Hi Everybody - I am new to this forum | ADHD Information

Mystical,

Acting younger than age is pretty typical for ADHDers.  A while back someone posted a formula to help you figure out your child's social age.  If anyone knows the post please bump it up . Anyway it was quite interesting but they say say that eventually they even up . 

The social age had nothing to do with intelligence but rather maturity.

Thanks for that maturity feed back,

I was getting worried about it.  I know of a few children that have A.D.D but no A.D.H.D and was wondering if I should have our son checked for something else due to his maturity level being so low.

 

 

I'm thinking like okiemom when I re-read these posts.  Undermedicated.  See if your doc will adjust ds's meds upward.  Another thing, is the Daytrana patch available in Canada?  My son has just started it and is doing wonderfully.  Ask your pdoc about it.  It's a transdermal delivery system, meaning the meds are absorbed through the skin.  It's a really even, constant delivery.  We love it! my name is dana and I have 3 children. a son that is almost 15, a daughter who is almost 14, and i have a 5 year old son. my oldest was diagnosed as mentally retarded, adhd, autistic, and duane's syndrome. he has been on adderall xr for about 9 years and last month his doctor gave me a presciption for this daytrana patch. i am not sure about it can anyone tell me about it if they have a child on it.
hi there i am new to this.

We have tried many things with our son, Rewards was a big one and constantly reminding him about every thing and rules and so on, praising him when he was actually able to restrain himself from doing something he was told not to do or when he made an effort to focus while we are conversing with him and remember what we said.

We communicate every way possible with him and even discuss with him to what he thinks may help him with some of his actions and be able to prevent doing things he knows he will get in trouble for but can seem to help doing them.

We involve our son in every way possible and help him help us as well.

As for the possible tourrett syndrom, I must say no he does not have these symptomes, he just has a very hard time focussing on one thing for a normal amount of time we would. he blurts things out because of his difficulty to deal with emotions towards certain conversation or comments made or how they sounded out.

He has been evaluated in details twice by 2 different doctors and both were very clear on his condition and agreed on many different levels.  I am concidering another assessment since he is getting older.

I am definately not giving up

I really appreciate all you inputs on this, it helps to know that even though we are all strangers we all have something in common to deal with, understand and help when we can.

Thanks so much

Hi Mystical,

I also have a 13 yr old, on meds for 3 yrs also. As you've found out, finding the right med, much less med dose is very tricky to say the least. My son is also on Concerta, plus takes Zoloft for a co-existing anxiety disorder.  We also augment the Concerta with Tenex.

Here is a suggestion for what its worth.  Based on what you've described, it sounds like you might be possibly be undermedicating.  We found that to be the case with my son......when puberty hit, his hormonal situation really whacked out his meds.  We have a adolescent psychiatrist micro managing his dose adjustments.  My son happens to fall into that subset of ADHD kids who metabolize their meds like water and require unusually high doses to reach therapuetic level.  My son currently takes 162 mg of Concerta each morning.  He is doing very well on this level.  The lower doses did nothing for him. 

Most parents give up on meds before ever reaching that dosage level.  My gut feeling is that there are a lot of kids who would respond to higher doses, but never get that opportunity because of reluctance to try a higher dose. 

Obviously.....all kids are different and I'm not suggesting your child would need a higher dose.  Only a qualified doctor could decide that.  I'm just saying you might want to consider that you're child, due to puberty issues, may just need a higher dose.

Regarding the high cost of Concerta.....do you have insurance, and if so, do you have a mail order option??  We pay for a 3 month supply of my son's high dose Concerta through Blue Cross federal plan.  Cash price at that dose would be close to 0 for the 3 month supply.

Okiemom

my son uses concerta at the dose 36mg best child out once med kicks in usualy takes about 30mins to work, but he also uses ritilin on weekends and i dont see the results like i used to when he was on ritilin 3x a day, he started taking concerta when he was nearly eleven because he didnt want to be seen as a child taking meds at school, hes very out going several friends and is allways in trouble at home for stupid mistakes temper bursts, but school life no problems not the brightest pupil but he is also borderlin dislexic, i tried reward systems and diet before we started on meds, but children with dislexic have short term memory loss and can forget simple requests

his pediatrician has also told me before that his dosage would increase as he grows older with the Ritalin which I am fine with as long it keeps helping him.  we go for a visit every 3 months and discuss how the dosage is working.  I always tell my son that if he feels anythings different or uncomfortable at any time to let me know so we can look into it with his Dr.

I am in Ontario Canada and although there are some coverage for certain things, his Concerta are not part of that coverage.  Neither me or hubby have coverage through our work for anything when it comes to meds or dental.

Jesse does have a very hard time to make friends and keep them, many people I have met always mention on how our son does not act his age and how he has more the mentality of a 10 yr old.  Unfortunately I have to agree most times and still wonder if it's because of his a.d.h.d.

