New here, - Lost - | ADHD Information
Long post, sorry, but please read and comment
Wondering if anyone has had similar experiences as me and my son, so heres my story, please read and comment.
I have 3 children in all, a now 7yo girl, 6 yo son (the one with the issues) and a 4 yo son.
My son who was 5 years old when his major problems started has been on alot of medications for his "conditions". His mother and I split up after 5 years of marriage about 4 years ago. He is 6 now. After his mother and I split, she moved back to where we came from (about 4000 miles away).
In fall 2007, he came to live with me because his mother could not handle him, and he said he missed me. He was on 2 meds then, without my knowlege, Risperdal and a ritalin deriviative. He was on these because, at 4 years old he was diagnosed with ADHD. Basically he didnt listen to his mother and had a nasty habit of hitting and tearing stuff up. When he got to me, I found that with discipline and a structured reward system, he fell into a routine where he was happy. We found that he did not need the meds and we slowly weened him off of them, and afterwards he seemed happier and had much more energy, which was lacking while he was on the drugs. 4 hour naps, and massive weight gain, while on the meds. When his mother found out that i took him off the meds she came to get him, saying that he needed them, would not listen to my reasoning that i could handle him and were on a road to getting him to act right. This happened about 3 months after he came to live with me. His mother had also just given birth to another girl, not mine, which leads me to believe she sent him here only to make her last months of pregnancy easier, not for his well-being...
Fast Forward another year, and his mother is pregnant again, from yet another different man then the last child. In late fall early winter 2008 she tells me he is uncontrollable at school, hitting children and adults and his siblings, using foul language and generally being not very happy at all. Im not sure of exactly how it all went down but in the beginning of 2009 she starts going to several doctors trying to find a solution for him. Many told her, as far as i know, that the meds he was on should control his behavior and that he needed counseling. She apparantly still couldnt handle him and finally had him commited to a mental institution, (still 5 years old). He was there twice, for about a month total. He spent several days in the hospital completly alone and scared, and still refers to the hospital as the bad place and the doctors there as the bad doctors. After the end of the final hospitalization, a doctor diagnosed him with: ADD/ADHD, schitzophrenia, bipolar disorder and ODD. The meds they gave him are as follows: Clonidine .05 mg twice a day, Mirtazipine 30mg at night, Vyvanese 30mg in the morning, Depakote SPR 250mg twice a day, and Geodon 40 mg twice a day. I on getting news of this was horrified, mainly because i thought my little boy was very very ill and needed these meds to prevent him from murdering someone. The docs that his mother talked to really have her believeing that if he did not have these drugs he would at the very least never lead a normal life. At the end of the hospital stay, he said again he wanted to come live with me, and his sisterl said she wanted to come as well.
So, March of this year him and his sister come to live with me. I get this huge bag of pills and am very good at giving them to him, because i knew the withdrawl from all these would be drastic, and again, i trusted the doctors opinion in that he needed these meds. I noticed several things though as the days went by. He had gained at least 20 pounds. If we let him, he would nap, even after sleeping, for up to 10 hours a day. When he was awake, he simply was not there. He was very compliant, but only to the point of where it mattered for him to be so, when something went wrong, it was unbelieveable blowup from him, kicking screaming......
With the kids coming to live with me there was a lag getting them on my new health insurance. I contacted their mother and told her that I would need her to get his scripts refilled and sent to me because i would not be able to do it on my insurance until the next month. She complied, but it took time. He was running low on the meds, so, I consulted with 2 medical professionals that i know (who were flabergasted at the amount of meds he was on) and they instructed me what to do to ween him properly off of these until we got the refills. Meanwhile, he was having serious problems at home and school with the way he was acting. We kept him from school for around a week while we weened him off the meds.
After the weening off, several things happened. He lost about 8 pounds in a week. He started smiling. He started to understand that i would not tolerate his behavior at home and school, and started acutally wanting to do better. He also started lying, not alot but a little. He had issues at school until the end of the year, but every day, even the bad ones, he seemed to show a little improvment. In fact, one week he won an award for the best acting kid in class for the week. When the new meds arrived from his mother, i informed her that for now, and under his now new social workers advice i was going to keep him off the meds and see if we could improve him further. This really upset her, and she threatened me with losing my kids forever. She called social services on me, which i found to be very insulting. The social workers agreed with me that i was taking the best action in the interest of my kid.
