If you are a woman in Columbia who has been quietly wondering whether ADHD explains the patterns you have been living with — and you have not been able to find a specialist who truly understands how ADHD presents in adult women — that specialist is available to you now.
I am Kristen McClure, a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with nearly 30 years of experience specializing in ADHD in women. I offer telehealth therapy for adult women across South Carolina, including Columbia, Lexington, Irmo, Chapin, Blythewood, Camden, and throughout the Midlands.
Who I Work With in Columbia and the Midlands
Columbia draws a mix of women that reflects the city itself: state government employees, military families, healthcare workers and educators from USC and the surrounding medical community, mothers navigating demanding family and work lives, and young professionals who have succeeded by working harder than anyone around them without fully understanding why it has always cost so much.
The women I see in the Columbia area share a common thread beneath their different circumstances: they are done explaining away the patterns. They are ready to understand what is actually happening.
Many are late-diagnosed — in their 30s, 40s, or later. The ADHD in women has been systematically underrecognized by the medical community for decades, which means that women who grew up without the diagnosis have spent years finding their own ways to manage, often at significant personal cost.
Some have had a formal diagnosis for years but have never found support that actually addressed the ADHD dimension specifically — therapy that understood the executive function piece, the shame piece, the hormonal piece, the burnout piece. They have received generic mental health care and found it only partially helpful.
Telehealth and South Carolina Women
Finding an ADHD specialist who focuses specifically on women — not children, not men, not ADHD as a side consideration alongside other specialties — is difficult in any state. South Carolina has a limited supply of this specialized care.
Telehealth changes the equation. The level of specialization that has historically required driving to a larger city or waiting months for an appointment is now available from wherever you are in South Carolina.
For women with ADHD specifically, this matters more than it might seem. Getting to a weekly appointment is a genuine executive function challenge — the commute, the transition, the arriving-on-time with everything you need. Telehealth removes those barriers and, for many women, allows the consistency of attendance that weekly therapy requires.
What ADHD Often Looks Like for Women
ADHD does not look the same in women as it does in the boys who are typically diagnosed in childhood. In adult women, the picture often includes:
- A mind that runs constantly — through tasks, worries, ideas, and parallel thoughts — even during rest
- Emotional intensity: feelings that arrive fast, hit hard, and are harder to calm than the situation seems to call for
- Inconsistent performance that defies a clear explanation — excellent when activated, barely functional when not
- Working significantly harder than peers to meet the same expectations, with no external evidence of the extra effort
- A long history of being described as "too sensitive," "too scattered," "too much" — or, conversely, of being told you do not seem like you have ADHD
- Coping strategies that have been highly effective until they stopped being enough
What We Work On Together
Understanding your brain. A diagnosis, or a growing recognition that ADHD is part of your picture, raises a lot of questions. What does this mean for how I work? Why have certain things always been so hard? What is neurological and what is not? Starting with accurate understanding changes everything.
The shame. Most women with ADHD arrive with significant internalized shame — not because their failures were real but because they have interpreted neurological difficulty as personal inadequacy. Addressing that shame is not peripheral; it is often the heart of the work.
Burnout. The ADHD woman who has been functioning through extraordinary effort often burns out in specific, recognizable ways. If you have been running on empty, understanding why and what actually helps is essential.
Anxiety. ADHD and anxiety co-occur at very high rates in women. If anxiety treatment has not worked as well as you expected, or has helped only partially, the ADHD piece may be what is missing.
Relationships. ADHD affects connection in specific ways — with partners, children, friends, and colleagues. Understanding the mechanism changes what is possible.
Hormones. For women in their 40s and beyond, ADHD symptoms often shift significantly with perimenopause. This intersection is real and rarely adequately addressed.
About Me
I am a Licensed Clinical Social Worker based in North Carolina with nearly 30 years of experience in mental health, specializing in ADHD in women and its intersections with anxiety, trauma, burnout, hormones, perfectionism, and the full arc of women's experience.
I am licensed in both North Carolina and South Carolina, which means I can see clients throughout both states via telehealth. I have a limited waitlist for new clients, and there is often availability sooner than you might expect.
Getting Started
You do not need a diagnosis to reach out. Many of the women I work with are still in the process of being evaluated, or have been wondering about ADHD for years without having formalized it. A first session is a conversation — about where you are, what you are looking for, and whether working together makes sense.
Learn more about ADHD therapy for women or contact me to schedule a first session.
Also serving women across South Carolina and North Carolina:
- ADHD Therapy for Women in South Carolina
- ADHD Therapist for Women in Charleston, SC
- ADHD Therapy for Women in North Carolina
- ADHD Therapist for Women in Charlotte, NC
