Hi all,
I've been lurking here for over a year now and have found this board to be so helpful in gaining insight with my son.
A little history - Ryan is 8 and from 3 or so we've always noticed he was a bit different. He's VERY auditorily distractable, has difficulty with sustained attention, and is easily frustrated. Subjectively he has many characterisitics of ADHD (inattentive type). We completed extensive testing with a neuropsychologist over a 6 month period and he basically ended up completely baffled by Ryan's "issues". His final impression (after a very brief try with Adderrall) was that he did not have ADHD but possibly some other type of mood disorder. We decided together that since he wasn't in "crisis" mode in any modality (school, home, church, etc) to just observe with time and do our best to manage him.
That was in 1st grade and now we've just started 3rd. The thing we're mostly having trouble with is his frustration levels. He is VERY hard on himself...much more than any parent or teacher. He'll frequently put himself down, saying he's stupid, he'll never learn the concept, he's the worst player on the baseball team etc etc. Reading the book The Explosive Child has been FABULOUS.....lots of great insight into ways to help him. Even before reading it we were already doing some of the techniques he discusses.
We also did a 6 week trial of Stratterra and were initially very happy with the result. But. after about 4 weeks we noticed that some behaviors were worse and it really wasn't helping the anxiety or frustration so the doc and us decided it probably wasn't the med for him.
The pediatrician is now talking about trying Pamelor for his anxiety/frustration. I see it mentioned out there but am not really convinced that we should try it. We've made progress without meds and he's getting old enough now to realize when he's getting frustrated and is able to verbalize more and meltdown less so that's a big improvement.
I guess I'm still wanting to try something else because the demands of school each year are increasing and so is his frustration. At this point he still likes school but I fear with time he'll come to resent it and hate going and just think he's the dumb kid in the class (which of course he isn't, he's quite bright). We do have an IEP in place with accommodations that are helpful to him.
Any insight any of you could offer would be helpful. Any feedback on Pamelor or other meds for frustration?
Thanks for getting this far! I tried not to write a book but of course it ended up one!
Welcome!
I have three children (8 yo DD, 11 yo DD and 13 yo DS) with mood issues (running the gamut from anxiety to bipolar disorder). It's great that you got such an extensive evaluation from a neuropsychologist. He sounds very thorough and helpful.
I would now recommend that you not have your ped do medication management. You need to have your son evaluated by a board-certified child psychiatrist and have him take on the med management. Pamelor is a tricyclic antidepressant. My understanding is that these are used rarely with children and only in very specific cases. You really need to do some research on your own plus have a skilled medical professional handle meds for your son.
Good luck.