Cynthia Hammer, MSW, was diagnosed in 1992 at age 49 with the inattentive type of ADHD. A few years after her diagnosis, she started her first nonprofit organization, ADD Resources, which she ran for 15 years before retiring. She then trained as a coach, and after two years, at age 67, she retired again.
During Covid, as something new and exciting to do, she decided to write a memoir/self-help book about her life with ADHD. In researching ADHD for her book, she learned that children with inattentive ADHD are underdiagnosed, while adults with inattentive ADHD are often misdiagnosed. Her book, Living with Inattentive ADHD, was released on August 29, 2023, and has received outstanding reviews from noted ADHD authorities, including Drs. Dodson, Hallowell, Jain, Faraone, and Nadeau.
When she realized the Inattentive type of ADHD was still under-diagnosed or misdiagnosed, she was inspired to start a new nonprofit in March 2021, the Inattentive ADHD Coalition, at www.iadhd.org. Then this past year, realizing that girls with ADHD are much less likely to be diagnosed than boys, she started a project to FINDtheADHDgirls.org as a project of the Inattentive ADHD Coalition. The website is www.FINDtheADHDgirls.org and provides a checklist to identify young girls with likely ADHD, numerous free handouts and articles, and a monthly newsletter.