My 7 1/2 yr. old seems to develop tolerances to drugs. Everything starts out GREAT, then the results taper off. He's been on dexidrine, Ritalin LA, now Adderall. First he had 10mg. Now it's up to 15. Doc won't go higher, cause he's not gaining weight.
Hi all.
My son is 7.5 years old now and we have been trying various meds for over 2 years (Concerta, Adderall, Ritalin, Abilify, some antidepressant that I forget the name of). We find something that really seems to work for him (after figuring out the right amounts), but then the benefit only seems to last 4 to 6 months. He is on 40mg of Ritalin LA and 17.5mg of Abilify now and it worked great for almost the whole school year. The last 2 weeks to a month have been a return to most of the problems we had before. The doctor upped him from 30 to 40 mg Ritalin, but there has not been an improvement. He now wants to switch from Abilify to Risperdal.
Now that I've said all of that, my question is whether anyone feels there child has built up a tolerance to some of the different meds? Is that possible?
I think they do. I have three girls on abilify. The youngest seemed to do well at first but now is having trouble again. We didn't even get 4-6 months.In high school I was on Prozac for two years, then it stopped working... Ritalin worked GREAT for me for a couple of months, then that too stopped working... if I took a break for a few months and went back to it, it would work again, but it would always stop working eventually. I'm currently on Adderall and hope the effects last, I haven't heard many people complaining that it stops working ::crosses fingers::
I am having some of the same problems. My 8.5 yr old son has been on meds since 4.5. He was doing well on Adderall XR 25 mg, but started having impulse control issues. We upped him to 30 mg, and he seemed to do better for 2 months. Last month a different child. His teacher and I don't know what has happened. I have called the pharmacy & manufacturer to rule out problem with meds. The manufacturer said there was no problem with that lot #, but didn't mention that he might develop side effects of irritability & anger. We are going to try an elimination food diet this summer. I am having an EKG on Friday to make sure he has had no heart damage from any of these medications. He is ADHD & has sensory integration issues.
I am at my wits end. I am broken hearted. He can be so sweet, but he is started to make a "Pain" of himself in his class, on the bus, on his team. Kids think he is always angry. This is not the child I know. I want to do something to help him. We have also done the vestibular imbalance testing, and tried the anti-viral medication. We have not tried that many meds for the adhd. Only ritalin, strattera, adderall and adderall xr. He couldn't swallow when we got an rx for concerta ...so we may try that again.
Any help would be appreciated. His doctor said that the jury is still out on how helpful behavior modification theraphy is at his age and maturity level.
Worried mom