childs anxiety is unbearable | ADHD Information

Hi,
Thanks for the book, Freeing you child from anxiety, i have just ordered it online, it might help us understand the problem a bit better. This forum is terrific!! Thanks for you help.
karen

The rebound is something that many doctors don't tell parents - we learn the hard way!!!!  I keep a journal when assessing meds.  I also get the teacher to fill it in.  As a teacher myself, I have helped a number of parents to refine and evaluate the effectiveness of medication.  Basically, I draw up a table with 30 minute intervals and then assess characteristics of interest eg attention, response to directions, impulsiveness.  Then I give it a rating to the +  if it is better than before - if it is worse   =  same/unchanged.  Then space for comment.  This makes it really easy to fill in.  By doing this for a few days I can see the duration of the meds and how symptoms react to meds.  I put this sheet on a clip board and take it into school, working through with the teacher to make sure they know what I mean.  Then with ritalin for example, I find the time when they are coming off meds and go back 30 minutes from this point for the next dose.  Then it kicks in as the other is leaving the system. When my son was little it was 2 1/2 hours!!!  Now it is 3 1/2 hours.  With my 16 year old daughter it is 4 hours. 

Have you read any of Sue Dengates material?  Our son is still on his concerta and zoloft but in the last 2 weeks his anxiety has dropped substanially by taking him off wheat  (already off dairy).  Nothing is the past has really stopped the anxiety, just dulled it!  

 

My 7 year old had to stop taking stimulants so they could treat the anxiety.  She too has been in our room for months, claiming a new room w/ her sisters (which they begged for) is too much "new" for her.  She used to hide in the bathroom at school and get serious dizzy spells. 

The zoloft is awesome and I have coupled it w/ a once a week trip to her psychiatrist which she also loves.  They play games together and he talks about her "worry brain". 

May I recommend a book our psychiatrist recommended (and is excellent):
Freeing your child from anxiety: http://www.amazon.com/Freeing-Your-Child-Anxiety-Practical/d p/0767914929/ref=sr_1_13/102-5799699-9011329?ie=UTF8&s=b ooks&qid=1186629349&sr=8-13

She is about to start ADHD meds since the zoloft has helped w/ the anxiety.  I would take a close look at the meds your child is on since stimulants also increased our daughter's anxiety.

All the best.

Can you elaborate on the report?  I am often at a loss when the doctor asked about side effects and I need to get better about tracking it.

[QUOTE=Diane V]You may need to change stimulants. Some cause greater anxiety than others. [/QUOTE]

Are there some stimulants that are more prone to promoting anxiety, or is it a matter of people responding differently to different ones and there's no general pattern?

"they say" Adderall and Dexedrine tend to cause more anxiety than methylphedinate drugs. For us that was not the case. We tried both. The methyphedinates were worse. Some more so than others. I do not think there is a general pattern of side effects with any of these meds except appetite suppression and sleep issues.
joyacacia39302.903125It was interesting today, cause my child was feeling sick and didn,t want to go to school. I gave him his am medication and he stayed home. He was quite settled, no anxiety at all, he was left alone by himself while i watched a movie. I couldn,t believe the change in him, I kept checking on him, usually i carn.t leave the room. Around 4pm he started to feel anxious. Mum can you come to the toliet with me, mum you have to stay with me, I carn,t be by myself etc. etc. So it seems while medicated my child copes really well but when he starts to come off the medication the anxiety kicks in big time. We don,t medicate on week-ends so thats why i didn,t pick up on this earlier, his anxious all the time. I have left a message for his Doctor and have made an appointment with a child psychologist but carn,t get in until October.
Thought this might help others.
karen
My six year old son, ADHD, Auditory Processing Disorder, has been commenced on concerta 18mgs after being on ritalin. We are happy with the medication except for his levels of anxiety. Child has always been anxious even before he started meds.
Our child has never slept in his own room, we have a mattress on the floor in our room, and even now he will wake crying and climb into bed with me. He also needs a night light on otherwise he is too scared, screams and goes on silly. We tried putting him in his own room with a night light and he started sleep walking, running into walls and fell one night in a box that was on the floor. It was stressing him out to much this was before he was on medication. Now he is even to scared to go to the toliet, have a bath, get a drink of water, he must be with us at all times.  He will not watch tv by himself. One night he woke up crying in our room and i totally lost it, I put him in his room with the light on and told him to stop the rot and go to sleep. He kept calling out, mum will you please help me, why won,t you help me, i finally gave in, he sounded so sad, i went to his room to lie down with him and i noticed he had wet the bed. My child didn,t seem aware that this had happened. He has never wet the bed even when he was being toliet trained. I felt very upset with myself.
So our main problems are being by himself
not sleeping in his own room
he had shocking night terrors but since being on the concerta this has slowed down, he wake up crying but i can usually settle him down.
Just wondering if other parents have simular issues and what helps.

thanks
karen

Hi Karen,

   Absolutely. Although not quite to that extreme. My daughter also suiffers co-existing anxiety. We had to stop stimulants due to this. IS he being treated for his anxiety? Both with medication and therapy?