So now, several months being off the meds, I think we are now on a road to keeping him healthy, off the meds and acting mostly right. He is out of school for the summer now and has settled into a routine of cleaning his room, doing math and reading and writing work, playing with other children (minor miracle as he has always been VERY withdrawn), and not acting up at home, really at all. We do have to watch him like a hawk, and are apt to congratulate him on good deeds, and negativly enhance his poor ones. He knows now that life is much happier and easier if he tries to get along with the people around him, and hopefully 1st grade will be a better experience for him then kindergarten was. We have also found that vigorous exercise, which he loves, greatly helps his attitude. We have a small trampolene in the house that he will jump on until he is exhausted, and wearing him out seems to be the key to keeping his attitude on an even keel.
So thank you for reading. I am not sure about how the courts will decide where and when my kids will be, I know the state where it is being handled rarely decides on the side with the father. But i know that I have done the right thing for my son, and whatever his mother does to mess him up is on her head. All my kids will always have a home with me and hopefully by the time they can make up their own minds about where they want to be they will realize that daddy has their best interests at heart.
I am wondering how out of the ordinary it is for a 5yo to be diagnosed with his conditions and if the amount of meds he was on was normal. I have been told by nearly everyone who hears my story that the diagnoses and meds he were on were simply too much and that Bipolar and schitzophrenia can not even be reliably diagnosed in a kid his age. thanks again
I hope for your kids' sakes that you can get permanent custody. Sounds like you are doing the right things for your kids. Just because that state rarely sides with the father, your case is not closed. Keep fighting for the right things. Get as much documentation you can from professionals (psychologists, doctors, teachers) as you can to back up your case. Document EVERYTHING! Judges like to see that you've done your homework. :) I know it's a lot of work but if you really want to win custody of your children, you'll do it.
He was probably on too much medication and kudos to you in getting him off of them. sounds like mom just wants a zombie. feel bad for the kids that followed yours. I hope your son is doing better these days and hope he doesn't have to go back to being a drug basket. Maybe mom has Munchausen-by-proxy?? That's a possibility.
Good luck and keep us posted.
I thank you for your encouragement kjl. Im really not sure how it is all going to wash out, and yes i hope i get my kids full time to. Things changed in my kids life when i wasnt around and playing catch up is hard, harder still with a kid who is having such serious issues as my son. I wasnt out of their lives by choice and circumstances prevented me from being close to them. I have a hard time dealing with how i let them down by not being around even if it was not 100% my fault.
I also have hard time speaking ill of their mother. Honestly i dont now how it came to the point in her life where it seemed like a good idea to have him committed, but i was not around, and i do not like to judge. She was a good mother when i was around and its hard to to think about her being "bad" or having some other issue that would have her in way any bring harm to my son. I want to think the best of her but her actions in having 2 more children when she herself could not support 3, and getting to the point of being so stressed about it she neglets the needs of our son - speak more to where her mind is.
I only bring this up because it begs the question: are doctors considering family life at all when perscribing these meds? More then him missing me, he was very happy to be in a home where there was no yelling, where he got loads of attention, and where he was basically I think more understood. When he came off the meds I saw so much of myself in him, he acts very simarlarly to the way i did when i was kid. I was a hellraiser. But i was also very creative, tended to think a different way about things then other kids did. I was different. I was special, unique, like all kids are. My mom, to her benefit, never considered once putting me on drugs to calm me down. As a nurse, she knew that ritalin was little more then a refined version of speed. She knew that was not good for a developing young mind, and this was back in the early 80's. I love her for going through the hell i put her through. And as it turned out, i calmed down all by myself. I was forced to face my reality, my insecurites, to face my fears and that i could achieve my dreams, if i tried.
Now let me say that im not anti drugs. I am sure there are people that need them, badly. I know ive met people that probaly could not function normally without them. But honestly, my son from what ive seen so far, had no busniess being on any drugs at all. He needs ALOT more attention then most kids, attention my ex simply by her circumstances was unable to give. I really feel like the "system" failed my son. I would think that there would be pause before giving a 5 year old a list of powerful meds, but from what im finding out there were many other kids, his age, in the same mental ward he was in. When did we start throwing obnoxious 5 year olds in mental hospitals anyway? Seems barbaric if you ask me. He did bad things, sure. He hit. He spit. He cussed. He yelled..... so did I, much worse actually from what ive seen, and id have to think that a reputable doctor would laugh in the face of a mother who would try to instituionalize a 5 year old for anything less then that kid attempting murder or suicide, which my son never even came close to.
The way my son is acting has all to do with what his mother and i have put him through, and very little if anything to do with him having some sort of defect. He is acting out because he doesnt have the words to express how crappy he feels. It breaks my heart that we have put all my kids through what we have. I wish i could change the past, but thats not how things get fixed. I may have messed up but now i am doing what i can. I am thier father, and no matter what happens that will not change. I hope that in the future they will see that i at least tried. I hope they forgive me for my mistakes......
