Son tested for ADHD- Therapist baffled and so am I..

[SunRae86]

I recently took my son (age 8) to be tested for ADHD. I am a late diagnosed female and I know too well how it feels to navigate the educational system without support in place.

At the feedback session the therapist said everything she observed points to ADHD (combined diagnosis of inattentive/hyperactivity/impulsivity. During the test he couldn't stop fidgeting/looking at the clock, and talked through the whole test about random subjects that had nothing to do with any of it.

Needless to say the test was inconclusive as he would test in an area- like working memory- and score high on one activity as above average, and then score low in another as below average (lower score indicating ADHD). So his scores were scattered and made it difficult. She said it was confusing because he is very bright and performed well, but it could have been that he preferred one activity over the other.

A side note is that he recently tested into the gate program. She said that even as a gifted child she would have expected more of the scores to be low to more conclusively point to ADHD.

She gave him the diagnosis based on the observations she had in our interview and her interview with him, as well as her observations during the test.

My problem is the school is fighting small accommodations to help alleviate things like time blindness on tests so that he finishes and doesn't feel as rushed. The fight comes from the fact that the diagnostics portion of the evaluation is not conclusive.

Has anyone else encountered a situation like this? We struggle a ton at home with behaviors but he is on his best behavior at school and gets decent grades. He sort of just falls through the cracks and I just want to make sure he is supported going forward.

[Speckled_frog]

Sounds a lot like my child - getting good grades, excellent school behaviour, extremely challenging at home. If there was likely to be a challenge at school, he’d refuse to go.

But we had his Assessment done by a child psychiatrist and she was fantastic in understanding his presentation. Interestingly, when we treated his anxiety with an SSRI, his impulsivity went through the roof & anyone who saw that side of my child would never doubt just “how adhd” he is. Is a child psychiatrist assessment possible for you? They just understand ADHD so much better.

Also, I don’t live in northern hemisphere, but I’m really not sure what test/diagnostic evaluation this is. I am not a professional in adhd diagnosis, but it all sounds very odd from my experience & knowledge of adhd diagnosis where I live.

My boy was getting decent grades up until grade 2, but as someone who does have child development/education expertise, I knew he would not be able to maintain these as learning & expectations changed in older grades. Now we have found a medication regime that works, i think there is no reason we can’t maintain good grades. Only mentioning it, cause if we didn’t find a medication regime that worked for him, I think he should be able to access accomodations & supports to meet his individual learning needs, rather than wait til he’s struggling & risk disengagement with learning.

[Speckled_frog]

Also want to add, particularly for a child with ADHD, test scores in a quiet room, can be such a poor reflection of functioning in a classroom.

In a classroom, a child with adhd’s brain (particularly without medication support) is often processing all the information in their environment at once, so cannot do the same tasks, they complete in a quiet environment. That is just how their brain works.

Any evaluation suggesting a child with ADHD doesn’t need supports in the classroom, based on test scores (rather than how they function in the classroom environment) is flawed.