adhd and nighttime | ADHD Information
we have tried some other meds for him but, he just won't try to swallow anything for us. he has been taking med for nearly 2 yrs now and he still gives us some trouble everyday when it's time to take it. We are going to try metadate cd starting tomorrow since we can open it and sprinkle it on whip cream or yogurt. I'm hoping it works as I'm told it last longer and will take away this 12pm ritalin dose. He'll still take his 4pm dose. Like I said when he is on the med he is ok but, when he is not, he is pretty hyper & impulsive. He gets very silly, fresh, aggressive. Also, we've noticed that when he sees another kid which he may not have seen in awhile he acts so fresh saying swears words even. I think he feels so shy and embarrassed when he sees them that he just shows off. To me, it's like a defensive thing like he is shy or embarrassed and somehow this behavior just comes out. It almost causes me to not want to get together with people because unless the timing is perfect med wise, I can run into problems. Has this type of thing happened to anyone else? is this severe adhd? something else? My son was speech delayed (starting speaking @ 3) and has had communication difficulties. His language/speech/ vocabulary has improved alot and continues to come along, but, I wonder if this also contributes to that behavior. any thoughts on any of this? We are still searching for answers to all of this.
Just to add to 4myson's excellent advice:if I have a night class / lesson / meeting, I will take a late afternoon dose of Ritalin. I can feel when it wears off and if I don't listen to my body, I may get a "second wind" and stay up too late at night. Even as an adult, I can't imagine having to practice piano or do homework at the end of a busy day without the help of meds.
This is my first time writing but have been reading messages on the forum for some time. I have 3 children with my youngest (just turned 7) diagnosed with ADHD at 5. He currently takes ritalin 3 times per day and clonodine in the evening. Unfortuneatley, because he won't swallow pills for us, we need to use the ritalin tablets. While he is on ritalin he is fine but, when it wears off, he is very difficult. It's like the hyperness is stored up and then comes out all at once. As such, he is completely unreasonable in the evening which makes reading or doing homework, even brushing teeth a huge ordeal. He becomes very defiant and just won't cooperate in any way. He can also be verbally defiant saying bad words etc when asked to do a little homework. A reward doesn't seem to help this situation either he just is unmoving and won't comply at all. Does anyone else have this problem. Any suggestions? Is this ADHD behavior? Thanks!
Have you tried any other medicines? Like focalin xr or something similar that can dissolve in soft foods. This is what my son's doctor prescribed and it is working for us. My son had some of the behaviors that you have described prior to medication. I just had to make sure we were consistant with our routines on a nightly basis. I also, had to set boundaries and I used a lot of love and logic strategies. Reasonable choices allowing him to buy into the program.
I don't think it ever hurts to go to counseling either. My son is in play therapy and it really has been a godsend.
Another thought for me is whether your son is diagnosed correctly. I'm wondering if you need to check into other possiblities. I don't know what else it could be, but I would think a good child psychiatrist or neuropsychiatrist could work with you.
Ooooh, we have the same issue. And it really makes me crazy when my dd gets so wild and out of control at bedtime. She hits her sister and calls her dad names. It is just terrible. So I can totally relate.
His behavior could be from the "rebound" effect. When the ritalin wears off, sometimes kids are affected such that their behavior is worse than before they take the ritalin. My dd has always been wild at bedtime, which right now is 8:30. I find that if I give her short-acting ritalin at 5, she behaves better at bedtime. And she gets the rebound when she is asleep already, I guess. We have also been offering her incentives for good bedtime behavior. I let her pick a prize out of a prize bag if she behaves well for bed/bath time. We are on day 4 of this plan and we have had two good nights. My long term goal is that her good behavior at bedtime will eventually become habit, and I won't need to reward her anymore. And I can move on and work on some other behavior problem.