Again sorry for the long post. This stuff is just kinda comin out
Try not to beat yourself up for not being there for your kids. If it wasn't 100% your fault, then you are absolved of being to blame in part.That's very "big" of you to not speak ill of their mother. (I have a hunch she doesn't practice the same) Actions speak volumes over words. :)
I think doctors have a lot to consider and they just don't have the time to consider all the factors. I think they depend on families to give them all the information and rely on families to make the diagnosis.
I'm glad to hear that you've made great strides in your life. Not everyone (especially people with ADHD) can make those kinds of changes. I sense a feeling of hope for your son and all your children. That's a good hope to have.
I had a psychiatrist tell me when I was 15 that I would have been better off as an only child (I'm one of 6). I still have trouble with that because it's probably true. I can totally understand that your son probably needs more attention than most kids might. My mother had a terrible time giving me the attention I needed. some people just have limitations and it's not anyone's fault really. a 5year old in a mental ward??? OMG! I was 15 when I went to my first "mental hospital" and it was awful. (save that conversation for another time) Maybe your son just needed "Super Nanny". And I'm not trying to make fun about that. Maybe he just needed some direction - not institution.
I am impressed by your ability to see that your son is simply affected by the tension between his parents. Kids react, sometimes strangely, to their parents splitting up (my daughter became more shy and withdrawn). You're right. Things don't get fixed by dwelling on the past. You can't change it. But you can, and seem to be, focus on making things better for your kids.
I think all parents hope their kids forgive them for their mistakes. But parenting doesn't come with a manual. There's no instructions. We do the best we can. You sound like a very caring, capable father. Your kids are very blessed to have you as their dad. Don't forget that!
Good luck with things. and it's okay if you write a long post. I've done it too. Sometimes we just need to.
Reading your descriptions of the great qualities about your son, they do
seem like classic personality traits of ADHD to me. No one ever talks
about the good things about it - I think you nailed them.
Every person has a different tolerance of the behaviors. I had no clue
about my son. He just seemed like an active little boy to me. It wasn't
until he was in school and he was so frustrated that he was attacking kids
at school that I really believed what was going on. I just didn't see it. If
she has other kids to compare him to (my son is an only child) maybe
that tipped her off. Who knows.
It does seem like it was a lot of drugs he was on. I am a big believer in
doing environmental changes (like giving a kid a goal rather than just
punishing them every 50 seconds) before you try meds. Because if they
haven't learned how to control themselves, you do have to medicate them
into zombiehood before they act "normal." There isn't an easy fix!
And I think you have completely nailed it that he acts out because he
can't say what's wrong. I'm convinced that negative behaviors of kids
with ADHD are due to frustration. Keep them from getting frustrated,
you'll stop the negative behaviors from happening.
It's classic for parents to blame themselves when their kids hit a rocky
patch. The good news is he's really young - you have a long time to fix
this and that's what matters. As a family you will get through this.
If I were you I would request copies of the reports from his diagnosis. I
would look into executive skills training, because that will help you to get
him to understand rules. It sounds like he might be a little delayed. Not
much. But if you know some tricks to cut to the chase then it will make
up some time.
Keep venting here. It's going to be hard. You've got a big old mountain
to climb. Most of us have had our own nasty journeys. We can
completely relate (or almost anyway), we understand, we can take the
venting (better than yelling at your kids or your ex!), and we might have
some advice.
Finally - give yourself and your son a break. It took a long time for him
to get to this point, you can take some time to get him where he needs to
be. Don't stress out your family by trying to fix everything at once.
Tackle the biggest problem, get that under control, and then go after the
next one.
You can do this! It's hard, but it's really really worth it.
Good luck!
I honestly skimmed the post, BUT, I just wanted to say that if seen by the correct specialists, children CAN be diagnosed with bipolar. I am not sure about schizophrenia. I thought that laid dormant until later, like teens/20's, but again not sure.
BUT I think a lot of the problem was all those meds he was on. I am so happy for your son living with you - he is very lucky to have you in his life. His mother sounds dreadful, like a monster who keeps having children but doesn't want to take care of them if they need supervision and care 
I am so sorry for what he has been through. Your story actually brings me to tears. I picture him stuck in that hospital alone and scared, as if it was my son.
Do you feel comfortable with the ADHD diagnosis? I actually was able to diagnose my son when he was 2. I had read about it in a toddler book but had him officially diagnosed just shy of 5. We didn't medicate until he was 6, almost 7. It is also genetic, is there anyone in either family, yours or his mothers, that resembles any of this?
I hope you win custody of the children, you can tell how much you care. Please keep us posted. I am so happy to read of him playing with children, etc.