Husband no help | ADHD Information
Kimber I feel your pain for I go through the same thing here in my house. My daughter and spouse do not mix and the lack of help not only with our child but with cleaning and upkeep is difficult. Pm me anytime and I will give you my number to talk anytime, I have free long distance on my cell phone. My brother is planning to counsel us both so we will see ( my brother is a minister). And to top you Kim my yard makes our yard look like white trash and is an embarassment. My hubby loves to collect things for the junk yard for $ fine but it is not organized then add the projects never started you get the idea.I have come to the conclusion that although my husband loves our son, he does not know how to help him. He has ADHD or something himself. I can save my son, but I can only encourage my husband to save himself. I did get him to go to the psychiatrist appt by threatening him with his life. The doc required both parents be there.Good for you, crazymama, sometimes you just have to be forceful. I actually wouldn't encourage anyone to smack their spouse, unless of course that's what works. I threatened to throw him out ofthe house if dh didn't go...saw I was sereous and agreed...makes fun of everything thrapist said...I am trying, but ds seems to know he can "play" us against each other. Ds's excuse, as always, we tried that and it didn't work. (My version of trying is more than once-not his)...I too have difficulty with my son's dad. He butts heads with our son and tends to be too on top of our son. He gets easily frustrated when our son makes any bit of noise. Typical child noise. In return our son will test the waters in these situations. My son's mom says that sometimes she feels that her son is more the child than our son. He also just says that therapists are out to get money and say whatever they want to get the money, but on the other hand he thinks that I should go to a therapist (which I do go to one due to the abuse I suffered in the marriage) as well as our son(he does for play therapy). The ex won't see a therapist. I find this interesting.
My son's dad has never been formally diagnosed as having anything other than he takes some medicine that is used for bi-polar patients(he slipped and told me this once). He won't ever state what the doctors say, as he says he is just depressed. He loses his cool quickly and then goes off and blames others. He even goes as far as saying I'm the hysterical one. Which is not the case. I'm not perfect but I don't go blaming everyone else in life. I know my ex adores his son but I too think he just does not know how to deal with him when it comes to certain things. (on the side... he hasn't worked for over 8 years on any full time basis... one of the reasons I finally left...doesn't seem to want to work)
When our son stays with him he says that he forgets to give him his medicine. Usually it is because he sees our son doing well. Hmmmm could it be because he is on the medicine daily and has made wonderful progress both at home and school? Interestingly enough our son had some difficult days at school after not having his medicine over the weekend. Not sure what to think here.
Our son shows some tendencies of blaming others. I just keep modeling for him that blaming others isn't healthy. Fortuantely I have supportive family and friends to help me. My soon to be ex often goes on a course where he gets hung up on numbers etc... Recently he went to a near by school and had our son weighed and measured. He then forwarded this information along with graphs showing where our son is on the spectrum to all the family members. Our son was 10 llbs when he was born and his dad has a problem with that. If you could see our son now you would say, he isn't overweight. The ped. says he is fine. Height weight are fine in relationship to one another. The interesting thing about all the weight/height stuff is that my ex is underweight but doesn't see this. Doctors tell him that he needs more in his diet. He refuses. I on the otherhand am overweight and recognize this. I work at trying to lose weight. I'm great at making sure my son eats healthy as I see what I've done wrong over the years. My son is probably the most healthy eater I know. 
He reminds me when I have too much diet coke.
He even has me read the contents on the box to check for sugar levels. He was with me when we met with his nutritionist. He is only four but very alert and smart in my opinion. He has his moments and wants sweets just like any other kid, but he knows when to stop. Thank God! Something I never learned until it was too late.
Sorry I'm so long winded... guess I needed to vent.
I should of said my ex's mom not son's mom
Have you tried smacking the crap out of him? Just kidding. My husband was like that at one time and I just tried to work around him. Imac's right, even if dh won't go, you and ds go. When I started doing that and started to see results, dh got on board. We don't always agree, but it's better than it was.
