Kathrine Bang Madsen

Exactly, yeah.

I think it's difficult to manage for most mothers because they, so it's a totally life-changing event, right?

Having a baby and being a parent.

And there's all these different tasks involved in it.

So what we see in our study is that ADHD diagnoses increase steadily across the postpartum years, and they peak around four years postpartum.

And so some have asked me, why is it actually that most of them are diagnosed four years after giving birth?

Because wouldn't they experience difficulties already when the infant is very young?

And maybe that has to do with recognition and help seeking, really, because it is sort of the normal way of thinking that mothers can be exhausted during the first postpartum years, right?

So maybe they and their husband and the surroundings, they are not really overly concerned about the potential difficulties that the mothers feel.

But when this keeps on going,

then eventually they will seek help because it accumulates over time, right?

And also the parenting demands accumulate over time.

So there's schedules, there's social things to do and deadlines and all that.

And all that family logistics, that's...

That really demands some heavily executive functioning skills, which are difficult for people with ADHD.

Exactly.

Yeah, maybe it's both actually, but the thing that it never existed before, I don't believe really in that story.

Because I think, so a lot of women have said that they feel that they can manage, I mean, they have these coping strategies, but once they get pregnant and once they get a child, these strategies they can no longer use.

So...

So it has something to do with the context changing, right?