for those on concerta | ADHD Information

i was wondering what strength of concerta that the child were on. my son who is almost 6 is on concerta 36,he was increased from 18. it is not working well after 2 weeks.           i thought 36 was the strongest concerta there was. i have noticed that eating is a real struggle on this med. he has always had a food adversion.at almost 6 he is only 37 lbs,even as a baby he did'nt like to eat or drink his bottle, i do the shakes,and instant breakfast with ice cream,he does'nt even like those,but i try to get whatever in him so he does'nt look like a skeleton. and sleep is difficult,i tried melatonin but i did'nt see it doing much,if i can get him to sleep before 12 am i'm lucky.

My daughter is on Concerta 54 mg. She used to take an other 10 mg of ritalin after school but we stopped that because of the hideous rebound she gets from the immediate release form. Adderall actually worked much better for her AD/HD, but I had the same probs w/ appetite. At almost 9 yrs old she looked like a concentration camp victim!

Her appetite is much better w/ Concerta and she is now of normal weight. I'm wondering, though, after reading your post if maybe the appetite effect is more of an age related thing w/ stimulants than any specific stimulant in and of itself??? All I can say is continue what you're doing in terms of calorically dense foods, and consider increasing his dose or changing to Adderall if his behavior still has room for improvement.

I hope that you can take some comfort in knowing that you are not alone in the appetite struggle. I had such a hard time w/ this because as much as I wanted my daughter to gain weight, I didn't want to establish bad eating habits (like very high calorie foods right before bedtime) at such an early age. Unfortunately, there are no easy answers here....

Best of luck!

Lisa