James Ochoa
ADHD Pathfinder
I am a licensed professional counselor dedicated to treating, understanding and exploring adult ADHD. As an adult with ADHD myself, I’m passionate about the possibilities. I believe we can learn to live powerfully despite our emotional storms, and I’ve been privileged to help people with ADHD discover new paths to their true, effective selves.
Despite growing up in a large, loving Texas family, I never seemed to fit into any of the available boxes. Many of my siblings excelled in school, but my brain didn’t seem to work as well as theirs. By the time I began studying psychology at the University of Texas in Austin, I was pretty sure something was wrong with me, but at least I realized I wasn’t alone. A lot of people were “wrong” in very familiar ways, but years would have to pass before this wrongness would be commonly understood as ADHD. Even then, as a new clinician with an M.Ed. in Counseling & Guidance from Texas State University, I worked most often with children, because, like many people, I thought ADHD was something kids got--and kids outgrew. My own diagnosis came in 1996. That’s how my journey began.