Does anyone go through this.  does your child seem to act below his age level, I was wondering about that as well?

my daughter who is now 22 is still acting below her age she was diagnoised with add and behavioural problems and learning dificulties shes now not cable of going out to work she is clased as disabled, her schooling was hard she was not medicated untill 8yrs of age you learn most things in early years , rebecca was unable to form friendships with her peers and still cant maintain a friedship, her mental age can rage anywere from 8 to 12yrs of age.Esmom38987.2825810185My son has always acted below his age level until just recently.  Over the summer he was very responsible and did as he was asked without too much fuss.  It's kept up for the first two weeks of school, so I'm hopeful it's a permanent change.  Not all kids will show such an improvement in maturity naturally, but I'd say it's always a possibility. 

quixote mentions something that's helped us and that's rehearsing.  I drill ds all the time on what the appropriate behavior is in a situation.  My son doesn't pick up very fast on examples of behavior, but suddenly the light comes on when someone explains it to him.  Example:  he was not good at conversation, interrupting and talking about stuff that was not related to what was being discussed.  A therapist pointed out that conversation was like a tennis match, it went back and forth and you took turns and tried to stay on topic.  His conversational skills suddenly got better, because he understood what he was supposed to do and say.  My ds also had a problem with impulsivity which got better when we added ritalin along with his strattera.  Pdoc said it helps it and it has w/ ds.
Pay more attention to the child... that is hilarious. People like that cannot
imagine the amount of time and energy our kids take... I keep up a
constant running dialogue with my very impulsive son, especially in
public. I'm talking rehearsing situations and appropriate responses, pre-
determined hand-gestures and key words as reminders, constantly
defining limits and boundaries, "check-ups" every aisle or two at the store
to tell him how he is doing... yeah, he needs more attention. Sometimes I
will hear a mother on the next aisle doing the same thing for the same
obvious reasons, and I always try to give her a big grin- I know we sound
crazy to other people, but it is the only way we can ever hope to teach our
kids. HANG IN THERE!

P.S. Does your employer offer FSA accounts for "out-of-pocket" medical
expenses? The money gets set aside pre-tax... saves me a lot of money.
Also I can get Adderall XR on our mail order plan, so the co-pay is 1/3 of
what it would be month to month.

Hi all

I am new to this forum, but going through some of its content I beleive I will be here a while.

Our son now 13 has been diagnosed with A.D.H.D when he was in grade 2, but due to the fact that the city we lived here were saying that about every kid that showed a little hyperness, we decided to wait and not use meds.  over diagnosed and over prescribed is what we called it in that city.

Anyways our son has been on meds for 3 years now, ritalin but I have noticed he is getting much worst as he grows older.  His impulsiveness are unbeleivable at times.

the things he does, which any other kid would know better than to do such a stupid act or even think of where did he come up with something like that.  I am getting discouraged fast.  and in our family I am the one that understands it most and feel bad for him.

I just wanted to know if this will get worst as he gets older, he is going to highschool next year and he has already gotten in trouble on his second day of school for agravating another student and started telling that student he would kill him and name calling and so on.  Many times he blurts words out to someone without thinking and very impulsive when he wants something or do something.

I love my son and would do anything to help him, but as he grows older it is harder to protect him from harm.

I am taking him to see his Dr next week to get him changed back to Concerta and this time we don't care of the cost as we did before.  But my concern is more his behavior than anything.

Any suggestions would be greatly welcomed to what I can do further to help.

I've read that around this age is when a med change, or at least another evaluation is in order is due. Hormones, growing up, etc wreeks havok on the system. 

We tried Concerta when we first started him on them and they worked fantastic for him, not doped up at all and was doing very well but because of the cost 0.00 per month we had to switch him to Ritalin which sells for 30.00 a month.

Now he is at 30mg of Ritalin 3 times a day and it doesn't seem to help him at all anymore.  and when it wears off... o.m.g he he 10 times worst he bounces off the wall as we say, he does not show much agression around us but his impulsiveness gets him grounded so much and it does not seem to affect him in any ways at all since he goes right back to do it again.

I know many times he forgets no mater how many time we explain to him and I know he wonders why he gets in trouble sometimes when he doesn't remember what he did wrong.

I have done a lot od reading on it but I guess my best bet is to discuss it with people that are around this.  No offence intended here but I am sooo tired of people that have no clue what add or adhd is and tell you to stop dosing your kids and pay more attention to them, I just want to ring their neck for saying something like that without even having a clue of what it is.

ADHD doesn't get worse, but meds DO NOT solve everything either. Has he been evaluated recently? Who is giving him his meds? Did he have any early developmental problems? Any social cluelessness? Does he know how to make friends? Does he have school interventions addressing his needs? Hyperness is NOT just ADHD. It can be, but there are other things that cause a kid to become hyper. Is he a behavior problem or just spacey?I am new to the board too, so don't mind me.... But you say he blurts out words without thinking and very impulsive, does he seem to have some touretts qualities, maybe stemming from the meds? I agree he needs to be re evaluated. Have you tried any type of reward system instead of constant grounding? I am new to the rewards sytem, and my child is much younger than yours, but let me tell you, he is a different person! People on this board use this system for older kids. Good luck!