ADHD at camp: when “I want to come home” means more

Harold Robert Meyer — The ADD Resource Center · https://www.addrc.org/ · Reviewed: July 1, 2026 · Published: July 9, 2026

How to tell ordinary homesickness from real danger when your child with ADHD calls in tears — and how far to trust the camp’s answers.

The phone rings after lights-out. Your child is sobbing, begging to come home now. Your heart says drive. Your head asks the harder questions: Is this homesickness, which passes — or something the camp isn’t telling you? Is he being bullied? Is he safe? And can you believe what the director says tomorrow morning? This article gives you a way to sort those questions in the next 24 hours, without dismissing your child or panicking.

Key takeaway

A crying call is data, not a verdict. Most camp distress is homesickness — intense, real, and temporary — and children with ADHD feel it louder because their emotional brakes are weaker. Your job is not to decide on the phone. It is to comfort the feeling, buy 24 hours, gather independent evidence from your child, the staff, and the pattern of the distress itself, and then decide. Trust in a camp is earned through specific, verifiable answers — never through reassurance alone.

Why this matters

Get this wrong in one direction and you teach your child that overwhelming feelings mean escape — a lesson that follows them into every hard classroom and job. Get it wrong in the other direction and you leave a child in a situation that is genuinely unsafe, having taught them that telling you didn’t help. Camps are generally less regulated than schools, with licensing and oversight varying widely from state to state — so the checking falls to you. The stakes justify a method, not a gut call. Cognoscenti

Key findings

Roughly 90 percent of children at summer camp feel some homesickness, and about 20 percent experience serious distress that worsens without treatment, according to research by psychologist Christopher Thurber and pediatrician Edward Walton. American Camp Association
The same report urges that children with attention deficit disorder continue their medication at camp rather than taking a “drug holiday” — a missed-dose pattern that can masquerade as a crisis. American Camp Association
Children with ADHD carry elevated bullying risk: one study found they were 3.7 times more likely to be victims of bullying than neurotypical peers. ADDitude
The American Camp Association tells camps that suspicion of abuse must go to outside authorities — camps should never attempt to “handle it” internally. A camp that says otherwise is telling you something. American Camp Association

The first call tells you less than you think

Homesickness peaks at night, when activity stops and the bunk goes quiet. A child who sobs at 9 p.m. is very often laughing at the waterfront by 10 the next morning. That’s not dishonesty — it’s how distress works in children, and it works harder in yours. Children with ADHD experience emotion at full volume, and many also carry rejection sensitive dysphoria, which can turn one social slight into an all-consuming emergency.

Before you interpret anything, rule out the mechanical causes. Is he getting his medication on schedule at the health center? Is he sleeping? A dysregulated, under-slept, unmedicated child genuinely cannot cope — and will tell you so.

Unhappy or unsafe: reading the difference

Unhappiness has a recognizable shape. The distress clusters at night and during downtime. Complaints are general — “I hate it here,” “the food is gross,” “I miss you.” The child still names friends, activities, moments that were okay. And the trajectory matters most: ordinary homesickness typically softens across days as coping kicks in.

Danger has a different shape. Watch for a child who avoids or fears one specific person and won’t say why. Distress that escalates over days instead of easing. Secrecy — especially any adult who told your child to keep something between them. Sudden clinginess, withdrawal, sleep disturbances, regression such as bedwetting, or age-inappropriate sexual language are warning signs safety organizations tell parents to take seriously. Children with ADHD are already frequent targets for peer cruelty, so “kids being kids” is not an acceptable answer when your child names a tormentor. RAINN

“A homesick child sounds desperate at 9 p.m. and fine at 10 a.m. A child in danger sounds different in a way you’ll feel before you can name it — but feelings aren’t evidence. Verify,” advises Harold Meyer of the ADD Resource Center.

Ask open questions, not leading ones: “What was the hardest part of today?” “Who do you sit with at meals?” “Is there anyone you try to stay away from?” Then listen for specifics.

How far can you trust the camp?

