It’s not considered a spectrum and that’s mostly because, when you get down to brass tacks, we all live within a spectrum of behavior. Instead, ADHD is a comingling of interoperating dysfunctions within specific systems of a person’s brain that relate to how the brain rewards your behaviors (to my understanding anyway). Ultimately, while everyone can experience moments of forgetfulness, inattention, anxiety, or hyperfocus, what matters most is if those things happen at a frequency enough to become a detriment to your everyday life.

ADHD can be broken into 3 types from my understanding:

• Inattentive ADHD (often most diagnosed in girls):
  • Trouble paying close attention to details, such as making “careless mistakes” in schoolwork, including missing or inaccurate details in work
  • Has difficulty sustaining attention in tasks or play activities, such as staying focused during lectures, in conversations, or reading lengthy items
  • Seems not to be listening when spoken to directly and may seem to be daydreaming or not be “in the moment”
  • Does not follow through on instructions; has trouble finishing tasks such as schoolwork, chores, or other duties; and may start tasks but lose focus and get sidetracked
  • Often has difficulty with organization, such as managing tasks and keeping work or home spaces neat, as well as problems with time management and missing deadlines
  • Avoids, dislikes, or is reluctant to engage in tasks that require sustained mental effort, such as schoolwork or homework, preparing reports, and filling out forms
  • Loses items they need for tasks or activities, such as pencils, books, tools, glasses, and keys
  • Easily distracted by things around them or by unrelated thoughts
  • Forgetful in daily activities and may forget to do chores and errands, return phone calls, pay bills, or keep appointments
• Hyperactive/Impulsive ADHD (often most diagnosed in boys):
  • Experiencing extreme restlessness, difficulty sitting still for extended periods, and/or wearing others out with one’s activity
  • Fidgeting with or tapping hands or feet or squirming in the seat
  • Being unable to engage quietly in leisure activities
  • Talking excessively
  • Answering questions before they are asked completely
  • Having difficulty waiting for one’s turn, such as when waiting in line
  • Interrupting or intruding on others
• Combination ADHD (skewed more to boys than girls): This is, as the name suggests, a combination of the two above, where no one of the trait groups is dominant but collectively is still impacting the patients day to day life.

I definitely suffer from a combination of both. I have intense moments of hyperactivity, and I can be easily wound up into an excited state (It’s like an energy feedback loop), but I’m constantly misplacing things, and I’m awful at future sights and sensing the passage of time. I’m very fidgety and can talk excessively, I have to bite my tongue to not interrupt people if I think I know where their question is going. I have reminders for all kinds of daily and weekly tasks to ensure I never forget them. I have a whiteboard in a prominent place where we can place future events so I can mentally prepare for them. Finishing tasks is super hard, once I get through the “interesting” guts of a project, all the “finishing touches” that make it “done” are boring and a real grind to do. Reading is still a very hard task for me, if I’m not medicated it’s almost impossible for me to get through several pages of a book at a time.

Maybe you know all this already, maybe not. For a long time, it was very rare for girls to get an ADHD diagnosis because of how it presents for girls. But this is the first step in understanding how the adhd mind works, which allows you to build around it so you can midgate the bad parts and harness the good parts.