Marauders ADHD headcanons

wereflamingo:

• All the marauders have ADHD
• Yes, all of them
• Sirius probably has it worst
• He has accidental magic until well into second year, triggered by rage
• Once the faculty noticed, McGonagall instructed him to practice wand magic as much as possible
• When not doing homework, he was asked to levitate objects or change their colors
• It was meant to just keep him practicing wand magic, but it also introduced him to the wonderful world of magical stimming
• He never stopped
• James likes to join him, because James is also hyper af
• But James also has other outlets
• He has quidditch and just plain flying to help him make some order in his own thoughts and release energy
• James doesn’t have rage issues like Sirius. He comes from an ADHD family who loves and supports him. He doesn’t get told off for fidgeting. feel constant rejection in his own home like Sirius does.
• He didn’t have to learn to rage against unjust punishments before he even turned five
• Remus has Predominantly Hyperactive ADHD like James and Sirius
• It’s hard to tell because Remus is polite and used to making himself invisible
• He has strategies
• He fidgets quietly, and most people don’t notice
• But when he can’t find a safe way to fidget, he’ll pick his cuticles bloody
• Dumbledore teaches him occulmency, supposedly to help keep his secret but really Dumbledore’s already training him to be a spy
• Occulmency is insanely difficult, he just can’t clear his mind 
• Because he always has a million thoughts flying around, so fast he doesn’t always notice
• But Dumbledore tells him not to worry about failing and just keep trying
• He keeps trying, and it gets easier every time
• But mostly, it teaches him to notice his thoughts
• That helps immensely with impulse control
• Before the moon, though, he starts slipping
• Peter is the only one of them who has Predominantly Inattentive ADHD
• He doesn’t struggle with impulse control, but he has a hard time focusing in class, and an even harder time focusing on homework
• He’s the only one who gets treatment, because he’s the only one who consistently gets bad grades
• The treatment is wit-sharpening potion
• Sirius used to take some of Peter’s potion for a while and it actually really helped
• Many people think Peter is stupid because of his ADHD, but he’s not
• It’s just that most of his homework is dreadfully boring, and often classes are too
• It doesn’t help that his friends are endlessly distracting with their color changing floaty magic
• He can’t keep up with James, Sirius and Remus when they’re brainstorming prank ideas and other projects
• They make such strange logical leaps and it’s just too fast
• Not that he doesn’t make his own unusual connections, but his friends (unlike most outsiders) can usually follow
• He could never organize a prank
• But sometimes he’ll be the only one to notice something they’d all forgotten
• And when given a task, he just needs to get away from distractions, and he can get it done
• Sirius has no patience with his slowness, he often interrupts Peter’s thoughts before he can finish and whatever Peter wanted to contribute is lost
• It’s not that James has patience, but he never insults Peter over it
• He just wanders off or shrugs and keeps talking
• All of Peter’s great ideas come up during the night after a planning session, not during the session itself
• Remus tries to have patience, but he’s not so great at it
• He can explain things several times from different angles
• But when Peter is talking, Remus finishes his sentences, trying to get to the point faster
• It’s usually alright, except before the moon he starts getting them wrong
• And Peter gets frustrated and retreats to the library to study with some classmates from other houses

• He likes the library because he doesn’t have to invite anyone anywhere and set himself up for rejection, he just shows up and people are there and they say hi and occasionally ask if he got some detail or other down in his notes

• Which is how he meets his girlfriends, btw, because he actually spends time with people other than the marauders 
• Inevitably, though, he gets bored of homework and opens his pranking notebook instead
• By the time they all go visit Remus in the hospital wing, Peter has a few days’ worth of notes from which he can select an amusing idea to present
• And then Remus lists what they’ll need to do to accomplish it, and Sirius and James clap Peter on the back, and suggest improvements Remus will surely try to veto, and discuss the magical theory behind the spells they’ll need
• So really Remus is not the only one who has a cycle
• The whole group goes through a monthly cycle right with him
• And I swear this used to be about ADHD? Like 200 words ago?