10 Adult ADHD Signs You May Not Realize Are Actually Symptoms

With everything there is to juggle in life, it’s easy to assume that everyone experiences that sinking-in-quicksand feeling as they navigate another busy day.

But if you find this feeling is paired with extreme levels of disorganization, inattention and overwhelm, these might be signs of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder.

Roughly 10 million American adults (and over 365 million globally) are thought to have ADHD — and because symptoms can show up differently in adults, realizing you might have the disorder is typically a slow burn, the overlooked signs of which can cause significant strain on your life and health.

“Adults looking for diagnosis often have many subtle signs rather than completely failing,” Dede O’Shea, a neuropsychologist at Beth Israel Lahey Health in Cambridge, Massachusetts, told HuffPost.

The hallmark symptoms of ADHD — inattention, impulsivity and hyperactivity — typically aren’t as noticeable in adulthood, likely because adults whose ADHD wasn’t diagnosed in childhood have had a lifetime to parse together the skills necessary to compensate for their symptoms. 

“Some symptoms of ADHD also mimic those of anxiety or depression,” Cristina Louk, a clinical psychologist based in Washington state, told HuffPost. “Most people will first get diagnosed with these disorders and get frustrated when treatment fails to alleviate their symptoms.”

In the moment, you might find yourself attributing certain feelings and behaviors to other things — blaming feelings of hype on too much coffee or snapping at your frozen computer on sleep deprivation — when really, they’re symptoms of adult ADHD.

Here are some of the sneakier signs you might be overlooking:

1. Procrastinating to the extreme