Your experiences with Focalin XR? | ADHD Information

My 6 1/2 y.o. DD is ADHD - emphasis on the H - and was just recently formally diagnosed. She's taking 10 mg of Focalin daily and has been at that level for one week, after starting on 5 mg for the first few days. We see a positive effect, but it's very inconsistent and the reports from school are only mixed. We're going to try 15 mg starting tomorrow, but feels kinda icky to increase it again, probably because we only got our heads around the whole idea of medication a couple of weeks ago. We also aren't loving the rebound thing, although the doc said this often passes after some weeks.

I would love to hear any and all experiences with Focalin - good or bad!

For anyone curious, my girl is the super "bouncy," creative type - very smart and often charming, but it can be an epic battle to break through the haze of her mental activity or to get her to appropriately curb her impulses. We have yelled and then felt guilty and frustrated a few too many times. And we've find out some kids are staying away from her in school because of her disruptiveness and impulsivity. We are desperately hoping to help her establish some air-traffic control for the busy airport that is her mind!

Thanks so very much.
WoodspritesMom40662.8135532407 [QUOTE=WoodspritesMom] We also aren't loving the rebound thing, although the doc said this often passes after some weeks.

[/QUOTE]

The bad news is, Focalin is the worst stim for rebound there is from the anecdotes I've heard.  My 12 year old son has been taking it for several years now, and the rebound in the PM and morning when his doses wear off is just the same as it was when he was 7 years old. 

The good news is, it's good stuff.  It works, you can set your clock by when it kicks in (although over time it no longer lasts for 8 hours... we are at 5.5 hours now), and we have had no real problems with it for the past 6 years or so. 

We added Intuniv last year to avoid going up further on the dose and nip some tics in the bud... but other than that, it's been magic for us.

Audrey
Hi WoodspritesMom. Im sorry to hear about your kid.
I read a thread of one mom and her son is using Focaling
too.

http://www.adhdnews.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=35790

Maybe you can get some ideas about the medicine, just to
make sure. I hope that helps.My child used to take Focalin XR.  It made him too flat and detached for a couple of hours per day, so we switched him to a different medication.  Metadate CD works much better for him.  Everybody's different, so hopefully Focalin XR is the right one for your child!Thank you so much, everyone, for your your responses. We are still in the observation stage. Trying to take it slow. For new readers on this thread, I will continue to appreciate all input!
My son takes Focalin and it has been wonderful except for the rebound. We had to add Clonidine. Now, he is better, but cannot sleep without the Clonidine whether he gets the Focalin XR or not. We loved how well Focalin XR worked, but had to take DS off of it because it was causing depression, anger, and aggression.  We, too, fought rebound in the beginning, and added a short-acting dose in the afternoons (focalin IR), but then he wouldn't sleep, so we added Clonidine.  And later, to combat the aggression, we added Tenex in the morning.  It was a windfall.

We switched to Concerta today, so I'm hoping we get the good parts, but avoid the issues we had with Focalin.

Best of luck.  It seems to affect everyone differently.

We have tried several meds for DD, 11, who is extremely ADHD- emphasis on the H, also.  Focalin XR has worked the best for us.  Rebound is pretty bad, but she also takes Clonidine for sleep along with melatonin, or she would literally be up all night.  (This has happened before!)  Anyway, we have found that this works the best for us.  She takes XR, but has a super fast metabolism and it doesn't last all day, like XR should.  She also takes regular non XR later in the day.  Good luck to you.  I know what you are going through!!Follow up:

After close to 2 weeks, we are seeing great results with 15mg! DD's spark is still there, along with all the creativity, but we all relate to each other so much easier, and things are going great at school, too. My hope had been that we'd be able to get to a point where we can speak to her and be heard without endless effort. We have that now, but the unexpected benefit is that she is also better able to communicate with us. She's still a big talker, but now she makes much more sense because she can really put her thoughts together! It's wild!

I have noticed that she is tired some mornings, but then it dawned on me… She should be tired occasionally, when she doesn't get enough sleep. It used to be she would just get more hyper. The evening rebound issue with sleep is already improving and isn't much of a problem. When she gets a little less that she needs for any reason, now she's just normally tired instead of "spinning." And on most nights, when she gets enough sleep, she's fine!

Wow, wow, wow. Why did we ever resist this option??
We tried Focalin XR with my oldest son who is 12years old and is ADHD and
Autistic. It calmed down SOME of his impulsiveness but boy oh boy did it
make him angry, sullen and quiet.

We had to take him off of it.

We also tried Adderall (same effect) and Metadate CD (again, same effect). I
think Daytrana really would have worked for him but he won't leave the
patch on.

So he's currently unmedicated.