Posted by asilydur on November 16, 2001, at 3:02:49
Hi-My son was diagnosed ADHD by a child psychiatrist
8 years ago when he was 4 1/2. He was extremely hyperactive and responded very well to ritalin.
After beginning medication his life started turning
around, he started making friends and doing well in
preschool. At some point we switched to dexadrine spansules and added paxil to help with rebound problems.
He was a straight A student all through elementary school and was accepted last year to a very good magnet
school in our city for gifted and talented students.
I had been wondering during 4th and 5th grade if his meds were working as well but his grades weren't suffering so I didn't do anything about it. He
started 6th grade at this new school and after being
off the dex all summer, it was apparant that the medications were much less effective and he has
been struggling all year. We increased the medication
to 15 mg dexadrine in the morning (from 10) and that
didn't do much so we added a 10mg spansule at lunch,
it seems to be helping a little more in the afternoon
but he is still having alot of trouble in the morning.
I am wondering if he needs to get off the paxil.
I have also been treated for ADD by this Dr. and my
experience with antidepressant/stimulant combos is that
they can work for awhile and then after awhile there are
strange side affects or you just start feeling bad.
When it gets to that point i've found that I feel better
when I get off the antidepressant. I'm at the point now
where I don't even need the AD for rebound anymore.
Anyway, my son is struggling, his counselors and teachers seem to like him and are willing to do whatever
they can to help him through this period. We all feel
its a combination problem of adjusting to middle school
and needing a medication change. My son's counselor said we would need to get a letter from his Dr. requesting an IEP and that they could do some things
to help him. Our doctor flat out refused to write a letter to the school saying our son has ADHD and requesting the iep. He says he doesn't what any information in our son's file at school "that we can't control". I really can't imagine what he is worried about. In my experience, teachers and councelors keep that info private. This Dr. has also told us not to tell his teachers he has adhd. We couldn't have had the great working partnership we've had with all of his teachers had we not been honest with them and I've never regretted telling his teachers. It seems to me that
the decision about what goes in our son's file should
be our's, not the doctor's. I feel more than a little betrayed that we've spent 8 years with this doctor and now he won't give us the support we need? He would rather see our son fail at this school rather than have a letter in his file? Can anyone give me an idea as
to how common a response this would be from a psychiatrist? I also have concerns about this
doctors knowledge of medications. I've read alot
of discussions on the two "babble" boards about the
roles of psychiatrists vs the roles of psychologists.
Our doctor can and does prescribe medication but he
seems more interested in therapy. And when something
goes wrong with a medication, he is more likely to dismiss it, or attribute it to some stress in my(or my
son's) life than deal with the fact that it is a biochemical problem. I do think I can tell the difference between an purely emotional problem and a
brain chemistry problem. When, after being on prozac
and dexedrine for a couple of years I started having
hand tremors, he dismissed it, didn't seem concerned.
I became more and more uncomfortable and finally took
myself off the prozac. Later we would try different
antidepressants that would work well for awhile then
I would start feeling bad. I would be feeling a discomfort that was not emotional (It was more like
feeling ill) the Dr. would attribute it to some stress in my life. I would eventually wean myself off the antidepresant and feel better after doing so. Now I am
not on any antidepressant and haven't been for months.
The stimulants don't seem to be working as well. My
doctors response was that maybe I shouldn't be doing
as much. I have to help support my family and I am not
doing nearly as much as I was when my kids were younger.
Giving up is not an option. He doesn't seem to get the
fact that our family is suffering financially because
of my lessened ability to produce income. Now my son
is having trouble with medications and while the doctor
is making some effort to adjust his meds, he was unconcerned when I reported an episode my son had that
clearly seemed to be a result of medications being out
of balance. He was acting very strangely and I was
was very worried. Again, it was the stress of the situation according to the doctor. My son is showing
some obsessive/compulsive tendancies and is having
problems with compulsively spitting, nail biting, etc.
The doctor doesn't seem concerned. When I talk about
his school problems he suggests that maybe the teachers aren't doing their jobs. I know enough about the school and how my friends are doing at the school, that I don't have any reason to think the teachers aren't teaching.
I am sorry this is so long but I just don't know what to do and I am very worried and frustrated. We need a doctor that knows these medications inside and out and I don't know how to go about finding one. Its not like they mention their strengths and attitudes in the yellow pages. I'm almost wondering if we need a neurologist. But do all neurologist treat ADHD? I've heard that the psychiatry dept at our state medical school is very old fashioned which might explain our doctors attitude but it also makes me think it might be difficult to find a more progressive doctor. Our doctor seems so out of it that when I asked him about Concerta several months ago
he told me it wasn't out yet, and I was seeing ads for
it in magazines and parents on an add parent forum were
writing about their experiences with it.
Thanks for listening and I would appreciate any feedback
and/or suggestions.
poster:asilydur
thread:13986
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20011105/msgs/13986.html