30 Signs You Might Have ADHD

By Ange Arnal 2 years ago

1. Lack of Attention to Detail

Paying Attention To Detail - Karthik Chidambaramimagesource/kharthikEver wondered why you're making so many mistakes? Feel bored all of a sudden when you're reading instructions? You're probably making mistakes because you're going too quick and you tend to overlook details. You tend to do things with 85% effort or accuracy.

2. Impatience

Six Steps to Tame Your Impatience | Psychology Today United Kingdomimagesource/psychologytoday
You might find that you're impatient with other people, especially when driving for example, but mostly your impatience will be with yourself. You might find that you're constantly opening and closing browser tabs because they're taking too long to load or people who talk or walk too slow tend to really rub you up the wrong way.

3. Impulsiveness

Impulsivity: Cause and Symptom of Anxietyimagesource/calmclinic
You could be known to impulse buy and be pretty terrible with your finances, acting on things without actually thinking about it. Not waiting your turn, so speaking over people a lot before they've finished saying what they wanted to say and craving excitement and new activities for stimulation.

4. Racing Thoughts

9 Ways to Keep Your Racing Thoughts on Trackimagesource/greatist
Feel like you have a muddled brain? Do you feel like you have so many thoughts that you can't just follow one of them? You might feel like you're very distracted but know and feel like you have a million and one things to do and you're not able to think clearly and create a clear mind.

5. Short Attention Span/Easily Distracted

Best Learning Tools for Those with Short Attention Spans | by Artem Zavyalov | The Startup | Mediumimagesource/medium
You're either 100% interested in something or not interested in it one little bit. There doesn't seem to be a happy medium with you and you're always doing 5 things at one and never actually getting round to finishing any of them.

6. Constantly changing tasks

5 diagrams that show how context switching saps your productivity - Work Life by Atlassianimagesource/atlassian
Your new hobbies that you seem to hyper focus on tend to burn out after about 6 months, tops! The tasks you start never seem to get finished because you're either distracted or you lose interest very easily. Don't worry it's very common, but some things can help.

7. Sleep problems

3 signs that tell you have a sleep disorder and you need to consult a doctor - Times of Indiaimagesource/timesofindia
You're always waking up throughout the night, you turn in your sleep a lot, falling asleep can be hard because you can't relax your brain, you're tired throughout the day, struggle getting up in the morning, you sleep walk and you procrastinate going to sleep. Sound like anything you do?

8. Trouble with Memory

Memory Loss in Women — Is It Age or Menopause? – Cleveland Clinicimagesource/healthclevelandclinic
Forgetting things seems to be something common, you lose or misplace important things and you can't see to remember password, plans, commitments or deadlines. You forget names and faces, phone numbers and addresses and going out shopping without a shopping list is just a recipe for disaster.

9. Procrastination

Stop procrastinating now: 17 strategies to get you back in action - The Creative Lifeimagesource/thecreativelife
Sometimes you might feel like you just can't start any of your tasks and it's a real struggle for you to start anything. Tasks seem overwhelming and everything you do seems to be last minute which is called Executive Dysfunction. You might find that you have a 'if i can't do it perfectly, there's no point doing it at all!" attitude.

10. Audio processing issues

Auditory Processing Disorder in Adults: Signs at Home & Workimagesource/ADDtitude
You prefer to watch TV or films with subtitles, phone convo's are a no go, you have poor listening skills and anytime you get given instructions or directions, you forget about them almost immediately.

11. Difficulty getting organised

10 Principles to Organize Your Life (And Keep It That Way)imagesource/doistblog
You forget your appointments if you don't have an alarm set, you often find yourself double booking yourself with plans and your paperwork is always a mess. You can never find important documents and your notes from work or school are half lost somewhere and you don't remember where.

12. Understanding time

How does time work? | Spaceimagesource/space.com
Are you often late for things? Underestimating how long things take? You think because you move quickly that you tend to underestimate what time you'll get to a certain place and you can hyper focus o and let hours go by without knowing .

13. Hyperactivity

1,319 Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder Illustrations & Clip Art - iStockimagesource/istock
Find yourself fiddling a lot? Unable to sit still, especially for a long time? And do you get one of those anxious tummy feelings when things are taking a long time? These could all be signs especially if you can't concentrate unless you have a pen to click or something to fiddle with.

14. Talking...a LOT

319 Talking Too Much Illustrations & Clip Art - iStockimagesource/istock
Have you ever been told that you talk too much? Or talk too loudly? You might find that you speak without thinking and tend to interrupt people before they've finished their conversation with you.

15. No sense of danger

Patrick senses no danger : r/MemeTemplatesOfficialimagesource/reddit
People with ADHD often engage in risky behaviour, especially in their younger years, with no regard to consequences. People with ADHD can often be reckless drivers, suffering with terrible road rage and often getting ridiculously enraged by other drivers.

