Our son is 9 and has tried all kinds of sports - soccer, basketball, football, baseball, volleyball, cycling, tennis, golf, and now lacrosse. He gets frustrated easily, is smaller and less athletic than many other boys in his class because their parents held them back a year so they would be larger in order to play football. Our soon dislikes football, but continues to play all the other sports. As a result, he hasn’t been able to become an “expert” at much of anything because he is always spreading himself thin trying everything. He is good at volleyball, tennis, golf and cycling, but does poorly and becomes frustrated at basketball and soccer and is just starting lacrosse. I would like to see him “zero in” on some things so he can work at them and build confidence. Has anyone else had this experience with an ADHD child?

I’ve lived with ADD since I was a kid but it was only identified recently at the age of 50.  I’ve found that individual type sports such as skiing , where I had to rely on myself worked best.  But, ironically, I have successfully played ice hockey as a goalie for 35 years.  I seem to be able to hyperfocus on the puck.  Goalie is more of an individual type position in a team sport.  Prior to playing goal, I was a forward and defensemen but was not as successful there because I could only focus on the puck and not what was going on around me.  I tried lacrosse as a defensemen also but had great difficulty focusing on the ball flying around outside. The only downside to playing goal in hockey is if I do not see a lot of shots, I lose my focus.

My son is 8 years old and has been taking karate classes for about a year.  It is difficult at times for him to concentrate, but he has done pretty good in class.  He responds well to the instructors and is really making an effort to do his best.

My daughter just turned 9.  She is in competitive gymnastics.  She does really well when she can focus, but it has definitely been challenging at times.  I’ve found that if she can have a few one-on-one lessons with the coach every once in a while, it helps her learn her routines better and she can concentrate more fully on all the things she needs to remember.  However, she loves the sport, which she has been doing for 3 years.  She tells me that the movements, the conditioning and the stretching feel good to her.  We stay very involved and communicate a lot with the coaches, and that has helped us keep some of the behavioral therapy consistent for her both at home and at the gym.

my son is taking baseball.At times he has problems concentrating,but over all he does very.So well he has made allstars.I hope that he will cont with this.

My son has picked his favorite sports at age 12 after trying several.  He plays football, but loves wrestling even more. He can focus in on the one opponent on the mat. 
My 8 year old did NOT like wrestling at all!  He still isn’t sure which sports he really, really likes to play most.  He plays baseball (sometimes very difficult to pay attention) and football. I think at this age, they aren’t quite sure where they fit in sportswise and trying different sports may help the kids find the right one for them.  This worked well for both my ADHD guys.

I am a 44 year old mother with three children. My son is 9 and has taken basketball for three years and has had great difficulty staying focused, playing well and building team relationships. I played basketball as a child and had the same problems.  I just got diagnosed with ADHD this year as my son. I just started playing tennis and seem to be a natural at it.

I (ADHD) played football and wrestled through university.  I also took up Kendo (Japanese fencing) later in life.  My youngest son (also ADHD) played soccer through university, he still plays in a highly competitive men’s league.  My oldest son (also ADHD) plays basketball in a NYC “take no prisoners” men’s league.  What all these sports have in common is high physical and mental intensity, high cardio rate (75% VO2 max), and being completely in the moment.  There is also limited input from a coach constantly calling timeouts.  We all tried other sports, but could never get into the “over coaching” that came with them.

My kids enjoy their gymnastics and skating. My son loves to skate because it appeals to his “need for speed”, lol. We had issues with his behavior while waiting for his turn in gymnastics - he couldn’t sit/stand still and would run all over the gym and get himself in trouble. I finally discovered that if we walked to class rather than drive so that some of his excess energy was used up, his behavior improved dramatically.

My son does not do well with sports that are not stimulating enough. He loved baseball, but we “directed him toward something else” when we kept noticing that the ball would whiz right by his head because he was in the outfield kicking around a blade of grass. Just not enough action.

Football was the same thing, it’s sort of a “hurry up and wait” game. He isn’t the greatest player so he ends up on the sidelines a lot and can’t stay interested enough on what’s going on out on the field.

Basketball worked great as long as he played most of the game. If he sat out at all, he drove the coach crazy on the sideline trying to make conversation. As long as he was kept in the game it was great!

Best sport ever so far? Cross Country!!  Running, running, running!!  He loves it, he’s good at it, he has always had unlimited amounts of energy and now that his muscles have been conditioned as well as his energy level, there is almost no limit to what he can do. In fact, his CC coach who has been coaching kids for over 20 years even said that our son “has a lot of talent”! Oh yes, TALENT!!!!  It’s been wonderful!!!

Am an adult with ADHD and I played softball from 1st grade though my junior year in high school. I always started and played the whole game and was a catcher which is where all the action was. My junior year I moved schools and ended up on the bench or in the outfield because my new coach really didn’t know my skill level.  I stunk in the outfield because my head was everywhere except in the game. I didn’t even play my senior year.

I’m ready to move on to the next thing with my teen daughter, she’s been playign Basketball off and on since she was 8 yrs, her problem with focusing on the court affects her as well, I don’t feel like she really cared for it like that but she tried. The way the coaches complaint about her I’m like forget it NEXT!!!!! She is very athletic and she likes to dance, maybe tennis? She went to one track practice after basketball season was over and said she didn’t want to run??????

We’ve not had any of the successes that are mentioned here.

We’ve tried it all. T-ball and baseball—we might have been ok but the first kid in the first practice said, point blank, “We don’t want you here.” That ended that.

We’ve tried Tai Kwon Do. He like goofing with friends more than paying attention to what to do. We might have to try it again. He seems to like soccer but has trouble paying attention.

I’ve tried to encourage running but he doesn’t seem to be into it. He loves to ride his bike but he gets bored because he only rides with us.

I am sorry to say that we did not have these great experiences.