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This sounds exactly like my daughter in the evenings. It was just like she saved up all her behaviors while on meds and it all came out in the evenings. She was hyper, loud, obnoxious and defiant. To aleviate the rebound symptoms her psych perscribed Tenex for the afternoons. She takes it about 1 hour before her focalin wears off and it really takes the edge off. She still has her moments, but at least its not all evening, every evening. Tenex is similar to clonidine, but is less sedating so she can take it in the afternoon without falling asleep.
If he was speech delayed, does he have other problems? Social issues? He could have more than ADHD going on. Speech delays have nothing to do with ADHD. If he is also socially clueless (and I do mean clueless) he's a good candidate for autistic spectrum disorder. Other symptoms are SID (problems with foods, textures, noise, sensitivity to smells), meltdowns because of transitions and in crowded places, inflexibility of personality, playing inappropriately or not at all with toys, and severe problems understanding school, although they can be very smart. Most times this is missed by regular professionals. You kind of need a NeuroPsych who runs tests for ADHD and beyond. Pediatricians and regular talk shrinks don't really know much about it, but it is often misdiagnosed as stand alone ADHD or ADHD/ODD. Stims are used often for the hyperness in ASD, and sometimes they work/sometimes they don't work. Here's a test you can take. If you answer it honestly, it is a very good indicator. Many parents of autistic spectrum higher functioning kids first got a clue about it from this test. It's excellent. Good luck.
www.childbrain.com/pddassess.html
MomWI38916.5063310185Besides bedtime being h-ll time mornings are on the list too. I had to add that.Bed time around her eis horrible. It takes forever to get him to settle down. He runs around touching mythings. It has gotten better since the Marble program but this is when he loses most of his marbles.
Hi there, i know what you mean as I deal with the same issues. Furthermore, my mornings are so bad. My son (just turned 7) wakes up every morning completely hyper, silly, agressive and the worse thing is I still chase him to take the medicine. He is very defiant in the morning. A two second thing can take ten minutes! Just started Medadate CD 20mg this week and although it lasts longer and it has eliminated his noontime dose it does not last 8 hrs as I was hoping (more like 6-7hrs) and the rebound still occurs. I give him a 10mg tab of ritalin at 4pm but around 7:30, it gets tough around here. Like I said before, homework, reading, even brushing his teeth is an ordeal. I'm at a loss. His ADHD symptoms are so bad both in the morning and at night. We don't know what to do. It affects the whole family too. Also, the eating situation is the same. My son eats at night even at 10pm and I let him because he doesn't eat much during the day. I fear school starting again. My mornings are so hard. Then I work all day! We still search for answers and hope things get better. I wish you luck too! Maybe it improves when they get older?
My son is 9 and takes Ritalin LA 30mg. He gets it about 8:30 in the morning (when he was in school) and it usually wears off anytime from 3:30 on. It depends on how challenging his day has been. My doctor wanted me to give him a snack when he got home. That helped sometimes but didn't solve the problem. I've tried letting him come down while enjoying an activity he likes and I have tried showers. Nothing is effective all the time. His doctor then suggested 5mg of Ritalin, but my only problem is that he misses dinner (he barely eats when medicated) and he still has that terrible come down (just later and closer to bedtime). So what else can I do? The killer thing is that everyday is not bad. Just some days. It is like I am treating several kids. I never know what combination of personality and symptoms I am going to get.
When school is in and he is fully medicated, dinner can happen up to 11 pm. He is just getting to 66 lbs and he is 4'8. I definitely don't want him to lose weight.my aunt would do that too for her son in the night time she'd let her son eat cereal because he wouldn't eat much in the day time either.I used to dread bedtime. My son is 10 and has ADHD with ODD. He was diagnosed at three. I talked to my doctor about bed time, he put him on risperdal. He takes it at 7 pm and by 9 pm he is calm and ready for bed. This medicine does make him sleepy, but not a zombie. It is also used to treat his aggression and anger. Ever since he started risperdal, our life is so much more peaceful at bedtime. He doesn't feel that we are being mean or picking on him. And we get to have a good, quiet end to the day. It's good to know I'm not the only one out there dealing with all that goes along with ADHD.