16. Inability to Prioritise

8 Best Practices for Prioritizing Project Work for Your Team | LiquidPlannerimagesource/
When you're faced with a lot of tasks, you often can't work out which ones more urgent, whether to do your taxes, do the washing or to do the weekly shop. But you usually find that the most difficult task ends up at the end of your list, because...well, it's the most difficult.

17. Feeling restless and on edge

Understanding Anxiety, Agitation and Restlessnessimagesource/calmclinic
This ones probably one of the more obvious ones and it goes hand in hand with racing thoughts and hyperactivity. You often find yourself feeling anxious or nervous a lot and find that your mind is trapped inside your body.

18. Emotional difficulties

Addressing Emotional Difficulties of Children and Adolescents in Schools - Pearson Clinicalimagesource/personalclinic
Struggle to control your emotions sometimes? Or your emotional reactions get the better of you at times? You find yourself prone to mood swings and can get irritable very quickly? Your short temper  and low self-esteem could be a sign of ADHD.

19. Rejection sensitivity

▷ Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria, when criticism and slights hurt too muchimagesource/psychologyspot
Rejection Sensitivity Disorder (RSD) is common in the brains of people who have ADHD and it's hypersensitivity to criticism can often make you over analyse conversations you have with others. You can read into them and convince yourself that others don't like you or they're annoyed at you.

20. Bad stress resistance

Why stress is dangerous - and how to avoid its effects - BBC Futureimagesource/BBC
When you get stressed you get VERY VERY stressed, there's no just feeling a tad overworked or under pressure, it's always usually REALLY stressed and your emotions go overboard making you very irritable, and someone who doesn't work well under pressure.

21. Caffeine can make you sleepy

Imageimagesource/twitter
Are you one of those people that caffeine doesn't agree with? Caffeine can feel like a 50/50 gamble, either it will make you hyper focus, twitch and feel a bit loopy or it can make you feel super tired. Now, who wants that? Nobody!

22. Social problems

Vector Illustration of Two Cute Cartoon Girls Using a Cell Phone. Women are Talking by Mobile Phone in Flat Style. Stock Vector - Illustration of adult, person: 127161211imagesource/dreamstime
You can find yourself in a spot of bother sometimes when you're in a social environment, you get weird looks off people, you struggle to sit still in meetings and you have difficulty reading people's non-verbal communication. You can sometimes offend people by accident and overall you might have poor social skills.

23. Zoning out mid conversation

Anyone else zone out during conversations? : r/socialanxietyimagesource/reddit
You're known for being a daydreamer, in the middle of conversations or while driving, you subconsciously don't notice it even happening and it feels like you're relaxing your eyes while they don't focus at all. it's all a bit of a daze really being in that head of yours.

24. Reading just is NOT your thing

Dyslexia: Symptoms, treatment, and typesimagesource/medicalnewstoday
Do you struggle to process what you're reading? You often misread texts, you re-read lines 5 times and don't understand how the sentence even started. You skip lines and lose your place a lot as you prefer to read on paper than on a screen.

25. Hyperfocus

Hyperfocus and the ADHD Brain: Intense Fixation with ADDimagesource/ADDtitude
Hyper focus is a coping mechanism for distraction and it can be so strong that you become oblivious to everything that's happening around you. You may get engrossed in a TV show or a book that you completely lost track of time and forget about all of your actual responsibilities.

26. "All or Nothing" motivation

All-or-Nothing' Thinking More Common in People with Anxiety, Depression, and Suicidal Ideation – Association for Psychological Science – APSimagesource/AoPS
So you're either all or nothing with everything in your life, you either have no motivation to do something or all of it at once, so if you don't do the thing right there and then usually never get around to doing it. This often means that you don't end up doing a lot of your tasks, leading to feeling stressed.

27. Change is difficult

Why Change Is So Difficult in an Office (and How to Cope)imagesource/integrify
ADHD brains like habit and structure and changes in plans, especially on the day can really though them off causing irrational emotional reactions. People with ADHD can often find it difficult to make plans or commit to things in the future because it throws them off.

28. Sensory overload

Sensory Overload | Autism in adults, Sensory overload, Kids sensoryimagesource/pintrest
Do you ever feel like everything is getting a bit too much? When places are too noisy, tastes are too bitter or scents are too intense, it can throw you off. Or when someone is breathing loudly or chewing too loud next to you it can upset you.

29. Being clumsy

Premium Photo | Smartphone device with broken screen being picked up from floor by clumsy young man cell phone film destroyed in fallimagesource/freepik
If you have ADHD you might find that you have poor motor skills, you're that person who's always covered in bruises because you're constantly walking into things that have been in the same place for years, door frames, door handles, corners of furniture etc. You name it, if its in your way, it's getting walked in to.

30. Lists!!! Lots of Lists

Why successful people don't use to-do lists | The Jotform Blogimagesource/jotform
And finally. Lists. You LOVE to make lists. They're everywhere, they're written down on the back of receipts, they're on your notes in your phone, you have a million alarms set throughout the day to remind you to do all of the things on your notes. These symptoms can also stem to ASD

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