Trust the camp the way you’d trust any institution: provisionally, and in proportion to its transparency. Accreditation is your first check — American Camp Association accreditation indicates the camp has adopted baseline abuse-prevention policies, though it guarantees nothing by itself. Berman & Simmons

Then test with specifics. Ask exactly what your child reported and what the staff observed, hour by hour. Ask who supervises the bunk at night and what the staff-to-camper ratio is. Ask how bullying reports are documented and what happens next. A camp serious about safety answers these questions specifically and willingly; hesitation and vagueness are themselves red flags. Generic reassurance — “he’s doing great, they all say that the first week” — without detail is a non-answer. Top Legal Firm

“Trust is not a feeling you extend to a camp. It’s a behavior you observe. Specific answers earn it; smooth reassurance does not,” notes Harold Meyer of the ADD Resource Center.

Verify independently. Request a call with your child in a private setting, not with a counselor beside him. Ask a second staff member — the nurse, an activity head — what they see during the day. If accounts don’t match, escalate. And know the bright line: allegations of abuse go to authorities, not to an internal review. A camp that resists that is a camp you leave.

Your 24-hour protocol

On the call: listen, take notes, validate, don’t decide. “I hear how hard this is. I’m going to talk with your counselor, and you and I will talk again tomorrow after lunch.” That sentence respects his feelings without rewarding panic or dismissing danger.

Next morning: call the director with your specific questions. Speak to a second adult. Again, take notes. Schedule the follow-up call with your child and compare — same story, or new details?

Bring him home if any of these hold: a named tormentor the camp won’t act on, any indication of abuse or grooming, physical safety lapses, or genuine panic that is worsening after several days of real support. If you do, frame it as a decision, not a rescue: this wasn’t the right fit this summer — and coming home to a parent who checked, verified, and acted is not failure. It’s the lesson you most want him to keep. If the checking leaves you depleted, tend to your own reserves too.

Bibliography

American Camp Association. (n.d.). Child abuse prevention resources. https://www.acacamps.org/resources/child-abuse-prevention-resources

American Camp Association. (2015). New thinking needed on helping kids avoid or cope with homesickness. https://www.acacamps.org/article/parents/new-thinking-needed-helping-kids-avoid-or-cope-homesickness

Carroll, B. (2026, March 11). Does your kid’s camp have a sexual abuse prevention policy? WBUR Cognoscenti. https://www.wbur.org/cognoscenti/2026/03/11/sexual-abuse-prevention-summer-camp-sleepaway-bronwen-carroll

Fogler, J. M., Weaver, A. L., Katusic, S., Voigt, R. G., & Barbaresi, W. J. (2020). Summarized in ADDitude Magazine: Study: Children with ADHD more likely to bully — and to be bullied. https://www.additudemag.com/bullying-and-adhd-research/

RAINN. (2025). For parents: Safer summer camp tips. https://rainn.org/prevention-tips-for-parents-caregivers/for-parents-safer-summer-camp-tips/

Thurber, C. A., & Walton, E. (2007). Preventing and treating homesickness. Pediatrics, 119(1), 192–201. Summary: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/01/070102092218.htm

Resources

From the ADD Resource Center:

External:

What’s next

If your child is at camp now, write down your three questions for the director before the next call — specifics beat instincts. And if your family is navigating ADHD-related social pain, bullying, or emotional intensity, The ADD Resource Center offers coaching and consultation for parents and children. Visit https://www.addrc.org/ or call +1 (646) 205-8080.

About the author

Harold Meyer founded The A.D.D. Resource Center in 1993 to provide ADHD education, advocacy, and support. He co-founded CHADD of New York, served as CHADD’s national treasurer, and was president of the Institute for the Advancement of ADHD Coaching. An author and international speaker, he has presented at the American Psychiatric Association Annual Meeting, CHADD national and local conferences, NYU Langone, Mount Sinai Medical Center, Weill Cornell Medical College, and the NYC Department of Education. — haroldmeyer@addrc.org

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Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria (RSD) is recognized by many providers but is not in the DSM.

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