I'm having trouble getting my husband involved. He originally agreed to come to therapy and work on the suggestions given to us. Now he is not responding-or his favorite thing to say is "We tried that once-it did not work" I feel he doesn't want to change-or even try. He is adhd & between he and my sn they just don't mix! I do not know how much more of the yelling and butting heads I can take between the two! Any suggestions on how to "change" him without "changing him"(so he doesn't realize what is happening). My sn tells him all the time-if you didn't yell first, I wouldn't yell back, but then hsbnd "blames" it on sn. VERY FRUSTRATED!
.IMac38944.8359722222
Same w/ mine-refuses to do anything about it/recognize it. Happy to hear you are moving foward...Good Luck with your son and new "freedom"!
thanks Kimber26Your son is lucky that you have custody and not your ex. Are you sure your ex was never diagnosed with anything, or is that just what he told you? If he is taking meds for bi polar, then he very well could have a diagnosis. I don't know of any formal diag. but I have wondered over the years. He may have one but just doesn't tell me or any family member. I feel sorry for him. He in my opinion is missing out so much on life. It could be so much better for him. It took a lot for me to finally leave a rough situation. At least my son has received help and we see daily improvements. Hopefully, the quality of his life will be so much better. He loves his daddy and I wouldn't want it any other way. I will just have to watch him carefully.
4myson-We all misplace words...I'm new to this also, and we haven't seen the dr for meds yet (july 22). I've been told by the fam pedi that the meds only are in the system when you give them-but I'm pretty sure he was talking about concerta or adderall. I've not heard anyrhing about Foacalin XR until some of the posts here. Hope you get your answers...Thanks kimber26
Goodluck with your dr visit on the 22nd...
A pharmacist told me that it takes 4 days to get ritalin completely out of your system. I don't know if this is really true since the doctor said it goes right out of the system at the end of the day. I imagine since it takes a while to build up in the system it takes a bit of time to get out of the system though.
My son is twelve and yes, butts heads with his dad all the time. I think my husband has given up on a relationship with him. I think part of the problem is my husband has an idea of what he'd like a son to be and my son is not that. Besides, the ADHD, my son has totally different interests than my husband.
Also my husband is very into table manners and neatness and that is NOT on my son's mind. I feel bad for both of them.
The good news is that my cousin's child was like that too and now that he's a grownup they are close.
there is hope!!!!!!!!!!!!!11
kimber26...
you may be right as I am knew to the medicine world in the last 3 months or so. I just know that twice now I've made these observations.
I plan on asking the doctor when we have our monthly check-up. My question to the doctor the first time this occurred was more in line with is it good to have medicine holidays/weekends off? The doctor responded that it was better to keep them on the medicine. He didn't always believe this to be true. The doctor is a research doctor and has changed his thoughts on the subject in recent years. My son is on Foacalin XR. Not sure if that is different from other medicines or not.
Thanks for bringing this up because I need to find out more about how it works.
(on a side note... I know that when my son's dad doesn't take his medicine he becauses extremely irritable and sometimes forgetful...all this medicine stuff is so confusing)
"becauses" should be "becomes"
Yikes!!!! and I'm an educator!
RN, CAN RELATE.SOME REFUSE TO EXCEPT THE FACTS OF DISORDERS BEING REAL. HELP THE CHILD REGARDLESS OF WHAT DAD SAYS. GET WHAT IS NEEDED FOR THE CHILD WITHOUT MEDICINE. THE CHILD IS LEGELLAY INTITLED TO IT. SCHOOL STAFF HAVE TO HELP EVEN OFF MEDS.
WRIGHTSLAW.COM CAN ANSWER ALL QUESTIONS YOU HAVE.
kimber26- can't blame a girl for trying.
your husband sounds so much like my soon to be ex.... blaming others I think is the middle name for my ex.
Goodluck to you and your kids.
I finally had to make the decision to move on. It just wasn't healthy for me or my son to be in the same setting 24/7. I truly feel that in our case my son is better off especially since he has ad/hd. ( I think his dad has ad/hd or some similar disorder...just won't recognize it or do anything about it).
