{"id":419392,"date":"2025-09-12T21:05:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-12T21:05:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/419392\/"},"modified":"2025-09-12T21:05:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-12T21:05:08","slug":"adhd-diagnosis-gave-this-author-a-reason-to-forgive-herself","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/419392\/","title":{"rendered":"ADHD diagnosis gave this author a ‘reason to forgive herself’"},"content":{"rendered":"

After Carla Ciccone<\/a> gave birth to her daughter, she spiraled with shame and self-hatred. She felt lost. She felt like a fraud. Part of her had always felt an aching imposter syndrome and a difficulty controlling her emotions.\u00a0<\/p>\n

She knew she needed therapy. What she didn\u2019t expect was an ADHD diagnosis<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

She thought back to the boys of her elementary school days, bouncing in their seats and unable to keep still. But that didn\u2019t describe her at all.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Ciccone examined the criticism she faced throughout her life from teachers and family members who told her she was lazy, careless and gave up too easily, she writes in her new book \u201cNowhere Girl: Life as a Member of ADHD\u2019s Lost Generation\u201d<\/a> (out now from The Dial Press).<\/p>\n

Hyperactive ADHD \u2013 the more commonly studied type \u2013 is only one part of the story. Inattentive ADHD, on the other hand, is driven by difficulty sustaining attention and focus rather than impulsivity or need for constant movement. Think daydreamers. It\u2019s more common in women<\/a> than in men.<\/p>\n

Ciccone isn\u2019t alone. In 2023, a study published in Epic Research found the number of newly diagnosed women<\/a> between ages 23-29 and 30-49 nearly doubled from 2020 to 2022. As Ciccone argues in her book, a lack of comprehensive research and attention to ADHD in women and girls has created a \u201clost generation\u201d she dubs the \u201cNowhere Girls.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Meet the \u2018big, chaotic sisterhood\u2019 of girls left out of ADHD research<\/p>\n

Once diagnosed, Ciccone craved answers. She undertook a personal and academic deep dive to discover why so many women grew up undiagnosed. She interviewed those who had been diagnosed later in life, many only after their children were diagnosed with the genetic disorder. She wanted an explanation for all the times she felt she was doing \u201clife\u201d wrong.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Symptoms of inattentive ADHD<\/a> include inability to sustain attention during tasks, mind wandering, careless mistakes, losing things, easily distracted by external stimuli or unrelated thoughts and forgetfulness, according to ADHD Magazine ADDitude<\/a>. People with it can get overstimulated easily and sometimes struggle to control their emotions.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlthough the word inattentive implies a lack of attention, it\u2019s a misnomer,\u201d Ciccone writes. \u201cPeople with inattentive ADHD can pay attention, and if something is of special interest to us, we display intense focus, but we lack the internal regulation required to make decisions about how and when to deploy our attention.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

While ADHD diagnoses are rising, it\u2019s not just because more people have ADHD. Part of the reason is that professionals are getting better at recognizing symptoms. In the past, the general thinking was that girls couldn\u2019t have ADHD and they were misdiagnosed in adolescence with anxiety or depression.\u00a0Black women, especially, are under- and misdiagnosed<\/a> compared to their white male peers, the Washington Post reported in 2021.<\/p>\n

Ciccone was frustrated to find research was largely focused on boys. She eventually found Stephen Hinshaw<\/a>, a professor at UC Berkley and one of the leading researchers on ADHD in women and girls, who is trying to change that.<\/p>\n

\u201cSadly, it’s a common story in the medical field that women and girls get overlooked until it’s too late,\u201d Ciccone tells USA TODAY. \u201cThen they go, \u2018Oops, I guess you better study you. I guess your bodies work differently.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Gender can play a big role in ADHD diagnosis. \u201cGendered socialization\u201d \u2013 the ways we internalize societal expectations from a young age (like dolls and trucks at playtime) \u2013 puts girls with undiagnosed ADHD at a disadvantage. There\u2019s pressure to be a quiet, polite girl. As Ciccone writes in the book, \u201cemotional dysregulation becomes especially tricky because we become more and more beholden to gender expectations that say it\u2019s inappropriate to display intense feelings.\u201d Sometimes, they\u2019re identified as \u201cgifted\u201d kids and are often perfectionists. They may appear to be listening, even if they aren\u2019t. They\u2019re often given more responsibility in the classroom than their male counterparts. They learn to mask.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn elementary school in the \u201890s, boys were expected to act out to a certain degree and be aggressive and loud and disruptive. And that\u2019s not to say that they had a good experience of that, they still get corrected. But if a girl does it, she gets corrected in a different way, in a way that goes (at) her self-esteem,\u201d Ciccone says. \u201c\u2018You\u2019re a girl, and you\u2019re supposed to be good.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

They learn coping mechanisms to skate by schooling \u201cat the cost of a lot of anxiety and a lot of stress,\u201d Hinshaw told Ciccone for \u201cNowhere Girl.\u201d Those skills (and supportive families, if they have them) can act as scaffolding against exacerbated ADHD symptoms.<\/p>\n

Inattentive symptoms typically persist with age<\/a>, while hyperactive ADHD symptoms often decline, according to the National Institutes of Health. So when that scaffolding falls away \u2013 with larger class loads in high school or college, in their first professional job, after having a baby \u2013 it all comes crashing down.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Carla Ciccone’s ADHD diagnosis gave her a \u2018reason to forgive\u2019 herself<\/p>\n

When the pandemic wreaked\u00a0havoc on the world, \u201cwe lost our support,” Ciccone says. “ADHD people, we can be chaotic but we do sort of thrive when we have a routine. And so when we lost that, I think a lot of us were just alone with our brains.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

But the pandemic also opened up different avenues for support, like telehealth. Ciccone found success with online therapy. Once she got her diagnosis, it led to a chapter of reflection and, ultimately, forgiveness.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe emotional dysregulation that leads to this sense of shame that is really persistent and really, really hard to shake, even when you do know where it\u2019s stemming from \u2026 it\u2019s very hard to get away from that,\u201d Ciccone says. Many of the women she spoke with felt overwhelmed, like she had, which led to a feeling of “I can\u2019t handle life the way that other people can and therefore I\u2019m not worthy of my position in the world.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Ciccone began to give herself grace for the things she used to hate about herself. She looked at her younger, undiagnosed self with compassion. She started listening to her body and letting herself move when she felt restless. She made slow, gentle changes to her life to accommodate her ADHD.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was empowering to know I had a reason to forgive myself,\u201d she says.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Need a new book? <\/strong>15 new ones to check out, from romance to horror<\/a><\/p>\n

Clare Mulroy is USA TODAY\u2019s Books Reporter, where she covers buzzy releases, chats with authors and dives into the culture of reading. Find her on Instagram<\/a>, subscribe to our weekly Books newsletter<\/a> or tell her what you\u2019re reading at cmulroy@usatoday.com<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n