At what point do psychologists or mental health professionals differentiate between a child with developmental trauma and a child with ADHD?
What about young children who are diagnosed with ADHD as well as PTSD or DTD?
I have read the book “What Happened to You?” by Bruce D Perry and Oprah Winfrey. What stuck out to me the most is how it mentions that many children, who have lived with a lot of adversity, are misdiagnosed with ADHD when plenty of them actually had PTSD. I don’t really remember where I got my other information, but I’ve read that childhood trauma within the formative years between 0 and 6 can affect a child’s development. Can a survivor of developmental trauma reverse symptoms such as inattention, with the right treatment for example, if they didn’t have ADHD in the first place? If one could be mistaken for the other in a child, how does one come to the conclusion that a person could have both? Can dissociation coupled with complex trauma look like inattention and therefore be mistaken as a symptom of ADHD perhaps?