4myson-Read? Yeah, right. i thought things were going ok-husband was finally going to come around-he was upset yesterday-"truely wanted to go to therapy w/ son (had emergency at work-couldn't make it). then i found out why he REALY wanted to go-to have it out w/ therapist--What gave him the right to say ADHD in front of son-son then wanted to know what it was, so I told him. now husband is pissed because "AT 8 John is too young to know what this is-He should not know- He's going to be labeled and put in special ed classes because he has a learning dissability-I was never told & I turned out fine(debatable) Blah Blah..." The man feeds off of blaming things on others. So don't want to play this game anymore. I pretty much now am concentrating on the kids & myself-If he comes around, fine. if not, fine. All that matters with Bn is that the kids have not done what he has told them to do. Life here stinks. Bn is in denial. Bn is a push over here. Rn isn't. Our kids no no other life than the way it is here. Kids know the truth of who they can count on. The way it is here is not going to change. It has been this way 13 yrs. oldtimer-I hope you can accept this without bitterness. I have similiar issues, and it is very hard. If mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy. Is a saying I heard that I have found to be very true.Life goes on here with or without Dad around. I see a father who isn't around alot a chose they have made. For 13 yrs. Daniel/Dara's dad choose his work over family. I am the main person these 2 are with. They prefer it that way any how cause this is all they know. The dad's will reap what they sew one. You as a parent will get back what you gave the kids. They just want your time. We don't stop our life to fit Dad either. Sundays are our family day. I have to except he isn't going to chnage. RN Putting that into words, I understand life goes on. I am having trouble withthe fact that when Dad is around, Life in NOT fun. Everything is a yelling, screaming, crying match for everyone. I get so pissed that husband is yelling over smallest thing, I start yelling at him over things not related to his yelling-I cannot reprimand him in front of the kids for him "parenting" them. (or so I feel) We work opposite schedules-him day me night, so sundays are the only day we have together also. By that time I can not possibly remember what I wanted to talk to him about from previous days (he comes home in time for me to go to work & I don't get home till after midnight) I guess I'm trying to figure out how to get dad to stop yelling and have one nice family day-just going to groc. store brings yelling and tears. Different work schedules would be difficult, I'm sure. I suppose that family counseling would be out of the picture due to schedules. This is only thing I can think about that might help. Would he be willing to read books that might show a positive approach to communicating with the family?Kimber: My husband was exactly the same way, until I started using 1-2-3 Magic. He finally learned that it was what worked, and that his yelling and nagging just escalated the child. I found we both needed a specific behavior tool to manage our child with ADHd. Once he noticed it worked he did it too. Parenting ADHD children isn't easy. I don't think my hubbie ever read a book to try and understand what the disorder is. Boy could I start a bitch session. My son is 15 now and doing well, and much better with his dad. It was the best thing I ever did with my husband-using 1-2-3 Magic. The bottom line was that he just didn't know what to do with a child that tested constantly. I think fathers tend to be harder on there sons anyways, and need to have alternatives to yelling. I hate to say this but it took him until the child was 8 to realize he was escalating the child. He was the one that had to figure it out. We can wish forever that fathers would be better, but I've learned to accept what I can, and focus on keeping my relationship well with my children. The rest is up to him, unless he's causing problems. We also wrote down specific consequences for my son, so he would get angry less, and for both of us to keep some sort of consistency. I hope this helps a little. It sure takes time.
The stimulant meds usually work quickly....some like short acting ritalin and short acting adderall take about 30 minutes to kick in.. I have found that adderal xr takes about an hour to an hour and 15 minutes...here is a med chart that I found that has lots of info about the various meds used to treat ADHD.
http://www.addwarehouse.com/shopsite_sc/store/html/article3. htm
One mom I know who gives med breaks in the summer said she starts her son back on Concerta 2 weeks before school starts so it will be working by the beginning of school. I think my son's Ritalin takes a week or 2 to fully kick in when school begins again. So the meds likely take a week to be fully removed from your system. That would make sense-How long does it usually take the meds to start working-Is each one different?