4 year old daughter “Hiding” things that aren’t serious, but she worries and stresses about them like they are.
My husband and I tried to get our daughter tested for ADHD when she was around 3 years old, because we were quite sure she had it. Doc said she may or may not have it, but most kids grow out of it in the next year or so.
She’s not a few months shy of 5 years old and we’re more sure than before that she has ADHD. We have an appointment scheduled, but it’s a ways away unfortunately.
In the meantime, I was hoping to get some insight into if anyone’s kiddos deal with this specifically.
Recently, our daughter has started to “hide” things from us. The first time she did it, she cried her heart out and said she did something horrible. Something that would make us hate her. Now, we assumed it was something awful (even though we knew it wasn’t because she is a sweetheart). It took a long time until she told us… she accidentally looked into a kiddo’s desk drawer when we were at a friend’s house. That’s it.
It has since snowballed as she says “there’s something I’m not telling you” maybe a dozen times a day. When we can get some info out of her, the thing she’s “hiding” is always something insignificant.
She overheard a nickname or first name. She noticed something unique about a person we past at the mall. She had a random thought, random memory from 2 years ago, etc. Nothing ever to warrant such a reaction, but the reaction is always the same.
My husband and I implemented a mantra of sorts to maybe help: “I can tell Mami and Daddy anything and everything. They can handle anything I have to say. Mami and Daddy love me no matter what.”
She is so hard on herself and stresses about these things she’s hiding so much. It breaks our hearts because we have tried so hard to give her a safe space to be herself, and for some reason, she has hyper focused on these things she’s “hiding”. Her dad and I both grew up with our own issues, and so we have always tried to do better for our daughter than our parents did for us.
I’m not looking for a diagnosis. Just wandering if this is a common occurrence in kids with ADHD? Just to get some insight before our appointment. And if not, then that still gives us some answers. Any insight would help.