Daughter with ADHD? To accept diagnosis or not?

[NotANaturalGeordie]

Hi - first post on this board.

DD1 is 7, and school suggested Attention Deficit Disorder, which seems to fit some of her behaviour difficulties and made sense, so we got a GP referral to CAMHS. The nurse there says she thinks DD1 has ADHD (Hyperactivity) and we are waiting for a diagnosis from the psychiatrist.

BUT, several of my friends/family say I should stop the process and not let her get 'labelled' - that if her behaviour is not very difficult I should just accept that she is bored at school and will not ever do well academically. They say the stigma of the label will prevent her from doing lots of things, may lead to bullying, stop her from getting a job and so on.

I know my imaginative, creative little girl reads brilliantly, loves maths and lives in her own world, unable to concentrate on long tasks or make close friends and is now falling behind on things like handwriting.

So - to diagnose or not? I know it doesn't change who she is, but will the label benefit or hinder her? Opinions/experiences please.

Not necessarily true... and as she hasn't got a dx, it might NOT be ADHD, it might be something else, which may get get more problematic as she gets older. As well meaning as the comment was, I think it rather gives people an easy out to say "oh well, we'll just muddle through, it's bound to get better as they get older." Not exactly of the greatest benefit to the child involved IMO.

Sorry but at 7 you still have NO idea if the issues are actually adhd or one of the many other neurodevelopmental issues such as sensory integration disorder, without a QUALIFIED assessment. Teachers & well-meaning friends are not neuro-experts despite the way some carry on.

Dollfrog is often on here explaining how 7-8 is the age of maturation when some of these lesser known issues such as auditory processing disorder become diagnosable & apparent.

To give you an example of what I mean:-
Inner ear issues can also impact attention and handwriting. (inner ear = balance = hand-eye co-ordination, pitch or volume senstivity can result in poor classroom attention etc). The non-clinician could easily think this was adhd, yet inner ear issues of this nature can often be really helped by an appropriate programme of physical therapy while the child is still growing. A potential lifetime of problems easily avoided for the sake of a bit of work at the correct stage of development.

Trouble is before it can be helped it needs to be identified - something no teacher is qualified to do. Formally ruling out adhd as a potential cause of her issues could have been a very useful thing to do for her long term.

Even if the school is fantastic they could now be about to implement strategies and techniques that are utterly inappropriate & ultimately time wasting for your daughter, however well-meaning.

I don't get, OP, why school were so concerned about her and then not. It seems a bit suspicious to me. Besides, teachers are not qualified to make, or rule out, a diagnosis. I'm guessing your CAMHS works on a similar model to ours, with an initial triage/screening process before seeing a psychiatrist or clinical psychologist, as appropriate - the nurse wouldn't have referred your DD on if there appeared to be no reason to.

Aside from the issue of whether or not she has ADHD (which drugs are not a compulsory treatment for - no one would force them down her throat) or something else - which others have already explained to you: what if she has to change school, or there is a significant change of personnel, so she ends up with teachers or management who don't know her so well or who are less sympathetic to her quirks?

I am interested to read this thread by NANG, apologies to the OP for bumping it up. I also have a daughter with longstanding issues with attention, language, superficial relationships with peers, emotional volatility/immaturity etc. She is just about to finish Y2 and these issues first came up in formal nursery aged 3 although they have been there for longer.

At times she will get on with a task if you 'catch' her in a natural motivation when her talents will shine. Her handwriting has improved although is not great (only because she has not done much of it, despite being able to write her whole name at first attempt aged 3). In broad academic terms she is doing ok and is well within her academic targets.

We have just been for a second round of initial assessment by community paed (the first followed severe receptive language impairment aged 4 treated by private speech therapist). The paed is hedging bets thus far (because she has observed that my dd can at times pay attention) and with a competent teacher the problems are minimized. EP review has been suggested but I am sure her profile across the curriculum is fine and not 'spikey' as the paed suggests may be the case. I am sure she does not have a 'learning disability' (dd1 is dyslexic so I have experience of what an LD looks like) but happy to wait it out while everything is assessed. By the time we go back she will be half way through Y3.

So we are back round in this circle and because she is doing well this year I feel like it is pointless, since school are not going to do anything different (they have made that clear). However last year the teacher was not up to scratch, and there were basis issues of non-attendance in small group work. This led me to re-refer to paeds because the attention issues leave a vulnerability in terms of accessing the curriculum, with a teacher who is not vigilant.

I think I am at risk of going round in circles with this and I too am wondering what is the point of chasing a dx when school are blatantly not going to do anything. Some friends/family believe I am some kind of neurotic attention seeking or rubbish mum or say she is just 'quirky' and I should just cherish that. Which I absolutely do. My dd is very musically gifted and creative. But I also see the down sides. Wondering if this really worth all the agonizing? But then if we get discharged from CDC she may have another 'wasted year' with the wrong teacher and I'll be kicking myself all over again because the process takes so long. What to do?!!
:-(
HW
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There's nothing neurotic about wanting to see your child do the best she can and nothing attention seeking about acting on real concerns. As others have pointed out, even if there's nothing but patience to be used right now, if there is a diagnosis to be had, it's likely to prove useful if she reaches a common point where her innate intelligence isn't enough to see her through and she starts to genuinely find school work difficult as the demands on her increase and the amount of individual nurturing available in infant classes starts to decrease.

It can never be not worth it, even if that's because you've got a definitive diagnosis of merely quirky, rather than the non-expert opinion of your family and friends.

Someone mentioned auditory discrimination difficulties upthread. Given that she's already had therapy for a receptive speech delay, there's a possibility that this might be an issue for your DD, hence her apparent need to be internally motivated - she gravitates towards tasks where she's confident that she knows what's required of her.

Thanks ouryve, I really appreciate that.

A high level SALT assessment has been requested (her language still shows unusual syntax, strange prepositions and slow processing speed). However the waiting list for this is lon--g, and it is possible that if still within normal limits academically by the next time we attend CDC, dd may well be discharged before the assessment. This is what happened last time aged 4 and 5. Then if a less competent teacher is involved again, we will be back at the beginning.

Perhaps I need to go back in Feb and request they keep her 'on the books' until the SALT assessment is complete?

Thank u for this.

HW
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