To wonder if there are signs of ADHD in infants

DS (now 13, AuDHD) similar to a lot here. From newborn he seemed hyper alert, got upset extremely quickly and frequently and was impossible to soothe. He was a terrible sleeper for the first couple of years. Never ever fell asleep without a lot of screaming - and would wake again after one sleep cycle. Nights would be 90mins of pacing with a screaming baby for 30 mins of unsettled sleep. As soon as he could crawl he would be the one who would not join in or stay on my lap at any toddler group. I know this is not uncommon, but he would often stand out as the only one. He was very cheeky and energetic whilst also volatile and sensitive. Very determined, pushed boundaries, but also gorgeous and really switched on and funny.

(Tbh his temperament is much the same now... )

DGD - weaning her was very hard, and took much longer. Looking back, she didn’t like the texture of food. She couldn’t stand loud noises like the vacuum cleaner, the liquidiser and fan in the toilet. She’d sleep for 3 hours in my arms, but unless being held was not a good sleeper day or night. DS was determined she’d sleep in her cot. Sheer exhaustion made them give up that idea - they had her in their bed for years. Emotional volatility - we don’t have a problem with her, after years of negotiations with our own DDs; but DDIL does.

By the age of 2, we were all saying ADHD, except her parents! Hyperactive was not the word! She’s on the pathway now, although it took DS two years to accept it - she’s 6.

None of these are remotely to do with ADHD...

Not with ADHD. But a sibling has autism and it was apparent from very very early. Didn't like to be held by anyone as a baby, would peel fingers off and go crawl away. Didn't smile, just stared. Very early talker, taught herself to read and write, was writing punctuated sentences by age 3 although had a verbal speech regression at 2 and was unintelligible to everyone but family. When the regression was cleared up, spoke only in monotone with a flat affect. Unfortunately this was before autism was on everyone's minds so was never diagnosed and was quite badly treated by teachers and adults who thought she was rude or 'odd'.

My advice is to try not to stress it! DS was very late and fat at birth but was (as with many of the above children) a dreadful sleeper and dropped all naps at about 20 months. He was also an early walker but speech was slower. Looking back he also rolled and crawled early - he just needed to be moving his body and getting to where he wanted to go.

But he was also quite a content baby who self settled at night and his NT brother was a huge screamer who also slept badly and walked fairly early so it's hard to say whether it's adhd or that I just make active babies who sleep badly. In retrospect I'm glad I didn't really know or worry about any of this stuff when he was tiny or I would have driven myself mad overthinking.

I have three NT DC, and IME it's really common to look at your crazy active toddler and think "I wonder if he/she has ADHD?"

My DS is AudHD. I’d say the signs as a baby (related to ADHD) were probably that he was an awful sleeper, lots of screaming for no apparent reason, couldn’t stand to be in the car after dark (that carried on until age 10, and now he only tolerates it), and just a sense from the get-go that his brain was running at a million miles an hour.

Well my ADHD baby was larger than average at birth, slept through from 8 weeks, and was a late talker although he did walk young. He was actually very placid and the only time he cried was when he was hungry or hurt himself. Always madly keen on animals - anything hairy or furry with a tail. He was a very charming child and got away with a lot at childcare thanks to his disarming smile. Once the staff woke up to it they found that underneath the charming smile was a very determined little boy.

The pointing thing always surprises me: my now 12yo can not follow a point to this day! Drives me mad - " Look the lovely pair of swans that live here have 6 cygnets!" Him looking completely the wrong direction. Me FFS. He also did not say a word until he was 4yo. Took him to a child psych.. He was oh he has this or that, stuff I'd never heard of ( and he was my youngest of 4), so I was terrified. Did a bit of speech therapy and OT - in my mind not that helpful but we were trying,
And then literally overnight he grew up!
20 words, then 50, then 1000. His vocabulary is better than mine now and I have a degree in English Literature.
He skipped a year of Primary school, went straight to a school that you have to sit an exam for, then another one you have to sit an exam for for high school.. Never bloody stops talking.
Don't get too anxious too early.
Obviously early intervention is good for kids that need it; but some kids are just going at a different pace.

Not sure which is ADHD and which is autism
he has both, but he was an early talker and talked incessantly once he started. He never had a cute baby voice, used long words and full sentences. really quickly (sometimes not always I the right context!), sounded like a little Professor!

As a baby he was very very fractious and cried all the time. Couldn't be put down at all and we really struggled with his sleep as a baby. He also walked early. Generally unsettled as a toddler and child. Not a calm child!!

Zoned out a lot as a toddler and child.

My daughter, who is 13 and was recently diagnosed with inattentive ADHD as well as ASD just didn't sleep as a baby. She would scream for hours, wouldn't feed and I just got the impression that as the day went on, she just got more and more overwhelmed, but couldn't sleep.

I'd spend hours rocking the pushchair or her swinging crib to try and get her to sleep - we might get 30-40 minutes and then she'd be awake again. At night, she wouldn't feed at bedtime, just started screaming - I would take her to a darkened room and use patting/cuddling/white noise to get her off, which would take anything from 30 - 90 minutes. Then she would wake an hour later, hungry because she hadn't fed, so I would feed her then and was lucky to get three hours out of her before she woke up hungry again. I would then have to wait until she was deeply asleep in my arms to put her down again, or the whole cycle would repeat itself.....

I had to swaddle her until she was eight months old, because before that, she just woke herself up by waving her arms around and hitting herself in the face!

