I have the utmost compassion for parents with children with ADHD or ADD or HD. Having an active toddler can make anyone crazy. I can only imagine what it’s like when the energy level continues like that for a decade.
Argh! I’ve only ever had children with mild ADD/ADHD/HD in my classrooms and that was a challenge.
I think when people don’t have children and/or aren’t aware of the issues involved and also haven’t any personal experiences, they often make snap decisions about ADD/HD/ADHD. It’s easy to get sucked into the media hype on both sides.
I say you volunteer to babysit the kids when they aren’t on their medication, Rhum Runnier.
I don’t think I ever impugned your parenting abilities, Tristan. I think you pretty much took care of that yourself. You are the one who opened a thread, not because you were interested in what dosages other Dopers’ kids might be on per se, or whether people thought your daughter’s dosage was unusually high, but because you wanted to brag about how much she is on.
Then, when you didn’t get an instant response, you followed up with,
Obviously since you take your daughter’s drug use and condition so very seriously, we should also. I am sure that 35mg of Ritalin makes a huge difference in the way your 6 year old acts, and I am equally sure that a six pack of beer would also. My point was that you sound as silly going on about how much Ritalin it takes to control your kid as a college freshman going on about the case of beer he drank Friday night does.
But hey, since 35mg only
Why not go for the complete control and bump her up to 50mg? After all, she still gets distracted.
I do commend you for giving the girl one drug free weekend a month, despite how unpleasant it must be for you to have a six year old that runs around. Being a parent is such a drain right?
Y’know, Rhum, whileI wasn’t cheering for you, I could understand your perspective until you got here. An ADHD kid with no meds is not “a six year old that runs around.” Comments like that consign you to the category of the simply ignorant. On 50 mg a day, my 7-year-old kid still had to be removed from his school and placed in a special program because he was running across the desk tops of his classmates, screaming at the bus drivers while running up and down the bus aisle waving his book bag, and engaging in behavior that was not as safe as those activities. Between a new combination of meds, good school programs, and counseling, he is doing much better–but the notion that he was “just running around” is foolish and trying to dismiss the stress my wife and I felt at the time with “Being a parent is such a drain right?” goes beyond insensitive–far more insensitive than some dark humor about how strong the kids’ meds are.
While I agree that the humor of the OP was a bit skewed, I will also go along with the idea put forth that those people who face traumatic or stressful situations are entitled to deal with it using dark humor. Your first post, here, would have been fine if you hadn’t gotten all surly about it.
Thanks Tom. I know one of my techniques in dealing with my kids is black humour. I tend to be careful where I display this humour because of the reactions of people who don’t understand because they’ve not been there dealing with these situations on a daily basis.
I’ve never met a parent who used meds lightly and casually. I’ve met parents who medicate kids who I don’t think I would medicate but I totally understand and support them in their choices because all I see is a snapshot of time.
And, Jesus, some days if you can’t laugh about it, you’re gonna go crazy.
Tristan, if the drug free weekend is so difficult for you all, why are you doing it so frequently? I’d seriously consider doing it on a greater timeframe. 6 is very young to be assessing whether a kid is moving past ADHD.
Drk, lithium is a very heavy duty drug, rarely used with children. I’d hazard a guess that your brother was either misdiagnosed as a child, had bipolar and ADHD which is resolved or something else entirely was going on.
There’s something in the pit for you, Rhum. Enjoy it, before it gets cold.
We’ve discussed the idea of putting more time between the drug free time, and it’s something we’re leaning towards… it just makes us feel so bad to give her the pills all the time.
But my honest opinion, now that she’s in full time school, is that she prefers it. She’s mentioned several times that she likes it better when she’s had her medicine so that she can be part of class.
I could care less how hard it is on me… I’m a parent, it’s my job to raise my kid the best I can, drugs or no.
Sure, Tristan :). I know it’s our job and I wasn’t being critical at all. I know my kid prefers to use the meds as he feels better and things work for him. I know there was an article recently (on medline? gah can’t remember) which talked about how the meds were effective for more than academics so choosing to medicate all the time was an OK choice for kids in the absence of weight problems and sleep problems.
But part of our job as parents, especially of children with SN is to be the best we can which includes taking care of ourselves.
I feel for you, Tristan, and the other parents who have spoken up here. Your situations must be incredibly trying.
