My child may be going on medication soon...he is 6.
My question is do most children stay on medication for life or can they slowly reduce the medication of time.
I have a hard time with having my child to be on medication for the rest of his life.
Everyone is different. There are studies that show that between 60 and 90% of people with ADHD "grow out of it". Unfortunately the numbers are not greatly reliable because of differences in diagnosis between studies, and differences in how ADHD looks in a kid and how it looks in an adult. It seems that the maturation process is slower for kids with ADHD. When your child gets to a certain age, they will be better able to determine if and how to use the meds. Some of us adults use coffee as needed.
My daughter's doctor believes in med breaks to see how much maturation has occured and confirm the med requirement. With adding Ogram's marble system for positive reinforcement behavior modification my daughter has reduced ODD symptoms and is more willing to work on homework despite how hard it is. We are still working out med optimization at this point (the other things we tried got us to a better point, but are not enough without the meds).
http://www.adhdnews.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=19898& PN=1
vickie38983.7957407407It depends. It's different for everyone.Hi there and welcome. I'm going to assume you are talking about stimulant medications for ADHD. The three teens I know who have ADHD, 2 have discontinued stimulants in high school, one of those is taking an anti-depressant; the third one is still on Adderall and she is now 20. I guess it really depends on the individual's symptoms and severity, and their ability to cope and compensate. HTH cr12345mr38983.8002083333Have you tried alternative methods yet?I have read ADHD is a life span disorder. I'm not sure what the exact percentage is right now that the researchers are throwing around...but I've read a large percentage of people of ADHD WILL take the symptoms into adulthood, HOWEVER, unlike children, adults usually over the years learn adaptive strategies to work around their symptoms.
It's just in the last 10 yrs or so that adults have really began to get diagnosed and put on medication in some cases. 20 years ago you just didn't hear or read much about adults with ADHD, much less adults taking stimulants.
Some parents try hard to get their teens off stimulants during their teen years because they want the child to be qualified for certain occupations... like the military, law enforcement, etc. Right now taking ADHD meds will pretty much disqualify you for the military.
My personal attitude is if the child moves into teen years, then adulthood without needing the stimulants and is pretty much functioning well using their learned strategies... great. But....I think a lot of teens/adults will need the meds to best function and have a better quality of life. Just my opinion. It will be interesting to see how this plays out in my household over the next few years. I have one son 13, who is ADHD primary inattentive, and one son 12, who doesn't have ADHD.
A certain part of me is saddened to know there are certain career fields that will be closed to my son due to his medication and psych history, especially since my husband works in federal law enforcement and I know my son's history would most likely disqualify him for a similar career if he wanted to pursue it. But another side of me knows that with his strengths and intelligence, I know my son will find his own path.
Okiemom
okiemom38983.877025463Most people learn to control them selves as they grow into adults. So, meds are not required as they get older. But each person is different.