I think she finally slept through the night when she was about 4. I had no idea she had ADHD then - just assumed she was a high needs baby. She was completely happy all the way through primary school, but fell apart within about 3 weeks of starting secondary school and now has a diagnosis of inattentive ADHD and ASD and struggles to attend school

That is so age appropriate though!

Adhd
Little sleep from birth
They do have ggparent who had parkinsons..
And 1 gp with dementia.
Impulsive from very young but mainoy never listened to no would have to be physically prevented from doing things
I would say dd1 is at more severe end
at toddler groups would move between activities after a few minutes
Never sitting for food
Stuff up her nose
Issues at school (hitting/biting) and nursery
Early very good speech
Walked 12m (actually quite careful as cruised 5m earlier)
Had to have reins for years and couldnt be trusted to scoot etc nervous with her around roads till at least 4.

Absolutely.
ADHD signs were not sleeping, basically from birth. Having said that by 5 weeks they were sleeping through 11pm to 5/6am. No sleep throughout the day though, occasional catnap if 10mins at absolute most. Spent the whole day just watching everything intently. I reckon they had the most developed eye muscles of any baby as when not mobile their eyes were constantly scanning everything. Thin, had trouble gaining weight.

Looking back, their signs of ASD as an infant was not really crying/reacting to anything. Didn’t talk/walk until really late but then immediately did it all in a pretty advanced manner, they obviously just couldn’t be arsed. Preferred to point/gesture and be carried than talk/walk (even after proving themselves very capable).

They are an adult now. Gets by just fine in life, good degree, good job, good friends (all have ASD but are the same). All enabled by a good combination of meds that suits, if not they couldn’t function at all. Even with ADHD meds, they are still ‘active’, need a long run every day, play sports (they love the structure, rules etc), and need very little sleep.

My dd met all her physical milestones normally, apart from being slow to talk. She went from only making animal noises and a few invented words at 22 months, to full sentences within about 5 months. Once she started talking, she simply didn't stop. It was like a stream of consciousness.

For the first year of her life she was an incredibly light sleeper, but after a year, slept excessively (12-13 hours every night plus 2-3 hour nap every day.

The 12 hours per night continued until her late teens.

To clarify is it autism or adhd or audhd you think your baby has? All present different. At 18 months though just going on your post it sounds like your child is not getting enough interaction maybe at home and just needs more. I have a very neurodiverse household here and being high maintenance and or bored was never a 'symptom' of anything. All mine presented much differently.

My SD has ADHD and seemed to have quite the opposite of a lot of the signs listed here; late walker, late talker, great sleeper (still sleeps as soon as her head hits the pillow) very content/compliant baby/toddler, only started showing signs at almost 3.

I don't think these are the same articles I read before, but they have some info about a possible link:

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/adhd-and-parkinsons#the-link

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33028106/

I have one child with Autism (and inattentive ADHD, not severe), one with severe hyperactive/impulsive ADHD (diagnosed at 5 as he wasn't looking like he was going to be able to attend mainstream) and a neurotypical child.

Compared to my NT child:

My autistic DC -had a spikey profile from infancy -delayed head control while other things were fine, extremely early explosion into full speech while struggling with walking, was more interested in things than people and could play with toys for hours without seeking interaction, reading and doing simple maths before starting primary school (we did not coach this, he basically just toddled about with me reading signs in the supermarket and adding up the cost).

My ADHD DC -i knew something was up from the get go. Born at 37 weeks but strong and active from the start, a new born baby holding his head up long before he should, then lots of little juddery movements (infantile myoclonus) without having actual seizures. The juddery movements gradually settled in the first year but I'd looked into it, and it can be indicative of neurological underdevelopment/immaturity. And kids with ADHD tend to have delayed maturation.

Low birth weight, early talker, early walker, poor sleeper
My DS was the opposite except he did walk at 10 months.

He was such an easy baby.

My DD, never stopped twitching, making a lot of noise from six months, different from other babies. Hardly slept. Wouldn't be put down or sleep away from me. She had really sensitive skin, I'd have to let her lie on coth nappies, because she'd get rashes. She's also dyslexic and could be on the spectrum.

My GD, couldn't be put down, hardly slept, had to co-sleep, very 'nosy'/hyper aware of everything and everyone. She has a MPA.
I've spotted ADHD ad autism from a few months old in other children. I've not been able to diagnose of course, but see that they were ND. I'm also on the spectrum.

That's interesting @SausageinaBun Puree food was an absolute no go for us. We switched to BLW really early on and that worked.

And not low birth weight, pretty standard walking/talking age.

My DD2 has inattentive ADHD. The problem with trying to work out whether there were any early signs is that I only have DD1 to compare her to. It's hard to know what is individual differences and what is neurodiversity.

DD2 was a happy baby, as was DD1. She was better at self soothing, DD1 needed to be held to get to sleep, but DD2 preferred to be put down. She was quite self entertaining. I did wonder if she had a secure attachment style as she didn't look back for me when she was playing at toddler groups. I think that might have been hyperfocus on what she was doing.

DD2 has some sensory issues. That was apparent when we started weaning. She couldn't stand lumpy food and would gag and throw up the entire contents of her stomach. I remember the "weaning expert" at our local children's centre telling me not to feed puree and thinking, "that's fine for you to say, but you're not cleaning up the puddle of puke". She was much slower to wean and carried on getting a lot of her calories from milk for ages.

I don't think either of those signs were particularly specific to ADHD. Probably the better indicator of ADHD was that her dad probably has it too. But we didn't realise until she was diagnosed.