If you've read my posts in the past, you know that after years of putting off the medicine option for our youngest son, we broke down and decided to go that route. It has not been going smoothly. We have now tried both families of the stimulant group of medicines. His teachers noticed little change at the bottom end of the dosage spectrum. Each time we have increased these bottom end dosages by only one or two increments, we have experienced some pretty negative side effects. Those side effects have resulted in a removal from the current medicine and a new consultation to evaluate our options. At the last appointment, they stated that if he doesn't do well with this current medication, we will need to re-evaluate and move to a completely different family of medicines. It looks like that's what we are going to be doing.
The stimulants seem to be doing the opposite of what they should be doing. In a child with Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD), they can have a sedative like effect that helps to slow the brain down to allow for better processing and a reduction in impulsiveness. According to his teachers, they have been experiencing an increase in his chattiness; impulsive desire to be up and moving and out of his seat; and hyper awareness of everything going on around him. Because his current medicine is a 30/70 release dosage, they should see increased focus and decreased impulsiveness as the school day progresses. This medicine releases 30% of its dosage immediately. The remaining 70% of the dosage is released throughout the day. This should translate into decreased impulsiveness and increased focus as the school day progresses. According to the feedback from his teaching team, the opposite is occurring.
In the evenings, we have been experiencing what they refer to as "rebound behaviors". As the evenings progress and the medicine begins to withdraw from his system, he becomes very intense and edgy. His tendency to fixate on conversations or ideas or activities intensifies. We have seen these type of behaviors displayed in many different areas. His fixated behavior has even increased to such a level that we have had to take his Kindle away from him. When we attempt to have him put it away for supper, or homework, or the evening, he has an absolute full blown "Rainman" style meltdown. We attempted to address this by setting up time limits on the Kindle through their "Freetime" option that allowed us to limit its usage to 30 minutes. After that time, the Kindle would shut down and become unusable. This seemed to work fine on the weekends when we don't give him his medicine. (We have only been administering the meds on school days.) Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for school nights when he has had his medicine.
If school had been experiencing increased focus and decreased impulsivity, we would have figured out a way to make it work. Because they have not, we are again going to remove him from his current medication and consult with his neurological team. Because the other families of medication require our son to be able to swallow pills, we have started trying to teach him the process. Like most physically based activities, it is a process. We are practicing with mini M&Ms. When he can successfully swallow those, we will progress to swallowing regular size M&Ms. I feel like this is their last opportunity to find the right medication for our son. He has lost ten pounds over the last two months. I feel as if we are experimenting with his little body. The process has me very frustrated and heartsick.
After discussing our options, my husband and I just don't know what else to do. His aunt had recently mentioned a special diet that one of her patients utilized successfully with her own children. Do we try something like that? We already closely monitor our children's diet by eliminating as much sugar, caffeine, and red dye as possible. We haven't tried a specific ADD diet though. At this point, it feels like one more dead end we just don't have the energy to go down.
Although we are frustrated with the process, there have been blessings. Through the time that we have been trying to establish a baseline for his medication, his normal winter health issues have not developed. Usually during this time of year, he has developed an asthma flair that requires round the clock breathing treatments; several prednisone boosts; and on going rounds of antibiotics. So far this year, we have been blessed to avoid that. It is a blessing. I'm not sure we could have dealt with his health issues on top of his learning and behavior issues. Sometimes it is the little things that help keep life in perspective. We are grateful for those little things. Some days, it makes all the difference.
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