at school, at least not with school work, and was a good pupil, very quiet, a bit of a loner, but with good results etc and well thought of. Around the time I started comprehensive school things start to gently fall apart, turning into a cascade - again, not acting out or anything but a quiet implosion, going from the top of the class to not getting entered for a number of GCSEs, and scraping 3 Cs plus a couple of Ds and I think an E. Getting a 4th C on retake which they let me do as well as my A and 2 AS levels (which I got grades N, U and X, the X for getting the day of the exam wrong). I think they kept giving me chances because they knew I had some small kernel of intelligence inside.
Anyway, sorry. like I said I think a criteria is symptoms (well?) before 12, I don't think I really started struggling academically till I was about 12 - will that alone rule out a diagnosis of ADHD?
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eekoh
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Post by eekoh on Nov 19, 2017 0:10:57 GMT
I think a good psychiatrist should be able to identify early symptoms that you potentially haven’t linked yourself, they’ve spoken to lots of adhd folk and know what they’re looking for. As for what those might be I’m not sure, but what I do know is that academic performance is related to intelligence as well as any adhd and bright kids are likely to compensate / learn coping or hiding strategies for difficulties like adhd. If you were in a big class, getting by ok (even if below your potential) and not disruptive then I think it’s quite easy to go unnoticed at primary school.
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Post by jp on Nov 19, 2017 17:54:32 GMT
I was wondering the same thing before I had an assessment. I struggled to find early examples - but they were there.
If you have an ADHD family - symptoms in the home might go unnoticed and indeed be considered 'normal'.
From what I understand intelligence can mask ADHD in early years - especially the Inattentive type. Symptoms begin to show as you start to need to organise yourself to do homework etc...
Approval seeking behaviour can also mask symptoms - i.e. if you are highly driven to be the model pupil/ son/ daughter.
There seems to be increasing, albeit controversial, evidence for late onset ADHD. It may exist, it may be a different type of ADHD, it may be something else entirely that just looks, swims and quacks like ADHD. Its certainly true that various things could cause late-onset ADHD-like symptoms e.g. heavy chronic marijuana use, or Anxiety disorders.
The latest DSM (5) raised the age of first symptoms from 7 to 12 (I believe!?!?)
Do you have any school reports? Are your folks still around to comment? As part of the diagnosis I was asked to get both my parents to fill out the Barkley questionnaire since neither could be present. They varied considerably in their responses, and although both initially said there was nothing of concern about me as a child, both ended up scoring me highly for ADHD.
Its a long time ago to try and remember - but from memory early symptoms included avoiding homework and chores, losing things (coats, gloves, homework, the house key that was eventually put on a string around my neck), teachers commenting on how I was underachieving/ not paying attention ( I didn't have reports available but both paremts remembered getting called in to chat to my teachers about this), climbing furniture/ walls at every opportunity (the whole house was an obstacle course in my mind), hard to tear away from tasks I was enjoying (to the extent that I would soil myself rather than stop whatever it was), getting lost, not staying in bed (I would get up over and over so my folks eventually locked me in my bedroom!!!) accident prone, talking excessively, changing the subject mid conversation, not finishing things - even things I enjoyed like big lego models for example, loosing the thread of conversations, easily confused by verbal instructions, day dreaming. And more....
Hope that's useful - best wishes
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jamesyp
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Post by jamesyp on Nov 20, 2017 21:08:02 GMT
I fully understand your point, my primary school memory is a little vague also. I went to a primary school in the middle of a 80s council estate, most of us were wild, in fact the only kid who behaved was the vicars son and we thought he was nuts. However having spent time in my child's class, they seem very well behaved, but at least five kids I know are diagnosed ADHD. So at a guess half my class had ADHD? or was it social deprivation? Either way its harder to single out the symptoms. Yes it's ideal if you kept every school report since 1981 or drag in your 78 year old folks!
Now I'm not a scientist, however I'm sure ADHD is related to having low Dopamine which also plays a factor in short & long term memory? I may stand corrected.
Good luck
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