I’ve had episodes where I had weird reactions to medications, and couldn’t settle down–couldn’t concentrate, couldn’t stop my mind racing, couldn’t sleep. I imagine that experience is as close as I will ever come to being in the shoes of your children…what a nightmare it must be to feel so out of control. I can’t imagine trying to cope with it, either as a child or a parent. Thank goodness you, as parents, recognize that this is a realio-trulio problem that needs medication and/or other management, and you’re willing to do what you have to do to help.
okay my Daughter on the average week is scheduled to take 28 myslex, 14 different kids of pills to fight her cancer, 10.5 ml.'s of clear fruity stuff, 42 ml.'s of an antibiotic, and her milti-vitamins.
If I were to list everything she’s taken in the past 3 1/2 years I would add another page to this thread.
She nerarly rattles when she walks.
Tristan, I hope you continue to cope, however you need to do it. That goes for the others with ADD/ADHD kids. My own nine-year-old is only on 5MG in the morning, 5MG in the afternoon, and sometimes he’s a handful. We’ve had difficulty getting clearance for the school to administer his lunchtime dosage, and his behavior just deteriorated to the point where my wife was called at work to remove him from class.
Yeah, my son has impulse-control problems. That means I’m a bad parent. Interesting, then, that his sister is a model student, taking honors courses, and always gets glowing reports from her teachers. Guess I just gave up as a parent when the second one came along, huh?
Rhum Runner, to equate Ritalin with a six pack of beer is one of the most ignorant things I’ve read on this board. The former is prescribed to calm and focus a child whose brain is chemically imbalanced. The latter is child abuse.
I’m curious – would you make such snide comments if Tristan mentioned that his daughter’s eyeglass prescription was incredibly powerful? Would you advise him to make her squint harder? Would you suggest that they (ho ho ho) make sure they don’t rearrange the furniture, or that they keep sharp objects out of the way? Ritalin is a compensating medicine, allowing the child’s brain to function more normally, just as eyeglasses are a compensating mechanism, allowing a child to see more clearly.
Tristan, my heart goes out to you (and all the other parents of kids with ADHD who have posted). ADHD is a neurobiological disorder–a medical condition–with a behavioral component. Unfortunately, this confuses a lot of people. I believe this confusion is caused by three things:[ul][li]Ignorance about the neurological effects of ADHD; []A lack of exposure to actual living, breathing children with the disorder; and[]Hysterical, ill-informed media reports that wail about how we are making zombies of our children through overmedication, while ignoring the actual pediatric research into best practice for ADHD management.[/ul]This leads many people to believe that ADHD is really just a lack of willpower on the part of the child caused by permissive parenting. Unfortunately, the most ill-informed people are often the most vocal. They ought to have a look at the PET scans. [/li]
I work with a lot of kids with ADHD. When we assist with a medication trial and hear this
from a parent or teacher, we know we’re on the right track with the meds. (Unless we’re doing a trial with a boy, of course. Then we start to worry a bit.)
Exactly. This is what a lot of the anti-medication crowd can’t seem to understand. Temperament is present from birth. Personality isn’t a purely environmental phenomenon.
Tristan,
Have you discussed with your child’s physician trying the newer, longer acting treatments for ADHD? Many only require administration twice daily, enabling your child to make it through the entire school day without needing to take another dose.
Thanks for your understanding and enlightenment, Savaka. Keep up the good work. I’m sure I speak for all the parents of ADD/ADHD children who posted here, and those who didn’t, when I say we appreciate all that you do. Attitudes such as yours make our jobs as parents easier. Just knowing that someone like you is out there (or someone like my son’s teacher, who moved up from teaching second grade to third and actually requested my son for a second year!) means we’re not alone, and more important, our children are not in a hostile environment surrounded by people who aren’t willing to try to understand them.
I just reread my post and realized that it comes off sounding like I’m a researcher or pediatrician or something. I’m not. I certainly don’t want to mislead anyone about that. I’m a school psychologist who went through a specialist’s program that laid on the neuropsych pretty heavy, which is where I got all the info from.
That said, thanks for your kind words, DAVEW0071. It’s best for everyone if we all realize that we’re on the same side. Best wishes to you and DAVEW0072 and any other DAVEW007*'s that there might be.