 

Diane V39301.2244328704 Hi Dianne,
Can they medicate for anxiety, at the moment he is only taking concerta 18mgs, his only been on meds for around  4months, he really needs to take this as i can notice a huge difference when he comes off it, he was a big problem at school until he started medication. What type of therapy should I be looking at, should I have him reviewed by a child psychologist. I didn,t know if the anxiety is just another thing we have to learn to live with and hope one day he will grow out of.
thanks
karen
joyacacia39301.2358912037

Absolutely they can treat the anxiety. I would find a pediatric psychiatrist if possible. A pediatric psychologist can help with ongoing therapy for the anxiety.

A lot of children are treated successfully with anxiety meds.

Hi fellow Australian!

My son has Auditory processing issues, ADHD, ASD and anxiety. We have been taking concerta / ritalin for 7 years now and during most of this time have taken zoloft for the anxiety.  Without it he is a mess. 

 

No it's not fair, I agree. He has to live. If his anxiety is gettign in the way of that, which it is, then it should be addressed. You may need to change stimulants. Some cause greater anxiety than others. It is probably worth the switch.
okay, Thanks Dianne we need to do something, it was hard enough convincing my husband he needed to start medication and now it seems we have to add more. It's not fair for our child to have to deal with all this anxiety though. I'll ring the specialist his under tomorrow and does anyone know of a good pediatric psychiatrist and pediatric psychologist maybe around the newcastle area in nsw, Australia. Its closer than sydney but we will travel if needed, his Paediatrician is based in sydney its 5hrs away.

Hi Happyrock, its nice to see a fella aussie on board. We live in the upper hunter valley in NSW. Maybe you could pm me any DRs you know of?
thanks
karen

I am a very visual person so I devised a table to use. 

Down the left hand columns put the time - 30 minutes is good.  Then decide upon the characteristics you want to look at  eg hyperactivity, attention/ learning , impulsiveness, mood.  Then you record meds of course.  Also leave a space for comments

Symbols +   if behaviour is better than last recording

              =  if it hasn't changed

              -   gotten worse

Here would be an example. 

                             focus  impulsive Con.  Anxiety

7:00 10mg Ritalin    -           ;   -      &nbs p;         &nbs p;  -

7: 30                       +           ;+         &nbs p;         =

8:00                         +          +                      -   Got in the car all ready

8:30                         =           ; =                     -        Got out maths -ready    

9:30                         =           ; =                     -        on edge

10:00                      -                   -                - off task, physical with child over book

 

So from this we can see that the med worked and began to wear off after the 3 hour mark.  As Ritalin has a kick in time (with my son it was timed at 23 minutes!!!) then you need to introduce the dose at 9:30 in this case.  It has however caused anxiety - the doctor may read this as being hyper focused and therefore reduce the dose.    I got to the stage where I just had one column and wrote comments,

When using multiple meds, I have taken to using a vertical time line with 1cm = 30 minutes.  One side indicates the administering of meds on the other side the symbol and any comments.  I can then see when meds need to over lap. 

My specialist many years ago explained keeping a record and this is what I came up with.  He loved it so much he copied it for all his patients as an example.  Then when I got lazy and didn't do a tabular record he produced it and said I might like to do this.  I then reminded him it was mine from 7 years prior!!!!!!

Great for a record when trialling meds and having to remember effects of meds and doses.   Hope this makes sense. 

I have used it in the classroom for kids  on meds - use on a clipboard for a week and see the pattern emerge!!

Good luck

 

Happyrock39303.700775463well, I have contacted our doctor and he has prescribed movox 25mgs nocte for my sons anxiety. Does any other parent have experience with this medication, my child is only 6 and in the side effects it says the child should be at least 8 years old. The side effects are pretty worrisome and it doesn,t actually say that this drug is for anxiety. We are very reluctant to start him on it.
karen
sorry about that!!!!  I am thinking this is just blank!!!  Somehow the spacing came up as letters!!!  Seems my computer is also suffering from a processing disorder as well!!!Happy rock
Looking at your chart.... what is nbsp?
Jeaniejo39313.9098958333