ADHD: Not Just for Kids Anymore

“I couldn’t concentrate. I always had trouble focusing and felt like I was all over the place. I was spinning my wheels,” reports a bright New York City woman who was recently treated for adult ADHD. “Once I was leaving the apartment for an important interview when I noticed that my dog looked kind of scruffy. Ten minutes later, I was still brushing him—and just totally forgot about the interview.”

Everyone gets forgetful or frazzled on occasion. The contemporary world bombards us with so much stimuli, it’s little wonder that we tap nervously on a desktop or have no brain space left to recall where we left the car keys. But when inattention, impulsiveness or hyperactivity overwhelms a life, it may be symptomatic of ADHD.

Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD (or, sans the hyperactivity, ADD), has long been understood to affect children. Symptoms have been studied by exhausted parents and teachers for over 100 years. Only since the U.S. government officially recognized it as a legitimate condition in 1998 has ADHD been widely understood to affect grown-ups. It is believed that between 2 percent and 4 percent of all American adults suffer from ADHD.

What adult ADHD is and is not

ADHD is a brain-based disorder. People with the condition are not simply high-strung or flaky or unwilling to concentrate. It’s a neurobiological condition, meaning that the problem is rooted in the body’s nervous system.

Several studies show that ADHD runs in families, though the condition may not surface at all unless additional genetic and/or psychological problems enter the equation. Note that various parenting styles may make ADHD better or worse, but the manner of parenting cannot cause the disorder.

The legitimization of ADHD has been a relief for many sufferers who otherwise felt guilty about their behaviors or believed they weren’t trying hard enough to overcome them. However, some skeptics charge that a disease is being invented to sell a cure for it. If a valid critique exists, it may be in the aggressive marketing of medications or the casual writing of prescriptions. Neither of these negates the fact that ADHD is a true medical disorder.

Diagnosis: Narrowing the gray zone

There’s no simple test or questionnaire that accurately diagnoses ADHD, so don’t self-diagnose based on a good hunch, a handy Web quiz or even on this article.

“With ADD, the prominent symptoms are attentional deficit, hyperactivity or impulsivity,” says Dr. Steven Safren, director of the Behavioral Medicine Service at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. “With any psychiatric diagnosis, the cutoff is whether there’s some functional impairment, meaning that it affects some aspect of your life or is disrupting enough that it requires treatment.”

According to the guidelines of the American Psychiatric Association, ADHD exhibits in a set of symptoms, plus significant interference in at least two major areas of a person’s life.

Major symptoms include:

            • Poor attention and excessive tendency to be distracted

            • Saying or doing things before thinking them through (impulsivity)

            • Chronic procrastination and lateness

            • Difficulty starting or completing tasks

            • Losing things

            • Poor organization and planning

            • Excessive forgetfulness

In today's fast paced world, everyone may experience at least one of the following life stressors at one time or another. However, if these events are reoccurring and constitute a major disturbance in a patient’s life, they can indicate a possible ADHD diagnosis. Only a professional can give you an ADHD diagnosis.