I'll keep as brief as possible. Daughter has just turned 7, the past 6 months have really made me ask myself do I think she has ADHD. She is our eldest child of 3 and a lot do align with normal behaviour but again as she's the eldest I'm probably not familiar with what is normal for her age. I'm probably feeling a lot more touched out this week as it's half term so the behaviours have been more wearing and to be honest I'm completely overwhelmed.
She is extremely bright, great at reading, sports, very popular at school, well behaved and nothing appears not normal from the outside looking in. At home;
- she is 100mph, her brain cannot switch off and she cannot chill out from the moment she wakes until she goes to bed
- she has sleep issues, always has done and cannot stay asleep past 5:30am no matter what time she goes to bed. DH has been sleeping in her room for 2 months because of frequent night wakes which is a whole other issue
- she struggles with change and questions everything
- she gets overwhelmed to the point of meltdown
- she has very little attention span and will spend 5 minutes on an activity before flitting to another and another and another. I've realised recently, I don't think she's ever completed a colouring page in her life despite loving crafting, she just moves on to another one
- she usually can't watch something on TV for example for longer than a few minutes without changing it to something else. The same applies with music
- she is extremely emotional over everything
- struggles to listen ie I ask if she can brush her teeth. She'll walk into the bathroom then back out again and claims she "forgot" - she can be extremely scatty
- following any instruction is rare
- she rushes doing everything ie she'll not wipe properly on the toilet/not flush/not wash hands
- she has to be in the same room as someone at home usually me or dad, I've taken to leaving her baby sister in her room with her for getting ready in a morning so I can get ready without her bringing all her items into my bedroom as she is unable to be alone
- she is completely unable to entertain herself or play alone and is constantly seeking us out for something to do
I have not mentioned adhd to her teacher but have told her about sleep problems which worsened a few months ago. She notices no issues and none of these problems seem to be present at school,
I do have parents evening soon so will broach it but what can I do to help her? It doesn't now but I'm concerned it might start to affect her when she's older. Do I need a diagnosis? If so how do I do this? I just don't really know where to start.