Parents with ADHD support group?

[wonderstuff]

So after suspecting I had ADHD a couple of years ago I finally got round to seeking some help and got a diagnosis on Friday. I’ve been prescribed Elvsan but failed to find any today, needs to be ordered so goodness knows when I’ll get round to that. My son is a mini me and if I’ve got it he certainly does so working out how to better support him is something to ponder, he’s 7, I said to his teacher a while ago that I suspected he had it but she disagrees, I’m sure school think I’m a complete flake. I also suspect dh has adhd!
So my house is chaos, I don’t sleep enough, holding down a job is a challenge, I’m always late and my daughter is possibly the most organised member of our household.

Wondering if there are others out there living with the chaos and if we could have a thread to vent and support each other?

Hey, you sound very similar to me - I even have an almost 7 year old who I see so much of myself in and feel she probably has it too.
Tha chaos is really getting me down at the moment.

Wednesday is my day off, failed do do any laundry or put away any of the mountains of clothes in my room. Pathetic that I can’t keep on top of it. Did buy enough food for everyone to eat and order my meds from the chemist. I’ve changed my name on everything bar my medical stuff so hoping they won’t want ID when I go pick them up - do you always need ID for controlled meds?

Borttagen do you have a diagnosis/treatment? I’m really hoping meds will help.

Work today, picked up my prescription after work - £86! Better bloody work. Work is mental and I've paperwork piling up - really hopeful that with medication I can start to get on top of it all.
Still failed to do laundry...

Feeling dreadful after taking Elvanse - not sure if with time I’ll feel better or if I’m definitely on too high a dose. Can’t drive today, feel quite disconnected. Fucksake.

I'm very recently diagnosed with ADHD (inattentive) and can certainly relate to the chaos! I'm pretty sure one of my DDs (9) has it, but our attempted referral failed because she masks in school, and because she is bright she does not appear to be falling behind academically.

I'm also on Elvanse, I started a few months ago. I take 30mg on work days, and 20mg at weekends, because I've heard it's really easy to build up a tolerance and end up with really high doses. I've also been given 5mg of instant release dex for days when I have stuff I need to do in the evenings.

What dose are you on? It could well be you are on too much!

It has made a huge difference for me, my brain fog has cleared and I'm able to be a lot more engaged. That said, I still have to make sure I'm focusing on the right things - the temptation to go down the rabbit hole on the wrong thing is still very very present!!

I actually put a huge mountain of clothes away the other day at the weekend thanks to the Elvanse without it being too painful!!

I also take magnesium (citrate) to help smooth things out a bit - one tablet for it kicking in, another when it starts to wear off, and a couple before bed as it helps me sleep.

Really interesting! I’m on 30mg, I mentioned to my dr that any caffeine in the afternoon affects my sleep and she said it may be that a lower than 30mg dose would work and she has one client on 10mg. Going to take half tomorrow and see how I go. It’s feeling I can’t drive today that’s worrying me most.

My mum said she felt bad for not noticing it when I was young, but like your dd I am a master at masking and also the queen of managing to do just enough to get by. Well mostly, except when I absolutely can’t and have a bit of a break down!

Definitely try the magnesium - both for it kicking in and for it wearing off! I see all sorts of people on doses like 60mg and I just think no way!! My Monday dose always feels slightly more jittery after dropping to 20mg for the weekend days.

I wouldn't have noticed DD had I not been aware thanks to DS being diagnosed with ASD/ADHD and then me realising what these conditions really are! I never thought it would have applied to me either, but my utter surprise at finally reading a list of symptoms that matched me perfectly brought so much peace! Getting the medication and diagnosis was somewhat of a more challenging battle though..

There's no way my mum could have known. Even when she filled out the questionnaires, it was so revealing to see how she hadn't seen an issue on things that I had. She saw me behave like her and thought that was normal! My intense efforts to try and revise (the environment had to be absolutely perfect, including, curiously, Fimo for me to fiddle with - early fiddle toy!) were completely unnoticed. She just saw me excelling in school, because I could focus when I was physically in school (and then collapse after!) Homework, coursework, revision - that's when it all fell down, and my GCSE results - whilst still pretty reasonable - were not a patch on what you would have expected given my classroom performance.

Gosh your school experience sounds so much like mine. I am wondering if when I sort medication I will return to studying. Such a frustration to understand a thing but struggle so much to produce work. But then wonder if I’m too old now.

I will try magnesium, I’m finding I’m getting very crabby when the Elvanse wears off, just in time for kids bedtime! I’m definitely happier taking half a tablet but struggling with sleep so much at the moment I’m not really on it so unsure if that’s because the dose is too low now or if it’s just that I’m sooo tired.

Really interesting thread... my DD diagnosed age 14, having had 3 years of "foggy head" but school resisting assessing anything because she was performing academically... but less well than in year 7

She really finds that Elvanse helps.

I've just started giving her magnesium... especially as she also has anxiety. Any ideas why this works - and how much - and what it does?

Someone told me people with ADHD are low in magnesium... and she definitely has sleep issues, which Im not sure whether they're connected to the Elvanse. She's on a high dose - 70 - but started at 20 and worked up to it gradually. About to see the psychiatrist again so we'll explore a lower dose for weekends - I think she would like that.

So, so true - understanding a thing, but not being able to produce the work! I often think I'd make a fantastic project manager. Studying would have been so much easier with medication back then, sigh.

Magnesium is good for anti-anxiety, and it does help you sleep! It's one of the few supplements that I can genuinely notice a difference with, that I can put down to that one thing.

I believe there is research out there that suggests magnesium levels are reduced by stimulants, so supplementation is needed to get back to normal levels if nothing else. Anecdotally there's a lot out there about it reducing tolerance as well. It's worth looking into.

70 is definitely high! Glad to hear your DD has finally been diagnosed. We're probably going to have to go down the private route ourselves now, as we can't get past the "gatekeepers" on the NHS for DD2 and ADHD due to the criteria for needing to show it in more than one setting. As of course masking doesn't exist

Through some miracle they accepted our referral for DD1 for ASD where that requirement wasn't needed, and so they did the full ADOS. We had some wonderful doctors who really understood how ASD is different in girls, and managed to pull out her behaviours to give us a definite diagnosis. I bet they'd diagnose DD2 with ADHD, but we can't get her in front of them!

Good luck - we went private as we knew the wait would be too long with her gcse''s coming up....expensive but so glad we did.

GOIng to do some more magnesium research....especially how they are reduced by stimulants, and I imagine the higher dose reduces it more?

I suspect getting a private diagnosis is probably the best investment we could make in her education!!

It would make sense if a higher dose of stimulants reduced magnesium more, but I am definitely not an expert! I just find it works :-)