ADHD Meds uncovered other issues, I’m struggling

[Yespresh]

After years if being treated for depression our 27 year old son now has a diagnosis of extreme ADHD thanks to help from someone on this site. He has been on meds for 6 months now. He has lost nearly 5 stone and is using the gym daily. The physical turnaround is remarkable.

He has always been argumentative and wont listen to reason but he now seems worse. He is so stuck in his ways. He lives at home after several attempts to leave but he cant manage alone. This morning I hid behind a door when he came downstairs so I wouldn’t have to speak to him before he went to work.

Is it possible his meds have uncovered another condition and if so what is it likely to be?

He doesn’t socialise unless it is on the internet, has extreme, passionate political views but wont work in politics, is very intelligent, doesn’t care about smart clothes or what he is wearing, will argue the toss over the smallest thing and wont let go and demands apologies for what he deems to be our failures. He is funny, he does understand body language, he will look you in the eye, doesn't have tics.

This makes me think he isn’t autistic but maybe he is?

Is there any professional help out there for me to help understand this does anyone know?

Have you considered ASD? The two conditions are often co-morbid.. The triad of impairment with ASD is around rigidity, social communication and sensory processing.

Have the meds raised his blood pressure and increased anger? I haven't tried them because I know from, er, dabbling, that it will likely happen to me.

I'd be looking at a meds review and bringing up the issues you've highlighted.
However, he is 27 so it may be difficult to get these issues raised.

Maybe email his GP with your concerns?

Tricky.

Good luck.

Thanks for the replies. He doesn’t get angry he just twists things around that you say to him. Difficult to explain but he is hard work.

i will look into ASD thank you.

Is it possible that after years of depression and untreated ADHD the meds are allowing new thoughts/emotions/personality traits through that he's having to adjust to?

Does he have any kind of counselling at all?

Yes, I think that is definitely happening or that his ADHD meds have made another trait appear more prominently. He isn’t currently having counselling as nothing has helped in the past and sadly none of the counsellors he has ever seen have ever mentioned he may not be neuro typical.

As he is an adult no professional will discuss him with us.

Sorry OP, but he needs to live elsewhere. He’s an adult, holding down a job, and making you feel uncomfortable in your own home. You said he can’t manage living on his own, what do you mean by this?

More than half of people with ADHD are also autistic. However it could be that he's angry with his circumstances. Maybe he thinks he deserves a different life (money, house, general success) and is angry at the world that he's stuck at home with his parents. People with ADHD are generally said to be lacking in emotionally maturity, so you should expect maturity levels of about 2/3 of their real age. So that won't help, but rather than the medication unearthing another trait, it could be that he's just having a stage of being an angry young man, doing nothing constructive to change his circumstances and instead hitting out on those closest to him. In which case boundaries and expectations are your friend.

I think there is sort of autism but when I look it up the symptoms are not him.

He can’t live alone as he isnt good with self care and money management. We have tried before. He has just applied for local authority housing but goodness knows if he’ll ever get to the top of the list as a single man with severe ADHD.

I dont know exactly how to articulate this so hope I don't say anything insensitive.

If he was suffering with depression and ADHD untreated as a teen then he wouldn't have had the opportunity to go through all of the emotional development that a teenager does. We know that they can be overly emotional, snappy, prone to unreasonable outbursts.

I wonder if it is a matter of his brain trying to develop the connections and coping mechanisms that he didn't then because now the meds he is on are allowing him to do that.

I would reconsider talking therapies, giving him the opportunity to work through those new feelings and processing abilities.

PDA? A form of autism but quite different to a lot of stereotypical autistic traits.

Go on the Adhd Foundation FB page & have a search through all the other co-morbidities. Adhd doesn't travel alone...

Have a look for a support group nearby too.

And yes, he needs somewhere like supported accommodation to live. You should not be frightened in your own home.

Hi Wombat and all. I am not frightened of him. I am fed up with his twisted truth. He is currently waiting for an apology from me for a perceived injustice. I have apologised and he now says i dont mean it and it doesn’t count!

I have had a look at the co-morbidities but nothing jumps out at me.

Our son remembers every word of every conversation we have. I on the other hand remember very little. There is a constant ‘you said this or you said that’. He analyses conversations in great detail and it’s exhausting.

We support him with a car and he doesn't pay rent. He is working but he usually lasts around 6 months in a job before deciding they are doing everything wrong and he hates the manager and leaves.

He owes around £5k on credit cards which he juggles.

He is Walter Mitty in reverse. He talks about all the things he is going to do but never does any of them.

He did once decide to sell tshirts so he bought 300 to sell on. He sold precisely none of them and as usual it is everyone else’s fault and not his own.

Me again. Been madly Googling. I think he has general social anxiety. Looking at the symptoms he does tick some of these in a major way. He is refusing to visit very good friends for Father’s Day tomorrow even though his Dad has asked him.

My dd was diagnosed with adhd but also asd which I was surprised at because she didn't tick many of the typical boxes when I'd looked into it previously.

It's worth considering.

Sorry forgot to add this is exactly my dd There is a constant ‘you said this or you said that’. He analyses conversations in great detail and it’s exhausting.

I can so relate :-( she also analyses faces - I end up doubting and analysing myself too -"was I like that?" It's always my fault!

Could well be side effects of medicine - can make people intense and blinkered. 5 stone is a lot of weight to lose. He will probably develop a level of tolerance quite soon. I'd look at whether a different medication or dosage might be better then, if he's not willing now.

You could be describing my DS1 who is 23. He had ADHD but often behaves like your DS. He was Dx a few years ago but there's been something going on with him since he was very small really and I have been trying to work out what it is fir ever and wasted lots of time and money!
I think he has ASD with demand avoidant traits. Eye contact avoidance is a red herring, as its atypical eye contact that the issue, sometimes this can be too much eye contact or inappropriate eye contact rather than no eye contact. His brother has an ASD dx and had the typical poor eye contact and so was easily spotted!
When he is under stress he says the most hurtful things and blames us for everything, it's very upsetting and draining.
No easy solutions though unfortunately.

An update. I emailed his GP with my concerns last week. He said he would call DS in for a meds check and chat. This happened last Friday. The GP phoned me an hour later. I suggested a referral for general autism or high functioning autism. GP agreed and GP also managed to get DS to agree that GP can talk to us anout this. We may finally be getting somewhere.